Understanding Environmental Policy

Columbia University Press

Chapter One

Global Climate Change as an Issue of Values

One cause of climate change, as we saw in all the environmental problems discussed so far, is our lifestyle choices, which are determined by our values. Behaviors based on these values have resulted in population growth and extensive use of fossil fuels. The philosophy of living for the moment that pervades our culture limits our interest as a society in addressing climate change. The true dangers of global warming will occur in the future. Because the effects cannot be predicted precisely, they are removed from current reality. The public responds far more quickly to environmental problems that immediately affect their personal lives. Air and water pollution and the hazard of toxic substances provoke a faster and more active response than climate change because the impacts of the former are immediate.

The effects of global climate change are complex and difficult to see. Many of them will not become apparent for several decades. Social learning is required if climate change is to achieve status on the systemic and institutional policy agenda. We need to imagine that we ourselves are living in the future and experiencing the negative impact of global warming. Analysts who examine the solvency of the social security system face the same challenge, for most of the people who will be harmed if the system goes broke have more immediate financial worries to focus on and so the system's solvency does not get on the policy agenda.

Another value dimension to the issue stems from the question of equity. Do people in the developed world have an unlimited right to burn fossil fuels to maintain their lifestyles while denying that same right to people in developing countries who are aspiring to a more consumptive lifestyle? A second equity concern is the greater vulnerability of poor people to the effects of climate change. Very often a wealthy nation can defend its settlements and food supplies against the negative impact of an extreme climate event. For example, the effects of droughts can be mitigated by irrigation, and the damage from floods can be fixed if massive amounts of capital are available to pay the costs of reconstruction. Poorer nations, on the other hand, lack the resources required for these kinds of responses. In his book American Heat: Ethical Problems with the United States' Response to Global Warming, Donald A. Brown (2002) takes the position that, because global warming has had and will continue to have a disproportionately large negative impact on poorer countries, reductions in emissions are a moral imperative. To Brown, the question that remains is how much reduction is needed, and, in his view, "no matter which ethical rule is followed on deciding on an atmospheric stabilization goal, the status quo on global warming emissions is ethically reprehensible" (232).

I do not agree that the ethical dimensions of climate change are as stark as Brown believes, but that ethics is one facet of the problem is clear. Because the science of climate change is uncertain, and because much of the impact will occur only in the future, I find the ethical dimension of the issue somewhat ambiguous. The key moral issue posed is that poor nations and poor people will probably be disproportionately affected by the climate change. Such change is also likely to worsen the environmental, social, and economic problems that lead to extreme poverty in the first place. Greenhouse emissions are clearly harmful, and we have an ethical obligation to reduce the threat of global warming for the most vulnerable among us, as well as for future generations. The political potency of this issue is rooted in its ethical dimensions.

Global Climate Change as a Political Issue

The industries that stand to lose the most from having limits set on greenhouse gas emissions are those that produce oil and energy (Levy and Newell 2004, 194). The Bush administration has evinced extremely close ties to both, particularly the oil industry. A powerful force motivating the administration to question the science of global climate change was the financial and political power of the American oil industry. It was not surprising, of course, that President Bush, the former governor of a major oil state with a large base of campaign contributors in the oil industry, was on the side of the oil industry with regard to reducing greenhouse emissions despite campaign promises to the contrary in 2000. The fundamental logic of this position is that reducing greenhouse emissions will cost money that could otherwise be spent by consumers on goods or services or by the government on services or infrastructure, which would earn elected leaders political credit from constituents. The other side of the political equation is that enforcing emission reduction policies would gain elected leaders credit from environmentalists.

Climate change is more a science and technology issue than a political one. No one is in favor of global warming, but those opposed to strong measures to reduce C[O.sub.2] emissions tend not to believe that the cost of such measures outweighs the benefits. Although certain businesses will be disadvantaged by the costs, overall it appears that higher environmental standards have indirectly advanced the modernization of American industry, creating wealth by creating cleaner environments. The operation of sewage treatment plants, for example, has not only resulted in clean rivers but has also contributed to the development and value of waterfront property. Policies that reduce greenhouse emissions may make certain cities more livable in the summer and might therefore encourage factories to invest in overall plant modernization. These investments, in turn, could increase competition, an economic plus. Thus, if the cost of mitigating climate change turned out to be a good investment, elected leaders supporting such policies would benefit politically. However, if these policies caused companies to close down plants in the United States or move to developing countries with less stringent greenhouse gas regulations, political supporters could suffer at the polls.

An elected leader's stance on the issue of global warming is symbolic of his or her attitude toward environmentalism. A large environmentalist constituency, and an energetic interest group community, is actively engaged in national and international environmental issues. But global warming did not (and, again, excuse the pun) generate much political heat in the United States until 2001, when President Bush came out against the Kyoto Protocol. The paradox is that Bush's opposition may have taken a relatively low-intensity international issue and given it domestic political currency in the United States. He may have had the same inadvertent impact on the issue's standing in the international community. During the 2004 presidential campaign, Bush's position on climate change was part of a set of issues that environmentalists cited as evidence of his anti-environmental stance. Senators John McCain and Joe Lieberman seized this issue as a way to delineate their own brand of moderate, mainstream environmentalism, and also, perhaps, to tweak a president whom neither was very fond of. The energy industry and other businesses opposed to emission limits lobbied against the McCain-Lieberman Climate Stewardship Act, and the Senate defeated the bill in late 2003 by a 55 to 43 vote. Opposition from the political Right was also intense. Writing about McCain-Lieberman in the conservative National Review on October 29, 2003, Marlo Lewis Jr. observed that,

[The bill would] impose a cap on C[O.sub.2] emissions. Carbon dioxide is the inescapable byproduct of the carbon-based fuels-coal, oil, and natural gas-that supply 86 percent of all the energy Americans use. U.S. energy consumption is expected to increase by 34 percent between 2001 and 2020, and carbon-based fuels are expected to supply about 90 percent of the increase. Enacting any variant of [McCain-Lieberman] ... would be tantamount to issuing a congressional declaration of war on the fuels that power the U.S. economy. Worse, it would establish the institutional framework for a succession of legislative, regulatory, and litigation assaults on carbon-based energy. (Lewis 2003)

Despite strong language on both sides of the issue, climate policy lacks the kind of grass-roots support generated by environmental issues with sustained and visible local effects. Climate change politics is primarily inside the Beltway engaged in by elites, and a factor in the rarefied world of international diplomacy. Its lack of a geographic focus, unlike the geographical significance of a toxic waste site, reduces its salience on the American political agenda. Although the issue is driven by scientific analysis, it is the political perspective that influences how the science of climate change is interpreted. Thus the intersection of science and politics helps to define the issue.

Politics also defines which emission control and carbon sequestration technologies will be used to reduce U.S. greenhouse gas emissions. The political dimension of the issue is partially derived from one's overall attitude toward the role of government. Left on its own to engage in unrestricted, profit-maximizing behavior, industry has no reason to think about long-term effects and reduce its greenhouse gas emissions. Those who believe that the free market alone can best deliver a high quality of life will also resist regulations imposing greenhouse gas reductions. Free market advocates might favor the use of the tax code to induce good behavior, but overall they are not sure about the seriousness of the problem and worry that global warming is merely an excuse to revitalize command-and-control regulation (Victor 2004, 31).

The politics of climate change has domestic variants, as we have seen in the United States, but it is largely an element of political relations between sovereign nations. International relations is an elite politics that reflects the economic interests of nation-states. With globalization, corporations have gained influence over the behavior of multiple nation-states (Levy and Newell 2004, 4). Although national sovereignty remains a powerful force, international regimes (or sets of governing rules and norms) have grown dramatically in the past half-century. This growth emerged, in part, to facilitate international economics and the flow of trade and capital across national borders. Whether the strength of global corporations will enable them to compete with a strong nation-state such as the United States, Japan, or China is unclear. I think that the people who control physical force (armies and police) will still tend to dominate those who control the cash, but this conflict is largely symbolic. Generally these two sets of powerful entities-multinational corporations and nation-states-are acting in concert. Our governing elites are often well connected individuals who move between the public and private sectors, or minimally have strong business and political alliances in addition to social relations across the public and private spheres. Vice President Richard Cheney is a good example of such an elite player, having served as a Cabinet official and also as CEO of Halliburton, the Texas-based construction and engineering firm that serves as a contractor for oil companies and for the U.S. government. These "elites" operate under the assumption that national and corporate interests are either inherently compatible or can and ought to be brought into alignment.

The issue of global climate change has gained status on the international political agenda as the world's political and economic elite have come to slowly accept that climate change is a real problem that could affect the business environment. Swiss Re, one of the world's largest reinsurance companies, for example, has begun to provide insurance against risks associated with climate change, a move prompted by the firm's analysis of the financial risks posed by climate change. In 2003 Swiss Re estimated such financial risks at more than $40 billion a year and expected it to rise to $150 billion a year by 2010. Their risk analysis also led Swiss Re to become a leader in corporate climate policy. Innovations include an internal climate policy, which states:

Despite advances in research, climate development is and will remain uncertain. Immediate action must be taken nevertheless, as even natural climatic variability carries risks far greater than generally assumed, and man's influence on the climate system will aggravate these risks even further. (Swiss Re 1998)

Swiss Re also intends to become "greenhouse neutral." In October 2003 the company announced that it would launch a ten-year program:

combining internal emissions reduction measures with an investment in the World Bank Community Development Carbon Fund. The voluntary initiative makes Swiss Re the largest global financial services company to set itself the goal to become greenhouse neutral. All Swiss Re locations will participate in the initiative. The programme will utilise the same methodology as Swiss Re offers to clients through its "Greenhouse Neutral" package in partnership with the Commonwealth Bank of Australia. (Swiss Re 2003)

The position of the European Union on climate change and the (slowly) growing recognition of the problem by the U.S. government illustrates the impact of these financial facts on international and domestic climate politics. Poor people will not be the only ones to suffer; the entire global economy could be destabilized. When comparing the costs of reducing climate change to the potential loss of economic activity that could result from global warming, the trade-off seems straightforward.

Global warming is a worldwide political issue with looming potential effects and has gained a growing consensus among our political and economic elite that rapid climate change needs to be controlled. The hope is that the urgency of the problem will reduce political conflict surrounding the issue and focus attention on technology and management concerns. The political dimension of this environmental issue will undoubtedly continue to be intense but, in the end, will probably result in substantive policy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Global Climate Change as an Issue of Science and Technology

The use of carbon-based fuels for electricity, heat, and transportation has changed most people's way of life. It determines the work we do, what we eat, how much leisure time we have and what we do with that time. Our lifestyle is so closely tied to the use of fossil fuels that it would probably be impossible to phase out their use. For that reason, some proposals for reducing atmospheric levels of greenhouse gases focus on removing the gases from emissions and storing them, the process called sequestration, rather than reducing the use of emission-producing fuels. According to Klaus Lackner:

Climate change concerns may soon force drastic reductions in C[O.sub.2] emissions. In response to this challenge, it may prove necessary to render fossil fuels environmentally acceptable by capturing and sequestering C[O.sub.2] until other inexpensive, clean, and plentiful technologies are available.... Storage time and capacity constraints render many sequestration methods-such as biomass sequestration and C[O.sub.2] utilization-irrelevant or marginal for balancing the carbon budget of the 21st century. Even the ocean's capacity for absorbing carbonic acid is limited relative to fossil carbon resources. Moreover, with natural ocean turnover times of centuries, storage times are comparatively short. Generally, sequestration in environmentally active carbon pools (such as the oceans) seems ill advised because it may trade one environmental problem for another.... Underground injection is probably the easiest route to sequestration. It is a proven technology suitable for large-scale sequestration. Injecting C[O.sub.2] into reservoirs in which it displaces and mobilizes oil or gas could create economic gains that partly offset sequestration costs. (2003, 1677-1678)

Continues...
Excerpted from Understanding Environmental Policyby Steven Cohen Copyright © 2006 by Steven Cohen. Excerpted by permission.
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