Timing is Everything

Oh, yes, timing is everything. And so here we are just a few short weeks away from the international climate change negotiations in Copenhagen and someone hacks into the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia and steals 1,000 emails and 3,000 documents, generated by U.S. and British climate researchers.

In a statement, the University said the “selective publication of some stolen emails and other papers taken out of context is mischievous and cannot be considered a genuine attempt to engage with this issue in a responsible way.”

This issue is climate change and it’s not going away. It’s getting worse and every moment of delay makes it costlier to deal with its impacts – with cost estimates at $500 billion per year, for every year we wait, according to the International Energy Agency.

Since the Kyoto Protocol, CO2 emissions have increased 6.5 % per year – and the worst case scenarios on global warming impacts are now being surpassed. Everything is happening faster than predicted and at a more serious scale. So if someone has doubted the predictions they were right. The predictions were much too optimistic.

President Obama needs to go to Copenhagen about something a heck of a lot more important than hosting the Olympics. The President needs to tell the world community the U.S. will get accountable for our own carbon footprint, and that we will step up to the plate and lead. Give the world community a target our country will meet, Mr. President. A minimum of 17%. Just do it.