Ecological Imperialism
In a paper delivered at “The Costs of Kyoto” conference, sponsored by the Competitive Enterprise Institute, Deepak Lal, James S. Coleman Professor of International Development Studies, UCLA, argued that “At Kyoto Third World countries are going to face their first serious confrontation with the growing ecological imperialism of the international green movement . . .”
Though treaty proponents initially proposed restrictions only on the industrialized countries, the Clinton administration has stated “that the Kyoto accord must include ‘language that makes it clear’ that developing country obligations under the pact will increase over time ‘and will include binding targets.'”
Lal cited a study by Thomas Schelling which shows that a delay in doubling of CO2 emissions for four decades would lead to a loss of 2 percent of gross world product in perpetuity. Though this will harm the industrial countries it could be devastating for the Third World.
Lal points out that it wasn’t until the Industrial Revolution that it became possible to eradicate “mass structural poverty.” “So” concludes Lal, “I look upon the green agenda . . . as ultimately trying to stop growth in the Third World. And if you’re saying you’re going to stop growth in the
Third World, you’re really going to say that you’re willing to condemn three-quarters of the world’s population to continuing poverty.”
Ignorance is Bliss
The Clinton administration has decided to dispense with using three economic models to analyze policy options to reduce greenhouse gases. Timothy Wirth, Undersecretary of State for Global Affairs, argued that the economic models were unable to produce an “honest result” in predicting the economic effects of climate change policy.
A draft report by the interagency team, that will not be completed, showed that a reduction in greenhouse gases to 1990 levels by 2010 would require a $100 per ton carbon tax increase the price of gasoline by 26 cents per gallon, $1.49 per thousand cubic feet of natural gas, $52.52 per ton of coal, and 2 cents per kilowatt hour of electricity.
Janet Yellen, chair of the president’s Council of Economic Advisers, told a House subcommittee that the administration would do economic analyses, but will “preclude . . . detailed numbers.” Not to worry, the administration will tell the public what it believes the impact of climate change policy will be: “Any policy the president endorses on climate change will be informed by his commitment to sustaining a healthy and robust economy” (BNA Daily Environment Report, July 16, 1997).
Real Action Not Likely
According to Robert J. Samuelson, “Global warming may or may not be the great environmental crisis of the next century, but – regardless of whether it is or isn’t – we won’t do much about it.”
To do something effective Congress would have to impose something equivalent to a $100 carbon tax, which would raise gasoline prices by 26 cents per gallon and electricity and natural gas rates by about 30 percent.
Because of the great amount of uncertainty surrounding the likelihood or magnitude of global warming, Congress is not likely to pass a tax that would put the economic screws to the American people.
The best way to cope with potential warming, according to Samuelson, is to adapt to it. To sign a sweeping treaty that would ultimately lead nowhere would make global warming “a gushing source of national hypocrisy” (Washington Post, “Dancing Around a Dilemma,” July 9, 1997).
Baby Steps to Lower Greenhouse Emissions
In hearings before the Senate Environmental & Public Works Committee, the panel of four scientists and one economist generally agreed that moderate steps should be taken to reduce greenhouse emissions. Harvard University Economics Professor Dale Jorgenson, argued that the U.S. should eliminate energy subsidies and adopt a tax based on carbon content of fuels. The proposed tax would lead to an increase of 5 cents per gallon of gasoline by 2025, starting at $5.29 per ton of CO2 and rising gradually to $10 per ton.
Richard Lindzen, professor of meteorology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and well-known skeptic of the global warming hypothesis, argued that Jorgenson’s proposal would have no effect on climate change. Both John Christy, associate professor of atmospheric science at the University of Alabama at Hunstville, and Eric Barron, director of the Earth System Sciences Center at Penn State University, endorsed modest emissions reductions that would improve energy efficiency and provide overall benefits to the economy (BNA Daily Environment Report, July 11, 1997).
There is one problem with such modest proposals. If human-induced climate change is a major problem then modest proposals will do nothing to avert it. If it isn’t a problem, then why do anything at all?
Canada Could Be Divided
According to the study by the Australian Bureau of Agriculture and Resource Economics (ABARE), a treaty to restrict greenhouse emissions would be devastating to Alberta’s oil, coal and gas industries as well as to Ontario’s iron and steel sector. Additionally, governments of the Atlantic provinces are counting on growing offshore oil and gas production to spur further economic growth. On the other hand, Central Canadian manufacturers will benefit by absorbing labor and capital driven out of the oil producing sector. Overall, Canada will experience a 0.5 percent reduction in output by 2010.
Chris Peirce, vice president of strategic planning with the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers, said, “You can kind of gloss over the really difficult issue that people would have to deal with by saying, ‘Well, the overall number [for the economic cost] is only 0.4 percent of gross domestic product’ . . . . When you look beneath that surface at what it’s going to do within the sectors, it’s quite a different matter” (The Financial Post, July 5, 1997).
Etc.
NATO Soldiers to Fight Climate Change?
According to the Washington Post (“Clinton’s NATO Effort Risky; President’s Vision Rests on Historic Rationale,” July 8, 1997) the Clinton administration envisions a new role for the expanded NATO alliance.
“The administration argues that the new NATO will be the cornerstone of a new system of international security dealing with a much wider array of threats than was the case during the Cold War. ‘Unlike Marshall’s generation, we face no single galvanizing threat,’ [Madeleine] Albright said at Harvard. ‘The dangers we confront are less visible and more diverse – some as old as ethnic conflict, some as new a letter bombs, some as subtle as climate change, and some as deadly as nuclear weapons falling into the wrong hands” (emphasis added).
Investor’s Business Daily (“Our Rain Forest Rangers,” July 7, 1997) reports that the administration’s Quarterly Defense Review claims that, “The most serious security problems are . . . those threats to the ‘international community’ stemming from ‘instability’ caused by ‘transnational problems’ such as poverty, disease, terrorism, global climate change, migration, and integration into a global economy” (emphasis added).
The United Nation’s Windbags
In a scathing editorial in the Village Voice (“When Smog Snobs Meet: Saving the Earth From Windbags,” July 8, 1997), Linda Stasi asks, “What do you call it when billions of tons of hot air per second are released into the atmosphere by gigantic gas bags? How about Rio Plus Five – the recent UN conference on the environment?”
Stasi continues, “Last week, world leaders and assorted international windbags from 60 – count em – 60 countries arrived here to whine about pollution while simultaneously causing massive traffic jams, which in turn caused massive pollution.”
Stasi is skeptical whether anything will come of the conference; instead she suggests, “maybe we’d have a better environment if they just shut down the UN altogether – it would be years before anybody even noticed that nobody was there.”
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