On February 8th the New York Times published an Article entitled Biofuels Deemed a Greenhouse Threat. While the study sited by the article makes some very important points about biofuels produced from new crops, it would seem that this article may serve to confuse as much as enlighten. What is true of biofuels today hopefully will change in the next generation of biofuels. At the end of the day it is true that the corn lobby (with certain folks in Washington's current support) is dead wrong. We all knew that. This article takes the logical next step to say that many middle-ground crops, such as soybeans and even sugarcane, may also be flawed. That said, when you get to biomass waste, such as wood waste currently being considered in Georgia, the article does point out that the equation changes dramatically.
Unfortunately, in my opinion, this article does a poor job expressing the importance of this subtly. As usual, the devil is in the details. What I actually think the scientists are doing here is delivering a firm rejection to what has been Washington and Detroit's path to ethanol, regardless of its source. That said, last month GM invested in Coskata, which uses "municipal solid waste (trash), agricultural and forest residuals, bagasse and many other carbon containing input materials".
So, while the report is surely correct in looking at the current state of biofuels the next generation promises to deliver a much different equation. As most who are informed on the subject would say, efficiency is the only silver bullet we have that probably has little or no down-side and should be our first focus. Any new fuel will have kinks that will have to be worked out before we will know for certain we are not doing as much harm as good. In that regard, solar offers a clearer slate of benefits, but again when you go to get that energy to your car using batteries the equation gets more complicated.
Saturday, February 9, 2008
Wednesday, January 30, 2008
The Science of Climate Change
How It Could Impact Our Children's Lives. How Should We Respond?
Introduction
Good evening. My name is Kim Miller. On behalf of Earthfriends and Greenprint, Welcome. It is very gratifying to see you all here.
The topic of tonight’s talk is The Science of Climate Change. Climate change is not a new topic for most of us. In fact, there are probably days when many of us wish we could escape hearing another news story on the topic. But hopefully tonight you will leave here feeling that you had a different kind of experience. The organizers bringing you this lecture tonight feel that you may find it unique in two ways:
We have the scientist in the room with us tonight. Unlike the one-directional TV media experience, which is how most of us receive information on this topic, tonight you will have the opportunity to get to know an individual deeply involved in climate research.
We have each other in the room. By all of us being present here tonight we are making a statement to each other that we are all at least curious, that we have an interest in finding out the facts surrounding this heavily-discussed topic and that we are interested in asking some of the difficult questions of what we do with that information. So in a sense we are all here supporting each other to explore this intimidating subject.
Tonight’s speaker is Dr. Kim Cobb. Dr. Cobb is a faculty member of Georgia Tech’s School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences. She has been involved with numerous climate studies as a climate scientist and also happens to be a Morningside resident, who recently became a parent. So I think we can assume that her relationship to Morningside Elementary is perhaps just beginning.
At this time please join me in extending a warm welcome to Dr. Kim Cobb.
[Kim Cobb Presentation]
Thank you Dr. Cobb for that insightful and thought-provoking presentation on the science of climate change. It is very enriching indeed to have this unique opportunity to hear the science directly from a scientist dedicated to the study of this field. As promised, in just a few minutes we will open the floor to questions. But before we start the questions, we will spend just a few minutes on the question, “How do we respond?”
How Do We Respond?
We have deliberately broken tonight’s talk into two discrete presentations, The Science of Climate Change and How Do We Respond? The reason for this division is that Dr. Cobb’s research does not really contemplate how we might respond to the findings of her data. And in this presentation we are very interested in drawing a clear line between scientific findings and the many and varied proposals for mitigating climate change. So in other words, what Dr. Cobb just presented to us is science. What I am about to present is not science, in that all mitigation proposals involve a set of -social- choices that come with them.
Let’s start with what is probably a common image many of us might picture when it comes to addressing climate change.
These are common images that we all encounter in discussions on what we can do to mitigate Climate Change. And these are two very good choices that you can make. A number of your neighbors in the Morningside area have put their heads together to explore some of these personal choices that can reduce one’s carbon footprint. One of those groups is called Greenprint (who has a table in the back here tonight). As you leave this evening we would encourage you to visit the Greenprint table, where you can get an extensive list of 67 such personal interventions, that you can start doing tomorrow, along with information on how to connect with Greenprint.
That said; are such interventions alone enough to meet the scope of this problem?
Can we address the challenge outlined in Dr. Cobb’s presentation if we all switch to florescent light bulbs and start driving hybrid cars? Let’s explore the answer to this question as presented by two researchers from Princeton University:
In 2004 two professors from Princeton University, Pacala & Socolow, published an influential proposal on climate change mitigation. While the work is somewhat dated, it has had an enduring impact on climate mitigation thinking primarily due to their approach of breaking the problem down into several solutions, rather than a single “home run” technology.
Pacala & Socolow start with the scientific consensus that we are on a course to reach a doubling of CO2 levels within 50 years if we simply stay on our current path, as shown in this graph.
Preventing this dangerous level of CO2 from occurring, they argue, will require a worldwide rethinking of energy. To convey the scale involved, Pacala & Socolow created a pie chart with 15 different wedges.
Some wedges represent alternatives to power generating, while others represent aggressive efficiency programs. They argue that we need to deploy any 7 of these 15 wedges, or sufficient amounts of all 15, to avoid a doubling of CO2 in our atmosphere over the coming 50 years. All the wedges represent existing technology we have today.
Some Examples of their wedges include:
Replacing 1,400 large coal-fired plants with gas-fired plants
Increase the fuel economy of two billion cars from 30 to 60 miles per gallon
Double today’s nuclear output to displace coal
Increase solar power 700-fold to displace coal
Cut electricity use in homes, offices and stores by 25 percent
And as you go down the list some of their proposals get more difficult:
Install carbon capture and sequestration capacity at 800 large coal-fired plants
Halting all cutting and burning of forests
While these scientists admit that such a worldwide reinvention of energy is an ambitious undertaking, they also point out that the job becomes much more difficult if we wait — and if we “delay a decade or two”, they say, “avoiding such a doubling of CO2 may well become impossible.”
They issue us a strong challenge. But what I find encouraging in their proposal is the approach of breaking down the solution into bite-sized wedges that are, in fact, within technological reach today given sufficient determination as a society to get there.
Let’s look at what might stand in the way of such a plan.
[Slide 7] Dirty Energy is Cheap Energy
While we may not feel it to be true when we fill up at the pump these days, our ever-increasing standard of living has a lot to do with having access to relatively cheap energy. In an environment of relatively cheap energy people do not generally feel compelled to make changes, especially if those changes decrease our disposable income. So in that environment, [trigger bullets] how do we create incentives to motivate both individuals and business to look for new ways to conserve, to invest in new forms of energy and for the development of new technologies?
[Slide 8] Correctly pricing energy
Many looking at this problem today believe that the key to creating these incentives will come from placing a significantly higher price on carbon emitting energy. That thinking may make some sense when you consider that currently our impact on climate is essentially invisible in our every day lives.
But how do we place a price on emitting carbon dioxide when, unlike most other forms of pollution, CO2 is invisible, tasteless and odorless? Some prominent voices have spoken out on this question.
[Slide 9] Market Incentives
Most essentially boil it down to market incentives. Jeffrey Immelt, CEO of General Electric puts it this way:
“The market [today] does not work in energy. Carbon has to have a value. Today in the U.S. and China it has no value. Energy players are being asked to take a 15-minute market signal and make a 40-year decision, and that just doesn’t work. ... The U.S. government should decide: What do we want to have happen? How much clean coal, how much nuclear and what is the most efficient way to incentivize people to get there? - Jeffrey Immelt, General Electric
Thomas Friedman, a New York Times columnist and forward thinker on energy says:
“The only way to stimulate the scale of sustained investment in research and development of non-CO2 emitting power is if the developed countries, who can afford to do so, force their people to pay the full climate, economic and geopolitical costs of using gasoline and dirty coal. Those countries that have signed the Kyoto Protocol are starting to do that. But America is not.” - Thomas Friedman, The New York Times
The common theme in both these men’s words to me -- is public policy.
[Slide 10] Public Policy
Many see adjusting our industrial and personal behavior towards clean choices and away from carbon emitting choices as the ultimate challenge of public policy. Certainly it is not difficult to believe that averting catastrophic changes to our climate -is- ultimately in the public interest.
Ultimately, you, the public, employ policymakers to protect what is in the public interest. As such we would urge you to first:
Educate yourself about the science (you are here tonight), then
Let your elected officials know what you think our policies should be and
Let your views be known in your community (because ultimately we need everyone working in the same direction to overcome this challenge)
In conclusion I would point out [trigger next slide] that the “climate-energy” debate has been relatively muted and slower moving than some other important social debates in our history. Why is that?
[Slide 11] The climate-energy debate
Michael Mandelbaum, of Johns Hopkins University, offers the following explanation:
“This issue doesn’t pit haves versus have-nots, but [rather] the present versus the future — today’s generation versus its kids and unborn grandchildren.”
- Michael Mandelbaum, Johns Hopkins University
With that I would like to thank you for your interest and attention. We will now open the floor for questions.
Introduction
Good evening. My name is Kim Miller. On behalf of Earthfriends and Greenprint, Welcome. It is very gratifying to see you all here.
The topic of tonight’s talk is The Science of Climate Change. Climate change is not a new topic for most of us. In fact, there are probably days when many of us wish we could escape hearing another news story on the topic. But hopefully tonight you will leave here feeling that you had a different kind of experience. The organizers bringing you this lecture tonight feel that you may find it unique in two ways:
We have the scientist in the room with us tonight. Unlike the one-directional TV media experience, which is how most of us receive information on this topic, tonight you will have the opportunity to get to know an individual deeply involved in climate research.
We have each other in the room. By all of us being present here tonight we are making a statement to each other that we are all at least curious, that we have an interest in finding out the facts surrounding this heavily-discussed topic and that we are interested in asking some of the difficult questions of what we do with that information. So in a sense we are all here supporting each other to explore this intimidating subject.
Tonight’s speaker is Dr. Kim Cobb. Dr. Cobb is a faculty member of Georgia Tech’s School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences. She has been involved with numerous climate studies as a climate scientist and also happens to be a Morningside resident, who recently became a parent. So I think we can assume that her relationship to Morningside Elementary is perhaps just beginning.
At this time please join me in extending a warm welcome to Dr. Kim Cobb.
[Kim Cobb Presentation]
Thank you Dr. Cobb for that insightful and thought-provoking presentation on the science of climate change. It is very enriching indeed to have this unique opportunity to hear the science directly from a scientist dedicated to the study of this field. As promised, in just a few minutes we will open the floor to questions. But before we start the questions, we will spend just a few minutes on the question, “How do we respond?”
How Do We Respond?
We have deliberately broken tonight’s talk into two discrete presentations, The Science of Climate Change and How Do We Respond? The reason for this division is that Dr. Cobb’s research does not really contemplate how we might respond to the findings of her data. And in this presentation we are very interested in drawing a clear line between scientific findings and the many and varied proposals for mitigating climate change. So in other words, what Dr. Cobb just presented to us is science. What I am about to present is not science, in that all mitigation proposals involve a set of -social- choices that come with them.
Let’s start with what is probably a common image many of us might picture when it comes to addressing climate change.
These are common images that we all encounter in discussions on what we can do to mitigate Climate Change. And these are two very good choices that you can make. A number of your neighbors in the Morningside area have put their heads together to explore some of these personal choices that can reduce one’s carbon footprint. One of those groups is called Greenprint (who has a table in the back here tonight). As you leave this evening we would encourage you to visit the Greenprint table, where you can get an extensive list of 67 such personal interventions, that you can start doing tomorrow, along with information on how to connect with Greenprint.
That said; are such interventions alone enough to meet the scope of this problem?
Can we address the challenge outlined in Dr. Cobb’s presentation if we all switch to florescent light bulbs and start driving hybrid cars? Let’s explore the answer to this question as presented by two researchers from Princeton University:
In 2004 two professors from Princeton University, Pacala & Socolow, published an influential proposal on climate change mitigation. While the work is somewhat dated, it has had an enduring impact on climate mitigation thinking primarily due to their approach of breaking the problem down into several solutions, rather than a single “home run” technology.
Pacala & Socolow start with the scientific consensus that we are on a course to reach a doubling of CO2 levels within 50 years if we simply stay on our current path, as shown in this graph.
Preventing this dangerous level of CO2 from occurring, they argue, will require a worldwide rethinking of energy. To convey the scale involved, Pacala & Socolow created a pie chart with 15 different wedges.

Some wedges represent alternatives to power generating, while others represent aggressive efficiency programs. They argue that we need to deploy any 7 of these 15 wedges, or sufficient amounts of all 15, to avoid a doubling of CO2 in our atmosphere over the coming 50 years. All the wedges represent existing technology we have today.

Some Examples of their wedges include:
Replacing 1,400 large coal-fired plants with gas-fired plants
Increase the fuel economy of two billion cars from 30 to 60 miles per gallon
Double today’s nuclear output to displace coal
Increase solar power 700-fold to displace coal
Cut electricity use in homes, offices and stores by 25 percent
And as you go down the list some of their proposals get more difficult:
Install carbon capture and sequestration capacity at 800 large coal-fired plants
Halting all cutting and burning of forests
While these scientists admit that such a worldwide reinvention of energy is an ambitious undertaking, they also point out that the job becomes much more difficult if we wait — and if we “delay a decade or two”, they say, “avoiding such a doubling of CO2 may well become impossible.”
They issue us a strong challenge. But what I find encouraging in their proposal is the approach of breaking down the solution into bite-sized wedges that are, in fact, within technological reach today given sufficient determination as a society to get there.
Let’s look at what might stand in the way of such a plan.
[Slide 7] Dirty Energy is Cheap Energy
While we may not feel it to be true when we fill up at the pump these days, our ever-increasing standard of living has a lot to do with having access to relatively cheap energy. In an environment of relatively cheap energy people do not generally feel compelled to make changes, especially if those changes decrease our disposable income. So in that environment, [trigger bullets] how do we create incentives to motivate both individuals and business to look for new ways to conserve, to invest in new forms of energy and for the development of new technologies?
[Slide 8] Correctly pricing energy
Many looking at this problem today believe that the key to creating these incentives will come from placing a significantly higher price on carbon emitting energy. That thinking may make some sense when you consider that currently our impact on climate is essentially invisible in our every day lives.
But how do we place a price on emitting carbon dioxide when, unlike most other forms of pollution, CO2 is invisible, tasteless and odorless? Some prominent voices have spoken out on this question.
[Slide 9] Market Incentives
Most essentially boil it down to market incentives. Jeffrey Immelt, CEO of General Electric puts it this way:
“The market [today] does not work in energy. Carbon has to have a value. Today in the U.S. and China it has no value. Energy players are being asked to take a 15-minute market signal and make a 40-year decision, and that just doesn’t work. ... The U.S. government should decide: What do we want to have happen? How much clean coal, how much nuclear and what is the most efficient way to incentivize people to get there? - Jeffrey Immelt, General Electric
Thomas Friedman, a New York Times columnist and forward thinker on energy says:
“The only way to stimulate the scale of sustained investment in research and development of non-CO2 emitting power is if the developed countries, who can afford to do so, force their people to pay the full climate, economic and geopolitical costs of using gasoline and dirty coal. Those countries that have signed the Kyoto Protocol are starting to do that. But America is not.” - Thomas Friedman, The New York Times
The common theme in both these men’s words to me -- is public policy.
[Slide 10] Public Policy
Many see adjusting our industrial and personal behavior towards clean choices and away from carbon emitting choices as the ultimate challenge of public policy. Certainly it is not difficult to believe that averting catastrophic changes to our climate -is- ultimately in the public interest.
Ultimately, you, the public, employ policymakers to protect what is in the public interest. As such we would urge you to first:
Educate yourself about the science (you are here tonight), then
Let your elected officials know what you think our policies should be and
Let your views be known in your community (because ultimately we need everyone working in the same direction to overcome this challenge)
In conclusion I would point out [trigger next slide] that the “climate-energy” debate has been relatively muted and slower moving than some other important social debates in our history. Why is that?
[Slide 11] The climate-energy debate
Michael Mandelbaum, of Johns Hopkins University, offers the following explanation:
“This issue doesn’t pit haves versus have-nots, but [rather] the present versus the future — today’s generation versus its kids and unborn grandchildren.”
- Michael Mandelbaum, Johns Hopkins University
With that I would like to thank you for your interest and attention. We will now open the floor for questions.
Friday, December 21, 2007
BEST OF 2007
[From Stop Global Warming 12/21/07]
2007 was a year of extremes. The world experienced a series of record-breaking weather events this year, from flooding in Asia to heat waves in Europe, snowfall in South Africa and wildfires in California. America faced its worst summer drought since the Dust Bowl years of the Depression.
While Mother Nature is continuing to unfold the consequences of global warming daily, we are finally starting to see this issue take a front seat, where it belongs. Local governments, corporations, schools and individuals are stepping up to the plate to meet this challenge.
As a group of engineering undergrads from MIT who helped launch the Vehicle Design Summit say, "We are the people we have been waiting for."
We commend some great action in 2007 and hope that 2008 will be the year that the magnitude of the political and personal response matches the magnitude of this urgent problem. And now for StopGlobalWarming.org's 2007 Best of List:
BEST FIRST STEP: The Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007
The Senate finally passed a bill to address significant new fuel economy standards, a vastly improved renewable fuels standard with strong environmental safeguards, and new efficiency standards that will essentially phase out the incandescent light bulb. The bill does not include everything we need, but it is a first step towards moving America beyond oil and a real down payment on curbing global warming.
BEST CONCLUSIVE, LAST WARNING: The IPCC Report
In November, the final IPCC report was issued representing years of study and the consensus of 2500 of the world's experts. The head of the IPCC said upon its release: "What we do in the next two or three years will define our future." Time Magazine characterized the report as a final warning to humanity.
BEST COLLEGE EFFORT: College of the Atlantic
The College of the Atlantic in Bar Harbor, Maine was the first college to pledge to become carbon neutral in 2006. The small college of just 300 students has just one major: human ecology, or the "study of our relationship with our environment." This tiny college started quite a trend, now more than 459 other US colleges and Universities have signed the American Presidents Climate Commitment committing their campus to go climate neutral. Universities are like small cities and are a glowing example as to what can be done across the country!
BEST PRODUCT: SIGG Bottles
The popular SIGG bottles are lightweight, aluminum bottles that are recyclable and 100% biodegradable. With 2.5 million plastic water bottles being thrown away every hour in the US, we hope people will start ditching the plastic and filling up reusable bottles. Here's to a plastic free 2008!
BEST CITY EFFORT: Chicago, Illinois
Chicago has green roofs, great recycling and sustainability programs, and was home to the Cool Globes exhibit this summer. Now it is undertaking a major alley retrofit. Chicago is the alley capital of America and will retrofit its 2,000 miles of alleys (which have the paved equivalent of five midsize airports) with environmentally sustainable road building materials that will allow water to penetrate the soil through the pavement itself, then the water will recharge the underground water table instead of ending up as polluted runoff in rivers and streams. Some of the water may even end up back in Lake Michigan, the city's primary source of drinking water.
BEST AWARD: Nobel Peace Prize to Al Gore and the IPCC
An excerpt from the Citation awarding the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize to the IPCC and Al Gore: "By awarding the Nobel Peace Prize for 2007 to the IPCC and Al Gore, the Norwegian Nobel Committee is seeking to contribute to a sharper focus on the processes and decisions that appear to be necessary to protect the world's future climate, and thereby to reduce the threat to the security of mankind. Action is necessary now, before climate change moves beyond man's control."
BEST MAGAZINE COVER: Sports Illustrated
On March 12, 2007, Sports Illustrated ran a cover of Dontrelle Willis up to his knees in water at Dolphin Stadium in Florida. The cover read: "Sports and Global Warming: As the Planet Changes, So Do the Games We Play. Time to Pay Attention!" We salute Sports Illustrated for connecting the dots for their readers on how global warming is going to impact athletes, the games they love to play and the fans who love to watch.
BEST REPORTING: Tom Friedman, New York Times
Tom Friedman, the regular op-ed contributor to The New York Times, consistently provides honest, accurate, fact driven, and thought-provoking pieces about global warming. He has been instrumental in waking up the American people to this issue. (Photo: Fred R. Conrad/The New York Times)
Best thing you can do? Forward this to your friends, keep virtually marching and making changes in your life to fight global warming!
Here's to a greener 2008!
[by Laurie David, Founder, StopGlobalWarming.org]
2007 was a year of extremes. The world experienced a series of record-breaking weather events this year, from flooding in Asia to heat waves in Europe, snowfall in South Africa and wildfires in California. America faced its worst summer drought since the Dust Bowl years of the Depression.
While Mother Nature is continuing to unfold the consequences of global warming daily, we are finally starting to see this issue take a front seat, where it belongs. Local governments, corporations, schools and individuals are stepping up to the plate to meet this challenge.
As a group of engineering undergrads from MIT who helped launch the Vehicle Design Summit say, "We are the people we have been waiting for."
We commend some great action in 2007 and hope that 2008 will be the year that the magnitude of the political and personal response matches the magnitude of this urgent problem. And now for StopGlobalWarming.org's 2007 Best of List:
BEST FIRST STEP: The Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007
The Senate finally passed a bill to address significant new fuel economy standards, a vastly improved renewable fuels standard with strong environmental safeguards, and new efficiency standards that will essentially phase out the incandescent light bulb. The bill does not include everything we need, but it is a first step towards moving America beyond oil and a real down payment on curbing global warming.
BEST CONCLUSIVE, LAST WARNING: The IPCC Report
In November, the final IPCC report was issued representing years of study and the consensus of 2500 of the world's experts. The head of the IPCC said upon its release: "What we do in the next two or three years will define our future." Time Magazine characterized the report as a final warning to humanity.
BEST COLLEGE EFFORT: College of the Atlantic
The College of the Atlantic in Bar Harbor, Maine was the first college to pledge to become carbon neutral in 2006. The small college of just 300 students has just one major: human ecology, or the "study of our relationship with our environment." This tiny college started quite a trend, now more than 459 other US colleges and Universities have signed the American Presidents Climate Commitment committing their campus to go climate neutral. Universities are like small cities and are a glowing example as to what can be done across the country!
BEST PRODUCT: SIGG Bottles
The popular SIGG bottles are lightweight, aluminum bottles that are recyclable and 100% biodegradable. With 2.5 million plastic water bottles being thrown away every hour in the US, we hope people will start ditching the plastic and filling up reusable bottles. Here's to a plastic free 2008!
BEST CITY EFFORT: Chicago, Illinois
Chicago has green roofs, great recycling and sustainability programs, and was home to the Cool Globes exhibit this summer. Now it is undertaking a major alley retrofit. Chicago is the alley capital of America and will retrofit its 2,000 miles of alleys (which have the paved equivalent of five midsize airports) with environmentally sustainable road building materials that will allow water to penetrate the soil through the pavement itself, then the water will recharge the underground water table instead of ending up as polluted runoff in rivers and streams. Some of the water may even end up back in Lake Michigan, the city's primary source of drinking water.
BEST AWARD: Nobel Peace Prize to Al Gore and the IPCC
An excerpt from the Citation awarding the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize to the IPCC and Al Gore: "By awarding the Nobel Peace Prize for 2007 to the IPCC and Al Gore, the Norwegian Nobel Committee is seeking to contribute to a sharper focus on the processes and decisions that appear to be necessary to protect the world's future climate, and thereby to reduce the threat to the security of mankind. Action is necessary now, before climate change moves beyond man's control."
BEST MAGAZINE COVER: Sports Illustrated
On March 12, 2007, Sports Illustrated ran a cover of Dontrelle Willis up to his knees in water at Dolphin Stadium in Florida. The cover read: "Sports and Global Warming: As the Planet Changes, So Do the Games We Play. Time to Pay Attention!" We salute Sports Illustrated for connecting the dots for their readers on how global warming is going to impact athletes, the games they love to play and the fans who love to watch.
BEST REPORTING: Tom Friedman, New York Times
Tom Friedman, the regular op-ed contributor to The New York Times, consistently provides honest, accurate, fact driven, and thought-provoking pieces about global warming. He has been instrumental in waking up the American people to this issue. (Photo: Fred R. Conrad/The New York Times)
Best thing you can do? Forward this to your friends, keep virtually marching and making changes in your life to fight global warming!
Here's to a greener 2008!
[by Laurie David, Founder, StopGlobalWarming.org]
Tuesday, December 11, 2007
The Gore Nobel Peace Prize Acceptance Speech
Al Gore delivered an amazing Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech in Oslo on December 10th. I feel it is so worth the reading I reproduce it below for those who missed it:
“Your Majesties, Your Royal Highnesses, Honorable members of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, Excellencies, Ladies and gentlemen...
I have a purpose here today. It is a purpose I have tried to serve for many years. I have prayed that God would show me a way to accomplish it.
Sometimes, without warning, the future knocks on our door with a precious and painful vision of what might be. One hundred and nineteen years ago, a wealthy inventor read his own obituary, mistakenly published years before his death. Wrongly believing the inventor had just died, a newspaper printed a harsh judgment of his life’s work, unfairly labeling him The Merchant of Death because of his invention dynamite. Shaken by this condemnation, the inventor made a fateful choice to serve the cause of peace.
Seven years later, Alfred Nobel created this prize and the others that bear his name.
Seven years ago tomorrow, I read my own political obituary in a judgment that seemed to me harsh and mistaken if not premature. But that unwelcome verdict also brought a precious if painful gift: an opportunity to search for fresh new ways to serve my purpose.
Unexpectedly, that quest has brought me here. Even though I fear my words cannot match this moment, I pray what I am feeling in my heart will be communicated clearly enough that those who hear me will say, We must act.
The distinguished scientists with whom it is the greatest honor of my life to share this award have laid before us a choice between two different futures a choice that to my ears echoes the words of an ancient prophet: Life or death, blessings or curses. Therefore, choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live.
We, the human species, are confronting a planetary emergency a threat to the survival of our civilization that is gathering ominous and destructive potential even as we gather here. But there is hopeful news as well: we have the ability to solve this crisis and avoid the worst though not all of its consequences, if we act boldly, decisively and quickly.
However, despite a growing number of honorable exceptions, too many of the worlds leaders are still best described in the words Winston Churchill applied to those who ignored Adolf Hitlers threat: They go on in strange paradox, decided only to be undecided, resolved to be irresolute, adamant for drift, solid for fluidity, all powerful to be impotent.
So today, we dumped another 70 million tons of global-warming pollution into the thin shell of atmosphere surrounding our planet, as if it were an open sewer. And tomorrow, we will dump a slightly larger amount, with the cumulative concentrations now trapping more and more heat from the sun.
As a result, the earth has a fever. And the fever is rising. The experts have told us it is not a passing affliction that will heal by itself. We asked for a second opinion. And a third. And a fourth. And the consistent conclusion, restated with increasing alarm, is that something basic is wrong.
We are what is wrong, and we must make it right.
Last September 21, as the Northern Hemisphere tilted away from the sun, scientists reported with unprecedented distress that the North Polar ice cap is falling off a cliff. One study estimated that it could be completely gone during summer in less than 22 years. Another new study, to be presented by U.S. Navy researchers later this week, warns it could happen in as little as 7 years.
Seven years from now.
In the last few months, it has been harder and harder to misinterpret the signs that our world is spinning out of kilter. Major cities in North and South America, Asia and Australia are nearly out of water due to massive droughts and melting glaciers. Desperate farmers are losing their livelihoods. Peoples in the frozen Arctic and on low-lying Pacific islands are planning evacuations of places they have long called home. Unprecedented wildfires have forced a half million people from their homes in one country and caused a national emergency that almost brought down the government in another. Climate refugees have migrated into areas already inhabited by people with different cultures, religions, and traditions, increasing the potential for conflict. Stronger storms in the Pacific and Atlantic have threatened whole cities. Millions have been displaced by massive flooding in South Asia, Mexico, and 18 countries in Africa. As temperature extremes have increased, tens of thousands have lost their lives. We are recklessly burning and clearing our forests and driving more and more species into extinction. The very web of life on which we depend is being ripped and frayed.
We never intended to cause all this destruction, just as Alfred Nobel never intended that dynamite be used for waging war. He had hoped his invention would promote human progress. We shared that same worthy goal when we began burning massive quantities of coal, then oil and methane.
Even in Nobels time, there were a few warnings of the likely consequences. One of the very first winners of the Prize in chemistry worried that, We are evaporating our coal mines into the air. After performing 10,000 equations by hand, Svante Arrhenius calculated that the earths average temperature would increase by many degrees if we doubled the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere.
Seventy years later, my teacher, Roger Revelle, and his colleague, Dave Keeling, began to precisely document the increasing CO2 levels day by day.
But unlike most other forms of pollution, CO2 is invisible, tasteless, and odorless -- which has helped keep the truth about what it is doing to our climate out of sight and out of mind. Moreover, the catastrophe now threatening us is unprecedented and we often confuse the unprecedented with the improbable.
We also find it hard to imagine making the massive changes that are now necessary to solve the crisis. And when large truths are genuinely inconvenient, whole societies can, at least for a time, ignore them. Yet as George Orwell reminds us: Sooner or later a false belief bumps up against solid reality, usually on a battlefield.
In the years since this prize was first awarded, the entire relationship between humankind and the earth has been radically transformed. And still, we have remained largely oblivious to the impact of our cumulative actions.
Indeed, without realizing it, we have begun to wage war on the earth itself. Now, we and the earth's climate are locked in a relationship familiar to war planners: "Mutually assured destruction."
More than two decades ago, scientists calculated that nuclear war could throw so much debris and smoke into the air that it would block life-giving sunlight from our atmosphere, causing a "nuclear winter." Their eloquent warnings here in Oslo helped galvanize the worlds resolve to halt the nuclear arms race.
Now science is warning us that if we do not quickly reduce the global warming pollution that is trapping so much of the heat our planet normally radiates back out of the atmosphere, we are in danger of creating a permanent carbon summer.
As the American poet Robert Frost wrote, Some say the world will end in fire; some say in ice. Either, he notes, would suffice.
But neither need be our fate. It is time to make peace with the planet.
We must quickly mobilize our civilization with the urgency and resolve that has previously been seen only when nations mobilized for war. These prior struggles for survival were won when leaders found words at the 11th hour that released a mighty surge of courage, hope and readiness to sacrifice for a protracted and mortal challenge.
These were not comforting and misleading assurances that the threat was not real or imminent; that it would affect others but not ourselves; that ordinary life might be lived even in the presence of extraordinary threat; that Providence could be trusted to do for us what we would not do for ourselves.
No, these were calls to come to the defense of the common future. They were calls upon the courage, generosity and strength of entire peoples, citizens of every class and condition who were ready to stand against the threat once asked to do so. Our enemies in those times calculated that free people would not rise to the challenge; they were, of course, catastrophically wrong.
Now comes the threat of climate crisis a threat that is real, rising, imminent, and universal. Once again, it is the 11th hour. The penalties for ignoring this challenge are immense and growing, and at some near point would be unsustainable and unrecoverable. For now we still have the power to choose our fate, and the remaining question is only this: Have we the will to act vigorously and in time, or will we remain imprisoned by a dangerous illusion?
Mahatma Gandhi awakened the largest democracy on earth and forged a shared resolve with what he called Satyagraha or truth force.
In every land, the truth once known has the power to set us free.
Truth also has the power to unite us and bridge the distance between me and we, creating the basis for common effort and shared responsibility.
There is an African proverb that says, If you want to go quickly, go alone. If you want to go far, go together. We need to go far, quickly.
We must abandon the conceit that individual, isolated, private actions are the answer. They can and do help. But they will not take us far enough without collective action. At the same time, we must ensure that in mobilizing globally, we do not invite the establishment of ideological conformity and a new lock-step ism.
That means adopting principles, values, laws, and treaties that release creativity and initiative at every level of society in multi-fold responses originating concurrently and spontaneously.
This new consciousness requires expanding the possibilities inherent in all humanity. The innovators who will devise a new way to harness the suns energy for pennies or invent an engine thats carbon negative may live in Lagos or Mumbai or Montevideo. We must ensure that entrepreneurs and inventors everywhere on the globe have the chance to change the world.
When we unite for a moral purpose that is manifestly good and true, the spiritual energy unleashed can transform us. The generation that defeated fascism throughout the world in the 1940s found, in rising to meet their awesome challenge, that they had gained the moral authority and long-term vision to launch the Marshall Plan, the United Nations, and a new level of global cooperation and foresight that unified Europe and facilitated the emergence of democracy and prosperity in Germany, Japan, Italy and much of the world. One of their visionary leaders said, It is time we steered by the stars and not by the lights of every passing ship.
In the last year of that war, you gave the Peace Prize to a man from my hometown of 2000 people, Carthage, Tennessee. Cordell Hull was described by Franklin Roosevelt as the Father of the United Nations. He was an inspiration and hero to my own father, who followed Hull in the Congress and the U.S. Senate and in his commitment to world peace and global cooperation.
My parents spoke often of Hull, always in tones of reverence and admiration. Eight weeks ago, when you announced this prize, the deepest emotion I felt was when I saw the headline in my hometown paper that simply noted I had won the same prize that Cordell Hull had won. In that moment, I knew what my father and mother would have felt were they alive.
Just as Hulls generation found moral authority in rising to solve the world crisis caused by fascism, so too can we find our greatest opportunity in rising to solve the climate crisis. In the Kanji characters used in both Chinese and Japanese, crisis is written with two symbols, the first meaning danger, the second opportunity. By facing and removing the danger of the climate crisis, we have the opportunity to gain the moral authority and vision to vastly increase our own capacity to solve other crises that have been too long ignored.
We must understand the connections between the climate crisis and the afflictions of poverty, hunger, HIV-Aids and other pandemics. As these problems are linked, so too must be their solutions. We must begin by making the common rescue of the global environment the central organizing principle of the world community.
Fifteen years ago, I made that case at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro. Ten years ago, I presented it in Kyoto. This week, I will urge the delegates in Bali to adopt a bold mandate for a treaty that establishes a universal global cap on emissions and uses the market in emissions trading to efficiently allocate resources to the most effective opportunities for speedy reductions.
This treaty should be ratified and brought into effect everywhere in the world by the beginning of 2010 two years sooner than presently contemplated. The pace of our response must be accelerated to match the accelerating pace of the crisis itself.
Heads of state should meet early next year to review what was accomplished in Bali and take personal responsibility for addressing this crisis. It is not unreasonable to ask, given the gravity of our circumstances, that these heads of state meet every three months until the treaty is completed.
We also need a moratorium on the construction of any new generating facility that burns coal without the capacity to safely trap and store carbon dioxide.
And most important of all, we need to put a price on carbon -- with a CO2 tax that is then rebated back to the people, progressively, according to the laws of each nation, in ways that shift the burden of taxation from employment to pollution. This is by far the most effective and simplest way to accelerate solutions to this crisis.
The world needs an alliance especially of those nations that weigh heaviest in the scales where earth is in the balance. I salute Europe and Japan for the steps theyve taken in recent years to meet the challenge, and the new government in Australia, which has made solving the climate crisis its first priority.
But the outcome will be decisively influenced by two nations that are now failing to do enough: the United States and China. While India is also growing fast in importance, it should be absolutely clear that it is the two largest CO2 emitters most of all, my own country that will need to make the boldest moves, or stand accountable before history for their failure to act.
Both countries should stop using the others behavior as an excuse for stalemate and instead develop an agenda for mutual survival in a shared global environment.
These are the last few years of decision, but they can be the first years of a bright and hopeful future if we do what we must. No one should believe a solution will be found without effort, without cost, without change. Let us acknowledge that if we wish to redeem squandered time and speak again with moral authority, then these are the hard truths:
The way ahead is difficult. The outer boundary of what we currently believe is feasible is still far short of what we actually must do. Moreover, between here and there, across the unknown, falls the shadow.
That is just another way of saying that we have to expand the boundaries of what is possible. In the words of the Spanish poet, Antonio Machado, Pathwalker, there is no path. You must make the path as you walk.
We are standing at the most fateful fork in that path. So I want to end as I began, with a vision of two futures each a palpable possibility and with a prayer that we will see with vivid clarity the necessity of choosing between those two futures, and the urgency of making the right choice now.
The great Norwegian playwright, Henrik Ibsen, wrote, One of these days, the younger generation will come knocking at my door.
The future is knocking at our door right now. Make no mistake, the next generation will ask us one of two questions. Either they will ask: What were you thinking; why didn’t you act?
Or they will ask instead: How did you find the moral courage to rise and successfully resolve a crisis that so many said was impossible to solve?
We have everything we need to get started, save perhaps political will, but political will is a renewable resource.
So let us renew it, and say together: We have a purpose. We are many. For this purpose we will rise, and we will act.”
“Your Majesties, Your Royal Highnesses, Honorable members of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, Excellencies, Ladies and gentlemen...
I have a purpose here today. It is a purpose I have tried to serve for many years. I have prayed that God would show me a way to accomplish it.
Sometimes, without warning, the future knocks on our door with a precious and painful vision of what might be. One hundred and nineteen years ago, a wealthy inventor read his own obituary, mistakenly published years before his death. Wrongly believing the inventor had just died, a newspaper printed a harsh judgment of his life’s work, unfairly labeling him The Merchant of Death because of his invention dynamite. Shaken by this condemnation, the inventor made a fateful choice to serve the cause of peace.
Seven years later, Alfred Nobel created this prize and the others that bear his name.
Seven years ago tomorrow, I read my own political obituary in a judgment that seemed to me harsh and mistaken if not premature. But that unwelcome verdict also brought a precious if painful gift: an opportunity to search for fresh new ways to serve my purpose.
Unexpectedly, that quest has brought me here. Even though I fear my words cannot match this moment, I pray what I am feeling in my heart will be communicated clearly enough that those who hear me will say, We must act.
The distinguished scientists with whom it is the greatest honor of my life to share this award have laid before us a choice between two different futures a choice that to my ears echoes the words of an ancient prophet: Life or death, blessings or curses. Therefore, choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live.
We, the human species, are confronting a planetary emergency a threat to the survival of our civilization that is gathering ominous and destructive potential even as we gather here. But there is hopeful news as well: we have the ability to solve this crisis and avoid the worst though not all of its consequences, if we act boldly, decisively and quickly.
However, despite a growing number of honorable exceptions, too many of the worlds leaders are still best described in the words Winston Churchill applied to those who ignored Adolf Hitlers threat: They go on in strange paradox, decided only to be undecided, resolved to be irresolute, adamant for drift, solid for fluidity, all powerful to be impotent.
So today, we dumped another 70 million tons of global-warming pollution into the thin shell of atmosphere surrounding our planet, as if it were an open sewer. And tomorrow, we will dump a slightly larger amount, with the cumulative concentrations now trapping more and more heat from the sun.
As a result, the earth has a fever. And the fever is rising. The experts have told us it is not a passing affliction that will heal by itself. We asked for a second opinion. And a third. And a fourth. And the consistent conclusion, restated with increasing alarm, is that something basic is wrong.
We are what is wrong, and we must make it right.
Last September 21, as the Northern Hemisphere tilted away from the sun, scientists reported with unprecedented distress that the North Polar ice cap is falling off a cliff. One study estimated that it could be completely gone during summer in less than 22 years. Another new study, to be presented by U.S. Navy researchers later this week, warns it could happen in as little as 7 years.
Seven years from now.
In the last few months, it has been harder and harder to misinterpret the signs that our world is spinning out of kilter. Major cities in North and South America, Asia and Australia are nearly out of water due to massive droughts and melting glaciers. Desperate farmers are losing their livelihoods. Peoples in the frozen Arctic and on low-lying Pacific islands are planning evacuations of places they have long called home. Unprecedented wildfires have forced a half million people from their homes in one country and caused a national emergency that almost brought down the government in another. Climate refugees have migrated into areas already inhabited by people with different cultures, religions, and traditions, increasing the potential for conflict. Stronger storms in the Pacific and Atlantic have threatened whole cities. Millions have been displaced by massive flooding in South Asia, Mexico, and 18 countries in Africa. As temperature extremes have increased, tens of thousands have lost their lives. We are recklessly burning and clearing our forests and driving more and more species into extinction. The very web of life on which we depend is being ripped and frayed.
We never intended to cause all this destruction, just as Alfred Nobel never intended that dynamite be used for waging war. He had hoped his invention would promote human progress. We shared that same worthy goal when we began burning massive quantities of coal, then oil and methane.
Even in Nobels time, there were a few warnings of the likely consequences. One of the very first winners of the Prize in chemistry worried that, We are evaporating our coal mines into the air. After performing 10,000 equations by hand, Svante Arrhenius calculated that the earths average temperature would increase by many degrees if we doubled the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere.
Seventy years later, my teacher, Roger Revelle, and his colleague, Dave Keeling, began to precisely document the increasing CO2 levels day by day.
But unlike most other forms of pollution, CO2 is invisible, tasteless, and odorless -- which has helped keep the truth about what it is doing to our climate out of sight and out of mind. Moreover, the catastrophe now threatening us is unprecedented and we often confuse the unprecedented with the improbable.
We also find it hard to imagine making the massive changes that are now necessary to solve the crisis. And when large truths are genuinely inconvenient, whole societies can, at least for a time, ignore them. Yet as George Orwell reminds us: Sooner or later a false belief bumps up against solid reality, usually on a battlefield.
In the years since this prize was first awarded, the entire relationship between humankind and the earth has been radically transformed. And still, we have remained largely oblivious to the impact of our cumulative actions.
Indeed, without realizing it, we have begun to wage war on the earth itself. Now, we and the earth's climate are locked in a relationship familiar to war planners: "Mutually assured destruction."
More than two decades ago, scientists calculated that nuclear war could throw so much debris and smoke into the air that it would block life-giving sunlight from our atmosphere, causing a "nuclear winter." Their eloquent warnings here in Oslo helped galvanize the worlds resolve to halt the nuclear arms race.
Now science is warning us that if we do not quickly reduce the global warming pollution that is trapping so much of the heat our planet normally radiates back out of the atmosphere, we are in danger of creating a permanent carbon summer.
As the American poet Robert Frost wrote, Some say the world will end in fire; some say in ice. Either, he notes, would suffice.
But neither need be our fate. It is time to make peace with the planet.
We must quickly mobilize our civilization with the urgency and resolve that has previously been seen only when nations mobilized for war. These prior struggles for survival were won when leaders found words at the 11th hour that released a mighty surge of courage, hope and readiness to sacrifice for a protracted and mortal challenge.
These were not comforting and misleading assurances that the threat was not real or imminent; that it would affect others but not ourselves; that ordinary life might be lived even in the presence of extraordinary threat; that Providence could be trusted to do for us what we would not do for ourselves.
No, these were calls to come to the defense of the common future. They were calls upon the courage, generosity and strength of entire peoples, citizens of every class and condition who were ready to stand against the threat once asked to do so. Our enemies in those times calculated that free people would not rise to the challenge; they were, of course, catastrophically wrong.
Now comes the threat of climate crisis a threat that is real, rising, imminent, and universal. Once again, it is the 11th hour. The penalties for ignoring this challenge are immense and growing, and at some near point would be unsustainable and unrecoverable. For now we still have the power to choose our fate, and the remaining question is only this: Have we the will to act vigorously and in time, or will we remain imprisoned by a dangerous illusion?
Mahatma Gandhi awakened the largest democracy on earth and forged a shared resolve with what he called Satyagraha or truth force.
In every land, the truth once known has the power to set us free.
Truth also has the power to unite us and bridge the distance between me and we, creating the basis for common effort and shared responsibility.
There is an African proverb that says, If you want to go quickly, go alone. If you want to go far, go together. We need to go far, quickly.
We must abandon the conceit that individual, isolated, private actions are the answer. They can and do help. But they will not take us far enough without collective action. At the same time, we must ensure that in mobilizing globally, we do not invite the establishment of ideological conformity and a new lock-step ism.
That means adopting principles, values, laws, and treaties that release creativity and initiative at every level of society in multi-fold responses originating concurrently and spontaneously.
This new consciousness requires expanding the possibilities inherent in all humanity. The innovators who will devise a new way to harness the suns energy for pennies or invent an engine thats carbon negative may live in Lagos or Mumbai or Montevideo. We must ensure that entrepreneurs and inventors everywhere on the globe have the chance to change the world.
When we unite for a moral purpose that is manifestly good and true, the spiritual energy unleashed can transform us. The generation that defeated fascism throughout the world in the 1940s found, in rising to meet their awesome challenge, that they had gained the moral authority and long-term vision to launch the Marshall Plan, the United Nations, and a new level of global cooperation and foresight that unified Europe and facilitated the emergence of democracy and prosperity in Germany, Japan, Italy and much of the world. One of their visionary leaders said, It is time we steered by the stars and not by the lights of every passing ship.
In the last year of that war, you gave the Peace Prize to a man from my hometown of 2000 people, Carthage, Tennessee. Cordell Hull was described by Franklin Roosevelt as the Father of the United Nations. He was an inspiration and hero to my own father, who followed Hull in the Congress and the U.S. Senate and in his commitment to world peace and global cooperation.
My parents spoke often of Hull, always in tones of reverence and admiration. Eight weeks ago, when you announced this prize, the deepest emotion I felt was when I saw the headline in my hometown paper that simply noted I had won the same prize that Cordell Hull had won. In that moment, I knew what my father and mother would have felt were they alive.
Just as Hulls generation found moral authority in rising to solve the world crisis caused by fascism, so too can we find our greatest opportunity in rising to solve the climate crisis. In the Kanji characters used in both Chinese and Japanese, crisis is written with two symbols, the first meaning danger, the second opportunity. By facing and removing the danger of the climate crisis, we have the opportunity to gain the moral authority and vision to vastly increase our own capacity to solve other crises that have been too long ignored.
We must understand the connections between the climate crisis and the afflictions of poverty, hunger, HIV-Aids and other pandemics. As these problems are linked, so too must be their solutions. We must begin by making the common rescue of the global environment the central organizing principle of the world community.
Fifteen years ago, I made that case at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro. Ten years ago, I presented it in Kyoto. This week, I will urge the delegates in Bali to adopt a bold mandate for a treaty that establishes a universal global cap on emissions and uses the market in emissions trading to efficiently allocate resources to the most effective opportunities for speedy reductions.
This treaty should be ratified and brought into effect everywhere in the world by the beginning of 2010 two years sooner than presently contemplated. The pace of our response must be accelerated to match the accelerating pace of the crisis itself.
Heads of state should meet early next year to review what was accomplished in Bali and take personal responsibility for addressing this crisis. It is not unreasonable to ask, given the gravity of our circumstances, that these heads of state meet every three months until the treaty is completed.
We also need a moratorium on the construction of any new generating facility that burns coal without the capacity to safely trap and store carbon dioxide.
And most important of all, we need to put a price on carbon -- with a CO2 tax that is then rebated back to the people, progressively, according to the laws of each nation, in ways that shift the burden of taxation from employment to pollution. This is by far the most effective and simplest way to accelerate solutions to this crisis.
The world needs an alliance especially of those nations that weigh heaviest in the scales where earth is in the balance. I salute Europe and Japan for the steps theyve taken in recent years to meet the challenge, and the new government in Australia, which has made solving the climate crisis its first priority.
But the outcome will be decisively influenced by two nations that are now failing to do enough: the United States and China. While India is also growing fast in importance, it should be absolutely clear that it is the two largest CO2 emitters most of all, my own country that will need to make the boldest moves, or stand accountable before history for their failure to act.
Both countries should stop using the others behavior as an excuse for stalemate and instead develop an agenda for mutual survival in a shared global environment.
These are the last few years of decision, but they can be the first years of a bright and hopeful future if we do what we must. No one should believe a solution will be found without effort, without cost, without change. Let us acknowledge that if we wish to redeem squandered time and speak again with moral authority, then these are the hard truths:
The way ahead is difficult. The outer boundary of what we currently believe is feasible is still far short of what we actually must do. Moreover, between here and there, across the unknown, falls the shadow.
That is just another way of saying that we have to expand the boundaries of what is possible. In the words of the Spanish poet, Antonio Machado, Pathwalker, there is no path. You must make the path as you walk.
We are standing at the most fateful fork in that path. So I want to end as I began, with a vision of two futures each a palpable possibility and with a prayer that we will see with vivid clarity the necessity of choosing between those two futures, and the urgency of making the right choice now.
The great Norwegian playwright, Henrik Ibsen, wrote, One of these days, the younger generation will come knocking at my door.
The future is knocking at our door right now. Make no mistake, the next generation will ask us one of two questions. Either they will ask: What were you thinking; why didn’t you act?
Or they will ask instead: How did you find the moral courage to rise and successfully resolve a crisis that so many said was impossible to solve?
We have everything we need to get started, save perhaps political will, but political will is a renewable resource.
So let us renew it, and say together: We have a purpose. We are many. For this purpose we will rise, and we will act.”
Sunday, November 18, 2007
Coulda, Woulda, Shoulda
Thomas Friedman's November 14, 2007 Op-Ed post says it all.
Click the "Coulda, Woulda, Shoulda" title above to read his piece.
Click the "Coulda, Woulda, Shoulda" title above to read his piece.
Saturday, November 17, 2007
U.N. Report Describes Risks of Inaction on Climate Change
This appears to be the top story today for the Times, and it's an important one for sure -- essentially capping off the IPCC's total findings. The set of IPCC reports is likely to form global policy for years to come. Understanding the weight of this set of reports is essential:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/17/science/earth/17climate.html?_r=1&th=&adxnnl=1&oref=slogin&emc=th&adxnnlx=1195313252-jLJbP3t5WQZzFDwOL2yIkw
As if the issue were not clearly urgent enough, note on page 2: "Likewise, a recent International Energy Agency report looking at the unexpectedly rapid emissions growth in China and India estimated that if current policies were not changed the world would warm six degrees by 2030, a disastrous increase far higher than the panel’s estimates of one to four degrees by the end of the century."
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/17/science/earth/17climate.html?_r=1&th=&adxnnl=1&oref=slogin&emc=th&adxnnlx=1195313252-jLJbP3t5WQZzFDwOL2yIkw
As if the issue were not clearly urgent enough, note on page 2: "Likewise, a recent International Energy Agency report looking at the unexpectedly rapid emissions growth in China and India estimated that if current policies were not changed the world would warm six degrees by 2030, a disastrous increase far higher than the panel’s estimates of one to four degrees by the end of the century."
Friday, November 16, 2007
Cap and Trade vs. a Flat Carbon Tax
Yes, David, "cap and trade" would be one answer, but not the best one in my opinion. Europe is currently floundering with such a system. In the US we have a great advantage over Europe, a central taxing authority. Therefore, in my opinion a flat carbon tax is better for the US. That said, I respect the argument that governments are not good at putting money to work. Therefore I propose a flat tax that replaces another tax, netting to no new tax. The only other tax large enough to be that other tax is income tax.
The final point Shira raised (in another post) is what to do with families that don't pay any income tax now. Here is how that is addressed: A 250% tax on dirty fuel collects enough revenue to refund $ 2,500 to each and every American household. Think of it as your "standard deduction". This refund compensates you for essentially the first $ 1,000 of fuel you purchased in a year. Buy an efficient car, ride the bus, etc and your cost all net to zero. On the other hand, if you own a lake house and a boat and drive an inefficient car you will end up paying much more.
/kim
On Nov 16, 2007, at 9:08 AM, David Rein wrote:
Interesting discussion. I think what you are arguing Kim is that we don't actually pay the full price for coal power because the costs of its negative environmental impacts are external to market for electricity.
A comprehensive energy plan would account for these impacts by setting carbon targets and auctioning off credits for the amount of CO2 emissions that can be sustained without causing global warming. Power companies like those in Georgia who rely on coal would then have to purchase enough credits to cover their Carbon emissions, and this added expense would create incentives to transition to non-coal fired plants or to find technological mean to sequester the Carbon emissions.
The final point Shira raised (in another post) is what to do with families that don't pay any income tax now. Here is how that is addressed: A 250% tax on dirty fuel collects enough revenue to refund $ 2,500 to each and every American household. Think of it as your "standard deduction". This refund compensates you for essentially the first $ 1,000 of fuel you purchased in a year. Buy an efficient car, ride the bus, etc and your cost all net to zero. On the other hand, if you own a lake house and a boat and drive an inefficient car you will end up paying much more.
/kim
On Nov 16, 2007, at 9:08 AM, David Rein wrote:
Interesting discussion. I think what you are arguing Kim is that we don't actually pay the full price for coal power because the costs of its negative environmental impacts are external to market for electricity.
A comprehensive energy plan would account for these impacts by setting carbon targets and auctioning off credits for the amount of CO2 emissions that can be sustained without causing global warming. Power companies like those in Georgia who rely on coal would then have to purchase enough credits to cover their Carbon emissions, and this added expense would create incentives to transition to non-coal fired plants or to find technological mean to sequester the Carbon emissions.
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