The new IPCC economic models show that economic growth is part of the solution
Story submitted by Tim Worstall
The IPCC has just released details of the economic models that are used to generate the emissions numbers for the climate change models. Whether or not we want to believe in climate change, think it’s all natural variation or are convinced that Armageddon is near at hand, the results are fascinating.
For the assumptions of the deeper greens are entirely refuted by what the IPCC themselves are saying. Economic growth is actually the solution to the perceived problems, not the cause. In the IPCC modelling the set up with the most economic growth has the least emissions.
Further, we don’t in fact need to reduce our energy consumption: again the model with the least warming still shows consumption near on doubling this century.
In fact, their models, recall, their own, the IPCC’s calculations, show that slower economic growth will lead to more warming.
There’s more on this at Forbes.
http://blogs.forbes.com/timworstall/2011/08/10/solving-climate-change/
Discover more from Watts Up With That?
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
#
#
LazyTeenager says:
August 11, 2011 at 4:32 am
John Marshall theorizes
———-
The best solution to our economic woes is to shut down the IPCC AND the US EPA.
———-
Yeah sure. No numbers, just handwaving.
Go to China, look at the sky, breath the air, if you can. Watch Chinese people coughing and spitting to clear their throat, if there is no EPA this is what you get.
###
What a bunch of ignorant non sense. The problem is not a lack of an EPA, Chin has their version of the EPA. The problem is Socialism and Communism. The EPA is nothing more then a vector for facilitating the leftist anti-freedom agenda using the environment as a pretext. I think you need to learn some real history and stop listening to your Marxist professors.
“Keep your eye on the pea folks.” As the shysters rapidly move the cups around to baffle the eye.
We know the models already in use by the IPCC are flawed and have failed to reasonably match the last ten years climate. Before any movement forward on new models, I expect to see an analysis detailing the model components, their mis-calculations, reasons why, and suggested fixes; along with representative model runs highlighting input impacts on results.
Instead, the models have been extended to include new models that
.
OK, by ignoring problems in the previous models there is a complicit decision to advance with the errors but to change the message and the message vehicle. Now, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised when the message is “Don’t worry, everything is fine, just pay taxes and our climate and economic problems will be controlled.”
There are some interesting caveats in the RCP abstract:
.
The end result is that not only is climate an incredibly complex system that has not been sucessively modeled yet, now we add to that complexity population growth, economic modeling, social consequences and technology changes. No problems are expected with the new RCP models.
Yeah, right! Ok, we’ve read the abstract and watched the pea. Do we get to read the code, check the calculations, look over the
adjustments made to the data?
I think some of you paint history with too white a brush. It seems some of you think that when regulations were non-existent, we were poison free people. And if we were poisoned by some unscrupulous business, we could simply and easily sue and somehow be reimbursed for our injuries. Tell that to a mother who gave birth to a child riddled with mercury poisoning. There is no amount of money to reimburse for that.
The business world is as populated with fraudulent people and businesses able to get away with fraud as much as the government is populated with fraudulent politicians and agencies able to get away with fraud.
Does buyer beware mean that we must be aware of danger before it kills our children or afterwards? Real polluters must be made to pay and then put out of business permanently, just as politicians and government agencies who trade in fraud must be.
where did my post go?
Pamela’s post is at 6:35am
I must say that, regardless of the findings, whether one likes them or not, or they seem reasonable or not, one should never base any conclusions on economic “models”. Economics is a social/philosophical science, not a physical one, and for that simple reason, the application of physics style mathematical modeling to economics is fallacious and leads very often to conclusions that are not merely quantitatively but qualitatively wrong. Human behavior is not governed by mathematical equations.
Hubba Hubba: Ding Ding!
Look at the models on this Red-Green thing:
>>> “It seems unfathomable to many that miracles would be needed in a government-supported industry created with great fanfare just two years ago.”
…-
“Energy
In Ontario, gloomy skies for solar power”
“Silfab Ontario has been making solar panels for barely four months in a refurbished factory west of Toronto, but already employees are nervous about the security of their jobs.
Plans to hire more people and expand production are on hold as demand for solar parts wavers and stock sits unsold. Several companies who install solar panels have been unable to pay for their orders because they’re waiting for assurances the power projects will be connected to Ontario’s electricity grid. A backup in the approvals process has brought the fledgling industry almost to a standstill.”
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/ontario/in-ontario-gloomy-skies-for-solar-power/article2125904/
Do we have an imposter? No regulare would post,
“where did my post go?”.
John-in-Oz,
This WUWT post:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/05/01/weekly-climate-and-energy-news-roundup-19/
linked to this Jo Nova post containing the survey pdf:
http://joannenova.com.au/2011/04/carbon-demonized-by-climate-propaganda/
I’ve never doubted that there were good and honest efforts by many IPCC contributors. Driven by an interest stirred by this site I’ve plowed through quite a few IPCC documents. One of the many factors that weaned me away from the alarmist view was the difference between the scientific reports and conclusions and the so called “Summary For Policy Makers”. That’s not a summary, that’s a complete re-write with almost diametrically opposed conclusions.
Lomborg has argued the same thing in The Skeptical Environmentalist (not explicitly with regard to CO2 emissions but for pollution); a line of argument for which he was denounced by Nobel-peace price receiving Pachauri as a Nazi; so sorry, the IPCC can only do one thing to earn my respect. Dissolve. And apologize for being a bunch of scum.
It’s absolute hubris and the height of arrogance to believe we can accurately model highly complex and chaotic systems such as the climate or the economy.
polistra says:August 11, 2011 at 5:24 am
The largest drop in real pollution happened when the Soviet Union collapsed. And the emissions graphs in one of yesterday’s stories show clearly that CO2 emission is perfectly and positively correlated with economic growth, in all types of countries. You CAN have growth without adding real pollution, as the US demonstrated in the ’60s and ’70s, but you can’t have growth without adding CO2 emission.
——————————————————–
Easily shown not to be true. First, I am looking at my flat screen monitor that takes half the power to run compared to my old CRT monitor. Less materials of construction too. Second, if you care about CO2 emissions, then changing from coal fired power plants to nukes will cut way down on CO2 emissions. China is completing about 6 nukes per year now and will increase that to one per month soon.
——————————————-
Pamela Gray says: August 11, 2011 at 9:40 am
t seems some of you think that when regulations were non-existent, we were poison free people. And if we were poisoned by some unscrupulous business, we could simply and easily sue and somehow be reimbursed for our injuries. Tell that to a mother who gave birth to a child riddled with mercury poisoning. There is no amount of money to reimburse for that. The business world is as populated with fraudulent people and businesses able to get away with fraud as much as the government is populated with fraudulent politicians and agencies able to get away with fraud.
————————————————–
Yes, Pamela, and I think you would agree that it’s far easier to expose and eliminate fraud in the commercial world than in government. Consider for example “truth in advertising”, required of commercial companies. What would the world be like if politicians were required to fulfill their campaign promises?
“Or, to boil it right down, the IPCC is telling us that the solution to climate change is economic growth and low-carbon energy generation.”
Of course they would say that. They’re obsessed with the idea that 1)climate change is a problem and 2)we’re causing it with our nasty, evil C02. The biggest problem with their “solution” to a non-problem is that the two “solutions” are antithetical to one another. Forcing a change to “low-carbon” energy, via a carbon tax means higher energy costs which stunts economic growth.
If economic growth is the “solution”, then by all means we should concentrate on that and simply forget all that carbon nonsense. “Problem” solved.
Nuke-There is a more fundamental reason why one cannot “model” the economy, even in principlem whereas physical systems one can theoretically model mathematically. It is difficult to model climate, it is WRONG to mathematically model the economy: mathematical equations cannot capture the nature of human behavior. I would recommend anyone who thinks otherwise read numerous works on this matter by the Austrians, although Mises’ Human Action should be sufficient a start. He makes it quite clear why one cannot consider the problems of Economics (of human action) to be understood through mathematical equations. This is perhaps why so many physical scientists are clueless about basic economics.
I won’t argue whether it’s morally acceptable to model the economy (but that is an interesting discussion for some other time, btw), but I will argue it’s impossible to model the daily choices made by billions of people every day.
We could make it easier to model, however, by reducing choice. Simply dictate what people can and cannot do. Let the government make the choices for them. We could model that, couldn’t we? Imagine how easy it would be, if like the failed USSR, consumers only had place to buy bread, only only one type of bread to buy. Soon, we would be able to create 5- and 1-year plans for the economy. We could save the planet!
Nuke-I think you’ll find that Mises argued that economic calculation is not made easier by planning. Not the least reason being that planning requires economic calculation to be possible to do in the first place (which leaves one in a chicken/egg problem, except in this case you want to create Chickens and Eggs out of nothing) And at any rate, if you limit people’s decisions you miss the entire point of the economy! But I suspect you already know that.
Nuke says:
August 11, 2011 at 1:45 pm
“We could make it easier to model, however, by reducing choice. Simply dictate what people can and cannot do. Let the government make the choices for them. We could model that, couldn’t we? Imagine how easy it would be, if like the failed USSR, consumers only had place to buy bread, only only one type of bread to buy. ”
That’s the best way to promote black markets with the according shadowy organizations running the trade; you end up with a whole new market, but one that will always try to hide from your view. And that is exactly what happened everywhere in the USSR, in the GDR, in the entire communist world; we usually call it endemic corruption but that’s only its effect on the bureaucracy; the corruption is necessary to enable the black market to hide from the official view. Corruption is the symptom for economic activity hidden from view. It’s happening in Mexico with the drug trade.
Leigh-In-Oz, that’s exactly it. Thank you for your help.
(Nice name and country, btw.)
It’s also a sobering reminder to me to always fact-check, even those things I’m convinced are true. I had sincerely but wrongly asserted that 40 percent of the public believe co2 is black. The correct number is 3 percent. Oops.
Two things that strike me as odd—even suspicious—about the reported results:
1. The extremely low level of hydrocarbon and nuclear use and very high level of “biofuel” use in the highest-income/lowest-emission profile. I wonder what “adjustments” have been made to relative prices in these models to produce such an energy mix? Typically, the IPCC is not saying: “… socio-economic parameters have not been included in the RCP information available for download” according to the paper.
2. How the highest income scenario—mysteriously—could have the lowest energy-intensity of production, the second-lowest primary energy use, the highest use of “carbon-capture” technology (in fact, a negative emission of carbon per average unit of energy in later years) and a population growth trajectory that is the actual population trajectory is a mystery to me.
The new IPCC economic model? Is it, perhaps, sounding something like this:
Stick ’em up! Hand over all your hard earned cash you capitalist “schwine”! We got the Catholic church on our backs, literally. Think of your great great grand children! How ’bout handing over your dough now, eh?
Richard Tol says:
August 11, 2011 at 3:12 am
“Comparing RCPs is thus meaningless.”
Why did the IPCC put out four if not for comparison purposes?
Pamela Gray says (August 11, 2011 at 9:40 am): “Does buyer beware mean that we must be aware of danger before it kills our children or afterwards? Real polluters must be made to pay and then put out of business permanently…”
Pamela, why would you insist that polluters be put out of business permanently, thus throwing an unknown number of possibly innocent employees out of work and depriving the economy of a (presumably useful) product? Why not require adequate pollution control measures instead (which, if expensive, could have the same resultt)? Note that closing the business could have the undesired effect of moving the pollution to a less environmentally vigilant nation.
“…just as politicians and government agencies who trade in fraud must be.”
A much more difficult proposition. Private offenders (including you and me) are up against the full resources of our government, including effectively unlimited funds and a near monopoly on violence. Public “offenders”, on the other hand, have these resources on their side. 🙁
Obviously individual politicians can be and have been voted or driven out of office, but the Congressional incumbency rate, for example, remains high:
http://politics.innerself.com/html/articles/reforms/general/89-congress-for-life.html
As for government agencies, offhand I honestly can’t think of one useless or counterproductive office/agency/department that has been abolished, though I assume there are some (readers, please help me out here); instead, they tend to grow and extend their own power. The EPA, for example, which protects us from mercury, arsenic, organic pollutants, radiation, carbon monoxide, etc. now protects us from atmospheric carbon dioxide as well. I can’t wait to see what’s next.
It’s not a matter of who’s temporarily in charge; the problem is the very existence of an agency backed by the power of government that can and WILL tell us how to live our lives.
@ur momisugly Andrew & DirkH:
I am NOT advocating central planning or restricting choice. Sorry, I assumed I could post something outrageous and have it seen to be a parady. However, I think it tracked too closely to the ideals of many eco-progressives to be seen as I intended.
Lazy Teenager writes:
Go to China, look at the sky, breath the air, if you can. Watch Chinese people coughing and spitting to clear their throat, if there is no EPA this is what you get.
I breathe the air here in Shanghai quite well… The local Shanghai Air Pollution Control Bureau is pretty stringent and quick to act to keep the skies nice and blue (when there isn’t a typhoon blowing through), and pollution to a minimum. It rained today until about 1 PM, but cleared up nicely and we’re having a lovely evening – will be a great time to grab a meal at an outdoor cafe and walk around the Bund, taking in the scenery before retiring to a club for some drinks and conversation.
It’s certainly not as bad as what I lived with in Valparaiso/Vina del Mar, Chile, and just outside of Brussels, Belgium – and definitely not like when I lived in Los Angeles in the early 90s…