Might be a round table and on the table a "lazy susan" with three sections. The three main guests, who could hold their own with the questions would be Gore, Lovins and McDonough. So then, you get your toughest questions, no softball pitches, for each of the three sections: environment, profit and equity, and have it. Vinod Khosla could be moderator. Make sure the supernumeraries get strict, short time limits for a response to each question.

No need to worry. Once we get a price on carbon, the invisible hand will take care of everything.

Whether we can attribute Katrina directly to climate change or not (and yes, I am quite aware that the flooding of New Orleans was as much the result of bungling by the Corps of Engineers as a natural disaster), I do think it offers the best example of how to--or not--respond equitably to the coming climate disaster.

Who are the doers of good work to contact?  Maybe the many talented at the Times-Picayune or Douglas Brinkley for context, folks from Global Green or Mercy Corps or Common Ground for response.

The stimulus?  The widely used wing nut talking point.  Environmentalism amounts to genocide.

Environmentalism prevents the latest GMO, agrichem technology from being used in food production and disease prevention (insect poisoning with DDT, for instance).  That causes food shortage and disease outbreaks that kill millions.

The response.  Climate equity.

Climate equity is another form of the idea that social and political policy ought to lift all boats, with more lift to those in poverty because they need it just to survive.

The problem is accepting the premise that stimulated the reponse.  Buy the false premise that environmentalism amounts to genocide of the poor and it leads down all sorts of garden paths that pander to the nut wing's favorite causes.

The main all encompassing cause?  As Grover Norquist puts it, to turn back the "socialist" policies started by Teddy Roosevelt and furthered by FDR.  They want to bankrupt government and turn everything it does over to "contractors".  

Turn defense over to Halliburton and Blackwater, turn the highways and ports over to the highest bidding foreign corporations (already in progress), and turn government policy making and lawmaking over to lobbyists for corporate power (mostly acomplished also).  Sell national parks to the highest foreign bidders as vacation homes.

Not much more pandering to corporate power is needed to complete the transition.  Don't say you weren't warned when the Blackwater highway patrol opens fire on your fanily on your next driving vacation.  No whining.  Your deaths will benefit the bottomline.  Hehehey.

http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog

I'm sure others have considered this more than I have, but this is something I have wondered about.

If you assign "responsibility" for, say, 70% of the accumulated greenhouse gases (or other environmental degradations/depletions) to the developed countries... and ask that they bear somewhat equitable and commensurate costs for same... Do they get any "credit" for the "global commons" of welfare "goods" that they have provided (albeit on the backs of fossil fuels, etc.)?

I am thinking of things like:
o immunizations, antibiotics, insulin, much of modern medicine in general;
o telephony and global communications infrastructure;
o the electric grid;
o modern refrigeration;
o etc.

One could argue that (a) the inventors are/have been properly compensated in the market, or (b) that these are not "net goods" (e.g. the electric grid contributed to fossil fuel consumption)... but I think it is more mainstream to consider these inventions, etc., as a positive legacy of the developed world that the "vulnerable and innocent" benefit from. If you are going to impose costs/responsibilities for environmental accumulated degradation, will there be room for some offsets to account for the "goods"?

Like I said, the thought is not fully formed, but I am certain that if you are going to engage in a topic as broad as "climate equity" it is going to come up... If you are going to consider negative externalities, do you need to account for positive externalities?

He'd be a great commentator on this.  Ask him!

Dave,

I love what you're trying to do with this series and I agree with your objectives 100%, but one quibble... why call it climate "equity"?  Lets go a step farther and call it climate justice!  Climate change is the largest environmental justice challenge our planet has ever faced and the grassroots groups working on these issues see themselves as part of a climate JUSTICE movement, not a "climate equity" movement.  The idea of climate justice is aspirational and I believe that is the term we should embrace - equity sounds weak in comparision.  With that said...

There is a third dimension to climate (in)justice beyond disproportionate impacts and responsibilities, and that is the idea of who is involved in formulating solutions.  The communities that are worst impacted by climate change (people of color, low-income, indigenous, developing nations - we have to name it) must have a seat at the policy-making table.  Climate policy formulated poorly can actually create additional social, economic and environmental hardships for already marginalized communities and we must avoid this pitfall.

Finally, good people to talk to... the Indigenous Environmental Network (Tom Goldtooth) and the Environmental Justice and Climate Change Initiative (Nia Robinson) are both doing fantastic grassroots climate justice work.  Rajendra Pachauri of the IPCC has been outspoken about the connections between climate change, development and poverty.  Tomorrow the Global Development and Economic Institute at Tufts University is presenting an award to economists Jojo Kwame Sundaram and Steven DeCanio for their work on climate equity.  The list could go on and on... I look forward to reading this series!

Mr. Bailo, perhaps you are imagining "global heating" as a sort of endless, idyllic summer?... averaging in the 90-100+'s?

Global warming will not only heat things to the point of being mild, but quite past the point.  It will do so, also, in unpredictable and uneven patterns, with severe consequences - as the earth climate forces struggle to balance itself against an increasingly disrupted and destabilized ecosystem.

On the contrary, heat is not, by definition, benign nor benevolent.  Aside from the obvious and severe havoc wreaked on the ecosystem, there are severe health consequences as well - to dispute your #3 and #4 points.  Lest we forget the health effects of extreme heat and heat waves - most recently, during the Chicago marathon?  Dehydration, heat stroke, increased incidence of foodborne and waterborne disease, as well as expansion of malarial and other vector-borne disease zones, are just a few of the direct implications of increased "heat", particularly for those who may not be able to devote an even greater amount of limited incomes to pay for "air conditioning".  Malnutrition and starvation will likely follow suit, especially as climate change alters growing conditions and water patterns to choke the yields of already strained fields.  Less vegetation means less food for all as, surprisingly enough!, cows and pigs can't subsist on air, but instead, require fields on which to graze and grow their "feed".

And, if indeed "shorter milder winters" will benefit the poorest of the poor, why is it, in countries with virtually no winter to speak of, these effects are anticipated to have the most pronounced (and inequitable) impact?

Perhaps you should expand your horizons past those of the U.S.? as well as read up more on the topic before you rush to suspect others' motives, and jump on conspiracy theories accusing the "man"?  

As relevant as these issues are, it  seems painfully apparant that we first of all need to secure concrete commitments from western governments to guarantee substansive emmissions cuts by 2030 as a binding deadline. Western democracies, the heaviest and worst accumlative polluters, are responsible for acting on behalf of developing nations and taking an initiatave which they can afford. If Europe, Asia, North America and Australiasia can lead on this issue the indirect benefits from reduced climate change will have direct positive impacts throughtout the developing world. Surely an equity in itself.

Robert Burr