<Wednesday's Open Thread The Oil Drum The Megaproject update>

55 comments on Two small bits on cars and global warming

Comments can no longer be added to this story.

| Show without comments | PDF version

zeroworker7 on April 5, 2006 - 1:46pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Hi LevinK,

Sure, we can try to guesstimate.  But when I think about it, the ledger seems heavily weighted in the "climate change is bad" direction.

Our economy (not to mention the world's ecosystems) is adapted to the climate we've experienced up until now.  Whatever change occurs, it is highly unlikely that we will be better adapted to live in the changed conditions.

It is analagous to an organism.  I read an article yesterday (Peak Energy linked to it) about coral reefs dying en masse in the Carribean due to increasing water temperatures in the summer.  The environment changed in a way the coral is not used to.  They didn't flourish, they died.  I see the same negative consequences coming from global warming.

Cities are built on rivers as they exist now, the breadbaskets of the world are based in areas which currently have good growing conditions, etc.

I think the "we should do a cost/benefit analysis" argument is just a reasonable sounding smokescreen to delay taking preventive measures.

Comments can no longer be added to this story.
LevinK on April 5, 2006 - 2:42pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
I think the "we should do a cost/benefit analysis" argument is just a reasonable sounding smokescreen to delay taking preventive measures.

You probably think so, because it would be a daunting task and the interested parties will have the opportunity to argue against the conclusions for years.

But the reality is that a cost/benefits analysis is the only way to make those with money and power take some decisions and justify the enormous amounts of money that needs to be spend to tackle the problem.

In this analysis though I insist that we at least try to include the risks and the actual destruction of our environment due to GW. I realise that we can hardly price the extinction of the corals, but this is what our society is for - money. If you do not put a price tag for it nobody will take it serious. It may not be cynical, but so is the world we live in... Believe it or not, I've actually read in an economic textbooks how presumably smart people are calculating the cost of the human life - by the net present value of the expected income of the person until he/she retires. So the graduated student is "expensive", a retiree is worthed a lot less and if you are unemployed you are obviously worthed nothing... blah

Comments can no longer be added to this story.
LevinK on April 5, 2006 - 2:45pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Ooops that should read:

It may be cynical, but...

Comments can no longer be added to this story.
zeroworker7 on April 5, 2006 - 3:14pm Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Hi LevinK,

Let me try to recap my position.

Performing a meaningful cost/benefit analysis of climate change is impossible.  There are too many unknowns, and any $ values you place on the costs and the benefits are just guesses.  The ultimate balance sheet is therefore worthless as a guide for future action (or inaction).

The only reason for asking for such an analysis would be to get someone bogged down in the discussion, to argue over the $ amounts, etc., in order to gum up the works and prevent any action from being taken to mitigate the problem.

The qualitative information we do have all points toward serious problems coming down the pike.  This is all we need.  I don't agree with the notion that everything needs to be put into $ terms before things can be discussed, or decisions reached about what policies to pursue.  I simply reject that hypothesis.

Comments can no longer be added to this story.
dinaz on April 6, 2006 - 8:11am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Perhaps it is better to consider that cost/benefit analysis related to climate change can occur at different scales. I think it is self evident that macro scale estimates as to the economic impacts of climate warming are impractical. Any figure cited by any group will invariably be skewed by the mandate of the group. But a choice between one technology or system and another can very easily be analysed for cost benefit, with consideration for effects externalised by classical economics. That is not to say that the valuation of the externalities will be accurate, but this does not mean that such valuation is useless. Indeed a major part of socioeconomically responding to climate change is devising new means of previously externalised costs. Measurement of economic flows is always developing and revising previous metrics. They are persistently imperfect but somehow, persistently practical. Why then should valuation of environmental and social impacts be rejected outright? IMHO it deserves a fair shot at development and integration into existing economic theory.
Comments can no longer be added to this story.
Don Sailorman on April 6, 2006 - 9:41am Permalink | Subthread | Parent | Comments top
Speaking as an economist, I am a big fan of economic analysis--where it can be applied appropriately.

By its nature, economic theory is relatively well equipped to deal with incremental change, changes where parameters stay stable, functions that you can differentiate because they are continuous.

But in regard to discontinuities and parameters that suddenly become highly variable, traditional economic analysis breaks down. For example, could you do a cost-benefit analysis to decide whether or not it was of economic benefit for the U.S. to fight in World War II? I don't think so.

Similarly, when dealing with "lumpy" problems, you are forced to discard the sophisticated arsenal of economic "weapons of mass optimization" and fly by the seat of your pants.

Having said all that, I do believe in the effectiveness of market prices to help us find good responses to problems of increasingly costly oil and also effective approaches to various envirnomental problems. No, the market will not "save" us, but intelligent laws that use market forces as an alternative to government command/bureaucracies can make a huge difference to deal with what is one of the biggest challenges humans have faced since the onset of the last ice age.

Comments can no longer be added to this story.

55 comments on Two small bits on cars and global warming

Comments can no longer be added to this story.

| Show without comments | PDF version