It is unrealistic to expect individual nations to make, independently, the sacrifices necessary to conserve energy. International leadership and worldwide cooperation are essential if we expect to protect the world's energy resources for future generations."
Discuss the extent to which you agree or disagree with the opinion stated above. Support your views with reasons and/or examples from your own experience, observations, or reading.
Many people feel that international leadership and worldwide cooperation are essential to protect the world's energy resources for future generations.On the other hand, there are critics who feel that, despite the international leadership and worldwide cooperation, it all rests on the individual nation to anticipate the scarcity of the resources for future generations and act accordingly. In this discussion I shall present arguments favoring the former statement while refuting the latter.
It is my belief that ,despite the sacrifices made by the nations to conserve energy, International leadership and worldwide cooperation are indeed essential to protect the world's energy resources for future generations.The war between US and Iraq for the oil resources is a classic example to show what the lack of mutual cooperation between the nations could do to the energy resources of a nation, not to mention, its safety.
Anticipating the problems likely faced by the future generations, Iraq, one of the leading oil exporters in the world, took a step to conserve the oil resources by passing "Oil cunsumption" act in 1992. This act stated that no private firm could use more oil resources than required and that every ton of oil used by the firm be properly documented. These documents,
inturn, were used to tax the firms based on their oil comsumption. As soon as the act was passed, many firms started to reduce their oil consumption. The nation also took more intiatives to reduce the oil consumption, and one among those was the refusal to supply the oil resources to US. US, due to the increasing demand for oil resources, waged a war on Iraq for oil resources and finally Iraq had to surrender.Though Iraq tried to conserve energy by even sacrificing the revenue from
the oil resources by the private firms,lack of mutual cooperation between Iraq and US costed Iraq not only its oil resources but also the valuable nation's assests in terms of lost lives and military resources.
International leadership is also as important as, if not, more than, the worldwide cooperation to protect the world's energy resources for future generations. We can prove this point by studying the wastage of nuclear resources by Russia(then USSR) before and after 1981, when four largest producers of the nuclear energy, US, India, Japan and Russia took a stand and formed an organization to control the nuclear experiments conducted by different nations across the world. In 1978, USSR started a series of experiments to produce nuclear energy to show its upper hand over all of the other countries in terms of nuclear resources. But these experiments backfired, and the nation lost 58.4b$ and many lives due to nuclear pollution created by the experiments. Concerned and agitated by the irresponsible act of USSR, the then four largest producers of nuclear energy formed an organization that not only prevented these kind of acts but also set an example to the other nations in terms of the best usage of the nuclear energy.
In sum, though the individual nation makes sacrifices to conserver energy, if not properly cooperated and leaded, these sacrifices will be futile and a day may come when the nations stop trying to conserve the energy and when the expectations of these nations to make sacrifices
will indeed be "unrealistic".
Discuss the extent to which you agree or disagree with the opinion stated above. Support your views with reasons and/or examples from your own experience, observations, or reading.
Many people feel that international leadership and worldwide cooperation are essential to protect the world's energy resources for future generations.On the other hand, there are critics who feel that, despite the international leadership and worldwide cooperation, it all rests on the individual nation to anticipate the scarcity of the resources for future generations and act accordingly. In this discussion I shall present arguments favoring the former statement while refuting the latter.
It is my belief that ,despite the sacrifices made by the nations to conserve energy, International leadership and worldwide cooperation are indeed essential to protect the world's energy resources for future generations.The war between US and Iraq for the oil resources is a classic example to show what the lack of mutual cooperation between the nations could do to the energy resources of a nation, not to mention, its safety.
Anticipating the problems likely faced by the future generations, Iraq, one of the leading oil exporters in the world, took a step to conserve the oil resources by passing "Oil cunsumption" act in 1992. This act stated that no private firm could use more oil resources than required and that every ton of oil used by the firm be properly documented. These documents,
inturn, were used to tax the firms based on their oil comsumption. As soon as the act was passed, many firms started to reduce their oil consumption. The nation also took more intiatives to reduce the oil consumption, and one among those was the refusal to supply the oil resources to US. US, due to the increasing demand for oil resources, waged a war on Iraq for oil resources and finally Iraq had to surrender.Though Iraq tried to conserve energy by even sacrificing the revenue from
the oil resources by the private firms,lack of mutual cooperation between Iraq and US costed Iraq not only its oil resources but also the valuable nation's assests in terms of lost lives and military resources.
International leadership is also as important as, if not, more than, the worldwide cooperation to protect the world's energy resources for future generations. We can prove this point by studying the wastage of nuclear resources by Russia(then USSR) before and after 1981, when four largest producers of the nuclear energy, US, India, Japan and Russia took a stand and formed an organization to control the nuclear experiments conducted by different nations across the world. In 1978, USSR started a series of experiments to produce nuclear energy to show its upper hand over all of the other countries in terms of nuclear resources. But these experiments backfired, and the nation lost 58.4b$ and many lives due to nuclear pollution created by the experiments. Concerned and agitated by the irresponsible act of USSR, the then four largest producers of nuclear energy formed an organization that not only prevented these kind of acts but also set an example to the other nations in terms of the best usage of the nuclear energy.
In sum, though the individual nation makes sacrifices to conserver energy, if not properly cooperated and leaded, these sacrifices will be futile and a day may come when the nations stop trying to conserve the energy and when the expectations of these nations to make sacrifices
will indeed be "unrealistic".
