U.S. Not Doing Enough to Protect Coral Reefs

[cdiver2]

Oh, come on - that statement is one of the worst examples of one sided, non-factual rhetoric I've seen in a long time.

The USA "is the World's biggest/worse polluter?" BS. Absolute BS.

Take a look around!

Does the USA have a broken nuclear reactor leaking radiation to the world? Does the USA have air you can barely breath over it's major cities? Does the USA have entire sea's that have been killed off from industrial pollution? Is the USA still testing nuclear weapons?

Is the USA curbing greenhouse gases exclusively due to Kyoto? No, it's not - but oh, wait a minute - neither is India, China or Russia. Oh well - ignore them, let's beat up on the USA. After all, that's far more fashionable, right?

Junk Science. [/QUOTE

Does the USA have air you can barely breath over it's major cities. LA has to be the worst in the world

 

[chrisch]

Boogie. Sorry - you are in Canada not US - you are correct your govt. did sign. I re-phrase "the US should have signed". I am not sure about Canada - lots of space and not that many people..
If we are going to get down to facts the per capita pollution is the highest from the USA. I cannot remember offhand if the total output from any one country has beaten the US, but it may have, so if that is your argument I will accept my wording could be improved.
The long and short of it is undiminished though:- it does affect us all. The fishing industry is global in nature, with us Europeans being one of the worst offenders in terms of bad management and overfishing.
I wonder if we will beat it or it will beat us??
Chris

 

[Boogie711]

Does the USA have air you can barely breath over it's major cities. LA has to be the worst in the world

Not even remotely close. Is the air quality over Los Angeles bad? Yes it is.

Is it worse than Bangladesh? Not hardly.
Athens? Laughably not.
Mexico City? Very laughably not.
Beijing? Jakarta?

Check your facts.

People like to bash the US for being a major polluter. First off, the major threat to the reefs isn't GHG emissions, but dumped wastes. Perhaps the US releases more GHG's than anyone else, but that's not an indication of pollution. It's an indication of industrial activity. Check on China in 10 years... or India or Russia or Pakistan or any major player. They'll be far worse.

It's fashionable to bash the US. But - the fact is, the air quality over major US cities is better now than it was 20 years ago. The Great Lakes are cleaner than they were 50 years ago!

 

[MikeFerrara]

The fact is, the air quality over major US cities is better now than it was 20 years ago. The Great Lakes are cleaner than they were 50 years ago!

The same is true for many of our rivers that were almost dead 30+ years ago but have fish in them again.

 

[chrisch]

If we are drawing a distinction between greenhouse gasses and pollution there is some truth to the postings. I consider greenhouse gasses to be pollution however. They (GHG) are also a severe threat to reefs and marine ecosystems as the rise in sea level and rise in water temperatures are killers.
In terms of air/water quality it is true the industrial nations, notably North America, have cleaned up from the dreadful mess of years gone by. This is good and should be recognised. It is not saving the planet by a long way. Climate change driven by greenhouse gasses will be the thing that threatens our existance. The main culprit for that is the USA. Sorry if this fact is inconvenient.
The US really does have some environmental successes to shout about, but they will come to nothing if the planet warms up a couple of degrees...
The sad thing, as has been pointed out, is that the developing countries (not covered by Kyoto) are undoing the things the US and Europe have got right. Poor air quality is a problem of developing countries and is driven by cheap production that is then imported by the developed nations who are busy patting themselves on the back that they are fighting pollution.
God help your grandchildren.. wherever they live.
Chris

 

[archman]

As I recall, the major flaws of Kyoto were:

1. The rules were too drastic.
2. Many important countries were not included.
3. Less industrialized countries were given polluting "breaks" over industrialized ones.

#3 is what I hear as the most popular among U.S. policy statements. Industrialized countries felt it was unfair that the burden of cost and cleanup (even after accounting for industrial capacities) went to them, while countries on their way "up" the industrial ladder got away nearly scot-free. These up-and-comers were regarded as one of the important participants for environmental regulation, as their infrastructure could be most easily modified and "fixed" ahead of time.

#1 of course is the real reason why the U.S. didn't sign Kyoto. But that's the practical nature of legislation. Few congressmen in their right mind would've signed onto that thing, unless they didn't expect to get re-elected. Kyoto was simply TOO MUCH.

 

[MikeFerrara]

Are we assuming that GHG is the leading cause of reef degradation? Since the earths climate wasn't a constant even before people I'm not even convinced that the case for GHG being the cause of global warming is all that strong.

I don't have numbers but I'm not convinced. Not when the mangroves are being torn out and resorts dump waste directly into the sea and ships (and boats) spew fuel all over the place.

In the case of shorelines being altered and wast being pumped in, these are things that can be stopped totally and immediately. That seems to be the place to start.

The same is true for fishing with poison or explosives, tearing the reefs out for building material and kicking it with our feet and dragging anchors over it.

 

[simbrooks]

The arguement that GHG=Global Warming is partially true, they certainly arent helping, but with the idea of a geological time scale there is a chance that "part" of the warming is possibly due to us being in that part of the cycle of warming and cooling - but that is pretty much all theory anyway as not many people where around back then. Like i said GHG probably arent helping the environment, nor is deforestation.

As for energy in the US, gas (even with the current price rises) is still rediculously cheap (around here about $1.75-1.80 per gallon) and home electric is also pretty cheap (cant recall exactly), but they are far lower than i paid in the UK (due to high taxes) and that made me turn things off when i had used them or not drive as far. The luxuries over here about that do make people more wasteful of energy - i see it thousands of times every day. Another example is that a 747 flying across the Atlantic uses the equivalent fuel per passenger as that passenger driving 18.000 miles per year - in just one flight! That sometimes makes me wonder about taking the flight back to see my family sometimes. The solution, we all know them for saving energy, reusing, recycling, and waste minisation, but there need to be policies put in place to give incentives before joe public actually starts to really try to help out where they can - or businesses to do their part for that matter. At work here we have about 100 employee's we produce tons of paper waste every week, but only have a little wheelie bin to put it in - once that is full (a lot of the time as the people who collect it can be bothered to empty it) the rest of the paper goes in the skip. I am not saying that things arent being done at all, but so much more could be done with very little extra effort or cost. Now a nice global swing in ideas would be nice, but that is not going to happen as Mike said as they wont settle down and stop trying to kill each other.

With regard to the Kyoto, maybe it was harsh, it should have included the other countries and the costs should have been the same (no subsidies/letoffs) for all countries and they should have to pay for what they allow to get out there and pollute the world, but the agreement was a farce - if it were more consistent and had a good time line of improvements then it should be the country's responsibility to sign it for the sake of future generations. The US, as well as many other countries have only just started waking up in the last generation or two (at most) to what damage has been done to the world by the boom of industry, and even though the current agreements/policies arent great, they should be improved upon to clean up the mess that is out there - it isnt going to happen overnight, but if steady progress is made with policies, incentives and programs put in place it should be possible.

BTW, i am an geological/environmental engineer by trade. I have internal conflicts about working for a company that seems to help our clients just squeeze through the guidelines rather than making sure they are doing a good job - that really irks me and i would love to do something about it, but it doesnt make economic sense and you can only reason with these polluters so much before you dont have a client at all. I am sitting way down on the totem pole in the company, one day i might start ascending somewhat, but that wont help - if the environmentally sound options are made to look good to our clients, our job would be so much easier and this internal wrangling would also decrease!

With regard to the initial thought on damage to coral reefs, i havent been diving them long enough to know about how they have changed. One country i always thought had more control/care about their reefs was Australia, am i wrong on that one?

 

[cdiver2]

Not even remotely close. Is the air quality over Los Angeles bad? Yes it is.

Is it worse than Bangladesh? Not hardly.
Athens? Laughably not.
Mexico City? Very laughably not.
Beijing? Jakarta?

Check your facts.

People like to bash the US for being a major polluter. First off, the major threat to the reefs isn't GHG emissions, but dumped wastes. Perhaps the US releases more GHG's than anyone else, but that's not an indication of pollution. It's an indication of industrial activity. Check on China in 10 years... or India or Russia or Pakistan or any major player. They'll be far worse.

It's fashionable to bash the US. But - the fact is, the air quality over major US cities is better now than it was 20 years ago. The Great Lakes are cleaner than they were 50 years ago!

I take it from this post you have the facts........ then present them then we can all see that we are wrong.

GHG not a threat WHAT ? . What planet do you live on ?.
I take it from that statment you have not heard of the greenhouse effect and what it is doing to the planet as a whole. Thats Ok the next few posts after yours will explain it.

US releases more GHG than eneyone else, thank you. The more industrial activity = more industrial waste a bit like 2+2=4 or it did when I was at school.

Air quality is better now over major US cities than it was twenty years ago. So is the air over most other citys around the world but that does not alter the fact that pollution is stll winning the race.

Check China, India, Russia or Pakistan OK one of the things we can do is stop sending work to the countrys that do not conform to pollution standards. But that will never happen why to much money to be made.
Your analogy China, Russia etc etc is like saying if I dont put a gum wraper in the trash then why should I. Because its the right thing to do.

 

[Boogie711]

I take it from this post you have the facts........ then present them then we can all see that we are wrong.

GHG not a threat WHAT ? . What planet do you live on ?.
I take it from that statment you have not heard of the greenhouse effect and what it is doing to the planet as a whole. Thats Ok the next few posts after yours will explain it.

US releases more GHG than eneyone else, thank you. The more industrial activity = more industrial waste a bit like 2+2=4 or it did when I was at school.

Air quality is better now over major US cities than it was twenty years ago. So is the air over most other citys around the world but that does not alter the fact that pollution is stll winning the race.

Check China, India, Russia or Pakistan OK one of the things we can do is stop sending work to the countrys that do not conform to pollution standards. But that will never happen why to much money to be made.
Your analogy China, Russia etc etc is like saying if I dont put a gum wraper in the trash then why should I. Because its the right thing to do.

CDiver - read my post. I didn't say GHG's are not a threat. I said it's not THE major threat, which is dumped wastes.

Oh, and furthermore, I'm acutely familiar with the so called greenhouse effect. And much like Mike Ferrara so eloquently pointed out in post #27, I'm still not convinced that GHG's would be considered a threat in terms of overall reef health. Mitigating factor, maybe. Threat - I wouldn't go that far.

Try reading a little more carefully before you fly off the handle next time. Apology accepted in advance.