THE "FINAL frontier" in the battle to tackle climate change will be confronting the prevailing culture and attitudes in society towards global warming, a new series of public lectures on the subject was told yesterday.
Prof Colin Scott and Suzanne Kingston of the school of law in UCD said traditional methods of laws, regulations and financial stimuli and sanctions would not in themselves be enough to achieve the reductions.
Changes in the goals, attitudes and values of the community were also necessary, they said.
"Our argument is that this is the key to achieving climate change reductions," said Ms Kingston.
The two UCD academics gave the first in a series of 10 lectures on the challenges posed by climate change, organised by the Earths Systems Institute at the university. The series is being convened by the institute's director, Prof Frank Convery, and Prof Chen-Ching Liu of its engineering school.
Prof Scott and Ms Kingston said that lawmakers would need to be creative in reinventing regulation.
They outlined three areas of intervention: command (acts and regulations); interests (market-based techniques such as the EU's emission trading scheme); and culture, which involves behavioural modification. They said all three areas were mutually reinforcing and dependent on each other.
Focusing on the "culture" aspect of regulation, they instanced initiatives such as the forest stewardship council and the fair trade labelling scheme.
Ms Kingston pointed to the success of the plastic bag levy in Ireland. In addition to the levy of 15 cent, she said there also had to be a "cultural acceptance of the argument that plastic bags were bad for the environment".
Prof Scott said retailers should set down environmental conditions in their own supply chain and banks should insist on the upholding of environmental standards when financing projects.