We love recycling.
We think people who take reusable mugs to coffee shops for their morning fix deserve a medal.
We offer a tip of the cap to those who eat food grown locally, eschewing plums from Chile.
There’s little doubt that screwing in energy-saving super-efficient light bulbs is a great thing.
And yet …
Laudatory as these individual actions may be, they’re not enough. Not even close, in fact. The planet won’t be saved by individual valor.
We need, rather, smart regulatory frameworks to attack carbon dioxide emissions at their source, even as all of us think of ways to “go green” in our own lives. We need, ultimately, Congress to act and deploy either a carbon tax or a cap-and-trade system to deal with climate change.
Washington moves according to its own logic, of course. And that’s why the Clean Power Ordinance, as advocates have dubbed a bill several aldermen are co-sponsoring in Chicago’s city council, is so important.
As we noted in our story this week, the bill targets particulate matter, a pollutant especially damaging to public health, and carbon dioxide, the pollutant responsible for climate change, spewed out by two power plants in Pilsen and Little Village.
Neither uses the most up-to-date technology to scrub out dangerous emissions, according to the Environmental Law and Policy Center.
The Clean Power Ordinance would tighten the screws on what’s allowed to come out of Fisk and Crawford. And if enacted, it would send a shot over the bow in support of a national climate change and pollution law.
Think about this as you’re out there on April 17, at the city’s annual clean and green day, raking mulch and tossing detritus.
Such days are great neighborhood unifiers and make communities look good as spring and summer unfold.
But unless we get a law like the Clean Power Ordinance — and eventually something from Washington — clean and greens aren’t enough.
If you see aldermen or their staff out there on April 17, tell them to support the Clean Power Ordinance.
Doubly lobby the mayor to that effect if he’s making the rounds this Saturday.
From:
http://www.chicagojournal.com/News/04-14-2010/Why_we_need_frameworks
