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“Sir Nicholas Stern, the head of the British Government Economic Service, has produced the world’s first big report on the economics of climate change…

“The purpose of Sir Nicholas’s report – commissioned by Tony Blair – is to deal with the argument of people who accept that climate change is happening, but who say that trying to do anything about it would be a waste of money. This argument is heard occasionally in Europe and frequently in America, where…it is combined with the notion that European attempts to tax carbon are part of a conspiracy by socialists determined to undermine the American way of life. Sir Nicholas’s argument is that, far from undermining the American way of life, attempts to mitigate climate change may help to preserve it. He argues this by setting the costs of allowing climate change to happen against the costs of mitigating climate change…

“Sir Nicholas maintains that if greenhouse gas emissions go on increasing at their present rate, global output is likely to be between 5% and 20% lower over the next two centuries than it otherwise would have been…

To read the complete article, click on http://www.economist.com/opinion/displaystory.cfm?story_id=E1_RTDDNGD

“MARKETS CAN HELP CLEAR THE AIR”

Our quotes are from the 11/06/06 issue of THE ECONOMIST:

“It is not a widely held view, but there is a lot to be said for economists. First, they like to pin down ideas with figures, and figures are often crucial for developing policy. Second, they like markets, and markets are often useful in implementing policy.

“Commentary on Sir Nicholas Stern’s review of climate change has focused mostly on the first tendency. That is as it should be, because figures should form the basis on which governments decide whether or not to spend money on trying to stop climate change. The greens are pushing hard to get America’s government on board. Anything which might move the argument in that direction is leapt upon…

“And whatever it does, America is not going to be the world’s biggest emitter for much longer. China looks set to overtake it by 2015. Emissions from developing countries will soon dwarf those of the rich world.

“How can poorer countries be persuaded to pollute less? They have a strong moral case for inaction. They weren’t the ones who made the problem. It was 200 years’ worth of European and American self-enrichment that coated the atmosphere with dangerous gases. Surely the poor have the right to get rich too?

“The counter-argument here is that developing countries are also the ones that will sustain the most damage, most quickly. The Himalayas, for instance, act as a great sponge. The snow and ice on their upper reaches hold water which is released slowly into India’s rivers through the dry spring and summer months. If the water melts too quickly, the crops die…

“Here is where the second habit of successful economists comes in useful. Sir Nicholas devotes a large chuck of his report to explaining how market mechanisms can help to accommodate both the developing world’s desire for self-enrichment, and its need to avert serious climate change.

“The Clean Development Mechanism, set up under the Kyoto protocol, permits companies in rich countries to buy emissions credits from companies in poor countries. An Italian power company which has run out of carbon allowances can buy more credits (rather expensively) through the European emissions-trading scheme, or more cheaply from a company in a developing country which has cut its own emissions or has invested in clean technology. In effect, methane from the Brazilian pig effluent, Chinese industrial gases and African trees are being sold to rich-world companies that want to increase their carbon emissions.

“When this mechanism was set up, it was widely regarded as the sort of economist’s conceit which was fine in theory but doomed to disaster in practice. And yet it does seem to be working. Up until 2012 (the end of Kyoto’s first stage) developing countries should get between $5 billion and $15 billion for cutting emissions by 1 billion tones of carbon-dioxide equivalent (a quantity about equal to India’s annual emissions).

Those dollars, of course, come straight from the pockets of consumers, and mostly European ones, since European countries have taken the Kyoto protocol most seriously. But they are being put to good use. Because developing-world industry is so dirty, it is much cheaper (ie, more efficient) to cut pollution there, than in the rich world. Which is why Sir Nicholas can argue that markets do work, and why one of the best ways for rich countries to set about protecting the wider world by extending and enlarging this scheme.

To read the complete article, click on http://www.economist.com/daily/columns/greenview/displaystory.cfm?story_id=8128019

“GOOGLE EARTH, SATELLITE MAPS BOOST ARMCHAIR ARCHAEOLOGY”

Our quotes are from NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC NEWS OF 11/07/06:

“Scott Madry, an archaeologist at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, has been pinpointing possible archaeological sites in France with the popular desktop program Google Earth. The freely available software is a virtual globe created with a collection of mixed-resolution images from both government and private satellite sources.

“‘Frankly, I was floored,’ Madry said. ‘I was just shocked at the results that I was able to get.’…I hadn’t thought of Google Earth as a serious scientific tool…, Madry said…

“‘I’ve spent 25 years on and off bouncing around in low-level aircraft, searching old maps, looking at aerial photographs, and I found a handful of new archaeological sites. I found more sites on the first day of sitting down and doing a systematic survey on Google Earth than in those years of using other techniques.’”…

Think of what you can learn about your tract – to solicit offers from timber buyers, to show to foresters who might provide services, to locate spots of considerable beauty.”

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Contact Duane Knapp at northavalonpf@yahoo.com

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