America's Share of the Climate Crisis

Posted by: mikeg | 28 May 09 | 8 comments | Permalink

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Yesterday we released a new report, “America’s Share of the Climate Crisis: A State-By-State Carbon Footprint,” to highlight the United States’ responsibility for taking the lead to solve global warming given our disproportionately large role in creating the problem. Using data from the World Resources Institute's Carbon Analysis Indicators Tool, the report examines each state's carbon dioxide emissions produced by fossil fuel combustion from 1960 to 2005 and compares those emissions to 184 other countries.

It's a pretty staggering report. For instance, my home state, Texas, would rank as the 6th biggest polluter in the world if it were its own country. There's also this fact: "The combined historic emissions of just seven states—Texas, California, Illinois, New York, Indiana, Pennsylvania, and Ohio—totalled 96,517 MtCO2, more than any other country in the world, including China (92,950)."

Read more and download the report so you can check your state's emissions numbers. Congress may be blowing it with the climate legislation, but the EPA's endangerment finding gives it the ability to regulate greenhouse gas emissions. Write the EPA now and tell them you want them to issue strong new rules to control global warming pollution.

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Comments:

Michael Brown [Visitor] on May 29, 2009 at 01:36

This report is very eye-opening isn't it?

sj1009 [Visitor] on May 29, 2009 at 07:17

Thanks so much for the post! I absolutely agree with your idea. sujja ------

green greg [Visitor] on May 29, 2009 at 07:42

After having worked as a research geologist for the past 12 years I can tell you that there is an even greater culprit regarding the carbon foot prints that are left on our environment. This culprit does more damage then all of those heavy offender states combined. In fact this offender is worse then the entire United States during its industrial revolution period. I am of course talking about the active volcano around the world. If we could just cap the emissions occurring on the Big Island in Hawaii the entire carbon out put for the United States would be reduced by more then half.

rational [Member] on May 30, 2009 at 11:14

...and while we're at it let's stop the tsunamis!

Wouldn't it be wiser to PREPARE for the new environment that global warming is causing, rather than trying to PREVENT it?

Excuse me for being rational, but reducing carbon dioxide is not going to prevent global warming. Reducing volcanic eruptions would, but that's just as futile as trying to change global warming...

The Clickbank Code [Visitor] on May 30, 2009 at 14:41

You can tell definitely by the weather alone that the climate and atmosphere is changing. It's scary!

Airsoft Junkie [Visitor] on May 30, 2009 at 15:50

This is some crazy stuff. I live in Metro Detroit and over half of our entire state looks red on that map. You gotta wonder what Ohio is doing wrong on this. How ironic is it that they are known as the "heartland" of America, have the shape of a heart, and their spot on the map is blood red.

Tom [Visitor] on June 01, 2009 at 20:03

My state, Mass, looks pretty bad too, but is that just because it's on the bad side of the per-capita equation? I mean, the state is entirely red, but how much of that is because we're fairly dense AND fairly small? If Mass were, say, the size of Montana, would it be green? What I'm saying isn't so much in support of Mass, but more that this map can be misleading states into thinking they are doing a good job. -- Tom

BlueG [Visitor] on June 05, 2009 at 06:18

Wow I never knew how much pollution was coming from here compared to the rest of the world. It is quite shocking that texas could be the 6th most polluting country on its own. David

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mikeg
San Francisco, CA USA

I am a Web Editor for Greenpeace based out of San Francisco, but I'm currently onboard the Greenpeace ship Esperanza in the Pacific Ocean as webbie for the Defending Our Oceans campaign.

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