US military's carbon footprint is one of the largest in the world and must be addressed in order to effectively contain climate change, a recent research by Durham and Lancaster Universities said
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 21st June, 2019) US military's carbon footprint is one of the largest in the world and must be addressed in order to effectively contain climate change, a recent research by Durham and Lancaster Universities said.
"The US Military has long understood it is not immune from the potential consequences of climate change... Yet its climate policy is fundamentally contradictory - confronting the effects of climate change while remaining the largest single institutional consumer of hydrocarbons in the world, a situation it is locked into for years to come because of its dependence on existing aircraft and warships for open-ended operations around the globe," one of the authors of the research, Patrik Bigger from the Lancaster University Environment Center, said as cited by the US-based EurekAlert! news-release distribution platform.
According to the research, if the US Armed Forces were a separate state, it would ranked 47th in the list of the largest greenhouse gas emitters, assuming only emissions from using different types of fuels.
The research stated that the US Air Forces was the larges emitter of greenhouse gas within the country's military and purchased largest amounts of fuel, as well as the US Navy.
The situation is similar to a stalemate, as the US military admit its enormous carbon footprint and is committed to address the climate change, but the country is too dependent on aircraft and warships used for US operations worldwide, Bigger said.
At the same time, the research pointed out that the situation would unlikely to change in next years, as the country would continue its active military activities in different parts of the world, while carbons are needed to ensure its aircraft and ships' life cycle.
According to research, the only way to improve the situation in long term is to "turn off vast sections of the military machine" of the United States.
