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Economic growth and climate change
The G8 wants to "decouple economic growth from energy use." Is that possible? That's the central question of out times, I guess. Walden Belloon thinks not:
The only effective response to climate change is to radically reduce economic growth rates and consumption levels, particularly in the North, and in the very near future. The climate change section of the G8 declaration is a long and all-too-transparent exercise to get around this reality.
David Roberts is staff writer for Grist. You can follow his Twitter feed at twitter.com/drgrist.
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Comments
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odograph Posted 8:33 am
07 Jun 2007
I think, obviously, we can all model ourselves on the nations that do the most with the least energy.
And sure, "decoupling" may be impossible in a strict literal sense ... but surely we can shoot for a better ratio over time.
In fact, the only way we can promise developing countries growth and emissions control is by promising better energy intensities.
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GreyFlcn Posted 9:34 am
07 Jun 2007
The profit motive is "decoupled" from how much electricity they create.
Instead it's associated with how much effieciency they create.
i.e. It's associated with how little electricity they create, while still maintaining full service.
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Nucbuddy Posted 10:18 am
07 Jun 2007
If given a goal at hand were to reduce the amount of electrical-energy generated, would not it make sense to tax consumption of the electricity?
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GreyFlcn Posted 10:42 am
07 Jun 2007
The general public isn't that good at that.
Utility based programs and Mandates/Rebates on consumer appliances is much more effective.
Since they are the ones which make the major decisions.
_
If consumers had all the influence, Joe Q. Public would have himself a 250mpg SUV.
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Sam Wells Posted 2:14 pm
07 Jun 2007
As emission standards drop for land-based sources such as cars, construction equipment, power plants, and industries, ship emissions are increasing at an alarming rate. The International Maritime Orgaization (IMO) has suggested limits on sulfur dioxide and notrogen oxides but has nothing more than an informal policy about global warming and CO2 emissions.
Folks, this is serious stuff and the ships and ship engines are getting bigger, like 20,000 to over 100,000 horspower. It might seem to be a blessing that the ships spread their emissions over a wide stretch of the ocean but most all in the northern hemisphere take the Great Circle Route, either close up to Alaska or Greenland.
Oh, you didn't know that. Come on, man, if a bird was going to fly to Japan it wouldn't head due west, it would head north and take a right at the Aleutian Islands - it is hundreds of miles shorter.
Those ships stink to high heaven and are HUGE carbon emitters. Their plumes have been modeled in various technical papers as to particulate aerosol and ozone potential. People living in ports such as LA/Wilmington are upset as hell because they fire up even more auxiliary engines while in port. Until we start controlling emissions on the high sea - and especially within at least 15 degrees of the Arctic Circle - we're just playing with toys here. I see some movement on cruise liners than anything else; maybe some shore power in LA and some cleaner fuels in ports. That is it. Globally, that's a pimple on a mountain.
You go and burn 50 to 100 metric tons of bunker fuel a day in an uncontrolled situation, no scrubber, elecrostatic precipitators, or anything. No carbon removal of any kind. And then you look at growth which seems low, 1-5 percent, but some kinds of containerships and tankerships are growing much faster, 7-10 percent. Decouple my arse, it is linear and very clear to me what the impacts will be.
Onward through the fog
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SustainableGreen Posted 4:04 pm
07 Jun 2007
Decoupling? Can't be done, but the Corporate Oligarchy will figure out a way. Just another externality to realize.
We need fundamental change.
David
Sustainability For Life
Messages done with sustainable energy, with Wind and Sun!
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GreyFlcn Posted 4:18 pm
07 Jun 2007
http://www.nrdc.org/air/energy/images/fcagoals4.gif
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caniscandida Posted 5:11 pm
07 Jun 2007
Please stop showing off, and translate into standard English.
Chickens are our cousins!
So are other sensitive animals!
Enough is enough!
No more factory farms!
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Billhook Posted 6:00 pm
07 Jun 2007
I well agree that the use of such jargon is essentially exclusive of those not informed of its meaning.
For anyone unclear on "decouple" it refers to the wish to end the fossil fuel dependence of economic growth.
As such it is fairly straightforward nonsense -
eternal growth on a finite planet is patently an artefact of ideology, not strategy.
"Energy Intensity" is a far more devious jargon, first pushed on Bush's behalf by the hag Klausen at the Pew Centre.
It pretends to a benign intent - being a measure of the energy required per unit of GDP produced.
But using reduced energy intensity as a target allows the charming fraud of expanding energy use while growing the economy even faster -
In reality it would only function benignly when a society declared that it was rich enough and renounced economic growth.
Regards,
Bill
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spaceshaper Posted 10:02 pm
07 Jun 2007
This is not quite a universal description of the term. Decoupling means declining to accept a generally assumed correlation of parallel conditions. A coupled meme in this case would be "economic growth necessitates increased fossil fuel use". The decoupled meme is that fossil fuel use can increase or decrease, economic growth can increase or decrease, but we are not compelled to accept the correlation of the one with the other. The horse generally pulls the cart - when the horse moves, the cart does also. Decoupling the pair allows the horse to go to pasture and the cart to be otherwise maneuvered. A useful practice.
The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.
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odograph Posted 10:43 pm
07 Jun 2007
There is no way to avoid an improvement in energy intensity, on the way to a better and sustainable world, unless again you think of a way for us all to leap to a new world at once.
Look at this graph:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Gdp-energy-efficiency. ...
Basically there should be a "let's meet here" sign in the upper right corner. As a first step, the US and Canada should move to be a little more Switzerland-like.
Now on the claim that "growth" must stop? I think that is often a sloppy claim because the kind of growth is not defined.
Obviously this thread is about a halt in CO2 growth ... but does growth in human knowledge, or human happiness, have to stop at the same time?
(GDP itself is a rude measure, useful only in the absence of anything better.)
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caniscandida Posted 1:14 am
08 Jun 2007
"Growth" is a biological metaphor, and we usually mean by it the increase in size of an organism as it ages. As everyone knows, that is part of a natural cycle: a healthy and fortunate organism is born (hatched, sprouted, whatever), then grows to the upper limits, size-wise, of its species, then declines and dies. Meanwhile, younger individuals of the same species are doing their own growing.
Also, it is necessary for the old and effete to die off, so that the young and exuberant may thrive. There is only so much space, and only so many nutrients.
As it is, that so many of us live into our 80s and 90s, while personally very satisfying, is vaguely catastrophic with regard to environmental values. It would certainly be unethical for medical researchers to try to keep us alive for many more decades beyond 100, as some people aspire to.
Any real, realistic vision of reality, the way things really are, must take death into account.
And so, to return to the metaphor of "growth" in economics: How in the world does it work? How can the arrow simply continue going up, up and up? And why would anyone want it to?
Chickens are our cousins!
So are other sensitive animals!
Enough is enough!
No more factory farms!
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DrColes Posted 1:18 am
08 Jun 2007
Science fact 2+2=4 a scientific fact is a truth that never changes can be reproduced by anyone every time.
Additional information http://www.InteliOrg.com/co2_climate_change.html
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spaceshaper Posted 1:30 am
08 Jun 2007
The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.
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caniscandida Posted 1:45 am
08 Jun 2007
Chickens are our cousins!
So are other sensitive animals!
Enough is enough!
No more factory farms!
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SustainableGreen Posted 2:42 am
08 Jun 2007
Then the next thing should be to decouple "well-being" from "economic", so that we realize other tangible and many intangible components of well-being. Full citizenship/rights for all classes in all cultures, maybe? Transforming the U.S., who spend more on health care per capita than any country, but who have the worst health care system just about in any developed country? Reducing the spread between the 'haves' and the 'have nots'? Are those means or ends? Hmmmmm....
We really have to get started on that pesky corporate oligarchy!
David
Sustainability For Life
Messages done with sustainable energy, with Wind and Sun!
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Nucbuddy Posted 4:45 am
08 Jun 2007
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Gdp-energy-efficiency.jpg
[...]
As a first step, the US and Canada should move to be a little more Switzerland-like.
You perhaps mean that the US should move its 19% nuclear-electricity share to be more like Switzerland's 37% share?
world-nuclear.org/info/reactors.html
Or, perhaps you mean that the US should move its 31-persons/km² population-density to be more like Switzerland's 176-persons/km²?
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_population_density
To do the latter, The US would need to increase its present population-level of 300 million somewhere toward 1.7 billion -- and/or it would need to reduce its land area.
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spaceshaper Posted 7:05 am
08 Jun 2007
No. Not for me. If you are suggesting that other values trump economic well-being then I disagree: this is a decoupling I cannot support. I take it as axiomatic that our sustainable well-being in harmony with all our sibling species in this once-in-a-lifetime-opportunity world of ours is supported on a stable tripos of economics, ecology and social justice or it is not supported at all.
The decoupling that is necessary is the association of economic growth with economic well-being. I enjoy reading Kunstler because he is so very clear on showing that economic growth pursued as a value in itself is in fact a source of major economic disbenefit.
The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.
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odograph Posted 7:18 am
08 Jun 2007
I think you are casting your net wide with those arguments though. Is that because we actually agree on some core philosophy?
That is, that there are probably ways we can "grow" in a sustainable way. We might even reduce our energy waste as we do that. And of course reducing waste will necessarily improve that "energy intenisty."
Stepping out all the way to GDP again ... I'll repeat that I think it is a rude (and imperfect) measure. There is nothing wrong with wealth (it is often just bits in a bank's computer these days). What we want though is wealth defined and spent in healthy ways. Bits spent on "Zero Energy Homes" are better than bits spent on megayachts.
(Though, there is always room for a cooperative, recycled material, zero net energy, people's megayacht!)
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Jon Rynn Posted 7:19 am
08 Jun 2007
However, if you redefine growth to be "the increase in the capacity to create wealth" then you have a whole new ballgame, because you are counting assets, wealth-producing resources, not consumption. What are assets? Factories for one, but also the soil, forests, underground resources like, oh, OIL -- so if you count assets, and you use oil, you are poorer, not richer. Plug: if you want to read more on this subject I wrote an article about it here(requires free registration).
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David Roberts Posted 7:41 am
08 Jun 2007
In the energy world, the task now is to move away from what you might call blunt-force production: just producing tons and tons of energy, trusting that sheer volume will meet rising demand even with massive inefficiencies. Instead, we're going to have to hold the total amount of energy produced steady, or reduce it, and turn our attention to using the energy we do produce much, much more wisely and efficiently.
Same with economic growth. We're just not going to be able to keep jacking up GDP higher and higher, trusting that it will trickle down and even poor people will be better off (see: Reagan). Instead, we'll have to cap or reduce total GDP and instead spread the wealth we do create around better and more efficiently.
Just as with energy we'll still be able to receive the same services, with economics we'll still be able to receive the same quality of life -- both by doing more with less.
Yes? No?
grist.org
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odograph Posted 8:21 am
08 Jun 2007
Would I mind in a sustainable and environmental world if that measure called GDP still grew? No, not really. As I've implied above, I think it's "just bits" these days.
But I do want to tackle the true environmental and sustainability issues, like the health of the oceans, the great forests, and the biosphere itself. I think a prudent GW plan is a necessary part of that.
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GreyFlcn Posted 8:34 am
08 Jun 2007
Versus
Demand-side economics
Trying to outrun demand is Futile; In a world with exponential population growth, and less developed nations evolving their infrastructure rapidly.
There will never be "enough" resources to slow things down.
_
It's like supplying a chainsmoker with crates of cigarettes in the vain hope that he will get sick of it.
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Billhook Posted 8:42 am
08 Jun 2007
The answer is No,
if we accept that the US lacks the powers to merely steal what goods it wants,
which seems very evident in the debacle in Iraq.
With 5% of global population and 25% of energy usage, the US now faces:
either a massive rapid cut in energy usage in return for other nations' verifiable restraint,
or attempted further global BAU with unprecedented climatic destabilization of the economy,
potentially with terminal impacts on the global civilization.
Compounding this predicament is the impact of geological limitations on fossil fuel supply,
plus the rapid acceleration of a range of GW positive feedbacks and sink declines,
plus the foreseeable impact of rising sea-levels on the docks serving international trade.
So, with regard to your question:
". . . we'll still be able to receive the same services, with economics we'll still be able to receive the same quality of life -- both by doing more with less.
Yes? No?"
the answer is emphatically "No."
Regards,
Bill
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Jon Rynn Posted 9:38 am
08 Jun 2007
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SustainableGreen Posted 11:03 am
08 Jun 2007
Hey, Spaceshaper:
You said: "this is a decoupling I cannot support. I take it as axiomatic that our sustainable well-being in harmony with all our sibling species in this once-in-a-lifetime-opportunity world of ours is supported on a stable tripos of economics, ecology and social justice or it is not supported at all.
The decoupling that is necessary is the association of economic growth with economic well-being. I enjoy reading Kunstler because he is so very clear on showing that economic growth pursued as a value in itself is in fact a source of major economic disbenefit.
I greatly agree on the inclusion but I guess I don't understand how we can include ecology and social justice without disengaging from economics to make space. Care to elaborate?
David
Sustainability For Life
Messages done with sustainable energy, with Wind and Sun!
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spaceshaper Posted 9:26 pm
08 Jun 2007
Not much to say really - kind of self-evident. Do you disengage from physics to make space for mathematics?
The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.
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