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5/8/2007

Government should not ratify Kyoto protocol

Daisuke Inoue

Thesis Statement:

U.S. should not ratify the Kyoto treaty because it is unfair and ineffective treaty, and there is the better solution for the global warming.

The Kyoto Protocol is the international agreement which is negotiated in December 1997 among industrialized nations. The pact will have been ratified by the necessary 55 countries that accounted for at least 55 percent of global emissions in 1990 and they have committed to making substantial reductions in their emissions of greenhouse gases by 2012. (Environmental Literacy Counci, 2007)(Fact) The United States accounted for 36 percent of carbon dioxide emissions in 1990. Ratifying the Kyoto Protocol would require the U.S. to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 5.2% percent below its 1990 levels by 2012. (Japan Times, 2004)(Statistic)

  1. Kyoto Treaty is unfair for U.S. We must pay the enormous costs if they ratify Kyoto protocol. There are economical, attitudinal and physical barriers.
    1. (Economic Barrier) In order to reduce the emission of Carbon Dioxide, U.S. needs to reduce the consumption of the fossil fuels such as oil and coal. Energy is the driving force for the economy, so reducing the energy consumption means decrease of economic activity. Therefore, if U.S .ratifies the Kyoto protocol, then U.S. economy growth will decrease. As a result, there will be fewer jobs available for Americans. Kyoto is, in many ways, unrealistic. Many countries cannot meet their Kyoto targets. The targets themselves were arbitrary and not based upon science. For America, complying with those mandates would have a negative economic impact, with layoffs of workers and price increases for consumers. And when you evaluate all these flaws, most reasonable people will understand that it's not sound public policy. g(George W. Bush, 2001) (Fact)
    2. (Attitudinal Barrier) Americans are required to change the life style. Mass consumption is what defined American for previous century. Being good Americans meant to consume more goods, so such attitude had being contributed more money to be circulated in the economy and increase the size of the American economy. However, Americans need to change the living style and trade off between the environment and the standard of living.
    3. (Physical Barriers) There is not enough technology available for alternative energy source to support the economic activity.
  2. Ratification of Kyoto protocol is ineffective solution for the global warming.
    1. Developing countries such as China and India are not required to reduce the emission of Carbon Dioxide. Even if America ratifies the Kyoto protocol and reduces the emission, the emission of Carbon Dioxide increases in the developing countries. Unless China and India reduce the emission of Carbon Dioxide, U.S. will not ratify the protocol. President Clinton and Al Gore were unsuccessful in getting the signers of Kyoto to include the developing nations. Knowing that the Kyoto Protocol would not be passed without the inclusion of developing countries in some way, Clinton did not even send the Protocol to the U.S. Senate for ratification. Gore now blames Bush for not getting the parties of the Protocol to include developing countries under its mandates. This is an outcome which neither he nor Clinton had been able to accomplish during their eight years of office from 1993 to 2001. How could Bush be expected to succeed where they had failed?( Edward I. Koch, 2004)(Expert Testimony)
    2. It is possible to trade the emission among countries, so U.S. can achieve the goal of reducing the emission while not decreasing the actual emission. The total emission will not change. The talks collapsed when the U.S. and European countries disagreed over the amount of credits that countries could receive from emissions trading and carbon sinks percent below 1990 levels. Industrialized nations could rely on planting forests and other greenhouse gas and carbon-removal methods?rather than on reducing emissions in order to meet their targets. (Unknown)
    3. Carbon Dioxide might not be the cause the global warming. Although 90% of scientists agree, there is the possibility the global warming is attributed to other causes such as changing the activity of sun. Science is not based on the majority rule. Even though most of the scientists believed that the sun rotates around the earth, the truth was that the earth rotates around the sun. What we know is that there is the correlation between the rise of the temperature and the increase of the Carbon Dioxide. Nature is complex system and many things are unknown, so there might be other mechanism which explains the global warming. The National Academy of Sciences said "Greenhouse gases are accumulating in the earth's atmosphere as a result of human activities, causing surface air temperatures and subsurface ocean temperatures to rise," In 2001, after the release of a National Academy of Sciences report on global warming, Bush said the concentration of greenhouse gases has increased because of human activity, but he emphasized that other factors could have influenced warming.(BBC news, 2001)(Example)@Referring to the NAS report, he said, "We do not know how much effect natural fluctuations may have had on warming. The globe is warming. The fundamental debate is, is it man-made or natural -- but put that aside."( Juliet Eilperin, 2004)(Example)
  3. (Counter examples)(points of information) Ratification of Kyoto Protocol slows the speed of the global warming. Industrialized countries were responsible for the global warming, so they need to take responsibility to solve the global warming. U.S is the country which emits the largest amount of Carbon Dioxide in the industrialized nations. Other major industrialized nation such as EU, Japan ratified the treaty. U.S. needs to cooperate. Kyoto protocol includes provisions to permit emissions trading among nations and clean development mechanisms, which encourages industrialized nations to transfer technology to developing countries that would reduce emissions. Bush administration ignored the warming from the scientists.
  4. There is the better solution for the global warming than ratifying the Kyoto protocol.
    1. U.S is developing the technology for clean energy. Bush administration support the research of the new energy source especially fuel cell.
      1. President Bush believes global warming can be better addressed through technology and greater use of renewable energy sources than through caps imposed on businesses and industries. He has pushed for international cooperation to encourage transfer of clean technology to those nations as an alternative to mandatory caps.( Stephen Dinan, 2007) (Fact)
      2. In 2002, President Bush set a national goal to reduce the greenhouse gas intensity of the U.S. economy by 18% by 2012. This goal sets America on a path to slow the growth in greenhouse gas emissions and?as the science justifies and the technology allows?to stop and reverse that growth as needed to meet the the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change(UNFCCC) goal. Our approach focuses on reducing emissions while sustaining the economic growth needed to finance investment in new, clean energy technologies. (Spencer Abraham, 2004)(Expert Testimony)
      3. In his 2003 State of the Union Address, President Bush announced a $1.2 billion Hydrogen Fuel Initiative to reverse America's growing dependence on foreign oil by developing the technology needed for commercially viable hydrogen-powered fuel cells ? a way to power cars, trucks, homes, and businesses that produces no pollution and no greenhouse gases. Through partnerships with the private sector, the President's Hydrogen Fuel Initiative seeks to develop hydrogen, fuel cell, and infrastructure technologies needed to make it practical and cost-effective for large numbers of Americans to choose to use fuel cell vehicles by 2020. The initiative will dramatically improve America's energy security by significantly reducing the need for imported oil. (U.S. Department of Energy, 2006) (Example)
    2. State government imposes the regulation on the private sectors to reduce the emission of the green gas. California state government imposed the regulation to cut the emission of the green gas on the car industry. California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger reached a deal with state Democrats today on legislation that would make the state the first to impose across-the-board strict greenhouse gas emissions cuts on industry, energy plants and businesses -- the same sort of regulations a growing number of national legislators of both parties believe could make their way to Capitol Hill next year. AB32 would generally require California to roll statewide emissions back to 1990 levels by the year 2020, a cut of about 25 percent. "We can now move forward with developing a market-based system that makes California a world leader in the effort to reduce carbon emissions. The success of our system will be an example for other states and nations to follow as the fight against climate change continues. AB 32 strengthens our economyh (Bill Blakemore, 2006)(Fact)

Bibliography

Make a Citation if you want to cite this paper for your paper !!

(EX) Lynch, Tim. "DSN Trials and Tribble-ations Review." Psi Phi: Bradley's Science Fiction Club. 1996. Bradley University. 8 Oct. 1997 .

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