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PULISHED IN THE Japan Times
Friday, Oct. 20, 2006
Change the tune on climate
By DAVID HOWELL
LONDON -- There can be no doubt that the film "An Inconvenient Truth," compiled
by former U.S. Vice President Al Gore, has struck a chord worldwide. Checking
potential climate chaos and saving the planet from destruction are causes that
have gripped the minds of people, especially young people, everywhere.
Unfortunately, while the Gore message provides plenty of material about which to
worry deeply, it is not so good at telling nations, governments or individuals
what they should actually do to prevent disaster. It leaves open the question as
to what incentives are actually required to make people change their lifestyles
radically, to change the whole path of industrialization and development and to
reshape economic growth -- and all for a very long-term objective that is by no
means certain.
The reality is that change on a scale involving nothing less than controlling
and altering the globe's weather is going to require an even more compelling
agenda than the Gore message if anything is to happen. If much less carbon is to
be pumped into the already poisoned atmosphere above us, full cooperation will
be required not just of the already industrialized world -- which created the
problem in the first place in past generations --but also of the developing
countries struggling to lift their billions out of poverty and follow the path
of economic growth.
It is not so easy to see why the poorer world, or countries like China and India
that are at last beginning to take off, should do this. Their priority need is
for cheap and plentiful energy, acquired as quickly as possible and by the
easiest methods possible. That means burning a lot more coal, as well as oil and
gas -- the fossil fuels that the crusaders for carbon reduction fear the most.
The developing countries' argument is therefore bound to be -- and already is --
that if the richer countries want to take a more expensive route from now on
with renewable energy sources and innovative technologies, or if they want the
poorer world to do the same, the richer countries should pay up.
However, to most populations, and the governments they elect, even in richer
countries, the here-and-now problems of higher utility bills, more expensive
gasoline, crime and terrorism and homeland security seem a lot more important
than trying to change the climate 20 or 30 years ahead -- which is when carbon
cutting action now would have an impact.
In the developing world, where millions are worrying where their next meal will
come from, carbon reduction must seem remote indeed.
This raises the question of whether the Gore appeal is ever going to be strong
enough by itself to get results. Schemes may be multiplying for reducing carbon
emissions in richer parts of the world, such as California or Western Europe.
But that is not nearly enough. Can other more immediate incentives and arguments
be mobilized to reinforce the climate security case, and start to achieve action
on the necessary global scale?
One powerfully reinforcing argument, with implications in a far shorter time
period than climate change, is the need for energy security and reliability.
This is something that China and India seek now, just as much as Europe and
Japan. It is an issue that affects just about everybody in one form or another.
Without cheap and reliable energy supplies, the developing world is going to
find its progress completely blocked -- as it nearly has been already by oil
shocks and soaring fuel prices.
And the motivation operates not just in the poorer world. A recent opinion poll
found that the biggest single concern in the United States is not climate change
and greenhouse gases but the need for energy "independence" from imported oil
and gas. In other words, Americans worry more about having to rely on oil from
unstable regions, such as the Middle East or Venezuela, or even Mexico right
next door, than about carbon emissions and weather violence -- even after the
Hurricane Katrina experience in New Orleans.
This may be completely unrealistic, since America, with its huge energy thirst,
is always going to be dependent on the world energy supply chain. But it shows
where the real worry points are.
The problem is that the two objectives -- energy security now and climate
security later -- could conflict head-on instead of reinforcing each other --
unless very carefully handled.
For example, increased energy security points directly toward burning a lot more
gas and coal, and toward a big expansion of nuclear power worldwide. The first
two of these alternatives are not at all carbon friendly; on the contrary, they
guarantee much more carbon in the atmosphere.
The third option, nuclear power is very unfriendly in a different way, as it
leads straight to weapons-grade uranium enrichment and to nuclear weapons -- a
path now being followed by North Korea -- to the deep dismay of Japan and
perhaps at last even China -- and by Iran.
So somehow these sharply conflicting outcomes must be prevented and the twin
aims of energy security and climate security made to work in the same direction,
rather than against each other. Somehow a grand unity of aims and purposes must
be crafted to mobilize full public support in the richer and poorer countries
alike. And it must not lead to the kind of horrors threatened by Kim Jong Il or
the fanatical mullahs of Iran.
This will need more than the appeal of Gore or the other low-carbon campaigners.
It presents an enormous challenge of persuasion, eloquence and realism to which
all the world's leaders, whether at Group of Eight summits or at U.N. or other
forums, have not yet risen.
David Howell is a former British Cabinet minister and former chairman of the
Commons Foreign Affairs Committee. He is now a member of the House of Lords (www.lordhowell.com).
The Japan Times
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