Not exact matches
«At some point, the
cost of capture intersects with the
cost of carbon, and all
of a sudden you don't have to subsidize industry to
do it,» explains Rob Savage, director
of Alberta Environment's
Climate Change Secretariat.
I'd like to think we
did it because we didn't want to press our luck anymore, because repairs
cost more than the Blue Book said you were worth, because you didn't have anti-lock brakes or passenger - side airbags, because we really couldn't have you breaking down on a late - night drive home from the airport or on a busy interstate, because
of fuel economy and our deepening concern over
climate change.
The alternative is a car - dependent, exurban sprawl disfiguring our towns and villages, worsening
climate change, leeching cities into wilderness, and
doing nothing to bring down the
cost of housing.
But these
do not affect the key point: the effects
of climate change, for example, will cause massive adjustment
costs so higher GDP may well not feed through to higher living standards.
As Chris Huhne has argued in Chapter 12, on
climate change, Liberal Democrats
do not argue that people should be prevented from flying or driving their cars, but rather that the true environmental
costs of their actions should be reflected in the price that they pay when they fly or drive.
European forest managers can have their cake and eat it, because according to a new study maximizing timber production in a forest
does not necessarily have to come at a
cost of reduced species diversity or the capacity to regulate
climate change by the same forest.
Water shortages are being felt around the world yet impacts vary in different places, said Gleick, adding that the human, economic, and environmental
costs of doing nothing, especially in the face
of climate change and environmental security threats, are high and require «new thinking.»
At the same time, the arrangement is designed to benefit the American companies, which can
do their bit to reduce emissions
of greenhouse gases, as required by the
Climate Change Convention, at one - third
of the
cost of making the same cuts in the US.
They
did so by adding the extra emissions to an existing model used in the UK government's 2006 Stern Review, designed to assess the economic
cost of coping with
climate change between now and 2200.
It's just amazing that, you know, you could capture that much information and it's interesting in the scientific perspective because what we are finding right now with issues like
climate change and conservation is that we really need fine - grained samples from very large geographic areas to really understand the dynamics
of species range movements and how fragmentation is occurring and many biogeographic questions, and literally, the only way we can
do this is through voluntary networks like this because it would
cost billions and billions to send professionals out at that finer scale to understand it.
«I
do think there's an opportunity, if the president chooses to take it, to show leadership and get attention on the
cost that
climate change is likely to cause,» says Kevin Kennedy, who heads the US
climate initiative
of the World Resources Institute in Washington DC.
The
climate models aren't really good enough in their representation
of present - day circulation to give you much confidence in the specifics
of their predictions [so that you could use them to
do a
cost - benefit analysis for example], but the risk
of widespread
change is still there.
The
cost of averting
climate change is often argued as a reason to
do nothing.
This is
done either through funding offers like Salix Finance, a not - for - profit company funded by the Department
of Energy and
Climate Change and the Welsh and Scottish Governments to remove the barrier
of significant upfront capital
cost to investing in energy efficient technologies.
Carol M. Browner, the new White House coordinator for
climate and energy, is a seasoned environmental regulator and campaigner who has focused on cap - and - trade legislation, which would steadily raise the
cost of unfettered fossil - fuel use, and rule - making as driving the necessary
change (as they
did with the 20th - century basket
of air pollutants).
This really is the problem: Mr. IAT is once again rebunking the denialist meme that AGW can't be a globally urgent problem if
climate scientists don't voluntarily internalize the marginal
climate -
change cost of their private fossil carbon emissions.
Arguably, what the funders
of organized
climate change denial have
done might in the long run
cost even more lives.
I agree that
climate change ranks low (22nd out
of 22 potential priority areas in a recent Gallup Poll, as I recall) among the American public, particularly when people are confronted by the reality that
doing something meaningful will entail
costs.
The high - income countries should help to finance the
costs of climate -
change mitigation in low - income countries as the high - income countries have promised to
do;
However, I am curious whether you will
do the same with respect to the diminished nutritional value
of these crops, the increased global prevailence and severity
of droughts, diminished agricultural output in Indonesia, etc, or, as is suggested by your response,
do you intend to «accentuate the positive» with regard to
climate change by omitting the
costs?
For a stark example
of the
costs attending business as usual, read the following «Your Dot» contribution from Elizabeth Hadly, a Stanford University biologist who's been
doing field work in Nepal's Himalayan highlands focused on the impact
of climate change on small mammals.
The destruction
of mountains, streams, rivers and groundwater, the destruction
of land laid waste by strip - mining, the loss
of wildlife in these areas, the human illnesses and premature deaths that result from these practices especially in Appalachia, the CO2 emissions and resulting
climate change along with the havoc this causes — all
of these are externalities that
do not enter into the price companies pay to mine the stuff or the
costs we pay to turn on the a.c.
Also, things are the way they are — setting aside the politics (for recieving nations) and psychological
costs (for those moving), it would make sense to some extent for people to move toward places set up for efficient wealth generation rather than to spread the wealth among the people whereever they are, so it wouldn't make sense to try to wipe the slate clean
of the advantages gained from history let along geography, although the later
does bring up the issue
of climate change refugees, and some wealth generating capacity is spread out (land), and
of course some clean energy resources are rather abundant in the developing world or parts thereof, and energy needs differ geographically even for the same lifestyle — see above... this whole paragraph should reference itself....
I hope we don't end - up regretting it too badly but by convincing ourselves that science must not be self - falsifiable, as is the case with the IPCC's position regarding scientific research into the causes
of climate change, I'm afraid we are destined to
do a lot
of wheel spinning at great
costs before we really make much headway in a truly conscious approach to our world's sustaining systems.
Even as potentially catastrophic as
climate change might be, if people don't sense
climate change as a direct personal threat, reason alone won't convince them that the
costs of action are worth it.
As I said before why
do we have to wait for the
climate change induced natural disaster that could happen that will make the bean counters put the
climate before the
cost instead
of the other way round.
I don't happen to agree with your conclusions, but the purpose
of my comment was not to give my perspective on the
cost / benefit calculation for
climate change mitigation.
So
do we continue to push
climate change stuff if we discover that the
cost is more than we have while the
cost of doing nothing is something we can easily afford?
«The situation the company finds itself in now is a significant amount
of uncertainty about what
climate change regulation might
do to the
cost of coal plants,» Eskelsen said Monday.
Cost benefit like that done by the Reagan administration does not work all that well when the cost distributions of climate change are that fu
Cost benefit like that
done by the Reagan administration
does not work all that well when the
cost distributions of climate change are that fu
cost distributions
of climate change are that fuzzy.
-- but ultimately, companies don't think twice about passing the
costs of climate change on to you, or if you become too much
of a risk, dropping you altogether.
Yet a leading U.S. Senate advocate
of legislative action on
climate seems to be starting off like a sprinter, perhaps because his legislation is pegged to estimates
of the Social
Cost of Carbon that don't account for the possibility that
climate change will turn out to be catastrophically costly.
How
do we discount the long - term
costs and benefits
of climate change?
Policymakers must
do cost / benefit analysis, taking into account tradeoffs, such as balancing risks from
climate change against those from poverty, and as Hans von Storch points out, «judgments
of the value
of costs versus benefits is [sic] a highly subjective, value - laden calculation.»
Their
cost estimates don't consider the benefits
of slower
climate change, such as improved health, and the reduction in impacts
of warming.
A new report from the American Security Project examines the
costs of doing nothing about
climate change, broken down into regional impacts across the US.
The problem for Mr. Romm is that most economic analyses
of climate change show that benefits don't exceed
costs for aggressive mitigation (see Manzi's comments, for instance).
We can
do that by internalizing the known
costs of global warming and
climate change and sea level rise that are not currently reflected in the price
of the products that are causing them.
Premier Wen Jiabao pledged China's support for greener development and addressing
climate change but drew the line at binding China to hard carbon emissions caps. Will this come at the expense
of low - carbon innovation? Apparently, analysis by Environmental Economics blog shows that countries which adopted the Kyoto Protocol experienced more greentech innovation (measured by patent filings) that countries that
did not. But Dr. David Tyfield (in a previous interview with GLF) would probably have you know that China's low
cost, low tech innovation can provide some interesting low carbon solutions.
Weitzman pointed out that, when we consider the full range
of possible outcomes from
climate change, the outlying possibilities on the high -
cost side
of the range
of possible outcomes
do not go quickly to zero, which implies far greater risks — and a far greater likelihood
of damages — than conventional analyses would suggest.
Some economic tools frequently used to evaluate public policy on
climate change such as
cost - benefit analysis that don't acknowledge responsibility for allocating the burdens for reducing the threat
of climate change on the basis
of distributive justice are ethically problematic.
The 2014 paper's author, Isabel Galiana, herself said that the «the paper
does not explicitly undertake a benefit /
cost analysis
of keeping
climate change to two degrees,» and also noted that if certain «tipping points» were passed, then
climate -
change induced damage could also increase.
«Even if we agreed on a particular computer simulation
of the monetary damages accruing from
climate change over the next few centuries, the calculation
of the «social
cost of carbon» would vary widely, depending on our choice
of parameters that have nothing to
do with
climate science,» he said.
Usual investment criteria may not deliver the super low -
cost, clean, renewable energy soon enough to avoid the worst effects
of climate change,» said Dr. Larry Brilliant, Executive Director
of Google.org, Google's philanthropic arm, «Google.org's hope is that by funding research on promising technologies, investing in promising new companies, and
doing a lot
of R&D ourselves, we may help spark a green electricity revolution that will deliver breakthrough technologies priced lower than coal.»
Choice 1: How much money
do we want to spend today on reducing carbon dioxide emission without having a reasonable idea
of: a) how much
climate will
change under business as usual, b) what the impacts
of those
changes will be, c) the
cost of those impacts, d) how much it will
cost to significantly
change the future, e) whether that
cost will exceed the benefits
of reducing
climate change, f) whether we can trust the scientists charged with developing answers to these questions, who have abandoned the ethic
of telling the truth, the whole truth and nothing but, with all the doubts, caveats, ifs, ands and buts; and who instead seek lots
of publicity by telling scary stories, making simplified dramatic statements and making little mention
of their doubts, g) whether other countries will negate our efforts, h) the meaning
of the word hubris, when we think we are wise enough to predict what society will need a half - century or more in the future?
But these direct
cost related factors don't even begin to count in the terrible external
costs of fossil fuels ranging from ramping damages due to
climate change and direct health impacts by adding toxic particles to the air and water.
However, if
climate change is understood as essentially a moral and ethical problem it will eventually transform how
climate change is debated because the successful framing by the opponents
of climate change policies that have limited recent debate to these three arguments, namely
cost, scientific uncertainty, and unfairness
of reducing ghg emissions until China
does so can be shown to be deeply ethically and morally problematic.
Common to these arguments is that they have successfully framed the
climate change debate so that opponents and proponents
of climate policies debate facts about
costs, scientific uncertainty, or economic harms to nations that act while other large emitters don't act rather the moral problems with these arguments.
The analyses evaluate the
costs of reducing greenhouse gas emissions, but
do not measure the resulting payoff — the benefits
of averting dangerous
climate change.
These questions are organized according to the most frequent arguments made against
climate change policies which are claims that
climate change policies: (a) will impose unacceptable
costs on a national economy or specific industries or prevent nations from pursuing other national priorities, (b) should not be adopted because
of scientific uncertainty about
climate change impacts, or (c) are both unfair and ineffective as long as high emitting nations such as China or India
do not adopt meaningful ghg emissions reduction policies.