Building on Al Gore's Roar

By Eban Goodstein of Lake Oswego, Oregon. Eban is a professor of economics and the volunteer executive director of the Green House Network. He is author of Economics and the Environment, and The Trade-off Myth: Fact and Fiction about Jobs and the Environment.

Last fall, some three thousand Oregonians packed the convention center to hear Professor Al Gore deliver an hour and a half seminar on global warming'what it is, what we know about it, and most importantly, what it means for us.

Al got wound up a time or two: his best line was about auto industry objections to the California clean car standards that Governor Kulongoski recently declared Oregon would adopt. In his best stump speech roar, Al said something like: "the folks in Detroit complain that if we adopt these standards then that would mean that 14 years from now, we'd have car standards ALMOST AS TOUGH AS THEY HAVE IN CHINA -- TODAY!" l

About the same time that Al arrived, a group of Oregon economists delivered a first look at the impact of global warming on the state's economy -- with costs likely to be in the billions of dollars. The biggest, and most immediate impact of a few degrees warming, will be a dramatic decrease in Cascade snowpack -- devastating the ski industry, and cutting summer stream flows from 30-60%. Very bad news for farmers, fish, urban water quality, and hydropower production.

Buried in the report were a couple of interesting maps: they showed what would happen if -- as appears increasingly possible -- the planet warms up enough to melt the Greenland and West Antarctic Ice Sheets. The resultant sea level rise of 48 feet would bring the shore of the Pacific Ocean up to 14th Avenue in downtown Portland, along the way, inundating most coastal towns. But no need to panic. If an ice-sheet collapse was initiated, it would take a few centuries for all this real estate to disappear.

What is to be done?

Car standards are a key first step, but as journalist Ross Gelbspan notes, this is only a first step to what ultimately must involve a rapid transition to clean energy sources -- like wind, biofuels, solar power and energy efficiency. This is a revolution that folks at the Apollo project figure can create millions of new jobs.

The huge turn-out for Gore's talk shows that Oregonians are hungry for information -- and action -- to stabilize the climate. And if you want to get involved, the best way is to attend the 'Build the Movement to Stop Global Warming' conference, coming up here in Portland at the end of January. If we can get those 3,000 folks out of their chairs and out walking the precincts, we can build the clean energy majority we will need to end the fossil fuel age, and pass along a decent planet to our kids.