Emissions Expansion Could Be Leading Threat to Developing Countries
Related subjects: Carbon Emissions, Climate Change, Energy Supply, In the Loop, J.E. Robertson, Sustainable Development, U.S. Environment Comments (0)
International efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and slow climate destabilization have been hampered by concerns that developing countries will not reduce their emissions aggressively enough, so leaving industrialized nations at a cost-competitive disadvantage. But evidence suggests a failure by developing nations to curb emissions expansion could pose the most significant threat to their political and economic stability.
Wealthy, industrialized nation are in a better position, economically, to accelerate production of clean energy technologies, even build up signiicant clean energy technology exports, as they transition away from the outmoded 18th-century model of burning carbon-based mineral resources to extract energy. They may be able to meet aggressive emissions reduction targets by building a new industrial base of clean energy infrastructure.
They may also be able to take the lead in supplying cutting-edge clean energy and emissions reduction technology to nations around the world, helping to rmake the future of industry. But for any emissions reduction strategy to be sustained over the long term, developing nations need to consider ways to develop a domestic root structure for clean, renewable energy resources that will make the new model cheaper than the old.
Developing countries are demanding as much as $100 billion from wealthy countries reponsible o the majority of historic industrial carbon emissions to help them cope with the effects of climate destabilization. The request is unreasonable only from the standpoint that industrialized nations did not understand the science that shows how cumulative carbon emissions impact the global environment.
There are good reasons for wealthy nations to consider climate adaptation aid a sound investment for global political and economic stability, and for protecting their own populations from the adverse effects of their own climate destabilizing emissions. But developing nations also need to consider the following realities: their long-term political and economic stability depends on total global emissions being sharply reduced, and it will be more harmful to them to shun a global climate pact and increase their own emissions than to join a pact that doesn’t guarantee significant aid.
Once a global emissions protocol is in place, it should be more workable to negotiate needed aid and/or trade agreements, as there will be a principle underlying the protocol that climate is a shared interest requiring a shared response. Such negotiations could also lead to bilateral and multilateral economic benefits, as a sustainable, green industrial economic fabric is advanced.
While the conventional wisdom continues to treat fossil fuels as the “obvious” go-to, the smartest, most cogent and reliable way to extract cheap energy from natural resources, the truth is that more advanced zero-emissions technologies are gaining ground. The oil-rich state of Texas is an example, moving quickly toward an ambitious 50,000 megawatts of generating capacity from wind power.
Falling significantly behind the broader trend toward greening economic output could mean an increased climate threat for developing nations. The “free market” can no longer sustain the traditional cost preference for fossil fuels; subsidies are too expensive and counter-productive and governments are taking the long-term consequences of such subsidies seriously: this means over-dependence on carbon-based fuels will put any economy at risk in coming decades, as more competitive nations achieve reliable, consistent cheap energy from clean sources.
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