Portal:Energy/Quotes

Quotes - Group 1

• "We must not waste time and energy disputing the IPCC's report or debating the right machinery for making progress. The International Panel's work should be taken as our sign post: and the United Nations Environment Programme and the World Meteorological Organisation as the principal vehicles for reaching our destination." – Margaret Thatcher, 1990
• "The Kyoto treaty would have wrecked our economy, if I can be blunt." – George W. Bush, 2005
• "We strongly believe that the efforts needed to combat climate change do not have to be regarded as constraints on the economy. Instead, they can be used as a lever for new, green technology." – Maud Olofsson, 2007

Quotes - Group 2

• "My administration is committed to a leadership role on the issue of climate change. We recognize our responsibility and will meet it - at home, in our hemisphere, and in the world." – George W. Bush, 2001
• "While the Kyoto Protocol is a crucial step forward, that step is far too small. And as we consider how to go further still, there remains a frightening lack of leadership." – Kofi Annan, 2006
• "It is going to be very difficult to keep temperature increases down to between 2 and 3 degrees centigrade [3.6 - 5.4°F]. We should work very hard to do that." – Nicholas Stern, 2006
• "Halting global warming requires urgent, unprecedented international cooperation, but the needed actions are feasible and have additional benefits for human health, agriculture and the environment." – James E. Hansen, 2004

Quotes - Group 3

• "In recent years, new nations have entered enthusiastically into industrial production, thereby increasing their energy needs. This has led to an unprecedented race for available resources. Meanwhile, some parts of the planet remain backward and development is effectively blocked, partly because of the rise in energy prices. What will happen to those peoples?" – Pope Benedict XVI, 2007
• "In order to prevent the harmful consequences that crude oil price volatility is having on the well-being of our people, it is urgent that we convene a World Leaders Summit to present alternative solutions to this serious problem, which could quite possibly be a significant shock to the prosperity of developing nations." – Leonel Fernández, 2005

Quotes - Group 4

• "Our children will enjoy in their homes electrical energy too cheap to meter." – Lewis Lichtenstein Strauss, 1954
• "There is every possibility that you will soon be able to tax it." – Michael Faraday, talking to William Gladstone on the future purpose of electricity.
• "Higher energy prices act like a tax. They reduce the disposable income people have available for other things after they've paid their energy bills." – John W. Snow, 2005
• "Our dependence on foreign energy is like a foreign tax on the American people." – George W. Bush, 2005

Quotes - Group 5

• "There are only two ways to stabilize concentration of greenhouse gases. One is to avoid emitting them in the first place; the other is to try to capture them after they're created. And there are problems with both approaches." – George W. Bush, 2001
• "The planet has a fever. If your baby has a fever you go to the doctor. If the doctor says you need to intervene here, you don't say, 'Well, I read a science fiction novel that told me it's not a problem.' If the crib's on fire, you don't speculate that the baby is flame retardant. You take action." – Al Gore, 2007
• "If the climate researchers' reports are to be believed, global warming is a huge medium and long-term threat, one which could have dramatic consequences such as refugee flows and armed conflicts." – Angela Merkel, 2007

Quotes - Group 6

• "The world's second-largest emitter of greenhouse gases is China. Yet, China was entirely exempted from the requirements of the Kyoto Protocol. India and Germany are among the top emitters. Yet, India was also exempt from Kyoto." – George W. Bush, 2001
• "The newly industrialized States cannot, for example, be asked to apply restrictive environmental standards to their emerging industries unless the industrialized States first apply them within their own boundaries." – Pope John Paul II, 1990
• "We should work together to make sure the international community upholds the goals and framework established in the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and its Kyoto Protocol and the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities." – Hu Jintao, 2007

Quotes - Group 7

• "If we already have the Kyoto protocol, why invent another proposal and not just implement one that already exists? If a country is incapable of implementing the result of an international treaty that has established rules and regulations, it won't end up implementing those rules voluntarily."" – Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, 2007
• "Climate change is a challenge China must cope with to realize sustainable development... Implementing a climate change containment policy may cost a fortune, but the cost will be even higher if we delay. Early action is imperative." – Ma Kai, 2007
• "The consequences of restricting the development of developing nations will be much more serious than the consequences of global warming." – Ma Kai, 2007

Quotes - Group 8

• "Without radical international measures to reduce carbon emissions within the next 10 to 15 years, there is compelling evidence to suggest we might lose the chance to control temperature rises. Failure to act will make an increase of between 2 and 5 degrees [3.6 - 9°F] in average temperatures almost inevitable." – Tony Blair, 2006
• "The question is not whether climate change is happening or not, but whether, in the face of this emergency, we ourselves can change fast enough." – Kofi Annan, 2006
• "I promise you a day will come when our children and grandchildren will look back and they will ask one of two questions. Either they will ask, 'What in God's name were they doing? Didn't they see the evidence?' Or, they may look back and say 'How did they find the uncommon moral courage to rise above politics and redeem the promise of American democracy?'" – Al Gore, 2007, on global warming.

Quotes - Group 9

• "Breaking the dependence on oil is, in my view, a matter of political will. A consistent policy will turn obstacles into opportunities. To hide behind excuses of ignorance or economic considerations is not leading us to a sustainable future." – Mona Sahlin, 2006
• "America is addicted to oil, which is often imported from unstable parts of the world. The best way to break this addiction is through technology." – George W. Bush, 2006
• "Energy independence [for India] has to be our nation's first and highest priority. We must be determined to achieve this within the next 25 years i.e. by the year 2030." – Abdul Kalam, 2005
• "Energy security is assuming a strategic significance once reserved for territorial security, and the global environmental challenges from energy production and use are amongst our most pressing." – John Howard, 2006

Quotes - Group 10

• "We simply must balance our demand for energy with our rapidly shrinking resources. By acting now we can control our future instead of letting the future control us." – Jimmy Carter, 1977
• "It is sensible to improve energy efficiency and to develop alternative and sustainable sources of supply; it's sensible to replant the forests which we consume; it's sensible to re-examine industrial processes; it's sensible to tackle the problem of waste. I understand that the latest vogue is to call them 'no regrets' policies. Certainly we should have none in putting them into effect." – Margaret Thatcher, 1990
• "We have the opportunity and potential to create an oil-free future today, it is potentially right around the corner - and, more often than not, the technology is already here." – John Kerry, 2003

Quotes - Group 11

• "For those who want some proof that physicists are human, the proof is in the idiocy of all the different units which they use for measuring energy." – Richard Feynman
• "The energy produced by breaking down the atom is a very poor kind of thing. Anyone who expects a source of power from the transformations of these atoms is taking moonshine." – Ernest Rutherford
• "If you take a bale of hay and tie it to the tail of a mule and then strike a match and set the bale of hay on fire, and if you then compare the energy expended shortly thereafter by the mule with the energy expended by yourself in the striking of the match, you will understand the concept of amplification." – William Shockley
• "It is easier to split an atom than to break a prejudice." – Albert Einstein

Quotes - Group 12

• "Our decision about energy will test the character of the American people and the ability of the President and the Congress to govern this Nation. This difficult effort will be the 'moral equivalent of war', except that we will be uniting our efforts to build and not to destroy." – Jimmy Carter, 1977
• "For generations, we have assumed that the efforts of mankind would leave the fundamental equilibrium of the world's systems and atmosphere stable. But it is possible that with all these enormous changes (population, agricultural, use of fossil fuels) concentrated into such a short period of time, we have unwittingly begun a massive experiment with the system of this planet itself." – Margaret Thatcher, 1998
• "A great nation like the United States has a duty not to obstruct the fight against global warming but should, on the contrary, lead the combat, because what is at stake is the fate of all humanity." – Nicolas Sarkozy, 2007

Quotes - Group 13

• "How did we arrive at a state in which the balance of world energy supply and demand could be so fragile that weather, not to mention individual acts of sabotage or local insurrection, could have a significant impact on economic growth?" – Alan Greenspan, 2005
• "Critical international security goals, including countering nuclear weapons proliferation, supporting new democracies, and promoting sustainable development are at risk because of over-dependence on fossil fuels. This dependence also presents huge risks to the global environment." – Richard Lugar, 2006
• "It is extraordinary that a century into the age of oil, with the global economy dependent on $3 trillion worth of this black liquid each year, we don’t even know how much is left." – David Manning, 2006

Quotes - Group 14

• "The Stone Age came to an end not for a lack of stones and the oil age will end, but not for a lack of oil." – Ahmed Zaki Yamani, 2000
• "If history is any guide, oil will eventually be overtaken by less-costly alternatives well before conventional oil reserves run out. Indeed, oil displaced coal despite still vast untapped reserves of coal, and coal displaced wood without denuding our forest lands." – Alan Greenspan, 2005
• "The higher relative prices of energy will create incentives for businesses to create new, energy-saving technologies and for energy consumers to adopt them. The market for alternative fuels is growing rapidly and will help to shift consumption away from petroleum-based fuels." – Ben Bernanke, 2006

Quotes - Group 15 Portal:Energy/Quotes/15

Quotes - Group 16 Portal:Energy/Quotes/16

Quotes - Group 17 Portal:Energy/Quotes/17

Quotes - Group 18 Portal:Energy/Quotes/18

Quotes - Group 19 Portal:Energy/Quotes/19

Quotes - Group 20 Portal:Energy/Quotes/20

Quotes - Group 21 Portal:Energy/Quotes/21

Quotes - Group 22 Portal:Energy/Quotes/22

Quotes - Group 23 Portal:Energy/Quotes/23

Quotes - Group 24 Portal:Energy/Quotes/24

Quotes - Group 25 Portal:Energy/Quotes/25