Getting Old with Climate Change

I am so delighted when I see examples of people changing their attitudes and doing something about it – for example, buying locally or using an allotment.

I am often surprised, despite my age, by the amount of cynicism and “no can do” attitude of many when it comes to global warming. So many vested interests are using the credit crunch as an excuse for doing nothing.

Although climate change is a big threat to humanity – doing something about it will cost us little. Remember the Stern report said (not exactly written by a hard boiled greenie with a hairshirt on) it would cost around 1% of GDP – a penny in the pound is not much for long term security.

Let’s compare that cost with the impact of the credit crunch. The current estimates are the credit crunch alone will reduce our fiscal balances 8% of GDP this year – much bigger than the cost of climate change.

But these problems are dwarfed by the problem of our ageing population. The human race is ageing so fast that the cost of the extra health care and pensions to the smaller working population is estimated to grow to ten times that of the credit crunch which itself is far greater an economic cost than climate change.

So why so much negativity towards doing something about climate change? Why the absurd idea that it is going to be tough to do something about it?

Contraction and convergence based on a green tax as a last resort will get us to meet our targets 80% reduction target by 2050. And the beauty is most of us would not even notice any pain.