An interesting commentary on the purpose behind Climate Change policy as reported by Investors Business Daily can be found here. The statement in question is from Ottmar Edenhofer - an easy name to google, but I found every little. He is a German economist and co-chair of the U.N. IPCC Working Group III on Mitigation of Climate Change. The interview is published in Neue Zurcher Zeitung. (No, I haven't personally read the root article, but have no reason to distrust the accuracy of available translations into English.)
There are various other comments on the article posted about the 'net here-and-there, mostly (as expected) on 'denier' web-sites. Still one should find it passing strange that no one else (AP, Wash Post, et.al.) are reporting on this AT ALL.
Hmmm. Too close to the Truth, perhaps?
- Steve
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(sigh) You should learn to read "root articles" Steve. Mr. Endenhofer is a respected economist who was only making a point about the economic consequences of any international agreement to reduce carbon emissions world wide. An excerpt from the interview:
ReplyDelete"Basically it's a big mistake to discuss climate policy separately from the major themes of globalization. The climate summit in Cancun at the end of the month is not a climate conference, but one of the largest economic conferences since the Second World War. Why? Because we have 11,000 gigatons of carbon in the coal reserves in the soil under our feet - and we must emit only 400 gigatons in the atmosphere if we want to keep the 2-degree target. 11,000 to 400 - there is no getting around the fact that most of the fossil reserves must remain in the soil."
I assume your denier sites are trying to put some kind of spin on this plainly obvious fact. But to claim it's part of the IPCC's "mission" to "redistribute the world's wealth" is a gross and contemptible lie.
The IPCC was charged with investigating the science behind climate change and the potential effects of it - including the economic effects. Why would it be news that nations with large fossil fuel deposits would loose out economically if limitations were placed on their exploitation?