 On Point Vincent Carroll, editor of the editorial pages, writes his On Point column most weekdays. He is also an author and freelance writer. Reach Vincent Carroll at carrollv@RockyMountainNews.com. |
Carroll: Green uncertainties
It’s been so dry up in Montana recently, remarked Brandon Scarborough when I reached him Monday in Bozeman, that the forests there may be emitting as much carbon as they’re storing. If that sounds like an odd thing to say, you need to know that Scarborough just wrote a paper titled “Trading Forest Carbon: A Panacea or Pipe Dream to Address Climate Change?” that was the reason for my phone call.
“Some researchers have concluded that large-scale forestry projects in the United States have the potential to sequester roughly one-third of annual domestic (carbon dioxide) emissions,” Scarborough noted in his report. Yet his analysis of the scientific literature fails to bear this out. Far from it. “Assuming that all 116 million acres of land suitable for forest growth . . . . were planted . . . . the new forests would offset approximately 7.5 percent of annual emissions,” this economist at the Property and Environment Research Center concluded.
Sounds as if planting new forests to offset carbon emissions is neither a panacea nor a pipe dream. Scarborough agrees, up to a point. But he thinks green-minded investors — especially those who casually purchase “carbon offsets” involving forestry plans — need to be aware of the immense uncertainties involved.
A credible market in carbon offsets depends, first of all, on realistic estimates, which are not so easy to come by. Forests in different regions don’t even soak up carbon at the same rate. Meanwhile, the projects have to be closely monitored for decades to ensure that their owners don’t cheat by failing to report fire, disease, logging and other disturbances.
“In the end,” he writes, “given the costs and uncertainties of commodifying forest carbon, future risks of carbon losses, and the unlikely event that forestry will play a significant role in a national emissions reduction program, one has to ask: Is it really worth it?”
It so happens that tropical forests build up carbon stocks at much faster rates than forests in temperate climates. But, of course, the long-term uncertainties for forestry projects in most equatorial nations are even greater than they are here.
Memo to the Times: Huh?
When government researchers asked men convicted of downloading child pornography if they’d ever abused kids sexually, 85 percent said yes, according to an unpublished study revealed last week by The New York Times.
Big news, obviously. Many kiddie porn fans are not just depraved, it turns out, they’re active predators. But wait: Such a conclusion is much too simple for the Times, whose story shifted to what may be the strangest paragraph published anywhere this year.
“Yet others say that the results, while significant, risk tarring some men unfairly,” the article said. “The findings, based on offenders serving prison time who volunteered for the study, do not necessarily apply to the large and diverse group of adults who have at some point downloaded child pornography, and whose behavior is far too variable to be captured by a single survey.”
The “large and diverse group of adults who have at some point downloaded child pornography” are lawbreakers who stoke the demand for a product that can be created only by exploiting, abusing and traumatizing children — but by all means, let’s not “risk tarring” them “unfairly.”
Vincent Carroll is editor of the editorial pages. Reach Vincent Carroll at carrollv@RockyMountain
News.com.
Vince,
Not ALL kiddy porn fanciers are child molesters, but almost 9 out of ten of those IN PRISON are. There is a difference between these two groups.
Viewing child pornography is bad; molesting children is worse.
That you would pick on another newspaper when the distinction the author was making is clear is just a symptom of the inferiority complex you have from publishing such a pathetic opinion page.
Posted by Carroll's a putz on July 24, 2007 01:20 PMSee that. Vince has the audacity to take on that treasured gem of liberals - the New York Times - and the invective flows. So much for tolerant and "liberal" discourse.
Posted by CC on July 24, 2007 02:27 PMTo Carroll's a putz -
you're the putz! You obviously do not understand that in order for these people to view child pornorgraphy, somebody has had to make it, thus molesting children in the process - how does this minimize viewing the porn a lesser offense than creating it? If there is a demand there will be more supply and therefor more violated children.
You sir are the pathetic one.