New Studies Find that the Same Tools that Empower Women also Combat Climate Change
Posted October 12, 2010 in Health and the Environment, Solving Global Warming
As the mother of three daughters, I am routinely reminded of how important it is for women to make informed decisions about their health, their families, and their future.
The conditions and opportunities we have in the U.S. are not the same worldwide. According to international development experts, women who do not have access to basic health education, including information on contraceptives, are more vulnerable to poverty and illness. Women who are empowered through education enjoy greater human rights and better health.
Now two new studies have identified yet another benefit of empowering women: reduced global warming pollution.
According to research done by the National Center for Atmospheric Research and the Futures Group, simply by giving women the tools to plan the size and timing of their families, population growth will slow and global carbon emissions will be reduced by between 8 and 15 percent—the equivalent of stopping all deforestation today.
This is an extraordinary proposition. Empowering women to make critical decisions in their own lives can also contribute significantly to solving the biggest environmental and humanitarian challenge of our time.
It also gives women a weapon to combat a major threat to their own survival. Studies show that women are 14 times more likely to die as a result of storms and other extreme weather as men.
As my NRDC colleague Kim Knowlton has described on her blog, women are at greater risk because they comprise an estimated 70 percent of those living below the poverty line around the globe. Women also tend to be the caregivers for children, the elderly, and the infirm, which means they bear the heaviest burdens in times of emergency.
Women are on the frontlines of the climate crisis. As the papers released today illustrate, the same tools that enhance women’s health, economic power, and human rights will also help them combat the risks of climate change.
In this way, the papers present an intriguing model for helping to improve lives while at the same time curbing carbon emissions. They offer another arrow in the quiver. They are also timely, as they will inform the review NRDC is currently undertaking on our potential reengagement on the complex, sensitive questions of population, consumption, and the environment.
But make no mistake—we still must press the world’s leader in government and business to make comprehensive changes to the way we produce energy and transport ourselves. We must advance the most effective solutions, including shifting to renewable energy, investing in efficiency, finding more sustainable ways to power our vehicles, and preventing deforestation. Yet as we do, we can also engage the world’s women as a potent force for change.
In her compelling synthesis of the new research papers, Kavita Ramdas writes, “Investing in women has already been demonstrated to be a primary strategy to ensure the health, safety, and development of societies. We may now find that it is also an essential way to safely steward mother earth through some of her most challenging crises.”
Fittingly, Ramdas entitled her piece, “What Is Good for Women Is Good for the Planet.”
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Comments
Jim Bullis, Miastrada Company — Oct 13 2010 03:07 PM
For those who want to alleviate climate concerns, the following should be interesting:
Standing Forests Solve Global Warming At No Cost
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The game winning answer to global warming is to create standing forests, where every ton of newly existing forest mass, on a sustaining basis, compensates by CO2 capture for the burning of a ton of coal, approximately. Key to this solution is distribution of water in North America on a continental basis.
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I have been dismayed by promotion of electric vehicles with implicit increased use of electricity and the associated increase in CO2. Viable, large scale solutions to this problem have been absent. But I have been shocked by the planning put forward by the US EPA ** regarding 'carbon' capture and sequestration (CCS), where the capture cost burden per ton of coal used would be up to $180-$320. This would be for capture of CO2 only, with additional costs for transportation and pumping it into caverns being not addressed, but acknowledged as additional expense.
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Thus motivated, I looked for a better solution, and found that China seems to have taken the lead over our environmentalists in this very practical matter. A year ago, in a speech about how China was planning to react to the global warming problem, President Hu spoke of "forest carbon". ***
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It is not a big step to think that this kind of solution would be possible in North America, Brazil perhaps, and other places yet to be identified. It is a big step to think big about water distribution that would be needed to accomplish CCS on the needed scale, but in North America this is within reach, with the action of wise government assumed. Of course there would be a need for due diligence in protecting Northern ecosystems, as well as due deference to rights of others. The goal of CO2 mitigation is not just our concern, so there would seem to be motivation for Canada to lend their essential support to such a project.
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Every ton of forest mass, that exists on a sustaining basis, sequesters CO2 sufficiently to compensate for the burning of a ton of coal, approximately. As it grows, it captures that CO2 from the atmosphere. Mature forests must be maintained and harvested wisely, and new forests must continue to grow.
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Using minimally productive land in selected regions, a fifty year project should be possible, where fifty years of coal fired power plant operation would be supported. In this time we would need to solve the problems of nuclear waste, so that there could be an eventual transition to that form of energy. During this fifty years, we would also need to work toward minimizing the amount of energy needed for our vehicles.
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This forest project, along with ancillary agricultural development, would be quickly self supporting. We know about the agricultural results from the latest California Aquaduct project implemented in 1963 through the California Central Valley. The forest part would be something new.
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The immediate benefit of such a project would be high quantity job creation, but up front investment in the permanent forest infrastructure would be repaid over the long term of highly productive operation. A large cadre of trained workers for forest management, a large expansion of agricultural operations, and a long term flow of export products would lift us from our current employment debacle.
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We see this as a public project that should appeal to all political strains, since it would create a backbone infrastructure that would set the stage for use of energy to continue functioning of our developed world without damage to the global environment.
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Implementing such a concept would require much detail in its actual design, but feasibility in general is not in question. This would be a massive federal project that must be handled by government, both in regard to international water negotiations and financial arrangements.
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Is there a political force that can handle such a project?
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** The announced plan by the EPA is to require 'best available technology' and the recent report by them (Sept 2010) said 'carbon' capture would cost up to $95 per ton of CO2. Working this out in terms of the burden on the use of a ton of coal shows that the burden for use of a ton of Powder River Basin coal (half the element carbon by weight) will be about $180 per ton of that coal, and higher carbon coal would incur proportionately higher burden, up to around $320 per ton.
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*** President Hu said, “— we will energetically increase forest carbon — we will endeavor to increase forest coverage by 40 million hectares and forest stock volume by 1.3 billion cubic meters by 2020 from 2005 levels.” ( This was reported by Joe Romm at his ‘climateprogress’ web site. See – http://climateprogress.org/2009/09/23/are-chinese-emissions-pledges-a-game-changer-for-senate-action-president-hu-un-speech/ )