Comments KenGreen has made

Matthew -

If that distinction were really true, I might agree, but in reality, both types of groups get much of their support from some very wealthy individual donors, and from donor foundations of the left or right. Companies donate to organizations on both sides of the spectrum to hedge their bets. And then, I fail to see how it's not "grass roots" if a company tells its employees that it's going to lose business and have to trim jobs if a particular piece of legislation goes through. The employees, after all, are individual concerned citizens, are they not?

Dave -

I dare say that for every over-estimate of the cost of carbon reduction you can find from some industry group, I can find you one from a governmental agency or environmental advocacy group that is so ridiculously low-balled that it will incite outright laughter from any serious economist.

California's recent experience with their cost estimates of AB32 is illustrative: agency analyses showed extremely low costs, and extremely high benefits for California's aggressive GHG reduction plan. But a panel of respected economists appointed (by the state itself!) to review the cost/benefit analysis condemned it - not a few reviewers, but ALL of them. 

Corporations have an incentive to overstate the costs of compliance, and underestimate benefits. Environmental groups and government agencies have incentives to understate the costs of compliance, and overstate benefits.

You prefer EDF's analysis, but they're hardly a neutral observer, nor are you: you're both single-mission environmental advocacy groups, not independent legislative analysts office. I think it's fair to say that any cost estimate that EDF would put out would represent the absolutely lowest cost estimate it's possible to make, using assumptions that are almost certainly so blue-sky as to make a serious economist laugh out loud on reading through them.

As for other things causing more economic harm, such as the financial crisis, you're right, they're probably bigger than the cost of carbon reduction. However, two, or three, or 10 wrongs don't make  a right. What you're saying now is "Heck, there's already so much wreckage, how can a little more hurt!" Not exactly critical thinking.

Dave - 

Your point about market distortions in energy is very good: I agree completely, energy markets are so distorted that simply pricing carbon doesn't guarantee that you'll get the fastest, most-efficient, or cheapest emission reductions.

But your answer, layering yet more distortions on the market in the forlorn hope that somehow clever enviro-planners will understand the distorted markets well enough to counter the distortions with "complementary" policies. This is Hayek's "Fatal Conceit" write large. All that's likely to happen is still greater market distortion and a shifting and proliferation of still worse externalities.

A vastly better plan is to levy a revenue neutral carbon tax while ripping out the distortions in energy markets by aggressively eliminating all subsidies, streamlining regulatory processes and standardizing them across states, and removing the regulations - such as CAFE, appliance standards, etc.  - that would be redundant in a world where the carbon externality was priced right.

Whither Obama's call to civility?

Dave -

There is a word for people who are fundamentally unable to acknowledge that anyone who disagrees with them on anything might be sincere in their beliefs. It's called "incivility." This affliction seems particularly rampant in the environmental movement, where if you disagree on absolutely anything, from the interpretation of a science study to the pros and cons of alternate environmental policies they resort to slander rather than reasoned response. Incivility is fundamentally destructive of people's ability to work together on anything, and simply sows discord and grievance.

Is it so hard for you to believe that people who who see cap-and-trade threatening, might offer up an alternative approach that they sincerely believe will accomplish the stated goal (whether they value it or not) without side effects of cap-and-trade they consider more destructive? Don't you find that a wee bit arrogant?

And consider the hypocrisy here: for ages, environmentalists have screamed at conservatives for not offering up positive alternatives to policies they favor. Now, when that's actually happening, they're screaming that it's an insincere tactical maneuver.

Obama has called for the return of civility, Dave: don't you think you ought to give it a try? Try allowing for the idea that someone who disagrees with you might actually be a sincere human being worthy of the basic human dignity you deny them with your incivility.

Kenneth Green Resident Scholar American Enterprise Institute kgreen@aei.org

On Pets

Many people here have mentioned their pets, and this is where environmentalism goes politically correct, because the environmental response to questions about pets would be: "Don't have them."

It is astonishing that people ostensibly concerned about global warming, and who are willing to force others to change their lifestyles with regard to cars, housing, clothing, flying, and even limiting the number of children people can have feel free to own animals that have extensive carbon footprints due to their protein diets, energy used in heating and cooling, and the zillion-dollar pet products industry.

If environmentalists were honest, they'd tell you straight up that the great green future is one of no pet-ownership. But they won't admit that, since it would lose a significant fraction of their support from animal lovers who also love their pets.On Umbra on fans versus AC posted 1 year, 4 months ago 19 Responses

Because they do.

You ask why I say that the IPCC relies only on computer models in attributing observed climate change to human activity.

The answer is simple: Because they do. I would encourage you to call up a climate modeler (such as Gerald North) and ask him exactly what climate scientists are referring to when they attribute observed warmth to human emissions of greenhouse gases.

Go on, Gerry is an approachable guy. Ask him. I did, which is where I got that information.

Oh, and, if you weren't paying attention, the NAS pointed out that paleoclimate reconstructions are not primary evidence of human causation of observed climate change. The Chairman of that effort? Gerald North.

KenOn How a conservative think tank's foray into climate policy stirred up a media hornet's nest posted 2 years, 9 months ago 25 Responses

Still mis-representing my views...

You claimed that in 2003, I was still "downplaying the problem" and cite a Source Watch page, rather than actually going out and reading my work. If you did so, you'd find that I have acknowledged the IPCC's baseline conclusions as being likely to be correct since I started writing about climate policy in 1997. You keep whacking away at what you claim you want: a discussion of policy with people who accept the science, and want to discuss meaningful policy. It has to make a person wonder if you really want that, or if it's only a line you drop to make yourself look more moderate.

I'll make this simple and unambiguous:

1. I agree, and have always agreed, that we have seen a warming of the atmosphere since 1850, as noted in the IPCC reports.

2. I agree, and have always agreed, that the warming is causing secondary climate effects, some of them negative.

3. I agree, and have always agreed that SOME of the observed warming was likely due to human GHG emissions. How MUCH we contributed at which point, and through which activity is still an open question, as is clearly evidenced from the fact that the IPCC itself keeps changing that assessment. That is policy-relevant data to question, as it bears on how effective a given action will be.

4. I agree, and have always agreed that the risks of climate change, whether human or natural, are serious, and warrant a firm policy response. When uncertainty was higher, I proposed adaptation actions and more funding for sequestration research. As the information has improved, I've recently also argued for congestion pricing, and a revenue-neutral carbon tax as an efficient and non-distorting policy approach.

5. I do not put much faith in the IPCC's predictive modeling, (nor anyone's predictive models!) and I'm far from alone on that. Many economists have taken exception with the input assumptions dreamed up in the SRES "Storylines and Scenarios." In that regard, I believe it is more intellectually honest to extrapolate forward from observed rates of warming, and develop policy proposals based on that level of warming, sea-level rise, and so on.

AEI and AR4

Andrew -

Your posts on this insanity have been somewhat more moderate than most, but you're still missing the story entirely. Every single paragraph of the letter to North and Schroeder focused explicitly on climate policy. I'll put some emphasis on the words here, as they seem to have been hard for some people to see in the letter you posted:

1. The very first sentence of the letter to Schroeder and North reads: "The American Enterprise Institute is launching a major project to produce a review and policy critique of the forthcoming  Fourth Assessment Report..." This is exactly what Nicholas Stern did - reviewed the science with scientists to find what he felt was most relevant to economics, then discuss policy. Think his people worked for free?

2. The next paragraph begins by saying that the purpose of the project is "to highlight the strengths and weaknesses of the IPCC process, especially as it bears on potential policy responses to climate change.

3. What we specifically requested of North and Schroeder in the third paragraph was a "well-supported but accessible discussion of which elements of climate modeling have demonstrated predictive value that might make them policy-relevant and which elements of climate modeling have less levels of predictive utility, and hence, less utility in developing climate policy."

4. We expected them to co-author the paper, and split the honorarium. $5,000 would not buy Gerry North's integrity, no more than $50,000 would.

5. Why Steve Schroeder gave you the letter to post (leading to an unpleasant bout of character assassination) is a complete mystery to me. We had previously co-authored papers, and he should have known I do not reject the scientifically-conservative claims of the IPCC, and never have. Steve could simply have asked who else would be involved, rather than assume we'd be taking extreme voices on board. That would have been far more honorable than setting the stage for a political attack on a former co-author and, I had thought, a collegial friend.

6. While I will respect Steve's privacy more than he did mine, out of a sense of fairness, I would like you to ask Steve if he did the previous work for Reason or Fraser Institute for free and post his response here, as you did our letter.
   

Kenneth Green ----------------------------- Resident Scholar American Enterprise Institute kgreen@aei.org