Climate change: How many warnings do we need?

We have “at most two decades to save the world”.

Mary Robinson’s stark and unambiguous warning came just as the possibility of hundreds of millions in European Commission pollution fines came into public view. If Ms Robinson’s warning pointed to an immediate danger to humanity, or at least the lifestyles we take for granted, the EU fines reminded us of some of our least attractive, self-destructive national characteristics — our reluctance to face up to reality or observeessential, life-protecting social regulations.

The commission may impose backbreaking levies because we continue to fall short on obligations to cut greenhouse gas emissions. This warning, primarily a consequence of farm animals’ capacity to produce dangerous gases, comes less than a year before milk quota limits are lifted and plans to double the size of the national herd become a reality. Already, Irish agriculture is the world’s biggest producer of methane gas after New Zealand, so next year’s expansion represents a significant environmental challenge.