Notes On Climate Risk

Michael Mann's Ecowatch article Climate Shock talks about the "fat tail" risks of climate change if there is a doubling of CO2 to pre-industrial levels (~550 ppm, or 700 ppm CO2-equivalent, or CO2e).

From Climate Shock: The Economic Consequences of a Hotter Planet, by Environmental Defense Fund senior economist Gernot Wagner and Harvard economist Martin Weitzman. There is a >10% chance that we will get 6C of warming

The point all such articles is scare people enough to get them to do something about future climate risk. All such efforts have failed up to now. Why does Mann think his latest effort might work?

Damned if I know.

An interesting related question asks how does Mann himself assess climate risk?

We find the answer in Esquire's When the End of Human Civilization Is Your Day Job, subtitled Among many climate scientists, gloom has set in. Things are worse than we think, but they can't really talk about it.

Here's Esquire reporter John H. Richardson talking about Mann's private view of things.

As Mann sees it, scientists like [NASA climate modeler Gavin] Schmidt who choose to focus on the middle of the curve aren't really being scientific. Worse are pseudo-sympathizers like Bjorn Lomborg who always focus on the gentlest possibilities. Because we're supposed to hope for the best and prepare for the worst, and a real scientific response would also give serious weight to the dark side of the curve.

And yet, like Schmidt, Mann tries very hard to look on the bright side.

We can solve this problem in a way that doesn't disrupt our lifestyle, he says.

Public awareness seems to be increasing, and there are a lot of good things happening at the executive level: tighter fuel-efficiency standards, the carbon-pricing initiatives by the New England and West Coast states, the recent agreement between the U. S. and China on emissions. Last year we saw global economic growth without an increase in carbon emissions, which suggests it's possible to "decouple" oil and economic growth. And social change can happen very fast—look at gay marriage.

But he knows that gay marriage had no huge economic downside, and the most powerful companies in the world are fighting to stop any change in the fossil-fuel economy.

So yes, he struggles with doubt. And he admits that some of his colleagues are very depressed, convinced there's no way the international community will rise to the challenge.

He gets into that conversation in bars after climate conferences, always pushing the side of hope.

We can solve this problem in a way that doesn't disrupt our lifestyle. Oh, my!

So it is clear that Michael Mann, generally speaking, can not assess risk, as I discussed in Adventures In Flatland — Part II. 

Mann believes he can assess climate risk in a "business as usual" scenario, but fails to understand any of the following risks—

• The risk that human nature precludes a meaningful human response to the climate problem, due in no small part to the fact that Flatland humans like Michael Mann can not assess risk properly.

• The risk that the global economy is increasingly shaky and may be entering a prolonged period of stagnation with occasional recessions. That is not BAU, and the risk is that a global slowdown may make the energy transition harder, not easier. (On the upside, this would slow emissions growth, a result which environmentalists will no doubt take credit for.)

• The risk that running our global civilization on renewable energy sources is simply not possible. Therefore, leaving all those fossil fuels in the ground is the biggest risk of all as far as global civilization is concerned.

• The risk that replacing fossil fuels with renewable energy sources, if it seems possible, will take five decades of continuous, hard effort without our knowing the final outcome.

• The risk that the growth aspirations of every large nation on Earth, especially those outside the OECD, will defeat all efforts to leave fossil fuels in the ground (i.e., global economic growth and decarbonizing the energy supply are simply not compatible).

• The risk posed by the fact that the Earth's atmosphere is a commons, meaning that every large nation on Earth must fully participate in decarbonizing the energy supply. If there are any defectors in this giant game of tit-for-tat, others will opt out as well.

• The risk that crude oil production will eventually go into permanent decline in a world which has utterly failed to come up with viable (i.e., affordable and efficient) large-scale technological alternatives to liquid fossil fuels.

• The risk that the consequences of climate change itself, along with its associated positive feedbacks, will eventually become a continuous drag on the global economy, thus crippling our ability to respond to climate change.

• The risk that the necessary technological breakthroughs that might help us mitigate climate change will not be forthcoming.

This list is surely not complete and is not ordered, but it's the best I could come with on the spur of the moment. Bear in mind that listing something as a "risk" is not a prediction that it will come true in some specific time frame. Also, I restricted myself to the climate problem, and didn't mention our degrading oceans, the current mass extinction, etc.

All of these risks are rarely considered because of humanity's characteristic optimism and obligatory hope. Some of these risks are incompatible with growth and humanity's characteristic economic frame of reference, which I discussed in the second Flatland essay. Some of these risks are not compatible with technophilia and our ancient (and presumably instinctual) linking of technology with survival.

So none of these risks seem to exist for Michael Mann, yet each one poses a potential threat to humanity. Remember, Mann wants to believe that we can solve this problem in a way that doesn't disrupt our lifestyle. 

I would remind Michael Mann, who struggles with doubt, that taking doubt seriously is the beginning of wisdom. Trying "very hard to look on the bright side" goes nowhere at all.

Well, at least we're on top of that gay marriage problem.

Pointless bullshit. Humans can't even get to first base.

Comments

[Mike Cooper]

Do you think Mann believes what he says, or just refuses to contemplate the truth?

Once again a great illustration of the pointlessness of Flatland thinking, Dave.