Comments James Dailey has made

  • Its about building the clean energy economy

    Thank you Sean for a great article on an important debate. As the Governor of Washington State just signed into law a statute that would start to link us here in the real Washington to a cap and market - first regionally - it is important for this debate to occur.

    The tax argument seems to be getting attention because people think of carbon only as an externality that should be regulated, like water pollution.  Indeed the EPA v Mass case solidified this view.  While this is true, it obscures the larger issue of transforming our economy away from carbon, obscures that we need the "reducers" or the "clean energy engine" to have a set of new revenues to make better energy choices possible.
    On Carbon taxes vs. carbon trading posted 1 year, 8 months ago 5 Responses

  • Debate is over, nay-sayers are irrelevant. Perhaps

    I visited those websites you mentioned.  What strikes me is that those of us in the "climate change is happening and there is no debate" camp come across - according to these people - as also saying "there is no debate, you bleedin' idiot". We need not be humble about what the science is telling us, and we need a frontal assault on these specious arguments.

    This is actually a problem for the "issue" (nice if it fit into that box) of climate change. My impression is that the vast majority of Americans, not to mention the rest of the 5.7 Billion people on the planet, are NOT fully aware that the debate has been settled on the science, and that we are now in for either a) a very interesting decade of responses; or, b) a slow slide over the edge of the abyss.  If people were fully aware, I would presume that they would "vote with their feet", and agree to just about any policy to fight climate change. On Search for local climate skeptic in Texas proves fruitless posted 2 years ago 61 Responses

  • An update from Dhaka

    Here is what my colleague in Dhaka is reporting via cell phone connection on Friday local time.  

    • all of Bangladesh seems to be without electricity since 0100h last night.

    • all of Dhaka is without power for almost 20 hours now. telecom, water and gas is still functioning but unknown for how long. No information available on damage from cyclone or when power is expected back -and no TV to get info from.

    • critical infrastructure in Dhaka is running on diesel generators so far - including hospitals, shops and banks - for the entire day.
    On Sidr, a massive tropical cyclone, is going to hit Bangladesh-Indian border within 24 hrs posted 2 years ago 7 Responses

  • At least they're *mostly* paying attention

    I recall 1995 when a similar report came out from IPCC and the rabid anticipation that it provoked. Ok, not really rabid anticipation as utter ho-hum.

    Seriously, I doubt more than a few thousand people worldwide ever read it.  I think I even needed a librarian's help at a UN Repository library to even find it.  It is too bad, to put it mildly, that stronger action wasn't taken then - when there was a chance to actually prevent some of the outcomes we are now likely to see.  Looking on the bright side, at least now governments, a multitude of NGOs, and even journalists will read the 2007 reports.

    http://www1.ipcc.ch/ipccreports/assessments-reports.htm

    What remains to be seen is, beyond the gnashing of teeth, rattling of sabers, shouting from soapboxes, advice column editorials, and climate change commemorative saris in Bali, will anything actually change? On IPCC Synthesis Report coming out Saturday posted 2 years ago 1 Response

  • Update on Sidr Friday 16 Nov

    CNN is reporting score dead , a total of 169 from official sources, but communications is largely down so this may in fact rise.

    This blog spot has local perpectives on what has occured.  


    This posting     has information from the Meteorological office in Dhaka and helps make a central point, which is that while almost any US Hurricane warrants massive media coverage the rest of the world sees on CNN, a massive Cyclone in the Bay of Bengal hardly warrants a mention.

    My last communication with friends in Dhaka - which is hundreds of miles from the coast were that they didn't expect much to happen, except of course that the power would predictably fail.  (which it does nearly every day in controlled "load shedding"). On Sidr, a massive tropical cyclone, is going to hit Bangladesh-Indian border within 24 hrs posted 2 years ago 7 Responses

  • Some reactions and clarifications

    Mahatma Gandhi was once asked (paraphrasing) 'What do you think of Western Civilization?' and responded 'I think it would be a good idea.'  In this famous anecdote he was pointing out the inherent contradiction in the terms of British colonialism to bring enlightenment and modernity to a civilization that had existed for thousands of years.

    Secondly, I don't believe in any notion of "noble savage", which you may well know is deeply entrenched in our culture.  Instead, I believe that all people, regardless of where they are born, should be given an equal chance to make of themselves what they will, within a sustainable vision.  Easier said than done of course, but this is one reason I invoked Ghandi who did not believe that the "normal" status quo of worker exploitation was the natural order of things, as his opponents argued.

    I ask:  Is it thus the natural order of things to burn a limited resource, effect all peoples and most especially the poorest people on the planet with the centuries long impacts of climate change, and shrug our collective shoulders and say "yes, but only so much carbon taxation is politically acceptable"?  

    At some point, there is a need for unreasonable people.  I would hope that we can follow Ghandi - who knew that the contradictions within a society were unjust and thus held the seed of a solution - not through violence but through perseverance.  I applaud Oxfam's calculation of proportional responsibility.  

    {aside: Sorry about the used car salesman analogy - sometimes us non-professional writers blog in unclear terms. }

    Third, I would propose something that should be obvious, that we need, as activists, writers, business people, etc to engage the rest of the world in the solutions to climate change.  And that means, I believe, in placing people and culture at the center.  It also means inviting more international perspectives to this space.

    Lastly, and to get down to what I hope was taken as a key point - we need mechanisms vis a vis the Clean Development Mechanism of Kyoto to capture village level decisions around energy usage.  In another post I will expound on that, since additionality is the biggest issue.    On What a nice idea posted 2 years, 5 months ago 45 Responses

  • Debating Kilamanjaro

    Fascinating you would bring this up.  Let me quote from the article you apparently skimmed.

    "The fact that the loss of ice on Mount Kilimanjaro cannot be used as proof of global warming does not mean that the Earth is not warming. There is ample and conclusive evidence that Earth's average temperature has increased in the past 100 years, and the decline of mid- and high-latitude glaciers is a major piece of evidence. But the special conditions on Kilimanjaro make it unlike the higher-latitude mountains, whose glaciers are shrinking because of rising atmospheric temperatures. "On What a nice idea posted 2 years, 5 months ago 45 Responses

  • label laws need enforcement

    I can hear the stampede already..."I buy at EcoGrocerX and they carry only top of the line carbon-neutral products...don't you just adore those people there..?"  

    By this I mean I am both repulsed and attracted by the concept.  Like other enviro-labelling the certification process is going to be key.  Getting a carbon-tax in place is actually a far better and more rational policy, but then again, who said we were a rational species.  

    Whoever proposed that it would be easy to "just" duplicate excel sheets and make simple changes to accounting systems, does NOT get to the IT departments of large organizations often, that is for sure.  Nonetheless, the tools available for enabling carbon-accounting-transactions is a very intriguing notion - a full accounting requirement.  Going way, way beyond labelling, but maybe worth exploration.  What would be needed are transaction standards, more akin to those used in the mortgage transaction engines than in the regulatory space.  

    Could business processing management (ala IBM and others ) be brought to this problem?  On Can a bag of potato chips point the way to saving the planet? posted 2 years, 6 months ago 10 Responses

  • cap and trade v carbon taxes - no joy

    hmmm.... I suppose I should care about this debate - carbon tax vs cap and trade, non? I mean I am currently talking about launching a new cap and trade based business model, (aimed at Clean Development Mechanisms in developing countries), so I really should care.  Admittedly.   But, the thing is, such debates, while meaningful I am sure on the policy level, give me no joy.  I want action not the long slow windup. I guess I side with Tony Kreindler just because he's more rational.  but. really, whatever...yawn, ennuie.


    Unfortunately, my feeling is that we have grossly and seriously mis-understood the climate disruption effects currently happening and about to happen.   75% of the time I believe we'll figure this out in the next decade and then attack the problem of weaning ourselves from a fossil fuel civilization using a host of tax incentives, cap and trade systems, amazing new businesses, and just plain better technologies and more respective living within limits - as the saying goes "the stone age didn't end cause they ran out of rocks!".   The rest of the time, especially this past week, after reading the news from the southern pacific ocean (CO2 levels way, way higher than expected by the models and antartica looking even more dubious) I think we are right now (meaning in this decade now) totally screwed %^$#$... and I mean that we are on the climate cliff and we have so much momentum, we are going to go over it, and its not very funny.  What is funny is that the scientists have been bending over backwards to be conservative and thoughtful...err, scientists, and I think the rest of us have tin ears.   In such a scary scenario, things fall apart and the center cannot hold, yadda, yadda,...and such debate and posturing will be utterly irrelevant and completely meaningless...dithering about your shirt color as you head over the cliff --- and the main questions will become:

    1. will the US/NATO military use force to keep fossil fuels flowing to the US and friends or will it force shut down of refineries and coal plants on specific timeframes (could we not see the covert sabotage of Indonesian/Chinese coal mining/oil activites if we considered this a strategic threat?)

    2. how quickly will economies be able to restructure to a lower level not driven by "consumer confidence"? as conspicuous consumption becomes economically unfeasible - and...survival economics and huge migrations of populations takes hold, with more droughts, famines and wars than currently, but then, without oil, the wars and the relief supplies grind to a sickly halt.  So I suppose the question becomes, which of these slow-moving disaster movie phenomena drives the others?

    3. will there be enough juice left in the veins of civilization to design and build carbon sinks that can eventually stabilize the situation? (over a long long period of time) Or, will it be a race to secure short-term sanctuaries for the most priviledged?


    So, anyway, I ignore that scenario 75% of the time, and try to stay focussed on the optimism and use whatever tools are available. Cap and trade, taxes, whatever, just so that we are doing something that gets us moving in the right direction.  Isn't there room for both anyway - tax credits for trading regime credits?    As I say to any who will listen, cheer up I guess, we could be living on a planet controlled by a madman bent on spreading his personal religious creed and directing his planet-spanning war machine to control the flow of oil (should I say spice). It seems like ignoring the sixth great exinction and the rather fascinating atmospheric-ocean chemical experiment ongoing is en vogue.  Where is that bottle of ennuie again?
    On A rejoinder to Environmental Defense posted 2 years, 6 months ago 3 Responses