Climate Change

The Scope of the Climate Crisis - [ECO]NOMICS Part 1 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AlFKMIfqaPE
Apr 27, 2022

Professor Juliet Schor (@Boston College) reviews the way economists have approached the problem of climate change. Conventional economists have misunderstood the problem and misdirected their attentions, producing policy recommendations that are not up to the challenge. Many economists have focused on technological innovation, believing it sufficient. Others have misdiagnosed it as a failure of government policy coordination, concluding it is an insurmountable political problem rather than an economic one. They overlook that climate destabilization has structurally inequitable causes and impacts. Economists have tended to analyze it as a market failure and their recommendations over-rely on market mechanisms of dubious effectiveness to correct it. Still others have taken out inadequate cost-benefit analysis toolkits to construct overly optimistic estimates of the impact of climate disruption on the economy. Economists have been central to the failure to respond to the crisis, and their approach has undermined action.
https://www.ineteconomics.org/perspectives/videos/eco-nomics 

India Endures Record Heat Wave: ‘The Only Reason Is Global Warming’ https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-04-29/india-braces-for-prolonged-extreme-heat-waves 
The life-threatening, extreme temperatures have caused hours-long power blackouts and put millions of people at risk.

Thermometer readings have already reached 46 degrees Celsius (115 degrees Fahrenheit) in central and northern India, with two months to go before the monsoon season that typically brings cooling rains. They hit the highest since 1901 last month.-  Mrutyunjay Mohapatra, head of the country’s meteorological department

https://www.ndtv.com/india-news/india-weather-extreme-heat-waves-set-to-stretch-into-early-may-2932060

 https://thebreakthrough.org/issues/energy/world-bank-imf-shift-focus-from-poverty-to-climate-change

The World Bank and IMF Are Getting It Wrong on Climate Change  https://foreignpolicy.com/2022/04/11/the-world-bank-and-imf-are-getting-it-wrong-on-climate-change/ 
Rich donor countries are working to deprioritize poverty reduction and economic development in the global south.
By Vijaya Ramachandran, the director for energy and development at the Breakthrough Institute, and Arthur Baker, an associate director at the University of Chicago’s Development Innovation Lab.

The shift of focus from poverty to climate is unjust, ineffective, and disastrous for the world’s poor. It’s unjust because rich countries are forcing the World Bank and IMF to deprioritize poverty reduction despite this mission being vital to protect developing countries from the climate shocks caused by rich countries’ emissions. It’s ineffective because poor countries make up only a tiny fraction of global emissions—and their share will remain small even if they were to grow rapidly using fossil fuels. And it will be a disaster for the 3 billion people struggling to escape misery because every dollar spent on the new carbon-reduction mission is a dollar that could instead go into education, medical services, food security, and critical infrastructure

In their zeal to reach emissions targets, rich countries are conflating two things, both of which are crucial to avoid the worst effects of climate change. Mitigation—the reduction of emissions—mostly needs to take place in rich and middle-income countries, which are responsible for the vast majority of carbon emissions. Adaptation—improving resilience to a warming climate—is lifesaving in poorer, more vulnerable countries. Adaptation requires investments in better housing, transportation, education, infrastructure, water management, agricultural technology, and other sectors. And it requires reducing poverty—so that more people have the resources to cope with weather-related extremes. Until now, these kinds of investments have been the bread and butter of the World Bank and other development institutions. By shifting development funding to emissions reduction, they are taking money from the poor and making them less resilient than they would otherwise be.

Prioritizing carbon mitigation over adaptation and poverty reduction in low- and lower-middle-income countries stands the relationship between climate change and development on its head.

The energy Africa needs to develop -- and fight climate change https://www.ted.com/talks/rose_m_mutiso_the_energy_africa_needs_to_develop_and_fight_climate_change?language=en " Everyone must get to a zero-carbon future. In the transition, Africa and other poor nations deserve to get the balance of what's remaining in the world's carbon budget. For economic competitiveness, for climate adaptation, for global stability and for economic justice, rich and high-emitting countries must uphold their responsibility to lead on decarbonization, starting in their own economies. We all have a collective responsibility to turn the tide on climate change. If we fail, it won't be because Senegal or Kenya or Benin or Mali decided to build a handful of natural gas power plants to provide economic opportunity for their people.