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In other words, if a cap and tradeplan has a stronger effect on lower emmissions then it is also going to have a stronger effect on prices?
I wouldn't disagree with that, just want to make sure it is the point.
Do you know of a similar summary that uses newer data?
As opposed to the greatest possibility of working?
Not to beat a thriving horse, but none of the plans have a hope in hell of working if a) it is not global, and; b) it does not cut emissions across the board by amounts of upwards of 90%.
If you have 25 people in a swimming pool with water that is circulated but never replaced, and only you commit to stop peeing in it half of the time, you are still swimming in urine.
So I know my input is not really welcome in this discussion, but someone needs to point out that the emperor is both naked and smells like urine.
Keep up the regular checks and reminders.
Must be all that chlorine masking the ureic acid smell.
There is also the problem of companies wanting to squeeze the last nickel out of investment on any given product or technology before making change.
Better question: since we are facing a serious problem, why are we fooling around with half baked solutions like finding ways for firms to abate carbon?
Better solution: mandate the amount of carbon that can be used and let the firms sort out how they are going to deal with it.
So how does this work if we want to radically cut the use of cocaine, for instance, or prostitution?
Given the nature of the problem that we are facing, why are the NGOs and political parties wasting time with irrelevant debates and plans based on market based solutions that will probably have little effect on abatement in the long run?
Curtail the amount of carbon that can be used and GHGs start dropping. Carbon problem solved. New problem: dealing with the blowback that will happen when a society severely addicted to carbon goes through withdrawal pains.
Just like smokers choose lung cancer over not smoking our society is choosing the carbon fiasco over direct action to save the environment.
Agreed, but it has to start somewhere, waiting for complete global agreement is futile.
We can clean up our act, we have the power to do that. Getting others to clean up their act will be more difficult, but if it comes down to it, I have far less of an objection to military action aimed at saving the environment than I do for controlling resources and expanding empire.
We're already using your preferred policy in these cases. Working out really well, don't you think?
I have no faith at all in our ability to curb our own appetites. We hold no moral ground on the issue at all. If anything, the global south should be gearing up for military action against us.
When you think about it, climate change is a weapon of mass destruction and many in the global north believe the victims will only be in the global south and with that in mind, the political and economic consensus, already, is adaptation. We adapt; they die.
of course, it won't work that way. But that is the de facto policy course for Europe and North America.
Yeah, a suicidal one. [img]smile.gif" border="0[/img]
Are you saying that your market based solutions would work better? How?
My solution to these two problems have nothing to do with either prices or direct control of supply, but then they are not carbon and don't threaten society the way that poisoning the environment does.
Any how, the main point is that directly limiting carbon use is a more effective way of dealing with the GHG problem than taxing it. Where is an irrefutable argument to the contrary?
Also keep in mind that we need to reduce all consumption, not just of carbon. Reducing the use of carbon while finding other ways to maintain overall consumption is self defeating.
[ 28 June 2008: Message edited by: martin dufresne ]
It's an equivalent way of dealing with the ghg problem. With caps, quantities go down, so prices go up. With taxes, prices go up, so quantities go down.
If you're concerned about uncertainty, then you can make a case for preferring one over the other. Caps provide more certainty about emissions levels; taxes provide more certainty about prices and the size of the economic costs involved.
Agreed.
There is a catch of course. But that will have to wait.
We should be concerned about uncertainty, that is the point. And price increases are not equivalent when it comes to absolute reductions in carbon consumption. One provides a relatively certain guarantee on the amount of reduction, the other is a crap shoot.
The only equivalence between the two methods is that both raise prices, but prices alone do not speak the the degree of consumption reduction.
They are not equivalent where it counts, in reducing consumption.
If anybody believes that I may have interest in some bridges around San Francisco and would be more than happy to sell whatever interest I have for the right price. My mailing address is available on the net and easy to find. Send me a cheque and we can do a deal. [img]smile.gif" border="0[/img]
Can one assume from your comment that you are totally opposed to any kind of military activity any time, anywhere for any reason? If not, what is the point? Did we do the right thing in Rwanda?
Never mind, or answer in a separate thread with a link.
I agree if you are arguing that the NDP needs to have a much more aggressive cap policy. Still, it is a better approach than merely manipulating costs.
Both the NDP and Liberal plans as presented are starting points.
As such, for the NDP plan, when it comes down to it you make the best choices about which class of emitters you star with, but who is and who isn't in at the beginning is comparatively secondary- 50% is 50%.
When I compare them from the position we agree on, I will endeavour to leave out or note as secondary comparable weaknesses in the Liberal plan.
[ 28 June 2008: Message edited by: KenS ]
That's a judgment call. It's not at all clear to me that short-run uncertainty about prices and about economic costs are outweighed by short-run certainty about emission levels. Provoking an economic catastrophe would wipe out whatever support there is for a climate change agenda for at least a generation.
Could be a professional bias here? [img]smile.gif" border="0[/img]
That is assuming that the public sees short term (historically speaking) economic reorganization as a catastrophe as opposed to a more severe and long lasting social and economic disaster brought on by not taking major action now.
And what the public sees is a function of what the media, government and assorted organizations tell them.
We are at a point in history where economic interests may be at odds with survival of society. I have no doubt that society will survive at some level, the question is do we take control of deciding where that level is, or do we keep clinging to what we have and hope that we come out alright?