Author: Hafiz Noor Shams

For more about me, please read this.

Categories
Environment

[1460] Of increasing Malaysian emissions

When I saw this…:

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia: Carbon emissions in Malaysia have increased by 221 percent since 1990, the highest growth rate among the world’s top polluters, the United Nations said Thursday, as it urged the government to control climate-changing gases more vigorously.

Malaysia, which has rapidly transformed from an agricultural economy to an industrialized one in the last four decades, is now ranked the 26th largest emitter of greenhouse gases in the world, said Richard Leete, the regional representative for the United Nations Development Program. [Malaysian growth of carbon emissions highest in the world, says UN. IHT. November 29 2007]

…I was prepared to defend Malaysia. After all, it is likely for a country’s emissions to increase in spite of improving efficiency (decreasing carbon per some unit of measurement, or in other words, carbon intensity). An economy may expand while emissions per capita dropped due to technological progress. In this case, there is effort to reduce emissions through growth. Indeed, many developing countries such as that in western Europe are experiencing this trend.

But when I read that Malaysian carbon intensity of energy (amount of carbon emitted per some unit of energy; kt CO2 per kt of oil equivalent) and intensity of growth (carbon emitted per some unit of GDP;kt CO2 per million 2000 PPP USD) have increased from 2.44 to 3.13 and 0.56 to 0.76 respectively from 1990 to 2004, I decided to frown instead.

Anyway, the Human Development Index initiative under the United Nations Development Program has tables of data for abuse.

And, the Bali Summit on post-Kyoto climate change action starts tomorrow.

Categories
Activism Politics & government

[1459] Of letter to Titiwangsa MP

Dear Sir,

I am a resident in the area of Titiwangsa and I would like to thank you for the work you have done for the area so far. I have written to you before and I would greatly appreciate it if you could invest in some time to read this email.

I write to you to express my concern regarding a proposed amendment to Article 114 of the Constitution of Malaysia to extend the retirement age of EC members from 65 to 66 that is currently being discussed in the Parliament. I would like to kindly encourage you to vote no to the amendment.

The amendment is being proposed to accommodate one person at a particular point in time and nothing else. It is no accident that the current EC chairman Tan Sri Abdul Rashid Abdul Rahman is nearing his mandatory retirement age.

Amendments of this nature is very damaging to our country’s institutional structure. It gives the impression that our institution and our Constitution are easily made undone at a moment’s whim. I strongly feel that for any law to be respected, it shouldn’t be easily amended to suit a very short-term goal. It is hard to have respect for the law when the law is being formed, modified and unformed in a very discretionary manner. The Constitution is the document that governs us and it worries me that the Constitution is being considered for an amendment with clear disregard for the future in favor of instant gratification.

Greater consideration that firmly keeps a long term view on the integrity of our institution must prevail over any short-term amendment such as that in question.

I kindly hope you are able to agree with me and vote no to the amendment.

Thank you.

Kind regards,
Hafiz Noor Shams

Categories
Environment Politics & government

[1458] Of schism in environmentalism

From the authors of the The Death of Environmentalism:

Shellenberger and Nordhaus have now launched an effort to expand the frame of political environmentalism to encompass core American values. Earlier this year the dynamic duo issued a new book, Break Through: From the Death of Environmentalism to the Politics of Possibility, in which they attempt to outline a positive vision for the future. Shellenberger and Nordhaus identify an emerging faultline that they argue will divide the environmentalist movement of the 21st century. On one side stand the traditional anti-immigration, anti-globalization, and anti-growth greens. They believe these neo-Malthusians “will seek to establish and enforce the equivalent of an international caste system in which the poor of the developing world are consigned to energy poverty in perpetuity.” Eternal limits to growth for the already impoverished.

One the other hopeful side, according to Nordhaus and Shellenberger, stand “those who believe that there is room enough for all of us to live secure and free lives. It will be pro-growth, progressive, and internationalist.” Nordhaus and Shellenberger see this new positive environmentalism as embracing markets and technological innovation in order to create prosperity and protect the natural world. Central to their positive pro-growth version of environmentalism is the development of cheap low-carbon energy technologies. Not only will such technologies prevent dangerous global warming, but they will also lift billions of people out of poverty by the end of the century. But how to get there? [Techno-Optimistic Environmentalism. Reason Magazine. November 27 2007]

Yup. Red green and blue green.

But emerging? I have always taken it for granted, meaning it is already there, here, now and real.

Categories
Photography

[1457] Of green viper in the wild

Hmmm…

Some rights reserved. By Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams.

Sssssssnake…

Some rights reserved. By Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams.

Sssssss…

Categories
Liberty Politics & government

[1456] Of non-interventionist, not isolationist

I’m not an isolationism — an isolationist. I want to trade with people, talk with people, travel, but I don’t want… to send our troops overseas using force to tell them how to live. We would object to it here, and they’re going to object to us over there.

— Congressman Ron Paul during the November 28 2007 Republican Presidential Debate, in response to Senator John McCain.