Save the world, ignore global warming
The Sunday Telegraph (U.K.) ^ | 12/12/04 | Bjorn Lomborg

Global warming has become the obsession of our time. From governments
and campaigners meeting for the climate summit in Buenos Aires right
now we hear the incessant admonition: making global warming our first
priority is the moral test of our age.

Yet they are wrong. Global warming is real and caused by CO2. The
trouble is that the climate models show we can do very little about
the warming. Even if everyone (including the United States) did Kyoto
and stuck to it throughout the century, the change would be almost
immeasurable, postponing warming by just six years in 2100.

Likewise, the economic models tell us that the cost is substantial.
The cost of Kyoto compliance is at least $150 billion a year. For
comparison, the UN estimates that half that amount could permanently
solve the most pressing humanitarian problems in the world: it could
buy clean drinking water, sanitation, basic health care and education
to every single person in the world.

Global warming will mainly harm the developing countries, because they
are poorer and therefore less able to handle climate changes. However,
even the most pessimistic forecasts from the UN expect the average
person in the developing countries to be richer in 2100 than we are
now.

So action on global warming is basically a very costly way of doing
very little for much richer people far into the future. We need to ask
ourselves if this indeed should be our first priority.

Of course, in the best of all worlds, we would not need to prioritise.
We could do all good things. We could win the war against hunger, end
conflicts, stop communicable diseases, provide clean drinking, step up
education and halt climate change. But we don't. And we have to ask
the hard question: If we don't do it all, what should we do first?

Some of the world's top economists – including three Nobel Laureates –
answered this question at the Copenhagen Consensus last May,
prioritising all the major requirements for improving the world. They
found that dealing with HIV/Aids, hunger, free trade and malaria were
the world's top priorities. This was where we could do the most good
for our dollar. Equally, the experts rated urgent responses to climate
change at the bottom. In fact, the panel called these ventures –
including Kyoto – "bad projects", simply because they cost more than
the good they do.

The Copenhagen Consensus gives us great hope because it shows us that
there are so many good things we can do. For $27 billion we could
prevent 28 million people from getting HIV. For $12 billion we could
cut malaria cases by more than a billion a year. Instead of helping
richer people inefficiently far into the future, we can do immense
good right now.

We live in a world with limited resources, where we struggle to solve
just some of its challenges. This means that caring more about some
issues end up meaning caring less about others. If we have a moral
obligation, it is to spend each dollar doing the most good that we
possibly can.

So in a curious way, global warming really is the moral test of our
time, but not in the way its proponents imagined. We need to stop our
obsession with global warming, and start dealing with the many more
pressing issues in the world, where we can do most good first and
quickest.

Bjørn Lomborg is associate professor in political science at the
University of Aarhus, and author of Global Crises, Global Solutions
and The Skeptical Environmentalist.

Save the world, ignore global warming
The Sunday Telegraph (U.K.) ^ | 12/12/04 | Bjorn Lomborg

Global warming has become the obsession of our time. From governments
and campaigners meeting for the climate summit in Buenos Aires right
now we hear the incessant admonition: making global warming our first
priority is the moral test of our age.

Yet they are wrong.

Bjørn Lomborg is associate professor in political science at the
University of Aarhus, and author of Global Crises, Global Solutions
and The Skeptical Environmentalist.

Save the world, ignore global warming
The Sunday Telegraph (U.K.) ^ | 12/12/04 | Bjorn Lomborg

Global warming has become the obsession of our time. From governments
and campaigners meeting for the climate summit in Buenos Aires right
now we hear the incessant admonition: making global warming our first
priority is the moral test of our age.

Yet they are wrong. Global warming is real and caused by CO2. The
trouble is that the climate models show we can do very little about
the warming. Even if everyone (including the United States) did Kyoto
and stuck to it throughout the century, the change would be almost
immeasurable, postponing warming by just six years in 2100.

Likewise, the economic models tell us that the cost is substantial.
The cost of Kyoto compliance is at least $150 billion a year. For
comparison, the UN estimates that half that amount could permanently
solve the most pressing humanitarian problems in the world: it could
buy clean drinking water, sanitation, basic health care and education
to every single person in the world.

Global warming will mainly harm the developing countries, because they
are poorer and therefore less able to handle climate changes. However,
even the most pessimistic forecasts from the UN expect the average
person in the developing countries to be richer in 2100 than we are
now.

So action on global warming is basically a very costly way of doing
very little for much richer people far into the future. We need to ask
ourselves if this indeed should be our first priority.

Of course, in the best of all worlds, we would not need to prioritise.
We could do all good things. We could win the war against hunger, end
conflicts, stop communicable diseases, provide clean drinking, step up
education and halt climate change. But we don't. And we have to ask
the hard question: If we don't do it all, what should we do first?

Some of the world's top economists - including three Nobel Laureates -
answered this question at the Copenhagen Consensus last May,
prioritising all the major requirements for improving the world. They
found that dealing with HIV/Aids, hunger, free trade and malaria were
the world's top priorities. This was where we could do the most good
for our dollar. Equally, the experts rated urgent responses to climate
change at the bottom. In fact, the panel called these ventures -
including Kyoto - "bad projects", simply because they cost more than
the good they do.

The Copenhagen Consensus gives us great hope because it shows us that
there are so many good things we can do. For $27 billion we could
prevent 28 million people from getting HIV. For $12 billion we could
cut malaria cases by more than a billion a year. Instead of helping
richer people inefficiently far into the future, we can do immense
good right now.

We live in a world with limited resources, where we struggle to solve
just some of its challenges. This means that caring more about some
issues end up meaning caring less about others. If we have a moral
obligation, it is to spend each dollar doing the most good that we
possibly can.

So in a curious way, global warming really is the moral test of our
time, but not in the way its proponents imagined. We need to stop our
obsession with global warming, and start dealing with the many more
pressing issues in the world, where we can do most good first and
quickest.

Bjørn Lomborg is associate professor in political science at the
University of Aarhus, and author of Global Crises, Global Solutions
and The Skeptical Environmentalist.



----------------------------------------------------------------------
"Why would I listen to losers?" -- Arnold Schwarzenegger

"Long term commitment in relationships is only necessary because it takes
so damn long to raise children. Marriage may well be some kind of trick
to keep the males around beyond sexual satiation." -- Captain Compassion

"Progress is the increasing control of the environment by life.
--Will Durant

Joseph R. Darancette
res0mp8t@NOSPAMverizon.net

Save the world, ignore global warming
The Sunday Telegraph (U.K.) ^ | 12/12/04 | Bjorn Lomborg

Global warming has become the obsession of our time. From governments
and campaigners meeting for the climate summit in Buenos Aires right
now we hear the incessant admonition: making global warming our first
priority is the moral test of our age.

Yet they are wrong. Global warming is real and caused by CO2. The
trouble is that the climate models show we can do very little about
the warming. Even if everyone (including the United States) did Kyoto
and stuck to it throughout the century, the change would be almost
immeasurable, postponing warming by just six years in 2100.

Likewise, the economic models tell us that the cost is substantial.
The cost of Kyoto compliance is at least $150 billion a year. For
comparison, the UN estimates that half that amount could permanently
solve the most pressing humanitarian problems in the world: it could
buy clean drinking water, sanitation, basic health care and education
to every single person in the world.

Global warming will mainly harm the developing countries, because they
are poorer and therefore less able to handle climate changes. However,
even the most pessimistic forecasts from the UN expect the average
person in the developing countries to be richer in 2100 than we are
now.

So action on global warming is basically a very costly way of doing
very little for much richer people far into the future. We need to ask
ourselves if this indeed should be our first priority.

Of course, in the best of all worlds, we would not need to prioritise.
We could do all good things. We could win the war against hunger, end
conflicts, stop communicable diseases, provide clean drinking, step up
education and halt climate change. But we don't. And we have to ask
the hard question: If we don't do it all, what should we do first?

Some of the world's top economists - including three Nobel Laureates -
answered this question at the Copenhagen Consensus last May,
prioritising all the major requirements for improving the world. They
found that dealing with HIV/Aids, hunger, free trade and malaria were
the world's top priorities. This was where we could do the most good
for our dollar. Equally, the experts rated urgent responses to climate
change at the bottom. In fact, the panel called these ventures -
including Kyoto - "bad projects", simply because they cost more than
the good they do.

The Copenhagen Consensus gives us great hope because it shows us that
there are so many good things we can do. For $27 billion we could
prevent 28 million people from getting HIV. For $12 billion we could
cut malaria cases by more than a billion a year. Instead of helping
richer people inefficiently far into the future, we can do immense
good right now.

We live in a world with limited resources, where we struggle to solve
just some of its challenges. This means that caring more about some
issues end up meaning caring less about others. If we have a moral
obligation, it is to spend each dollar doing the most good that we
possibly can.

So in a curious way, global warming really is the moral test of our
time, but not in the way its proponents imagined. We need to stop our
obsession with global warming, and start dealing with the many more
pressing issues in the world, where we can do most good first and
quickest.

Bjørn Lomborg is associate professor in political science at the
University of Aarhus, and author of Global Crises, Global Solutions
and The Skeptical Environmentalist.



----------------------------------------------------------------------
"Why would I listen to losers?" -- Arnold Schwarzenegger

"Long term commitment in relationships is only necessary because it takes
so damn long to raise children. Marriage may well be some kind of trick
to keep the males around beyond sexual satiation." -- Captain Compassion

"Progress is the increasing control of the environment by life.
--Will Durant

Joseph R. Darancette
res0mp8t@NOSPAMverizon.net