A couple of weeks ago, Greens Senator Christine Milne argued that Ross Garnaut, the economist conducting the climate change review for the government, was treating climate change “in purely economic or political terms” and ignoring the seriousness of the warnings coming from the science – and some of his musings about short-term and long-term targets were kind of worrying.
But in his most recent speech (PDF) at the Solar Cities Convention in Adelaide, he clearly articulates the urgency of the issue, and – without saying so explicitly, nails the “60% by 2050″ target from Labor’s election campaign as utterly inadequate.
Some select quotes:
The combination of Australia’s exceptional sensitivity, relative to other developed countries, to climate change, and the real opportunities for it to do relatively well in a world of ambitious, comprehensive mitigation, suggest that Australia should be pressing the international
community towards the strongest feasible global mitigation outcome.
any allocative formula (RM: to decide how much carbon each country is allowed to emit) that does not emphasise population over current or past emissions levels as the basis for long term emissions rights has no chance at all of being accepted by most developing countries.
To summarize, the world is moving towards high risks of dangerous climate change much more rapidly than has generally been understood. Without strong action by both developed and major developing countries alike between now and 2020, it will be impossible to avoid high risks of dangerous climate change. The show will be over.
A more comprehensive interim report is being released today, which should provide a lot to chew on. But it looks like Garnaut is going to place the seriousness, and urgency, of the issue of climate change front and center.
UPDATE: The report has been released here. Much more of the same. As Crikey put it in their special second edition (subscribers only) on the topic:
The shorthand message: This Is Serious Folks
oh good, looks like those worrying earlier statements have been relegated to public musings rather than forming part of his policy recommendations.
Looking at your selective quotes, he’s practically channelling Christine Milne, which makes me very happy for one.
Yes, he seems to be getting it.
As I’ve said before and I’ll probably get plenty of excuses to say again, the targets need to be based on science and scientifically informed criteria of sustainability and unacceptable levels of risk. The role of the economists is to advise on the most cost-effective and efficient mix of policy instruments to get us to those targets.
exactly, Paul
Paul,
Who decides on ‘unacceptable levels of risk’? That is clearly a role where economists should have some significant input. Physical scientists are not well placed to determine what risks the population of Australia and the world are prepared to accept.
Some might say that any rise in global average temparatutes is unacceptable. An economist would approach the issue from the perspectives of balancing the risks against the costs. We could reduce CO2 emissions drastically over the next ten years by switching completely to wind/solar/geothermal/electric cars etc. But it would cost a huge amount. That is money that we can’t spend on other things that we may think are more important, such as poverty reduction, research into AIDS or indeed, consumption.
Economists have the tools to look at the benefits AND the costs of CO2 abatement. Policies that are made solely on the basis of what engineers are capable of are certain to lead to government spending more than the community is prepared to pay.
Required: that said, the tools of economists do not provide the only method by which risks and costs can be measured.
There are many factors relating to quality of life that are not adequately captured by GDP, for instance.
And whilst I would like to have the time to respond much more fully to Required, I would suggest two areas where the economists would have difficulty:
* appropriately valuing the protection of aspects of non-human nature which are not substitutable by human-made capital even in theory (e.g. endangered species);
* dealing with improbable, but not impossible or only trivially probable, risks which climate change could render more probable, which would be catastrophic if they eventuated, and whose full consequences are unpredictable, unquantifiable and uncontrollable at the present time.
Actually it is not the economists that decide appropriate levels of risks, it is elected politicians.
Scientists tell us the costs, economists give us the relative impacts, it is up to us collectively to decide what to accept.
So we’re all rooned.
Required,
Some might say that any rise in global average temparatutes is unacceptable. An economist would approach the issue from the perspectives of balancing the risks against the costs. We could reduce CO2 emissions drastically over the next ten years by switching completely to wind/solar/geothermal/electric cars etc. But it would cost a huge amount. That is money that we can’t spend on other things that we may think are more important, such as poverty reduction, research into AIDS or indeed, consumption.
Firstly as others have pointed out, an economist is not equipped to ‘balance the risks against costs’ on any front except human generated wealth, essentially, unless we were going to see a spectacular leap-frog in convenotional use of economics, and all of a sudden qualified environmental economists were listened to. In a nutshell, as conventional economics ignores, or if you prefer, externalises, all the real costs of human industry to the environment, and therefore to us, the best they can offer is a misleading or at very best inadequate calculation of risk vs cost.
Secondly, I’d encourage you to do some further research on the consequences of global warming, as it is going to significantly exacerbate problems such as poverty and AIDS reduction. To pick just one example, climate change predictions are expected to create millions of ‘climate refugees’ – take for eg how Vanuatu asked Australia if we’d be willing to take their population given that sea level rise predictions coupled with what they are already experiencing clearly indicate that they are going to lose basically all their viable livable land mass (Howard refused of course, and good old NZ agreed to take them).
Now think about Bangladesh.
Another obvious example is to think about the global climate predictions and food production shortages.
In short, climate change is the greatest risk to human viability on this planet, and the most significant threat to our ability to address long-standing critical issues such as poverty and AIDS.
As to consumption, one of the few “bright sides” of climate change is that nearly all the things we need to do to mitigate climate change are what we’ve needed to do for ages to reduce consumption and head rapidly towards living within the sustainable bounds of the planet. So if we were to invest a ‘huge amount’ in addressing climate change, I’d suggest we might get a twofer
A key point here being that reducing consumption of resource/energy throughputs does not mean reduced realisation of the personal and social utility which such consumption is meant to achieve. As Amory Lovins (I think) put it, we really want cold beer and hot showers, not X kW-hours of electricity.
And what wilful said, except perhaps the last sentence.
I think that around about now Howard’s machine would have been building a character assasination of Garnaut.
Robert, you said:
Required: that said, the tools of economists do not provide the only method by which risks and costs can be measured.
What other methods are there, aside from the tools that economists use, to measure risks and costs?
Climate scientists can tell us ‘this much CO2 will lead to that much of a rise in sea level’. Engineers can tell us ‘we can reduce CO2 emissions by 60% at a cost of $x’. How do you compare the two, if not by using the kinds of tools that economists have developed?
Paul,
You said economists would have difficulty:
‘appropriately valuing the protection of aspects of non-human nature which are not substitutable by human-made capital even in theory (e.g. endangered species)’
What is the ‘appropriate’ valuation of an endangered species, and who is more qualified to estimate it than an economist? An economist might use approaches based on what people are prepared to pay to preserve endangered species in the wild, or on what it would cost to preserve them in zoos. Is that not ‘appropriate’? If so, what is?
Sure, it’s difficult, but economics is the only social science that has developed tools to explicitly weigh the costs of these kinds of things against the benefits.
I’ll reiterate that I was responding to your post saying that abatement targets should be set using ’scientifically informed criteria of sustainability and unacceptable levels of risk’, not by economics.
I was simply arguing that there is no science that is better placed to analyse risk than economics.
It’s called subjectivity, Required.
Is an economic model a useful tool to compare the relative value of one’s beloved to a summer’s day?
Myriad, you said:
In a nutshell, as conventional economics ignores, or if you prefer, externalises, all the real costs of human industry to the environment, and therefore to us, the best they can offer is a misleading or at very best inadequate calculation of risk vs cost.
You clearly don’t have a solid grasp of how economics treats ‘externalities’. Using a classical economic approach, the damage that CO2 emissions do to the environment are classified as externalities. That does not mean that economics ‘ignores’ that damage, it means that economists recognise that the buyers and sellers (e.g. of electricity) do not take that damage into account when they make their transactions, basically beacuse they don’t have to pay for it. The role that economics can play is attempting to quantify that damage (or the risks of damage) so it can be compared to the costs of abatement.
That’s one of the things that the Stern Review did – it attempted to estimate the external costs of GHG emissions. It came up with an estimate that the damage done by GHG emissions is equivalent to a loss of world GDP of $110 per tonne of CO2 equivalent. That estimate (although I don’t agree with the way it was derived) allows us to weigh up the different abatement options. Effectively it means that any abatement option that costs less than $110 per tonne og CO2 equivalent should be taken up. Any measure that costs more than $110 per tonne is not worth the effort.
That’s what economists can do, estimate how far it is worth going to reduce GHG emissions. And the answer is not ‘reduce the risk to zero’. Reducing the risk of climate change will cost serious money, and will lead to hardship all over the world. Up to a point, it’s worth it. Economists try to identify that point.
Theoretically we could probably reduce GHG emissions to close to zero (at least for stationary energy and land transport), but it would probably not be worth the effort – we would be putting ourselves through enormous privation to go further than we need to if we want to reduce the risks to, say a 2 degree rise.
Of course the targets should be informed by the sciencs, and I wholehartedly agree with wilful that politicians should make the ultimate decision. But economists can help the politicians see both sides of the coin.
Hopefully the Greens can retain a constructively critical role throughout the process. There’s a danger here if the party, fearing irrelevance, attempts to safeguard their demographic base through kneejerk contrarianism or extremism.
Robert,
Subjectivity is a lousy basis for policy making.
As for your facaetious question:
‘Is an economic model a useful tool to compare the relative value of one’s beloved to a summer’s day?’
The answer is that I get pleasure from both. My preference would be to have both at the same time. An economist might be able to glean from my behaviour which gives me the greatest pleasure.
For example, if I have a choice between going out in the sun on my own or spending all day shoe shopping at a shopping centre with my girl, I have to make a decision. An economist would look at the decision I make and say ‘clearly he would rather go to the park on a sunny day than go to Fountain Gate with the missus’. Based on that (and thousands of other observations of my behaviour) an economist could start to get a handle on where my preferences lie – for the sun or for my girl, and under what circumstances I am likely to prefer one to the other.
The mistake you are making is to misconstrue economics. Economics is a positive science, not a normative one. It describes things as they are, not as they should be. Economic theories and models can give an insight into which allocation of resources will bring the greatest happiness to the greatest number of people, but it doesn’t compel policy makers to follow that path.
In the context of climate change, economists can observe people’s behaviour and get an estimate of how much they value the environment, and how much they value the distant future. If it turns out that people behave like they care about the environment but don’t much care about what happens in 200 years time (when we are all long gone), that would lead an economist to conclude that the best approach might be to reduce the damage that occurs during our lifetimes, but not worry too much about people who will not be born for a hundred years.
Again I reiterate that my original comment was that economists and economics have a role in determining how much people are prepared to pay to reduce the risks of climate change, and therefore where emissionstargets should be set. Physical scientists should not have a monopoly, as that would lead us to overspend on GHG abatement, which could be just as bad for human welfare as underspending.
I should apologise for making this comment then leaving this thread for the day. It’s home time for this little economist. Sorry if I appear to be piking out on this interesting discussion, but I will be back in the morning.
Required: the slightly less facetious formulation of my comment is that economics, as a discipline, does not provide a complete and perfect theory for decision-making.
The models by which economists try to value various things are based on imperfect empirical data, and the models themselves often contain simplifications for mathematical or computational tractability, or simply be rather less than perfect. Now, behavioural economists, from what this little outsider has been able to glean, include some very clever people who are able to figure out some very interesting things. But there are limits. And where those limits come in, the personal prejudices of the economist concerned have a funny way of intruding on their pronouncements.
I’m not doubting for one moment the contribution economists can make to public debate. I’m just noting that, clearly, politicians shouldn’t take their views as the be-all and end-all.
http://www.monbiot.com/archives/2008/02/19/an-exchange-of-souls/#more-1103
I haven’t read all above carefully…yet.
But I suspect the issue of economists attempting to provide objective [?] models that attempt to relate to human and environmental issues may be illustrated by Monbiot’s comments on Sterne and the use of some of his ‘methodology’.
I’ll try to present the essential issue below bit recommend a full reading.
“On one side of Stern’s equation are the costs of investing in new technologies (or not investing in old ones) to prevent greenhouse gas emissions from rising above a certain level. These can reasonably be priced in pounds or dollars. On the other side are the costs of climate change. Some of them – such as higher food prices and the expense of building sea walls – are financial, but most take the form of costs which are generally seen as incalculable: the destruction of ecosystems and human communities; the displacement of people from their homes; disease and death. All these costs are thrown together by Sir Nicholas with a formula he calls “equivalent to a reduction in consumptionâ€?, to which he then attaches a price……………………
The poorer people are, the cheaper their lives become. “For example,� Stern observes, “a very poor person may not be ‘willing-to-pay’ very much money to insure her life, whereas a rich person may be prepared to pay a very large sum. Can it be right to conclude that a poor person’s life or health is therefore less valuable?�
This is the crux of Monbiot’s article:
” Stern’s methodology has a disastrous consequence, unintended but surely obvious.”
Worth a look.
‘Clearly politicians shouldn’t take their (economists) views as the be-all and end-all’
Judging by comments from Climate Minister Wong, the views of prof Garnaut will be just one of many that will go into Government policy later this year. It would be good to know who else have the minister’s ear and if there isn’t just a bit of wriggle room being developed. After all whether we stay with 60% reductions by 2050 or as Garnaut hinted the need for 90% by the same date, the date is so far in a pollies future that few would want to be electorally hung prematurely.
I think what we’re going to see here is what we’re seeing with the tax cuts. Rudd will enforce an absolute compliance with election commitments. So anything further – almost regardless of any changes in opinion or evidence – will have to wait for a second term agenda.
I don’t know that that is good enough, Mark. The public clearly indicated at the election that they wanted decisive action on climate change. To give anything less on a matter of national (environmental) security would be a failure of duty. Your prediction applied to an invading army would have Rudd declare to the threat “go back, dealing with you is not in this term’s budget. I will send you a memo when we are ready for your attack!!”
Sadly I think that Bob Brown is correct. Penny Wong has reduced Garnaut to “input”.
BilB, but I agree!
You may not have noticed my post saying this style (with reference to the tax cuts, but to a ton of other stuff too) would lay up all sorts of trouble for the government.
I’m not condoning, just saying.
It’s very clear though, that he’s taken a decision that unlike Howard, he won’t go beyond or break election promises. The upside is that he’ll try to lay the ground for doing things right in a second term. But my concern is both that time is wasting, and also that it may in fact be counter-productive and not just in the medium or long term but by making things worse now.
Here’s the post:
http://larvatusprodeo.net/2008/01/11/evidence-based-policy/
Mind you, I don’t think Garnaut should be fetishised either. I certainly wasn’t thinking everything he said was holy writ when he released that discussion paper Rob referred to in the post about a possible reserve bank style mechanism for regulating emissions. But I think we’re basically on the same page.
It’ seems clear from what Penny Wong has been saying that Mark’s right. They are going to stick to their election promise. She gave this as the reason. In a way it’s fair enough if the rest of the world uses that target, but I’d hope that they will advocate for more, and sooner.
On economists, Quiggin says that Garnaut is balancing economic and environmental risks. I think Quiggin gets it:
I haven’t read Garnaut’s report yet, just the Adelaide speech and heard him on radio and TV. I’m not sure that he does get it. He’s saying, I think, that 450ppm of CO2e is the upper limit to avoid 2C, which will require a 90% cut by 2050. That will still give us a 50% chance of going beyond 2C.
He doesn’t seem to recognise that 2C is out of date as the upper bound to avoid DAI (dangerous anthropogenic interference). Spratt and Sutton in their climate code red put a cogent science-based case that we already have DAI. They are shooting for 0.5C above pre-industrial, that is about 0.3C less than now. To achieve this without wrecking the planet they propose 320ppm ASAP. That’s CO2e including aerosols. (We are currently at 384ppm CO2, but about 455 CO2e including the ‘Kyoto six’. If you add aerosols it comes back to about 375ppm.)
I’d like to see Garnaut wrestle with the stuff Spratt and Sutton wrestled with and then tell us what he thinks. So far I don’t think he has.
Required.
You clearly don’t have a solid grasp of how economics treats ‘externalities’. Using a classical economic approach, the damage that CO2 emissions do to the environment are classified as externalities. That does not mean that economics ‘ignores’ that damage, it means that economists recognise that the buyers and sellers (e.g. of electricity) do not take that damage into account when they make their transactions, basically beacuse they don’t have to pay for it. The role that economics can play is attempting to quantify that damage (or the risks of damage) so it can be compared to the costs of abatement.
While I certainly wouldn’t claim to be au fait with economics in a comprehensive sense, I did take a few courses in economics, specifically the economics of sustainability at U. You’re basically saying my point for me, but the bit I’m arguing is this:
The role that economics can play is attempting to quantify that damage (or the risks of damage) so it can be compared to the costs of abatement.
To which I point out that classic economics is fine at calculating the last part – the costs of abatement, but generally terrible at calculating the costs of impacts to the environment and their flow-on effects to human society and economy. For starters there’s still no effective way to deal with intrinsic value; and I’ve yet to see conventional economic calculations come anywhere close to the true cost of say for eg, the cost of loss of connectivity within ecosystems, cumulative costs. And how do you put a monetary value on something like a key stone species, and is money even a remotely relevant measure?
Ecologists and similar are therefore much better equipped to spell out the risks of loss of biodiversity etc., and such analyses need to be read in conjunction and with equal weight to the economic analyses. But we simply don’t do that.
Yes Stern and now Garnaut are at least using figures that suggest the order of magnitude of cost to the planet if we don’t act, but how exactly, do you price the cost of the gulf stream failing and up to a 1/3 of the species on this planet being lost? The consequences of such large, catastrophic impacts which we are now actively flirting with defy any meaningful economic quantification, and can only really be understood through other prisms.
Robert, I think you said earlier this year in relation to the Labor Party’s replication of Coalition policy on climate change (no interim targets, no agreed cuts until developing countries do so, no articulated carbon trading scheme) that it was not fair to demand an immediate response – wait for the Garnaut report.
Well the interim report is now in and both Wong and Rudd have accepted it as a ‘valuable input’. They will wait for Treasury modelling and for the final report in September before moving. To me this response is ominous – it is easy to make verbal commitments in relation to climate change but hard to deal with interest group realities and this is presumably what they are ducking.
In my view the Howard Government was excessively cautious – the Ruddites with the prospect of power just said whatever was convenient to say.I still fail to see how setting 2050 targets without reference to adjustment cost information and without interim targets makes sense.
I wonder what the excuses will be in September. I assume delays are a certainty as the Ruddites seek ‘more information’.
“…and can only really be understood through other prisms.”
Panic shouldn’t be one of them.
Mark,
I think that what should be happening in this term of Labour is that contracts on very substantial alternative energy installations (30 gigawatts at least) should be engaged in. The preparation for such major works will take several years as surveys and plans have to be prepared while turbines which take some years to make are ordered. Properly timed this would have the major works keyed up to commence immediately after the next election. A guaranteed win.
Harry: I agree that the response is less than reassuring. If they really intend to stick with this position come hell or high water – and the best ways to tell that will be to follow what they do at the next round of climate change negotiations, and the way the emissions trading scheme is finally designed – I’m perfectly happy to give them a right bollocking.
Billb: that implies that the government is going to be building the next generation of non-emitting power plants.
Given that NSW is just about to privatize its generation facilities, I can’t see that happening.
As far as Mark’s point goes about iron compliance to election commitments, there is more than a little quiet ditching going on. The “clean internet feed” proposal is is quietly turning into a joke, the plan for a Department of Homeland Security got sent off to a review and will almost certainly be ditched, and Rudd seems to be hedging on the idea (first floated publicly, AFAIK, by the blogosphere’s Nick Gruen) of delivering the tax cuts into super.
Given all that, I reckon there’s plenty of wiggle room for the government on this topic.
Panic shouldn’t be one of them.
who’s panicking?
Labor’s equivocation over the Garnaud report is very disturbing.I wouldn’t trust pollies of any current political party in Parliament to have the moral courage to make the right decision about dealing with climate change (except the Greens.)You can’t eat, drink or breathe dollars. Its long been demonstrated if we leave it to the pollies, the world is doomed. Rudd’s been told he has to act this year on climate change, instituting a regime to cut carbon emissions to 90%. Regardless of what he promised in the election, he should bite the bullet NOW, TODAY, both domestically and internationally. No excuses are acceptable.
And what really gets to me Paul, is that those outrageous socialists, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, as a rather salient comparison to Rudd, have both pledged to cut the USA’s emissions by 80%.
Our economy is currently in vastly better shape than the USA’s, so it really begs the question – if they can pledge it and see it as doable and necessary, why isn’t Rudd?
Look, Garnaut himself says we can’t afford to go one out on severe targets. I can’t see any evidence yet of the Govt hedging on interim 2020 targets, which is what they said they would do post Garnaut in association with their carbon trading regime.
I’d expect they will nominate an interim target based on what the international norm is. If they don’t even go that far I’d give them a bollocking also.
Brian,
That’s why I said Rudd has to act internationally to make a 90% emmission target acceptable. He has the runs on the board now with Kyoto and has also gained heaps of international respect with The Apology. I want to see him exploit it.
And slightly OT, that renowned international socialist, Hillary Rodden Clinton, has promised to freeze interest rates in her Texas debate with Obama. I’m not normally one to advocate Oz should emulate the US, but I like those two Democrats more and more the more I hear of them.
Paul, the economic situation in the United States is not the same as here. They are either close to, or in, a recession, and their property market is falling around their ears because far too many houses were built by speculators.
According to many economists, our economy is growing too fast – there is not enough supply of many things, including labour, to keep up with demand. That’s why the reserve bank keeps putting interest rates up, and that’s why a lot of people are arguing that the government should break its election promises and abandon some of its tax cuts (particularly to high income earners).
There has been quite a bit of discussion as to whether the Reserve Bank’s goals and tactics are appropriate – for instance, wouldn’t it be better to put up with higher inflation for a little while and not risk more unemployment – but even if Hillary’s plan is a good idea in the USA it doesn’t follow that it’s a good idea here.
You are quite right, Robert. At the exact moment when state direction is necessary our (apparently very light) premier is destroying the means. It doesn’t matter who builds and owns the facilities, but the programme has to be laid down by governemnt and if private interests are not able or willing to participate within the time frame then government must enable the resources to achieve the targets. I think that Rudd is torn between a desire to have a traditional term of Labour style governemnt (health/education/employment/social welfare/etc) as a victor, and facing the war like challenge of addressing global warming. Which way will he go?
Robert,
I recognise that what you say is true, but at the moment higher interest rates seem to be doing little else than creating mortgage stress and exacerbating the rental crisis. Not to mention further increasing an ultimately unsustainable national personal credit cfard debt.
BilB, I think Rudd will try to have a bet each way. Whether he can remains to be seen. And if the Yanks are prepared to cut greenhouse emissions by 80% why can’t we at least aim for that? On the end, it cdomes down to the fact that once farming lands become environmentally debhilitated and the rivers run dry, you can’t eat or drink money.
I think there will be much to like about the final Garnaut Report. A little while ago Nic Gruen in a piece for the AFR wrote that Garnaut is one of our best strategic thinkers. Gruen thinks that if he does his job well, as he undoubtedly will, his report will be of similar importance to the whole world as Stern’s was in 2006.
Garnaut has selected stabilisation at 450 ppm of CO2e as the “strongest feasible” global mitigation outcome. Stern considered that 450 ppm was not feasible and opted for 550 instead. At 450 ppm Garnaut reminds us that we have only a 50% chance of limiting warming to 2C. At 550 ppm the odds blow out to a 50% chance of limiting warming to 3C.
Garnaut sees 450 ppm as achievable by 2050 with some initial ‘overshooting’ “followed by a period in which emissions fall below that of the natural sequestration rate.”
Australia’s contribution if the world converges on the same per capita emissions budget by 2050 would be an 88% reduction from 2000 levels.
I haven’t checked Stern, but I think it likely that the commonly adopted 60% reduction assumed that stabilisation would not be reached until later, probably 2100. As Garnaut points out, the longer you leave it the greater the risks.
Garnaut clearly understand that it is for policy makers to select targets and helpfully suggests that you can have two simultaneously. One that is in tune with what other countries are doing and a stronger indicative target that you are willing to adopt if others play ball.
The problem that the Rudd Government has is that if they stick to 60% it cannot be sold as scientific.
Garnaut himself has two problems. The first is that the implied starting figure for Australia is 400 Mt in 2000. I don’t know the correct figure, but it was 547 in 1990 and 559 in 2005. It seems to me that agriculture, land use (including forestry) and waste might have been omitted.
The second is that he refers to failing sinks, but then does not appear to take that aspect into account in determining his 2050 emissions budget.
Given those problems I’m not sure that his stabilisation strategy remains “feasible”.
Penny Wong sticking vehemently to Labor’s election commitment of 60% by 2050 demonstrates to me why climate change policy should not be in the hands of politicians. It is simply irresponsible to rule out deeper cuts if scientific evidence indicates that climate change is accelerating as Spratt, Sutton, Monbiot, Hansen etc and most recently by Garnaut in Labor’s own report process.
If science tells us we should adopt 80% reductions or zero emission goals then we should seriously consider this, rather than stick to deals done during election campaigns to keep the coal industry and unions happy.
Conventional economics will not be relevant either; sea level rises of 1+ meters and catastrophic weather events alone will cost much more than moving to a low carbon economy.
Spratt & Sutton’s recommendation that we adopt an “emergency footing” on climate change could be a way out of the political morass that is bogging down real action.
So far, Labor has done absolutely nothing to reduce Australian emissions, nor the emissions growth curve . . .
I agree with most of that, Peterc, except that I think it’s going to take something obvious and dramatic before “we” or the world in general adopt an emergency footing.
AND the last sentence is perhaps a bit unfair. The Department of Climate Change has just published the trend data to 2020. While the upward trend continues it’s not quite so fast due to the “measures” taken.
Penny Wong responded to criticism on PM tonight. She recognises that more needs to be done and promises to set an mid-term target
Why is a dirty business man in a suit advising our government about theses things?
Can Garnaut be trusted? http://rosettamoon.copley.org.au/?p=85 , rosettamoon site suggests another whitewash like the Greenhouse Office rubbish of 90s.
Russ Garnaut is an academic economist. As far as I new his personal grooming habits are quite adequate…
Brian, on the 7:30 report that “Well, I think we have to take an evidence based approach to this” (with respect to water policy).
But then she completely refused to discuss any possible discussion about strengthening the 60% by 2050 target in light of Garnaut’s interim report which states the situation is worse than previous projections (including Stern & IPCC reports). She also suggests that “2020 targets are more important”.
Well, it is obvious that 2020 targets must inform 2050 targets and vice versa, rather than be considered in isolation. I can’t understand Labor’s instransigence about locking in a 2050 target if new scientific evidence indicates it is not large enough (Garnaut cites a possible 90% reduction target by 2050).
Wong (and Labor) are just playing politics about this, liked Howard did when he locked Australia in to a position of not ratifying Kyoto.
Perhaps the common thread is that both Labor and Liberal appear to have made commitments to some leading industry figures which they won’t divulge or divert from? Why else the lock in when their own report suggests change is required?
Regarding the DCC trend data, there is a some positive information there, but:
* emissions still are predicted to rise signficantly by 2020
* government actions to reduce emissions are not clear and transparent.
In Victoria, the Brumby Labor government is:
* renewing Govt car fleet leases until 2012 for 6 cyclinder thirsty cars
* building a $3b desalination plant that will need 90mW of energy to run
* committed to building a new coal fired power station
* not putting in any new rail lines (but they are buying more trains and trams)
* deepening the Port Phillip Bay shipping channel for more container ship traffic – with most of the containers now being transferred by road (trucks).
* unchecked logging of old growth forests and water catchments continues to create signficant carbon emissions (and loss of water).
All this is hard to reconcile with the DCC trend data report which states:
“On an indicative basis, emissions for 2020 are projected to reach 120% of the 1990 level. This is below the 127% projected previously, reflecting a projected decline of emissions from electricity generation in the latter part of the projection. This decline reflects an increase in electricity generation from renewable
sources in line with the 20% Renewable Energy Target.”
The bottom line is that emissions are still projected to increase by 2020, and there is still no action on making signficant systemic cuts. It still seems to up to all of us to keep changing our light globes.
I don’t buy Wong’s assertion that emissions trading will achieve all the emission reductions we need, and it won’t happen quick enough.