Wednesday, August 08, 2007
Conservation debate at Cathedral
This is the speech I delievered at the Wellington Cathedral as part of Conservation Week. On my team was Jeanette Fitzsimons and Roland Sapsford debating whether climate change was caused by economic theory.
Today I am going to talk about the most radical idea in New Zealand politics, in fact probably the most radical idea in current international political debate. It may sound ridiculous because it’s such simple common sense, but it is something that our current economic theory doesn't acknowledge – that we have only one planet. Our economy assumes that we can achieve infinite growth and dispose of infinite waste on a finite planet.
What I am going to talk about in detail is how we as individuals and communities are actually changing the planet, our only home. I am going to talk about the most serious ecological crisis facing us - climate change and how this is caused by failure of current economic theory to recognise basic truths like natural limits, appropriate measurement, decision making and costs.
Ever since the industrial revolution 250 years ago we have managed to tap into vast stores of trapped sunlight in the form of fossil fuels and released massive amounts of energy. We have liberated ourselves from manual work and achieved incredible wealth but now we are seeing the natural consequences, the real costs involved of living on a finite world. Climate change, and peak oil, I believe will be the two major challenges of my generation.
Howard Stern, the UK Treasury economist, who released his influential report last year has called climate change "the largest and broadest marker failure in history." It's a failure because it’s not in our interests to heat the planet but still we happily pollute, blindly walking towards the precipice. Why? Because our whole economic system is built on cheap energy and our wealth is dependent on fossil fuels.
It is in very clear what is causing climate change – it is anthropogenic – that means it is human caused. The problem comes from fossil fuels that we dug up and converted into carbon dioxide, forests that we burnt and land that we cleared, methane from livestock, that we farmed, in short, from man's economic activity.
Since the industrial revolution we have been putting massive amounts of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and to be honest it’s the wealthly industrialised countries that are primarily responsible. The 15% of the world’s population that live in rich countries is responsible for half of emissions, and two-thirds of past emissions, while the poorest 37% of the world’s population is accountable for only 7% of emissions.
Why are we warming the planet? In part it's because we don't care. I mean in an economic sense. The effects of greenhouse gases are just not taken into consideration by the economy. The atmosphere in theory and practice is viewed as a free-for-all, as a limitless resource. A sort of global commons. However what we are seeing now is a tragedy of the commons occur, where no-one is responsible for the pollution in the atmosphere so we keep on polluting it and so despite international treaties, Live Earth concerts and all the best scientific advice, emissions are rising ever year about 3%.
Our economic system doesn't take into account the costs of climate change. At the moment the price of petrol is at about $1.50 a litre, this price takes into consideration the cost of crude, the cost to refine and ship it, the costs to retail it; the costs to society in the form of petrol taxes for things like ACC and building new roads. But it doesn't take into account the environmental costs associated with burning it. Perhaps that’s one reason why figures released last week show that C02 emissions from petrol consumption has increased 60% since 1990 in New Zealand
The cost associated with rising global temperatures is huge: the new infrastructure needed to prepare for climate change; the increased costs of insurance premiums because of more extreme weather events, the costs of resettling climate refugees from Tuvalu or Bangladesh, which Christian Aid, a few months ago predicted could be 1 billion by 2050; or even the cost to the taxpayer of having to buy Kyoto credits because we so far above our targets. In short, the true costs of burning a litre of petrol are ignored.
Currently there is vigorous debate about the costs of action. Some, like Bush argue that Kyoto's targets are too costly others like Stern argue the costs of action -1% of global GDP vastly outweigh the costs of inaction– 20 % of GDP. The financial costs of switching to renewable energy or investing in public transport are immediate, yet the benefits of a stable climate are in the future for someone else to enjoy. Our economic system does not factor in future generations; it values self interest – it's better to pollute now and let the future pay the costs, so we do.
We know how to deal with the climate change and the message from scientists is stark and simple we have to reduce emissions. Fast. Yet our present economic system doesn't encourage action to reduce emissions, it encourages the opposite. Currently, the most important measure of how we are doing is Gross Domestic Product, GDP. Converting a central North Island plantation forest to a dairy farm makes sound financial sense and is fantastic news for the nations GDP and economic growth. But not so good news for lake Taupo or the climate. Until we start to prioritise other measurements like happiness, or ecological sustainability we are going to get skewed results.
In conclusion, It is inevitable that we will continue to put greenhouse gases up there but we have to view this as a privilege and only acceptable within natural limits. If we have to adhere to this current economic system, we must have a realistic price put on carbon to incentivise positive choices like public transport and renewable energy and disincentivise negative decisions like chopping down a forest for a dairy conversion or for unsustainable goals, like Fonterra's aspiration of 4% compound growth every year. To reclaim the future our economy must view serious reductions in our emissions not as costs but as investments in a better world. Our only world - one that's able to sustain us.
Today I am going to talk about the most radical idea in New Zealand politics, in fact probably the most radical idea in current international political debate. It may sound ridiculous because it’s such simple common sense, but it is something that our current economic theory doesn't acknowledge – that we have only one planet. Our economy assumes that we can achieve infinite growth and dispose of infinite waste on a finite planet.
What I am going to talk about in detail is how we as individuals and communities are actually changing the planet, our only home. I am going to talk about the most serious ecological crisis facing us - climate change and how this is caused by failure of current economic theory to recognise basic truths like natural limits, appropriate measurement, decision making and costs.
Ever since the industrial revolution 250 years ago we have managed to tap into vast stores of trapped sunlight in the form of fossil fuels and released massive amounts of energy. We have liberated ourselves from manual work and achieved incredible wealth but now we are seeing the natural consequences, the real costs involved of living on a finite world. Climate change, and peak oil, I believe will be the two major challenges of my generation.
Howard Stern, the UK Treasury economist, who released his influential report last year has called climate change "the largest and broadest marker failure in history." It's a failure because it’s not in our interests to heat the planet but still we happily pollute, blindly walking towards the precipice. Why? Because our whole economic system is built on cheap energy and our wealth is dependent on fossil fuels.
It is in very clear what is causing climate change – it is anthropogenic – that means it is human caused. The problem comes from fossil fuels that we dug up and converted into carbon dioxide, forests that we burnt and land that we cleared, methane from livestock, that we farmed, in short, from man's economic activity.
Since the industrial revolution we have been putting massive amounts of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and to be honest it’s the wealthly industrialised countries that are primarily responsible. The 15% of the world’s population that live in rich countries is responsible for half of emissions, and two-thirds of past emissions, while the poorest 37% of the world’s population is accountable for only 7% of emissions.
Why are we warming the planet? In part it's because we don't care. I mean in an economic sense. The effects of greenhouse gases are just not taken into consideration by the economy. The atmosphere in theory and practice is viewed as a free-for-all, as a limitless resource. A sort of global commons. However what we are seeing now is a tragedy of the commons occur, where no-one is responsible for the pollution in the atmosphere so we keep on polluting it and so despite international treaties, Live Earth concerts and all the best scientific advice, emissions are rising ever year about 3%.
Our economic system doesn't take into account the costs of climate change. At the moment the price of petrol is at about $1.50 a litre, this price takes into consideration the cost of crude, the cost to refine and ship it, the costs to retail it; the costs to society in the form of petrol taxes for things like ACC and building new roads. But it doesn't take into account the environmental costs associated with burning it. Perhaps that’s one reason why figures released last week show that C02 emissions from petrol consumption has increased 60% since 1990 in New Zealand
The cost associated with rising global temperatures is huge: the new infrastructure needed to prepare for climate change; the increased costs of insurance premiums because of more extreme weather events, the costs of resettling climate refugees from Tuvalu or Bangladesh, which Christian Aid, a few months ago predicted could be 1 billion by 2050; or even the cost to the taxpayer of having to buy Kyoto credits because we so far above our targets. In short, the true costs of burning a litre of petrol are ignored.
Currently there is vigorous debate about the costs of action. Some, like Bush argue that Kyoto's targets are too costly others like Stern argue the costs of action -1% of global GDP vastly outweigh the costs of inaction– 20 % of GDP. The financial costs of switching to renewable energy or investing in public transport are immediate, yet the benefits of a stable climate are in the future for someone else to enjoy. Our economic system does not factor in future generations; it values self interest – it's better to pollute now and let the future pay the costs, so we do.
We know how to deal with the climate change and the message from scientists is stark and simple we have to reduce emissions. Fast. Yet our present economic system doesn't encourage action to reduce emissions, it encourages the opposite. Currently, the most important measure of how we are doing is Gross Domestic Product, GDP. Converting a central North Island plantation forest to a dairy farm makes sound financial sense and is fantastic news for the nations GDP and economic growth. But not so good news for lake Taupo or the climate. Until we start to prioritise other measurements like happiness, or ecological sustainability we are going to get skewed results.
In conclusion, It is inevitable that we will continue to put greenhouse gases up there but we have to view this as a privilege and only acceptable within natural limits. If we have to adhere to this current economic system, we must have a realistic price put on carbon to incentivise positive choices like public transport and renewable energy and disincentivise negative decisions like chopping down a forest for a dairy conversion or for unsustainable goals, like Fonterra's aspiration of 4% compound growth every year. To reclaim the future our economy must view serious reductions in our emissions not as costs but as investments in a better world. Our only world - one that's able to sustain us.
# posted by gareth @ 10:02 PM 
