Learning From the Climate Change Crisis

• Author: Jason J. Czarnezki
• Pages: 15-31

CHAP TER TW O

Learning From the Climate Change Crisis

Accordi ng to the Nobel Prize-winn ing Int ergovernmental Panel on Climate

Change (IPCC), “[w]arming of the climate system is unequivocal,” and “most of

the observed increase in global average temperatures since the mid-20th century

is very likely due to the observed increase in anthropogenic [g reenhouse gas]

concentrations.” 1          

   

awareness for environmental problems, and the challenges of drafting effective

environmental policy and legal regimes. Both climate change and the ecological

costs of daily choice derive from diffuse causes, a democratization of pollution,2

whether from many individual sources or many countries. As discussed in sub-

sequent chapters, the same obstacles facing climate change mitigation face any

movement towards everyday environmentalism: (1) the need for awareness and



challenge of determining how best to regulate and legislate against the causes of

these problems.

Part A of this chapter reviews the basic causes and widespread impacts of the



public awareness of the climate change crisis, as well as the challenge of educat-

ing policymakers about effective legal and policy responses. Part B then turns to

the steps that have been considered and taken thus far to address climate change,

ranging from action at the national and international levels down to the regional

and local levels. Part C, in turn, assesses the promise and limitations of law in

addressing mitigation of climate change. Overall, the chapter argues that we must



through increased knowledge and public awareness, by targeting the appropriate

regulatory tools and level of government action, as well as incorporating scien-



failures of past and existing public policy and legislation.

Ultimately, the challenges facing law and policy in regulating greenhouse gases

-

1. IPCC, CLIMATE CHANGE 2007: SYNTHESIS REPORT, Summary for Policymakers, available at http://

www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar4/syr/ar4_syr_spm.pdf.

2. See generally Timothy P. Duane, Environmental Planning and Policy in a Post-Rio World, 7

BERKELEY PLANNING J. 27 (1992).

15

16 EVERYDAY ENVIRONMENTALISM: LAW, NATURE & INDIVIDUAL BEHAVIOR

tal impacts in the aggregate arising from multiple diffuse sources, the need to raise



best regulatory tools for promoting environmentally conscious decision-making.

A. Understanding the Climate Change Crisis

Concerns about global climate change emerged in the 1970s, though as early as

          

dioxide emissions from coal combustion could lead to global warming. Consider-

ing this time-frame and the potentially disastrous consequences of climate change,

the current state of public awareness and political action remain disheartening.

Perhaps this can be attributed in part to the complexity of the science that struggles

to mesh with the rigidity and formalism of le gal rules, as well as the incremental

and seemingly remote nature of many of the environmental impacts of climate

change. At least in the United States, many in the public and political realms still



The Climate Change Problem

The greenhouse effect is a natural process in which greenhouse gases allow sun-

light to enter and prevent heat from leaving the earth’s atmosphere—the process is

essential to keeping the planet’s surface warm. However, the earth now is warming

rapidly due to human activities, especially the burning of fossil fuels, which emit

-



that humanity caused most of the global warming over the last 50 years.

Greenhouse gases include water vapor, carbon dioxide, metha ne, and nitrous

oxide, among others. Water vapor naturally forms in the earth’s atmosphere. Other

greenhouse gases, though, are increasing in the atmosphere due to the burning of

coal, oil and gasoline, and natural gas, as well as deforestation, livestock farming,

wetlands destruction, and fertilization. Since pre-industrial times, greenhouse gas

   3 In the

 

2005.4 As a result, the earth’s surface temperature is 1.4°F warmer now than a

century ago, with most of that increase occurring since 1978.5 As seen in Figure

B, through the year 2009, the warmest years of the past century are 1998, 2002,

2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, and 2009.

3. IPCC, Fourth Assessment Report, Climate Change 2007: Mitigation of Climate Change, Summary

for Policymakers, provides statistics not otherwise cited in this section.

4. U.S. EPA, INVENTORY OF U.S. GREENHOUSE GAS EMISSIONS AND SINKS: 1990-2005 § 2.1 (April

2007), available at http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/emissions/downloads06/07Trends.pdf.

5. NAT’L ACADEMY OF SCIENCES, UNDERSTANDING AND RESPONDING TO CLIMATE CHANGE 2 (2006).