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Kyoto Protocol

Imagine there was a US election coming up. Would the Kyoto protocol be a considered issue? Would candidates address it in any of their manifesto's.

I'm trying to establish how important this issue is to the average american?

Do all the supporters of the Bush administration agree that the the US should refuse to sign up because it would/could damage the Economy? Especially given the US' deficit. Has the issue had much covergae in the States?

For those who check my other thread, you'll know why I'm asking this.

The Kyoto Protocol calls on most developed economies (including that of the US) to reduce CO2 emissions. If a means of production cannot be found to maintain current levels of production while reducing CO2 emmissions then, yes, the economy is bound to suffer in some way and this is why the Bush administration has refused to ratify it.

I have problems forming an opinion on this issue to be honest. While I do believe that there is more than enough evidence to indicate that global warming is an issue that we should be taking steps to irradicate, I'm not convinced that the Kyoto Protocol is the answer. On the one hand, the environmentalists will argue that the emission reductions will not be enough to curb the pattern of global warming and from the other side there is the argument that the economic costs of implementing the agreement will far outweigh any environmental benefits. In other words - if both sides are right - we're damned if we do and damned if we don't.

If you're writing this as part of the Bush campaign strategy, then I believe that it is an issue that can very easily be framed (rightly or wrongly) as an instance of Americans surrendering a degree of their economic advantage for a small environmental gain. I don't know what the feeling of the average American citizen is, but I'd imagine that they'd be reticent to have their terms of economic production dictated to them by the global community.

I personally care about this issue, though the environment is not an issue that got much attention from voters in the election. Kerry did discuss it and there was a question regarding Kyoto in the Presidential debates, but it did not seem to have much effect on the outcome nationally. Democrats did make some gains in the Western U.S. in elections, including victory in a governor's race, by discussing the environment and trying to connect its relevence to hunters and fishermen, who usually vote Republican.

I think the U.S. in the long term could join Kyoto with some economic benefits by investing more in the research of alternative fuels and pollution controls that would allow us to reduce levels of pollutants while maintaining productivity at a reasonable cost.

The current administration really has no interest in joining Kyoto or trying these means, as they pass legislation like the "Clean Skies Act" to fool people into thinking they support reducing pollution, when in fact, the bill actually increases the level of pollutants allowed by businesses in many cases. Same in the case of "Health Forrests." I just read an op-ed article on Friday that sounded like it must have been written by someone paid by the Bush administration, claiming that "Clean Skies" is effecitive in reducing pollutants like mercury, which is an outright lie. On top of that, they're also finding loopholes that are allowing them to begin some of the early stages of drilling for oil in ANWAR.

In the future, we'll have to see how well the new strategy works of candidates trying to show how environmental policies affect people's daily lives to give the issue better context.

Kyoto is of minimal importance, and it's always instructive to remember how the Senate voted on it in 1997 (including Sen. Kerry): 95 against, 0 for. The environment is an issue in itself, but Kyoto specifically is not.

like imokruok said, no Kyoto is not an issue.

No major politician is arguing for it.

quote:

Originally posted by Yoepus like imokruok said, no Kyoto is not an issue. No major politician is arguing for it.

no, russia or europe for example has no major politicans.

quote:

Originally posted by imokruok Kyoto is of minimal importance, and it's always instructive to remember how the Senate voted on it in 1997 (including Sen. Kerry): 95 against, 0 for. The environment is an issue in itself, but Kyoto specifically is not.

The thing is that we really need to start moving toward reaching some of the goals of Kyoto, even if we do it on our own. Right now the EPA seems to stand more for Environmental Pollution Agency and even Christie Todd Whitman resigned her post, largely due to frustration with administration policy. Bush had a horrible environmental record as governor of Texas and it has continued with him. Kyoto or not, much more needs to be invested in cleaner, alternative methods that can be affordable for industry. Even global warming pollutants aside, mercury exposure is showing to be a growing problem asociated with birth defects and disease, such as autism.

quote:

Originally posted by St_Andrew no, russia or europe for example has no major politicans.

Hey you said it not me

I'm not really into politics but I picked up a bit about this on the news today.

Why is it that we all sign this agreement to try and help reduce the affects of global warming, and yet the biggest sinner of them all is exempt and nobody seems to put pressure on bush to get involved.

I find it grossly unfair.

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Originally posted by chesco I'm not really into politics but I picked up a bit about this on the news today. Why is it that we all sign this agreement to try and help reduce the affects of global warming, and yet the biggest sinner of them all is exempt and nobody seems to put pressure on bush to get involved. I find it grossly unfair.

there is a lot of people putting pressure on Bush but he doesnt care

has anyone seen "The day after tomorrow " ? .. Although it is fiction, it does bring a true messege behind it all.. it does give a big kick in the ass to the US president ( or should I say vice president in terms of movie ) .

I was listening to this.. I just hope that companies will take action independently if the US gov't dont do anything about it.

when things done in Unity you can move mountains..

quote:

Originally posted by Renegade The Kyoto Protocol calls on most developed economies (including that of the US) to reduce CO2 emissions. If a means of production cannot be found to maintain current levels of production while reducing CO2 emmissions then, yes, the economy is bound to suffer in some way and this is why the Bush administration has refused to ratify it.

The problem with the Bush administrations refusal to ratify Kyoto IMO, was that it said it wouldn't sign anything that would hurt the US economy. That's a clear prioritization which taken to the extreme would mean that no matter what global disaster may be caused by CO2 emmissions then we will not see the Bush administration take any steps whatsoever to prevent that, unless some hitherto unknown approach to limiting global heating is discovered. I find that the real problem with Bush's refusal - if it only was the Kyoto accord in itself, then so be it, but the refusal to sign it was categorical I think.

quote:

Originally posted by trancaholic The problem with the Bush administrations refusal to ratify Kyoto IMO, was that it said it wouldn't sign anything that would hurt the US economy. That's a clear prioritization which taken to the extreme would mean that no matter what global disaster may be caused by CO2 emmissions then we will not see the Bush administration take any steps whatsoever to prevent that, unless some hitherto unknown approach to limiting global heating is discovered. I find that the real problem with Bush's refusal - if it only was the Kyoto accord in itself, then so be it, but the refusal to sign it was categorical I think.

I remember that his exact words at the time were something along the lines of that "the American way of life will not be compromised" which, as you said, seems to be a pretty clear indication that no degree of economic sacrifice - via the Kyoto Protocol or any other means - will be made to curb global warming. While there isn't much doubt that some sacrifices would have to be made by the Americans were they to sign on to the Kyoto Protocol, I think that the economic costs of its implementation are being highly overstated.

The most prominent argument is that the US would be punished and forced to reduce emissions where other economies would not, thus reducing the US's short to mid-term economic competitive advantage. There are, however, several problems with this. Firstly, the US has the highest per-capita and gross CO2 emission rates in the world (4% of the population and 25% of the emissions) and thus already has an advantage over the rest of the economies of the world in this regard. The EU for instance, has a population that is 55% greater than that of the US's (456 million compared to 295 million), yet creates just 63% of the emissions that the US does (link). Even so, EU nations - despite the fact that, by and large, their economies are not developed as that of the US's - have committed to greater reductions in CO2 emissions than would be expected of the US in the event that they were to ratify the protocol (link). This raises the question, if the EU can do it, why can't the US?

Then of course, there's the issue of China. Why should they be allowed to continue to increase emissions, the US asks, when the rest of the world can't? The answer is two-fold: the first, which most neoliberalized Americans will be unlikely to accept, is that China is still, like it or not, a developing economy. Many people still do not have easy access to electricity or running water and there are less personal vehicles in China than in Los Angeles alone. If we draw a distinction between "survival emissions" and "luxury emissions" then China should, theoretically, be allowed increases in CO2 emissions to ensure that essential services are provided to its citizens. Where the US is concerned, however, a small reduction in CO2 emissions would not involve the sacrifice of any of these essential services (people will still have access to power, water and cars for instance) whereas in China, India and - to a lesser extent - Russia, a mandatory reduction in CO2 emissions may make it difficult for the government to provide its people with these essential "survival" services. It might also be worth pointing out here that compared to Russia the US produces 4 times as many total CO2 emissions and twice the per-capita emissions, compared to China it produces twice the total emissions and nearly seven times the per-capita emissions and compared to India it produces about six times as many total emissions and some nineteen times the per-capita emissions - and the US are suggesting that reducing their CO2 emissions by a few percent is somehow unfair?

Besides all this though, the often overlooked fact is that - independantly of globally enforced treaties - China has actually been able to significantly reduce CO2 emissions despite meteoric economic growth:

quote:

Earlier this year, NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council) released a report that found China's greenhouse gas emissions declined between 1996 and 2000 while its economy grew at a rapid pace. We based our report on U.S. government analyses: The Energy Information Administration and the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory had determined that China's carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions -- the main cause of global warming -- declined 17 percent over that four-year span, despite economic growth of 36 percent. China was able to accomplish this feat by restructuring its economy, switching to cleaner energy sources and improving energy efficiency. [...] By contrast, U.S. emissions over the same period grew by approximately 70 million metric tons per year, approximately 5 percent. These newer, more reliable figures still provide enough evidence to argue that China has done more than the United States to combat climate change over the past decade.

http://www.nrdc.org/globalwarming/achinagg.asp

These reductions are greater than the reductions expected of any the Kyoto Protocol signaturies and several times greater than the emissions reductions that would be expected of the US were they to ratify it. Once again, if a developing economy can acheieve these results, why can't the US? How can US politicians possibly claim that affording China a theoretical increase in pollution under the Protocol is unfair when they are - without any real external pressure - already significantly reducing CO2 emissions and still acheiving solid economic growth?

Like I said before, the Kyoto Protocol is not a perfect solution and it will require many nations to make small, short-term sacrifices. Those who continue to wail and gnash their teeth, however, about the horrendous economic costs and the unfairness of the protocol have their fears significantly misplaced. Compared to the costs of inaction, the global implementation of the Kyoto Protocol comes relatively cheaply.

Nice post Renegade

i have yet to see some conservative rebut arguments like that

^^^^^^ Yes, great post. I wonder how Australia would fare in this moral context, though? Is it "fair" that Australia won't implement the Kyoto?

Germany - with huge economic problems - is going to replace its whole coal industry before 2020, and hence cutting CO2 emissions with 40% below 1990 level. Wow, suck on that one the US and Australia

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4295389.stm

Here's a uniquely Canadian perspective on the issue, given the corrupt government we have here.

http://www.canada.com/calgary/calga...e6-7d46fca0353e

Kyoto beast must be tamed

Opponents of Kyoto have long argued there are three things wrong with it:
junk science, computer modelling based on wishful thinking and huge
expenditures for nothing. At long last, the third objection, costs without
benefits, has penetrated the ice fog that semi-permanently engulfs the
bureaucratic minds of Ottawa.

On the first issue, the notorious hockey stick graph, which purports to show
a rapid increase in mean global temperature, has been replaced with a pie
plate.

That is, there were higher temperatures at the early end of the stick handle
when Greenland was green and the Vikings named their Newfoundland landfall
"Vinland" because of the grapes they discovered but that no longer grow
there.

The handle may be flat, but there are "blades" at either end. Normal people
would conclude that such science is anything but settled and the rhetorical
power of the hockey stick is extinguished.

Second, the computer models that project the alleged affects of human
activity into the future have not escaped the great law of computation:
garbage in means garbage out.

The temperature data are incomplete, contradictory, or invented so that when
you grind them through a computer program the results are meaningless.
Worse, different climate models produce different results and are often
contradicted by measured temperatures -- as in Antarctica, for instance.

Again, normal people know that if next week's weather forecast has a 50 per
cent probability of being right, anyone who uses wonky data to predict
global temperature decades hence is in the same business as fortune tellers
and Ouija board artistes.

It is the third problem, however, that finally got the attention of some of
the people who would be tasked with figuring out how actually to implement
the Kyoto protocol.

Here, it is no longer possible to live in a dream world where data are
conjured up and software always gives you the results you want. Because
these are real dollars the government is dealing with, the encounter with
reality cannot be indefinitely postponed.

The first response, unfortunately, was as fantastic as the belief in the
hockey stick and associated computer projections.

Environment Minister Stephane Dion has for months been claiming that
spending on Kyoto would strengthen, not degrade, the Canadian economy. In
his recent speech to the Toronto Board of Trade, he "guaranteed" that
Kyoto-inspired "investments" will make Canada more competitive in what he
called the "carbon-constrained global economy."

Now, Dion was a fine political scientist before he went into politics. Back
then, he valued evidence and respected facts.

Indeed, years ago, he could competently debate their meaning and knew that
computer models were not always reliable guides to understanding reality.
All that has changed: the environment minister today has moved far beyond
any concern with facts.

As early as January of this year, he declared he was "in a blitz to have
results."

Voluntary agreements are all well and good, but unilateral regulation, he
warned, is always an option.

From his later statements, it looks like an increasingly attractive one. It
seems the time for negotiation is over.

Now is the time to implement. Dion seeks engineers to get the job done, not
scientists or, worse, lawyers to argue about it. One is reminded of the
equally assertive words of his colleague, Anne McLellan, who famously
announced that debate over the gun registry was over. It isn't.

We have seen the government embark on policies based on ideological
fantasies before, and we know they never work out the way they are supposed
to do.

This is what the bureaucrats in the Department of Natural Resources who are
at least nominally concerned with productivity in one part of the Canadian
economy discovered when the looked closely at the likely costs.

The initial estimate of $10 billion had to be doubled, and the final
estimate is still unknown. Thus, Dion's announcement of his "plan" was again
postponed till sometime in April.

The resulting fight between the Kyoto advocates in Dion's department and the
more sensible officials in Natural Resources has been going on for weeks.

Among other things, the Natural Resources people pointed out that the Kyoto
advocates ignored the enormous administrative costs to enforce the draconian
regulations that compliance with Kyoto demands.

It is good news that a few bureaucrats understand the great costs Kyoto
would impose.

Let us hope it is a prelude to a serious examination of the intellectual
house of cards upon which Kyoto is based.

Eventually and inevitably, like the gun registry, it will have to be
scrapped.

Barry Cooper is managing director of the Fraser Institute's Calgary office
and a professor of political science at the University of Calgary.

I'll let you guys in on the secret to why the US isn't signing anytime soon. And it's not even the corporate interests argument (though I do believe that carries some weight).

90% of the US voters have never heard of the Kyoto Protocal, and couldn't tell you what it's all about. Therefore the politicians in charge feel no pressure to join. The only pressure being put on them about this issue comes from corporations who feel vehemently that the Protocal would hurt business.

I truly believe that the biggest problem in United States foreign policy today is voter apathy towards the issues involved. If we had a more educated electorate, the people making decisions at top would be held accountable instead of be allowed to do whatever they please.

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