The Cost of Doing Nothing

According to this report, acting now to avoid the negative consequences of global warming will require 1% of GDP, while waiting until later will cost between 5-20% of GDP:

Economist: Global warming will be costly, by Thomas Wagner,  The Associated Press: A comprehensive report on the global economic cost of climate change, to be released by the British government Monday, is expected to be the world's most serious effort to quantify the long-term effect of doing nothing.

The Independent newspaper reported Friday that the long-awaited review would say global warming could cost the world's economies up to 20 percent of their gross domestic product if urgent action is not taken to stop floods, storms and natural catastrophes.

Author Sir Nicholas Stern met privately with Prime Minister Tony Blair and his Cabinet ministers Thursday to brief them about his findings. Stern, a government adviser on climate change, is a former chief economist of the World Bank.

Quoting unidentified officials at the briefing, The Independent said Stern warned the world would have to pay 1 percent of its annual gross domestic product now to avert catastrophe but that doing nothing could later cost five to 20 times that amount.

"Business as usual will derail growth," the paper quoted Stern as saying as he briefed the government on his 700-page report, covering a period up to the year 2100.

The report was mandated by Blair's treasury chief, Gordon Brown, who is expected to replace Blair when he steps down as prime minister next year. Brown recently said he would use the report to alert governments around the world that they have been too slow to recognize — let alone fight — the threat of climate change. ...

Comments

[evagrius]

Uh... "a penny saved is a penny earned", "a stich in time saves nine" etc;

[joan]

I don't think the science on global warming is accurate enought to even predict temperature changes let alone their economic effects. We should do what we can, but trying to quantify GDP effects is trash. I suspect it is too late to do anything and we will have no choice but to live with the concequences.

[evagrius]

joan;

You're right. It seems that the predictions have all been off so far. It seems the actual measures exceed those predicted.

The situation is not completely hopeless.

The effects we are seeing and experiencing now are the results of actions taken 30-50 years ago.

If we reduce our emissions now, the results won't be seen until most of us are dead. But our children or grandchildren will be able to benefit.

So-do you want to think of future generations or do nothing?

[calmo]

About joan's trash:We should do what we can, but trying to quantify GDP effects is trash. Recall that the main argument that was used by US officials against signing on to the Kyoto Protocol was that it would be an unacceptable cost to our GDP.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyoto_Protocol#Position_of_the_United_States
But I think this is a good suspicion:I suspect it is too late to do anything and we will have no choice but to live with the concequences and that eva's response is even better than suspicious:So-do you want to think of future generations or do nothing? which brings our focus back to the inadequate time frame of politicians (even those earnest enough to worry about their legacies). This administration in particular, has no use for these longer-range people. Send in the geologists and tourist harvesters --send the ecologists and environmentalists and most economists, home.
'Does it make money now and can I get my mits on it?' is the key that unlocks their otherwise deaf ears.

[John H. Morrison]

Maybe Peak Oil will save us from the worst consequences of global warming. Or maybe the slowdown or stoppage of the north-Atlantic current will give western Europe and eastern North America a colder and snowier climate, to increase the reflection of sunlight from the earth.

On the other hand, the northern polar cap is melting, reducing the reflection and increasing the absorption of sunlight. The permafrost is melting, releasing methane into the atmosphere. And the atmospheric concentration of CO2 is accelerating. These suggest that we are caught in a positive feedback loop.

The worst possible consequence of global warming is a runaway greenhouse effect leading to another Venus: thick CO2 atmosphere (90 times the pressure of the earth's atmosphere), temperature around 700 Kelvin, and no water. Venus's runaway greenhouse effect was caused by its long solar day (117 earth days), so until learning about the positive feedback (in the paragraph above) I viewed this consequence as remote.

[evagrius]

Here's an article from the New York Review of Books;

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/19596

Quite good. Lots of interesthing points- Japan and Germany are the leaders in solar panels/ energy.

[mrrunangun]

Thirty years ago in his popular geology books, later compiled into one volume "Annals of the Former World", John McPhee wrote that we are living at the warming tail end of an ice age and that the earth would perhaps continue to warm for many more centuries. He wrote that in many times past the sea levels had been fifty feet higher than at present, levels that would place Atlanta and Nashville at or near the seashore. There is no reason to believe they will not do so again. Recent excavations at Venice, Italy revealed that the Mediterranean has risen nine feet since Roman times. There is little or no reason to believe that short term human intervention will have a great impact on these cycles which occur in geologic time measured in tens and hundreds of thousands of years.

[evagrius]

mrrunangun;

Sure. It's always interesting to read someone argue that humans have little impact on the earth and then turn around and brag how certain projects "change" the environment. A fascinating contradiction.

[mrrunangun]

Thirty years ago when John McPhee was writing, global warming was not an issue. Indeed during the late seventies and early eighties we had a series of very severe winters and pop climatologists were regaling the public with predictions of the new ice age soon to come. Back then, there were proposals to reduce particulate emissions some claimed were reducing the penetration of the sun's light to the earth. Global freezing was baloney then, and vewry likely global warming is now. Scientific scare stories sell now as then. Very few people understand the science and the experts argue. The public is invited to take sides in the argument based on the scare stories. That is how the USA became the only major industrial power to abjure nuclear electrical power generation for the past thirty years.

[calmo]

U B mistook mrrunagunVery few people understand the science and the experts argue. Only kooks think the glaciers are faking it.
Honest.
The US did not sign on at Kyoto because corporate interests were not served, not because the kooks argued powerfully we were about to freeze our asses off.

[evagrius]

mrrunagun;

I don't think you're correct. Thirty-four years ago I was at university, taking a year long course on biology and ecology. The professors were already discussing global warming. In fact, much of what they discussed is now current events, so to speak.
In 1989, James Burke produced a documentary, After the Warmimg, that is still quite accurate.

calmo is correct- UB not correct

[Bupa]

There is an enormous peer-reviewed literature on global warming. There is an overwhelming consensus that human activity is contributing to global warming.

Don't be ignorant. In this case ignorance can be genocidal.

The U.S. is and has been the largest contributor to our species contribution to this catastrophe. Americans drive gas-guzzling cars and live in under-insulated and over-sized houses. Americans have the largest carbon footprint. They are off the charts.

Americans should quickly move to European level gas taxes. Policy wonks should focus their energies on reforms that might alleviate some of the regressive nature of such a tax. I say some and not all, because the goal is to change behavior and that ain't going to happen if the Government hands back to a family the amount it is taking away in the tax.

For those who cry that this is unjust. Think of folks in Bangladesh and India and the Pacific islands. They will be the biggest casualties of America's glutinous ways. Also look at Nick Stern's report. The poor everywhere will suffer most if global warming isn't curtailed.

[yartrebo]

CO2 emissions is one case where there is a very strong instance of diminishing returns.

Eliminating the first bit of emissions is very easy - actions such as not flaring natural gas and using compact fluorescent bulbs actually have a strong positive rate of return (easily 10%/year on capital invested). Retiring the oldest and least efficient power plants generally pays for the cost of capital for new plants. Retiring SUVs and pre-oil crisis cars has similar economics (assuming that the main use of SUVs is indeed image and thus a zero-sum game). The effect on GDP from these changes is generally mostly neutral (perhaps slightly negative) if the capital is diverted from other capital projects, and quite positive if it comes from increased savings.

Once you get rid of the low-hanging fruit (which is quite abundant in the USA), CO2 emission reductions can become very expensive. To get rid of that last bit of emissions would involve supplying even peak power loads and vehicles with non-polluting energy and stopping devices such as blast furnaces from emitting CO2. With today's technology the hit would be well over 20% of GDP for reducing CO2 emissions to 0.

As such, it would be smart to attack the problem quickly, so that more drastic steps are not needed later and so that technological advance is sped up.

[evagrius]

From the Guardian;

Simple verdict after a complex inquiry: time is running out

· By 2100, an upheaval not seen since the last ice age
· Famine, disease and mass extinction as heat rises

David Adam and Larry Elliott
Tuesday October 31, 2006
The Guardian

Sir Nicholas Stern was commissioned by Gordon Brown to write a landmark report on climate change, amid growing fears about the human and economic cost of global warming.
Sir Nicholas, an internationally regarded economist, spent more than a year examining the complex problem. After a week of rumours and leaks, yesterday he formally launched his 579-page report. Though dry in its delivery, it had a simple and apocalyptic message: climate change is fundamentally altering the planet; the risks of inaction are high; and time is running out.

Article continues

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

This is a summary of the key findings.
The science

Out of this enormously complex report comes a simple conclusion: human activity has raised the amount of the key greenhouse gas carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

Stern uses the standard scientific measure to show how the amount has risen from 280 parts per million (ppm) before the industrial revolution to 430ppm now. The gas traps heat and has caused the Earth to warm by more than half a degree, with a further half degree at least to come over the next few decades.

If carbon emissions continue as they are, the level will reach 550ppm by 2050 or sooner. Scientists believe that would drive global average temperatures to 2C above pre-industrial levels. It could also release natural stocks of carbon from the soil or permafrost, making the situation worse.

Stern warns: "The scientific evidence points to increasing risks of serious, irreversible impacts from climate change associated with business-as-usual paths for emissions."

With no action to cut emissions, by the end of the century the atmospheric level could hit 750ppm, with a 50% chance that a 5C temperature rise would follow. "An illustration of the scale of such an increase is that we are now only around 5C warmer than the last ice age," the report says.

The scale

World emissions of greenhouse gases were the equivalent of 42bn tonnes of carbon dioxide in 2000.

The biggest source (24%) is the use of fossil fuels to generate energy, such as power stations that burn coal, oil and gas to produce electricity. Energy as fuel for transport (14%), industry (14%) and to supply buildings (8%) is also a big emitter. So are agriculture (14%) and changes in land use (18%), which mainly means chopping down forests. Harvesting timber from tropical forests and using the land for oil palm and soya can boost income per hectare from $2 to $2,000. Stern says: "The loss of natural forests around the world contributes more to global emissions each year than the transport sector."

Impact on the planet

Significant warming will profoundly change our planet, the report says.

One of the first impacts will be on the water cycle. Droughts and floods will become more severe in many areas. Rain will increase at higher latitudes and decrease in the dry subtropics. Hotter land drives more powerful evaporation, which brings more intense rainfall and flash floods. "Warming may induce sudden shifts in regional weather patterns such as the monsoon rains in South Asia or the El Niño phenomenon," the report says.

Differences in water availability between regions of the world will become more pronounced. Already dry areas such as the Mediterranean basin, southern Africa and South America could lose 30% of their water if temperatures rise by 2C. By contrast, South Asia, Russia and parts of northern Europe could get 10% more water, causing rivers to burst their banks.

Glaciers are melting - a quarter have gone from the South American Andes since the 1970s - and "some small glaciers are likely to disappear completely in the next decade given current trends".

Slight warming may lift crop yields, such as wheat and rice, in the US, Europe, Australia, Siberia and parts of China. But beyond 3-4C there will be increasingly negative effects. Experiments suggest worldwide cereal production could fall 5% for a 2C rise and 10% if the rise was 4C - a level that would make entire regions unsuitable for crops, including parts of Australia. Africa, western Asia and the Middle East could lose 15-35% of their main crops if temperatures rise by 3-4C. Maize production in tropical regions such as parts of Africa and Central America could suffer substantial declines.

Extra carbon dioxide from the atmosphere dissolving in the oceans is making them more acidic. An atmospheric level of carbon dioxide equivalent to 560ppm (double pre-industrial levels) would decrease average pH by 0.15 units. Such a rapid change has not happened for hundreds of thousands of years and "makes it harder for many ocean creatures to form shells and skeletons from calcium carbonate", Stern says. It could disrupt sea life irreversibly, halting the growth of corals with knock-on effects up the ocean food chain as far as salmon and whales.

Seas will rise by between 20cm and 80cm if the Earth warms 3-4C, increasing the risk of coastal flooding and storm surges. Extreme weather events such as hurricanes and typhoons will become more intense: peak wind speeds of tropical storms increase 15-20% with a 3C rise in sea surface temperature, Stern says.

Warming over the last 40 years has driven species an average of four miles towards the poles a decade, while seasonal events such as flowering and egg laying have come forward several days. Coral bleaching has increased since the 1980s and Arctic and mountain ecosystems are struggling. Climate change has helped wipe out more than 1% of the world's amphibians from tropical mountains.

With further warming, many more species will be unable to adapt or move quickly enough to survive. In the Arctic, species such as polar bears and seals are likely to be very sensitive to the rapid warming and substantial loss of sea ice.

Stern cites one scientific study that found 1C of warming could leave 10% of land species facing extinction, with tropical mountains badly affected. A 2C rise could see 15-40% of land species threatened, including 25-60% of mammals in South Africa and 15-25% of butterflies in Australia. Half the tundra and a quarter of cool conifer forest could disappear.

Warming of 3C threatens 20-50% of land species, with thousands lost from biodiversity hotspots such as African national parks and the Queensland rainforest. Large areas of coastal wetlands will be lost to the rising sea. Some models suggest the Amazon could severely dry and then start to die off, the report notes.

Impact on people

"The impacts of climate change are not evenly distributed," Stern says. "The poorest countries and people will suffer earliest and most."

Changes in water availability will affect billions of people. Population growth combined with a 2C rise could leave 1-4 billion people experiencing growing water shortages, predominantly in Africa, the Middle East, southern Europe and parts of South and Central America. The review says: "Melting glaciers will initially increase flood risk and then strongly reduce water supplies, eventually threatening one-sixth of the world's population, predominantly in the Indian subcontinent, parts of China and the Andes."

Disruption to agriculture from a 2-3C rise will put 30-200 million more people at risk of hunger. Once temperatures rise 3C, 250-550 million extra people will be at risk - more than half in Africa and western Asia. At 4C and above, global food production is likely to be seriously affected.

Stern refers to a World Health Organisation estimate that climate change has killed 150,000 people since the 1970s, mainly in Africa, through diarrhoea, malaria and malnutrition. "Just a 1C increase in global temperature above pre-industrial levels could double annual deaths from climate change to at least 300,000, according to the WHO."

In higher latitudes such as the US, Europe, Russia and Canada, cold-related deaths will decrease. But worldwide, deaths from malnutrition and heat stress will increase. Malaria and dengue fever could become more widespread, with one study saying a 2C rise in temperature could expose 40-60 million more people to malaria in Africa. Other studies say the risk of malaria in west Africa could recede as rainfall decreases.

In cities, heatwaves will become more dangerous, Stern says, with extreme temperatures and more dangerous air pollution. A 4C temperature rise could expose 1.5-2.5 billion more people to dengue fever.

On sea level rise, Stern warns: "According to one estimate, by the middle of the century 200 million people may become permanently displaced due to rising sea levels, heavier floods and more intense droughts." Risks and a need for coastal protection will rise for Bangladesh, Vietnam, small islands in the Caribbean and Pacific, and large coastal cities such as Tokyo, New York, Cairo and London. The report adds: "Damage to infrastructure from storms will increase substantially from only small increases in event intensity. Changes in soil conditions, from droughts and permafrost melting, will influence the stability of buildings."

The new Qinghai-Tibet railway, planned to run over 300 miles of permafrost, has a costly insulation and cooling system to stop melting; most roads, houses and railways are more vulnerable.

Impact on the economy

The Stern review says doing nothing about climate change - the business-as-usual (BAU) approach - would lead to a reduction in global per capita consumption of at least 5% now and forever. That would represent a fall in living standards more than double that experienced in Britain's worst year since the second world war.

Stern warns the cost could be much higher and approach levels not seen since the great depression of the 1930s, when the US economy shrunk by almost 25%. The cost of BAU would be higher still had the model used by the Stern team taken into account three additional factors.

Firstly, if direct impacts on the environment and human health are included, the estimate of the total cost of climate change increases from 5% to 11% of global per capita consumption. While the report admits measuring these effects is difficult, it says the estimate is a cautious one.

Secondly, it says the planet may be even more sensitive to an increase in global temperatures than previously thought, because the carbon sinks that absorbed greenhouse gases are no longer as effective as they were and feedback effects have increased. Once this is factored in, the cost of climate change goes up to 14% of global consumption.

Finally, climate change affects poor parts of the world more than wealthy parts, even though developed countries are responsible for the lion's share of emissions. If the unequal burden was distributed more fairly, the estimate of the impact could rise by more than a quarter than without such adjustment.

"Putting these additional factors together would increase the total cost of BAU climate change to the equivalent of around a 20% reduction in consumption per head, now and into the future," it says.

The report also puts a price on the economic damage caused by every tonne of carbon we currently emit - $85. "But these costs are not included when investors and consumers make decisions about how to spend their money."

Big natural disasters can today cost a low income country about 5% of its GDP and the report says the cost of climate change to India and South-east Asia could be 9-13% of GDP by 2100. An additional 145-220 million people could be forced to live on $2 a day and poverty could kill an extra 165,000-250,000 children every year in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa.

For developed countries, some initial economic benefits (one study said early climate change could boost the US economy by 1%) will be overrun by the cost of extreme weather events. The report says: "In the UK, annual flood losses could increase from around 0.1% of GDP today to 0.2-0.4% of GDP once global temperature increases reach 3 to 4C."

Main points

· Carbon emissions have already increased global temperatures by more than 0.5C

· With no action to cut greenhouse gases, we will warm the planet another 2-3C within 50 years

· Temperature rise will transform the physical geography of the planet and the way we live

· Floods, disease, storms and water shortages will become more frequent

· The poorest countries will suffer earliest and most

· The effects of climate change could cost the world between 5% and 20% of GDP

· Action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and the worst of global warming would cost 1% of GDP

· With no action, each tonne of carbon dioxide we emit will cause at least $85 (£45) of damage

· Levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere should be limited to the equivalent of 450-550ppm

· Action should include carbon pricing, new technology and robust international agreements

Useful links
IPCC
UN framework convention on climate change

ftnewspaper.com

Healthcare Business Solutions
Best-selling book, "A Portable Mentor," provides solutions...

somc.org

[Movie Guy]

The report referenced in the AP article is called the 'Stern Review Report on the Economics of Climate Change'.

You can read it over at the HM Treasury web site of the UK Government. It's up.

[Movie Guy]

I find it interesting that there aren't many discussions about volcanoes with regard to countering the effects of the natural cycle of global warming and the additional man-made effects that are accelerating the cycle.

[Adrasteia]

A brilliant physicist once said that extraordinary claims demand extraordinary proof. As I read it, this report provides none whatsoever to back up its cost claims.