On DotEarth, Andy Revkin again wrestles with a dilemma he returns to frequently: how do we overcome human nature? He quotes the work of David Ropeik, who's done considerable work on communicating risk, and who is not sanguine about our ability to communicate the risk of climate change. The problem, Revkin and Ropeik agree, is that climate change doesn't activate our primal survival instincts. No matter how much evidence is presented, how many reasoned arguments are advanced, we don't see (or perhaps feel) how it threatens us directly, so we don't get fired up to do what's necessary to solve it.
This kind of discussion takes as its premise the notion that climate change is a classic tragedy of the commons: While we all benefit from the vitality of a public resource, each individual has incentive to overconsume.
And yeah, those problems are a bitch, especially on this scale.
Except I don't think that's the right way of viewing the problem of climate change.
The crucial thing to note here is that unlike, say, claiming pasture land or pulling fish out of the ocean, polluting the atmosphere with GHGs is not a benefit. GHGs are not like other pollutants; they rise and fall in direct proportion to the amount of fossil fuels burnt, and burning fossil fuels costs money. The fact that there's no price on carbon means that it costs less than it should, but it still costs.
Energy costs being costs, insofar as people can get the same value by burning less fossil fuel everyone has an incentive to reduce their overconsumption of our shared atmospheric resource. After all, everyone has incentive to reduce their costs.
This isn't an academic distinction. The Revkin/Ropeik discussion is predicated on the notion that reducing GHGs is painful. But in at least half the cases (and I'd wager far more), reducing GHGs is profitable. Instead of approaching climate change thinking about how we can talk people into accepting tangible pain for intangible future benefits, we should approach it thinking about how we can make the many tangible benefits of GHG reduction more manifest and easier to capture.
We're doing people a favor here, not trying to persuade them to swallow castor oil. And human nature is perfectly compatible with accepting favors.
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Comments
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Millstone Posted 3:58 am
06 Aug 2008
I would also agree that there isn't a benefit from putting more GHGs into the atmosphere; however, there are a number of clear benefits to the combustion processes that put them there. To me that is kind of like saying "the smoke from this fire isn't good" when it is the only thing keeping you warm. Not exactly the same, I realize, but without ICEs and coal etc. we wouldn't be on the internet having this discussion.
By the same coin, while burning fossil fuels costs money it also generates money.
On the other hand I completely agree with you that the focus for the near terms needs to be on the profitable and easy solutions, the cliched low hanging fruit. I think the problem you run into there is a lot of the easy solutions are not at all "sexy", like grandiose visions of advanced solar, hyrdogen economies and others are.
Energy efficiency (which I think you must be referencing as major part of your half) is decidedly square which is why I doubt you will see it used in greenwashing campaigns anytime soon. But we all know how much companies love touting their REC purchases.
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GreyFlcn Posted 5:54 am
06 Aug 2008
"If Only Gay Sex Caused Global Warming"
http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0702-26.htm
-David Ahlport
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gmobus Posted 8:01 am
06 Aug 2008
I know that the environmental community has crafted a good-sounding story about how reducing burning fossil fuels will be profitable. But so far it still seems to be just a story. I think it is incumbent on this community to show through a workable case study exactly how this profit is to be made. No hypotheticals. No assumptions about improvements in technologies. Just a clear, straightforward example of turning green saving costs and generating marginal profits that would attract investment. I'll allow you the ability to remove all subsidies from existing energy sources to make a level playing field. But I think it is time to do a real, honest pro forma statement of how this is going to work. We need a full fledged business plan and not more arm waving.
I don't want to come off as hyper critical. Note that I worked the thermal solar energy business back in the 80s. So I'm not blowing smoke from the other side. But I am nervous that this story is going to get a lot of hopes up that may not bear out in practice. And while there are a lot of people telling this story, I have yet to see some solid evidence.
As a model you might want to consider T. Boone Pickens latest move. His business plan might provide the ammunition you need for this continuing faith in market solutions to an externality problem (note pricing carbon would require you actually know the functional relationship between carbon burned and GHG impact and derive the 'right' price). If Pickens would share his detailed analysis and it isn't just a whim of his because he has to get out of oil, then you might be able to build a case for this notion of how green is going to be profitable. You would be doing a giant favor to all those green business folks who, so far, have only been able to clamber for subsidies themselves in order to get a cost advantage.
Meanwhile I'll stick with first principles. Thermodynamics and the physics of work suggest that unless the transition from FF to renewables is massive and quick there will indeed be plenty of displacements as we wind down the FF inputs to the economy (either because of peak oil or to reduce GHG). We need to design actions based on reality and not false hope. So until you can produce a real working plan for prosperity, I will continue to urge people to adopt reduced expectations and prepare for economic contraction.
Question Everything
George
To an optimist a realist looks like a pessimist. To a pessimist a realist looks like an optimist. Being a realist can suck sometimes.
George Mobus,
Associate Professor, Institute of Technology,
University of Washington Tacoma,
and Professional Student for Life
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Andrew Glikson Posted 2:38 pm
06 Aug 2008
It is only once atmospheric CO2 levels declined to below about 450 ppm in the late Eocene (about 34 million years ago) that the ice sheets began to grow and lower temperatures allowed small burrowing mammals to emerge out of their holes and evolve into large mammals - including the primates. Current global warming is reversing this trend.
Emergence of large-scale agricultural cultivation and civilization in the great river valleys about 8000 years ago was allowed by rivers fed by snow melt water, now endangered.
Species can not recognize their blind spots ... Lemings plunge off cliffs, kangaroos get killed on the highways, while civilization fouls its nest as does the kingfisher.
only the genus Homo has ever mastered fire, proceeding to manipulate the electromagnetic spectrum, split the atom and travel to other planets. Possessed by a conscious fear of death, craving for God-like immortality and omniscience, the species has developed the absurd faculty to simultaneously create and destroy, perpetrate the demise of terrestrial forests, extinguish other species and, lately, erode the very atmospheric conditions that allowed its appearance in the first place.
The biological rationale that has transformed tribal warriors into button-pushing automatons capable of triggering global climate changes or a nuclear winter remains inexplicable.
The rest is details ...
Dr Andrew Glikson
Earth and paleo-climate research scientist
A.N.U., Canberra, A.C.T.
Australia
(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
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Wolverine Posted 6:34 am
07 Aug 2008
Adopting a do nothing attitude for whatever reason just supports the status quo. If you don't like the fact that humans are causing major changes to our atmosphere by their unnatural and massive emissions of greenhouse gases, you should do what you can to reverse that behavior. At the very least, when you die you'll be able to tell yourself that you did what you could.
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Andrew Glikson Posted 12:27 pm
07 Aug 2008
Milestones in the evolution of the atmosphere with reference to climate change. Australian Journal of Earth Science, 2008, vol. 55 No. 2. If of interest, let me know your E-mail address and I can send it to you as a pdf file, along with other papers and articles.
Best wishes
Andrew Glikson
8-8-08
Dr Andrew Glikson
Earth and paleo-climate research scientist
A.N.U., Canberra, A.C.T.
Australia
(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
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