Denial of political pathways.

This is part four of climate action denial.

Part one...Introduction

Part two....Denial of the science of climate change.

Part three....Denial concerning Technological Solutions.

Different political pathways to decarbonising.

The important point to make at the onset here is that, globally, we have a very urgent need to decarbonise our energy use largely by reducing consumption of the fossil fuels that we heavily depend on. We have known this for considerable time and yet we have not found the will or the political pathways in doing so. Now that the window of opportunity in terms of staying within a carbon budget is much much tighter we cannot rule out any of the methods of reducing carbon emissions. Not only should we consider the range of technological solutions some of which were briefly mentioned in part three but we should also consider the different political pathways.

I will argue that political extremism and the fear of opposing political extremism has been a major problem. In fact it seems a good way of defining political extremism to be one that relies on ideology that narrows or excludes good and effective choices that we allow to solve political problems. One approach is to see both the benefits and downsides of different political systems so that we don’t end up choosing one or the other or even just a compromise of different systems. Good design is not just about a compromise ending up between two extremes but ending up with a solution better than the extremes. Similarly good political governance will reach for maximum benefit with different systems for different locations and for different enterprises depending on many factors such as availability of resources and technological advance.

Of course good successful governments do already use many different approaches but for election purposes they often focus on simplified rhetoric leaning towards one or other political sides or a wishy-washy ineffective compromise. This may partly explain our clearly observed indecisions on effective action on climate change. The more enlightened the electorate is on incorporating different political pathways that complement each other the more likely we will have effective and transparent government.

In the late 18^th century the economist Adam smith extolled the advantages of individuals pursuing their own self interest free from poor regulation or control (Invisible hand) and in the early 19^th Century the economist William Forster Lloyd explained the problems of individuals pursuing their own self-interest without effective regulation (tragedy of the commons). It should be clear today that to solve the problems of climate change we need the benefits of innovation that also requires taking into account the effects that this has on others.

When countries race to extract fossil fuels they see the individual benefit to their own economy but the environmental cost is shared across the world.  Each country behaves in their own self interest by extracting fossil fuels as fast as they can because they reap the rewards of the finance gained in the short term from these resources but they don’t pay the full price of the environmental damage. Of course in the long term we all lose out
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It is the realization of these facts and an attempt to break this deadlock that led world leaders to agree targets at the COP21 meeting in Paris. This is a good example of global cooperation which some political extremists trying to discredit this as an attempt at a world government at the same time as denying the science of human induced climate change with their contradictory viewpoints. Of course we have had previous examples of good global cooperation for example on tackling ozone depletion:- Montreal Protocol   or of making ongoing steps towards tackling world poverty with the millennium development goals. (Goal 8 for example aims for a “global partnership for development”).

Market forces alone will not stop the consumption of fossil fuels or the irresponsible deforestation of the rain forests. Believing that regulation is not required is a dangerous political extreme that sees government only necessary for raising armies to invade or defend or to keep the masses in order. This form of extremism leaves us vulnerable to those that will exploit people and situations within and without their own countries. We become at the mercy of those with the most short-sighted outlook who seek their own profit with no regard to the external costs. Overfishing or over grazing (as in the tragedy of the commons scenario) would become inevitable as does environmental damage without adequate control measures on the irresponsible. The fallacy in this way of thinking (market forces alone will suffice) is an example of a more general fallacy...the fallacy of composition. The fallacy is the belief that everyone following their own self interest will necessary turn out to be the best on average for everyone. This is not the case. Just as in the case of an audience all being able to watch an event better if they don’t follow their own personal self interest of standing up to try and view the event better. The spectator would be able to view the event better if they alone stand up. A country may benefit if they alone continue to burn fossil fuels. Civilized countries know that out of control (unregulated) behaviour is detrimental to us all and do pass necessary regulatory laws, however when it comes to urgent climate change mitigation we seem reluctant or slow to take enough necessary regulatory steps. The point I am making here is that we should be flexible and open to the best combination of market forces, planning and regulation that will change with time and situation. By limiting our political pathways it seems we pander to the political extremist perhaps in the hope that we can bring them on board in agreeing that humans are causing the climate change today but at the expense of delaying action.

It is worthwhile to exemplify this with possible strategies already existing that differ with time and place but also have room for improvement.

Improving efficiency of appliances and buildings.

From the diagram at the top of the post we can see that one way to cut back on emissions is to improve efficiency of appliances or buildings. We can consider the pathways that encourage this to happen. The entrepreneur perhaps motivated initially by carbon taxes and market forces will use the engineer’s scientific knowledge and skill to develop higher standards of appliances or buildings. This in turn creates a higher minimum standard that can become the new regulated target for further entrepreneurs to challenge and thus drive up standards. This can be applied to transport vehicles (for example in minimum mpg per person or for EV’s mpkWhr! per person) and electrical appliance rating plates.

Improving clean energy production and sustainable cities.

The same strategies of market forces and regulation can obviously be applied here but we can also see the importance of planning at a governmental level in the energy supplies and at more regional level in improving the design of cities. A well designed city won’t just happen without overview and planning, leaving it instead to individual businesspeople pursuing their own interest. Today most people live in cities and the future indicates that the population growth will occur in the cities. Cities around the world are expanding. The efficiencies of these cities are about more than the efficiency of the appliances and the individual buildings. Design of clean transport system that is both energy efficient and efficient in moving people with minimum congestion, and design of water, sewage, energy and communication systems are all essential to be planned to the highest standard.

We need the best innovative engineering motivated if necessary by market forces, guided by scientific understanding on environmental and climate issues and by the inspiration of well planned public policies to make our cities truly sustainable.

Planning decarbonisation.

 A decarbonised energy system will require not just our existing electrical supply to be powered 100% from alternatives, but also our transport system and heating systems that are likely powered by natural gas in many parts of the world. While we should be planning, using R&D, in all these areas, should we start implementation of all these areas now? Is there a preferred order of implementation?  As indicated in the last post on intermittency issues it was suggested that these issues could be reduced by increasing electrical vehicles at the same time as increasing our electrical energy from renewables. This is not the only reason to start implementation of electrical vehicles. Our cities will be much cleaner in terms of air pollution and also the overall energy efficiency will be increased reducing carbon emissions even before the grid is completely supplied from renewables. The motor car powered from an electrical motor is much more efficient than the internal combustion engine and this outweighs the inefficiencies involved in electrical generation from fossil fuels and the energy losses in transmission lines to charge the batteries in the EVs. This is not the case for direct heating of buildings by natural gas. The humble gas boiler of today is extremely efficient and in the order of 90% plus. It seems that using fossil fuels to generate electricity and transmit to homes and factories to provide heat for water and room air will never be as efficient as burning the fossil fuels directly in the building concerned. The conclusions here are obvious:- While any country or region requires the need for fossil fuel in electrical generation it will not only be cheaper to continue with gas boilers for direct heat in the home, offices and factories it will also be better for minimizing carbon emissions. However when the country is free from fossil fuels in electrical generation we have the following dilemma.:- It will be cheaper to use gas boilers for direct heat (if external costs to the environment and subsequent costs in addressing the climatic problems are ignored)  but it will be worse for carbon emissions. We have a conflict here between market forces and regulation and hopefully we will have the sense to regulate being aware of the external costs.

Free market works by failures getting eventually forgotten and the successful providing the next stepping stone. This is a very useful development method when you have many chances at finding the best way forward. When you have but one chance then it is foolhardy to leave the outcome to market forces alone. The important point to make here is that when looking for political ways to combat climate problems we should not fear or apologise for incorporating the use of the concepts of market forces, government planning and regulation. Rather we should use these methods to complement each other for maximum and urgent effect and look for politicians to outwardly and transparently express these ideas.

In terms of what the individual can do, if we, the electorate don’t realize the necessity for different political pathways then the only politicians that will be electable are those that will not take the necessary steps on action.

Next:-

Denial of the need to limit energy demand. (To follow)