menegonblog

Sesta puntata di Meneglobe, luoghi comuni sui cambiamenti climatici, 30 ottobre 2007

Benvenuti alla sesta puntata
di “Meneglobe, taniche di pensiero dal mondo”, la trasmissione dedicata ai temi
della stampa internazionale e che propone il punto di vista dei grandi think
tank stranieri.

Dedichiamo la puntata di oggi all’ambiente e all’energia.
Forse siamo un po’ in ritardo, due settimane fa, con l’assegnazione del premio
nobel ad al Gore il momento poteva esser più adatto.

Ricordiamo soltanto un pezzo
del CATO, Gore’s Noble Challenge, firmato da Patrick Michaels, in cui Gore è
invitato ad affrontare il dibattito che, ritiene l’autore ha sempre sfuggito. The fact is that Al has ducked, feinted, dived away from, or fluffed
each and every opportunity for a reasoned debate with any global warming
scientist not of his choice, a choice he no longer enjoys. Heartland Institute,
a Chicago think tank, spent over a million dollars filing ads in the Wall Street Journal,
the New York Times and their ilk, begging Al to debate. No dice. In a less public venue,
my own Cato Institute sent kind and courteous letters asking him to share our
pretty auditorium on Washington's Massachusetts Avenue, for a civil discussion
with our scholars. Again, no dice.

Gore has massively departed from the scientific mainstream on global
warming, even as that community may be itself biased by the funding afforded by
emphasizing the negative.

For example, the United Nations' Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change (of which I am a member, while Gore is not) predicts a
mean sea-level rise of about 13 inches by 2100. Gore's book and movie contain
an undated montage showing Florida sliding beneath the waves, something that
could only happen with 13 feet or more. How on earth does one
accomplish such a disconnect from scientific reality? Gore only has one
scientist, James Hansen of NASA, whispering the sweet nothings into his ear
that sea-level could rise this much or more in the next 92 years, as
Greenland's ice sheets are destabilized by climate change.

No other scientist is willing to climb out on this
limb, because it is simply not supported by the observed climatic history of
Greenland since the end of the last ice age. For much of six millennia, ending
3,000 years ago, it had to be warmer, and yet the ice stuck like glue.

How about the other pole? Every computer model mentioned by the United
Nations shows Antarctica gaining ice this century because a slight warming will result in more
precipitation which must fall as snow.

Insomma, un articolo a muso duro quello di Mchaels,
pubblicato nell’American Spectator del 12 ottobre.

Il giorno prima usciva sul sito dell’heritage foundation un
altro pezzo sul tema. Global
Climate ch’ange bills before congress, di Ben Lieberman e William Beach. In maniera più specifica si parla delle numerose proposte di
legge che il congresso americano si accinge a discutere e a votare. Misure che
spesso implicano costi molto alti, mirando a frenare di fatto l’economia e i
consumi elettrici e altri tipi di consumo.

The real issues are whether or not the release
of greenhouse gases is a significant factor relative to natural temperature
variability and what the likely consequences of warming would be. Climate
change is not unprecedented. The Earth's average temperature has increased over
the past 30 years, and many point to this as evidence of dangerous human-induced
warming. However, temperatures have risen and fallen many times before,
including the Medieval Warm Period and a well-documented global cooling trend
from the 1940s to the 1970s that prompted headlines and Newsweek cover stories warning of a coming ice age.
While mankind's activities have likely contributed to the current warming
trend, today's temperatures are still within the range of natural variability.

These climate bills would address real
concerns, but these concerns are not catastrophic.

Even if the U.S. were a party to the treaty and
the European nations and other sig­natories were in full compliance (most are
unlikely to meet their targets), the treaty would reduce the Earth's future
temperature only by an estimated 0.07 degrees Celsius by 2050--an amount too
small even to verify

Passando alle misure proposte, queste
vengono divise in due categorie: le tradizionali misure energetiche e la
legislazione cap-and-trade.

Traditional Energy Measures. Most people are familiar with the first category
because such mea­sures are included in existing energy law. This includes
mandates and incentives to switch to non- fossil fuel alternatives--namely,
Renewable Fuels Standards (RFS; e.g., corn-based ethanol for vehi­cles) and
Renewable Portfolio Standards (RPS; e.g., wind power for electricity
generation). This cate­gory also includes measures aimed at reducing energy
consumption, such as energy efficiency stan­dards for home appliances and motor
vehicle effi­ciency standards for cars and trucks, sometimes referred to as
corporate average fuel economy (CAFE) standards

Cap-and-Trade. This approach involves the first-ever
restrictions on fossil fuel use in the United States. The "cap"
refers to a limit on the amount of carbon dioxide that may be emitted from the
use of coal, oil, or natural gas. "Trade" refers to the mech­anism by
which those covered entities can buy or sell the rights to emit, called
allowances. These allowances could be bought and sold like a com­modity. Thus,
if a regulated entity reduced its emis­sions more than required, it could sell
its excess allowances to others at the market price, usually measured in
dollars per ton of carbon dioxide.

Su questa distinzione torneremo a
breve.

Ma avviciniamoci a queste ultime ore introducendovi al nuovo
libro di Cucile Philippe, presidentessa dell’Institut èconomique Molinari.

Il libro è intitolato C’est trop tard puor la Terre e lo
recensisce il 23 ottobre Le Cri du contribuable.

7
idée fausses sur l’environment

la recensione riassume il punto di vista esposto nel libro
di Cécile Philippe su 7 temi.

Le “bugie” raccontate e smentite sono:

Il faut
appliquer le principe de précaution”

L’applicazione del principio ha ad
esempio ostacolato la lotta alla malaria impedendo per molto tempo l’uso del
ddt, che si pensava danneggiasse alcune specie di volatili

«
Il faut interdire les OGM »

Gli effetti negativi non sono ancora
stati accertati, mentre si beneficia del conseguente aumento della produzione e
del contenimento dei prezzi di frutta e legumi.

La
fin du pétrole approche

Si scoprono continuamente nuovi giacimenti
e si sfrutta sempre meglio e con più efficienza le risorse disponibili.

L’homme
est coupable du réchauffement climatique

I cambiamenti climatici ci son sempre
stati. Nel 15° secolo le temperature erano più alte di oggi.

Le
protocole de Kyoto peut nous sauver

Se Europa e Stati Uniti raggiungeranno
gli obiettivi posti si inciderà per 7 centesimi di gradi celsius sul andamento
del clima.

Le
marché tue l’environnement

Il mercato, spiegano Marx e Engels, tende
alla razionalizzazione dell’uso delle risorse. Quindi a ricavare il massimo profitto
dal minimo dispendio di risorse.

Le
développement durable est bon pour l’homme !

Se l’uomo è considerato una minaccia,
lo sviluppo sostenibile è la premessa per il sottosviluppo.

E arriviamo quindi alle notizie più
fresche. E’ uscito il numero autunnale di Regulation, l’approfondimento
disponibile anche on line del CATO. Un articolo, ma potremmo anche parlare di
un breve saggio, affronta l’annosa questione del cambiamento climatico. Combating Global Warming, is
taxation or cap-and-trade the better strategy fo reducing greenhouse emissions?
Ian Parry e William Pizer scrivono:

The
favored federal policy to address climate change is a domestic cap-and-trade
system that, in time, would naturally link to the emissions trading system
recently established in Europe.

a
vocal minority, including Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) and former vice president
Al Gore, as well as Congressmen John Larsen (D-Conn.) and Pete Stark
(D-Calif.), have begun arguing in favor of a CO2 tax. To maximize opportunities for
cheap emissions reductions, a CO2 tax would be imposed upstream in the fossil fuel supply chain, as this
encompasses all possible sources of emissions when fuels are later combusted.
Limiting the tax to a relatively small number of fossil fuel producers eases
administrative burdens on the government. The
tax, which would be levied in proportion to a fuel’s carbon content, would be
passed forward into the price of coal, natural gas, and petroleum products, and
therefore ultimately into the price of electricity and energy-intensive
products. Higher energy prices would encourage the adoption of fuel- and
energy-saving technologies across the economy and promote switching from
carbonintensive fuels like coal to less carbon-intensive natural gas and to
carbon-free fuels such as nuclear and renewables. from
a standpoint of reducing emissions at the lowest possible cost, market-based
instruments like CO2 taxes and emissions permit systems are typically superior to “command
and control” approaches (e.g., vehicle fuel economy requirements, emissions
standards for electricity generation, energy efficiency requirements for
household appliances).

By
raising fossil fuel prices, market-based instruments encourage all options for
low-cost emissions reductions across the economy; in contrast,
command-and-control approaches tend to overly burden specific sectors,

a
$10 CO2 tax
would raise about $60 billion in revenue per year (or more, as emissions rise
in the future and if other greenhouse gases are also taxed). One way of using
this revenue would be to finance a reduction in individual federal income taxes
of around 6 percent, which would (moderately) alleviate various tax distortions
in the economy. For example, by taxing away some of the returns to working and
saving, income taxes deter some people from joining the labor force and
encourage others to consume too

much
of their income.

CO2 taxes, like emissions permits, do impose
economic costs. For example, they induce costly investments throughout the economy
to conserve energy and they cause industry to use cleaner, but more expensive,
fuels than they otherwise would.

Moreover, by driving up economy-wide energy costs, CO2 taxes can also
have harmful

effects on the overall level of economic activity and
employment, which exacerbates some of the distortions created by income taxes.
While there has been some controversy on this issue, the most recent research
suggests that the overall costs of imposing a CO2 tax of around $5 to $15 per ton,
with the revenues used to reduce income taxes, are small and perhaps even
negative.

Although some revenue might be earmarked for clean
technology programs, legislating reductions in other taxes is probably the best
use of most of the revenue from CO2 taxes, from the standpoint of the overall economy.

PRICE CERTAINTY Another potentially important advantage of the CO2 tax is that it
fixes the price of CO2. In contrast, under a pure cap-and-trade system, CO2 permit prices
can be volatile because the supply of permits is fixed but the demand for
permits may vary considerably

As regards price stability, there are reasonable
grounds for optimism. Some CO2 tax proposals have recently emerged, and some of the
proposals for cap-and-trade systems (such as the McCain-Lieberman and
Bingaman-Specter approaches) include safety valves and mechanisms for borrowing
over time. However, even though many cap-and-trade proposals envision
auctioning a rising share of allowances over time, near-term revenues in these
proposals, and also in the tax-based counterparts, are not offset by other tax
cuts but are typically earmarked, for example, in technology and transitional
assistance programs.

We can only hope that policymakers will come to
appreciate fully the potential for reaping a large dividend with more judicious
use of revenues over the longer term.