The truth of climate change
I am writing in response to Marc Thiessens’ opinion “Fracking gives US powerful advantages” published September 20th. Marc is thrilled with the strategic dominance the US gained by becoming the world’s largest exporter of natural gas and one of the largest oil exporters. I however contend Marc is shortsighted, and that what he’s happy about is unfortunately another colossal failure by political leaders and the fossil fuel industry to respect the truth of climate change.
Where have you been Marc? Standing in the fumes of fracking operations breathing the leaking methane? You sure haven’t been out West where this years’ fire season created fire tornadoes and the most polluted air on the planet, nor on the Gulf coast where our country is being devastated by hurricanes and flooding.
We need to crank up the courage to speak the truth, otherwise how will the public ever grasp how alarmingly fast we must make the transition to zero-combustion energy … just to give our children a habitable biosphere and a viable future.
We quickly need to reduce carbon emissions substantially to slow climate change and mitigate, by some measure, the chaotic and catastrophic consequences we’ve begun and will continue experiencing.
True leadership would have focused attention upon reducing usage of fossil fuels, rather than drilling for more, and establishing a cleaner, more sustainable future. We need to leave most of the known reserves of oil and natural gas in the ground.
Del Nord
Spokane Valley