Post
It’s Not Really About a 350 ppm Target
…It’s about how we get there.
I know in the next few days there will be a lot of talk about this wonderful number of 350 as the festivities of 350 International Day of Climate Action ensue. But, before we go into this wonderful time, I think we have to be clear about what this 350 number actually means. 350.org released an animated video showing what it thinks this number means:
350.org’s Trailer
… but some of us could use a bit more of a concrete definition.
So, to clear the air (no pun intended), 350ppm CO2 is a target that we already passed and the present CO2 concentration of the atmosphere is 387ppm. That is not to say that a 350 target can never be reached but it is not really something that can conceivably be reached in our lifetime or possibly in our grandchildren’s lifetime.
To back up this point, I attended a lecture a few days ago by a famous environmental economist from Harvard University, Robert Stavins. After admitting that many people often perceive him as a living oxymoron, Stavins defended the need for an economic understanding of the climate issue and subsequently began presenting his team’s most recent models.
I was amazed to hear him say that, if every nation of the world was to put 1% of its GDP per year to reducing CO2 emissions, we would certainly be able to reach the 550 target by 2100 and we even might be able to get to a 460 target. We would not be able to reach a 450 target, though, and the price gap between a 460 target and a 450 target is fairly large, with exponential cost increases continuing as you go from there. By the time you got to 350, you're talking some severe economic consequences with much of today's capital stock rendered obselete far too quickly.
So, what does 350 mean for the climate conference? Well, not terribly much considering how incredibly distant it necessarily is. It is an ideal that we strive for, though.
Perhaps there’s a larger issue here that deals with the nature of CO2 ppm targets and dates: it’s not really good enough to set a target and a date. You have to talk about how you’re going to get there. I mean, we learned this from Kyoto and all of the nations that clearly are not going to fulfill their agreement.
And, listening to Stavin’s critique of Kyoto that I recorded (below), I realized that the COP-15 treaty will not really be more or less effective whether they set a 350 target or a 550 target. What makes it effective is if they talk about HOW they’re going to reduce emissions. Will there be a truly global carbon market, for example?
I found the end of his critique especially telling:
Famous Environemntal Economist Gives a Critique of Kyoto
Comments
Contrary to what Prof. Stavins says, an economic understanding of climate change is not all that important. Climate change is primarily a moral issue, then an issue of justice and legal responsibility, then an issue of risk management (which current economics is unfit for) and only then an issue of cost. Although I’m personally doubting whether to put aesthetics ahead of that.
In its current state, economics is unfit to address more than the question which kind of policies to reduce climate change would cost more or less, and even there I wouldn’t want it to stray as far from empirics as it is wont to.
Well, yes, of course climate change is a moral issue. That’s why we need economists to tell us how many jobs will be obsolete and how many people will be out of work if we change at a certain rate.
The loss (and gain!) of jobs is a practical matter and we would indeed want economists to tell us something about it. Unfortunately the current hostility to empirics among many in the science means that we can’t trust most of them to come up with an answer that would inform sound policy.
The mainstream in economics—neoclassical economics—is a failed research programme. Its models can’t process risk. Its researchers are incapable of dealing with empirical results don’t fit their models. The science has gone in a perverse search of negative results as a confirmation of its central theses.
With regard to employment, neoclassical economics has not even digested the minimum wage puzzle. Indeed, many choose to deny the empirical data staring them in the face.
In this context, environmental economists who, like Professor Stavins, advocate a ‘climate policy ramp’, that is, a slowly but steadily increasing effort to curtail emissions, are generally of the neoclassical persuasion. I would like to direct you to Terry Barker’s send-up of these people for the Tyndall Centre.
With regard to the argument, Stavins ignores transaction costs and institutional capabilities when he says that the Kyoto Protocol excludes many low-cost opportunities for mitigation. One would think that the practical difficulties we’ve encountered with the CDM would bring that point across, but, as said, neoclassical economists aren’t that interested in empirics. He also ignores the fact that the Kyoto Protocol is part of a larger political process in the context of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and treats it like some stand-alone economic policy to reduce it to the tools of his analysis. He’s effectively discussing a strawman. Other famed environmental economists, like Yale’s own W.D. Nordhaus, do the same.
I actually think the brilliance of the 350 movement is that it adresses this.
According to me the role of morals is to say what we want (eg. we want a world here polar bears can live and the Maldives are still above sea level).
The role of science is to define what is needed (eg. then we need to keep CO2 below 350 ppm).
Finally the role of political life including citizens and politicians is to discuss how to get there, find the ways to do it, and do it.
350 ppm might seem an impossibility right now..but we have to remember that it is ONLY we together that can help our mother earth..