Thursday, August 20, 2015

Victoria's Green Matters - 20th August 2015



Deal With IT's Secretary Victoria Nicholls writes a regular column in the East Kent Mercury:

It is now accepted by 95% of the world’s scientific community that global warming is caused by greenhouse gases emitted by human activity. There is now so much evidence that it is difficult to think that there are still people around the world who do not accept the facts.

There has been a 0.85°C increase in temperature between the years1880 and 2012 and 2014 is the warmest year on record; 14 of the warmest years have occurred since the year 2000. There is expected to be a further increase of 5°C by the end of the century if no concentrated action is taken to limit carbon emissions. 2100 is the year when all fossil fuel use must be phased out.

We are heading towards the next round of climate negotiations due in Paris in November. Work has been going on behind the scenes for some time by ministers of the EU to set out a framework for negotiators to follow. The US and China have already announced targets for reducing climate polluting emissions and the G7 nations have pledged to gradually end fossil fuel use by the end of the century. US President Barack Obama recently announced many measures to replace the coal industry with renewable technologies

We can look to Paris as a good start but work needs to go on at ground level and ordinary people must continue to fight for their communities. East Kent may well see a resurgence of the movement towards fracking which must be stopped.

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