Many business leaders and policymakers believe that any meaningful attempt to address the climate crisis will result in global poverty. We believe the exact opposite is true -- as does Working Group III of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (May, 2007).
Global poverty is the inevitable outcome of continued inaction.
But a properly financed, public-private global transition to high-efficiency and renewable energy technologies holds the potential for an unprecedented worldwide economic boom.
A global public works program to rewire the planet would create millions of new jobs all over the world. It would begin to reverse the widening gap between the North and the South. It would raise living standards in developing nations without compromising the economic achievements of industrial nations. It would turn dependent and impoverished countries into trading partners. And in a very few years, the renewable energy industry would eclipse high technology as the central driving engine of growth of the global economy.
What is missing is neither the technology nor the know-how. What is missing is the vision. One example is put forth in:
The Clean Energy Transition
The Plan involves three interacting strategies which include:
* In industrial countries, withdrawing subsidies from fossil fuels and establishing equivalent subsidies for clean energy sources;
* Creating a large fund -- perhaps through a small tax on global commerce -- to transfer clean energy technologies to developing countries; and,
* Incorporating within the Kyoto framework a progressively more stringent Fossil Fuel Efficiency Standard that rises by 5 percent per year.
(The plan does not rely on international carbon trading, although internal emissions trading can provide a powerful tool domestically to help nations meet their annual five percent goal. The plan's proposed fund of $300 billion a year for a decade to transfer clean energy to developing countries corresponds to a similar estimate from the International Energy Agency.)
There are many other solutions being proposed, among them:
George Monbiot's Climate Plan (While Monbiot's plan is specific to the UK, most elements apply to all industrial countries.)
Al Gore's 10 Point Legislative Plan
US Pirg's: "Rising to the Challenge: Six Small Steps to One Big Reduction"
