Perhaps because the “other side” has spent thirty years fighting tooth and nail to stop even the most modest attempts to address the problem?
When people spend that long telling you what they want, it’s generally safe to believe them.
When people spend that long telling you what they want, it’s generally safe to believe them.
The hope is that these steps accumulate into something meaningful. A virtuous upward spiral.
If you wanted to reduce public pressure against fossil fuels you would instigate something exactly like a tree planting program.
Can I assume you are also opposed to straw and plastic bag bans? Unlike tree planting which at least does something, those bans are almost entirely worthless.
Now that Asian countries are introducing bans, we should start seeing slowing microplastic accumulation. Within a decade microplastic accumulation should peak. By then we'll have more efficient means of addressing microplastic pollution.
One point not often brought up is that microplastics in the ocean contribute to ocean temperature rise, since the plastics are able to retain (and thus radiate) more thermal energy. This one of the reasons the great garbage patches are hypoxic--warmer water holds less oxygen.
Or, if let's say the other side isn't working in good faith, they could then hold it up as "proof" they have done their part and ride that "effort" for another 30-40 years.
Sure there might be more disagreement down the road but any bipartisan action on climate change is better than none.
If I'm damned either way I'm going to go to hell doing as I please.
It's hard to know if climate change would even be an issue if protesters of the 70s, 80s, and 90s wouldn't have made any investment into nuclear power so difficult.