Going Green

Whatever you may think of Rupert Murdoch and his politics, the man has some sense. The Murdoch empire is going carbon neutral.

In one of the most unexpected conversions since Saul of Tarsus hit the road to Damascus, Rupert Murdoch is turning into a green campaigner. He is making the whole of his worldwide operations carbon neutral and setting out to "educate and engage" his readers and viewers about global warming.

He believes his companies' "global reach" presents "an unprecedented opportunity to raise awareness and to stimulate action around the world". A former sceptic who confesses to having been "somewhat wary of the warming debate", he laid on his first global webcast for all his employees on Wednesday to tell them that he was "changing the DNA of our business". He added that he had started with himself, buying a hybrid car.

Mr Murdoch's conversion, which may surprise employees like Jeremy Clarkson, was heavily influenced by his son James - who took BSkyB carbon neutral a year ago this week - as well as by Tony Blair and former US vice-president Al Gore. All three attended his annual meeting for senior executives in Pebble Beach, California, last year where he was convinced to take the lead on the issue.

This is the sort of measures that Bjorn Lomborg has proposed. I've been in discussion groups about things like hybrid cars, and there's too much "if we can't solve the whole problem at once, it's not worth the effort" thinking going on. People were pooh-poohing hybrid cars because "they don't solve the problem." (Seriously.) The point is, hybrids are better than nothing. I think it's largely a matter of waiting from someone else (Daddy? The Deciderer?) to take care of it.

If Murdoch is willing to turn his media companies into advocates for energy conservation and taking measures against climate change -- well, it's better than a lot of the things they've advocated.

Of course, our government doesn't listen to people like Murdoch. Or anyone else.

The G-8 leaders are scheduled to sign off on the global warming declaration, titled "Growth and Responsibility in the World Economy," during their June 6-8 summit in Heligendamm, Germany. German Chancellor Angela Merkel, along with outgoing British Prime Minister Tony Blair, has been pushing for a strong statement on climate change as part of the June meeting, and newly elected French President Nicolas Sarkozy said in his acceptance speech last week that global warming is his top priority.

The U.S. representatives in Bonn, however, are trying to soften the message of the 18-page climate change document by deleting sections that would call on the industrialized world to modify activities linked to recent warming. They also proposed striking one of the document's opening phrases, which says, "We underline that tackling climate change is an imperative, not a choice. We firmly agree that resolute and concerted international action is urgently needed in order to reduce global greenhouse gas emissions and sustain our common basis of living."

Do I really have to say anything?

(Footnote: Given the examples above, it seems to me that, among his other achievements, Bush has made our government irrelevant, at least internationally. It's still able to do a lot of damage domestically. I'm going to be interested to see how the Europeans react to our attempts to gut the climate change agreement. I'm sure Angela Merkel would do it for another backrub.)

(Thanks to AmericaBlog for the heads up on these.)

Update:

And then you read stories like this:

A Depression-era program to bring electricity to rural areas is using taxpayer money to provide billions of dollars in low-interest loans to build coal plants even as Congress seeks ways to limit greenhouse gas emissions.

That government support is a major force behind the rush to coal plants, which spew carbon dioxide that scientists blame for global warming.

The beneficiaries of the government's largesse -- the nation's rural electric cooperatives -- plan to spend $35 billion to build conventional coal plants over the next 10 years, enough to offset all state and federal efforts to reduce U.S. greenhouse gas emissions over that time.

The bottom line, at least as related by this article, is that the co-ops are saying "screw you on environmental concerns and global warming." Glenn English, who's current CEO of the industry organization, talks a nice talk, but noticeably missing are any willingness to compromise or, gods forbid, investigate alternative strategies.

It would be interesting to see how many of these local co-ops have close ties to the mining industry.