Save the world: Ditch Kyoto

[leebert]

http://www.scientificblogging.com/news/solve_the_climate_problem_by_abandoning_kyoto

... the essence of the argument is this: Carbon Trading is the wrong approach.

Solid agreements & technology transfers would be better.

Politics of the possible? Don't know....

The EU Carbon Credit (CC) market was heavily scammed, EU CC's are still hovering around $1 EU, in the gutter. Investors got screwed. Why? B/C countries like France overstated their projected GDP, grabbed an armload extra CC's, kept their internal costs down & shafted England & others who correctly projected their GDP growth. In the end England didn't get terribly screwed b/c the CC prices fell through the floor due to oversupply, but they did get screwed nonetheless. Nobody's trading EU CC's, so the program became a farce. They're trying to fix it, but it'll take time before existing EU CC prices rise & become meaningful.

Once EU CC prices rise, though, companies purchasing CC's will have even more incentives to "back-door" emissions to CC selling countries, and by association off-shore production and cut jobs domestically.

Without China & India onboard, or if other CC scams broaden leading to an global oversupply of credits, carbon credit schemes risk losing efficacy - either the prices will stay lower than they would otherwise or carbon credit buyers will find more reasons to off-shore production. Instead of purchasing increasingly expensive credits & retiring them, companies will just have one more incentive to offshore emissions instead.

With China's per-unit emissions levels being higher than in the industrialized West, we're actually increasing emissions by off-shoring production, not lowering them. It's not just a question of per-capita emissions, but of overall progress.

So Kyoto - as it is now structured - might have just served to accelerate globalization & increase emissions. So much for screw the workers, save the environment.. it's screwed BOTH!

And what will unionists think of future Kyoto-like agreements? Will they have enough say to encourage saving domestic jobs via clean alternative energy?

There are other quandaries to consider: Were China to consent to emissions curbs & realized increased costs, then other nations could undercut China and start offering a competitive advantage below China's, functionally doubling China's internal costs (costs + lost income). This is why the ENTIRE WORLD needs to get onboard, not just the industrialized countries. Yes, the per-capita emission levels are lower in lesser developed nations, but the emissions per unit of production also needs to be considered as well as soot per capita.

See:

http://www.reason.org/commentaries/dalmia_20060622.shtml

http://www.jennifermarohasy.com/blog/archives/001376.html

http://www.scientificblogging.com/the_soot_files

[jpak]

1. Save the world - ditch Bush and the GOP

n/t

[leebert]

2. Sure ...

... and while you're at it, perhaps John Kerry & Barbara Boxer too? They voted against Kyoto in that Senate resolution back a few years now & now they want to hang the Kyoto albatross around Dubya's neck.

Gee, are we being played OR WHAT?

Oops, I forgot. Partisan ideology and agitprop trumps facts, any day.

[Viking12]

4. yawn.

[Nihil]

5. The "Kyoto albatross" has got nothing to do with Bush ...

... as he hasn't made a single move to improve the environment with or without
Kyoto so rest in peace, there's no need to defend his noble name there ...

FWIW, you can certainly ditch Kerry and many of the other so-called
Democrats (some of whom may or may not be up for the presidential race)
but that doesn't get away from the fact that ditching Bush/Cheney/Rice et al
*TOMORROW* would be the single most effective step the USA could make
towards not only saving the planet but ensuring that no more wars start
up to distract us from saving the planet.

Waiting around for another year and a bit will really not help anyone
(except the Bush cronies).

Replacing him with a Bush-wannabe (i.e., well-paid corporately-owned puppet)
after that delay will be even worse for everyone left on this planet.

[leebert]

15. Blame Bush on Kyoto? Sins of omission, but none of commission

So you want to blame Bush, but not Clinton, Kerry & Boxer who turned against Kyoto? Even though they ended up NOT supporting Kyoto? http://clinton4.nara.gov/CEQ/19981112-7936.html
Kyoto was rejected in 1997 by the entire US Senate, Dem & Repub, because it did not hold China and other developing nations at all accountable for the "warming".

It is really hypocritical of liberals to deliberately strawman Bush with something that you can't really blame on Bush, but it's a very convenient ploy that conservatives in turn can use against us (just like we libs like to use Rush Limbaugh as a convenient poster boy for what's wrong with the Repugs...).

Better yet, Clinton resisted doing something about off-road soot emissions, it was Bush who first made the move to regulate them. And since soot has been shown to be a global-warming agent (not just a dimming agent), then Bush has done more to help address climate change than Clinton ever did.

http://www.mindfully.org/Air/2002/EPA-OMB-Diesel-Emission10jun02.htm

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_hb4832/is_200407/ai_n17723285

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1316/is_12_36/ai_n8643128/pg_9

Every 2 weeks China fires up a coal-fueled power plant big enough to power San Diego. NOTHING we do to mitigate emissions will amount to squat to offset what the Chinese are doing.

QED baby, QED.

[Viking12]

16. I'll type very slowly so that you can understand....

Bush withdrew from the Kyoto Process AND all other substantive international engagement on climate change. Whether Clinton got a blow job or submitted Kyoto to the senate is NOT relevant to assessing Bush's dismal record on climate change (and nearly every other policy). At least Clinton was engaged with the rest of the world on this important issue. Bush has wasted 7 years of potential progress.

Sorry Charlie, you're not providing anything new with your soot hysteria. GHGs are the most significant player in modifying global climate. The regional effects of soot are interesting and important but still a small slice of the pie.

P.S. I've witnessed your 'soot spam' on many climate blogs. The wingnutosphere may fall for the old "say it often enough and it becomes the truth" tactic. Most of the folks on the E&E forum won't.

[leebert]

17. Bush eats puppies

Bush withdrew from the Kyoto Process AND all other substantive international engagement on climate change. Whether Clinton got a blow job or submitted Kyoto to the senate is NOT relevant to assessing Bush's dismal record on climate change (and nearly every other policy). At least Clinton was engaged with the rest of the world on this important issue. Bush has wasted 7 years of potential progress.

Sorry Charlie, you're not providing anything new with your soot hysteria. GHGs are the most significant player in modifying global climate. The regional effects of soot are interesting and important but still a small slice of the pie.

Soot ... hysteria?

Do you dispute James Hansen's statement that 25% of all GW is due to the Arctic melt-off AND that soot is the cause of MOST of the Arctic melt-off?

Of course GHGs are significant. The long-term GHGs *are* significant.

Do you dispute the statements of Prof. V. Ramanathan, et al - good qualified experts who are recognized and respected - WHO see short-term soot abatement as an interim measure to help the process along?

Fact: Bush enacted a diesel soot ban. Clinton didn't.

Fact: Bush has done little other than that. Clinton abandoned Kyoto before Bush did.

My opinion: Kyoto may have helped accelerate globalization leading to increased emissions.

My observation: A way to get constructive engagement w/ industrialists and China is to first address the soot issue.

P.S. I've witnessed your 'soot spam' on many climate blogs. The wingnutosphere may fall for the old "say it often enough and it becomes the truth" tactic. Most of the folks on the E&E forum won't.

Oh, my, we have a detective!

I'm sorry that you think that I'm an agent of the anti-Christ or whatever, but the problem here is that nobody can even be a little bit wrong without suffering a direct personal attack from the denizenry such as yourself. The problem I see with both sides is that neither will engage in good faith discussions w/out resorting to cheap polemics.

In your intolerant screed, you've pretty much demonstrated EVERYTHING that's people find disturbing with the environmental movement. I've engaged in NO "soot spam" on any climate blogs. Having TWO blogs is not spam, dear. Piping up in engagement in search of a solution is ... just what it is.

Perhaps the reason you had to type so slowly wasn't b/c of me?

Defectionately,

/leebert

[Viking12]

18. LOL. get your facts straight.

Fact: Bush enacted a diesel soot ban. Clinton didn't.

He didn't? Certainly an expert like you knows that the Truck and Bus regulations were enacted in December 2000 under Clinton to be phased in starting with low sulfur fuels in Septmeber 2006 and tighter emissions standards in 2007. Yes, the nonroad diesel vehicle standards were enacted in 2004 under Bush but that regulation was well on its way before he took office.

If you want to continue your silly comparison of Bush and Clinton feel free. Did Clinton do much to advance climate change policy? Not really. Did Clinton go out of his way to alienate the global community, suppress and distort scientific information, or create phony policies like the Clear Sky initiative? Not at all. Did Bush?

Do you dispute James Hansen's statement that 25% of all GW is due to the Arctic melt-off AND that soot is the cause of MOST of the Arctic melt-off? Of course GHGs are significant. The long-term GHGs *are* significant. Do you dispute the statements of Prof. V. Ramanathan, et al - good qualified experts who are recognized and respected - WHO see short-term soot abatement as an interim measure to help the process along?

No, I don't dispute it at all. What I take excpetion to is your ranting and raving that this "upsets" current knowledge of the climate. It does nothing of the sort -- the contributions of soot have been on the radar for nearly a decade. I also find your unsubstantiated 'opinion' that Kyoto has increased emissions to be quite comical.

[leebert]

19. Bush, a very bad man ...

I'll concede happily then that Clinton did as you say he did, it was a misunderstanding on my part WRT the on-road vs. off-road regulations. My recollection is that Bush reinstated the off-road regulations after Congress tried to cancel it. And it was a proposal that the Bush admin. could have easily defaulted or rescinded.

IAC, this is minor irony in my mind considering how Bush is considered the bad guy, etc. My recollection (and you can correct me if you so wish) is that his "Clear Skies" regulations were partial implementations of what health advocates asked for. Was there was some modicum of progress? By whose metrics? Looking at emissions worldwide and the relatively decent quality of air the USA has achieved in the past 40 years under various administrations, I'm OK with incremental progress coming in due course. Industry will balk, Republicans will delay, clean-air activists will decry what they see as excessive incrementalism. There's no risk-free anything.

IAC, I admit teasing the lot of you about Bush's record... I find it ironic that nobody gives Bush any credence on what modicum of good he has done (vs. the really really bad things he didn't do as an agent of Satan). And in light of what's going on in China - or the EU - is Bush as much the bad guy as people here seem wont to portray him?

Here's what bugs me about the battle plans of activists:

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1316/is_12_36/ai_n8643128/pg_9

"...the Natural Resources Defense Council made a public relations faux pas, issuing a press release that was too complimentary, calling the proposal, "the biggest public health step since lead was removed from gasoline more than two decades ago." Green groups pounced. In his "In the Loop" column, The Washington Post's Al Kamen reported that "other enviro groups were apoplectic, saying that the compromise proposal was a perfectly fine and important initiative, but the NRDC's effusive praise would cripple environmentalists' efforts to criticize the administration's overall, far-from-perfect record." NRDC soon removed the offending press release from its Web site, and in June of that year, the organization sent EPA administrator Whitman a "corrected"--and less effusive--statement of support for the off-road proposal."

[leebert]

20. Kyoto: Bass-ackwards or not?

Let's see:
http://clinton4.nara.gov/CEQ/19981112-7936.html

"...As we have said before, we will not submit the Protocol for ratification without the meaningful participation of key developing countries in efforts to address climate change."

And as far as I know the USA is still part of other climate change agreements, just disengaged from Kyoto.

Clinton sought a scheduled timetable for developing countries to phase in their own carbon credit requirements as their emissions increased. Lacking that provision I'd say Clinton functionally pulled back leaving it to Bush to formalize the stance. I might also note that Kyoto hasn't been revised since by any of the remaining signatories. When the subject of Chinese emissions is brought up in various international forums, China remains recalcitrant with an almost belligerent stance citing it's globalization function as "the world's factory."

What progress is being made by those countries who have stayed engaged in the protocol? Kyoto is being circumvented which is in turn further damaging the ozone layer (via Chinese chicanery).

The issue of back-dooring CO2 emissions is already being openly discussed in the EU, with their carbon credit trading system being in a horrible state of affairs -- Britain essentially pulled out of the next round of CC trading as the credit values fell through the floor last year (2006) from what I can only describe as widespread cheating in CC preallocation (see my DU journal...).

I'm not making up the EU discussions about back-dooring CO2 emissions, this is being discussed across the pond. The problem of back-dooring emissions visa vi Kyoto goes like this: A European firm that is faced with the choice of keeping production domestic is faced with higher costs if they are to continue paying carbon credits on their carbon-based energy use. This, even in EU countries that seek to keep production domestic by proactively developing clean energy sources, etc.

This gives companies already considering off-shoring production another incentive to go ahead with moving production (preassembly, whatever) overseas to Kyoto "poor countries" (not scare quotes...) where there are also no CC overheads.

The problem is this: China is the destination for a great bulk of the off-shored production and it's emissions/unit-of-production IS 40 percent HIGHER than the worldwide average (due to inefficient coal-fueled generating plants).

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6V2W-4M340FY-1&_user=10&_coverDate=04%2F30%2F2007&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_sort=d&view=c&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=901dbbcd413e221ead9989949bfe8b0b
http://www.mnp.nl/en/service/pressreleases/2007/20070622ChineseCO2emissionsinperspective.html
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines07/0305-02.htm

With further incentives to offshore production, can Kyoto inadvertantly accelerate globalization & increase emissions, just as it was subverted into being counterproductive to the Montreal Protocol on ozone-depleting chemicals? Part of China's lower production costs is that it doesn't carry CC overhead, and in fact, under Kyoto China gets to SELL carbon credits.

You're welcomed to explain to me why my concerns are grossly exaggerated.

[razzleberry]

22. the Kyoto treaty is periodically revised ...

at so-called 'CoPs', conference of parties.
IMO, the changes always involve greed
and/or some type of carbon-offset scam.

what do you mean by 'back-door',
go-it-alone, or something else?

keep in mind that -->zero<-- countries have adopted laws
mandating the Kyoto treaty as their own law.

the closest thing is the EU's 'limitations' on their
power industry, which flopped in phase one,
mostly for the reason that people acted in their own interest.

[leebert]

23. back-dooring emissions

razzlebery wrote:

IMO, the changes always involve greed
and/or some type of carbon-offset scam.

Yes, welcome to the world ... ;-)

I don't know how a global credit-based system can be made with accountability measures & performance metrics w/out some kind of subversion creeping in ... if the EU's CC system got subverted, if Kyoto's is being subverted, then how will we get the rest of the world to get in line for Kyoto revisions that'll actually work?

what do you mean by 'back-door',
go-it-alone, or something else?

Ah, yes I should've clarified what I meant...

By back-dooring I mean surreptitiously moving the carbon emissions out the back door by off-shoring them to non-CC buying countries, thus bringing the total cost savings waaaaay down. In this way production off-shoring & emissions back-dooring are closely linked, the CC imbalance just creates further incentives to off-shore production (China is a CC source-country which sells them on the world CC trading market).

The real stinker is that the per-unit level of emissions in China is actually HIGHER than anywhere else, so off-shoring & back-dooring ='s increased emissions, not decreased emissions.

It appears to me that Kyoto, as it is currently implemented, is ineffectual. Blaming the USA's disengagement would be off the mark since there are plenty of other countries involved in the process.

keep in mind that -->zero<-- countries have adopted laws
mandating the Kyoto treaty as their own law.

the closest thing is the EU's 'limitations' on their
power industry, which flopped in phase one,
mostly for the reason that people acted in their own interest.

Well yes, the CC market crashed b/c of functional cheating on the preallocation phase.

[leebert]

21. Soot ...

What I take excpetion to is your ranting and raving that this "upsets" current knowledge of the climate. It does nothing of the sort -- the contributions of soot have been on the radar for nearly a decade.

I'm afraid you might be a bit mistaken on this count. The IPCC has long listed aerosols (soot, sulfates) as a vast unknown quantity, biased toward a net cooling effect. While it is true that sulfates, being whitish, *DO* reflect sunlight w/ a net cooling effect, the finding that soot traps more heat than it shades is a major reversal in climate knowledge, V. Ramanathan states as much (again, for those joining this thread, and it bears repeating... Ramanathan's team found that within the thick haze of mid-tropospheric brown clouds, soot has been shown to account for 50 percent of the warming formerly ascribed ONLY to CO2 alone.)

Read V. Ramanathan's statements. He described it as an utter surprise that black carbon was warming the troposphere MORE THAN it was dimming/cooling the surface AND he has described this discovery as a potential way out of our current conundrum.

So yes, it's a bit of a climatology upset. The problem of long-term cumulative GHG will remain b/c of CO2's extended half life in the atmosphere. Methane isn't quite as bad (10-15 year half life) but its effect is far more pronounced, HCFC's even worse.

Considering the vastness of the Asian Brown Cloud it could account for a great deal of anomalous seasonal temperature readings.

Ramanathan's team also models soot having a 40 percent role in warming over the Pacific (30 percent of the planet's surface), so what about other sources of soot, such as slash & burn agriculture throughout the tropics & subtropics? With the Arctic melt-off being ascribed as mostly soot-caused, how much of the past century's observed warming is soot-caused then? I can easily ballpark 33 percent and I wouldn't be surprised if research could add another 10 accounting for other sources of soot.

Here's my point in all this: How do we get industry & nations really interested in a phased approach & drop their rejectionist stance? Soot abatement is comparatively easy, its effects are almost immediate (2-3 months, if not weeks) and can buy us some time as CO2 mitigation is progressively phased in. The cost-benefit ratio of soot abatement might offset some of the current real costs of global warming -- the unprecedented heat waves in Europe, the drought problems in Asia, the even-worse potential of methane outgassing from tundral peat (which is withering from earlier melts, apparently in large part due to soot). Were immediate cost overheads from soot averted nations might have more resources to redress CO2.

This *IS* provided soot abatement will enable the Arctic & tundra to partially re-ice & the rest of the temperature anomalies to partially abate, and I don't see evidence to the contrary that it wouldn't.

If my headlines were rather provocative (and yes, I'll concede intentional provocatage)... I have my reasons. To get people to pick it up & give it some serious consideration.

What do we want?
Incremental progress!
When do we want it?
In due course!

[hatrack]

3. Just be patient - it expires in five years anyway . . . nt

.

[razzleberry]

6. Europe needs to go first

Europe has the popular political support, to reduce emissions.
I suggest Europe reduce by 90%. to show it can be done.
The money that Europe saves, will be a welcome bonus.

[losthills]

7. The US needs to sign on to Kyoto

and Democrats should make it a campaign issue.

No matter that it is flawed, it is the only framework that exists for international cooperation on climate change. America needs to get involved in this and take a leadership role toaddress it's flaws and propel it into a true mechanism for change.

[razzleberry]

8. Kyoto makes things worse, not better

first of all, the US is party to the
UN Framework Gonvention on climate change.
.....................................

The Kyoto scam works something like,

China starts production of ozone depleting CFCs.
then they say they plan to not make as much...
or something like that.
and other countries pay them money.

no thanks

[losthills]

9. If that is true,

(and I am not agreeing with you)
then we need to sign on to it so that we can help fix it.

Standing on the outside, lobbing critisizms, as the Bush Administration is doing, is accomplishing absolutely nothing.

And, had we been involved from the beginning, as we should have been, the situation would be far different.

[razzleberry]

11. please see my post #10, n/t

[leebert]

14. Kyoto can't be fixed

1) Kyoto partially misidentifies the problem

2) And definitely offers the WRONG solution

1. The problem, so it turns out, includes the vast largely soot-caused Arctic melt-off and the soot-ladened Asian Brown Cloud whereby the airborne soot is causing easily HALF the warming former BLAMED ON CO2, and 40 percent of the warming over the vast Pacific (30% of the Earth's surface) and MOST of the Arctic melt-off (b/c of wind currents, mostly Asian soot), accounting for easily 22 percent of all global warming. Kyoto doesn't, AFAIK, have provisions for trading soot credits (aerosols). That's easily a quarter to a third of all worldwide observed temperature anomalies - most of it we can pin on Asia's rampant pollution.

2. The Kyoto solution, so it turns out, has INCREASED emissions because the emissions per-unit of production is HIGHER IN CHINA than in the West. Worse yet, because China isn't required to PURCHASE carbon credits, so they can pollute with impunity at no additional costs. In essence Kyoto CREATES incentives for companies to back-door emissions as well as off-shore production. So we've managed to SCREW western labor & the global environment, not just one or the other.

http://www.reuters.com/article/email/idUSL137011320070813

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=115&topic_id=113139&mesg_id=113139

Every 2 weeks China fires up a coal-fueled power plant big enough to power San Diego. NOTHING we do to mitigate emissions will amount to squat to offset what the Chinese are doing. Unless we can get the Chinese on board, everyone's screwed.

[razzleberry]

10. Clinton and Gore knew the treaty was flawed

that's why they did not submit to the Senate, the treaty in its then
current form, none of the bad things have been fixed,
in my opinion, it got worse with every convention


(from a press release, VP Gore, Nov 1998)
As we have said before, we willnot submit the Protocol for ratification without the meaningful participation of key developing countries in efforts to address climatechange.

http://clinton4.nara.gov/CEQ/19981112-7936.html
(fourth paragraph)

[losthills]

12. I don't disagree that it's flawed.

But it's an ongoing process. And the country with the most emissions is disengaged....

[leebert]

13. That'd be China then?

Better yet... China's engaged in *SELLING* carbon credits ... and China's soot per capita is probably higher than everybody else's & it's CO2 per unit of production is higher than everybody else's. IOW, we've made the problem WORSE by offshoring production & emissions to China. Way to go, Kyoto.

Under Kyoto, China gets to sell CC's, including ones that they don't deserve to sell:
http://www.reuters.com/article/email/idUSL137011320070813
(oh, and it's destroying the ozone layer while they're at it....)

The EU's FUBARd CC market:

http://www.reason.org/commentaries/dalmia_20060622.shtml
http://www.jennifermarohasy.com/blog/archives/001376.html

Me:

http://www.scientificblogging.com/the_soot_files