A Familiar Pattern is Emerging
May 25th, 2008Posted by: Roger Pielke, Jr.
This post provides a good example how some climate bloggers try to shut down debate over policy options by personalizing policy debates.
William Nordhaus, one of the leading economists who has worked on climate change, has a new book coming out, which is good news for anyone interested in the subject. His book was reviewed in The New York Review of books by Freeman Dyson.
But rather than take on the arguments made by Nordhaus, Real Climate and Joseph Romm attack Nordhaus’ arguments by proxy. They attack Freeman Dyson for invoking arguments raised by Nordhaus. In the process they ignore the substance of the issues and turn the issue into a referendum on an individual with whom they have policy differences. This tag-team smear job is becoming a bit too familiar.
In Nordhaus’ book he discusses five policy approaches, summarized by Freeman Dyson as follows:
Nordhaus examines five kinds of global-warming policy, with many runs of DICE for each kind. The first kind is business-as-usual, with no restriction of carbon dioxide emissions—in which case, he estimates damages to the environment amounting to some $23 trillion in current dollars by the year 2100. The second kind is the “optimal policy,” judged by Nordhaus to be the most cost-effective, with a worldwide tax on carbon emissions adjusted each year to give the maximum aggregate economic gain as calculated by DICE. The third kind is the Kyoto Protocol, in operation since 2005 with 175 participating countries, imposing fixed limits to the emissions of economically developed countries only. Nordhaus tests various versions of the Kyoto Protocol, with or without the participation of the United States.
The fourth kind of policy is labeled “ambitious” proposals, with two versions which Nordhaus calls “Stern” and “Gore.” “Stern” is the policy advocated by Sir Nicholas Stern in the Stern Review, an economic analysis of global-warming policy sponsored by the British government.[*] “Stern” imposes draconian limits on emissions, similar to the Kyoto limits but much stronger. “Gore” is a policy advocated by Al Gore, with emissions reduced drastically but gradually, the reductions reaching 90 percent of current levels before the year 2050. The fifth and last kind is called “low-cost backstop,” a policy based on a hypothetical low-cost technology for removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, or for producing energy without carbon dioxide emission, assuming that such a technology will become available at some specified future date. According to Nordhaus, this technology might include “low-cost solar power, geothermal energy, some nonintrusive climatic engineering, or genetically engineered carbon-eating trees.”
What do Real Climate and Joseph Romm do? Rather than engage the substance of the policy arguments, they go on the attack, with Real Climate using the term “b#ll&hit” and Romm “unmitigated disinformation.” Of course the policy issues that they don’t like — discount rates, cost estimates, air capture — all come from Nordhaus, not Dyson. But rather than engage the substance they viciously attack an individual.
The only apparently original view from Dyson that Real Climate takes issue with is when Dyson notes that (in a second book discussed in the review, by Ernesto Zedillo) chapters by Richard Lindzen and Stefan Rahmstorf (of Real Climate) are both unsatisfactory:
These two chapters give the reader a sad picture of climate science. Rahmstorf represents the majority of scientists who believe fervently that global warming is a grave danger. Lindzen represents the small minority who are skeptical. Their conversation is a dialogue of the deaf. The majority responds to the minority with open contempt.
A sad picture indeed.
May 26th, 2008 at 12:53 am
Roger, you’re clearly right that both Romm and Climate have unfortuinately focussed on Dyson rather than picking up on the policy issues raised by Nordhaus – who actually advocates a “carbon tax of $34 per metric ton of carbon in 2010 (all calculations are in 2005 international
U.S. dollars). The optimal tax rises in future years, reaching $42 per ton in 2015, $90 per ton in 2050, and $202 per ton in 2100.” http://nordhaus.econ.yale.edu/Balance_2nd_proofs.pdf
The negative attacks by Real Climate and Romm on Dyson and Lindzen might have some merit, but they are entirely short-sighted – and totally miss the more important point of Nordhaus’ strong conclusion, which Dyson failed to mention.
But then again, your own focus on criticizng Real Climate and Romm also ignores the opportunities raised by Nordhaus and Dyson to discuss policy.
May 26th, 2008 at 2:51 pm
So let’s do that now (discuss the policy implications)..
I was intrigued by the idea of “genetically engineered carbon eating trees.” What may be missed in the discussion about them is that most trees in forests take a fairly long time to grow to the point that they look “forest like” to people and wildlife. And the problem with forest tree breeding is not the time it takes to develop a new variety (especially with genetic engineering), but the time it takes to test it in nature (50-100 years). So if you plant thousands of acres that are insufficently adapted (to the unknown future climate) and they all die, there goes your carbon eaters as well as a substantial investment (4% over 50 years..).
That’s not to say that shorter rotation trees (like poplars or eucalyptus) wouldn’t work- it’s just that people don’t think of those as forests in the same way and would be unlikely to be happy campers (so to speak) to see one quarter of the forests converted to those (even if the short rotation trees would grow in those areas, which they wouldn’t).
The good news is there are plenty of annual and other perennial plants that could more easily be genetically engineered, tested, changed if the climate changes, managed in a sustainable manner, and that would provide income to landowners.
Let’s go there.
I wonder what percentage of our current research funds are going to work on developing varieties and sustainable practices that meet the above criteria?
May 26th, 2008 at 4:39 pm
docpine-
There has been some discussion of this subject by Craig Venter (human genome sequencer), e.g.,
http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5iYXm1UNEI-ViI-p5S6TAaogyDv8Q
I am unaware of any public research funds in the US focused on such technologies, but I’d love to hear of any . . .
James Hansen and Wallace Broecker have also proposed capturing carbon dioxide via various means (including plants).
May 26th, 2008 at 9:38 pm
Thanks for the link to the Venter article; it sounds like more of a lab or processing plant technology. The analysis of environmental impacts for such a technology including the efficacy of the “suicide gene” would be a compelling read, I’m sure.
I suppose we should be grateful that his team is only “using synthetic chromosomes to modify organisms that already exist, not making new life.”
Genetically engineered poplars are pretty low tech by comparison.
May 27th, 2008 at 11:44 am
Hm, I was thinking of a different pattern that I see emerging in this discussion again — the one where people wave their hands and direct scientists to go do work for them, claiming they know better than the scientists actually working on the material what should be done with it.
Like “genetically engineered carbon-eating trees”
A biologist might make similar suggestions. Like
— “what we need is the string theorists to simply pull in half the carbon dioxide strings, making half of those disappear from the atmosphere — problem solved.”
or
– “what we need is the radiation physicists to provide a way to — controllably — orient most of the molecules of any one or more of the greenhouse gases at the top of the atmosphere. Arrange them so that the emitted infrared photons go uphill or at worst sideways, and none of them go downhill, increasing the efficiency with which Earth’s atmosphere gets rid of excess heat. Problem solved.”
or
– “what we need is the ionospheric radio physicists using something like the HAARP system to create a heat pump, beaming small amounts of microwave energy to nudge all the greenhouse gases up to energy levels where they will emit infrared photons carrying away more energy than input. Power the radio transmitters with windmills or bicyclists. Problem solved.”
And of course
– “Details of calculation should be performed by practicing scientists in the field, not by me, since this is clearly important enough to preempt whatever they’re wasting time with on their day jobs now.”
May 27th, 2008 at 11:50 am
Oh, don’t forget the marine mammal scientists’ proposal:
– ” Restore large biomass consuming animals in the ocean, all the way up the trophic level from algae and plankton to codfish and sharks to the big whales, because large whales, both the filter-feeders and the carnivores, were the most effective carbon sequestration path available. All (except the ‘Right Whale’) sink when they die. The bottom of the abyssal ocean used to be littered with the slowly decomposing carcasses of the great whales, before whaling ships started taking them out of the ocean and the populations crashed. No other single pathway was so effective at collecting and removing large masses of carbon from the active biosphere to the abyss, before whaling began. Problem solved.”
May 27th, 2008 at 5:28 pm
Would it not work better if everyone was focused on solving the problems rather than arguing with others that have thought up ideas of how to solve the problems that don’t match their conclusion on what the problem is and or how to go about it?
May 28th, 2008 at 7:08 am
To add to Hank’s list I did read about a serious proposal to ionize the CO2 molecules so they could be sucked out by the magnetosphere at the North pole. Probably cause an ice age if it worked though.
I find that where I live at least, if we leave nature alone she does actually grow trees quite well all by herself. Probably stopping the current forest destruction is the real best first step.
When I was planning my carbon-free home, with underground pipes for geothermal energy and solar roof panels to capture the sun I soon realized I was really designing an inferior type of tree. If we could just manage to copy what a leaf does naturally…
May 28th, 2008 at 2:35 pm
Relying on taxes may not be as effective as believed either. In the US, despite driving decreasing over 4% the past year, fuel production has declined less than 1%.
Even with more efficient cars being produced, efficiency continues to decline.
http://cumulativemodel.blogspot.com/2008/05/fuel-efficiency-continues-to-decline.html
June 1st, 2008 at 3:45 am
“…people wave their hands and direct scientists to go do work for them, claiming they know better than the scientists actually working on the material what should be done with it.”
That is one of the more bizarre sets of mischaracterizations I’ve read lately. Nowhere in the comments preceding it did I see anything remotely resembling them. What I read were thoughts and suggestions concerning policy – supposedly the point of this thread.
So to get back to policy, it would seem wise to first establish whether reducing carbon emissions is a good idea or not before discussing the hows. People seem to forget that we’re in a tiny de-glaciated interval of a 3-million-years-and-counting ice age, and if past cycles are any indication, it’s about to end.
June 1st, 2008 at 3:46 am
“…people wave their hands and direct scientists to go do work for them, claiming they know better than the scientists actually working on the material what should be done with it.”
That is one of the more bizarre sets of mischaracterizations I’ve read lately. Nowhere in the comments preceding it did I see anything remotely resembling them. What I read were thoughts and suggestions concerning policy – supposedly the point of this thread.
So to get back to policy, it would seem wise to first establish whether reducing carbon emissions is a good idea or not before discussing the hows. People seem to forget that we’re in a tiny de-glaciated interval of a 3-million-years-and-counting ice age, and if past cycles are any indication, it’s about to end.
June 2nd, 2008 at 7:44 pm
Hank -
I doesn’t look like you made it into that Therm 101 class yet. When will that be?