Transcript Exhaust Pipe vs. Smoking - Canadians for Action on Climate Change

Exhaust Pipe vs. Smoking: Which Causes More Harm?
Toronto’s medical officer released a report stating a 30% reduction in vehicle emissions could save
200 lives, one billion dollars a year in health care costs and 68,000 asthma attacks for children a
year in Toronto alone. OMA estimates for annual premature deaths (2130 people) due to smog in
Toronto alone were almost three times the number of deaths (831people) Health Canada attributes
to secondhand smoke exposure for the whole of Canada. One must wonder why there is such
apathy towards these numbers when pollution is something we can clearly defeat.
Canadians for Action on Climate Change
Government’s key role is to serve as the trustee of the commonwealth and the common
health for this and future generations. Yet …
Canada now stands out as one of the last major industrialized countries opposed to
targets for deep reductions in greenhouse gas emissions and one of the biggest blockers
of climate change negotiations.
Canadians for Action on Climate Change is a developing non-profit NGO of activists,
academia, physicians and citizens focusing on climate change, true cost economy and
relocalization. Our organization seeks to provide news, reports and analysis to inform,
educate and develop environmental policies for all levels of government in Canada. We
are committed to being part of an international movement against destruction of our
shared environment. Our current economy is unsustainable and an unethical catalyst to
ever increasing global warming. This model assumes endless growth and limitless potential
wealth that completely disregards the fact that the earth’s life support capacity is
finite. We respect the integrity, resilience, and beauty of the common wealth of all life as
the foundation for a new sustainable economic model for our finite planet that will
benefit generations to come.
You can contact us at [email protected]
http://canadianclimateaction.wordpress.com/
Our shared environment is neither a ‘left’ nor
a ‘right’ issue. It is not a partisan issue.
We all breathe the same air.
We all share one finite planet.
We are now at a crossroads. Some citizens have such a deep
sense of entitlement that they actually fight for their ‘right’ to
harm our shared environment. Such individuals are so
disconnected from nature that they do not understand that
their perceived ‘right’ to pollute and degrade our shared
environment is at the expense of not only their own health, but
the health and welfare of their own children and the people
they love. Such perceived ‘rights’ and senses of entitlement
are the root cause of climate change which now kills 300,000
people per year.
Canada and the US together represent less than 5 percent of humanity
yet consume over one-quarter of the world’s oil, and contribute to
more than one-quarter of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions.
Carbon is the most significant greenhouse gas, and Canada’s per
capita carbon footprint is more than twice that of the average
European, roughly five times the world average, and more than 20
times that of many developing countries.
Canadians must urgently face up to our grossly outsized and destructive
carbon footprint, and changes need to start somewhere.
Idling and drive-thrus are simply luxury items we can live without. The
low hanging fruits so to speak.
Whether in blissful ignorance or conscious disregard, to continue to act
like we are simply entitled to more – and more urban sprawl, more
cars, more oil, and more greenhouse emissions – constitutes a
planetary arrogance of frightening proportions. Idling bylaws and
moratoriums on new drive-thrus would represent an important first
step towards a new vision of denser, less resource intensive cities, and
one which is ultimately more in step with our responsibilities as global
citizens.
We are in a world wide public health crisis
epidemic as a direct result of air pollution.
A new advocacy and public health
movement is needed urgently to bring
together governments, international
agencies, non-governmental organizations
(NGOs), com-munities, and academics from
all disciplines to adapt to the effects of
climate change on health. Any adaptation
should sit alongside the need for primary
mitigation: reduction in greenhouse gas
emissions - Lancet and University College
London Institute for Global Health
Commission
The Role of Cities
The battle against climate change will be won or lost in cities. The role of
provincial and federal governments is, of course, widely debated, analyzed
and understood. Yet the challenge is so huge that cross-cutting action at all
levels will be needed. The central role of city leaders in our rapidly urbanizing
world will be key to reducing the world’s greenhouse gas emissions. The
leaders of large cities have a particular responsibility to act, and governments
must empower and enable city governments to take on this role.
If global efforts to address climate change are to be successful, they will need
to integrate city requirements and environmental management capacities.
Only with a coordinated approach and actions at the global, regional,
national and local levels can success be achieved. Many cities are now
taking the initiative to reduce their impact on the global climate.
By 2030, two-thirds of humanity will live in cities or urban areas. Half already
do. Even now, cities consume 75 per cent of the world’s energy and are
responsible for 80 per cent of carbon dioxide emissions. Moreover, all cities are
highly vulnerable to the impacts of climate change, and none more so than
fast growing cities in developing countries. About 20 of the 30 largest cities of
the world are situated on low lying coasts. Rising sea levels of a few metres
would have catastrophic implications. So there’s an extraordinary
responsibility and motivation for cities to act. It is at city level that innovation
and progress on climate change action is most likely to be achieved.
Joseph Stalin's disturbing words…
"One death is a tragedy; a million is a statistic.“
It's a horrible quote, but when it comes to statistics this seems increasingly the case. Are forgetting that
every one of those numbers has real life attached
to it? There are emotions and feelings. Life is
complex. Data represents life, and therein lies the
purpose and meaning of these numbers and
information. The following number represent men,
women and children.
The Numbers
The research on the human costs of
pollution and pollution-related diseases
estimated that around 21,000 people in
Canada will die from breathing in toxic
substances drifting in the air this year with
3,000 of those deaths due to short-term
exposure to smog.
In Ontario, the number of "smog days" nearly
quadrupled from 15 in 1995 to 53 in 2005.
By 2031, short term exposure to air pollution
will claim close to 90,000 lives in Canada,
while long-term exposure will kill more than
700,000 citizens.
Ontario and Quebec residents are the worst
hit Canadians, with 70 percent of the
premature deaths occurring in Central
Canada.
In the past 15 years alone, there has been a
fourfold increase in asthma in children under
15 in Canada.
If nothing is done to clean the air, medical
experts estimate that by 2026 the number of
smog-related premature deaths in Ontario
alone will hit 10,000 annually.
OMA estimates for annual premature
deaths (2130 people) due to smog in
Toronto alone were almost three times the
number of deaths (831people) Health
Canada attributes to secondhand smoke
exposure for the whole of Canada.
In 2008, 80 per cent of those who die due to
air pollution will be over 65.
25 Canadians under 19 will die from shortterm acute pollution exposure this year.
A child’s breathing zone is lower than adults
so they are more exposed to vehicle
exhausts and heavier pollutants that
concentrate at lower levels in the air.
Children are the most vulnerable breathing
50% more air per pound than adults.
Toronto's medical officer has released a
report stating a 30% reduction in vehicle
emissions could save 68,000 asthma attacks
for children a year.
The World Health Organization (WHO)
estimated that the number of children dying
from asthma each year could increase by
20 per cent by 2016 if urgent action was not
taken to reduce emissions from vehicles and
factories.
In 2008 there will more than 9,000 hospital
visits and 30,000 emergency room visits, and
620,000 doctor's office visits, stemming from
air pollution.
Eight thousand people a day die from air
pollution. There are 3 million annual deaths,
worldwide.
Emissions from an individual idling a car in an
average size municipality will emit nearly the
same amount of emissions volume as the
total annual emissions from an individual in
Bangladesh.
More than 20 million people have been
displaced by climate-related sudden-onset
natural disasters in 2008 alone, according to
a new study by OCHA and the Norwegian
Refugee Council’s (NRC) Internal
Displacement Monitoring Centre.
The total number of people affected by
natural disasters due to accelerating
climate change has risen sharply over the
past 10 years, with an average of 211 million
people directly affected each year, nearly
five times the number impacted by conflict
in the same period.
April 2009: CO2 hits 800,000-year high at
Mauna Loa Observatory Mauna Loa
Observatory, Hawaii (USA) Atmospheric CO2
reached 389.47 parts per million (ppm).
June 10th, 2009 – co2 went up again.
It is now at 390.18
The human respiratory system can only
handle an upper level of 426 ppmv before
the blood begins to become acidic after
long-term exposure.
Climate change is the biggest global
health threat of the 21st century
The Costs
The national economy: air pollution will top
eight billion dollars in 2008, and by 2031 it will
go over 250 billion.
The Ontario Medical Association estimated
that health care costs caused by poor air
quality in 2000 would amount to nearly $630
million, not to mention the $566 million in
costs due to workers taking sick days.
In Ontario alone, lost productivity will cost
Canada $349,400 this year. By 2031 that will
total over $9 million in damage.
Healthcare costs in the province will be
$221,800 this year, up to almost $6.5 million
total by 2031.
Economic damage to quality of life will hit
$194,100 in Ontario in 2008, up to $265,000 in
2031 and totalling almost $5.5 million by that
time.
Economic damage due to loss of life will
cost $3,644,100 in 2008, rising to $6,367,200 in
2031, and totalling $115,674,500 by 2031.
Air Releases of Carcinogens by
Province
Rank Provinces Air Releases of Toxics
of Carcinogens (kg) Percentage
Prince Edward Island . 26 %
Northwest Territories .41%
Newfoundland .91%
Nova Scotia 1.36%
Saskatchewan 1.62%
Manitoba
5.16%
New Brunswick 5.47%
British Columbia 11. 13 %
Quebec 17.61%
Alberta 17. 91 %
Ontario
38. 18 %
Air Releases of Toxics
of Carcinogens
Ontario's smog causes 9,500 deaths per
year, medical association says. Of these
1,000 occurred immediately after times of
intense pollution.
Drive-thrus | Sixty percent of the 129 billion dollar per year
industry takes place at the drive-thru window.
Welcome to the Denialism Industry
This strategy of “manufacturing scientific uncertainty” comes directly
from the industry’s denialism playbook. The industry invests big
money for public relations campaign to raise doubts about the
increasingly definitive scientific evidence. They realize that if you
could argue about the science, then you can stop municipalities
from trying to address the problem. If the new ‘science’ which is
bought and paid by industry doesn’t work, they fall back on the
argument of ‘choice’ – whatever the risk to society, it the citizens
right to do so. This is just another example of industry’s scientific
consultants who specialize in product defense. Not unlike tobacco,
oil and climate change. Corporate spin experts have recognized
that manufacturing doubt works and if they do it well they can stop
government legislation, or at least slow them down for years. This is a
growing trend that disingenuously demands proof over precaution in
the realm of public health.
Drive Thru Resources:
http://drivethrulies.wordpress.com/the-need-to-start-somewhere/
Drive-thrus - Think the impact is insignificant? Think again.
idling-report-markham1
We have used the calculations provided to us in this study (idling times are completely in
line with Tim Horton’s own study (3-4.5 minutes) & with the national average of 3.84
seconds) to produce a very conservative number for the total number of emissions, etc.
produced in London drive-thrus.
London has 156 drive-thrus – so we have based our amounts on (29 x 5) 145 as opposed
to 156 to keep our results conservative.
Here are the results: (City of London only)
Idling time: 108, 795, 760 minutes.
Fuel Wasted: 2, 175, 925 litres of fuel wasted.
Emissions: 590 tons of carbon dioxide & other pollutants.
To offset this amount of pollutants in one year we would need to plant 29,220 trees.
Fuel wasted – enough for an average car to circle the globe 425 times.
And this is ONLY London based on only 145 drive-thrus. Imagine the result from all cities in
Ontario, in Canada, in North America, in the world.
For more info. on this study (data) please contact us at
[email protected]
Climate policy and environmental
policy is characterized by the
habituation of low expectations and a
culture of failure. There is an urgent
need to understand global warming
and the tipping points for dangerous
impacts that we have already crossed
as a sustainability emergency that
takes us beyond the politics of failureinducing compromise.
CAPE – Canadian Association of
Physicians for the Environment
represents 4,000 physicians across
Canada. They urge municipalities
across Canada to pass the strongest
anti-idling bylaws possible. The Toronto
medical health officer recently asked
the City of Toronto to amend the city’s
existing bylaw to 10 seconds.
http://www.cape.ca/
Finally, while we grasp with how we
can cut back our emissions let’s look at
annual tons of CO2 per person and
reflect: Annual tons of CO2 per
person…
Ethiopia .01
India 1.1
China 3.2
Sweden 5.6
France 6.2
UK 9.4
Japan 9.7
Germany 9.8
CANADA 17.9
USA 19.8
It’s us, the one billion affluent people of the
world whose footprints are crushing the
planet. Surely we can all agree this is grossly
unethical. Climate change today accounts
for over 300,000 deaths throughout the
world each year.
Children are the most vulnerable in our
society. It is the responsibility of every
adult citizen on our global planet to
take every precaution to protect our
children and mitigate against climate
change. Just as all children must have
the right to clean drinking water, all
children must have the right to
breathe clean air.
Idling is systemic of a much bigger problem.
That of a car culture phenomenon, a culture of self entitlement and
our ‘choice’ to destroy our shared environment. Our shared natural
environment has become a toxic dumping ground.
We are paying the highest price…
Today we are living in what scientists call ‘the sixth extinction’. The
fastest die off of species the Earth has ever seen. The biodiversity crisis
is due to the destruction of ecosystems, the overexploitation of
species and natural resources, overpopulation, the spread of
agriculture and livestock, and pollution - all contributing to ever
accelerating global warming caused by humans.
We are conducting a vast toxicological experiment in which our
children and our children's children are the experimental subjects…
CBC Video Now Online | The Disappearing Male Doc Zone | CBC-TV
http://www.cbc.ca/documentaries/doczone/2008/disappearingmale/#
The Disappearing Male is about one of the most important, and least
publicized, issues facing the human species: the toxic threat to the male
reproductive system.
The last few decades have seen steady and dramatic increases in the
incidence of boys and young men suffering from genital deformities, low
sperm count, sperm abnormalities and testicular cancer. Some researchers
say that declining male fertility rates could be the first sign of extinction.
Health:
http://www.environmentaldefence.ca/
http://www.cape.ca/
http://www.ewg.org/
A Transition to A Whole Earth, Steady State Economy is Essential
Everything began with the industrial revolution in 1750, which gave birth to the
capitalist system. In two and a half centuries, the so called “developed”
countries have consumed a large part of the fossil fuels created over five
million centuries.
Competition and the thirst for profit without limits of the capitalist system are
destroying the planet. Under Capitalism we are not human beings but
consumers. Under Capitalism mother earth does not exist, instead there are
raw materials. Capitalism is the source of the asymmetries and imbalances in
the world. It generates luxury, ostentation and waste for a few, while millions in
the world die from hunger in the world. In the hands of Capitalism everything
becomes a commodity: the water, the soil, the human genome, the ancestral
cultures, justice, ethics, death … and life itself. Everything, absolutely
everything, can be bought and sold and under Capitalism. And even
“climate change” itself has become a business.
“Climate change” has placed all humankind before great choice: to
continue in the ways of capitalism and death, or to start down the path of
harmony with nature and respect for life.
Redesigning the Way We Think & Live:
http://www.happyplanetindex.org/engage/charter.html
http://www.neweconomics.org/gen/
Evo Morales | Save the Planet from Capitalism
Today, our Mother Earth is ill. From the beginning of the 21st century we have
lived the hottest years of the last thousand years. Global warming is
generating abrupt changes in the weather: the retreat of glaciers and the
decrease of the polar ice caps; the increase of the sea level and the flooding
of coastal areas, where approximately 60% of the world population live; the
increase in the processes of desertification and the decrease of fresh water
sources; a higher frequency in natural disasters that the communities of the
earth suffer[1]; the extinction of animal and vegetal species; and the spread
of diseases in areas that before were free from those diseases.
One of the most tragic consequences of the climate change is that some
nations and territories are the condemned to disappear by the increase of the
sea level.
Read Full Opinion Piece Here:
http://councilofcanadianslondon.wordpress.com/2008/12/19/climatechange-save-the-planet-from-capitalism-evo-morales/
Achievements You Will Not Read About in the MSM
(Main Stream Media)
Ecuador first to legislate rights for nature |10 December 2008
Ecuador Approves New Constitution: Voters Approve Rights of Nature
Ecuador | First Country in the World to Shift to Rights-Based
Environmental Protection, Working With Legal Defense Fund
By an overwhelming margin, the people of Ecuador today voted for a new
constitution that is the first in the world to recognize legally enforceable Rights
of Nature, or ecosystem rights. The Community Environmental Legal Defense
Fund is pioneering this work in the U.S., where it has assisted more than a
dozen local municipalities with drafting and adopting local laws recognizing
Rights of Nature. Ecuador is now the first country in the world to codify a new
system of environmental protection based on rights. With this vote, the people
of Ecuador are leading the way for countries around the world to
fundamentally change how we protect nature. Article 1 of the new "Rights for
Nature" chapter of the Ecuador constitution reads: "Nature or Pachamama,
where life is reproduced and exists, has the right to exist, persist, maintain and
regenerate its vital cycles, structure, functions and its processes in evolution.
Every person, people, community or nationality, will be able to demand the
recognitions of rights for nature before the public bodies."
Could We Pass Such a Law in North American? Probably Not. Why?
1- Apathy caused by a complete disconnect from our shared natural
environment
2- Entitlement which has been cultivated in the very essence of our being in North
America
3- Corporations are now more powerful than our governments
4- The average citizen is being kept in the dark on the severity of climate change
and the implications
Solutions:
1- Seek out Independent Media
2- Reconnect Children with Nature
3- Mandatory ecoliteracy courses including ‘precautionary principle’ in work
places and all levels of government
4- Utilize waiting times in the health sector with education. Replace television
shows in waiting rooms with documentaries. Replace irrelevant reading
material / magazines with those which focus on climate change and health.
Direct Action
“…I believe we’ve reached the stage where it is time for civil
disobedience.”
Al Gore, Clinton Global Initiative, Sept. 25, 2008
The Reverse Graffiti Project | ‘Art less pollution’
This is what you may call reverse graffiti. Brazilian streetartist
Alexandre Orion removes soot to draw skulls and create ‘Art less
pollution’.
At dawn on July 13, 2006, Brazilian streetartist Alexandre Orion started
working on a intervention in the Max Feffer tunnel Sao Paulo and
created ‘Art less pollution’. The intervention was through a process of
subtraction, scraping off layers of soot from vehicle exhaust built up
on tunnel walls to produce images of human skulls.
Read more about the intervention and see pictures at Alexandre
Orion’s website.
VIDEO:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JwsBBIIXT0E&eurl=http://www.fa
cebook.com/home.php#
Capitalism strikes again… Note that since this time – ‘GreenWorks’ [Clorox
Corporation] has purchased this video for an advertising campaign.
Under the Radar | Le Clan du Néon
Lights Out Activists on Anti-Neon Crusade in France. By Adam Sage, Times (UK),
November 8, 2008. "Meet Le Clan du Néon, an increasingly popular environmental
movement that wants to make the City of Lights a little darker. One tactic is to turn off
neon shop signs at night by reaching the external fire switches that control them, usually
found two or three metres up the façade... Le Clan was set up in Paris, but its lighthearted and low-tech activist approach to ecology has been a hit across the country
with students, many of whom see the antineon activity as a nocturnal lark. Groups have
sprung up in Normandy, Bordeaux, the Alps and Dordogne. Members from the latter
have posted an internet video that says that in a region bereft of night life, turning out the
high street lighting is as good a way of passing the time as any... The thousands of shop
signs left on at night in Europe consume tens of gigawatt hours of electricity a year. In
France, where the nuclear industry supplies 80 per cent of electricity, the result is more
radioactive waste. Elsewhere, it is hundreds of tonnes of CO2 emissions. 'If all the neon
signs in the world were turned off, the impact on global warming would be very
significant,' said Nicolas, 28, another Le Clan member. 'There ought to be a law against it,
but since there isn't, we have to go around doing it ourselves.’
Full Article: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/europe/article5110640.ece
Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iq6j3O6wAdE
Today's protesters, tomorrow's saviours.
It is pertinent to ask what view our great-grandchildren will take when
they look back in 100 years. The slow cooking of the planet is quite
distinct from other disputes today. With climate change, the ultimate
question is whether humans can continue to live on this planet at all.
Plane Stupid Direct Action Group. They were disruptive and controversial to say the
least. Spied upon, locked up and lambasted by the establishment of their time. The
state considered them to be dangerous terrorists and, as Tony Benn put it, "Newsnight
would have treated the suffragettes as trouble-makers." But those women who battled
for gender equality were later vindicated by history. I suppose it's a testament to their
success that the Climate Change Secretary, Ed Miliband, was citing them as an
example of the sort of movement we need on global warming, adding, "Maybe it's an
odd thing for someone in government to say." Certainly an odd thing for someone in
government. Put against a context of the average Brit emitting 11 tonnes of CO2 a
year, today's activity didn't just get the nation talking, it had a real impact. Like the
Kingsnorth 6, who shut down one of the dirtiest coal plants in Britain and were later
acquitted by a jury of 12 ordinary people, Plane Stupid just made history. Seriously what
people will think about this protest in 100 years from now? Will that generations'
politicians be lauding today's action as a model for defeating their eras' defining
challenge?
Direct Action Becomes Cool
Interesting enough – ‘Lush’ produces a product called the
charity pot where all the proceeds are donated to worthy
causes. One of the groups to benefit is Plane Stupid. Others
range from Butterfly Conservation to Reprieve, the human
rights charity.
Lush states they believe that there is a long tradition of using
non-violent protest to create change where other means
have failed. Highlighting the constant growth of habits we
know we can't sustain, as Plane Stupid has, they see as
laudatory.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/dec/12/the
airlineindustry-climatechange
Drive Thru Resources:
http://drivethrulies.wordpress.com/the-need-to-start-somewhere/
World News on Pollution & Climate Change
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/climate-change
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/pollution
Health:
http://www.environmentaldefence.ca/
http://www.cape.ca/
http://www.ewg.org/
Redesigning the Way We Think & Live:
http://www.happyplanetindex.org/engage/charter.html
http://www.neweconomics.org/gen/
Lastly - for Inspiration:
Essential Reading: Paul Hawken: You are Brilliant & the Earth is Hiring:
http://www.up.edu/commencement/default.aspx?cid=9456&pid=3144