Bali Summit Leaves Lots of Unanswered Questions in Its Wake

It appears that US did not succeed in completely wrecking the UN Summit in Bali on global warming that just ended. According to a report in The Guardian, after opposition to the refusal of the US to cooperate grew so intense it finally conceded a point and agreed to stop opposing technological and financial assistance to the poorer counties. But the US did succeed in removing from the final document all references to specific reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, which probably was its main objective. So while the process moves forward, perhaps concluding with a final agreement by the end of 2009, it remains unclear where the process is headed. The science says that at a minimum greenhouse gas emissions must be stabilized by 2015 and reductions of about 80% from 1990 levels must occur by 2050. There is nothing in the final Bali document to acknowledge these goals which are aimed at preventing catastrophic climate change.

Politically, it appears that to have any hope of avoiding this impending catastrophe three things have to happen in the US elections next November: the Democrats retain control of the House, the Democrats win the Senate by several seats, and a Democrat or John McCain is elected president. Unless those three things fall into place there doesn’t seem to be any reason to continue to hold out hope. Even if those three things happen there still is no reason for any optimism. At the moment, the problem of limiting climate change seems overwhelming.

IPPC Leader Says Developing Countries Need Increase in Carbon Emissions

Rajendra Pachauri, the head of the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (ICPCC) recently said when the IPCC released its fourth report of the year that "If there's no action before 2012, that's too late. What we do in the next two to three years will determine our future. This is the defining moment." It is hard to but it better than that. However, it appears the “we” which Pachauri refers to includes only the developed countries because in a statement made at the world conference on climate change being held in Bali, Indonesia he said that to get millions people out of poverty developing nations need to boost carbon emissions. In an AFP article Pachauri is quoted as saying that “If you have the case of India, a half billion people who do not even have electricity, what mitigation (of carbon emissions) can you carry out?”

Pachauri’s view is opposite to the conclusion from a report by the Center for Global Development (CGD) which I described yesterday. That report said that an increase in carbon emissions by developing counties to get large populations out of poverty would result in catastrophic climate change regardless of what developed countries did. Perhaps the president of the CGD, Nancy Birdsall, has the answer to this dilemma when she says as reported in DailyIndia that “To avoid a shared global disaster, we in the rich countries need to cut our own emissions quickly and do much more to help developing countries shift to a low-carbon future while at the same time meeting the just aspirations of their people for a better life.” The latter task is likely to be a tough sell in the developed countries but it may be our best hope.

Report Says Developing Countries Need to Curtail Carbon Emissions

The idea that severe climate change can be prevented by developed countries sharply cutting back on carbon emissions while developing countries continue to increase emissions to lift their populations out of poverty has been dealt a blow by a report from the Center for Global Development which concluded that the developing countries too must back and soon. According to DailyIndia.com, the report, which has the long title of “Another Inconvenient Truth: A Carbon-Intensive South Faces Environmental Disaster, No Matter What the North Does,” found that even if emissions from the North suddenly dropped to zero emissions from the South alone would drive atmospheric carbon dioxide levels past 450 ppm by 2060, generally regarded as the point where climate change has catastrophic consequences. The lead author, David Wheeler, is quoted as saying that “Our results reveal the dangerous fallacy in the notion that the South can utilize carbon-intensive growth to dramatically increase incomes--a kind of last-minute, fossil-fueled development push--before the onset of catastrophic climate change.” To make matters worse, Wheeler claims that the conclusions of the report are on the conservative side because it only included carbon dioxide emissions, leaving out other greenhouse gases and the effects of positive feedbacks. All in all, it is a grim picture that emerges as the meeting about what do to after the Kyoto Protocol ends takes place in Bali, Indonesia.

Malaysia Leads the World in Greenhouse Gas Emission Growth Rate

It is hard to believe that any country can outdo China in increasing the rate of greenhouse gas emissions with the Chinese building new coal-fired power plants at the rate of about one a week but it looks like Malaysia has done just that. According to the recently released United Nations Development Report, during the period of 1990 to 2004 emissions of carbon dioxide increased in Malaysia by 221%. This growth rate is tops among the 30 biggest greenhouse gas emitters. According to the Associated Press, this rapid growth in emissions has occurred even though Malaysia ratified the Kyoto Protocol and “has taken several initiatives to use renewable energy as well as ways to cut emissions.” Overall, this country of 27 million people ranks as the 26th largest greenhouse gas emitter in the world. Based on its growth rate of emissions it appears likely to move up the list quickly. In the fight against global warming Malaysia seems to be a country that needs to be closely watched.

Black Friday a Dark Day for a Green Future

Once again another holiday season has rolled around and as reported by Reuters “Eager shoppers stormed malls and stores across the country on Friday to snap up the early-bird specials that mark ‘Black Friday,’ the first official day of the U.S. holiday shopping season.” This shopping madness might be good for the bottom line of major retailers but for the natural systems that we all depend on this consumerism frenzy is bad news. Bill McKibben has written an excellent essay on Gristmill blog called “The Problem with Christmas” about finding the antidote for this annual self-destructive ritual. McKibben argues that “our environmental problem, at root, isn't that the stuff we're buying uses too much energy or too much plastic, or that its paint has lead in it, or that it's been shipped too far. Our environmental problem is that we consume way too much because we've agreed to try and meet basic human needs -- status, respect, affection -- with material ends.” Something to think about while reading all those ads about what is on sale at the mall this holiday season.

Will the US Budge on Global Warming at Bali?

With the time window closing rapidly on taking effective action against global warming what happens next month at the world conference in Bali, Indonesia has taken on great importance. In the words of UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon speaking about the upcoming Bali meeting at yesterday’s release of the latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report, "The world's scientists have spoken clearly and with one voice. I expect the world's policy-makers to do the same.” According to the Associated Press, the report, which was basically a compilation of the three previous IPCC reports this year, stated that “carbon emissions, mainly from fossil fuels, must stabilize by 2015 and then drop. At best, temperatures will keep rising from carbon already in the atmosphere...Even if factories were shut today and cars taken off the roads, the average sea level would reach as high as 4.6 feet above that in the preindustrial period, or about 1850.”

Getting carbon emissions to stabilize by 2015 will not be easy since they are increasing globally by about 3% to 4% annually with almost half of the increase attributable to China. For any success the process for reducing emissions must start very soon, for example, in Bali. However, George W. Bush continues to reject a mandatory cap on emissions. Unfortunately, it seems unlikely that an administration that has accepted large sums of money from the fossil fuel industries for campaigning, has a political base that includes Rush Limbaugh ditto heads and the global warming denying religious right, and is ideologically opposed to government regulation of business is about to change course any time soon. Bali seems likely to be one more world conference on global warming where little if anything gets accomplished.

Ships Are Outpolluting Planes

The was a large global warming protest recently at London’s Heathrow Airport but so far there has been no such protests at any shipping port. Maybe there should be. A shipping industry group called Intertanko has released a report which says that carbon dioxide emissions from shipping are now almost double that from aviation. In an article on the report from ABC News in Australia it says that Intertanko attributes the growth in carbon dioxide emissions from shipping to an increase in global trade and the use of more fuel to speed up the delivery of goods.

Concerns about shipping in this country have largely focused on terrorism. In the US critics of the government’s security measures have complained that a large percentage of shipping containers that arrive in this country are never checked. There has been little concern over the amount of carbon dioxide released getting the containers over here. This report should finally place shipping under the global warming microscope.

Is Preserving the American Lifestyle while Fighting Global Warming Incompatible?

Energy efficiency expert Joe Romm from the Center for American Progress says in a recent post on Gristmill blog that “The deniers and delayers want people to believe that environmentalists are hyping climate change to achieve a hidden agenda of government limits on their consumption,” He also points out that he doesn’t "know any major environmentalist or environmental group that has promoted such a message.” Nevertheless, there are environmentalists (perhaps not considered major environmentalists by Romm) who do have that message and are keeping the debate alive within the environmental community. The position for need to reduce consumption is well articulated by Glenn Barry in a post on his Climate Change blog on his website Climate Ark. Barry states that “The crazily consumptive, super size, sexily scintillating, over the top American lifestyle is precisely the reason global climate is changing and the Earth's ecosystems collapsing.” He goes on to say that “Climate policy can only be effective if based upon ecological truths. And one such truth is that going green DOES mean sacrificing the American lifestyle. And it is deeply wasteful of time and resources necessary to solve global ecological crises to suggest otherwise.”

If we are going to successfully fight global warming we better hope that Barry is wrong. It his highly unlikely that people in large enough numbers will give up the American lifestyle. If we can’t work around that problem then we probably will not solve the problem of climate change.

Biofuels May Be Fueling Global Warming

The main knock against using food like corn for fuel is that because of the high price of gasoline which it can replace as ethanol it drives up the price of food which makes the problems of world hunger even more acute than they already are. Until now at least, those in favor of biofuels could at least argue that by replacing gasoline with ethanol from crops like corn, greenhouse gas emissions are reduced. But even that argument is now in jeopardy as a result of paper by Nobel Prize winner Paul Crutzen and colleagues who found that the nitrogen fertilizer used to grow crops such as corn results in greater amounts of the greenhouse gas nitrous oxide being produced by microbes than was previously thought. In fact, so much nitrous oxide results that it is calculated that by using corn for fuel the contribution to global warming can be as high as 1.5 times as burning fossil fuels. According to an article on SciDev.Net sugar is the only biofuel crop that is exempt from this problem because it requires less fertilizer. However, growing sugar in places like Brazil results in deforestation which also increases global warming.

Considering the effect on food prices alone, the rush to turn corn into ethanol hasn’t made much sense. If the results of this new study are confirmed this transformation from food to fuel will make even less sense.

Should Step It Up Give It Up?

Where are all the planned Step It Up events for A National Day of Climate Action on November 3rd? With 35 days left it looks like there are less than 200 events planned. I say looks like because the grand total is no longer available for viewing. I guess the events were adding up so slowly that it was thought that showing the total would lead to discouragement. It seems almost hard to believe but back in February with 45 days left before A National Day of Climate Action on April 14th there were already 753 planned events listed on the Step It Up website. Looking back, I guess that was the Golden Age of Step It Up.

Maybe the Civil Rights movement is not a good model for a global warming movement. Maybe we really don’t need a global warming movement. Maybe just doing what needs to be done without gathering in large groups for demonstrations is the way to go. In any case, I plan to attend one or two Step It Up events but it seems like it won’t be the same as those heady days last spring when tens of thousands of people gathered at over 1,400 events to ask Congress to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 80% by 2050. How did Bill Mckibben pull that off? He is probably wondering himself.

Another Geoengineering Scheme—Floating Pipes

Every few months it seems a new geoengineering scheme to save us from global warming hits the news. The lastest one is from a very improbable source, British scientist James Lovelock who gained fame for his Gaia theory of a self-regulating Earth. Lovelock teamed up with another British scientist, Chris Rapley, to write an article in the journal Nature to propose a geoengineering scheme to enhance the take up of carbon dioxide by tropical waters. The scheme involves placing huge numbers of floating vertical pipes in the water in order to draw cold water up to the surface by downward movement from ocean swells. Since cold water is richer in life than warm water more carbon dioxide would be taken up, at least in theory. An article on the BBC News website points out that Lovelock and Rapley were not aware that an American company named Atmocean has already begun testing such a scheme. Long pipes placed in water allow cold water in at the bottom and have a valve to block the downward flow of cold water during upward motion.

Why is Lovelock jumping on the geoengineering bandwagon? He told BBC News that “We are taking the very strong line that we are not going to save the planet by the regular approaches like the Kyoto Protocol or renewable energy. What we have to do is to look at it in a systems sense, or a Gaian sense, and see if it’s curable by direct action.”

It is hard to argue with Lovelock’s pessimism about our ability to reduce greenhouse gas emissions fast enough. If this were a baseball game the home team would be down by 10 runs in the bottom of the ninth with 2 out. However, it is also very difficult to embrace any geoengineering scheme. Whether it is mirrors in space, microscopic sulphate particles placed in the atmosphere, stimulation of plankton growth, or whatever, one has to wonder whether these people really know what will be the results of what they are doing. One thing at least is clear. We should have acted on this problem 20 years ago. It really may be too late.

Is Step It Up Losing Momentum?

To keep the momentum of their global warming movement going following the success of the first day of Step It Up events on April 14th author Bill McKibben and company have called for another day of Step It Up events on November 3rd. Unfortunately it appears there is less enthusiasm for this second go-around. Forty-five days before April 14th there were only two states, North Dakota and South Dakota, in which events were not planned. Well here we are only 42 days before November 3rd and the list of states without events planned is rather long. The list includes Nevada, Wyoming, Colorado, New Mexico, North Dakota, Kansas, Nebraska, Arkansas, Mississippi, and Alabama. Not only does there appear to be a lack of enthusiasm among event planners, but politicians do not seem to be accepting invitations to attend the events. Among 221 members of Congress who have been invited only two have to this date accepted. Among 14 presidential candidates who have been invited none have so far said they would go. Since I think it fair to say that momentum for fighting global warming is not on the wane in the US and if anything it has picked up, it is likely that the reduced enthusiasm for Step It Up events has more to do with Step It Up than the issue per se. Perhaps the problem is that the novelty of showing up at global warming protest events has worn off. We’ve done that, now what? Perhaps people have concluded that the first round of Step It Up events had no effect on politicians so why go through all the bother of doing it again. In any case, if this truly is a political movement it appears to be somewhat in trouble.

IPCC Climate Impact Report Filled with Gloom and Doom

At a meeting held in London to launch the complete report on climate change impacts by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) British climate scientist Martin Perry, who co-chairs the working group that wrote the report, had some particularly pessimistic comments to make. According to an article in the Guardian he said the following:

“We are all used to talking about these impacts coming in the lifetimes of our children and grandchildren. Now we know that it’s us.”

“…we cannot mitigate out of this problem. We now have a choice between a future with a damaged world or a severely damaged world.”

“…it’s evident from the work of the IPCC that even with a maximum of a 2C we’re not going to avoid some major impacts at the regional level.”

Perry doesn’t believe that there is much chance of holding global mean temperature to a 2C increase. According to climate scientists like James Hansen going beyond 2C could push us beyond some climate tipping points that might make global warming unstoppable and eventually lead to a world that we would find unrecognizable.

Overall the picture appears to be pretty bleak and with every passing year it just seems to get bleaker.

Is Fred Thompson Going After the Sun is the Cause of Global Warming Vote?

Now that Fred Thompson has declared that he is running for president a statement of his on global warming that he wrote on the ABC Radio Networks website back in April is receiving a lot of attention. Here is the statement:

Some people think that our planet is suffering from a fever. Now scientists are telling us that Mars is experiencing its own planetary warming: Martian warming. It seems scientists have noticed recently that quite a few planets in our solar system seem to be heating up a bit, including Pluto. NASA says the Martian South Pole's ice cap has been shrinking for three summers in a row. Maybe Mars got its fever from earth. If so, I guess Jupiter's caught the same cold, because it's warming up too, like Pluto. This has led some people, not necessarily scientists, to wonder if Mars and Jupiter, non-signatories to the Kyoto Treaty, are actually inhabited by alien SUV-driving industrialists who run their air-conditioning at 60 degrees and refuse to recycle. Silly, I know, but I wonder what all those planets, dwarf planets and moons in our SOLAR system have in common. Hmmmm. SOLAR system. Hmmmm. Solar? I wonder. Nah, I guess we shouldn't even be talking about this. The science is absolutely decided. There's a consensus. Ask Galileo.

The statement seems to suggest that Thompson is a global warming denier blaming increased solar activity for the rise in mean global temperature on Earth rather than greenhouse gases from human sources. Perhaps he is? On the other hand there are huge numbers of American voters who believe that increased solar activity is the culprit even though scientists have found not a shred of evidence to support this notion. If I had to make a guess I think that Thompson believes that “the science is absolutely decided” and “there’s a consensus.” The other stuff is probably to get votes by sticking it to liberals. His comments are amusing but for those of us who think that that facts presented in peer-reviewed scientific journals carry more weight than flip remarks by conservative politicians and that taking quick action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions is absolutely urgent there is more reason to laugh at Thompson rather than with him.

Book on Climate Tipping Points Makes the Point

For those who still don't feel a sense of urgency to take action when climate scientists such as James Hansen from NASA warn us that if he don’t start reducing greenhouse gas emissions very soon we will pass climate tipping points that will propel us into disaster it might be a good idea to read With Speed and Violence: Why Scientists Fear Tipping Points in Climate Change by Fred Pearce, a former editor at New Scientist. If this book has a clear message it is “don’t mess with Mother Nature on a global scale.” The book of course will be lost on those souls who truly believe that global warming is a left wing conspiracy to take over the world via United Nations carbon police, but for all others this book is one more reality check as it is chocked full of possible ways that small changes can be rapidly amplified by various positive feedback climate mechanisms to result in the climate flipping from one state to another. The science seems clear enough, but the big question that remains is will we soon reach the tipping point for meaningful action. There are no answers to that in Pearce's book.

Is a 3,000 Square Foot House a McMansion?

Michigan Democrat John Dingell, chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee and well known thorn in the side of environmentalists for blocking legislation to raise fuel efficiency standards for cars, is drafting a bill which would eliminate the tax deduction on mortgage interest for a house larger than 3,000 square feet. Dingell is quoted in the Washington Post as saying:

remove the mortgage interest deduction on McMansions -- homes over 3,000 square feet.

There probably would be a lot of support for removing this tax deduction for McMansions but does a 3,000 square foot really classify as a McMansion? While there is no agreed on definition, a house of 3,000 square feet seems a bit small to make the grade. In a post on this blog that I wrote earlier this month it was noted that nationally known land use law expert John Nolon from Pace University Law School uses the definition of 6,000 to 8,000 feet. He was quoted in the Guardian as saying that:

A 6,000 sq ft-8,000 sq ft house is a climate change disaster. If the country doesn't rein in the construction of these mansions the message to individuals is that they're encouraged to follow their urges. The phenomenon with McMansions is similar to that with SUVs: they express a certain sort of success, they're available and they're fun.

Nolon clearly is talking about very large houses when he uses the term McMansions. Dingell however is including houses that are only slightly larger than the average size new house. Why is he even using the term McMansion?

Perhaps Dingell is trying to appear green while proposing legislation which has no chance of passing. If he used Nolon’s definition and made the cutoff at 6,000 square feet that might be hard for the real estate and developer lobbies to defeat. The Washington Post article says that realtors and home builders are already up in arms about Dingell’s proposal. They probably won’t be the only ones.

Dingell is the chairman of an extremely important committee when it comes to the issue of global warming. We can only hope that he sincerely is trying to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and not just trying make it look like that is his goal.

Nothing Funny About Belching Livestock

It is not surprising that many people find it hard to take seriously the claims that methane expelled by cows can be a threat to the planet. It seems more like gross-out humor than serious climate science. Particularly since many people believe that the methane comes out at the end of the digestive tract as in humans. Actually most of this methane is expelled by belching.

According to a recent article in The Christian Science Monitor cows burp about once every 40 seconds. Their digestive processes yield as much as 100 gallons a day of methane and much of it is released through belching. Multiply that by all the cows in the world and you can be begin to see why this has no relationship to toilet humor. Considering that methane is a much more powerful greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide with regard to heat trapping (although it does not last nearly as long in the atmosphere) it is clear that this is very serious business.

To make this subject even more grim cows are not the only type of livestock that burp methane. For example, sheep are also part of this problem. A reporter from a Western Australian radio station discovered that in her part of the world this is particularly true because of the high salinity which results in the sheep eating bush that generates lots of burping.

Kay Balatero recently discussed the issue of belching cows on Gristmill blog and noted that scientists are looking for ways to change the diet of livestock to cut down on the belching. She finds herself doubting the wisdom of this effort:

But I'm somewhat skeptical about this dietary tampering; the idea of manipulating cow diets even further than we already have is a little disconcerting. We've seen corn-fed CAFO [confined animal feeding operations] cows become more susceptible to disease as a direct result of eliminating their natural diet of grass, leading to overuse of antibiotics by the beef industry. Would it be better to leave well enough alone, and simply consume less (sustainably raised) beef?

In theory, the problem could be solved by humans becoming vegans in vast numbers. Who needs billions of livestock if we no longer eat beef or lamb or consume dairy products such as milk, cheese, ice cream, and yogurt. The chance of this happening seems to be zero. If civilization is going down, it hardly seems likely that people would give up such perceived pleasures as eating a choice cut of grilled steak or a juicy hamburger from the barbecue during the descent.

Does DiCaprio’s Lifestyle Matter?

Most humans don’t fly. Among those who do most do not fly in their own private jets. But Leonardo DiCaprio does fly in his own private jet and since he is a celebrity calling for action against global warming this really bothers some people. It really bothers Glenn Barry who runs the climate change and global warming portal Climate Ark. It bothers Barry so much that he has issued an action alert to :

Let Leo know that the battle to stop the growth in aviation's greenhouse gas emission is one the most important environmental battles ever that requires his personal example. To be a credible messenger of global ecological sustainability Leonardo must both walk the walk and talk the talk. Let him know you will see his movie if he swears off private jets.

On other extreme, David Roberts blogging on Huffington Post has a simple reaction to all this agitation over how DiCaprio travels. Roberts says “eh.” Roberts explains his “who cares” attitude by saying:

I care about global warming. I don't think celebrity behavior is going to affect the issue one way or the other…

Whether or not celebrities matter in the fight against global warming it is a sure bet that we are going to keep hearing from celebrities on this issue. Celebrities are so much part of the media that is it almost impossible to imagine the media without them. Probably the mayor of Seattle, Greg Nickels, who originated the U.S. Mayors’ Climate Protection Agreement which has now been signed by over 600 mayors and town supervisors has done more to combat global warming than all of the celebrities combined if you leave out Al Gore but outside of the Seattle area you are unlikely to see him show up in the media. The value of the media to the fight against global warming is largely to show pictures of the effects of climate change such as melting glaciers, stranded polar bears, etc. When it comes to taking action against global warming the media will focus on celebrities which is not where the action is.

What’s the Deal with Dingell?

A debate among environmentalists is raging over whether the proposals by Michigan Democrat John Dingell, chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, represent a sincere effort to fight global warming or a sneaky way to prevent meaningful legislation on raising CAFE standards for cars. On Gristmill blog, David Roberts is defending Dingell while Joseph Romm accuses Dingell of using the “poison pill” strategy to undermine legislative efforts to raise CAFE standards.

Trying to decipher Dingell’s motives becomes even more complicated when you realize that only last December when asked whether a scientific consensus on global warming has been established Dingell replied:

"This country, this world, the [human] race of which you and I are a part, is great at having consensuses that are in great error. And so I want to get the scientific facts, and find out what the situation is, and find out what is the cure, and find out what is the cure that is acceptable to the country that I represent and serve."

So here is someone who only recently was wondering whether humans are to blame for global warming and now has proposed the following strong measures as listed by David Roberts:

A carbon tax of up to $100 per ton.

A gas tax of $0.50 a gallon.

A cap-and-trade system.

Ending the mortgage tax deduction for "McMansions" over 3,000 sq. feet.

All with the goal of reducing GHG emissions 60-80% by 2050.

Clearly there would be great political opposition in the United States to at least three of these proposals, the carbon tax, gas tax, and end of the mortgage deduction for many people. And coming from someone who only about eight months ago appeared to have been in the global warming skeptics camp has to raise doubts over the sincerity of these proposals. However, after holding hearings on global warming and energy maybe Dingell has had an epiphany and has decided that he is the one to put forth truly strong legislation, sort of like Richard Nixon, who made his reputation by being an anticommunist deciding that he would be the one to open the door to communist China.

Even if Dingell’s motives can not be unequivocally determined, his proposals seem to provide hope that the debate in the US Congress has at last shifted from whether human sources are the cause of global warming to what to do about it.

Folly of Building McMansions

Although people buying SUVs have taken most of the heat for making foolish purchases while the global warming crisis has taken on alarming proportions the folly of those buying McMansions is now starting to gain attention. An article in the Guardian quotes John Nolon, a leading land use law expert from Pace University Law School, as saying:

A 6,000 sq ft-8,000 sq ft house is a climate change disaster. If the country doesn't rein in the construction of these mansions the message to individuals is that they're encouraged to follow their urges. The phenomenon with McMansions is similar to that with SUVs: they express a certain sort of success, they're available and they're fun. If legislative folks don't take some kind of position on mansionisation, it will go unchecked.

Compared with modest size houses of perhaps 2,000 square feet McMansions of 6,000 to 8,000 square feet take more energy to heat in the winter and cool in the summer. Also, there is a lot more space to light and more room for all those energy using appliances such as TVs and computers. With about half of electricity being generated with coal burning in the United States it is not hard to see why McMansion building is another driver of global warming.

The article points out that there are places that are starting to take action to halt this madness. For example, Boulder, Colorado, the first city in the US with a carbon tax, has imposed a cap on the size of new house after the average size new house grew to over 6,000 square feet.

The excesses in American society seem endless. Limiting house size might be a good place to start attacking the bigger is better problem. Bigger isn't better because our planet isn't getting any larger.