Category: Economics of mitigation

Categories
Economics of mitigation United States of America

December 2, 2023 – Exxon’s boss vs IEA, planet

One year ago, on this day, December 2nd, 2023,

DUBAI, Dec 2 (Reuters) – Exxon Mobil CEO Darren Woods on Saturday rejected the International Energy Agency’s recent claim that using wide-scale carbon capture to fight climate change was an implausible “illusion”, saying the same could be said about electric vehicles and solar energy.

“There is no solution set out there today that is at the scale to solve the problem,” Woods told Reuters on the sidelines of the COP28 climate summit in Dubai.

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 423ppm. As of 2024 it is 423ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that the oil industry chief execs were turning up in force to COP28, the one with the so-called “Stocktake”. And the chief executives have a habit of saying inconvenient things or truthful things.

What I think we can learn from this. From the mouths of babes. And not-terribly-bright greedheads…

What happened next

MARC TO WRITE IN DECEMBER

What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.

References

Xxx

Also on this day: 

December 2, 1964 – Mario Savio’s “bodies on the gears” speech at Berkeley..

December 2, 1981 – “Is the world getting warmer?” (YES)

December 2, 1991 – “Ecologically Sustainable Development” bites the dust…

Categories
Australia Economics of mitigation

December 1, 1995 – bullshit modelling put out by Keating Government

Twenty-nine years ago, on this day, December 1st, 1995, bullshit “ABARE” climate modelling put out by Australian government, as part of its push for special treatment internationally.

1995 Release of “Global Climate Change” report by Keating Government, based on ABARE AND DFAT “modelling”.

This was hardly a surprise. At the beginning of the year a front page story on The Australian (back when it was still almost a newspaper) had said as much. From January 18, 1995.

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 361ppm. As of 2024 it is 423ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that the first Conference of the Parties (COP1) had happened in Berlin in March. Australia was one of the nations that, thanks to the Berlin Mandate, was expected to turn up a couple of years later, with a plan for emissions reductions. But Australia had already comprehensively failed to take any action towards its first proposed target, the Interim Planning Target of October 1990. And so it was going to need other ways of responding to the challenge, as in denying the challenge and trying to push it on to other people. ABARE had already done some idiotic plant modelling and now the Department for Foreign Affairs and Trade were happy to take ABARE’s modelling and create an argument that said Australia shouldn’t have to x. In essence, this was not under that wicked, wicked man, Liberal John Howard. It was under St. Paul Keating. 

What we learn is that the Australian political elites’ mendacious and rapacious hostility towards climate ambition is essentially bi-partisan and has been going on for 30 however many years and here we are, 

What happened next? Keating lost office in March of 1996. Howard simply turbo-charged the hostility to all things environmental and especially climate. 

What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.

References

Xxx

Also on this day: 

December 1, 1976 – Met Office boss still saying carbon dioxide build-up a non-issue

December 1, 2005 – David Cameron says “low carbon living should not be a weird or worthy obligation”

December 1, 2008 – Climate Change Committee fanboys carbon capture

Categories
Australia Denial Economics of mitigation

October 31, 2006 – Stern Review “pure speculation” according to John Howard

Seventeen years ago, on this day, October 31st, 2006, Australian Prime Minister John Howard dismisses the report on “The Economics of Climate Change” by former World Bank economist Nicholas Stern as “pure speculation”


,

Fraser, A. 2006. Greenhouse Report Pure Speculation, Says Howard. Canberra Times 1 November

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 382ppm. As of 2024 it is 422ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that Australia had just finally really woken up to climate change in September 2006. John Howard was beset on all sides and trying to fight back. At this point, he was probably still grumpy and resisting the idea of having to set up the Shergold Group Report. And so he took aim at the recently published Stern Review and called it pure speculation. 

What we learn is that a) people who are supposed to be responsible stewards of the future can be utter fools and that b) the species doesn’t know how to do concern about its own future. If it did, we wouldn’t be in this mess. Nothing in our cultural evolution in the West, at least the last 300 or 500 years or so has prepared us. And here we are. 

What happened next? Although Howard tried to do a pivot to save his skin it didn’t really convince anyone, probably not even himself. He got trolled by a senior ABC journalist on February 7. And he continued to sneer at Stern when Stern paid a flying visit in the first half of 2007. And of course, eventually, after leaving office, John Howard gave a talk to the Global Warming Policy Foundation or whatever it’s called that “one religion was enough.” 

What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.

Also on this day: 

October 31, 1994 – Four Corners reports on Greenhouse Mafia activity

October 31, 2018 – Extinction Rebellion makes its declaration of rebellion

Categories
Austria Economics of mitigation Energy Science

October 13, 1993 – IIASA and the IAMs – Gaia help us all

Thirty one years ago, on this day, October 13th, 1993,

Nebojša Nakićenović, William Nordhaus, Richard Richels and Ferenc Toth, Integrative Assessment of Mitigation, Impacts, and Adaptation to Climate Change, Proceedings of a Workshop Held on 13–15 Oct. 1993 (Laxenburg: IIASA, 1993)

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 357ppm. As of 2024 it is 422ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was tha the cold war -scientist shall talk unto scientist’ outfit the International Institute for Advanced Science Analysis (IIASA) was about 20 years old. It had a surprisingly long history of banging on about climate change and energy, back to 1975, with William Nordhaus and then Hafele’s energy studies. And they put together some workshops. And they were big fans of all their fancy computer models: really in love with them. 

What we learn.  And here we are 30 years later. And they just keep redrawing lines and magic shit into existence. Making heroic assumptions about the speed of development and deployment of offshore wind and hydrogen and so forth, bearing no resemblance to the real world. But how are you gonna make the numbers add up? 

So we’re trapped in these ridiculous mental models and computer models, because we don’t tell the truth to ourselves about ourselves. That we screwed the pooch and is it no one’s short-term career interest to be the one who says “hey guys, I think we screwed the pooch.” You are not going to get promoted – in fact, you’re not going to keep your bloody job full stop if you do that…

What happened next so I’m sure that in 1993 there were people with misgivings. They didn’t speak up. I’m sure that there were other people who had misgivings in 2003, didn’t speak up. 2013 didn’t speak up. 2023 didn’t speak up. Why would you? 

What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.

Also on this day: 

October 13, 1990/97 – Ros Kelly defends the Interim Planning Target vs Australia does nothing

October 13, 2005 – “Climate Change: Turning up the Heat” published

Categories
Economics of mitigation

March 8, 1966 – Spaceship Earth blasts off…

Fifty eight years ago, on this day, March 8th, 1966, American thinker Kenneth Boulding was talking about the importance of how we think about our position in the universe. Hint – we are on a fragile spaceship.

March 8 1966 Boulding Coming Spaceship Earth –

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 321ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that we just put people in space, everyone was thinking about space and spaceships and astronauts and spacewalks. And that sense of fragility was growing.

What I think we can learn from this is that Kenneth Boulding was a smart guy. So did other smart people, Bucky Fuller, Lewis Mumford. Barbara Ward, you name it. But our smarts didn’t save us (and our luck always runs out).

What happened next: Three years later, everyone’s got EarthRise posters. Everyone’s talking about her fragile planet. All of that kind of went away in 1972-73, at least publicly. Presumably, there’s a whole lot of people who still believe that but feel powerless and isolated to do anything meaningful about it (that Spiral of Silence). Fortunately, we learned our lessons and from 1989 We’ve been busy saving the world ever since [sarcasm]. 

What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.

Also on this day:

March 8 – International Women’s Day – what is feminist archival practice? 

Categories
Australia Economics of mitigation Green Jobs

October 30, 2008 – a worker-greenie coalition? Maybe…

Fifteen years ago, on this day, October 30, 2008, the top Union body (ACTU) and Australian Conservation Foundation co-launched a report about a putative “Green Gold Rush” of jobs, an argument they’d also been making in the early 1990s.

It was good old-fashioned ecological modernisation and green Keynesianism

AND 

On the same day, the Treasury released modelling that had been commissioned to support the wretched “Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme” of Prime Minister Kevin Rudd. 

“Australia’s Low Pollution Future: The Economics of Climate Change Mitigation”:

Treasury modelling establishes that there are benefits to Australia acting early if other countries also adopt carbon pricing but that delaying action may lead to higher long-term costs (source).

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 385.8ppm. As of 2023 it is 419ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was

In Australia everyone was talking about the climate, ahead of the long awaited launch of the CPRS White Paper in December.

Eco-modernist green jobs rhetoric was attempting to square the political circle, and at least reds and greens were talking to each other again (it had been rocky).

There was of course a history of this – see “Green Jobs Unit.”

What I think we can learn from this

We do like our stories of harmony and win-win. They soothe us. 

What happened next

The White Paper was shonky af (see Ross Garnaut’s op-ed ‘Oiling the Squeaks’). Rudd’s legislation attempts the following year were farcical giveaways. And then it fell apart… 

What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.

Categories
Australia Economics of mitigation

July 31, 2008 – another day, another “Strategic Review”

Fifteen years ago, on this day, July 31, 2008 the “Strategic Review of Australian Government Climate Change Programs” was released:

“The Wilkins Review analyzes current climate change programs to determine whether they are complementary to the CPRS”

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 386ppm. As of 2023 it is 423ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that the Rudd Government had set up the Wilkins Review to “house clean” and to get rid of all the other climate support schemes which were not market-based. And in exchange, we would get an economy-wide carbon price which would by magic, fix all the problems because that’s what these people genuinely believed.  

What I think we can learn from this is that there are lots of people who are very smart with all of the right qualifications, who also have no idea how the world really works. 

What happened next is Rudd’s wonderful Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme died. Twice. He bottled calling an election in early 2010, Julia Gillard had to clean up his mess and Australia’s emissions are high.

What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.

Categories
Economics of mitigation Uncategorized United States of America

May 20, 1960 – Spengler suggests decline of the … whole shebang

On this day american economist Joseph J. Spengler’s  Science article –  

“Illustrative also would be the covering of much land by water should continuing population growth so step up man’s production of carbon dioxide that the oceans failed to absorb all of it, with the result that the carbon dioxide content, and hence the temperature, of the atmosphere rose sufficiently to melt the polar ice caps.”

See here

https://www.jstor.org/stable/1705886

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 319 check  ppm. As of 2023 it is 423ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that by the late 1950s carbon dioxide build-ups existence and possible long term consequences was not confined to a tiny tiny minority. Anyone who read a newspaper, could understand exponential growth and 19th century could see that there might be some writing on the wall…

What I think we can learn from this

We knew enough to think about worrying.

What happened next?

No economist bothered to think about the problem until Nordhaus in the 1970s.

What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong?  Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.

Categories
Carbon Pricing Economics of mitigation United States of America

May 19, 1993 – President Clinton begins to lose the BTU battle…

Thirty years ago, on this day, May 19, 1993

Senator David Boren comes out against BTU tax, after Burson Marstellar astroturf campaign (see Agrawala and Andressen, 1999: 470)

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly xxxppm. As of 2023 it is 420ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was

There had been enormous – and ultimately successful – local lobbying efforts. Boren had been picked off, in a kind of Serengeti strategy thing, but in the political sphere rather than the scientific. And this really spells the end for Clinton’s BTU. 

What I think we can learn from this is that the opponents of climate action, smart, determined, strategic and well funded. These characteristics do not necessarily apply to the proponents of action, unfortunately. 

What happened next

Clinton had to kill the BTU energy tax. And that was basically it for Clinton and domestic climate action (imo). It also meant that the opponents of action really had good proof of concept, and presumably, the Australians were looking at this and saying, “that’s how it’s done.”

What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong?  Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.

Categories
Australia Coal Cultural responses Denial Economics of mitigation Industry Associations

 May 4, 1990 – coal industry sweats over greenie influence… – 

The greenies need to be put back in their box…. Lobbying, economic modelling, scare campaigns, smears. The usual…

“The recent shift in the environmental debate to promote global rather than regional goals is causing alarm among the world’s leading industrialists because of its potential to distort world trade and regional economies.

“The impact on Australia is assuming major proportions, with an Access Economics study to be released next week revealing that one-third of almost$40 billion in proposed mining and manufacturing projects are under threat of environmental veto”

 Massey, M. 1990. Environmental debate tops agenda at coal conference. Australian Financial Review, 4 May, p. 10.

The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 354ppm. As of 2023 it is 420ppm, but check here for daily measures. 

The context was that industry had only just started to push back against green groups. It had lazily assumed that the whole thing was a fad that would blow itself out very quickly. It was only really in late 1989/early 1990 that they started, in Australia, to properly co-ordinate a firm response…

What I think we can learn from this

When they wreck everyone’s future, that’s within normal parameters. If anyone tries to stop them, even slow them, that counts as “distortion”

What happened next

They won.  The UN process was effectively kneecapped. Domestic processes were kneecapped. They got rich. The atmosphere got enriched too – with insane amounts of carbon dioxide…

What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong?  Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs