http://www.boston.com/news/globe/edi...lobal_warming/

World Bank undermines efforts on global warming

By George M. Woodwell and Kilaparti Ramakrishna | August 11, 2004

WOODS HOLE
WHILE WE are all preoccupied with an unnecessary war costing billions
of dollars and eating up time that might far better be spent on the
alleviation of poverty and disease, global climatic disruption gains
momentum and moves toward irreversible climatic chaos.


The World Bank recently met to consider continued support for
development of new sources of fossil fuels, the primary cause of the
climatic disruption. It decided to continue support in the interest of
offering succor to those less developed nations that might sell oil or
coal or gas into the world markets. The action calls attention once
again to the growing discrepancy between what the scientific community
is saying about the state of the world and what the political and
economic communities are willing to hear. The fact is that the
environment is being changed in ways that destroy its life-supporting
capacities. Immediate effective steps must be taken to stop the
erosion.

First, the world must move away from a reliance on fossil fuels --
coal, oil, and gas -- as the energy source for industrialization.
There is, of course, enormous resistance to this change. The political
and economic interests of the fossil fuel industry and its allies are
overwhelming. They argue, in a now stereotypical pattern, that the
scientists are wrong, then that the scientists may be right but change
is very expensive and the expense is not justified, and, finally, that
it is too late to try because we cannot stop the changes.

The World Bank, on the other hand, has an international legal
personality and a position of leadership. Its job is to improve the
world, to aid in economic development.

While one might question the organization's methods, its mission is
certainly not to drive the world into impoverishment. Yet the human
undertaking that the World Bank wishes to advance is dependent upon a
functioning environment that is being destroyed daily by current use
of fossil fuels.

The best way to eliminate a pest, defeat an enemy, or cause the
erosion of society is to change the environment out from under it.
History is rich in examples as climate or soil or other environmental
resources have collapsed and caused the demise of one civilization
after another.

The difference now is that the changes are global and the global
industrial civilization with all of its successes and all of its
promise is at hazard.

The atmospheric burden of human-produced heat-trapping gases,
especially carbon dioxide, is more than 30 percent 0above what it was
a century ago and far higher than it has been at any time in the last
460,000 years. And it will soar under current policies to levels that
are in fact unpredictable as the warming feeds on itself by
stimulating further releases of heat trapping gases from forests and
soils and as the seas warm and absorb less of the excess carbon
dioxide from the atmosphere.

The full effects of heat-trapping gases in the atmosphere, without
continued additions, will extend far beyond current predictions.

The failure of the United States and others to take international
leadership in correcting this trend is inexcusable, but this failure
in no way justifies the action of the World Bank in leading the world
into even greater reliance on fossil fuels.

If the bank requires justification in international action, it has it
in the Framework Convention on Climate Change, a treaty that has been
ratified by all the nations, including the United States, and provides
for "stabilizing" the heat trapping gas content of the atmosphere at
levels that will protect human interests and nature. It is time for
the public to hold the World Bank and other international development
agencies to a far higher set of environmental standards than has been
set by most of the governments that delegates to the governing board
represent.

Failure to do so assures the ultimate and final failure of the central
mission of government at all levels, but most conspicuously in the
international realm that the international development banks serve.

George M. Woodwell and Kilaparti Ramakrishna are the director and
deputy director of the Woods Hole Research Center.