Between email lists, several columns in Tweetdeck and a constantly moving Facebook news feed I probably have anywhere between 25 and 50 campaigns fly by me on a given day. Keeping up to speed is as good it gets, it’s next to impossible to engage in any meaningful way. Here’s one of those occasions where it’s worth taking a timeout and wading in; the continued investment by the World Bank in large scale fossil energy projects.

There is great background on the South African Eskom deal here, exhibit A when it comes to investigating the misdemeanours of the World Bank. The bottom line:

• Promotion of fossil fuels: Despite its pro-poor, pro-climate rhetoric, the World Bank’s fossil fuel lending has increased 400% since 20060% of these projects were funded specifically to provide energy access to the poor.
• The International Energy Agency (IEA) predicts that continuing to pursue centralised coal powered electricity will only lower the un-electrified population from 1.4 billion today to 1.2 billion in 2030.
• The IEA’s 2010 World Energy Outlook states that in order to achieve universal energy access 70% of today’s un-electrified population will rely on decentralized renewable energy systems.

It’s time for the World Bank to update it’s energy policies. To incorporate strategies that will have much greater impact in fighting poverty, reducing global warming, and environmental impacts.

The public campaign calling for that update starts today. The Sierra Club (remember them) and World Development Movement lead the charge. Bring it on.

Ardnacrusha: The 1920's biggest Irish tourist attraction

The country can’t afford it, it will take too long and what is more, there simply is not the demand. All excuses used to knock back, initially, Ireland’s first national power generation scheme, Ardnacrusha, in the 1920s and then the Rural Electrification Scheme in the forties.

Ardnacrusha was a monument to modernity, a huge concrete hydro plant built on Ireland’s largest waterway, the Shannon. And this in a country that had barely emerged from the fogs of Victorian colonialism. In fact, even that seems far too grand a concept for Saorstát Éireann in 1925, a newly forged country run by “young men standing amongst the ruins of one administration with the foundations of another not yet laid and with wild men screaming through the key-hole” to re-hash Kevin O’Higgins famous description of early government.

Ireland was a country with zero industry, zero money and outside of Dublin, zero electricity. And yet with the help of some vorsprung durch Siemens, it had the imagination and the willpower to sign off a nation changing capital project. The cost, £5m, 20% of the government’s annual budget at the time. What’s more, the project came in on time and went over-budget by a mere £150,000.

With memories of Ardnacrusha still alive, the Rural Electrification Scheme was conceived in 1945 to bring light to the majority of Ireland’s two million rural dwellers. Again, the scheme was described as madness. It took already 2,000 miles of line to supply Ireland’s towns and cities, it would take a further 75,000 miles to reach the parts other electricity schemes could not. 1,200 transformers existed in the country in 1945. Another 100,000 would be required to finish the job. And roughly one million wooden poles would have to be found somewhere (Finland!). Ireland was still an agrarian nation, the war had destroyed trade with its only market, the UK, and as in the 20s, it had not a pot to piss in. Yet 15 years later the scheme was nearly done, Ireland’s dispersed population had at last running water in their kitchens, lightbulbs in their hallways and the ability to serve Guinness Extra Cold in the local.

I recall all of this for two reasons, the first, I’ve spend the week reading the history of electricity in Ireland. It makes for a tidy case study of local and national identity, technology and politics. But more than that, it illustrates how the identity of Ireland was produced (indeed reflexively co-produced) in the mix of nationalism, ambition, engineering feat and civic pride that went into these crazy big projects. And maybe that pot needs to be stirred again.

The second reason, the week begun with a pair of regressive statements from leading members of Ireland’s commentariat, Myers and O’Toole. Myers produced an unusually il-informed libertarian monolgoue on the foolishness of investment in wind energy in light of this harshest of winters. O’Toole meanwhile would be the Hugo Chavez of Western Europe, bemoaning foreign ownership and low extraction taxes of hydrocarbons beneath Irish waters. Nationalise them all he didn’t quite say but was certainly well on the road. But in that he missed the big point, as did Myers. Ireland is in a position not entirely dissimilar to that of the 1920s. A tired old administration hasn’t even bothered ordering 2011 diaries, its work is done. The new government is going to be faced with some big choices, propping up banks, endorsing the EU-IMF deal, and as O’Toole alludes to, the hegemonic kowtowing to Big Oil engaged by their predecessors.

They will likely claim, as will governments elsewhere in Europe, that big capital projects are off the table for now. The rules of our new austerity prevent such dreaming. But that’s the thing about dreams, they’re usually the events of our histories re-imagined. And as oil heads back to $100 per barrel, if we were to bring out our pencil and squared paper, what would an energy-secure Ireland (or UK for that matter) look like now I wonder. Maybe, if their number can be found, it’s time to call back those nice men from Siemens.

Pic (cc) JesseYounger1.

Reading Zygmunt Bauman at the moment. In Consuming Life he lifts this great quote from Mary Douglas‘ In the Active Voice:

Unless we know why people need luxuries (that is, goods in excess of survival needs) and how they use them, we are nowhere near tackling the problems of inequality seriously.

I like that Bauman is ignoring the standard Maslovian psychological approach to consumerism (which seems to my over addled and under educated mind so self-serving and self perpetuating, a form of back slapping almost from marketing types) and bringing the whole discourse out into a much broader societal and sociological space. Because, the consumers’ wants not only affect them, but their relationship to the objects/subjects they are consuming, and the rest of society. Bauman this time:

In the society of consumers, no one can become a subject without first turning into a commodity, and no one can keep his or her subjectiveness secure without perpetually resuscitating, resurrecting and replenishing the capacities expected and required of a sellable commodity.

Bauman gives some great examples of how in our networked age, technology is allowing the consumer to be (reflexively?) turned into the commodity. Exhibit A: The call centre software which filters high spending shoppers straight to the head of the queue whilst low-spenders are doomed to spend eternity in the great touch-tone void; “For instructions on how to fix the lump of plastic technology you are paying us £45 per month on an 18 month contract please press ’1′, for all over services, please press ’0′…”

Photo (cc) jmulot.

On June 11th 2004 a referendum was held in Ireland. Should a child born on the island have an automatic right to citizenship the nation was asked. A constitutional right that had existed since the foundation of the state in 1922  was overturned by an incredible 79% of the voting public. Children now born in Ireland’s hospitals to non-national parents had a fight on their hands if they wanted a harp emblazoned passport.

At this juncture it is fair to ask if any child now born in Ireland would want citizenship of that sorry republic, but that’s a cheap shot and beside the point. Which is this, at a moment when national hubris, property speculation, and all-round back slapping were reaching their apex, Ireland turned her gaze inward and essentially told the world “right lads, we’ve finally made it, and we’re sharing the spoils with no one“. I think that was the first time I’ve really been embarrassed and ashamed to be admit to being Irish. Funny how some things change and some things don’t.

>>>>
A week of prevaricating and straightforward lies by those that would claim to be Ireland’s leaders ended last night with Cowen and Lenihan admitting that yes, a bail out is coming, yes the IMF and EU are involved, and yes, this is going to hurt. I want to focus on one theme that has been running through the press coverage all week and perhaps applies not only to Ireland, but to the every other EU member state, both those inside and outside the Eurozone (and btw, am I the only person who thinks there’s a Crystal Maze comeback in here somewhere?). The issue, the misconstruction and misconception of sovereignty.

The notion of sovereignty as we understand it hinges almost entirely on the autonomy of the nation state. Of course the nation state itself is a construct devised by Germans at Westphalia in 1648 and improved upon at various junctures ever since. And the simple fact is, I contend here, the notion of the nation state is well past its sell-by date. Reasons being:

• Globalisation – Aspects of the social contract now being fulfilled by private corporations and civil society organisations, particularly in least developed countries (Ireland circa 2011). Add to that the super-politics of transnational institutions such as the IMF and EU.
• Information society – linked but distinct from globalisation. Technology and information society frees us from a top-down knowlege/power hierarchy, and this knowledge/power recognises national borders in extreme cases (e.g. the great firewall of China). To boot, the Marxist relationship between production and capital is arguably severed irreparably in places, not altogether a bad thing.
• Risk society – Pervasive global risks (climate change, GM etc.) have led to the cosmopolitization of global society. Risk has been democratised across borders and time and negated the global ‘other’. At least that’s the theory. In other words, be it in Belfast, Berlin or Belize, the same big planet ending issues are faced by all.
• Reflexive modernity – the very forces in society that unleashed modernity have undermined it. An example, our economic ingenuity has in theory allowed wealth creation and ownership through multiple layers of society, but really, quants in Goldman Sachs have led us on a merry dance, and at times its debatable if even they knew the havoc their credit default swaps and other assorted financial devices would cause.

So it looks like the nation state has more than a few chinks. Let’s take a looks so at the issue of Ireland in particular.

A genuine challenge that can be played with you and yours this holiday season, stick the sovereignty tail on the Irish nation state donkey below. And then just for kicks, stick another tail on the poor beleaguered beast to represent the moment sovereignty left town. Do let me know how you get on.

• Dublin’s largest post office trashed in failed rebellion (1916)
• Irish state formed (1922)
• Oath of allegiance to Westminster/Windsors dropped (1937)
• Irish republic declared (1949)
• Entry into the EEC/EU (1973)
• One to one link between Irish punt and sterling broken (1979)
• Belfast Agreement (1998)
• Euro becomes currency (1999)
• Maastricht/Nice/Lisbon treaties (various)
• Irish government commits over €50bn to banking/property sector (2008)
• IMF assumes control of state budget (2010)

All well and good you say, so what, we have never been sovereign and Ireland in particular is in some sort of national state, or not. I make the points above to illustrate some of the reasons Ireland, and plenty of other Europeans states, are in this mess. And perhaps to being to explore ways out. It may actually suit the Irish government and indeed the populace of that country to suggest some sovereignty has been devolved to the IMF/ECB/EC/EU/KLF/whoever. Why? Well let us examine the social contract as it exists in Ireland. Around the same time the Germans, Spanish and Dutch were roasting hog in Westphalia, Hobbes was attempting to defined the duty of care a state owed to her citizens, a concept Rousseau later nailed. The citizen gives the sovereign (lawmakers) legitimacy and in return, the citizen is given protection from a life “nasty, brutish and short“. And here is where it gets interesting in relation to Ireland.

The social contract in Ireland, like those contracts for ghost hotels and bogland housing developments signed over the past 15 years, was never a document fully validated by the state. Yes the constitution asserted independence from non-state power-institutions, but even to this day the church in the republic is the legal owner of the majority of schools and hospitals. And make no mistake, this was complicit. Ireland could in the 1950s have taken the UK’s example and followed leading theories on the practise of health and social science (leading to the NHS in Britain) but instead allowed those institutions to remain in the hands of the clerics.

So we see there is a history of the Irish government reneging on its side of the the deal. This is likely to continue. During the last 20 years Ireland has not saved for a rainy days and its social services are at breaking point. If ever in the history of the state Fianna Fail have been aware of a social contract between the polity and the people, then that’s a piece of paper that has been lost down the back of the couch some time ago. It was found last week but I fear it has been dusted off and given to Oli Rehn of the EC, Ajai Chopra of the IMF and the “Others” to which Ireland is now in hock.

“Now the old system of industrialized society is breaking down in the course of its own success. Are not new social contracts waiting to be born?”
-Ulrich Beck, Reflexive Modernization

And yet in all of this Ireland has perhaps the greatest opportunity since the inception of the state in 1922 to redefine itself. To shape a society that is not a hangover from stale civil war politics, led not by “Soldiers of Destiny” or “the Tribe of Irish“. A society whose most important assets are not in the hands of a morally bankrupt church. A country whose leaders have a vision, some sort of vision.

Institutional reform is a must. There will be an election in January, the incoming Taoiseach must be elected with a mandate to tear down and rebuild the institutions of state. Whether the Dáil works or not is irrelevant, its legitimacy as a parliament has, like a bloodied sponge, been slowly wrung dry. Only total reform of the upper and lower houses, as well as the electoral system will do.

And Ireland, like most other western nations, must address those that walk the corridors of these institutions. It is time to call out the soothsayers of our time, the economists, and recognise their nakedness. These are the most powerful policy gatekeeprs of the modern age, all political decisions run through them. Yet, in a sense, economists are no different from the other discrete experts of modernity, the chemists, the physicists, the engineers. Experts in their fields yes, but capable of proscribing wide solutions for a better, fairer, happier society? Capable of the imagination needed to knock down and rebuild? Absolutely not. So why should all political decision run through them.

But perhaps in reforming the levers of the nation state we are looking for solutions and looking for “the political in the wrong place, on the wrong floors and on the wrong pages of the newspapers” to quote Beck (Reflexive Modernization). We have seen the great European and Bretton Woods institutions wrest power from above the nation state. It is time to create the sub politics that will also attack it from below. How might this look like? Well Hermann Scheer, in one of the last interviews given before he died this year painted a quite astonishing picture of how community energy projects in Germany were finally taking hold and transforming communities.

It is a fight. This is a structural fight. It is a fight between centralization and decentralization, between energy dictatorship and energy participation in the energy democracy. And because nothing works without energy, it’s a fight between democratic value and technocratical values. And therefore, the mobilization of the society is the most important thing. And as soon as the society, most people, have recognized that the alternative are renewable energies and we must not wait for others, we can do it by our own, in our own sphere, together in cooperatives or in the cities or individually. As soon as they recognize this, they will become supporters. Other—this is the reason why we have now a 90 percent support against all the disinformation campaigns. They have much more money and possibilities to influence the public opinion, but they lost this. They lost this conflict. In the eyes of the people, they lost the conflict. They are the losers already.

Energy is just one example, albeit an important one, where Ireland needs to look not at a Big Society model espoused by its neighbour, but a small society, one in which there is a common currency of values between those at the top and bottom, and one in which those values are illustrated and made real by projects such as Scheer’s in every community. Is this pie in the sky? No, there are tens of thousands of half finished developments, roads and houses dotted around the country, waiting to be used for something far more worthy than property speculation. Surely in these lies the infrastructure for a better society. And far better to spend resources on this sustainable (economically, socially and environmentally) endeavour than keep alive the banking institutions that have so utterly failed the country.

For the first time since 2004 I’m tempted, just a little, to go home.

Cross-posted from 1010uk.org.
10:10's Lighter Later campaign held a day of high-profile activity on Monday, the summer solstice, including a specially organised conference for MPs, peers and policy makers in Portcullis House, Westminster.

The event, on the lightest evening of the year, saw energy academics, road safety campaigners, representatives from the tourism industry and experts on crime and other social research areas come together to press the case for a change to the UK's clocks to GMT+2 in summer and GMT+1 in winter.

Re-photo (cc) Anthony Mayfield

Within the climate change mitigation discourse, a war effort is often called for. WWII is cited by some as the only time during the history of industrialization that a societal/productivity shift of the order of magnitude now required has happened. But we want to look at a slightly different point in history. Just like post-punk was an altogether better sound than punk itself, the post-war effort (in both Germany and Japan) has plenty of interesting lessons for us when it comes to the subject of societal change.

Let us consider for a brief moment the issue of social capital in post-war Germany and Japan. These countries had just been whooped ten shades of blue, millions dead, and in Japan, two nuclear craters. Understandable if the local populaces felt a bit put out and distrustful of the Allies restructuring plans. Yet the economic turnaround in each country was nothing short of miraculous. Now, we’re not going to get totally reductionist on this, there are plenty of reasons, common and independent, why the original Axis of Evil managed to get back on its feet, but one nugget provided here by Francis Fukuyama stands out in this decade old paper originally written for those friendly folk at the IMF.

Apart from religion, shared historical experience can shape informal norms and produce social capital. Both Germany and Japan experienced considerable labor unrest and conflict between workers, managers, and the state in the 1920s and 30s. The Nazis and Japan’s military rulers ultimately suppressed independent labor unions and replaced them with “yellow” ones. After their defeat in World War II, the democratic successor regimes opted for a much more consensual approach to management-labor relations that produced Germany’s postwar Sozialmarktwirtschaft and Japan’s lifetime employment system. Whatever their current dysfunctions, these institutions played a critical role in allowing the two societies to return to growth after the war, and constituted a form of social capital.

What did these institutions do? They bound society. They allowed trust to develop, crucially between workers, so that an honest day’s pay was not going to be wiped out by either hyper-inflation or schemes dreamt up by the occupying powers. An honest day’s work was rewarded and society could get back to rescuing cats from trees and whatever else they do on the banks of the Rhine.

Of course that’s not all Frankie has to say but he goes and ruins his nice ideas with a little apology for Globalisation right at the end, that’s to be expected we suppose. And while we’re on the subject, it’s 2010 and you know what, we’re still not at the end of history buddy!

Back to climate change. Post COP15, there’s a big argument that with the failure of our governments, it is time civil society, and business, stepped up to the mitigation plate. The job they have to do is huge and in order to do it they’re going to have to create even more social capital than was mobilized during the late forties and fifties in Germany and Japan, for without this social capital, the job for CSOs will be next to impossible. But the great thing about social capital is that much like economic capital (i.e. cash), surplus capital can be banked and transferred to those that need it most. Think about a trusted NGO. Let’s say the Red Cross. Over the last century the Red Cross has done a big job in warzones and natural catastrophe areas. On a whole, the world trusts them. When they come looking for money (and trust) in times of peace we happily supply. And when the shit hits the fan they’re ready financially, and in terms of trust, to get to the heart of the action.

Enter the likes of 10:10, a concept keepfakingit endorses so much we went and joined the company. If civil society organisations like 10:10 are to win the day in this battle, you had better believe they are going to have to become the Goldman Sachs of social capital, using every trick in the book to first-off generate that capital, then bank it, and have it spent in the most efficient way possible to cut emissions. Organisations are going to have to work together, and use additively created radii of trust to bring more and more people under their umbrellas of social action. This means building layers and layers of trust (thus social capital) across real life social networks, both horizontally and vertically. Horizontally from nuclear family to nuclear family, through communities, schools, businesses and clubs. Vertically through neighbourhood watch schemes, councils, religious orders and up and over international borders.
This is hugely ambitious, it has to be. And here at keepfakingit we think there’s a chance it may work.

The 15th United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP15) kicks off in Denmark’s capital city tomorrow. And I won’t be there. Until Friday. Here’s some background as to why keepingitfake.com will be in town, and what we’ll be doing when we’re there. And before you ask, yes, we’re going by train.

There will be 15,000 delegates at the ‘Glastonbury of Climate Change’¹ with a straightforward mission: save the world from ourselves. Well that’s the idea. No doubt there will be plenty of coal lobbyists, developed world special interest groups and lots of other nefarious characters there trying to spoil everyone’s fun. But let’s pay attention to the good stuff.

First off the KFI itinerary. We get into town late on Friday and we’ll be staying across the water in Malmö*. Mornings we’re going to be pounding Copenhagen pavement with @danielvockins filming segments for The Stupid Show, a daily internet TV show brought to you the Age of Stupid team. More details on that later in the week. Providing we manage to stay out of harm’s way there’s a tonne of things to be doing in the afternoon. We’re still trying to sort accreditation for the Bella Centre where the actual negotiations are taking place. TckTckTck are running a bloggers/media centre nearby in any event so that’s going to be HQ for the week.We’ve also promised a colleague a short video for kids. That scares us more than the toughest Danish police tactics (YouTube).

KlimaForum is the global civil society fringe event running in parallel to the main event. It will seek to influence proceedings across town. Whether it does or not it has some big hitters in attendance and be a focal point for non-delegates in town for the 12 days. Timetable here.

It’s impossible to say at this stage what the day-to-day mix is going to be at the Bella Centre. We know the world leaders fly into town on the 18th but what, if anything, they’ll have to talk about remains unclear. Provisional negotiating are supposed to be finished by the 15th but we’re a long way from getting a short form document ready for high level debate so that’s unlikely.

Future:Media:Change lists four media hubs on which you can follow all the action. As if Keepfakingit.com won’t be able to keep up.

Special shoutout to oneclimate.net. The full social/multi media experience.

Here’s some background on the science which should in theory be supporting the whole thing. If it wasn’t for clowns like this.

Lots of talk about numbers. Remember folks, some of these countries will try to confuse the issue by comparing carbon apples with carbon intensity oranges. So if you want to see how 17% reductions against 2005 levels compares with 20% on 1990 check out this great tool from Sandbag. And if you don’t know your IEA from Perfluorocarbons check this out.

Nick Stern, when asked last week by Dr. Mary Dengler what the two greatest barriers to a real deal at COP15 were, replied succinctly; trust and finances (video here). Let’s see how that pans out. He’s probably right.

With that in mind Nelson Mandela and his crew of oldies but goldies, the Elders, have sent letters to 192 heads of state laying down some serious smack. The Elders team includes Desmond Tutu, Kofi Annan, Gro Brundtland, Jimmy Carter and Mary Robinson [big KFI shoutout and RESPECT to Mrs. R!!!]. Here’s the press release.

Lots of art and culture going on over the 12 days. Rethink Climate is doing a great job of pulling a lot of it together, short review with with photos here.  Arts4COP15, put together by the RSA’s Arts and Ecology team, is also doing a great job. As mentioned right here a couple of weeks ago, Ghost Forest will be in town. With any luck keepfakingit will get in front of all of this stuff and blog it up.

The scale of Twitter activity coming from the Bella Centre and environs is going to be truly epic. Here’s some a nice handy list I’ve put together. If you want to be added to this list gimme a shout.

Okay, that’s the brief overview. We’ll be back during the week with more detail on the negotiations themselves.

* Big shout out to Billy and Cecilia who are opening their home to KFI for the duration. Thanks!

¹ Anonymous RHUL Lecturer

Some consensus building and optimism from the editorial in today’s Financial Times [registration wall].
They go on to wade in on the carbon tax vs emissions trading debate. No surprise where our neo-liberal friends come out in that debate:

In theory, a global carbon tax could do this. In the actual world, a global scheme of tradeable emissions quotas is the best solution. To work, such a scheme, which must form the core of any Copenhagen deal, has to meet three conditions: it must lay down a time-path for emissions cuts over several decades (to let businesses and households predict the net costs of such long-term investments as houses and power plants); allow for adjustments if – but only if – the science changes; and impose binding limits on all countries.

There’s a bit about the fairness of developing countries catching a carbon break and then some big numbers:

Selling unused quotas would, moreover, be hugely lucrative for poorer countries. At today’s European carbon price, yearly carbon emissions have a market value of more than €500bn, a figure which could increase significantly as the global ceiling took effect. The potential transfers from rich countries resulting from quota trading could easily swamp the €100bn per year the European Commission has estimated poor countries will need to tackle climate change.

Most countries seem to grasp the gravity of the challenge. If they can also see what is in it for them, a deal may yet be within reach.

It’s a bit late this evening for me to jump into the Stern Report to see if these numbers stack up but it’s a lot of money either way. I also think that last paragraph is crucial. We have a lot of heavy hitting economists on these issues right now. I have my doubts as to whether runaway CO2 levels in the atmosphere can be halted, not to mind lowered within a traditional western capitalism framework but it sure looks like these guys are going to make an effort.

Wow. Just out of a Prof Dieter Helm lecture at LSE. “Climate Change Policy, and why has so little been achieved”. To paraphrase Ted Theodore Logan, Dude laid down the smacketh in a most bodacious way. I didn’t see Nick Stern in the audience. He must have had advance warning of what was coming. Helm started with a growing tribute to his Lordship, how could he not, he was on enemy territory after all. But after calling him the most important economist in the UK right now, alongside Mervyn King, he proceeded to calmly, and very eloquently dismember Nick’s very own Stern Report.
This was no Hallowe’en slasher. Helm is more expert a surgeon. He took aim only at crucial organs and arteries. He chose his spots and cut with the finest of Japanese steel.

For the second time in a week I listed as a speaker told his audience that we are now in the post-science phase of dealing with climate change. The science they have argued is good. Beyond repute in fact. Helm made the point that practically every university on the planet is currently contributing to climate change discourse, and there is remarkable consensus. We’ve passed 350ppm CO2 and are approaching 400 and 500. We all know what comes next. His point here was that the ‘we’ includes our politicians. A politician who now rejects the science of climate change finds himself on the lunatic fringe.

“So why the fuck has there been NO major policy advances in the past 20 years” Helm didn’t say. But that’s what he meant. If we can answer that question maybe we can start to chart a policy course through Copenhagen and beyond.

This begs the question from the Oxford prof, “what bits of economics are painful to policy process”. He spent the rest of the lecture laying some of these out.

–
Now for a word from standard economic orthodoxy.

GDP, given a growth rate of 3% per annum, will be 4x today’s GDP by 2100.
=> We’ll all be 4x “wealthier”
=> 2100 consumption will be 4x today’s consumption
Coal as a % of our energy source goes something like
25% today
28%
30% 2100
Ee-KKKKKK-er!!!!!!

And now back to our scheduled programming.
–

Paraphrasing Prof Helm:
PEAK HYDRO CARBONS IS A BULLSHIT PROPOSITION
We’re not running out of coal. Gas is ok. Oil will continue to be found, as the Arctic melts this gets even easier. Certainly we’re good for at least a century.

Ok, let’s fly through some more points.

Economists mix up manmade vs. natural capital.
There’s a one:one replacement value put on them
Sure there might be no more swallows flying north for the summer, but hey, I’ve got my iPod.

There’s a political truism. Tell your electorate a policy can be achieved cheaply. Fail. When the electorate realise the ruse you’re in trouble Mr. Politician. This is about to happen. Example: the argument that mitigation can be achieved for ~1% GDP.

The utility of tomorrow.
Is the utility of a person in 2100 equal to that of a person living today?
Sure about that?
How about people in 3100?

Fuck that. How about people today?
Does, for a politician/economist, a person in their own constituency have the same utility as some dude hanging in Jo’berg?

Stern argues yes to the above and uses those assumptions in his Economic Review. Bad Economist says Helm. You’re changing the game. While nobody would argue with the virtue of the model, around here, “shit ain’t like that. It’s all fucked up” (Ice-T). Modern society simply does not value us as equal. So why should modern economics.

Onwards. All our leaders are quoting the 1% GDP cost of climate change mitigation. Guys. GET REAL. It cannot be done for that low low price. Pay peanuts, get monkeys. Get me?

[Sidenote here for the RHUL massive: Sustainable development is still playing this GDP/Policy game. It's not the rules of the game that need to change. It's the game itself.]

Helm at this juncture takes us on a history lesson, and in the process flattens the Kyoto framework. Framework?!?, what he meant to say was house of cards. An EU joint in the biggest of ways. The whole deal was setup to make the EU look good, and the “cuts” already achieved by Euroland are a mere sleight of hand. This analysis merely backs up postings made right here on Keepfakingit.com earlier this month.

Helm doesn’t leave it at that though. He contends that by signing up to Kyoto, the EU may have made matters worse than doing anything at all! The logic being that by offshoring CO2 to the dev world via dubious CDM deals, more hot air has actually been created than would have been in existence if, for example, all our coal was still made in Wales. As opposed to making it in China, where coal fired electricity is of a higher CO2 intensity, and it then has to be shipped all the way back to Llandudno for that great new PPP housing deal. To make a point here, and he was up front in saying he has no numbers to back it up, Helm puts it out there that G.W. Bush may have done more good than harm by keeping the US of A out of Kyoto. Big statement.

So where is Helm going with this? Well he’s about to flatten the EU ETS calling it a lobbyists dream and rent capture and rent seeking of the highest, or is that lowest order. The volatile prices produced are good for the traders (here that Clark?) but bad for long term investors as there is no long view on carbon price produced. The simple fact is the incentive to cheat here is Massive.

After offloading on his audience about ETS, 2020-20-20 is never going to get the time of day. And it doesn’t. Easy target for an economics prof though so no points there.

So finally to where we all want to get to. Copenhagen. Zero optimism here. Bottom line forecast:
US do nothing on 1990 levels
EU keep on keeping on. That is dress up dubious cuts as real progress.
India gets 4x emissions permissions.
China sets its stall out for 40% US, 40% EU and 1% GDP acquisition from each of the EU and the US. Think they’re going to get it? No. But that’s not really the point.

The only solution’s another revolution
I’m not sure how much of the above makes sense out of context but my notes look good to me. In summary, here’s what went down:

If Helm were at the helm…

• COAL is the BIG ISSUE – Need to start cutting it NOW.
• Energy demand is going up with GDP. This has to stop.
• We need Nukes and we need CCS and we need them now.
• Sorry guys, 1% GDP is not going to take our problems all away.
• Biodiversity is bigger than climate change. We might solve climate change, but by then 50% of all species on the planet will be KIA.
• Why the fuck are politicians BORROWING money to support unsustainable GDP growth. Stop N.O.W.
• Carbon taxes, all EU countries will have them within five years.
• And while they’re at it they’ll be taxing carbon on the borders too. Take that China-import-export market.

Now, if you’re still interested, go read the good professor’s book.

Nicholas Stern in his introduction to ‘A Blueprint for a Safer Planet‘ outlines as succinctly as I’ve seen it just why Copenhagen this December is the most important international conference so far this century.

The Copenhagen deal must be more ambitious [than Kyoto], more international and much stronger. We must agree not only on our ambitions but on the details of action; the timetable is very tight. It will not be easy, but success is vital to the future of the planet.

If we do succeed, we will have created the potential not only to provide a serious response to the problem of climate change, but also to unleash an era of internationalism which could make the world much better at dealing with some of the other important international issues of our time, above all the fight against poverty. If we fail, the confidence and trust necessary to create and sustain an international agreement may be destroyed and the confidence of investors and markets, crucial for the real decisions that will make the necessary changes, will be undermined. Furthermore, addressing many of the obstacles to development, such as water availability, agricultural production, malaria and Aids, will become much harder and more costly. We have to see the issues of economic development and of climate change as parts of a whole.

from the NY Times

Two related pieces in the Columbia Journalism Review over the past week on energy, climate change and the press’s role in covering the issue. And in my mind it is one issue, not two. This is a great example of what makes CJR such a great resource.
They have the ability to step back and look at the media landscape as it pertains many subjects in politics and finance asking the questions of journalists and bloggers that we don’t ask ourselves enough.

Curtis Brainard pulls apart pieces from the Pew Research Center, the NY Times, the LA Times and PBS. His thesis, that it may now makes sense for journalists to pull back from making planet saving proclamations in support of climate change action and instead frame the discourse around helping keep the pennies in the pocket of Joe the Plumber and other downstream media consumers.
Brainard pulls through some useful looking data from Revkin in the NY Times illustrating this. The fact of the matter is that people have bigger financial worries all of a sudden. In Brainard’s words:

A poll released last week by the Pew Research Center found that addressing the nation’s energy problems ranks sixth among a list of twenty voter concerns, with sixty percent of those polled agreeing that it should be a “top priority” for government. On the other hand, concern for protecting the environment and dealing with global warming has declined precipitously in the last few years, with those issues ranking seventeenth and dead last, respectively. The takeaway message for journalists is that those “stewardship” frames will not be sufficient in terms of galvanizing support for clean energy. In the pursuit of public engagement, the press would be better advised to link sustainability issues to economic growth and “green” jobs.

There’s plenty of other good shout-outs in the piece but here’s the real take-away:

The economics of sustainability is clearly a frame that is of particular interest to readers and audiences these days. Nova spends relatively little time discussing the impacts of global warming, which are presented only as contextual background. Though there remain many points of climate science that the media can and should explore, this seems a positive development because it implies that the press has accepted the basic threat of warming and is now prepared to address the cost and feasibility of various solutions

So far so good (perhaps). Brainard returns to a similar theme a few days later on CJR.org. Now here’s the really interesting part from my perspective.

One of the things that history will remember about the coverage of climate change is that, not unlike the Iraq War, the press itself became an important part of the story, largely due to faulty reporting at its outset….But, as CJR contributing editor Cristine Russell pointed out in a recent feature story, the fine points of science and technology must now be communicated to the political and business reporters who have been assigned to the coverage of climate solutions.

There’s no arguing that our business reporters need to know these points inside out. In fact, more importantly, the men and women inside the Treasury making the decisions these reporters report on need to know the facts. But all that doesn’t hide a big question that arises from the above thesis. Should be we be allowing the business pages abstract the world’s climate change problems into a more palatable, or certainly more applicable, problem for our media consumers. In other words should we concentrate on a set of self-centered reasons and try change human behaviour by appealing to people’s financial interests?

Many would argue that the end justifies the means, and in the case of climate change the situation is so dire and so urgent that we can dismiss only a very few options. But the media  has a role to tell it like it is. To inform us that our actions and in action are having a direct and catastrophic impact on the world. If an Obama stimulus promotes green jobs and clean tech all the better, but let’s keep the climate change horse running in front of the economic cart.

I left out my main point about the significance of the Third Coast. It’s of the moment to report the US has lost its edge. It is declining empire. The current financial crisis and the last eight years of White House led turbulence shore up that easy and lazy argument. The Heartland (Third Coast) project goes someway towards arming us in refuting that claim. It shows the USA is not simply a market. It is a cultural entity.

It can be argued that the original culture wars started the moment the Pilgrims set sail from Europe (more on them soon). And at its heart America is a cultural entity. The current financial events are merely the latest in a series that started with the Boston Tea Party. It’s easy so to get the financial, cultural and political history of the US confused.

And this is the reason, ultimately, that America will continue to matter after China and India fly by it on the IMF and even UNESCO charts. It will matter for its culture; its sport, its academia and its art.

This by way of Momus whose article is also very much worth checking out. Good links to different takes on the current difficulties our friendly neighbourhood investment banks are going through.

Mark Boulos, whose two-screen video installation All That Is Solid Melts Into Air pits a Nigerian liberation movement called MEND (Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta) against futures traders at the Chicago Mercantile Exchange in a way that suggests they both serve irrational gods.

Only downside is there’s no way to view the installation in question.

Tom Raftery at GreenMonk talks about the new (US) EPA programme, SmartWay, which is aimed at bigging up companies who cut down on product transport emissions. I particularly like one phrase:

You are only as Green as your supply chain after all!

Exactly. And for those who have been through and now do organic and clean energy as standard, supply chain cleanliness is a logical next step. Telling the world about it is even more logical.

This has pretty wide applications. Food, from fresh produce to produced supermarket meals. Clothes, including production conditions and textile sources . All aspects of technology production, energy consumption and distribution.

I’m picturing a scenario where I open my nicely new matt-finished iPhone box. Inside it has some fancy Apple packaging that includes the line “Designed by Apple in California.” And then “Produced and distributed on behalf of Apple at http://tinyAppleURL/34512″

Click the URL and get a full breakdown of labour, materials and distribution for YOUR individual iPhone.

Is this possible? Of course it is.

I carry in my pocket two mobile devices every day. Both have GPS and cellular triangulation just in case I go kill someone and the feds need to hunt me down. I’ve got an Oyster card that uses some sort of RFID magic to open the doors of Transport for London for me on the days I’m not on a bike. So the tracking technology is already in my pocket and probably yours. Crucially it’s also already on the scanning codes that big logistic enterprises use. Tie this in with a network of energy, textile, labour and component databases and we start to paint a pretty vivid picture of the history of pretty much any goods sold in the West. So the logistic technology is there to start tracking. Tie all the above into a carbon reporting database and we start getting a true picture of the actual cost of your new iPhone.

That’s the theory anyway. Is there anybody working on this right now? And what are the implications for companies that do this? Are there really that many profit making or even seeking corporations who will be willing to put their necks on such a transparent line?

Last word to Tom Raftery:

Chain image (c) from Heaven’s Gate (John)

I’ve really got to get out more. The Financial Times today has a great interactive report on exactly why food prices are rising globally. They look at changing diets, subsidies and market distortion, climate change and rising input prices. Beats the daily market rundown.

Seems to me that food production and distribution issues is the new climate change. Except it’s not. It’s all the same thing. Hear that Delia do you?

Without trying to scare off our loyal readership, we’ve got some breaking economic news courtesy of Londonist. In what can only be descriped as a spit (pea) in the face of Middle East food fans, the price of falafel has sky-rocketed here in the UK’s capital.
Considering we’re slap bang in the middle of World Falafel Month, this is a tremendous blow.

Londonist cites world famous Falafel Hut in Shepherd’s Bush Market as a lead instigator in the latest round of London falafel hikes. Their eponymous menu items have gone up to £3. All we can do here at TrashBlanc.com is promise you we’ll send around some of our best investigators to look into the matter first hand. Stay tuned.

Whilst economists around the world fret about sub prime loans and $100 barrels of oil, here at TrashBlanc.com we have eyes on the bigger picture. Food. Well it seems that the bean counters over at the Financial Times are starting to pay attention too. They’re reporting some recent Goldman Sachs warnings over spiraling agriculture prices.

Jeff Currie, head of commodities research at the US bank, says with disarming cheer: “We think we could go into crisis mode in many commodities sectors in the next 12 to 18 months . . . and I would argue that agriculture is key here.”

The FT points out that this is happening surreptitiously. It’s all eyes on metals and minerals right now. So developing nations are going to be hit first and hardest, but this tsunami of high prices will spread to your local Tesco.

The overall point here is pretty obvious. Whilst we in the SUV driving West are fretting about the cost of driving to Tesco and the cost of our dodgy mortgages, the bigger issue in the world is putting dinner on the plate.

Inhabitants of the western world typically spend far more time worrying about the price of petrol for their car, rather than the price of wheat or corn. And when western investors do think about “commodity shock”, their reference point typically tends to be the 1970s oil crisis.

However, as Mr Currie observes, this is a dangerously blinkered view. Back in the 1970s, famine touched a much bigger proportion of the world’s population than the energy crisis, he says. And even today, rising food prices pack a powerful political punch in the developing (or partly-developed) world, to a degree that is sometimes under-appreciated by the pampered west.

Indeed, there is already ample evidence that political tensions are building: the World Food Programme, for example, now thinks a third of the world’s population lives in countries with food price controls or export bans.

Econmics