Category: Climate business

Visionary road maps

Here’s a way to map the climate change “debate” that goes a million miles beyond the simplistic for and against view beloved of sceptics and Climate Debate Daily. Click in the Flash animation above and you can access a Debategraph view of the issues around climate change (the buttons below allow you to access various map tools — the green button opens underlying information in a pop-up window). It’s a sort of cross between a mind map and a wiki, allowing you to add and develop ideas and viewpoints. Produced by Debategraph in collaboration with the MIT Center for Collective Intelligence, the Open University’s Knowledge Media Institute, the IQ2 Green Festival on Climate Change and The Independent the idea is to build the map as a public, international resource in the run up to the crucial Copenhagen meeting in December. Click on the central “climate change” circle, and then the details viewer (green button) to read more). David Price, co-founder of Debategraph, explained in an email:

The goal is develop the map iteratively to a point at which it represents genuinely rich and comprehensive public resource; so any recommendations of people on the science and/or policy side who you think might be interested in the visualization approach and in contributing to the map will be very welcome.

I think this is a fascinating way to look at the issues around climate change — to map the arguments in a manner that conveys the complexity of the issue, and avoids the constant need to restate the obvious. Changes you make here at Hot Topic will be reflected at all other sites embedding the map. Have a play, explore, and let me know what you think in the comments. If there’s enough interest, I’ll embed the map in its own page so that it’s only one click away from the front page. Could be a fantastic tool, especially for PolSci students… 😉

[Stereolab]

(Six) Things on my mind

copenhagen.jpg The Copenhagen climate conference — Climate change: global risks, challenges & decisions — closed yesterday, and work has now begun on producing a summary document — scheduled for publication in June. In the meantime, delegates have drawn up a preliminary list of six key messages, which were handed to the Danish prime minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen at the closing session. They are (in full, because I think they’re important and worth reading):

  1. Climatic trends: Recent observations confirm that, given high rates of observed emissions, the worst-case IPCC scenario trajectories (or even worse) are being realised. For many key parameters, the climate system is already moving beyond the patterns of natural variability within which our society and economy have developed and thrived. These parameters include global mean surface temperature, sea-level rise, ocean and ice sheet dynamics, ocean acidification, and extreme climatic events. There is a significant risk that many of the trends will accelerate, leading to an increasing risk of abrupt or irreversible climatic shifts. (my emphasis)
  2. Social disruption: The research community is providing much more information to support discussions on “dangerous climate change”. Recent observations show that societies are highly vulnerable to even modest levels of climate change, with poor nations and communities particularly at risk. Temperature rises above 2ºC will be very difficult for contemporary societies to cope with, and will increase the level of climate disruption through the rest of the century.
  3. Long-term strategy: Rapid, sustained, and effective mitigation based on coordinated global and regional action is required to avoid “dangerous climate change” regardless of how it is defined. Weaker targets for 2020 increase the risk of crossing tipping points and make the task of meeting 2050 targets more difficult. Delay in initiating effective mitigation actions increases significantly the long-term social and economic costs of both adaptation and mitigation. (my emphasis)
  4. Equity dimensions: Climate change is having, and will have, strongly differential effects on people within and between countries and regions, on this generation and future generations, and on human societies and the natural world. An effective, well-funded adaptation safety net is required for those people least capable of coping with climate change impacts, and a common but differentiated mitigation strategy is needed to protect the poor and most vulnerable.
  5. Inaction is inexcusable: There is no excuse for inaction. We already have many tools and approaches – economic, technological, behavioural, management – to deal effectively with the climate change challenge. But they must be vigorously and widely implemented to achieve the societal transformation required to decarbonise economies. A wide range of benefits will flow from a concerted effort to alter our energy economy now, including sustainable energy job growth, reductions in the health and economic costs of climate change, and the restoration of ecosystems and revitalisation of ecosystem services.
  6. Meeting the challenge: To achieve the societal transformation required to meet the climate change challenge, we must overcome a number of significant constraints and seize critical opportunities. These include reducing inertia in social and economic systems; building on a growing public desire for governments to act on climate change; removing implicit and explicit subsidies; reducing the influence of vested interests that increase emissions and reduce resilience; enabling the shifts from ineffective governance and weak institutions to innovative leadership in government, the private sector and civil society; and engaging society in the transition to norms and practices that foster sustainability.

This seems to me a very good summary of the climate problem: it’s worse than we thought, we need to act now, and we’ve got the tools to do it. Now all we need is the willpower and the commitment. Politicians, are you listening? Inaction is inexcusable.

[Edgar Broughton]

Right and wrong

dollarcloud.jpg

Estimating the economic impact of climate change and climate policy is controversial — not least in New Zealand, where some economists have been happy to generate specious forecasts to serve political purposes — so it’s a relief to read an article about climate change by a leading NZ economist that gets the issue “right”. Infometrics chief economist Adolf Stroombergen’s latest piece for the Dominion Post (which I saw in The Press business section on Saturday) correctly identifies that New Zealand’s primary vulnerabilities in the near to medium term are to the effects of climate change overseas, and to the actions other countries take to address the problem.

This will come as no surprise to readers of Hot Topic, as I’ve been emphasising this point for the last two years. However, while Stroombergen’s overall conclusion may be correct, his take on some of the underlying issues is a little less sure-footed.

Continue reading “Right and wrong”

Re-Make/Re-Model

dunne.jpgAccording to Carbon News (also at Scoop), the extension of the deadline for submissions to the ETS Review committee last week came at the request of major emitters who feared that committee chair Peter Dunne’s refusal to listen to arguments about climate science would mean their views would be ignored.

Sources say that the Greenhouse Policy Coalition – whose members include New Zealand Aluminium Smelters, New Zealand Steel, Fonterra, the Coal Association, Carter Holt Harvey, Norske Skog Tasman, Winstone Pulp, Pan Pacific Forest Products, SCA Hygiene, Business New Zealand, Solid Energy and Methanex – realised that it was in danger of not being heard because its submission failed to meet Dunne’s criteria.

The organisation asked for more time to come up with an acceptable submission, and it is understood that several members of the coalition then also asked for extensions. (Business New Zealand chief executive Phil O’Reilly has confirmed to Carbon News that his organisation asked for more time).

The clear inference is that the GPC and its members had prepared submissions that included attempts to call the basic science of global warming into doubt — or would at the very least fall foul of Dunne’s insistence that he would not hear arguments from “groups wanting to re-litigate the science of climate change”. Some of New Zealand’s largest corporates were prepared to stand up in front of the review committee and argue — what? That the world’s cooling? That the risks are overstated? That CO2 is not a greenhouse gas? The intellectual dishonesty of a group apparently prepared to line up with the cranks and argue black is white in order to defend its narrow economic interests beggars belief.

Meanwhile, lest the Greenhouse Policy Coalition forget the reason why emissions reductions are important and urgent, a prominent climate scientist not called Hansen has warned that climate change is proceeding faster than projected in the IPCC’s Fourth Report [BBC, Reuters]. Chris Field, a professor of biology and of earth system science at Stanford, and a senior fellow at Stanford’s Woods Institute for the Environment, told the American Association for the Advancement of Science conference last week that recent studies showed that:

…in a business-as-usual world, higher temperatures could ignite tropical forests and melt the Arctic tundra, releasing billions of tons of greenhouse gas that could raise global temperatures even more—a vicious cycle that could spiral out of control by the end of the century.

Field also considers that aggressive action to reduce emissions brings multiple benefits:

“What have we learned since the fourth assessment? We now know that, without effective action, climate change is going to be larger and more difficult to deal with than we thought. If you look at the set of things that we can do as a society, taking aggressive action on climate seems like one that has the best possibility of a win-win. It can stimulate the economy, allow us to address critical environmental problems, and insure that we leave a sustainable world for our children and grandchildren. Somehow we have to find a way to kick the process into high gear. We really have very little time.”

That should be required reading for the CEOs of the companies that fund the Greenhouse Policy Coalition. Unless, of course, they define their economic interests as more important than the survival of our civilisation.

[Roxy Music]

Star witness

homer.jpgThe Environment Court is currently hearing the appeal against consents granted for Meridian Energy‘s Project Hayes windfarm in Central Otago — and has been forced to sit through some evidential nonsense from climate cranks. Auckland property developer Roch Sullivan joined the appeal last year, and announced that he intended to bring some leading climate cranks to give evidence. Last Friday it was Chris de Freitas’ turn and he did our plucky little NZ cranks collective proud, as the Otago Daily Times reports under the headline “Professor denies greenhouse effect“:

Prof de Freitas, of the University of Auckland, said there was no evidence to suggest carbon dioxide was the major driver of climate change. “Climate is not responding to greenhouse gases in the way we thought it might. If increasing carbon dioxide is in fact increasing climate change, its impact is smaller than natural variation. People are being misled by people making money out of this,” Prof de Freitas said.

He said mild warming of the climate was beneficial, especially in a country such as New Zealand, which had a prominent agricultural industry.

“One could argue that carbon dioxide is quite beneficial. There may be benefits of wind farming that I may not be aware of, but there is no data to show benefits in terms of mitigating potential dangerous changes in climate by offsetting carbon dioxide,” he said.

No evidence to suggest carbon dioxide was the major driver of climate change? I think the good professor is somewhat understating the case — at the very least, being economical with the truth. How a respected academic can ignore 150 years worth of physics and four successive IPPC reports is a matter that might be of interest to psychologists (perhaps even his head of department), but it gets better.

Prof de Freitas admitted there was debate about climate change, when questioned during cross-examination by Central Otago District Council lawyer Graeme Todd. “The debate centres on causes. There is a possibility climate change could be impacted by human beings, but it is not a significant impact,” he said.

In response to a question by commissioner Alex Sutherland, Prof de Freitas said the jury was out on climate change, and preemptive action could be dangerous. “There’s no basis for alarm. We might be shooting ourselves in the foot if we act on what turns out to be a bubble-less pot,” he said.

The jury is still out, not on the reality of climate change, but on whether so misrepresenting the evidence amounts to a contempt of court. The duties of an expert witness before the Environment Court include:

5.2 Duty to the Court

5.2.1 An expert witness has an overriding duty to assist the Court impartially on relevant matters within the expert’s area of expertise.

5.2.2 An expert witness is not an advocate for the party who engages the witness.

Since de Freitas’ areas of expertise include tourism, climate in caves, and suitable clothing for Canadian winters, it appears he is somewhat overstating his expertise in daring to advise the court in those terms. I do hope the judge is lenient, for his sake. Or perhaps de Freitas simply wishes to be acknowledged as an inexpert witness…

[Neko Case]