In Santa Maria, Lompoc, and many other areas of the country, Earth Day was observed a couple of weeks ago as it has been for several decades. It originated in 1970 to recognize and encourage world peace and honor the Earth. In more than 50 years, is the Earth doing any better peacefully or environmentally?
Since then, Santa Barbara has become an unchallenged leader in trying to control the environment through regulation, intimidation, and activism. All the environmentalists seemed to have accomplished is to drive productive, tax-paying businesses out of the county. The ozone levels are about the same as they have always been, a fact explained away by claiming it’s ships passing by that dirty the air.
Their “fact” discounts the real fact that UCSB researchers report that “for thousands of years, oil and natural gas have erupted from natural marine hydrocarbon seeps in the depths of the Santa Barbara Channel.”
Did you notice that in the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic when virtually all traffic stopped in California for weeks that the air didn’t get any cleaner? Maybe it wasn’t the fumes emitted from automobiles, trucks, and industrial plants that caused air pollution. Could it be a natural occurrence instead? Maybe our scientists should look for other causes instead of grabbing the low-hanging fruit.
Have you noticed that since a concerted effort, heavily emphasized through regulation by government, to “reduce greenhouse gas emissions” that coincidentally weather patterns have changed and forests are dying? Could it be that tinkering with an environment that flourishes on carbon dioxide only worsens the situation? Have you noticed that during the effort to reduce emissions that our water supply in California has been significantly reduced?
Concerning the reduction of emissions, did you know that the smoke/ash plume from one eruption of a volcano, according to the Centers for Disease Control, “can result in additional threats to health, such as floods, mudslides, power outages, drinking water contamination, and wildfires. Health concerns after a volcanic eruption include infectious disease, respiratory illness, burns, injuries from falls, and vehicle accidents related to the slippery, hazy conditions caused by ash.”
And the United States Geological Survey says, “Volcanic gases like sulfur dioxide can cause global cooling, while volcanic carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas, has the potential to promote global warming. The most significant climate impacts from volcanic injections into the stratosphere come from the conversion of sulfur dioxide to sulfuric acid, which condenses rapidly in the stratosphere to form fine sulfate aerosols.”
“The aerosols increase the reflection of radiation from the sun back into space, cooling the Earth’s lower atmosphere or troposphere. Several eruptions during the past century have caused a decline in the average temperature at the Earth’s surface of up to half a degree (Fahrenheit scale) for periods of one to three years.”
And as urban planners and environmentalists use “high density housing” to help save the planet, they only create other problems. When you pack people into even tighter living conditions, they tend to get on each other’s nerves. How about stopping illegal immigration into our country as a way of reducing the human footprint in our nation?
And as environmentally sensitive politicians increase energy saving regulatory pressure on the housing industry, have you noticed that the dream of owning your own home/condo is just that, a dream for low- and middle-income families?
The idle rich in Montecito, “save the Earth” hypocrites all, fund environmentalist efforts from their resource-gobbling mega-mansions. From there they preach their conservation and environment-cleansing blather. They fund the election of politicians who will adhere to their version of how others should live.
Did you notice that even the most ardent/hypocritical supporters of “saving the environment” still enjoy the pleasure provided by the exploitation of the very environment they are trying to save? They all drive or are driven in gasoline/diesel-powered vehicles; fly in fossil-fuel-guzzling jet airplanes to and from conferences that support the elimination of fossil fuel; and use hundreds of products in their daily lives that are produced using fossil fuels.
Have you ever heard of just one Green New Deal advocate giving up their cellphone? Or for that matter trying to live without anything associated with fossil fuel for just one day? Nope, they’ll just go on ranting, raving, and creating new regulations that raise the price of everything out of reach for the average person.
Meanwhile, many of their efforts—including wind farms, such as the one being built in Miguelito Canyon south of Lompoc, and solar farms—create damage to a wide area of the land and eliminate habitat for sensitive and endangered species. But that doesn’t matter and is explained away in environmental impact reports as necessary because of the “overriding consideration” that the value of the project is far more important than the loss of some critters and plants
So I say instead of focusing on the evil fossil fuel industry, how about helping clean the environment by ridding it of homeless camps and the blight they create.
Ron Fink writes to the Sun from Lompoc. Send your thoughts, comments, and opinionated letters to letters@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in May 6-13, 2021.