Whenever an environmental issue is presented as desperate, in demand of immediate public attention and firm governmental intervention, advocates demand everything is on the table to solve it.
“Climate Change” has been presented in just this manner. Proponents block traffic, have demanded it be declared a public-health emergency, and, in general, have tried to force the issue on a reluctant public, most of which, are simply going about the business of living their lives.
But in demanding everyone else put everything they depend on for existence on the line, are the climate-change activists willing to give a little in exchange? Particularly where their climate-change issue butts up against an icon of their environmental worship?
Methane as a greenhouse gas is approximately 30 times more efficient in retaining heat in the atmosphere than carbon dioxide. Methane is the reason climate activists are calling for the elimination of the raising of bovine and many other agricultural activities.
Of particular interest, but little known publicly, methane is also the reason there have been calls in the environmental community for the banning of farming rice, an action that would likely lead to mass starvation. This point is of particular interest because, on a global basis, this is an admission of what some scientists already know: Wetlands produce the majority of naturally sourced methane.
In making the distinction that rice is cultivated by humans in man-made wetlands, activists tacitly acknowledge natural wetland methane production is the 800-pound climate-change gorilla in the room that everyone is trying to ignore.
I realize the scientific community would like to use their high-trust position to alter the reality in regard to this. First, they will tell you this isn’t really a problem because natural wetlands provide other environmental functions, like water-quality benefits and the food energy necessary to drive the marine estuarine ecosystem food chain.
Then they spin the ability of wetlands to sequester, or store carbon, as another factor that excuses any negative impacts. Most amusing is when, in desperation, they spin the idea we need take immediate action to halt global warming because the additional atmospheric heat just makes the wetland’s methane operation more productive. This is eerily similar to
the complicit parent who insists on giving little Johnny or little Suzy anything they want in order to avert a violent temper tantrum.
For nearly a generation now, official state policy has been to protect wetlands. Wetland policy has managed to age very well, primarily because government has carefully managed the media image and dialog, controlling the “science” by selectively funding what is, and what is not, studied.
Wetlands have been protected by an aggressive regulatory framework, particularly in eastern North Carolina, at great public expense and personal inconvenience, that has had far-ranging social consequences.
It’s not the public’s fault that now, with the urgency of abating climate change, the scientific community finds themselves on the horns of a dilemma, having painted themselves into a corner. However, the incestual relationship between the government and the scientific
community stands in conflict with the public trust and obligates the government to prop up any conflicting public-policies such as this.
So the question is: Are we going to be all in on climate change, or are we all in on wetland restoration and creation? The scientific community, the government regulators, and the environmental fanatics shouldn’t be allowed to have it both ways.