[MCN] Climate and the Economy: A mini-anthology/pre-primer

[Lance Olsen]

Climate and the Economy: A mini-anthology/pre-primer
Compiled by Lance Olsen 2010
Last updated August 14, 2017



“Decarbonization of the world’s economy would bring colossal disruption of the status quo. It’s a desire to avoid that change — political, financial and otherwise — that drives many of the climate sceptics. 

Still, as this journal has noted numerous times, it’s clear that many policymakers who argue that emissions must be curbed, and fast, don’t seem to appreciate the scale of what’s required.”


NATURE, EDITORIAL  21 FEBRUARY 2018

==================

“...many scientists say deep emissions cuts are necessary … to prevent … dangerous consequences of global warming. 

"Getting from here to there would require a massive economic shift.”

Rachel Pannett and Jeffrey Ball. “Australia Approves Energy Bill.”  
The Wall Street Journal  p.A7, August 21, 2009

======================

 “Changes in world GDP (WGDP) have a significant effect on CO2 concentrations, so that years of above-trend WGDP are years of greater rise of CO2 concentrations.”

Granados et al. Climate change and the world economy: short-run determinants of atmospheric CO2. Environmental science & policy 21 (2012) 

====================================

“We calculate that global CO2 emissions from fossil fuel burning decreased by 1.3% in 2009 owing to the global financial and economic crisis that started in 2008."

“Despite this drop, the 2009 global fossil fuel and cement emissions were the second highest in human history.”

“The growth in CO2 emissions closely follows the growth in Gross Domestic Product (GDP) corrected for improvements in energy efficiency.”

P. Friedlingstein, et al. Update on CO2 emissions. Nature Geoscience. Published online: 21 November 2010

==================================

"… the race between climate dynamics and  climate policy will be a close one ….” and “ … requires an industrial revolution for sustainability starting now."  

Hans Joachim Schellnhuber. 
“Global warming: Stop worrying, start panicking?”
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 
September 23, 2008  vol. 105  no. 38 

====================================

"So far, there are few signs that either companies or countries have been able to decouple economic growth from carbon emissions growth."

PricewaterhouseCoopers, Carbon Disclosure Project 2013
http://www.pwc.com/gx/en/sustainability/publications/carbon-disclosure-project/index.jhtml <http://www.pwc.com/gx/en/sustainability/publications/carbon-disclosure-project/index.jhtml>

=====================================

"Even doubling our current rate of decarbonisation, would still lead to emissions consistent with 6 degrees of warming by the end of the century. To give ourselves a more than 50% chance of avoiding 2 degrees will require a six-fold improvement in our rate of decarbonisation."

"Too late for two degrees? Low carbon economy index" PricewaterhouseCoopers November 2012
https://www.thepmr.org/system/files/documents/Low%20Carbon%20Economy%20Index%202012.pdf

====================================

 “The effects of climate change will be ‘severe, pervasive and irreversible’ within the next few decades if countries burn more than just one-quarter of the fossil fuel reserves already found, according to a major new U.N. draft report”

“In short, 75 percent of the fossil fuels must remain in the ground to forestall devastating impacts.“

http://www.newsweek.com/leaked-un-report-climate-change-impacts-already-inevitable-may-soon-be-266860 <http://www.newsweek.com/leaked-un-report-climate-change-impacts-already-inevitable-may-soon-be-266860>

===============================

“THE Stone Age did not end for lack of stone, and the Oil Age will end long before the world runs out of oil.” 

Sheikh Zaki Yamani, former Saudi oil minister
Quoted here : 
http://www.economist.com/node/2155717 <http://www.economist.com/node/2155717>

===============================

“I believe humanity is making risky bets in the climate casino. ….  But it is always possible that humanity will wake up  ….  If that happened, fossil fuel reserves would indeed be stranded. Investors beware: the risk of that cannot be zero.”

Martin Wolf. A climate fix would ruin investors.
Financial Times. June 17, 2014 
http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/5a2356a4-f58e-11e3-afd3-00144feabdc0.html#axzz3C5hyxJyx <http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/5a2356a4-f58e-11e3-afd3-00144feabdc0.html%22%20%5Cl%20%22axzz3C5hyxJyx>

================================

“What does all this imply for corporate boards? It may mean that it is time to put climate-related issues on the board agenda (if they are not there already). These discussions are most effective when integrated into a company’s strategic planning sessions. In its oversight role, the board should expect management to assess climate-related risk the same as it does any other significant risk ...  ”

Kathy Nieland, Catherine Bromilow and Matt Arnold.
The New Era Of Climate Risk Disclosure.
The Corporate Board  May/June  2010

=====================================

"… energy consumption in 1960 was about half what it is now …. Surely we had a civilized country then, with roads, electricity, entertainment, and so on. …. Have we, by doubling our energy consumption, doubled our happiness?"

Kimon Valaskakis, Peter S. Sindell, J. Graham Smith, and Iris Fitzpatrick-Martin. The Conserver Society. 1970. Harper & Row.

====================================

 "We have only one planet and the time has come to transform our present lifestyle and consumption patterns in order to halt the degradation of the Earth's natural capital ..."

From the Executive Summary, WWF:  China Ecological Footprint: Report 2012 : Consumption, production, and sustainability.

============================

“The emission of greenhouse gases into Earth’s atmosphere is a by-product of modern marvels such as the production of vast amounts of energy, heating and cooling inhospitable environments to be amenable to human existence, and traveling great distances faster than our saddle-sore ancestors ever dreamed possible. 

“However, these luxuries come at a price: climate changes in the form of severe droughts, extreme precipitation and temperatures, increased frequency of flooding in coastal cities, global warming, and sea-level rise (1, 2). 

“This is the price we pay for the luxury of about 200 y of relatively unchecked greenhouse gas emissions.

“The price of our emissions is not felt immediately throughout the entire climate system, however, because processes such as ice sheet melt and the expansion of warming ocean water act over the course of centuries. Thus, even if all greenhouse gas emissions immediately ceased, our past emissions have already “locked in” some amount of continued global warming…”

Lasting coastal hazards from past greenhouse gas emissions <https://www.pnas.org/content/early/2019/11/06/1917051116>
Tony E. Wong. PNAS first published November 7, 2019.
https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1917051116 <https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1917051116>




-----------------------------------------------------

"Politicians strain to outdo each other with promises to 'get tough' on crime and to bring law and order back to the streets….There is no question that common street crime is an important social concern. But its image has become so bloated in the mirror of public opinion that it blocks our view of the white collar crimes which are both more costly and more dangerous to society."

James Coleman. The Criminal Elite. 1985. St. Martin's Press

————————————————————

"In a corrupt environment, resources will be directed toward such non-productive areas as the police, armed forces and other organs of social control and repression as the elites move to protect themselves, their positions and their material wealth …   resources otherwise available for socio-economic development will be diverted into security expenditure."

John McFarlane. Transnational Crime, Corruption and Crony Capitalism in the Twenty-First Century. Transnational Organized Crime. Vol. 4 No. 2, Summer 1998

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://bigskynet.org/pipermail/missoula-community-news_bigskynet.org/attachments/20230506/b4d0a3ba/attachment.html>