The Sierra Club's contingent in Kyoto
arrived bearing gifts—bright yellow T-shirts that implored, "With
the Earth in the Balance, Don't COP out." In the parlance of treaty negotiators, COP refers to the "conference of the parties," the broad
climate-change framework hammered out in Brazil in 1992. The literary allusion
was to that same year's best-seller by then-Senator Al Gore, in which he called
for "bold and unequivocal action" to combat the threat of global warming.
Sadly, Vice President Gore heeded neither the Club nor his own book. He did make
a dramatic, 1-day appearance at the 11-day December gathering, under pressure
from environmentalists. But when the United States and 37 other developed nations
finally agreed on binding targets and timetables to reduce greenhouse-gas
emissions, the steps were anything but bold and unequivocal.
"The good news is that the world focused its attention on global warming and
decided to act," says Club President Adam Werbach, who attended the conference
with Dan Becker, the Club's global warming program director, and Kristin Hyde,
its communications director. "The bad news is that the pollution levels set by
this treaty are risky for us, dangerous for our children, and potentially
catastrophic for our grandchildren."
The treaty calls for more rigorous cuts than the White House wanted heading into
the talks, but falls far short of the steps urged by other industrialized
nations-and by President Clinton himself, who as recently as October cited a
"solemn obligation" to prevent global warming.
"I think we all have to agree that the potential for serious climate disruption
is real," he said. "It would clearly be a grave mistake to bury our heads in the
sand and pretend the issue will go away."
Faced with strong opposition in Congress and a $13 million lobbying campaign by
polluting industries, the White House grudgingly agreed to on-paper reductions of
carbon dioxide, methane, and other greenhouse gases to 7 percent below 1990
levels by 2012. But the formula for scaling back emissions is enormously
complicated, and Clinton aides admit that the real reductions required will be
closer to 3 percent-a number that environmentalists, citing loopholes in the
treaty, regard as overstated as well.
"This agreement has almost as many loopholes as targets," complains Becker. "It's
the result of a tug-of-war between the Europeans, who wanted honest reductions,
and the Americans, who wanted dishonest reductions." Besides the lengthy
timetable for cuts, he and others object to the treaty's heavy reliance on
voluntary measures and especially its emissions-trading scheme, which allows U.S.
industries to discharge higher levels of greenhouse gases in exchange for
investing in pollution controls in other countries. "The thinking is, 'Let
Vladimir do it, so we don't have to do it here,' " says Becker, who adds that
this so-called joint implementation plan is "unverifiable" and "unpoliceable."
Club activists contend that the United States-which produces nearly a quarter of
the world's carbon dioxide, the primary culprit in global warming-is the place to
begin reversing the trend toward climate instability. "Most of all, we want to
get cuts in domestic emissions now," says Becker. "There's
a lot that could be done by this administration-and even more if Congress
helped."
To jump-start that process, the Sierra Club has launched a public-education
campaign to rally support for quick action on climate change. Starting last
fall-months before the Kyoto summit-the Club produced a series of
attention-grabbing public-service announcements to air
on TV stations around the country. A new Web site offers everything from news
accounts to a recent "name that gas guzzler" contest, which invited visitors to
help Ford come up with a fitting moniker for its latest CO2-spewing sport utility
vehicle.
Two long-standing objectives remain at the top of the Club's
climate-change agenda: increasing the fuel efficiency of automobiles and light
trucks, and encouraging energy conservation and a nationwide shift from fossil
fuels to renewable energy sources.
For now, at least, Senate leaders are threatening to block ratification of the
Kyoto agreement unless it's weakened still further. But with or without a treaty,
Club leaders are intent on persuading the American people of the need for bold
and unequivocal action. Only then,
they believe, will Clinton and Congress come along.
Pacific Coast: GOLD STRIKE
On Thanksgiving a hundred Sierra Club volunteers and Native Americans gathered at
Indian Pass in the California desert to break bread and unite in the fight to
halt a proposed gold mine on the very site where they ate their meal. Over the
course of the day, spiritual leaders of the Quechan tribe guided Club activists
to the "Running Man" pictograph and to other sites that reveal 10,000 years of
human presence.
If the Bureau of Land Management and Glammis Gold have their way,
the areas will be scarred by 700-foot-deep pits and 300-foot-high piles of
unreclaimed waste rock. The activists have vowed to fight to prevent mining on
the sacred lands, beginning with a letter-writing campaign aimed at the
California director of the BLM (now under way), and ending, if necessary, with a
showdown in court. To express your support, write Ed Hastey, BLM, 2800 Cottage
Way, Sacramento, CA 95825.
SWAMP AND CIRCUMSTANCE
Bob Schneider of the Yolano Group has scaled peaks from Peru to Nepal. But he
enjoyed one of his greatest highs in the pancake-flat Sacramento Valley one
drizzly day last November. After nearly a decade of behind-the-scenes efforts to
transform 3,700 acres of a flood-control channel into habitat, environmentalists
under the aegis of the Yolo Basin Foundation saw their mission accomplished with
the dedication of the Yolo Bypass Wildlife Area. "This is the heart of the
Pacific Flyway," says Schneider of the wetland ecosystem. "It'll be visited by
millions of migratory waterfowl."
But the bogs aren't only for the birds.
Conservationists envision a marshy mecca for recreationists and duck hunters, who
gave the project an impressive boost.
President Bill Clinton, who attended the event, hailed the spirit of cooperation
that enabled the largest wetland restoration in the West. Schneider takes a
similar view. "Farmers, hunters, property owners, state and federal agencies, and
environmentalists all teamed up to re-create wildlife habitat," he says. "No one
entity could have done it alone."
Atlantic Coast: DRIVE IN, FLY OUT
The protections of the Clean Water Act coupled with an improving New England
economy have brought the once severely polluted Blackstone River to its cleanest
condition in a century. Continuing the effort, the Rhode Island Chapter is now
working on converting an abandoned 35-acre site in the Blackstone's watershed
into a stop on the Atlantic Flyway. Turning out for a Club-sponsored cleanup in
September, 50 volunteers filled up 100 trash bags of debris from the old 35-acre
Lonsdale Drive-in.
Both of Rhode Island's senators applauded the effort at the
celebration that followed, as did the state's environmental director, Andrew
McLeod, who affirmed the goal of establishing a wetland on the property. Having
helped track down the funds, chapter activists are now awaiting the state's
purchase of the land and the transformation of asphalt into critical habitat for
waterfowl.
Interior Highlands: ECO-THUGGERY
On her way to what she believed would be a TV interview on the possible impacts
of lead mining in Missouri's Mark Twain National Forest, Becky Horton of the
Ozark Chapter was brutally attacked by stick-wielding hoods last July. After the
beating, the four criminals-one sporting a swastika on his shirt-duct-taped her
to her car seat, stuffed a Sierra Club pamphlet in her mouth, and taped a
property-rights video to her hand. The terrified activist was found in her
vandalized car the following morning.
Bullying over land-use issues in the Ozarks is nothing new. In recent years, acts
of intimidation have ranged from threatening phone calls to stalking to gunfire.
The assault, however, represented a new low in the harassment. "Some people don't
like what we do," Horton says. "They have a right to say so, but not to brutalize
me. We have a right to monitor the river's health, and to protect the area that
is our home." Her unidentified assailants remain at large.
Rocky Mountains: RUNAWAY RUNOFF
Upon reaching the 14,109-foot summit of Pikes Peak, poet Katharine Lee Bates was
inspired to write "America the Beautiful." These days, environmentalists are
finding less to sing about. With approval from the U. S. Forest Service, the city
of Colorado Springs applies thousands of tons of gravel annually to maintain
Pikes Peak Highway, the 20-mile route taken by thousands of tourists on their
motorized pilgrimage to the mountaintop.
An estimated 20 percent of the gravel
washes off the road, smothering wetland vegetation, and, according to a report
from the Forest Service itself, diminishing biological productivity in nearby
streams by 85 percent. Yet with evidence dating to 1952 linking highway erosion
to environmental degradation, authorities have done little to abate the flow of
roadway sediments into Pikes Peak waterways. Kicking up a little dust of its own,
the Rocky Mountain Chapter is now suing the Forest Service and Colorado Springs
for violating the Clean Water Act.
American Southwest: POLLUTER PREVENTION
Shin-Etsu Chemical Company boasts that it contributes to a better quality
of life. But the proposed polyvinyl chloride manufacturing plant of its
subsidiary, Shintech, Inc., would have the opposite effect in Convent, Louisiana.
Located in the industrial corridor known as Cancer Alley, the predominantly poor,
African-American community is already overburdened by toxic emissions. Thanks
to corporate coddling at the state's Department of Environmental Quality,
Shintech was licensed to disgorge an additional 625,000 pounds of filth into
Convent's air. The ensuing outcry from a broad coalition, including the Delta
Chapter, civil-rights groups, and residents, convinced the EPA to reject the
permits. The activists are now suing to shut out the PVC purveyor
permanently.
