Steps Towards An Ecosociety: Dealing With Air Pollution Essay -- essay

Steps Towards an Ecosociety: Dealing with Air Pollution This essay identifies and explains the problem of pollution facing humanity today. It will also propose one of the first ideas which could more effectively limit air pollution, Emission Credit Trading. This can be seen as one of the first steps in the development of an ecosociety. The notion of a viable ecosociety has created considerable problems in terms of deciding the most effective and efficient policies to be implemented. Air pollution has become one of the most serious environmental problems here at home, and throughout the rest of the world. Air pollution is also perhaps one of the more politically sensitive problems because of the numerous economic, environmental and health implications involved. A key step in the policy-making process is to define the problem to be remedied. If we can not understand the problem, how are we to know what needs to be fixed. Unfortunately, implementing policies on air pollution has the politically undesirable effect of having extensive economic consequences on all sectors of the economy. Therefore, those policies which lead to the development of an ecosociety must be aimed at having the greatest environmental impact while creating minimal economic distortions. For the purpose of this essay, pollution shall be identified as follows "...the deliberate or accidental introduction to the environment of contaminants, in the form of either wastes or products " (Bryner, 10). This essay will deal with the problem of air pollution. Air pollutants come from heavy industry, fumes from automobiles, jet planes and the like. When speaking of the automobile alone "...each gallon of gas burned releases 22 pounds of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere...the car is the single largest contributor to global warming " (Rifkin 179). Although the majority of the problem areas are in the developing world, these areas can affect the entire world. The atmosphere is not confined to borders like the land. Pollution spreads beyond the borders of any country, and as such, no one region can solve the problem alone. In some developing nations, there are areas that people and animals cannot live in for extended periods of time. One visitor to the Romanian 'black town' of Cops Mica noted that "the trees... ...eved, and the initial steps toward the ecosociety taken. Obviously this is not the ideal, having to put a price on the air we breath so as to ensure it's quality, but unfortunately it is the most viable option considering the social system in which we all live. Works Cited 1. Arnopoulos, P. Political Dimensions of an Information Society: A General Overview. Montreal: Gamma, 1982. 2. Bryner, G. ed. Global Warming and the Challenge of International Cooperation: An Interdisciplinary Assessment. Provo UT: Bringham Young University Press, 1992. 3. Gore, A. Biotechnology: Implications for Public Policy. Washington DC. : Brookings Institution, 1985. 4. Keller, E. Environmental Geology. Columbus: CE Merrill Publishing Co., 1985. 5. Mitchell, B. Canadian Resource Policies: Problems and Prospects. Toronto: Methuen, 1981. 6. Rifkin, E. Proteases and Biological Control. New York: Cold Spring Harbour Laboratory, 1975. 7. Saunders, DA Reintegrating Fragmented Landscapes: Towards Sustainable Production and Nature Conservation. New York: Springer-Verlag, 1993. 8. Vig, N and Kraft, M. Environmental Policy in the 1990's. Washington DC: C.Q. Press, 1990.