The presupposition that the US has to take the lead reveals that the writer holds non-western cultures like the Chinese, or Indians, to be devoid of the rationality or reason to solve complex problems. Or....and this is worse - and I think shown quite often among certain writers and social commentators - they

Apart from Brazil - which due to its European heritage no doubt has people that care about gaseous emissions into the atmosphere and how that might affect future generations - the worst polluters in the world apart from the US - although the US is at least willing to take concrete steps to try to reduce emissions - the other two have point blank stated they want no part of it. Worse still, given the nature of their cultural values, namely that they have no goodwill towards those outside of their immediate tribe (India has a medieval caste system in particular) their own people do not care about pollution in the way that westerners do.

And before you criticise this argument by saying they are poor, they are not. India and China are very wealthy countries, with middle-classes larger than that of the US. The problem is with all non-western cultures, is that they do not distribute their wealth to the poor.

Corruption is rife, so programs to install plumbing and drainage systems in neighbourhoods just gets stolen by local councils, and the poor people get no recompense.

Utterly devoid of humanity, such cultures need to be forced into adopting whatever measures the civilised west decides.

I wonder what it would take to show fools like this woman what they are suggesting.

Perhaps we should require a modest level of math be acquired before anyone can become an academic.

Without the wealth that can only be generated by fossil fuels, now, & for the foreseeable future, the world could not afford the tens of thousands of academics, like her, who sit on their buts, in some ivory tower, & write this garbage.

Yes, we might all be better off without that wealth, if it meant these twits were put to work doing something useful, it would do her, & my heart good.

The article is quite right in suggesting that universal action is required to really do anything about emission reduction, but then does not take the obvious step of declaring effective action to be impossible.
Even if there was much less doubt about IPCC attempts to forecast the state of an extremely complex natural system decades into the future and the cost-benefit calculations could be made to add up, the political will would still not be there.
If you consider emissions to be a problem and believe the IPCC projections then start buying sun block for your grand children.

Sustainable economies have to arise from the current quagmire of vested interests, corrupt governments and historical wealth enclaves now in existence. Chances are it will happen in Asia, as this is where the expertise is being developed and the culture embraces improvement rather than protectionism.
New technology is unwelcome in Australia as it impinges on the rent seeking traditional industries. The Skunkworks concept of "plan to fail 80% of the time" is totally lost on the bean counter and lawyer set. (BTW: The 20% that do not fail more than pay for the 80% that do. The point is real innovation and progress, new industries and game changers.) Scientists and engineers in the West are hounded by Bankers, Lawyers and other economic parasites so that even when game changers are found they are not supported and inevitably die a death of parked patents, legal attack (ah la Microsoft, IBM) or just financial starvation. (The recent gas Fuel Cell is a good eg.)
Hasbeen: Are you really sure that only oil and gas can provide for now and "foreseeable future"? Can you not acknowledge that you might be unaware of some cutting edge tech? Given that large scale solar thermal systems using mirrors, molten salts and steam turbines can get pretty close to coal per Kilowatt, I'd be shocked if there were not many more. So long as oil and gas are priced without all the costs included (tax exemptions and other special treatment makes them seem more viable than the actually are) then it will be hard to compare apples with apples.
Energy is more a cultural problem: One of entrenched interests, lack of transparency and exploitation of nations by other nations. So long as the US is hypocritical, war based, and at the mercy of religious ignorance it will continue the bankrupting battle for other peoples' energy. Australia will probably import Chinese clean energy systems. :-(

That's the first time I've heard China and India described as 'utterly devoid of humanity'.

Alternative energy will only come on line when it is economical and practical to do so. Its the inefficiencies of such energies which stop their progress not the ill will of oil barons.

Solar,wind power etc are expensive and far less efficient than oil and coal. We can't afford them as yet and the now discredited Global Warming fears have put them back a step further.

We all want energy efficiency and low pollution but the writer seems to think that Obama can wave a magic wand and these new energies will suddenly become economically feasible.

The Carbon Tax is simply a false way to make alternative energies seem more efficient by making more efficient energies more expensive than they need to be.

Well Ozandy, there is nuclear, which can supply all our domestic, & most of our industrial power requirements, but mate, if any of those other pie in the sky schemes worked, companies after a buck would be exploiting them now, not asking for tax payer hand outs to use them.

That, or someone would be patenting their "discovery" & screaming how good it was. Haven't you noticed they do that, long before their stuff is commercial, then the idea sinks quietly, without trace when looked at seriously.

For transport fuels, there is no prospect, other than the now very efficient turbo diesel development, that makes hybrids look like technology from the arc. The current battery technology is all ready mature technology, & will go no further. A new method of bottling power will be found, but not where every one is looking right now.

Modern diesels will cut our road, & farm fuel consumption by half, as it spreads, but thast's about it for now.

Dear Hasbeen,
I agree with you totally. There are no free feeds and if you are getting one someone is paying. Polliticians and academics live in a make believe world of pork barrels and free rides where the tax payer picks up the tab and sadly the left is more out of touch with the real world where you are forced to live within your means. It would be nice to live in a world without pollution but not possible as our imagination has not been stretched there yet for necessity is the mother of invention.

Your article implies the presumption that a politician, Obama, or few of them, can stop the decaying processes of this planet.

No! No one can.

Even if anyone had the insight to produce a formula as universal as that of Christ, “Love to prevail over War”, would get us anywhere.

We have already gone through the inanity of a church with his name.

However, if we wish to know how we got where we are, I suggest we start from Constantine the Great.

He was the one who gave the ‘Temporal Power to the Popes of Rome, and the dears made good use of it.

They just burned anyone with a thinking brain.

Sad they did not burn the scientists!

If they had, we would not have any thinking brains to write about.

The reality Miss Florini is that we forgot to dig into our history and now we hope in one who, with a magic wand, will save us all

Dear Skeptic,
Obviously you havn't thought very deeply on the words of Christ else you would know magic wands come from the twister of Gods word. All God gave was his word and man chose to believe the twisters tale. Jesus said that we need to have a change of heart to see the Kingdom of God, for as man thinks in his heart so he is. The brain controls the electrical circuit for the body function. The attitude of the heart controls how we think. Pride is the problem and it entered the human race long before Constantine. There is no magic wand and if you want the power in your life you have to connect with Jesus. He said My word is Spirit and is life to them that find it. Unless you believe [his word} and are baptized you don't receive the Holy Spirit who teaches the believers the truth. If the Spirit and the word are not one then you have the twisters tale and not the Truth.

Why from Constantine?

That Emperor put at the disposal of the Popes or Rome a State, that is, a bureaucratic structure with an army and a police force, (Temporal Power) that they used to force people to submit to their dictates, forgetting Christ’s message.

They exterminated Heretics, persecuted Jews, humiliated women, waged wars against peoples with different systems of belief or racial origins, practiced Slavism and persecuted anyone they disliked; Calvin, Luther, Bruno…etch.

Waged wars against any potential movements that could dispute their spiritual and temporal dominance; Muslims, Lutherans Calvinist… etch.

The viciousness of their regime surpassed that of the ones instituted by the most notorious of dictators;

In conclusion:”The State as ‘bureaucratic structure for the administration of our Planet’s wealth cannot but disregard the most fundamental of Human aspirations: Justice.

Wars made the States and the States, under any political system can only make wars.

To prevent that war which can wipe all life on this planet we have to eliminate privilege and injustice.

Leaders of any kind are dangerous, as they cannot but morph into dictators.

For some reason the author and many greens don't seem to understand that it's not more sustainable to do things at a loss, it's less.

When you do something at a loss, you don't use less resources, you use more.