Greenland Is Not Green

There's been quite a lot of talk on global warming lately. I subscribe to National Geographic and the lead article, entitled 'The Big Thaw' on the cover, describes how the ice in different parts of the world is melting more quickly than predicted. While some experts think that sea levels would rise by 1 metre by 2100, others think that a rise of 3 metres is likely if most of Greenland ended up a slush instead of rock-solid ice. Such a rise in sea levels would be freaky for low-lying islands and coastlines. Singapore would be... err, well, sunk. So would be Kiribati and Venice.

Maps would need changing. No more piece of white mass next to Canada with some of lalaland underwater. Oh man.


So what does it all mean? It means that you and me need to stop contributing to global warming and start thinking about the Earth we are going to pass on to our children and their children. We need to start living in the present with the focus on the global future. We need to stop taking bags from supermarkets and scolding the cashiers that give us too many. If everyone used less plastic, less plastic will be made. Remember, plastic doesn't disappear. We need to start pressuring our governments to start taking environmental concerns more seriously. Taking a stand, that's what we need to do.

I am worried about China and Indonesia. With a lot of people to feed, it is hard to put the environment as priority. It's all about food now, money now, build now. But we have to educate. Whatever is done today will impact the future we have together, globally. The haze was the first time Singaporeans really felt the impact of a global climate incident, and I think it made us think about our lives on an international scale. We are not alone, really. So with China and Indonesia and all other major carbon emitters, we need to take some firm stand. We need to tell our government to take a firm stand. The US is finally about to do something about their poor emissions standard (it's about bloody time) after years of pressure from other countries that ratified the Kyoto Protocol. We need to tell Brazil to stop selling off the Amazon because it helps recycle a huge percentage of world's carbon output. It's shrinking like nobody's business. (Why don't we declare war on Brazil if it fails to do that? Would we? It affects us (and future us) all, much more than the stupid Iraq war).

Buzzword - carbon footprint. And here. And this - carbon emission per capita by country. SG is ranked 25. China is at 99th place but you have to factor in the 1.2 billion people there.

Goodness, we're screwed.