Failing to address climate change hurts the poor
Martin Hertzberg’s Aug. 9 letter (“Costly Carbon Control Promotes Inequality”) compounds the economic inaccuracies of Morgan O’Brien’s Forum piece (“Let’s Innovate Rather Than Bicker,” Aug. 7) by supporting it with incorrect science.
Contrary to Mr. Hertzberg’s claim, atmospheric convection cannot cool the Earth because the Earth is surrounded by a vacuum. Atmospheric convection can only redistribute the energy, equalizing the temperature without changing the average temperature.
As has been known for more than a century, radiative heating from the sun and emission from the Earth are the dominant factors determining the Earth’s temperature. Infrared emission from the Earth is reduced by the infrared absorption of atmospheric gases, collectively known as the greenhouse effect. Without the greenhouse effect, the average surface temperature of the Earth would be over 55 degrees Fahrenheit cooler. The increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide over the past century is further increasing temperatures in a dangerous way.
I agree with Mr. O’Brien that addressing this problem requires innovation without increasing income inequality. However, assessing a carbon fee to externalize the environmental costs does not increase income inequality, as Mr. O’Brien asserts without evidence. The Household Impact Assessment by the Citizens’ Climate Lobby shows a net benefit for lower-income households when the carbon fee is linked to a per person dividend. The dividend helps the poor more because they have a below-average energy footprint.
Unlike regulation, a carbon fee and dividend also enable energy innovation without trying to pick a winner based on debatable industry estimates. Lest we forget, failing to address climate change also disproportionately affects the poor due to severe weather impacts on poor neighborhoods. CLAUS D. MAKOWKA
Shadyside concoction of EPA bureaucrats and environmental propagandists”? It is easier to call names — fourth-grade stuff! — than to refute facts. The science is supported by more than 2,000 hardworking scientists from 154 countries.
“CO2 is ... an essential ingredient in the Earth’s ecosystem”? So what? Sugar is an essential ingredient in the bloodstream, but too much is a problem.
“There is not one iota of reliable evidence that it has any effect on weather or climate”? Just plain, damnably false. See references above.
Passing a college course, even in a science subject, does not guarantee ability to analyze facts, separated from emotions, wishful thinking and personal ego. Greenhouse gas chemistry was well understood many decades ago — but quickly became a political football. This is sad, as climate change can ultimately create more problems — mass migrations of hungry desperate people, for instance — than the inconvenience associated with accepting that we have a problem and need to figure out how to deal with it. RICHARD MYERS
Richland
Regarding “Ridge, Hayden, Other GOP Leaders Sign Letter Saying Trump Unfit” (Aug. 8): While most of the co-signers strike me as career professionals rather than career politicians (not that party affiliation never influenced decisions),
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they were all complicit in creating a party (through a deaf, dumb and blind method of operation) that brought Donald Trump to the top of the ticket.
Only now do they regret their actions and the results of their own silence since the Republican revolution of ’94.
While I applaud the signers for their efforts, each and every one brought this day upon themselves. They all had a hand (unwittingly?) in the creation of this Frankenstein at which they shake torches and pitchforks. In one way, shape or form, the co-signers of the letter helped embolden and broaden the “Archie Bunker” constituencies of both parties as well as the unaffiliated.
While the letter was factual, and well-written, they failed to include an apology for what they helped bring about with their own actions and decades of assisted development. THOMAS FULLARD
North Huntingdon