{"id":1024,"date":"2014-05-05T12:25:00","date_gmt":"2014-05-05T16:25:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nypirg.org\/capitolperspective\/?p=1024"},"modified":"2015-05-12T06:46:01","modified_gmt":"2015-05-12T10:46:01","slug":"environmentalists-advance-nys-earth-day-agenda","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nypirg.org\/capitolperspective\/environmentalists-advance-nys-earth-day-agenda\/","title":{"rendered":"Environmentalists Advance NY\u2019s Earth Day Agenda"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>As Albany begins its post-budget agenda, it is remarkable how little the governor and state lawmakers discuss environmental issues.\u00a0 There are the occasional news releases \u2013 lip service really \u2013 about green initiatives, but little about policies that seek to reduce the pollution.<\/p>\n<p>There are big environmental issues that need to be addressed \u2013 most notably climate change.<\/p>\n<p>According to NASA, last year was tied with 2009 and 2006 for the seventh warmest year since 1880. \u00a0And the trend in the average global temperature has been steadily rising.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p>Despite the distortions put out by the fossil fuel industries, there is agreement that the earth\u2019s rapid warm up is the result of our activities.\u00a0 Again, according to NASA ninety-seven percent of climate scientists agree that climate-warming trends over the past century are very likely due to human activities and most of the leading scientific organizations worldwide have issued public statements endorsing this position. Here is a partial list of these organizations:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The United Nation\u2019s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a group of 1,300 independent scientific experts from countries all over the world, concluded there\u2019s a more than 90 percent probability that human activities over the past 250 years have warmed the planet.\u00a0 In addition, these other groups have arrived at similar conclusions:<\/li>\n<li>American Association for the Advancement of Science;<\/li>\n<li>American Chemical Society;<\/li>\n<li>American Geophysical Union;<\/li>\n<li>American Medical Association;<\/li>\n<li>American Meteorological Society;<\/li>\n<li>American Physical Society;<\/li>\n<li>The Geological Society of America;<\/li>\n<li>U.S. National Academy of Sciences; and<\/li>\n<li>U.S. Global Change Research Program.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>So, what can New York do?\u00a0 First, it can pass the Climate Protection Act.\u00a0 That legislation establishes a timetable for reducing greenhouse gas emissions in New York by 80% below 1990 levels by 2050,as recommended by international climate experts.\u00a0\u00a0 This bill caps climate change pollution from all measurable sources in NY starting in 2016 and then incrementally lowers that cap,starting with a 20% reduction by the year 2020, with an additional 10% reduction every five years.\u00a0 It also requires the state\u2019s Department of Environmental Conservation to develop a plan to adapt to the environmental threats posed by the world\u2019s changing climate.<\/p>\n<p><em> <\/em><\/p>\n<p><em> <\/em><\/p>\n<p>To help New York better adapt to a changing climate, sea level rise projections and climate data should be integrated into state planning and permitting programs.\u00a0 A second bill \u2013 the Community Risk Reduction Act \u2013 will make such evaluation a required element for all state-permitted and funded development, not just rebuilding efforts after a catastrophic storm.\u00a0 This legislation applies such standards to projects proposed through a variety of state funding and permitting programs.<\/p>\n<p><em> <\/em><\/p>\n<p>State environmental organizations have organized an Earth Day Lobby Day event this week to push those initiatives \u2013 as well other environmental and public health protections \u2013 into the legislative debate.<\/p>\n<p>In order to get Albany to act, there needs to be legislative leadership.\u00a0 And it\u2019s that leadership that poses a special challenge.<\/p>\n<p>While the Assembly typically moves these types of bills, the success of the fossil fuel industries in tarnishing environmental and public health measures as anti-business makes lawmakers wary to action.<\/p>\n<p>A hot, parched planet will hardly be a place to do business.\u00a0 But facts \u2013 or even logic \u2013 are not what drives this debate.\u00a0 What drives it are partisan politics and greed.\u00a0 Sadly, there is little coming out of the governor\u2019s mansion to combat the lies and deceptions of those seeking to bamboozle the public about the problems and sources of global climate change.<\/p>\n<p>Yet, this November candidates for state office \u2013 from governor all the way to state legislative seats\u2014will be running for office.\u00a0 It will at that time when New Yorkers can hold policymakers accountable for their actions \u2013 or lack of actions \u2013 to protect our health and the planet.<\/p>\n<p>Hopefully, they will have something good to tell us.<\/p>\n<p>That\u2019s all for now.\u00a0 I\u2019ll be keeping an eye on the Capitol and will talk to you again next week.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As Albany begins its post-budget agenda, it is remarkable how little the governor and state lawmakers discuss environmental issues.\u00a0 There are the occasional news releases \u2013 lip service really \u2013 about green initiatives, but little about policies that seek to reduce the pollution. There are big environmental issues that need to be addressed \u2013 most [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[75,74,25,76],"class_list":["post-1024","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-climate","tag-earth-day","tag-environment","tag-fossil-fuels"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nypirg.org\/capitolperspective\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1024","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nypirg.org\/capitolperspective\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nypirg.org\/capitolperspective\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nypirg.org\/capitolperspective\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nypirg.org\/capitolperspective\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1024"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.nypirg.org\/capitolperspective\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1024\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1474,"href":"https:\/\/www.nypirg.org\/capitolperspective\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1024\/revisions\/1474"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nypirg.org\/capitolperspective\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1024"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nypirg.org\/capitolperspective\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1024"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nypirg.org\/capitolperspective\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1024"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}