Last year, even big business joined in with statements of concern. We in BP have reached that point. Browne said some months later that perhaps there was a place for carbon taxes, which, coming from a company which makes its money selling fossil fuels, was even more remarkable. In an article in UK magazine Green Futures, environmentalist Carl Frankel attributed the change in attitude of what he calls Big Oil to two main points. Another was the resolve not to let politics intrude on profits.
Climate change opens up a brand new universe of business opportunities.
Too much carbon in the air means less carbon pumped from underground and juiced up demands for solar, wind and other types of renewable energy. It is true there have been climate changes throughout time, but what makes people sit up and take notice of the current global warming is the rate and nature of the change. It is faster than past temperature changes, and is at least partially human-induced from the massive burning of coal and oil to produce electricity and to fuel vehicles. World Wide Fund for Nature's climate change campaigners say one of the significant features of this warming is that night-time minimum temperatures are rising faster than daytime maximum temperatures, which has huge implications for disease and human health. The document said warmer and sometimes wetter weather may already be extending the seasonal transmission and the range of infectious diseases such as malaria and dengue fever beyond regions where they are endemic and where inhabitants maintain some immunity.