Hockey Stick Graph
United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change

Can We Feed Ourselves?
Photo essay about the challenges the natural world faces as a result of human activity

Career Interviews

Adina Matisoff
talks about her
work in rural China

Juniper Neill
speaks about her work on environmental issues in the US Foreign Service

Kids 4 Offshore Project University of Oldenburg

Energy Kid’s Page Energy Information Administration

Understanding Climate Change United Nations Environment Programme and the Climate Change Secretariat

Asia-Pacific Partnership on Clean Development and Climate International Debate Education Association

World leaders have a big dilemma on their hands. Scientists say the way we use the Earth’s resources to fuel growth and prosperity for the world’s 6.6 billion people is unsustainable. If the situation doesn’t change, they predict we’ll soon have an environmental crisis. But will changing global energy consumption mean halting economic growth for some countries? What will that mean for businesses, employees, and consumers? What can governments do to manage the Earth’s limited resources responsibly and still ensure development for their citizens?

Most countries rely on fossil fuels such as coal, oil and gas to provide the energy that drives their economies—from factory smokestacks to cars and electricity. These fuels emit greenhouse gases, such as carbon dioxide (CO2), that experts believe cause climate change and health problems.

Get the Facts

unsustainable – not able to be maintained or supported in the future, especially without causing damage or depletion of a resource.

fossil fuels – fuels made from the remains of plants and animals that have been exposed to heat and pressure in the earth’s crust for millions of years.  These are hydrocarbons (made of the elements of water and carbon), such as gas, oil, or coal.

non-renewable natural resources – a material found in nature that is necessary or useful to humans and that is not replaceable after it has been used.

developed countries – industrialized countries with high per capital income, education, literacy, life expectancy and standard of living.

developing countries – countries that are poor and their citizens are mostly agricultural workers but they want to become more advanced socially and economically.

bilateral – affecting or undertaken by two sides equally; binding on both parties; a bilateral agreement or negotiation.

clean energy – energy, such as electricity or nuclear power, that does not pollute the atmosphere when used, as opposed to coal and oil, that do.

Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN – an organization of ten countries from Southeast Asia; including Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Vietnam.  It aims to increase economic, social and cultural growth and peace for all its members through cooperation. 

multilateral – participated in by more than two nations, parties, etc.; multilateral agreements.

Kyoto Protocol – an agreement on global climate change reached by the United Nations Conference on Climate Change in Kyoto, Japan, in 1997. The major industrial nations pledged to reduce their emissions of greenhouse gases between 2008 and 2012.

carbon credits – a scheme that provides a way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by giving them a monetary value.  These credits can be exchanged between businesses or traded on the international market.

unilateral – performed or undertaken by only one side; not a mutual decision or agreement.

Asia-Pacific Partnership on Clean Development and Climate – an international non-treaty agreement between Australia, India, Japan, China, South Korea and the United States that began in 2006.  It aims to cooperate on development and transfer of technology that enables reduction of greenhouse gas emissions.

Oil-rich countries, like Ecuador, Angola, and Kazakhstan, benefit from selling their natural resources to high-energy consumers through bilateral agreements. But since there is a limited amount of these resources, countries like India and China often compete for them.  They may pay high prices or go without fuel if the resource-rich country signs an agreement with another country. 

For these reasons, neighboring countries sometimes participate in regional agreements to alleviate competition for energy security. In 2005, the European Union agreed to cut 50% of CO2 emissions by 2050 because they realized they could not afford to compete with each other for bilateral deals with resource-rich countries. To cut emissions they cooperate on setting guidelines to develop clean energy, improve trade with resource-rich countries, and open markets for the sale of alternative energy.

	Photo: Miles Hunter

The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) has had similar cooperation since 1999. They are developing projects that no one country could do by itself, such as a pipeline that distributes gas to all the countries. Unlike the EU, ASEAN does not have mandatory emission cutbacks, nor does it include Asian countries with the most demand for energy. Should Asia set up a formal framework for energy cooperation, like the European Union?

Multilateral agreements such as the Kyoto Protocol provide a worldwide plan to handle these issues through trading carbon credits. Under the Kyoto Protocol, developed countries, like the United States and the European Union countries, are responsible for reducing CO2 emissions and developing cleaner energy for themselves and developing countries. Developing countries, like China, Brazil and India, are encouraged to use cleaner energy, but are given more time before they have to cut emissions. 

Photo: Scott Lowe

Some developed countries, like the United States, prefer unilateral decisions about how much energy to use and where to get it from, but work with other countries on developing clean energy. President Bush said that CO2 emission cuts would hurt the United States’ economy if China and India do not have to cut back also. However, countries like the United Kingdom say this structure gives these countries an opportunity to develop first. Do you think developing countries will have an unfair advantage if they do not have to cut CO2 emissions?

Instead, the United States participates in the Asia-Pacific Partnership on Clean Development and Climate along with five countries in Asia. Together they have initiated over 100 projects to develop cleaner energy, but maintain voluntary emission cuts for both developed and developing countries. Do you think this will be as effective as mandatory emission cuts?

The many disagreements about how to reform energy use are stalling efforts to reduce climate change.  Between 2008 and 2012 world leaders will meet to figure out what to do next. They can choose to address the problems with any combination of approaches, but they have to decide now or else risk further damage to the Earth. What do you think they should do?

Copyright 2007. Author: Adina Matisoff