CREDIT: COAL FOSSIL FUEL POWER PLANT SMOKESTACKS EMIT CARBON DIOXIDE POLLUTION BY JZEHNDER ON THINKSTOCK
Though Canada may not be the worst country for emitting CO2, we unfortunately rank close to the highest of CO2 emitters per person at 16.24 metric tons per year (2011); clearly, the time for us to do something about our bad habits is now.

This past summer was hot; hot, dry air helped advance the fires in Fort McMurray, southern Ontario became toasty and Canada’s east coast did not have a drought, though it didn’t look good for a couple of months. Many wells ran dry in southern Nova Scotia. Yarmouth County homeowners, for the first time in over 20 years, had to have water trucked in.

Also, the Atlantic Ocean soaked up the sun; reports about the link between the warming of the Atlantic and super-strong Hurricane Matthew that swept along the North American coast were posted by reputable organizations.

The Huffington Post headlined an article with these words, “Matthew’s strength is yet another climate change indicator”. Newsweek and The Guardian both carried articles telling that major storms, such as Matthew, will “grow in menace as the world warms and sea levels rise, scientists have warned”. Climate change should more accurately be termed “climate destruction”.

Meanwhile the Canadian government has given its approval for the construction of the Kinder Morgan pipeline across B.C. to transport petroleum to the coast. Kinder Morgan itself says that its pipelines already carry 300,000 barrels of oil per day from the Alberta tar sands to Vancouver and Washington State. The company is planning to triple this, and it expects the new pipeline to be completed in 2019.

Canada, it is said, does not contribute substantially to the emissions causing climate change. But then, there are few countries that do. The Union of Concerned Scientists posted that China is the biggest contributor of CO2 emissions at 8,715 metric tons in 2011, with the U. S. a distant second at 5,490 and Canada way back at 552. However, Canada ranks close to the highest of CO2 emitters per person at 16.24 metric tons per year (2011).

Unfortunately many in the country do not seem to feel that it is time to change business as usual. Climate change is upon us, and yet, many of us still believe that the time to arrest the development of the fossil fuel industry is not. So Canada remains one of the “small” contributors, each one doing its bit to encourage climate destruction.

As a result, we will increasingly bear the cost of clean-up and emergency responses as ocean storms, famine, drought, boreal forest fires, flooding, habitat destruction and species extinction increase. They all continue to increase at rates that should alarm us. On the environmental front, there is no good news to celebrate except the occasional story of a recovered river or species brought back from the brink of annihilation.

Somehow we have lost our way. While the global environment continues to degrade, most of us benefit from investment, pension and retirement plans that still profit from the success of fossil fuel companies. And most of us are still too happy to use fossil fuels, resisting the cost and inconvenience of timely and real change.

We have been created to, among other things, steward this world, the only home we will ever have. This is my reading of the opening pages of the Christian Bible. There is always time to recover our path and respond to God’s call to be just stewards of this planet, but the longer we wait, the more difficult it will be.

There may come a day when, yes, there will be dividends in our accounts. But the planet on which we live will no longer be able to provide us with the temperatures, plant life, animals and water that are the true basis for our economies and the quality of life we need.
Editorial opinions or comments expressed in this online edition of Interrobang newspaper reflect the views of the writer and are not those of the Interrobang or the Fanshawe Student Union. The Interrobang is published weekly by the Fanshawe Student Union at 1001 Fanshawe College Blvd., P.O. Box 7005, London, Ontario, N5Y 5R6 and distributed through the Fanshawe College community. Letters to the editor are welcome. All letters are subject to editing and should be emailed. All letters must be accompanied by contact information. Letters can also be submitted online by clicking here.