Not as simple as 1, 2, 3

Damian Carrington identifies three factors that stand in the way: Politics and Economics, Low-Carbon Energy, and Fossil Fuels. Before diving in and noting everything that he left out, I decided to do a little background investigation of him. Carrington is the head of the environment at The Guardian and has a blog about various environmental issues, this article being one of them. I will cut him a little slack because this was a blog post and not exactly meant to be an in-depth investigation of the challengers faced by those wanting to stop climate change. However, he should have at least noted that these factors are not all encompassing. Other factors include skepticism and those that refuse to believe the science of climate change. Another one of the most important factors that he neglects to discuss under the heading of “Politics and Economics” (which I think should be separate factors to begin with) is the role of developing nations. He does say “Renewables, especially solar power, are also the best and cheapest way to bring electricity to the 1.3 billion people who are without power,“ but he doesn’t discuss how developing nations play into the mix. For example, China is growing at an unprecedented rate of and average of 10% per year. As the West tells the world that they need to develop green and factor in the environment to their decisions, countries such as china are not convinced because to get where we are today the environment suffered greatly at the hands of the west. Combating climate change today will have a lot to do with promoting and facilitating green technologies in the developing world through incentives such as green subsidies. Also, he does not mention cultural norms as a factor. It would be unwise to not acknowledge our consumer culture and the challenge changing it would be. Ultimately, this article aims to simplify a much too complex issue. The debate over climate change cannot be summed up into 3 factors and except to be comprehensive and address all obstacles.