For the past several years, about 40 percent of honeybee hives in the United States did not make it through the winter, one of the highest rates of mortality ever recorded.
When people have the knowledge and feel the costs of their actions, they make better decisions – for themselves and for the environment.
Government regulation came with a cost and has its limits.
When regulators moved beyond those obvious sources of pollution, they expanded their authority at the expense of personal freedom and economic growth.
In the same way Uber allowed individuals to use information technology to connect people and provide more choice, smartphones and personal technology allow us to live the stewardship ethic that is so much part of the way conservatives already live.
Now, several companies offer technology to monitor a home’s electricity use in real time.
It doesn’t matter if your goal is to reduce environmental impact, reduce the amount of oil money going to hostile countries like Russia and Iran, or simply to save energy.
These new technologies do what government bureaucracies and politicians cannot – cut electricity demand in ways that honor personal freedom, allowing people to make their own choices using their own information.
While the left’s approach to environmental protection demands we change our lifestyles to conform to their worldview – forcing people onto transit on their schedule – conservatives empower people to make their own decisions, providing options like car sharing.
The conservative approach recognizes that personal incentive and liberty are not only consistent with environmental protection, when combined with technology, they are the most effective tools to promote environmental stewardship.