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Defenders Magazine
Defenders View: The Changing Climate For Global Warming
What a difference a few months make for conservation. Last fall, an anti-environmentalist Congress was stonewalling action on global warming and the Bush administration was doing its best to avoid acknowledging the crisis, much less address it.
This year, President Bush finally admitted—in his State of the Union speech, no less—that global warming is a problem and must be addressed. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is considering listing the polar bear as “threatened” under the Endangered Species Act because the bear's habitat is literally melting before our eyes. A new Congress is moving rapidly on several fronts to tackle the causes of the problem. And former vice president Al Gore, who sounded the alarm about climate change more than two decades ago, has won an Academy Award for his stirring film on the issue, An Inconvenient Truth.
These are all heartening developments—particularly the high priority that leaders in the 110th Congress are placing on tackling global warming. Among several bills introduced in Congress, two stand out: the Global Warming Pollution Reduction Act in the Senate, and the Safe Climate Act in the House. The former, authored by Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), would cut global warming pollution and boost renewable energy. The latter, authored by Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.), would also reduce global warming emissions, setting a target of an 80 percent reduction from 1990 levels by 2050.
The bills circulating on the Hill, while extremely important and necessary, need to be complemented with other measures. The bills tackle the difficult problem of curbing the pollution that causes global warming—but they don't address the inevitable near-term impacts of warming on wildlife and habitat. The sad truth is that even if we dramatically reduce global warming pollution today, the climate will continue to heat up for decades. And while that is happening, many creatures and the places they call home will feel the squeeze.
As our executive vice president, Jamie Rappaport Clark, noted in testimony before a Senate panel in February, as the Earth warms, habitats shift. These shifts may spell extinction for some species, starting with those that depend on the ice pack in the Arctic, where temperatures are rising faster than other parts of the world.
Take the polar bear, for example. As a report issued by Defenders in December points out, the bears' sea-ice habitat is rapidly melting away and could be completely gone by 2040. In the meantime, more bear cubs are dying, populations are falling and remaining bears are turning to cannibalism to survive.
To address these challenges, Defenders' wildlife experts are meeting with legislators and testifying at hearings to keep wildlife issues front and center on Capitol Hill. We're working to inform the public about the problem, both through public service announcements and a series of monthly reports on the impact of global warming on Arctic species such as the polar bear. (You'll find the reports, announcements and other information on our special Web page, www.defenders.org/globalwarming.)
We are also gathering some of the best minds on this issue at a special symposium in Washington, D.C. on September 27. The symposium will review the impact of global warming on wildlife and consider options to reduce the resulting threats. The symposium will develop policy responses to ensure that as many wildlife populations as possible will survive the coming “bottleneck” of global warming impacts over the next century. We've invited experts in the fields of climate change, wildlife conservation, law, government and citizen advocacy to present and discuss their findings, views and recommendations—with the goal of framing a blueprint for action.
Through our symposium and our many other initiatives, we intend to harness and direct the energy around this issue to produce meaningful action. With the changing political climate both in Washington and nationwide, the problem of global warming is finally attracting the serious attention it deserves. There are huge obstacles remaining—as a significant number of global warming naysayers still occupy seats in Congress, and the Bush administration still holds veto power over any legislation. But with your help and support, I'm optimistic that we can at last begin the urgent task of tackling global warming and the problem it portends for America's cherished wildlife.
Rodger Schlickeisen is the president of Defenders of Wildlife. To send him an e-mail, write Rodger@Defenders.org.
