The record for the world’s hottest day tumbled twice this week when Monday’s global average surface air temperature reached 17.15C, breaking the record of 17.09C set on Sunday.
I link this disturbing news to a May Science Daily report that “today’s rate of atmospheric carbon dioxide increase is 10 times faster than at any other point in the past 50,000 years”.
Scientific graphs show that CO2 and world temperatures rise and fall together. Although less prominent, methane and other agriculture greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions contribute.
Your July 19 article in which East Coast MP Dana Kirkpatrick responded to criticism of the Government’s draft emissions plan had her promising: “The Government will work hard to address climate issues and emissions, we just have a different approach to it”; the plan “showed the Government could grow the economy and deliver on the country’s climate change commitments”; “We still have plenty of work to do to reduce emissions and deliver on climate change. We are committed to meeting our emissions budgets and climate change targets, including net zero by 2050,” she said.
How can that be true when her Government has announced its intention to repeal Labour’s ban on new gas and oil exploration (beyond onshore Taranaki)? Plus, National wishes to keep agriculture out of the Emissions Trading Scheme, and its Fast-track Approvals Bill will allow three ministers – Chris Bishop, Shane Jones and Simeon Brown – to approve projects that have previously been stopped by the courts because of their environmental impact.
Please stop pretending our small country’s emissions make no difference. On a per-person basis, NZ/Aotearoa remains the 4th or 5th highest GHG emitter in the OECD.
Our local MP misleads us – the Government is not working hard to address climate issues and emissions. It is doing the opposite. The many thousands of people demonstrating against the fast-track bill show that.
Bill McGuire may be right. As this week’s temperatures indicate, our world may be locked on course to become a hothouse of our own making.
The way to prove McGuire’s Hothouse Earth theory wrong is to reduce our emissions as soon as possible.
Bob Hughes