In October 2007, James E. Hansen testified with regard to an application to build a new coal-burning plant in Iowa.  Hanson is the Director of the Goddard Institute for Space Studies and senior scientist in the Columbia University Earth Institute.  He said some harsh things about our substantial dependence on coal:

Global warming from continued burning of more and more fossil fuels poses clear dangers for the planet and for the planet’s present and future inhabitants. Coal is the largest contributor to the human-made increase of CO2 in the air. Saving the planet and creation surely requires phase-out of coal use except where the CO2 is captured and sequestered (stored in one of several possible ways).

Hundreds of millions of people live less than 20 feet above sea level. Thus the number of people affected would be 1000 times greater than in the New Orleans Katrina disaster. Although Iowa would not be directly affected by sea level rise, repercussions would be worldwide. Ice sheet tipping points and disintegration necessarily unfold more slowly than tipping points for sea ice, on time scales of decades to centuries, because of the greater inertia of thick ice sheets. But that inertia is not our friend, as it also makes ice sheet disintegration more difficult to halt once it gets rolling. Moreover, unlike sea ice cover, ice sheet disintegration is practically irreversible . . .

The biologist E.O. Wilson (2006) explains that the 21st century is a “bottleneck” for species, because of extreme stresses

How can we save up to 6% of our total electricity usage? Dry our clothes outside--hang them on clothes lines.  Unless the neighbors try to interfere, as described by this article from Time Magazine.  Yes, there are people who want to do their part to lower their carbon footprint. But…