Last week, I attended a dialogue session with Singapore's Minister for the Environment and Water Resources Dr Vivian Balakrishnan, which provided me with quite a number of interesting insights regarding environmental issues I thought would be good to share with everyone.
50 years ago, the world population was just 3.3bn, less than half of what it is today. This unpreceedented population increase took a huge toll on the earth resources, causing much of the environmental damage we see today. Although the good news is that we will never see such a drastic change in demographic patterns in future, the grim reality is that the past fifty years of development had been largely based on reaping the "low hanging fruit" of energy obtained from fossil-based sources. As we face mounting environmental challenges such as climate change today, we can no longer continue to rely on the environmentally-damaging fossil-based fuels, meaning that we would face huge challenges since there can be no more "low-hanging fruit" to pick from.
There has been universal recognition that environmental problems are planetary in nature, which no one government can solve. Hence a key question which arises in seeking to resolve environmental issues is: How can individuals and sovereign nations, which are fundamentally self-seeking entities, act with collecetive responsibility on environmental issues?
1. On recycling: although Singapore has a recycling rate of 58%, which might seem high, the bulk of recycling comes from industry, which means that household recycling in Singapore is very low. This is largely due to the lack of the practice of segregating household waste in Singapore. Most household waste comes from food, but incinerating food is highly inefficient because it is made out of 90% water, it should instead be reprocessed in a more efficient cycle. Similarly, paper should not be incinerated because it can be efficiently recycled with current technology. Electronic waste too should be recycled too as precious metals can be extrated from them. All in all, economic interests need to be aligned coorectly to increase recycling, which is a crucial step in reducing energy consumption.
2. The need to pay the real price for using fossil-based fuels: For the past fifty years, energy prices have actually been falling in real terms. Extensive energy subsidies have meant that the real cost of energy is not reflected. This is a wrong price structure because the cost of production is passed on to the environment, which only encourages businesses to cash in at the expense of the environment.
3. Carbon taxes: As a country which contributes less than 0.2% of global emissions, it would be futile for Singapore to unilaterally impose carbon taxes. However, collectively we can save the world. What is needed is a global, multilatercal rules-based system which makes the world conscious of the external consequences of our choices. Once the true cost of using fossil-based fuels is reflected, demand for clean energy sources will naturally increase.
4. Alternative energy: Currently, coal and oil, which we have supplies in excess of a hundred years for, are much cheaper to exploit than alternative energy. New unconventional oil and gas sources such as fracking have further increased the supply of conventional energy sources, which means that since they are cheaper, they will continue to be our dominant energy source. Crudely put, so long as fossil products remain cheaper than alternative energy, alternative energy will remain a hobby project.
5. Role of government in promoting alternative energy: Although government incentives for promoting alternative energy has had some success, they need to be distributed in a more fair way to prevent only a select few technologies receiving all the government perks. The government should support research and development of alternative energy so that these research may be exploited by the private sector. Governments should also be more transparent regarding energy policy and empower people with the choice to adopt greener lifestyles.
6. Role of non-government organisations: Increasingly, we are seeing governments being hampered in their response to environmental issues because of the political costs it migh t involve, thus solutions to these problems might require greater intervention from non-government organisations, which can push governments and businesses to do the right thing.
Finally, we all need to rethink our approaches to environmental issues, reprioritise our needs, and resolve to make the necessary sacrifices.
Karen Ramsay-Smith
25 Apr 2012 13:57
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Tags: Juniorcommission Video
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(An intimidated me throwing some bread crumbs far away so that the ducks/geese wouldnt come near me- but my strategy didn't work too long. Smart ducks/geese---) 
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