Lessons and options from an IPCC inquisition
The IPCC Fifth Assessment Report Working Group 3 Summary for Policymakers, released yesterday, contains many important messages, including the following (some of which have been paraphrased for clarity):
In summary, the WG3 Summary for Policymakers reinforces and extends the key messages from Working Groups 1 and 2 that climate change is real, has dangerous consequences for humanity and requires our immediate action to rapidly and substantially reduce human-caused climate change emissions, which are the dominant cause of the problem.
Somewhat desperately in my view, the Summary suggests that we may have to rely on energy from biomass with carbon capture and storage to reduce CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere to acceptable levels following “overshoot”.
Political and policy challenges in reducing climate change emissions
The World Economic Forum’s Global Risks Report 2014 states “Global risks can only be effectively dealt with if there is a common understanding of their importance and interconnected nature, and a readiness to engage in multi-stakeholder dialogue and action.”
However, public policy analyst Prof Michael Howlett suggests “risk averse governments are often happier to do nothing or little rather than do something which might lead them to be blamed for a failure. This aversion in the climate change case extends so far as leading some governments to engage in a number of procedural strategies intended to downplay a problem and deny the need for substantive action to deal with it rather than take positive action towards its remediation.”
Commenting on Howlett’s paper, Paul Harris, a professor of global and environmental studies, stated “When historians look back at policies intended to curb the world’s greenhouse gas emissions, they will conclude that they involved more science, diplomacy, politics and policy activity than anything else in human history. They will also conclude that they failed.”
Harris concludes “Sadly, by the time climate change impacts are bad enough for policymakers to react effectively, it will probably be too late. Policy innovation in the near future can, at best, mitigate the worst effects of climate change in the distant future. Even positive policy innovation now cannot avoid negative outcomes for future generations. Whatever the future policy scenario, substantial negativity is inevitable.”
What can Australians do to reduce the risk of leaving a terrible legacy for our children?
Australia is vulnerable to climate change impacts and is heavily dependent on fossil fuels for both domestic use and export. On the other hand, Australian society has demonstrated that it has the innovative capability to take a leading role in developing and implementing low-emission technologies and adopting low-emission lifestyles.
Ideally, federal and state governments would jointly provide leadership on deploying that capability, coordinated through the Council of Australian Governments. However, that seems unlikely given the present combative and ill-informed political debate about climate change and the influence of the fossil fuel industry.
University of Adelaide law school senior lecturer Dr Peter Burdon suggests “it is essential for ethical people to be active to protect the people and places they love. In undertaking this work, results matter – but they do not matter so much as whether or not one makes the effort”.
So what steps might we take?
Energy analyst Hugh Saddler recently investigated the reasons behind the continuing fall since 2010 in electricity supplied via Australia’s National Electricity Market, which has also reduced CO2 emissions because of reduced generation by fossil fuel power stations. Saddler concluded that the three largest factors were the impact of (mainly regulatory) energy efficiency programs, structural change in the economy away from electricity intensive industries and, since 2010, the response of electricity consumers, especially residential consumers, to higher electricity prices.
Another factor he identified was the growth in output from rooftop solar photovoltaics and other small, distributed generation. Ric Brazzale, managing director at Green Energy Trading, corroborated these conclusions, particularly with respect to rooftop photovoltaics. So, households and businesses can play an effective role in reducing climate change emissions and may save money in the process.
Apart from emissions from fossil fuel power stations, we also have to reduce emissions from all our other activities. Actions by individuals, households and businesses are necessary and may be cost-effective. However, as the Summary points out “Effective mitigation will not be achieved if individual agents advance their own interests independently”. Indeed, climate change and other related problems won’t be solved unless we all adopt more prudent and frugal lifestyles.
In the absence of effective leadership from federal and state governments, Australia’s best hope for organising and coordinating collective action is at local government and community level and there are many encouraging examples of that. (See for example, Local Government NSW, Planning for Climate Change; Sustainable Tools for Environmental Performance Strategy; Hepburn Wind.)
Thus we need not despair because of incompetence in high office. In fact we might die waiting for that problem to be solved ('The Peter Principle').
By all means ask your politicians why they are failing to provide leadership on climate change mitigation but also take Burdon’s advice to take action. Talk to your local council and to your neighbours about what you and your local community can do.
Hugh Outhred is a senior visiting fellow at the School of Electrical Engineering and Telecommunications, University of New South Wales.