Now back to what is pissing me off:
Looks like the EPA is following suit

"White House spokesman Tony Snow said, adding that 'We are doing a better job of reducing emissions' than Europe."

This is what he is basing that on: "The White House said Snow was referring to figures from the International Energy Agency that from 2000 to 2004, U.S. carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuel combustion grew by 1.7 percent, while in the European Union such emissions grew by 5 percent."

Here is an analogy: Gas prices in Lapland are 10 dollars per gallon. While in Elbonia they are only 6 dollars per gallon. Lapland raises their gas prices by 'only' 1.7%, while in Elbonia they have risen a whopping 5%. Can it truly be said that Lapland has done a better job of controlling their gas prices? No! of course not. What a stupid thing to say!

The White house has decided to totally ignore the fact that were are pumping 40% more CO2 into the air than all of the EU! Keep in mind that the EU has over twice the population and a higher GDP. So each person is doing a better job of controlling their energy consumption and the economy doesn't suffer due to CO2 controls.

The right wing nuts will repeat their mantra over and over again. "The economy will be ruined if we start limiting greenhouse gas emissions". They contend that the the economy is so good (is it really?) only because we allow our corporations energy companies to pollute without regard to the effects of CO2.

If this was the case then we would expect to see that the economies of countries that try to take care of their emissions (like those using a carbon trading scheme, and those who signed up for the Kytoto Protocol) to have worse economies than ours. Well this is clearly simply not the case as we will see.

Here is a table I made (from WTO and IMF data) of various countries GDP. I also found the CO2 emissions by country (for as late as only 2003).

GDP



CO2 Emmisions


RATIO


Clearly those countries that have decided to be responsible for their CO2 emissions have not had a bad impact to their economies, even when you take an economic powerhouse like the EU as a whole.

Turns out someone did this exact exercise on Wikipedia. Similar results. The point is: It is a total farce to claim that capping CO2 emissions will hurt the economy. The data is against that argument.

It is clear that we need to start thinking about getting power of alternative sources. I'm all for solar, waves and wind. But I am also all for nuclear. Best yet, lets start getting biodeisel from algae and refining it with this process.

Here is some further discussion of this that I found entertaining.

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