Bjørn Lomborg writes on hisFacebook page about this story on WUWT: Newsbytes: Japan Stuns UN Climate Summit By Ditching CO2 Target
The last twenty years of international climate negotiations have achieved almost nothing and have done so at enormous economic cost. Japan’s courageous announcement that it is scrapping its unrealistic targets and focusing instead on development of green technologies could actually be the beginning of smarter climate policies.
Japan has acknowledged that its previous greenhouse gas reduction target of 25 per cent below 1990 levels was unachievable, and that its emissions will now increase by some 3 per cent by 2020. This has provoked predictable critiques from the ongoing climate summit in Warsaw. Climate change activists called it “outrageous” and a “slap in the face for poor countries”.
Yet, Japan has simply given up on the approach to climate policy that has failed for the past twenty years, promising carbon cuts that don’t materialise – or only do so at trivial levels with very high costs for taxpayers, industries and consumers. Instead, al…most everyone seems to have ignored that Japan has promised to spend $110 billion over five years – from private and public sources – on innovation in environmental and energy technologies. Japan could – incredible as it may sound – actually end up showing the world how to tackle global warming effectively.
Unfortunately the Japanese model is not even on the agenda in Warsaw. The same failed model of spending money on immature technologies remains dominant. That involves the world spending $1 billion a day on inefficient renewable energy sources — a projected $359 billion for 2013. But a much lower $100 billion per year invested worldwide in R&D could be many times more effective. This is the conclusion of a panel of economists, including three Nobel laureates, working with the Copenhagen Consensus Center, a think-tank that publicises the best ways for governments to spend money to help the world.
If green technology could be cheaper than fossil fuels, everyone would switch, not just a token number of well-meaning rich nations. We would not need to convene endless climate summits that come to nothing. A smart climate summit would encourage all nations to commit 0.2 per cent of GDP – about $100 billion globally – to green R&D. This could solve global warming in the medium term by creating cheap, green energy sources, that everyone would want to use.
Instead of criticising Japan for abandoning an approach that has repeatedly failed, we should applaud it for committing to a policy that could actually meet the challenge of global warming.
Read the full article in Britain’s The Times:
http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/opinion/article3924584.ece
More on Japan’s new climate policies: http://www.businessweek.com/news/2013-11-14/japan-sets-new-emissions-target-in-setback-to-un-treaty-talks
h/t to David Hagen
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Let’s be more explicit about the money flow from such schemes as it actually works in this corrupt world. It goes from poor people in rich countries to rich people in poor countries.
We already have a practical affordable technology – it’s called nuclear energy. If Japan had any sense, it woud be restarting all its reactors – they have been gone over with a fine-toothed comb
by the regulators and there is no reason to keep them idle. Of course, if Japan wants to spend a lot of money to produce bad emissions (and I don’t mean CO2) , they probably deserve them.
Jimbo says:
” Global warming has stopped!”
That has now been declared a myth. The heat was hiding in the arctic. They’ve got the headline and that’s all they need to make it “true”. Just like the 97% and the hockey sticks, it doesn’t matter if the paper is discredited or not. The headline rules popular opinion. Sad days.
If we stick with global warming has stopped they’ll use that as evidence that we’re “deniers”. Perhaps: “Global warming has slowed” would be less open to attack from the CO2 cult. Their models are still heavily warming biased even if we just roll with the new excuse. It’s just not enough to save them if we don’t play into their hands.
‘Climate change activists called it “outrageous” and a “slap in the face for poor countries”.’
Watermelons…..green on the outside and red on the inside. And they probably have about the same I.Q. as watermelons too. Ho hum.
What an outstanding article from WUWT. Now I do think I understand the direction that the Warsaw talks are taking. The World Empire (UN) cannot offer its services of governance and economic subordination through regulations and taxation for less than $100 billion per year, and they currently do not receive enough Tribute. So that must be good. (;
And meanwhile, efforts continue in the UK to leave the European Union – a political union that was originally cast as a trade agreement. According to Nigel Farage, it costs the country millions of pounds per day for the privilege of receiving legislation from Brussels. How would Britain pay a percentage of its GDP to the UN, when it already pays a percentage of its GDP to the EU?
That’s what we soooooooooooo wanted all these years. It’s the blog post we’ve all been hoping for for 10 years, everyday refreshing our browser, and just feeling deep disappointment. But now we’ve finally got it.
a plan B to solve a problem that doesn’t exist.
Magoo says:
November 18, 2013 at 1:28 pm
But that undermines the whole point of the green movement – wealth redistribution from the rich to the poor. Of course it’s not on the agenda in Warsaw.
Magoo makes the salient point: the money proposed to be spent is to be spent BY the “poor” countries IN the poor countries BY the poor countries. It just comes FROM the wealthy countries.
“Fixing the problem” is not the prime objective, i.e. the process, not the outcome, is what is driving the current agenda. Shows up everywhere, including the refusal to stick to only the proven facts.
Baby steps, PoF, baby steps. Crawl before you walk, walk before you run.
We know that warming isn’t a problem and we know that the Greens don’t want the “solution” to be anything but as they stipulate it – but I like this piece (and gave it a “like”) because it is a sensible step away from what the Greens desire and one that they cannot argue with without showing their hand. Think positive, people. From this step, there will be another… and another. The Greens will hate it. 🙂
Climate change activists called it “outrageous” and a “slap in the face for poor countries”.
I’m waiting for the Climate Change Activists to publish their own plan that includes an energy budget; a portfolio of proven energy sources with amount of energy supplied, cost to build and operate and carbon emitted by each; sources of energy use reduction, cost to implement and its economic impacts; expected rate of economic growth (or shrinkage) by country and effects on both developed and developing countries. It’s hard work and potentially embarrassing which is why it hasn’t been done yet.
Ian W says:
November 18, 2013 at 1:50 pm
————————————-
Don’t just do something. Stand there!
I always thought there was value in being a procrastinator but never really had the time to investigate.
I am absolutely convinced that the same people who shut down the Thorium projects in the USA
(Nixon) and the people who now push for the carbon tax and UN Agenda 21 and who litter our landscapes with useless windmills are the very same.
They act from greed and fear of a human made Armageddon.
If we let them go ahead we will see a society we don’t like.
Now in order to get the Thorium technology finally introduced and rid ourselves from the climate scam we need to kick the current political establishment out of power.
This is the only way to go.
We need to get politically organized, write a world view that includes cheap and abundant Thorium based energy, clean landscapes without wind farms, without generator farms and without bio converters. A world view without facial recognition, spy camera’s and Big Brother watching you but a new age of freedom, a thriving economy where creative people decide their own destiny and their own future.
The current clan of crooks has been bogging humanity for decades now and their actions are running out of control. Instead of giving humanity wings they have decided to destroy our Middle Class and jeopardize our wealth, our pensions and our savings.
If not stopped we will face extensive exclusion zones, limits on energy use (for those who can still afford it) and travel restrictions.
All our freedoms will be gone and we will be managed and controlled like any other species.
The time has come to draw a line and we still have the freedom to draw it in a peaceful manner through the existing political systems within our nations.
Expect nothing good from people who act on a scare.
The time has come for the brave to take charge and secure the freedoms of all mankind.
Japan should stop wasting money on wind and solar and devote most of its time and money in developing liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactors (LFTRS), especially since they closed down all their Light Water Reactors (LWRs) after the Fukushima fiasco.
Nuclear Power used to supply roughly 26% of Japan’s energy needs, which they’ve had to replace with coal and natural gas power stations at tremendous cost to their economy.
Compared to LWRs. LFTRs are 200 times more efficient, produce 200 times less nuclear waste, are many orders of magnitude safer, run at single atmospheric pressure making Fukushima-type disasters impossible and are roughly 50% cheaper to build and operate, etc.
The recent surge of coal/natural gas imports have lead to Japan’s longest string of monthly trade deficits since the end of WWII. To top it off, Japan’s Central Bank is printing money like crazy, which is weakening the Yen and making those coal and natural gas imports that much more expensive.
China is developing LFTRs technology at a rapid pace and expect to have their first test LFTR on line by 2020. If Japan doesn’t try to catch up with China on LFTR development, it’ll have devastating and long-term economic consequences in terms of economic efficiencies and production/price competitiveness.
Jordan says (November 18, 2013 at 2:24 pm): ‘If the UK experience is anything to go for “economic nuclear” would appear to be an oxymoron.’
According to this article, the contract price for electricity from the Hinkley Point plant is £92.50 per MWh, indexed for inflation, starting in 2023.
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/oct/30/hinkley-point-nuclear-power-plant-uk-government-edf-underwrite
According to this article, British offshore wind electricity is priced at £155/MWh, onshore at £100/MWh (when the turbines are running).
http://www.windpowermonthly.com/article/1188054/uk-announces-new-wind-energy-prices
None of these are bargain prices, of course. There are allegations that the government has messed up (wouldn’t be the first time) on the Hinkley Point deal, since the Chinese are getting similar reactors for about half the price of Hinkley Point:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hinkley_Point_C_nuclear_power_station#Economics
Part of the Chinese advantage may be economy of scale, i.e. ordering a number of plants at once. Supposedly the price of Hinkley Point electricity will be slightly less if another proposed plant is also ordered.
If the Japanese spend part of their $100 billion “green research” money on making nuclear power more affordable, that would seem to be a better investment than “renewable” fuels.
Capitulation (sung to the tune Anticipation by Carly SImon).
Japan may do all te R & D it likes, but they know deep down the only answer is nuclear power
http://www.templar.co.uk/itzman/RenewablePoliciesAndCosts.html
There is nothing that renewable energy can do that nuclear can’t do better, and cheaper.
It will take time, but in the end the reality is that a move away from fossil fuels will be a switch to massive deployment of nuclear power.
This is not a point that governments want to admit, but there really is no cost effective alternative.
And renewables are not an alternative to fossil fuels anyway. They are just ‘go greener ‘ stripes painted on the side of a fossil grid.
Plan nine from outer space is my default position
Plan 9 from Outerspace?
“…end up showing the world how to tackle global warming effectively….” If only there were global warming that we can do one damn thing to tackle. Bjorn is a neat guy, but he’s still wandering in lala land.
philjourdan
Plan9; Just as stupid but more entertaining in solving a non-existant apocalypse.
@Pete of Perth – yea, but Plan 9 is now considered a classic. Something Plan B probably will not have to worry about. 😉
Japan has a huge natural resource, one it can even export and the technology exists right now, 100% proven, 100% viable, 100% “clean” 100% cheap.
GEOTHERMAL
“If the UK experience is anything to go for “economic nuclear” would appear to be an oxymoron. ”
Surely Jordon can predict the price of the natural gas that must be imported to the UK for the next 60 years.
“liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactors (LFTRS), especially since they closed down all their Light Water Reactors (LWRs) after the Fukushima fiasco. ”
Of course, Japan would shut down LFTRS for review if the seismic design criteria suddenly changed.
What we have here is a good argument for a balanced mix of energy sources.
“LFTRs are 200 times more efficient ”
So you are saying LFTRs have a 7000% thermal efficiency?
“China is developing LFTRs technology at a rapid pace and expect to have their first test LFTR on line by 2020. ”
No! http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/Country-Profiles/Countries-A-F/China–Nuclear-Power/
The nice thing about paper solutions is that you can make up anything you want.
Let me be blunt. Nuclear reactors are built to make power not to reduce ghg emissions. China did not get serious about building nukes until slave labor could produce enough coal.
The full article is paywalled, of course.
Any initiative or technology offering real increases in energy efficiency would pay for itself, and attract plenty of R&D on the merits. It’s only boondoggles like renewables and mitigation that need to assemble cabals to push them.
Proofread. Then check. Then read aloud. Otherwise you, too, may end up saying the opposite of what you intended, often, as here, making no sense at all.
Actually, the fuel of the future for Japan (and perhaps all of us) is methane hydrate.
http://features.blogs.fortune.cnn.com/2013/09/03/japan-energy/
Of course, we have to get past the Co2 boogeyman, first….