Saturday, September 19, 2009

Condoms Will Save The World, If Only We Let Them

According to a new study from the London School of Economics, eliminating unwanted pregnancies through family planning and contraception is four to five times more cost-effective than rolling out low-carbon technologies. Preventing unwanted pregancies (and the resulting overpopulation, which results in more environmental destruction and global warming) costs $7 per ton of carbon. Low-carbon energy sources go from wind at $24 per ton on up, for an average of $32 per ton.

Unfortunately, as Lydia DePillis notes, the Sierra Club and the Obama Administration are too nervous to talk about this, because family planning is controversial. Hurts to type that.

2 comments:

low-tech cyclist said...

It's a shame the Sierra Club was only enviro org that the reporter apparently interviewed. Would have been nice to see if they were the norm, or an outlier.

As far as the Obama Administration's concerned, I'd say the evidence is on their side on this one. As the WaPo article noted, it isn't just the number of births, it's where those births happen, that matters from a global-warming perspective: one U.S. birth projects to generate as much carbon as 91 additional births in Bangladesh.

So I can see why the Obama Administration would want to get our own act together on this issue before taking it on the road.

steve said...

Really a nice post and very informative.It will make people aware from the use of Condoms and importance of condoms.