What does climate change cost?

Hi everyone, 

First: I've become slightly less tech-nitwit and found out how to put this thing onto BLOGLOVIN'. So go on, click the button on the top of this page! 

Today's post is on a topic I recently got interested in, because of a great lecture in our UCL course 'Politics of Climate Change', by Dr. Sam Randalls. I'll be talking about the economics of climate change - not cold specific, but so interesting I want to ramble on about it for a bit.

I'm not used to thinking of climate change within an economic framework. I am a scientist (or rather hope to be able to call myself one, in some far-away future), so the term 'climate change' makes me think: GCM simulations, glacier mass balance, orbital forcing, temperature trends and endless hours looking for the reason the matlab coding for my model run won't work. 

Aha, a cliché picture. Appropriate nonetheless.

Source

This particular course is more alpha/gamma than beta based and includes master's students from many different programmes, among which Environment, science and society, Aquatic Science and various ones from the politics and economics departments. Many of the students in the course have much less specific knowledge of climate change than us, but know much more about policy than the MSc. Climate Change people do. Many of them also consider Climate Change a global challenge of secondary or tertiary importance compared to other challenges, because they are more focused on e.g. economic development in the global South. 
Because of the interactive group discussion component of the class, this makes for interesting but sometimes frustrating discussions, because the differences in framing the problem are often so large. 

The economic framework introduced in the lecture only emphasized to me the difficulty of climate change mitigation policy. Also, it was another confrontation with how many policy makers but also fellow students don't seem to understand the urgency of the issue at hand. Again. A matter of framework and opinion. 

Here is a quote from the UN Framework Convention Article 3: 

“The Parties should take precautionary measures to anticipate, prevent or minimize the causes of climate change and mitigate its adverse effects. Where there are threats of serious or irreversible damage, lack of full scientific certainty should not be used as a reason for postponing such measures, taking into account that policies and measures to deal with climate change should be cost-effective so as to ensure global benefits at the lowest possible cost. To achieve this, such policies and measures should take into account different socio-economic contexts, be comprehensive, cover all relevant sources, sinks and reservoirs of greenhouse gases and adaptation, and comprise all economic sectors.” 

Climate change has thus become an issue that by economists is weighed by cost/benefit principles. The Stern review is seen as the absolute document in this area; a cost-benefit analysis with ethical input, the second of which is now in progress (Randalls, 2014). In my head, it's the economic equivalent of the IPCC reports (any thoughts on this?). 

Cost-benefit analyses regarding climate change have been controversial since they exist, and very understandably so. They either focus on a specific goal derived from science - often, 2 degrees C as a "climate change limit" - or look for an optimal amount of climate change, where it e.g. improves Siberian agriculture to an extent that it is economically beneficial. 

So what are the main issues at hand? From what I gathered from lectures and readings: 

- The climate does not change homogeneously across the planet. Siberia suddenly being viable for agriculture might mean sacrificing a few islands in the Pacific or the Dutch shoreline and having 'Amersfoort aan Zee'. The same goes for glaciers and ecosystems that will vanish forever. We can roughly calculate the economic benefit of a warmer climate in e.g. Scandinavia. But what is the cost of losing Alpine glaciers for ever, or the entire species of Polar Bears? In short: how to put a price on this? How to compare the cost and benefit here?

-  When will it be too late? For many ecosystems or parts of the hydrological system, it is already irreversibly too late. "Waiting for more evidence" as many economists have been recommending for decades, will eventually lead to mitigation costs that are unbearable. Also; economists are often judged as climate-skeptics. Agree/disagree?

- How much can we put on future generations? How many of the inevitable mitigation strategies necessary can we burden next generations with? This again depends on economic projections: will they have the resources to take on this burden? To make a highly dramatic statement: with what 'climate debt' do you want your grandkids to come into the world? 



Finally, what are the viable economic strategies for mitigation? There are two: carbon markets (cap-and-trade and project based) and carbon taxes. Implementation: the issue with free trade undermining the benefits of a carbon market and the USA's full-on tantrum when it comes to carbon taxes. Also, these strategies will have an effect on the global South, who (understandably) argue for our moral responsibility to let them develop. 

Conclusion: DIFFICULT. Hugely interesting, terribly depressing, maybe even more so than my science-side-of-things-courses. But I hope to learn more, because policy is something we can't conveniently shove aside as an issue that doesn't concern scientists.

Please share your opinions, points of view, questions and ideas for future topics with me. I appreciate them!

Let me clear some things up!

Hi there,

First of all: yay, let's celebrate that from now on I don't have to overthink every word I post on here! Because finally, I will not be graded for it anymore. I'm very happy that my global environmental change course had us start our blogs, but I'm also very excited for not waking up in the middle of the night thinking "Did I actually cite that article?" or "Was that last post academic enough?".

So on to the order of business. I am going to clear a few things up in today's post. The reason for this: it seems to me that many people have a difficulty distinguishing between climate CHANGE, climate VARIABILITY and the ominous term GLOBAL WARMING. 

Not enough white stuff.. Look at it, so brown!

The lack of snow of the past month led to many conversations on the skilift that went as follows: "Oh there really is little snow this year, huh..?" "Yeah man, it's crazy! Never seen it like this." "Me neither. Damn climate change/ global warming."

And this makes me so incredibly angry! I realize this is slightly ridiculous, but as many of my friends know, climate change and nuclear energy are two very touchy, emotionally loaded subjects for me. Only talk to me about them if you are A) knowledgeable on the subject or B) interested and open-minded in learning something about it. Then I will enlighten you on the exact topic of this post and/or why nuclear energy is our only temporary energy option, if we want to reach the threshold atmospheric CO2 concentration of <350 ppm again. OK, sorry, back on topic..

So let's first discuss the ominous term that so many use but so few understand. GLOBAL WARMING. It's a physical process, and no, its definition is not that the UK is going to develop a tropical climate. It is however, indeed, a net increase in the energy contained in the earth's atmosphere, causing rising surface air temperatures. Also, the more correct term for it is RADIATIVE FORCING, which simply said is the increased trapping of longwave radiation because of a rising concentration of greenhouse gases. This is a gradual but alarming process, which is a DRIVER of our next topic.

Just to emphasize: global warming is a DRIVER of CLIMATE CHANGE. Climate change again mostly manifests itself through changes in the earth's hydro-ecological system. This includes desertification, glacial melt, sea level rise, and especially an increase in the extremes. This majority of the intensification in the system comes from a net transfer of freshwater from snow and ice, as well as increased vapour pressure leading to more precipitation and evapotranspiration. To make things easy: dry will get drier, wet will get wetter. Get ready for deserts, floods and storms. 

So essentially what climate change will intensify, is the term everyone neglects: CLIMATE VARIABILITY. It's been around since planet earth exists, because climate is per definition an average. Usually over a period of 30 years, which is the generally accepted definition by the world meteorological organization. Climate variability encompasses the anomalies, such as a very hot summer, or in this case, a winter with very little snow.

So in conclusion: there is no way we can attribute the lack of snow this winter to climate change. It is simply climate variability. So quit bullshitting that it's climate change. What we do know, is that global warming is leading to higher night-time minimum temperatures, and thus to less snow in the future. Climate change will be driving up the snow boundary, so lower-lying ski areas will be in trouble. So yes, climate change has an overall impact on the amount of snow. But it's climate variability you have to blame your lack of this season's powder runs on.


P.S. Sorry for the capitals, the italics and the bold print. But as I said; touchy subject for me.
P.P.S. Check out this Huffington Post article, which explains it quite well (or scroll down a few posts for the direct impact on the ski industry)

Still Concerned

Hi there,


As most of you know, I started and kept up this blog in the framework of our UCL course 'Global Environmental Change'. Over the course of the past months, I've been looking different places, researching the influence of climate and environmental change on "cold stuff" there - ice, snow, permafrost. From the Arctic, to Germany, over Austria and other places, back to Iceland. Each region has its own story to tell, and the concern for the cold is alive in all of them.

I hope that with this blog, I've perhaps informed you about things you didn't know before - polar bear/sea ice interaction, the (endangered) existence of delicious ice wine, how we affect the climate through the snowsports industry. Also, I hope I've pointed out some interesting literature, movies and websites, to enrich your own web of knowledge sources.

But much more importantly, I hope that I've brought to your attention how climate change hits much closer to home than you might realize. It affects everyday lives, regardless whether it does yours or not. So many ecosystems and people's existences are based around the cold climate of their area, for which they now have to fear. The planet will survive, the populations on it will not. Which is why the 'mañana mañana' attitude regarding climate and environmental change needs to turn around. Needs to turn into understanding. Into progressive thinking. Into solution-oriented discussion. 

Might be a cliché, but I'd like to be able to take the

same picture again in say, 50 years and still be standing

in front of an actual iceberg. Not at this rate..

(At Jökulsárlón, Iceland)

I am still concerned about the cold, if not more so than before starting this blog. I will keep it up, because I'm a passionate budding scientist in this area, hoping to devote my life to glaciology and climate change. So even though the blog might become a little quieter, keep on the lookout for new posts. Thanks to the ones loyally reading and commenting, it's been a great learning experience.

Couldn't help but posting...

... this article.

Have a laugh and have a think - it connects to my previous post.

Growing Ice Chills Global Warming?

Hi all,

Better late than never: happy new year, hopefully with interesting discoveries and experiences.

Today's post is something we have been seeing popping up over the past years: theories on how 'climate change isn't real'. Of course, this plays right in the hands of many sceptics, for whom climate change mitigation policies would be an inconvenience in the least.

I want to discuss the following Guardian opinion article: "Antarctica: record cold and growing ice chills global warming theories." The article argues that due to record cold and the growth of ice in Antarctica, the arguments of extreme heat, ice melt and rising sea level in other parts in the world become redundant. Also, it doubts the value of scientific research, because of its 'contradictory evidence'. "Perhaps, the chill of growing ice and the record cold in Antarctica have caused China to theorize that global warming is a hoax. (...) All of the “proofs” of global warming seem to be embarrassed by the observed data." (Gaul, 2013)

It displays little understanding of science, especially of climate dynamics. The concept of natural variability is one the author disregards entirely. Also, he is one of the many who regards the hiatus as proof against global warming. 

Personally, I am scared of these kinds of articles, because they are so conveniently convincing to the non-scientist. Firstly, they lead us into a false sense of security, causing us to believe that if the hiatus continues, we have nothing to worry about. Secondly, they make the public doubt the scientific community. Of course, a healthy dose of critical thinking is what science needs in order to stay truthful. But this article ridicules science with easy-to-believe false reasoning. 

I'd like to hear your thoughts on this article in particular, and the many others of its kind, as well as ideas on how to give the public non-opinionated information that is more easily understandable than a journal article.