Climate change is an existential threat and no matter how many times climate change deniers try to tell you that it’s some kind of liberal hoax, it is real and if we humans don’t’ decide to do something to mitigate it, one day it will make us pay.
This news will not be welcomed by many. What I have to say next will be even less welcomed. Climate change doesn’t care a whit about national borders. No border wall will stand in its way. What happens in a “foreign country” impacts everyone no matter what side of the border they live on.
Cross border impacts of climate-affecting actions is not new, by the way. Until the 1980s, Canada suffered from acid rain, in large part due to pollution from US factories south of Canada’s border. In June 2023, Canada struck back—unintentionally. Over 2,000 wildfires (15 times the usual average) that burned nearly 11 million acres of forest in Canada, filled the skies with smoke that drifted as far south in the US as the Carolinas, creating a haze that forced cancellation of many outdoor activities along the East Coast, and had people wearing masks to go outside.
I live in Frederick, Maryland, a modest-sized city some 40 miles north of Washington, DC, and over 400 miles from the Canadian border. When I went outside on June 8, for my normal morning walk along the Monocacy River, the haze was so thick I thought there was a forest fire nearby.
There wasn’t. According to the morning weather report, the unusually thick and somewhat noxious smelling haze was a result of forest fires in Canada of all places. There were bad air alerts from New York to North Carolina, with people cautioned to stay inside in most areas around us because the particles in the air posed a severe health hazard to the very young, the very old, and people with pre-existing health conditions.
The cross-border fallout from pollution and climate change is not limited to health issues. There are diplomatic consequences as well. When I was being considered for appointment as American ambassador to Cambodia, my nomination was held up in the Senate by the delegation of one of our states that borders Canada who wanted our State Department to pressure the Canadians to allow us to drain a polluted lake near the border, which unfortunately would have sent the polluted water into Canada.
The Canadians, quite rightly, said ‘no way,’ and I was left in limbo for several weeks until wiser heads in the political establishment prevailed and the hold was lifted I learned later that the state took unilateral action which caused just what the Canadians feared and the whole thing ended up in court cases, diplomatic wrangling, and with everything else occupying my mind, I lost track of it. But, I still remember it whenever the subject of pollution crossing borders comes up.
Those who try to deny climate change, or ignore it (and I’m not sure which is more dangerous) need to pay attention. Our pollution can hurt others and their pollution can hurt us. Kind of makes you think that maybe we should all start cooperating to fix things, doesn’t it? – NWI
