Hansen, dubbed by some as the “father of global warming,” has been connecting the dots between science and politics since his groundbreaking 1988 testimony to Congress about the greenhouse effect. In the last year, however, Hansen has gone far beyond talking about climate change. He’s now taking direct (personal) action to stop it. What keeps you up at night in terms of the climate?
The fact that the solutions to this problem actually make sense – they add many other benefits – we just have to make that clear. Of course, there are special financial interests that would be harmed unless they start investing their money differently, but for the general public, it actually makes sense to move more rapidly beyond fossil fuels. Energy companies, energy departments, not just the United States, just take it as the God-given fact that we’re going to burn all the fossil fuels. In fact, that doesn’t make sense from the standpoint of the public or the planet. We really should leave the larger part of the remaining fossil fuels in the ground, and that means especially coal and unconventional fossil fuels. We just have not succeeded in communicating what I think is clear scientifically. So that’s why I keep working so many hours per week – to try to help make that clear. source: Nell Greenberg is a communications manager at Rainforest Action Network.

As St. Maarten is now fully dependable on oil it would be very wise to think (finally) about an integral energy policy including a transport policy as well as a change in the Gebe organization to deal with the future of alternative energy. Perhaps we should change the board first as this board has never taken any known innovative initiative to adopt to the changes that are taken place around us.