Monday, November 25, 2019

Climate Links November 2019 #2

Back in September, Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment produced a report in collaboration with the Earth Institute of Columbia University and the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, called 

The missing economic risks in assessments of climate change impacts. Sept. 20, 2019.
PDF available.

An introductory article about it at Yale Climate Connections can be found here:

New report finds costs of climate change impacts often underestimatedDana Nuccitelli. Nov. 18, 2019.
It's difficult to accurately project the costs of climate change impacts because the rate and magnitude of climate change is unprecedented.  
"Climate economics researchers have often underestimated – sometimes badly underestimated – the costs of damages resulting from climate change. Those underestimates occur particularly in scenarios where Earth’s temperature warms beyond the Paris climate target of 1.5 to 2 degrees C (2.7 to 3.6 degrees F). 
That’s the conclusion of a new report written by a team of climate and Earth scientists and economists from the Earth Institute at Columbia University, the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, and the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment. It’s a conclusion consistent with the findings of numerous recent climate economics studies...."

Those are both more diplomatic / polite criticisms of the absurdity of most climate change economics, practiced by the likes of Tol and (recent Nobel-prize winner) Nordhaus.

But if you truly want to understand just how bad that state of affairs is, then you can do no better than reading Steve Keen.

Keen is a (heterodox) economist whom I have been following for well over a decade. He is, IMO, one of the rare economists who truly understands how credit and debt impact the economy, (e.g. Economists Ignore One of Capitalism’s Biggest Problems. Banks Create Money out of Nothing.)... and, as such, was one of the very rare economists that anticipated the '08/09 GFC (e.g. Steve Keen's Debtwatch, circa April 2007

He has in the past year turned his keen eye and sharp wit upon dissecting the state of cli.ch.econ. In fact, he has started collaborating with another researcher/analyst whose work I've come to very much respect, Tim Garrett, Prof of Atmospheric Sciences at Univ of Utah. Garrett has long been integrating a physics approach to the study of economies (e.g. here: Long-run global economic growth)

In any case, Keen has a much less subtle takedown of the inanity of Nordhaus's work (as representative of most work in the field of climate change economics), for which I've attached a PDF, and for which you can find more info here: Steve Keen on Nordhaus (Playing with DICE; Shocked Disbelief) and here: The Cost of Climate Change: A Nobel Economist’s Model Dismantled, and here: ‘4°C of global warming is optimal’ – even Nobel Prize winners are getting things catastrophically wrong.



The Collapse of Civilization May Have Already Begun. Nafeez Ahmed, vice. Nov. 22, 2019.
Scientists disagree on the timeline of collapse and whether it's imminent. But can we afford to be wrong? And what comes after?

Economics for the future – Beyond the superorganism. Nate Hagens. Science Direct.



WHAT TO EXPECT FROM THE UN’S COP 25 CLIMATE CHANGE CONFERENCE. Andrew Urevig, Ensia. Nov. 26, 2019.


The planet is burning. Stephen J Pyne, aeon. Nov. 20, 2019.
Wild, feral and fossil-fuelled, fire lights up the globe. Is it time to declare that humans have created a Pyrocene?

Climate Change Is Coming for Global Trade. Joseph Curtin, Foreign Policy. Nov. 16, 2019.
As sea levels rise and storms become fiercer, container shipping could be in for major disruptions

Global heating supercharging Indian Ocean climate system. Peter Beaumont and Graham Readfearn, Guardian. Nov. 19, 2019.


Climate change fueled the rise and demise of the Neo-Assyrian Empire, superpower of the ancient world. The Conversation. Nov. 13, 2019.
Climate change is here to stay. In the 21st century, people have what Neo-Assyrians did not: the benefit of hindsight and plenty of observational data. Unsustainable growth in politically volatile and water-stressed regions is a time-tested recipe for disaster.




https://twitter.com/tveitdal/status/1199615758285856768?s=09

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