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C&C - Nicholas Stern: Ballerina
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Aubrey Meyer
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Dec 17, 2007 10:50 PST
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Mr Nicholas Stern, in the view of Mr Georg Haas of the German Green
Foundation [the Heinrich Boell Stiftung] is a star critic of
“Contraction and Convergence” [C&C].
Calling it a ‘privilege’ and using the internet, Mr Haas has
re-broadcast Mr Stern’s latest argument that C&C is a, “spectacularly
weak form of justice” - citing [what is by any standards] a
spectacularly weak form of C&C.
http://www.klima-der-gerechtigkeit.de/eine-spektakular-schwache-form-von-gerechtigkeit/
Like many in this increasingly dysfunctional climate debate, Mr Stern is
clearly intellectually challenged by the issue of accounting climate
change mitigation with C&C.
Mr – soon to be Lord – Stern yet again substantially repositions himself
with his latest opinion of C&C. This is – to my knowledge – the fourth
time since he published his Review a year or more ago.
In this much publicised report, Mr Stern carefully pre-selected,
targeted and then dismissed C&C as an ‘assertion’ [“it is not an
argument; it is an assertion”].
He then went on to assert the ludicrous view that a safe and stable
ceiling of 550 ppmv atmosphere concentration of CO2 can be achieved and
maintained for a mere one percent of GDP. This assessment of coping
assumes that GDP will continue to grow exponentially at 3%. This
prognosis assumes that although the damage costs are growing
exponentially as well, they are growing from a lower base, and so can be
absorbed indefinitely by the benefits of growth. [Adolf Hitler lost the
Second World War using a stronger argument than this].
After publication Mr Stern then went on to tell his future students at
LSE that in fact the universal equal emissions rights argument in C&C
was, “too difficult to get your head around” as it was like saying there
was an equal right to vote. [This assertion was unexpectedly developed
in the current UN’s Human Development Report courtesy of Kevin Watkins
of OXFAM].
Then Mr Stern made volta face number three. He went to a climate
“who’s-who” gathering a few weeks ago in Potsdam to support Mrs Merkel’s
pro-C&C agreement with Indians. At this he co-signed [with the
Nobel-laureates et al listed below] a statement asserting the [quote]: -
”Principle of carbon justice, i.e. striving for a long-term convergence
to equal-per-capita emissions rights accomplished through a medium-term
multi-stage approach accounting for differentiated national capacities.”
[unquote].
http://lists.topica.com/lists/GCN@igc.topica.com/read/message.html?mid=1721226171&sort=d&start=24
‘Striving’ to achieve this ‘justice-principle’ implies that we have a
choice and that by signing this, you in some manner ‘believe in choosing
this justice principle’.
Something appears to have escaped the attention of the co-signatories to
this list – and not least Mr Stern. It is that since the global
contraction of carbon-consumption and emissions is necessary to
stabilize the concentration of GHG in the atmosphere, it is impossible -
whatever the state of moral vigour - not to converge the per capita
consumption of this. It is a function of the maths, not the morals.
And now Mr Stern’s latest votal face - truly a ‘tour-de-farce’ is to
side up with the Indians in a top UN forum with Mr Nitin Desai to
*denounce* this very [albeit very weak version of the] C&C argument in
favour of what . . . ? It was not specified.
The number of turns here are worthy of a ballerina. And an economist who
affirms and then denounces weak justice as we plough into worsening
climate disasters, sounds a little apostate to me.
What comes next? 32 pirouettes to Jihad?
I can't believe that Mr Stern will – as Mr Haas proposes – be in favour
of the NGO Eco-Equity argument [“Strong Justice”] published through
Heinrich Boell Foundation. In this argument, emissions must go to zero
globally for climate safety and this must be achieved by the money and
effort of developed countries alone whose emissions will go to zero by
2028 [sic] in exchange for a blank cheque for the emissions of
developing countries in honour of their greenhouse gas development
rights.
This is a form of mathematical black magic that turns leaden whining
into golden water. It would be a flat contradiction of the ‘agreement’
just achieved in Bali, where this viewpoint was finally defeated in
favour of an outcome specifying the need for an all-country agreement.
But that point does seem – looking back over the years – never to have
much bothered the NGOs.
Mr Stern should probably take a rest. He has been heavily lobbied,
poorly advised and - like Mr Haas and many others, including the
climate-equity faction - has not done his own homework adequately.
Against all of this, the C&C calculus is clearly laid out here. Now, it
is against the backdrop of the ‘coupled model’ runs from the Hadley
Centre now in IPCC AR4: -
http://www.gci.org.uk/Animations/BENN_C&C_Animation_[Tower_&_Ravens].exe
This shows the narrowing opportunity we now face and is the basis of any
globally numerate response to climate change.
These numbers are certainly unwelcome. These numbers are definitely
inconvenient. However, if we are steered by this there is a chance that
we could yet solve this global problem faster than we are creating it.
However, if we continue to be steered by people of the confused and
vacillating judgement of Mr Stern, the policy challenge framed by these
numbers may well prove impossible to resolve.
Whatever the outcome, the C&C assumptions and accounting in this
exposition of the numbers happen to be transparent, accurate,
trustworthy and true. In the words of the email received today from
Georg Haas "really very beautiful and very instructive."
Thank you Georg. I really appreciate the considered view. Can you
persuade Mr Stern to look at it - and then pass judgement on C&C - too.
Aubrey Meyer
GCI
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
• Global target such as the 2°C-limit for planetary warming relative to
pre-industrial levels or the (largely equivalent) halving of worldwide
greenhouse emissions by 2050. It is useful to view those emissions as
the product of two crucial factors, namely per capita emissions times
population. Both of these must be appropriately addressed to attain the
long-term stabilization target.
• Series of consistent short and medium-term emissions reduction
targets, essential to drive investment and technology and to minimize
the need for greater action later.
• Leadership role of industrialized countries, both regarding drastic
emissions reductions and development of low/no-carbon technologies in
order to give poor developing countries room for urgently needed
economic growth within the boundaries of a global carbon regime.
• Principle of carbon justice, i.e. striving for a long-term convergence
to equal-per-capita emissions rights accomplished through a medium-term
multi-stage approach accounting for differentiated national capacities.
• Carbon price, as generated, for instance, through an international
cap-and-trade system (of systems) based on auctioning permits.
• Establishment of a powerful worldwide process supporting
climate-friendly innovation and cooperation, combined with increased
funding for RD&D including basic research, to facilitate technology
transfer and proliferation.
• Major contributions to a multinational funding system for enhancing
adaptive capacities.
• Scaled-up efforts to reduce emissions from deforestation and
accelerate ecologically appropriate reforestation, achievable through
the creation of new incentives for communities and countries to preserve
and even increase their forests.
• Reductions of non-CO2 greenhouse gas emissions.
Participants
Nobel Laureates
Prof. Zhores Alferov (Nobel Prize in Physics 2000), Russian Academy of
Sciences & Foundation Alferov, Russia
Prof. Murray Gell-Mann (Nobel Prize in Physics 1969), Santa Fe Institute
Prof. David Gross (Nobel Prize in Physics 2004), University of
California, Santa Barbara
Prof. Theodor Hänsch (Nobel Prize in Physics 2005), Ludwig Maximilians
University, Munich
Prof. Alan Heeger (Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2000), University of
California, Santa Barbara
Prof. Sir Antony Hewish (Nobel Prize in Physics 1974), University of
Cambridge
Prof. Klaus von Klitzing (Nobel Prize in Physics 1985), Max Planck
Institute for Solid State Research, Stuttgart
Prof. Walter Kohn (Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1998), University of
California, Santa Barbara
Prof. Wangari Muta Maathai (Nobel Prize in Peace 2004), Green Belt
Movement
Prof. Rudolph Marcus (Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1992), California
Institute of Technology, Pasadena
Prof. Sir James Mirrlees (Nobel Prize in Economics 1996), University of
Cambridge and Chinese University, Hong Kong
Prof. Mario Molina (Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1995), University of
California, San Diego (revised)
Prof. Carlo Rubbia (Nobel Prize in Physics 1984), CERN, Geneva
Prof. Amartya Sen (Nobel Prize in Economics 1998), Harvard University
Prof. Sir John Sulston (Nobel Prize in Physiology/ Medicine 2002),
Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, Cambridge
Contributors
Dr. Angela Merkel, Federal Chancellor
Matthias Platzeck, Minister President of Brandenburg
Sigmar Gabriel, Federal Minister for the Environment, Nature
Conservation and Nuclear Safety
Dr. Annette Schavan, Federal Minister for Education and Research
Prof. Johanna Wanka, Minister for Science, Research and Culture of the
State of Brandenburg
Prof. Frieder Meyer-Krahmer, State Secretary, Federal Ministry of
Education and Research
Prof. Markus Antonietti, Director, Max Planck Institute for Colloid and
Boundary Layer Research, Potsdam
Prof. Carlo Carraro, Chairman, Department of Economics, University “Ca’
Foscari” of Venice
Dr. Peter Frey, editor in chief, Berlin studios of ZDF German television
Prof. Mohamed Hassan, President, African Academy of Sciences and
Executive Director, Academy of Sciences for the Developing World/ TWAS,
Trieste
Barbara Hendricks, opera singer, Honorary Ambassador For Life for the
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Founder of the Barbara
Hendricks Foundation for Peace and Reconciliation
Prof. Sir Brian Hoskins, Former Head of the Meteorological Department,
University of Reading
Prof. Daniel Kammen, Director, Renewable and Appropriate Energy
Laboratory (RAEL), University of California, Berkeley
Prof. Paul Klemperer, Edgeworth Professor of Economics, Oxford
University
Jim Leape, Director General, World Wide Fund for Nature, Gland
Prof. Diana Liverman, Director of Oxford University’s Environmental
Change Institute
Prof. Joachim Luther, Former Director of Fraunhofer Institute for Solar
Energy Systems (ISE), Advisor to the German Government on research and
innovation
Ian McEwan, English novelist and Fellow of the Royal Society of
Literature, Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, and Fellow of the
American Academy of Arts and Sciences
Prof. Volker ter Meulen, Professor Emeritus, Institute for Virology and
Immunology, University Würzburg; President of the German Academy of
Sciences, Leopoldina, Halle/Saale
Prof. Jürgen Mlynek, President, German Helmholtz Association, Berlin
Prof. Nebojsa Nakicenovic, Professor of Energy Economics at Vienna
University of Technology
Dr. Sunita Narain, Director, Centre for Science and Environment (CSE),
New Delhi
Prof. Michael Oppenheimer, Albert G. Milbank Professor of Geosciences
and International Affairs in the Woodrow Wilson School and the
Department of Geosciences at Princeton University
Prof. Rajendra Pachauri, Chairman of the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel
on Climate Change); Director General, TERI, New Delhi
Prof. Kirit Parikh, Member, Planning Commission, Government of India,
New Delhi; Professor Emeritus and Founding Director, Indira Gandhi
Institute of Development Research (IGIDR), Mumbai
Prof. George Poste, Director, The Biodesign Institute, Arizona State
University
Ambassador William C. Ramsay, Deputy Executive Director, International
Energy Agency, Paris
Prof. Johan Rockström, Director, Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI)
Dr. Karsten Sach, Director, Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature
Conservation and Nuclear Safety, Berlin
Achim Steiner, Executive Director, United Nations Environment Programme
(UNEP); Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations, Nairobi
Prof. Matthias Steinmetz, Director, Astrophysical Institute Potsdam
(AIP)
Prof. Sir Nicholas Stern, IG Patel Professor and Director, India
Observatory and Asia Research Centre, London School of Economics and
Political Science
Prof. Klaus Töpfer,
Former Executive Director,
United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP),
Nairobi
Prof. Robert Watson,
Chief Scientist and Director for Sustainable Development
World Bank
Prof. Carl Christian von Weizsäcker, Director emeritus of the Institute
of Energy Economics at the University of Cologne;
Max Planck Institute for Research on Collective Goods, Bonn
Prof. Ernst Ulrich von Weizsäcker, Dean, Bren School of Environmental
Science and Management, University of California, Santa Barbara
Prof. Geoffrey West,
President, Santa Fe Institute
Anders Wijkman,
Member of the European Parliament; Member of the Royal Swedish Academy
of Science
Convenor
Prof. Hans Joachim Schellnhuber,
Director,
Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK);
Chief Climate Advisor to the German Government
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