Assuming AGW is real, what do we do about it ?

[Michael Hardner]

AGW=Anthropogenic (human caused) Global Warming.

Again, this thread is not to debate IF it's happening. If you're on this thread, then we're debating what to do about it.

And, of course, one of the options is 'adapt', i.e. 'get used to it.

Mitigation costs seem lowish:

There are different metrics for reporting costs of emission

reductions, although most models report them in macroeconomic

indicators, particularly GDP losses. For stabilization

at 4–5 W/m2 (or ~ 590–710 ppmv CO2-equivalent) macroeconomic

costs range from -1 to 2% of GDP below baseline in

2050. For a more stringent target of 3.5–4.0 W/m2 (~ 535–590

ppmv CO2-equivalent) the costs range from slightly negative

to 4% GDP loss (high agreement, much evidence). GDP losses

in the lowest stabilization scenarios in the literature (445-535

ppmv CO2-equivalent) are generally below 5.5% by 2050,

however the number of studies are relatively limited and are

developed from predominantly low baselines (high agreement,

medium evidence).

Issues related to mitigation

If we want to move towards adaption - how will we handle the worst-case scenarios, if they do come to pass ?

Do we allow open migration from affected countries to the first world ? Do we pay into an international insurance fund ?

[TimG]

If we want to move towards adaption - how will we handle the worst-case scenarios, if they do come to pass?

How do we handle a dinosaur killer asteroid, a super bug or an coronal mass ejection? All are risks with some level of plausibility. The fact is we cannot deal with all possible risks and it is foolish to even bother trying.

I think economic models which estimate the cost of mitigation are pure fiction because we don't have alternate energy sources that can be deployed at the scale required. We might have those sources in the future but until we have them we cannot estimate their cost.

There are many natural and human events that cause suffering in over populated poor countries with incompetent governments. The blame for such suffering rests largely on the affected societies but that does not mean the rest of the world should do nothing to help. But it does mean that help for climate change adaption should be no different from help for human suffering caused earthquake, famine or war. The attempt to put climate change into a special category is a crude form of extortion because it is impossible to show that any complex event was really caused by 'CO2 emissions'.

Aid, if provided, should be handled by individual countries. If the UN is involved it should be on a project by project basis. Large slush funds in the hands on unaccountable bureaucrats are recipes for corruption.

In short, what we should do is invest in alternative energy R&D, reduce regulatory barriers which hinder deployment of alternative energy and accept that CO2 emissions are going up over the next 50 years no matter how much we may wish otherwise.

Edited October 1, 2010 by TimG

[betsy]

AGW=Anthropogenic (human caused) Global Warming.

If we want to move towards adaption - how will we handle the worst-case scenarios, if they do come to pass ?

Do we allow open migration from affected countries to the first world ? Do we pay into an international insurance fund ?

We don't wait for the worst case scenario. Don't waste time and money trying to reverse something most likely irreversible.

Preparation for adaptation....encouraging other countries to prepare as best as they could is a definite must. Large part of foreign aid must be directed to this preparation.

How can the first world accomodate to adopt an entire nations affected by global warming? This reality must be made clear to every country.

Worst case scenario will have us not fully prepared to deal with GW through lack of time....lack of proper planning (boondagles and trial/error)....maybe lack of funds.

Edited October 1, 2010 by betsy

[M.Dancer]

Buy Beach front propert on Hudson's Bay...sell to Club Med.

[GostHacked]

I'll play along with the hypothetical.

If AWG is true, then we might be already screwed. It took us some time to get to this stage, and even if we were to correct and stop all of the pollution that causes AWG, it would take a couple decades for us to notice any kind of difference.

If the oceans are rising, then coastlines are going to be devastated. We have been residing in large coastline cities for a long time now, and those places are going to get wiped out first. It will be economically a disaster as well. People will have to abandon those cities and move more inland. This means building whole new cities.

[Michael Hardner]

How do we handle a dinosaur killer asteroid, a super bug or an coronal mass ejection? All are risks with some level of plausibility. The fact is we cannot deal with all possible risks and it is foolish to even bother trying.

That's actually not what the business world does. They practice something called "risk management" and we would be wise to do that.

I think economic models which estimate the cost of mitigation are pure fiction because we don't have alternate energy sources that can be deployed at the scale required. We might have those sources in the future but until we have them we cannot estimate their cost.

Again, since this thread assumes warming is happening, what is the % of GDP that is worth investing in any solution ?

There are many natural and human events that cause suffering in over populated poor countries with incompetent governments. The blame for such suffering rests largely on the affected societies but that does not mean the rest of the world should do nothing to help. But it does mean that help for climate change adaption should be no different from help for human suffering caused earthquake, famine or war. The attempt to put climate change into a special category is a crude form of extortion because it is impossible to show that any complex event was really caused by 'CO2 emissions'.

Fair enough, but certain things could demonstrably be related to climate change - such as sea levels rising, or famine.

Aid, if provided, should be handled by individual countries. If the UN is involved it should be on a project by project basis. Large slush funds in the hands on unaccountable bureaucrats are recipes for corruption.

In short, what we should do is invest in alternative energy R&D, reduce regulatory barriers which hinder deployment of alternative energy and accept that CO2 emissions are going up over the next 50 years no matter how much we may wish otherwise.

Ok - those seem reasonable... if anemic. It seems that you want to do something, but if the worst comes to pass - then what ? What about mass migration away from affected areas ?

[Michael Hardner]

Worst case scenario will have us not fully prepared to deal with GW through lack of time....lack of proper planning (boondagles and trial/error)....maybe lack of funds.

And to that point - how does the first world achieve consensus on how to PLAN for this - either adaption or mitigation ?

[Michael Hardner]

I'll play along with the hypothetical.

If AWG is true, then we might be already screwed. It took us some time to get to this stage, and even if we were to correct and stop all of the pollution that causes AWG, it would take a couple decades for us to notice any kind of difference.

If the oceans are rising, then coastlines are going to be devastated. We have been residing in large coastline cities for a long time now, and those places are going to get wiped out first. It will be economically a disaster as well. People will have to abandon those cities and move more inland. This means building whole new cities.

How long would it take to build a 10 foot seawall across a few properties ? Or the entire coastline of the world ?

[TimG]

That's actually not what the business world does. They practice something called "risk management" and we would be wise to do that.

Managing risk includes choosing to ignore those risks that cannot be managed as reasonable cost.

Again, since this thread assumes warming is happening, what is the % of GDP that is worth investing in any solution?

That depends on:

1) What is the likihood that warming causing problems that require a "solution"?

2) What is the likihood that a "solution" will actually solve the stated problem?

3) Are there better uses for the money that would be invested in the solution?

The problem for most of the solution favoured by AGW activists are not likely to work and will divert large sums of money away from investments that would do a lot more to help humanity.

Fair enough, but certain things could demonstrably be related to climate change - such as sea levels rising, or famine.

Famine is never something that can be attributed to climate change. In all cases it is a result of a society that failed to develop the economic infrastructure that allows to feed its people even if the weather does not co-operate. This failure also goes hand in hand with a failure to control population growth.

The ability to deal with rising sea levels is also a function of social development. While it is true that some land may have to be abandoned most wealthy societies are more than able to build the large infrastructure that would keep the rising seas at bay. The fact that the sea rise will be less than 2 ft/100 years gives us a lot of time to build this infrastructure.

Ok - those seem reasonable... if anemic. It seems that you want to do something, but if the worst comes to pass - then what ? What about mass migration away from affected areas?

We will cross that bridge if we come to it.

[GostHacked]

How long would it take to build a 10 foot seawall across a few properties ? Or the entire coastline of the world ?

Is 10 feet going to be enough? If the waters start to rise, how high could it go? Prepare for absolute worst case scenario and then go from there I think .. If AGW is going to cause more hurricanes, tornadoes, .. bad weather, then you need to use New Orleans as an example as to what can go wrong with not building the walls to spec or maintenance was not done on the walls to ensure they would do the job.

Storm surges would push over that 10 feet easily. So do we spend money protecting those cities? Or do we spend money moving those cities?

Holland has a good system so far, but if there was a major storm in the north, Holland would disappear.

[Michael Hardner]

Managing risk includes choosing to ignore those risks that cannot be managed as reasonable cost.

Agreed. But by making that choice we are, in fact, "dealing with" the risk.

The problem for most of the solution favoured by AGW activists are not likely to work and will divert large sums of money away from investments that would do a lot more to help humanity.

"large sums of money" is a fact of life when you're dealing with the global economy. .1% would still be billions wouldn't it ? Again, I ask:

What is the % of GDP that is worth investing in any solution ?

Famine is never something that can be attributed to climate change. In all cases it is a result of a society that failed to develop the economic infrastructure that allows to feed its people even if the weather does not co-operate. This failure also goes hand in hand with a failure to control population growth.

Right - but we know now that they are ill-prepared to deal with disaster, and that some nations will therefore be hard-pressed in dealing with adverse conditions. And we're saying that we don't want to spend our GDP on mitigation.

Do you see where this could go ?

We could be in a scenario where we're saying "We don't want to spend our money now, to save their lives later." Is that what we're saying ?

[wyly]

If we want to move towards adaption - how will we handle the worst-case scenarios, if they do come to pass ?

if you're considering handling worst case scenario, you don't handleit... worst case is end of days type stuff a couple of million survivors living on the arctic coastlines... Edited October 1, 2010 by wyly

[ToadBrother]

In short, what we should do is invest in alternative energy R&D, reduce regulatory barriers which hinder deployment of alternative energy and accept that CO2 emissions are going up over the next 50 years no matter how much we may wish otherwise.

There are other issues that come into play. Few people seem to be willing to admit that the complex long-chain hydrocarbons we're pumping out of the ground are, from an industrial/material fabrication/production point of view almost the most valuable mineral in the world. As you pump the gas into your car or light your BBQ charcoal with lighter fluid, ponder that what you're basing turning into a puff of smoke is a series of chemicals of incredible importance to a vast number of industrial processes.

Oil's importance goes far beyond keeping airplanes in the air or trucking fresh produce from California to White Horse. As we sit back and go "Oh well, pump the CO2 into the atmosphere, burn the oil, we gotta keep the economy going", there is a far far darker shadow to the industrialized world than AGW (which, I think, to some degree is now unstoppable no matter what we do). When we run out of oil, it isn't just the cars that stop moving, the underpinnings of modern agriculture, of our materials technology stop, too. Cracking coal to make suitable long-chain molecules in and of itself requires vast amounts of energy, as would attempting to use simpler hydrocarbons like methane and ethane.

Frankly, at this point, with peak oil somewhere on the horizon in the next fifty years, we should be more worried about the fact that probably the most moronic and suicidal use of oil is moving vehicles with two or more wheels. A sane society would be looking at ceasing the use of natural long-chain hydrocarbons, when there are other ways to create motive power in vehicles.

So I kind of look at the AGW defenders and critics as being kind of like Nero fiddling while Rome burns. We've got bigger problems.

Edited October 1, 2010 by ToadBrother

[ToadBrother]

We could be in a scenario where we're saying "We don't want to spend our money now, to save their lives later." Is that what we're saying ?

Of course, that could spell doom for us anyways. At some point when conditions in an area become inhospitable to large numbers of people, people get up and leave. We're seeing it in Africa, but what happens when it begins happening in earnest in Eurasia? The last time we had a major migration, Europe, the Middle East and China ended up having vast numbers of nomadic Asian Steppe dwellers knocking on their doorsteps.

[wyly]

We don't wait for the worst case scenario. Don't waste time and money trying to reverse something most likely irreversible.

if worst case scenario is end of days than the amount of money spent is irrelevant...if you have cancer and your MD tells you for a 100K (which you have)you can get treatment that will save you are you going to quibble about the money? are you saving it for a rainy day?

the fact there is already research being done to stop and eventually reverse the process...

Edited October 1, 2010 by wyly

[wyly]

Is 10 feet going to be enough? If the waters start to rise, how high could it go? Prepare for absolute worst case scenario and then go from there I think .. If AGW is going to cause more hurricanes, tornadoes, .. bad weather, then you need to use New Orleans as an example as to what can go wrong with not building the walls to spec or maintenance was not done on the walls to ensure they would do the job.

Storm surges would push over that 10 feet easily. So do we spend money protecting those cities? Or do we spend money moving those cities?

Holland has a good system so far, but if there was a major storm in the north, Holland would disappear.

worst case sea level rise and that would centuries off, 250ft if I recall correctly...greenland melting completely would be enough for 1/2 of holland to disappear but that's only 16 million people, when you consider countries like Bangladesh the numbers will reach 100s of millions...

[wyly]

"large sums of money" is a fact of life when you're dealing with the global economy. .1% would still be billions wouldn't it ? Again, I ask:

What is the % of GDP that is worth investing in any solution ?

you would need to figure out the loss if we do nothing...how much is NY city worth? London, Miami, add in every other coastal city on the planet , a 20'rise will devastate every coastal city...you can build dykes at enormous cost for a while but then there is limit to that as well and then the cities will need to be abandoned...

then add in the economic cost for lost agricultural land...

I would think the cost of doing nothing quickly surpasses doing something...

[wyly]

There are other issues that come into play. Few people seem to be willing to admit that the complex long-chain hydrocarbons we're pumping out of the ground are, from an industrial/material fabrication/production point of view almost the most valuable mineral in the world. As you pump the gas into your car or light your BBQ charcoal with lighter fluid, ponder that what you're basing turning into a puff of smoke is a series of chemicals of incredible importance to a vast number of industrial processes.

yup...I had that disscusion with an executive friend with CONOCO-Phillips...we're burning up a non-renewable resource...of all the great things we can make with it we choose to burn it in our cars...

[TimG]

What is the % of GDP that is worth investing in any solution ?

It is a meaningless question that depends on the specifics of the investment, who pays and what the likelyhood of success or failure.

Right - but we know now that they are ill-prepared to deal with disaster, and that some nations will therefore be hard-pressed in dealing with adverse conditions. And we're saying that we don't want to spend our GDP on mitigation.

Where is the evidence that spending the money would actually do something about the problem? Everything I have read tells me that we could spend trillions on mitigation and it will change nothing. If you want to convince me to spend something on mitigation you have to identify specific actions with quantifiable costs and a high chance of success. I am have no interest in spending money to assuage misplaced feelings of guilt.

We could be in a scenario where we're saying "We don't want to spend our money now, to save their lives later." Is that what we're saying ?

We are sayihng we could save more lives later if we invested the money we have now in things other than mitigation.

[betsy]

And to that point - how does the first world achieve consensus on how to PLAN for this - either adaption or mitigation ?

Funds available will determine I guess which is more viable.

If it's an end-of-days-scenario (as Wyly envisions)....I guess it will be every country for herself (or every allies grouped together for themselves to weather it).

[TimG]

A sane society would be looking at ceasing the use of natural long-chain hydrocarbons, when there are other ways to create motive power in vehicles.

If this is really what you are concerned about then you should be in favour of cheap electricity because that will make EVs much more viable. Unfortunately, cheap electricity requires we burn coal in the short term while nuclear generation is built in the long term. Neither of which is politically correct because of this obession with CO2 and nuclear waste.

A sane society would not be obsessed with solving all problems at once and focus efforts on the more immediate problems such as possibility that oil demand with out strip supply.

Edited October 1, 2010 by TimG

[wyly]

Funds available will determine I guess which is more viable.

If it's an end-of-days-scenario (as Wyly envisions)....I guess it will be every country for herself (or every allies grouped together for themselves to weather it).

I haven't envisioned anything, it's the worst case scenario...in such a situation the term allies becomes a non factor, there will be no allies it will be everyone for themselves, the social fabric of society will fall apart...

[eyeball]

One thing we should do is document our hubris, for posterity's sake.

Other than that, getting to higher ground sounds like a plan. I'm hoping my property line will be the future high tide mark myself.

[eyeball]

yup...I had that disscusion with an executive friend with CONOCO-Phillips...we're burning up a non-renewable resource...of all the great things we can make with it we choose to burn it in our cars...

If humanity had a real long-term plan we'd be looking at how to use our resources to uplift our planet bound species into a space faring one.

Once we get to that stage we can give this poor old place a break and some time to heal.

[wyly]

One thing we should do is document our hubris, for posterity's sake.

Other than that, getting to higher ground sounds like a plan. I'm hoping my property line will be the future high tide mark myself.

I suspect you'll be pushing up daisys before you get a chance to see beachfront, do it for your grandkids...