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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (Oct. 31, 1997)
CONTACTING US NEWSROOM: (541)346-5511 E-MAIL: j ode@oregon. uoregon edu ADDRESS: Oregon Daily Emerald P.0. BOX 3159 Eugene, Oregon 97403 Perspectives EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Sarah Kickler EDITORIAL EDITOR Mike Schmierbach NIGHT EDITOR Holly Sanders Solving global warming requires government to be part of team Help Wanted: Intelligent consumers needed to save the planet while powerful governments try to destroy it. Sound like something from an OS PIRG or Students for the Ethical Treatment of Animals pamphlet? It’s not. The U.S. government actually sent this call for help, if not in so many words. The White House issued this mes sage after a U.S. Department of Ener gy report last week found a sharp in crease in industrial pollution in 1996. While President Clinton played with voting polls and Paula Jones, greenhouse emissions rose in Jonas Allen one year nearly half as much as they had the previous six years. Apparently, U.S. industry grew out of its britches in 1996. Oddly enough, it dirtied them along the way. Carbon dioxide released by U.S. in dustries was ol ma jor concern to the energy department. But according to Associated Press re ports, White House advisers felt a cut in emissions would hurt the econo my. Rather than take responsibility for their industrial mess, government officials immediately contacted the nation’s on-call diaper service — tax payers. One day after the pollution report, government-funded researchers from the Arthur D. Little Company an nounced a sudden breakthrough in automotive technology. The firm claimed they had made a small, elec tric fuel cell that used gasoline to recharge itself, got double the gas mileage of current automobiles and, coincidentally, could make a car “vir tually pollution free.” This announcement was the gov ernment’s discreet version of a “help wanted.” See, Arthur D. Little’s environ ment-friendly toy can only succeed if consumers show an interest in it, and the government knows that. The gov ernment also knows it doesn’t want to help the other boys and girls clean Industry and the White House can 7 expect consumers to save the environment by themselves up the mess. As a result, efforts to push the new technology were fast and furious as U.S. industry tried to divert the flood of environmental guilt onto the public. The White House also had interest in the fuel cell's promotion and suc cess. The energy department report doomed Clinton’s 1992 proposal to curb greenhouse emissions by the year 2000. As a result, a recent speech to the National Geographic Society revealed the president’s new goal for lower emissions. The AP said Clinton’s target year is now around 2010, more than two years after Arthur D. Little expects its new fuel cell to be common in U.S. automo biles. Coincidence? It’s doubtful. According to AP reports, White House advisers, reeling from the en ergy department’s attack on industry, hailed the fuel cell as “real evidence of President Clinton’s belief that we can develop new, clean technologies that help our economy and our envi ronment at the same time.” Quick translation: “We made at mospheric mud pie, but we still have environmental goals. Buy our fuel cell and reduce emissions by 2010 so our industries won’t have to.” Not surprisingly, the fuel cell was partially a government project. Arthur D. Little did its research in conjunction with a government weapons lab. The fuel cell uses gasoline to recharge its electric battery, then re leases half the amount of carbon dioxide of internal combustion en gines. Gregory Bothun, a physics profes sor at the University, described the new fuel cell as “much friendlier to the environment." That’s exactly what the govern ment wants. What the government doesn’t want is to take the initiative and curb greenhouse emissions. It passes that responsibility onto the consumer. It also doesn’t want to admit that the new engine doesn’t solve our depen dence on fossil fuels; it just uses them at a slower rate. No matter how fast we use natural resources, someday they’ll be gone. If U.S. industry isn't hit with emis sions limits, the only resource we’ll have is gas. And not the natural type. The White House staff doesn’t seem to realize there is no “I” in “T-E A-M.” Consumers can’t, and should n’t, be held solely responsible for cleaning up industrial pollution. We are in this mess together, government included. Meeting Clinton’s new emissions goals needs to be a group effort. You’d think after all these games, U.S. officials would’ve learned how to share. Jonas Allen is a columnist for the Emer ald. His work appears on alternate Fri days. His views do not necessarily repre sent those of the Emerald. Drawing GO P loots TO OVERHAUL THE IRS. Clinton tools, 10 OVERHAUL THE IRK 1 ..TORA! TORA' TORA! Thumbs 1/ To coverage of the IACP report: The report has been cited by The Register-Guard and the Eugene City Council as somehow vindicating police behavior in the June 1 protest. While the report did generally side with the police, its focus was far too narrow to be consid ered a validation of police actions. First, the report only con sidered the official procedures for deal ing with conflict situ ations, rather than thd specific actions police took on June 1. Second, the re port found several flaws in police pro cedures, despite the general approval of regulations. Rnaily, the report was from a police group— hardly an unbiased agency. The real vin dication of the po lice, if it comes, will be when an indepen aeni Doara consia ers the specific ac tions taken by individual officers. If, after listening to tes timony from pro testers, officers and third-party ob servers, the Eugene police are found to have acted appropri ately, then The Reg ister-Guard and the city can exalt in the legitimization of their methods of control. Unfortu nately, the police have refused to co operate with the cur rent investigation, complaining that they have been screwed over by management and city officials. Still, the official investiga tion will conclude in a matter of weeks. Until then, there is no reason to declare the police depart ment vindicated. The caption of the photo for the design charette (ODE, Oct. 30) was incorrect. It should have said the event took place in 206 Lawrence Hall. The Emerald regrets the error.