Climate Change and The

OPINION Georgia (who chaired the Senate Com- eration treaty. Thirteen other nations mittee on Armed Services) have all re- have terminated active nuclear weapons THE EDITORS’ BL8G cently argued for the elimination of such programs. Even the cantankerous Liby- For more posts from SciAm Observa- weapons. As arms-control experts note, an leader Mu‘ammar Muhammad al- tions, see www.SciAm.com/blog if the U.S. thinks it needs new nuclear Gadhafi announced in 2003 that his weapons, then it is easy for other coun- country would end its program. A high- Emotions Recalled in the Sea tries to believe that they are in need of profi le cut in the U.S. arsenal could re- of Tranquility them, too. capture some of the moral high ground Posted by George Musser, Sept. 5, 2007 Antiproliferation efforts have suc- that antiproliferation efforts thrive on, Last night I saw a preview of In the Shadow ceeded frequently. In the 1980s South without eroding the nation’s ability to of the Moon, the new feature-length docu- Africa built six nuclear bombs, then dis- assuredly destroy any country that mentary about the Apollo moon landings. I mantled them and joined the nonprolif- would attack it. g admit it: I’m a space buff. But I think the movie will appeal even to people who aren’t. Its innovation is to explore the emotions of the astronauts, recalled after nearly four Sustainable Developments decades of refl ection. What emerges defi es the stereotype of laconic test-pilot jocks. Here was a group of men, chosen for grace under pressure, who Climate Change were profoundly moved by their experiences. You feel they could be your own grandfathers, with all their warmth and idiosyncrasies. The and the Law fi lmmaker, David Sington, captures them with a simple style of documentary fi lmmaking, a Even the Bush administration has started to recognize perfect antidote to the age of irony: no com- U.S. legal obligations to fi ght global warming puter graphics, no opinionated or golly-gee- B Y JEFFREY D. SACHS whiz narration—just the astronauts, in their own words, and the NASA footage, unadorned. Global negotiations on forward any meaningful stabilization Today I sat in on a series of roundtable stabilizing greenhouse strategy in its place. One of the most interviews with Buzz Aldrin (Apollo 11), Alan gas emissions in the pe- shocking aspects of the U.S. failure has Bean (12), Edgar Mitchell (14) and Charlie Duke (16). What a pleasure to meet people riod after 2012 will been the country’s disregard for both in- who are humbled by their celebrity and can commence in Bali in ternational and domestic law. Yet this never quite get over the fact that anyone December. The main lawlessness looks set to change. cares what they did. Mitchell said he wel- emitters— including In recent years the unilateralist for- comed the opportunity the fi lm gave him to Brazil, Canada, China, the European eign policy of the U.S. government has rethink what the events meant to him: “I was Union, India, Mexico, South Africa and shamelessly ignored or contravened too busy at the time to think about how I the U.S.—have recently affi rmed their countless aspects of international law, felt.” Aldrin says that dealing with emotions commitment to reach a “comprehensive ranging from the Geneva convention to will be one of the great challenges of the agreement” in these negotiations. They multilateral environmental treaties to space program as it plans to set up long-term have also promised which the U.S. is a bases on the moon and eventually Mars: to contribute their signatory. “The compatibility of people together may The Supreme Court be our most serious obstacle to success.” “fair share” to stabi- struck down This brazenness lize greenhouse gas- has infected the very To be sure, the fi lm had its weak points. all the EPA’s defenses It neglects the engineers and other behind- es to prevent “dan- core of policy dis- the-scenes guys who made the mission pos- gerous anthropo- for inaction. cussions in our sible. The close-up shots of the astronauts’ genic interference country. Consider faces are charming at fi rst, but by the ump- with the climate system.” an opinion piece by two distinguished teenth time I found them a little tiresome. Of course, one of the biggest obsta- professors of law at the University of There’s also an awkward beat when John cles, if not the very biggest, to such an in- Chicago, who argued in the Financial Young claims Gus Grissom said he was ternational agreement has been the U.S. Times on August 5 that the U.S. has no afraid to complain about poor wiring in the itself. The U.S. not only has failed to rat- obligations to control greenhouse gases Apollo 1 capsule, for fear the agency would ify the Kyoto Protocol—the internation- and that if other countries don’t like how continued on page 42 al framework to limit emissions up to the U.S. behaves, they might think about the year 2012—but also has failed to put paying the U.S. to cut its emissions. INSTITUTE GILBERT/EARTH BRUCE 38 SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN November 2007 OPINION Stunningly, the B. Bellinger III, a legal adviser to the ing part of the state’s coastline; and that law professors com- State Department, recently empha- the state was vulnerable to considerably pletely neglected sized the administration’s commit- greater coastal losses this century if cli- that the U.S. is al- ment to international law and re- mate change is not mitigated. Moreover, it ready bound to take ferred to its allegiance to a post-2012 emphasized that mitigating U.S. auto steps to stabilize green- climate change framework in that emissions would have a meaningful effect house gases in the atmo- context. on the pace of climate change. sphere under the United The Supreme Court also The obligation to limit greenhouse gas Nations Framework Con- weighed in recently to af- emissions is therefore already the law of vention on Climate Change, fi rm that U.S. domes- the land, and it’s high time we began re- signed by President George H. tic law compels specting those laws. We should do so not W. Bush and ratifi ed by the Senate in stronger federal ac- only because it is important that we honor 1992. Their claim that the U.S. has no tion to mitigate cli- our legal commitments but because we duty to avoid damaging the climate of mate change. Massa- made those commitments for reasons of others is fl atly contradicted by the Con- chusetts, among a our own survival and well-being. Even an vention, which declares in its preamble number of plaintiffs, administration that has dragged its feet that “in accordance with the Charter of sued the Environmental for seven years is fi nally beginning to face the United Nations and the principles of Protection Agency for its that reality. g international law…. [States have] the re- failure to regulate the emission of carbon sponsibility to ensure that activities with- dioxide by automobiles. The court fi rmly Jeffrey D. Sachs is director of the in their jurisdiction or control do not struck down all the EPA’s defenses for in- Earth Institute at Columbia University cause damage to the environment of oth- action: it noted that the EPA is obliged to (www.earth.columbia.edu). er States or areas beyond the limits of na- regulate any deleterious pollutant emitted tional jurisdiction.” by motor vehicles; that carbon dioxide Ironically, those law professors are clearly falls within that category; that An expanded version of running away from international law even Massachusetts had standing to sue be- this essay is available at www.SciAm.com/ontheweb faster than the Bush administration. John cause climate change was already claim- COLLINS MATT Forum Don’t Wreck the Mars Program Devoting all the funding to just one mission would be a mistake BY ROBERT ZUBRIN In the mid-1990s the U.S. opportunities come every two years or so, Subsequent missions are in jeopardy, embarked on a new strat- when Earth and Mars are properly however. Alan Stern, associate administra- egy for exploring the aligned.) The new strategy spread out the tor for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, Red Planet. In response inherent risk of interplanetary travel and warned in July that at least one of the fu- to the 1993 failure of the ensured that the engineering experience ture Mars probes may have to be scrapped Mars Observer mission— and scientifi c data acquired by one mission to free up funding for a much costlier mis- a billion-dollar, decade-in-the-making could be rapidly used by the next. The ap- sion, tentatively scheduled for the 2018– probe that mysteriously lost contact with proach has proved a brilliant success, put- 2020 period, that would collect samples of ground controllers just before it was sched- ting three NASA spacecraft into orbit Martian rock and bring them to Earth. uled to go into orbit around the planet— around Mars and three rovers on the plan- Moreover, highly placed scientists and NASA administrator Daniel Goldin decid- et’s surface (Pathfi nder, Spirit and Oppor- program leaders report that the new plan ed to shift to smaller, less expensive space- tunity). The Phoenix Mars Lander, which may actually require the sacrifi ce of all craft and create a sustained exploration left Earth in August, is expected to reach other Mars spacecraft after 2009.

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