It's time for U.S. action on global warming

The Bush administration would like to throw cold water on the idea of doing anything substantive about global warming. But the heat should be on the president until the United States limits emissions of greenhouse gases.

The administration wants to substitute research for policy. In scientific matters, more study consistently yields more knowledge. There's nothing wrong with putting more money into climatological research, if the taxpayers can afford it. But it's a make-believe view to suggest the scientific consensus is anything but clear. As far as serious policy-making goes, an abundance of evidence already demands the kind of concerted actions President Bush wants to avoid.

A new study of available research has documented that global warming already is changing natural systems. In a report for the Pew Center on Global Climate Change, two scientists said warmer temperatures are affecting plants, animals and natural rhythms across the country. The range of a butterfly species, the sachem skipper, has shifted 420 miles north from California into central Washington. Along the Pacific Coast, U.S. fish species are moving farther north. Nationally, precipitation levels have increased up to 10 percent.

Worse is in store, as previous Post-Intelligencer reports have shown. Along much of Washington's coast, steep terrain will limit the problems caused by rising sea levels. Even so, some lower-lying areas, including Olympia, could face bigger problems, just as Florida will. Hotter summers are predicted to cause more forest fires. And some ski resorts, heeding scientific predictions of reduced snow packs, have long pushed for measures against global warming.

West Coast and Northeastern states have initiated their own efforts to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases, which contribute significantly to global warming. Regional programs can have limited value, especially in reducing public frustration over the failure to confront the increasingly obvious problems.

The United States must be at least a part of the solution to the problem it does more than any other country to create. Fresh from an election victory, the administration may well think it can engage in four more years of calls for better science and voluntary "action." When a Scripps Howard News Service reporter asked White House science adviser John Marburger about the possibility of regulating greenhouse emissions, he said, "Not in this administration."

The swagger in the White House walk will face the persistence of Sen. John McCain. Last week, the Arizona Republican and Sen. Joe Lieberman, D-Conn., responded to the release of another report, on dramatic warming in the Arctic, with more calls for passage of their bill for reducing global-warming gases.

Most other economic powers have decided to join the Kyoto agreement on climate change. With each major scientific study, the need to limit global warming becomes more obvious. Domestically and internationally, pressure should force action by Congress and a president who came into office promising to regulate carbon dioxide emissions.

On the Net: www.pewclimate.org

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