KYOTO OR PUNT?

Brad DeLong has an insightful response to the Skeptical Environmentalist's attack on the Kyoto treaty.

He [Lomborg] may well still be right that inaction on control of greenhouse gas emissions over the next twenty years is the best policy--but that claim needs a footnote warning that we need now to build the institutions necessary to take swift action if it turns out that things are worse than expected. He may well be right that the resources that Kyoto would suck up would do more for human welfare if spent creating a more human world by boosting public health and economic infrastructure--but that claim needs to be accompanied by a plan to make sure that these resources are devoted to their best alternative use in the global south. "Would" cuts no ice here. "Will" does.

And, most disappointing of all, is Lomborg's failure to even mention the importance of technological development. If it is the best policy to wait for a technological fix to the problem of global warming, then we need first to fix our technology so that it will be able to do what we ask of it when we need it.

It's not my field of expertise, but as a card-carrying economist I can't help but think that Lomborg is probably right when he condemns Kyoto as a worthless waste of the world's wealth--as something that will be ineffective at fighting global warming and so expensive as to foreclose options to do other things that would be more useful. Lomborg's flaw, however, is that he doesn't spell out what the "other things" we should be doing are. And that's what he needs to do if he wants to advance the ball.

This may come as news to the environmental ostriches, but the best alternative to flawed global warming policy might be an alternative policy, rather than none at all. Anyone ever thought of tying those IMF loans to investments in clean technology rather than failed austerity programs? Are you ready to explain to your grandchild why driving an SUV to Target was worth sinking half of Bangladesh under the ocean? Please forgive me if I remain skeptical of environmental skepticism.