Re: Canada must set an example for the world Jan. 25, by Elizabeth May.
I share Ms. May’s concern about our federal government’s withdrawl from the Kyoto Protocol. As an international treaty, with years of careful negotiation behind it, the protocol represents the best and most timely opportunity of reducing global greenhouse gas emissions. As Canada has always insisted, all polluters are now onside but we are running out of time.
To avoid runaway global warming, scientists warn that global emissions need to cease rising and begin to fall by 2015. Canada has rejected Kyoto in favour of a Durban deal whereby the legal limits on GHG emissions won’t take effect until 2020, possibly five years too late to avoid a disastrous rise in average world temperatures.
Political and economic expediency is obviously trumping the science of climate change. I join with Elizabeth May in urging our federal government to take its place in playing a constructive role in controlling greenhouse gas emissions.
Our country needs to return to Kyoto and make new binding commitments within its framework.
Sonya Ignatieff
Saanich