Spotlight Cancún: Climate Realism

Eban Goodstein, Guest Blogger
Another in a series from the Triple Crisis Blog and the Real Climate Economics Blog on the Cancún Climate Summit.

The elections earlier this month saw the breaching of the 2016 deadline set by NASA’s Jim Hansen for global CO2 stabilization, and also moved us well beyond IPCC Chair Rajendra Pauchuari’s statement that action beyond 2012 “will be too late”. So where does this leave us? For what are we now, officially, too late?

Until this year, one could envision, just barely, a “politics as usual” scenario that set us on track to stabilizing C02 concentrations at 450 ppm.  The 450 goal would, according to the IPCC’s best guess, have held global temperatures to 2.1 degrees C above pre-industrial levels—a further 1.5 degrees C warming this century. Getting there would have required US policy that initiated cuts in 2012, and delivered 80% reductions by 2050. These would have had to have been coupled with Chinese and Indian commitments to stabilize emissions by 2025, and then start down their own aggressive emission reduction pathways.

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Who Killed the Euro?

Matías Vernengo

Before the Great Recession it was common to suggest that the international reserve position of the dollar was in jeopardy, and that a crisis could generate a run on the dollar.  Yet, the unexpected casualty of the crisis was the euro.  If there were any doubts about the demise of the euro after the Greek crisis these have been lifted by the Irish crisis.  Who did it?  There is no need for a CSI team to pour over the evidence; the culprit has left its fingerprints all over the bloody scene.  No, not the butler, it was the European Central Bank (ECB).

In the United States the crisis led to an effort by the Fed to maintain the interest rate on long-term government debt at low levels, with the controversial quantitative easing policy.  By buying great quantities of treasuries, the Fed not only keeps stable bond prices and low interest rates, but it also provides assurances that Treasury bonds remain a secure asset.  That allows the US Treasury to maintain high fiscal deficits on a sustainable basis.

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Spotlight Cancún: Making the Economic Case for Tackling Climate Change

Kevin Gallagher and Frank Ackerman

Triple Crisis bloggers Kevin Gallagher and Frank Ackerman published the following opinion article in the Guardian on the economic case for tackling climate change and why it has the potential to persuade US policymakers to take action.

Cancún and the new economics of climate change

The failure of US climate legislation, following last year’s disappointing negotiations at Copenhagen, casts a pall over the round of climate talks in Cancún this week. And the global recession and budget-cutting crisis makes this seem like the worst time for new climate initiatives. Unfortunately, we don’t have the luxury of delaying action: the laws of physics don’t need 60 votes in the US Senate to continue making the world’s climate less and less liveable.

There are two battles over climate change. The legitimacy of climate science has been challenged in the media, but repeated reviews have found only scattered typographical errors in IPCC reports and other assessments. Last year’s theft of emails from climate scientists revealed the shocking news that leading researchers can be rude and competitive – but not much else. While science-deniers remain prominent in US politics, most of the world has moved on.

What the debate has moved on to, though, is concern about the costs of climate policies. Bjorn Lomborg, the poster child of climate scepticism, is no longer attacking the science; instead, he now claims that the damages from climate change would be small, while the costs of doing anything about it would be enormous. The new Lomborg (“Scepticism 2.0”) relies heavily on a few conservative economists, notably Richard Tol and William Nordhaus, to suggest that we can’t afford real climate solutions.

Read the full article at the Guardian.

Spotlight Cancún: The Curtain Rises for Climate Negotiations

Miquel Muñoz

The UN Climate Change Conference started today and will be meeting for the next two weeks in the resort city of Cancún, México. The Spotlight Cancún series, a joint series by Triple Crisis and the Real Climate Economics blog, which this post begins, will invite experts to analyze different aspects of the climate change negotiations, and how these, in turn affect the bigger picture of finance, development and the environment. We welcome Miquel Muñoz as a regular contributor to Triple Crisis to begin the discussion.

The Cancún conference runs through December 10 and comprises: six official UNFCCC meetings (COP 16, COP/MOP 6, AWG-LCA 13, AWG-KP 15, SBSTA 33 and SBI 33); side conferences such as the Global Business Day, Agriculture and Rural Development Day, Oceans Day, Development and Climate Days, and Forest Day; hundreds of official and unofficial side events; and all the social and cultural activities that traditionally accompany such meetings, such as the climate village. Cancún, like previous UN Climate Change Conferences, is more than just a negotiation; it’s the yearly gathering of the climate change community.

Over the next two weeks, we may or may not hear about Cancún in the news. Distractions such as sabre-rattling half a world away and leaks of US diplomatic cables will keep the two greatest greenhouse gas emitters, the US and China, the UN Secretary-General, foreign ministries from all over the world, the international press and others occupied. But even without these distractions, the truth is that expectations for any agreement happening in Cancún were already low. So low, in fact, that some analysts have even posted a pre-mortem of the meeting.

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Policy Space at the WTO: Developing Countries Should Reject Demands in Manufacturing Negotiations

Mehdi Shafaeddin

After a failure to initiate a new trade round in Seattle in 1999, the so-called Doha Development Round began before the end of 2001, in the midst of mistrust between developing and developed countries. In the text of the Doha Development Agenda, a lot of lip-service was paid to development issues. Since 2001, there has been one failure after another in reaching an agreement by the two parties.  Will the Round be concluded?  In my view, if developed countries insist on their anti-development stance, it should not.

The crisis in trade negotiation is a crisis of confidence in the intention of developed countries, which are basically concerned with their own interests rather than the mutual interests of both parties. According to Ms. Barshefsky, an ex-US trade representative: “[the] developing world is not hearing what we are saying and we’re not hearing what the developing world is saying. We’re passing like ships in the night”.

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European Debt Crisis and "Currency Wars" Halted G-20 Progress

Martin Khor
Part of a Triple Crisis series on the Nov. 11-12 G-20 meetings.

Triple Crisis blogger Martin Khor published the following opinion article for the Malaysia Star on the two issues that prevented progress at the G-20 meetings in Seoul: the new financial near-crisis in Europe and the ongoing debate about the competitive devaluation of currencies.

Inconclusive end to G-20 summit

The world economy remains in a web of serious problems with the potential to break out in new crises. The G20 summit last week discussed them but could not agree on the causes or how to resolve them. Even as the G20 leaders were meeting in Seoul, the real drama was taking place half a world away, as Europe stood on the brink of a new financial crisis.

Ireland faced a big jump in the interest cost of its debt, arising from (and giving rise to) fears that it would have to be bailed out, like Greece some months ago, or even face a debt default.

It seems like the crisis of investors losing confidence could also spread to Portugal, Spain and Italy.

Read the full article at the Star.

European Debt Crisis and “Currency Wars” Halted G-20 Progress

Martin Khor
Part of a Triple Crisis series on the Nov. 11-12 G-20 meetings.

Triple Crisis blogger Martin Khor published the following opinion article for the Malaysia Star on the two issues that prevented progress at the G-20 meetings in Seoul: the new financial near-crisis in Europe and the ongoing debate about the competitive devaluation of currencies.

Inconclusive end to G-20 summit

The world economy remains in a web of serious problems with the potential to break out in new crises. The G20 summit last week discussed them but could not agree on the causes or how to resolve them. Even as the G20 leaders were meeting in Seoul, the real drama was taking place half a world away, as Europe stood on the brink of a new financial crisis.

Ireland faced a big jump in the interest cost of its debt, arising from (and giving rise to) fears that it would have to be bailed out, like Greece some months ago, or even face a debt default.

It seems like the crisis of investors losing confidence could also spread to Portugal, Spain and Italy.

Read the full article at the Star.

"Gather and Sell": Ghana's Illegal Gold Industry

Thomas Lee, re-posted from World Policy Institute

Following Triple Crisis blogger Lyuba Zarsky’s piece on mining and sustainable development, we bring you celebrated photojournalist Thomas Lee’s vivid photo essay on Ghana’s black market gold industry from the World Policy Institute. Triple Crisis is pleased to announce the World Policy Institute as a blog partner.

Deadly Gold

Dunkwa-on-offin, Ghana—An illegal gold mine collapsed in these remote jungles on June 27, 2010, after heavy rains hit central Ghana. At least 100 people were buried, but that’s just an estimate. The owner had no idea how many of his 136 hires were working at the time of his arrest, and the dozen illegal miners who survived kept their mouths shut, fearing prosecution. This is hardly a rare incident, but it provides a vivid snapshot of the deeply rooted abuses in Ghana’s ancient and ever more profitable gold complex. Theo and his team head to work as dusk begins to fall at the illegal gold mines in the bush of Kenyasi, Ghana.

View the full photo essay at World Policy Institute.

“Gather and Sell”: Ghana’s Illegal Gold Industry

Thomas Lee, re-posted from World Policy Institute

Following Triple Crisis blogger Lyuba Zarsky’s piece on mining and sustainable development, we bring you celebrated photojournalist Thomas Lee’s vivid photo essay on Ghana’s black market gold industry from the World Policy Institute. Triple Crisis is pleased to announce the World Policy Institute as a blog partner.

Deadly Gold

Dunkwa-on-offin, Ghana—An illegal gold mine collapsed in these remote jungles on June 27, 2010, after heavy rains hit central Ghana. At least 100 people were buried, but that’s just an estimate. The owner had no idea how many of his 136 hires were working at the time of his arrest, and the dozen illegal miners who survived kept their mouths shut, fearing prosecution. This is hardly a rare incident, but it provides a vivid snapshot of the deeply rooted abuses in Ghana’s ancient and ever more profitable gold complex. Theo and his team head to work as dusk begins to fall at the illegal gold mines in the bush of Kenyasi, Ghana.

View the full photo essay at World Policy Institute.