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I have my doubts that Mencken was the first to come up with the "For every problem there is a solution that is simple, neat and wrong" aphorism. So axiomatic is it that it seems that one could find similar versions dating back to the construction of the pyramids, or least the Roman aqueducts. The idea that slapping a price on carbon will be sufficient to kick humanity's fossil-fuel habit is no exception.
Just about everyone can agree that we need to internalize the ecological costs of burning coal, oil and gas. A price on carbon, whether through a cap-and-trade system, or a tax on the point of entry, or both, will almost certainly be part of the solution. British Columbia and Quebec have already adopted carbon taxes, a cap-and-trade network is scheduled to come online in Ontario and the New England states, and another will soon involve several western states. Europe, as Jonas noted in setting up this week's question, has the most experience trading the rights to emit carbon. But as we have no experience trying to manage planetary ecosystems, it would be the height of foolishness to rely on carbon pricing alone.
We also don't have the luxury of trying one option for a few decades, and then, if that doesn't do the trick, switching to an alternative. We were warned last month -- again -- that emissions have to start dropping by 2015. So the only rational way forward is to throw everything we've got against the wall and hope something sticks. Indeed, we should hope that more than one of those things stick.
Among the most effective, although least popular, tools at our disposal are command-and-control regulatory regimes. Governments can, and frequently do, impose moratoria on deleterious technologies. There is no reason why we can't outlaw coal-fired electricity production, so long as we give utilities enough time to find alternatives and reduce demand. This kind of tactic is much easier when the utilities are publicly owned, of course. Trying to reconcile the interests of shareholders with the need to reduce the amount of product being sold is an exercise in futility, no matter how much one hears about "negawatt" incentive plans.
While nationalizing the coal industry seems highly unlikely at this juncture, that doesn't mean we can't at least order a stop to the construction of all coal-fired power plants, until carbon capture and sequestration makes practical and economic sense (a scenario that, like fusion power, is several decades off and always will be). The Waxman-Markey bill actually includes a watered down version of this kind of approach, although "watered down" is something of a euphemism in this case. Utilities could continue building coal-fired plants until 2020; after that they'd have to capture two-thirds of their carbon emissions. Contrast that with James Hansen's call for an immediate halt to the construction of new plants and a shut down of all (non-CCS) plants by 2020.
The contribution of automobiles to the problem presents similar opportunities and obstacles. Barack Obama's recent order to increase fuel-efficiency standards is a good start, but whoever occupies the White House will probably have to improve on those standards several times over the next couple decades for to make an appreciable difference to global emissions. A more dramatic, and again, less politically palatable, option is for the federal government to order the industry to stop making private automobiles in favor of mass transit vehicles.
You don't have to be Michael Moore to apply the historical precedent of the Second World War, and Moore's vision of "bullet trains criss-crossing this country in the next five years" is perhaps a too optimistic. But he's on the right track, so to speak. The only real hurdle to this kind of thinking is the fact that most citizens don't accept the premise that the threat posed by climate change is comparable to that posed by the Third Reich. Again, this is because we have no experience living in a radically altered climatic regime.
More generally, the American public is understandably skeptical of any plan that hints at socialism, especially after years of budget cuts that make it impossible for government programs to fulfill their own mandates. It's hard to find a reasonable argument in this country when it comes to health care, for example, despite the fact that the rest of the industrialized has figured out that it's cheaper and more effective to make government the major player, insurer and supplier. So I'm under no illusions about how difficult will be building support for command-and-control solutions.
There are days when I despair that the only way we're going to kick-start the transformation of the energy grid is to suffer through a rapid series of natural disasters that make it clear we can't risk what business as usual will do to the climate. Unfortunately, such scenarios usually entail the loss of life on scales that dwarf anything we've seen so far in this country. Only then will society accept the lunacy of relying on market forces or silver bullets. Carbon prices, yes, but also heavy government investment in renewables, regulatory regimes that make it illegal, not just inconvenient, to pollute, and the widespread understanding that rich people have to stop wasting so much energy.
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In ABCNews, " Obama Is Leading America towards socialism " (vidéo), the interviewed person is filmed of back for step to be acknowledged!
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/06/09/palin-obama-is-leading-am_n_212943.html
Posted by: humorix | June 9, 2009 8:59 AM
I strongly disagree with almost everything you wrote.
On what grounds do you expect it is any less effective than other regulations? There is no meaningful difference between 'illegal' and 'unprofitable': both are overwhelming incentives to a rational business.
Note the EU is hardly a counterexample. First off, there is no solid carbon price, but rather an extremely volatile carbon market which creates substantial risk for clean energy investments (if prices fall, like they've been doing), which is a disincentive. And anyway their carbon prices are ineffectually low: currently US $18.66/MT CO2 ($68.43/MT C).
http://www.pointcarbon.com/
This is a very, very weak incentive. For coal-fired electricity, roughly 1.9c/kWh(e) (assuming 40% efficiency, 112 gCO2/MJ(th) coal). For natural gas, half that. This in a market where electricity exceeds 20c/kWh. (All figures USD).
And what more fair, logical way to determine what constitutes "enough time", but to set the price of carbon to accurately reflect its (external) social cost? If a political bureaucracy is allowed to decide, wouldn't the fossil fuel lobbies wrangle to delay it indefinitely (as they always succeed to)? Your example of the "watering-down" of Markey and Waxman (phonies, the both of them) is a clear example of how the political process fails at this. It failed today, it'll fail in 2020.
The simplicity of a straight tax is its overwhelming strength. You can put it in effect immediately, without indefinite delaying: the economic consequences are bounded above by its value, unlike a cap or ban (which have no limit to the price spikes they can induce). And once it's in effect (right away), the politicians are out of the picture. Powerful incentives, on the scale of hundreds of billions of $$$, will irresistibly draw the utilities away from fossil fuels.
I'm not at all amused by your Shell sponsorship, by the way.
No, it's a horrible mistake! One, it's self-limiting by Jevon's paradox - more efficient engines are an incentive for more driving (they lower the effective price of gas), which counters their own effect (in a Jevons' case, negating it completely). But much worse, is that it is a clear misdirection of resources. The requirement is to eliminate large-scale CO2 losses, which means eliminating petroleum as a transport fuel. (Of course you couldn't state this on your blog, naturally - you'd lose your sponsor!) More-efficient petroleum engines are a distraction - all investment in them is, ultimately, completely wasted. Not that Shell is complaining. And how far does it really go - double mileage by 2030 or whatever, well so what? They'll be twice as many cars then. You know all those thousands of thousands of thousands of people in the developing world? They want their cars too.
No, what we need is to replace fossil fuels transport. And when you have completely-clean transport, then efficiency no longer matters in the same way. A nuclear-powered hummer is no worse, CO2-wise, than a nuclear-powered scooter. Fuel standards are a distraction from this, a dangerous distraction that only further entrenches our reliance on fossil fuels.
And in the same vein:
Totally insane.
Actually, we have experience living in many radically altered climate regimes, from African savanna to Arctic tundra. We're not fragile amphibians: we adapt much, much better to our environment than anything else. We build fires in snowstorms, irrigate crops in deserts, restrain oceans with seawalls. I think this is a point lost in too much hyperbole.
Like fuel efficiency standards, this is a false goal and a distraction. We're not planning ahead for thousands of years: we're not capable of it anyway, so it's really absurd to be arguing about infinite sustainability, when what we're really trying to solve is an immediate catastrophe.
So where's the nuclear power, and CCS? Over time I've become extremely sensitized to this blunder: conflating renewable and carbon-free is a tacit rejection of nuclear power, which is ridiculous because it's by far the strongest solution. :(
You quote James Hansen for immediate shutting down of non-CCS coal. Well here's what he says about sustainable energy:
http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/mailings/20081229_DearMichelleAndBarack.pdf
I emphasized the word. It is an unchallenged assumption, a blind spot.
Now you're just mixing in irrational emotion. EVERYONE uses energy. China emits more CO2 than the US now (IIRC), and they're hardly 'rich'. Your trite populism won't cut it here, sorry. If anything, the problem (and I use this word ironically) is not rich people, but rather poor people. The real challenge is not eliminating impact of rich people like you and I (anyone American is rich) - we can afford to live off semiconductor solar panels and Tesla Roadsters. The real challenge is far more difficult and involves deeply conflicting goals (unlike your easy populist answer of 'blame rich people'). The real challenge is that there an incredible amount of people who are improving their lives incredibly fast. Going from extreme poverty to only relative poverty (by American standards, where everyone is fabulously rich). This is China, India, Indonesia. This is the big thing: billions of cars, billions of new kilowatts of electricity. This dwarfs the United States. We are not in control. We are onlookers.
And the difficult conflict is the humanitarian need for vastly larger energy supplies at cheap prices, against catastrophic climate change from cheap coal.
Posted by: anonymous | June 9, 2009 11:30 AM
So far the climate does not seem to be following the models. Proof positive that the climate is wrong.
And you know what happens if the climate gets colder in 2020. And 2030?
I think we will be quite fortunate in that regard with high carbon taxes. We can kill off a lot of poor people. A net benefit all around.
And any one here ever hear of the Polywell Fusion Reactor? The folks running the experiments are making great strides and expect a yes/no answer in two years.
Posted by: M. Simon | June 9, 2009 11:47 AM
Thanks for the thoughtful article and the thoughtful #2 comment. Respectfully, I want to toss a bomb into the whole discussion of CO2.
The premise of cap and trade--that CO2 drives global warming--is based on United Nations' climate reports that are tainted by politics and an agenda. The reports don't pass the smell test -- see www.energyplanusa.com. Plus, there's been many new climate discoveries since the UN's 1997 Kyoto Protocol that are largely omitted from the reports because, I think, they undercut Kyoto.
America needs our own scientific assessment of global warming. I am a Democrat who for the past 20 years believed global warming was caused by CO2. But now after reading the UN reports I suspect the fix was in. The UN reports contain much good science, but in the end, the UN is a political organization where politics trump science. We need our own objective climate commission to think through global warming and determine whether it's driven by CO2. ...before we burden our economy with CO2 taxes.
-- Sorry but referring to energyplanusa does your argument little good. Any site that relies on material such as the Great Global Warming Swindle doc, a film that has been so soundly discredited, doesn't deserve to mentioned in a serious conversation.-- JH
Posted by: Rmoen | June 9, 2009 12:12 PM
JH-
You take a page out of the Rush Limbaugh playbook of attacking and demeaning those who don't agree with you. Before I posted a link to the Great Global Warming Swindle, I researched it and found it sound. Please explain how and where it's been 'soundly discredited'. Reasonable people can disagree. Please answer straight up: Do you agree with me that the USA should NOT rely upon the United Nations for science opinion. ...especially since the UN has a vested interest in demonizing CO2 to support their Kyoto Protocol.
Rmoen: Discrediting the GGWS is as easy as Googling it. Do your homework, first. As for whom to rely on for climate science: the US and everyone else should rely on the best peer-reviewed science. And that peer-reviewed science is unanimous in concluding that CO2 is the primary greenhouse gas responsible for global warming. Search my blog (scienceblogs.com/islandofdoubt) for countless references. Or better yet, read realclimate.org. If your research leads you in a different direction, then your standards of what constitutes reputable science are wildly different from mine, and those of the vast majority of the climatology community.
Posted by: Rmoen | June 9, 2009 5:13 PM
There is simply no reason to go off the deep end over CO2 emissions. The models can not possibly make accurate predictions, on way or the other. To state by 2015 we are doomed is utter nonsense.
Technology is and will find ways out of the energy crisis and in doing so will solve the greenhouse gas emissions issue as a by-product. Case in point – see www.hybridpwr.com. Remain calm and let science and industry solve the problem. We really do not need “hep” (Texas term) from the government.
Posted by: Mike Keller | June 9, 2009 8:45 PM
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Posted by: gertrudeCharlton | June 10, 2009 12:40 AM
I've worked on the nuclear energy side of things for over 20 years, and watched the ongoing public debate on all energy sources, the grid, and so on. Actually, calling it a debate is a compliment, since the participants rarely have much concept of how large scale electric generation and distribution works, or just how really, really huge the demand is. There is much to argue with in the essay above, but the last part of the last sentence seems to me to be the key element that keeps getting glossed over. The cleanest, safest, cheapest energy is that which we don't use. Conserve, conserve, conserve.
If you'd care for an entertaining look at the real world of nuclear energy from the inside, see my novel "Rad Decision," which is available free at http://RadDecision.blogspot.com . Noted futurist and Whole Earth Catalog founder Stewart Brand was kind enough to say "I'd like to see Rad Decision widely read."
We'll make better choices about our energy future if we first understand our energy present.
Posted by: James Aach | June 10, 2009 6:29 PM
As we hurtle through space on our sweet little ball of terra firma so much stress is being generated by angst over what may happen to our babies in the future. Will they starve because of our selfishness and lack of planning? Will humans become extinct because of our selfishness and inability to understand our place in the universe? Will worldwide civilization collapse as have the majority of local civilizations in the past (“Collapse” by Jarad Diamond) because we selfishly use up all our natural resources and pollute the earth into oblivion? Maybe you bloggers should stop wasting your time typing and just turn up the music and have another beer. I think that the global warming train is roaring down the track and there is no possible way to put on the breaks. I also think that post carbon chaos is going to wipe out anyone who is unfortunate enough to survive the global warming mess.
Posted by: Gale Whitaker | June 11, 2009 11:30 AM
Well, Gale, you sort of nailed it, but I would reverse the order of catastrophe. Peak oil may well have occurred in July 2008 and, if so, scarcities could appear in a few short years. No substitutes are anywhere near ready to come on line in a timeframe that is needed. That, and/or higher prices, could send economies further into tailspin. Basic services--waste disposal, health care, food production and distribution, civil order, and so on could begin to unwind. The build-out of a alternative energy projects would be jeopardized as would ultimately the electrical grid itself.
More studies seem to be appearing that suggest the coal supply may not be what it's cracked up to be. Many of these studies are sure to be summarized in the soon-to-be-released "Blackout: Coal, Climate, and the Last Energy Crisis" by Richard Heinberg. My guess is that we are going to burn all of the hydrocarbons available. Simulations run by David Rutledge of Caltech suggest CO2 concentrations may not significantly top 450 ppm. While this may be good news in some quarters, it's still a heckuvalot. It is my opinion that the only thing that will curtail the emission of CO2 is resource exhaustion.
In any case, energy is likely to become a precious commodity.
Posted by: Eric the Leaf | June 11, 2009 1:01 PM
Discrediting the GGWS is as easy as Googling it. Do your homework, first. As for whom to rely on for climate science: the US and everyone else should rely on the best peer-reviewed science. And that peer-reviewed science is unanimous in concluding that CO2 is the primary greenhouse gas responsible for global warming. Search my blog (scienceblogs.com/islandofdoubt) for countless references. Or better yet, read realclimate.org. If your research leads you in a different direction, then your standards of what constitutes reputable science are wildly different from mine, and those of the vast majority of the climatology community.
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