Ship of fools

2375

ship-of-fools

A scientific report published by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) has concluded that a type of genetically modified maize banned by France does not pose a risk to animals or other plants.

Earlier this year France's provisional ‘Higher Authority on GMs' said it had “serious doubts" about the safety of the crop, MON810. It was duly banned. Following the EFSA report, the European Commission has the power to force France to lift it. I am not keen on Europe taking precedent over the nation state, but on this occasion at least it would be making the right decision.

MON810 is a product developed by the biotech giant Monsanto. It is intended to resist the European Corn Borer, a moth that has been known to damage crops, particularly maize, for around the last hundred years.

Greenpeace has of course responded. Marta Vetier, Greenpeace's GM campaigner, has called on the EFSA to be shut down. Why the media even reports the statements of Greenpeace is beyond me. Certainly the tide is turning against this ship of fools, but surely the media should credit their idiocy with silence.

If journalists write an article on immigration they don’t ask the opinion of the BNP, when they write about the environment they shouldn’t voice the words of Greenpeace. The Neo-Luddites should be mentioned by journalists only because of their continuing criminality and not give voice to their backward environmental and political positions.

If you give money to Greenpeace, watch this.

Transport failings

2351

transport-failings

According to the BBC, a team of academics from Glasgow and Plymouth universities has declared the Labour government's record on transport "a big disappointment".

The reasons were as follows:

• Traffic congestion is worse than a decade ago.
• The investment needs of the railways have been almost completely ignored, in particular to increase capacity.
• Bus services in most of the UK have remained poor, especially in comparison with European rivals.
• Tram schemes have been abandoned, despite proving effective at getting motorists out of their cars.
• Walking and cycling have been largely neglected.
• The government is afraid of addressing the environmental impact of aviation.
• Transport carbon emissions continue to rise.

My thoughts:

• The environmental impact of aviation is more of a symbolic problem than an actual one. Aviation accounts for just 1.5 percent of total CO2 emissions and is unlikely to contribute more than 3 percent by the mid-century.
• Tram schemes have been abandoned because they're very expensive and there's little demand for them. Where there is demand for public transport, buses are a much more sensible option.
• Bus services in most of the UK have remained 'poor' for an entirely rational reason – there isn't much demand for bus services. Even in London, most drive around half-empty.
• Traffic congestion has worsened because we don’t have enough road-space. The government collects £32bn in transport taxes, but only spends £8bn on roads, most of which goes on maintenance. The M6 Toll road offers an example of what we should be doing: getting the private sector to build and operate new roads to take the strain off congested bits of the existing network.
• The investment needs of the railways have been ignored because, despite privatization, the railway companies continue to rely heavily on taxpayer funding and central planning. If they were free to set ticket prices and direct investment, they could make profits and plough them back into increased capacity (rather than relying on a £6.5bn subsidy).
• It's hard to see what government could do to encourage walking and most towns already seem to have more cycle-lanes than cyclists.
• In the short term, rising transport emissions are more or less inevitable. In the long run though, technology will solve the problem, not government.

Kyoto derailed by financial crisis

2310

kyoto-derailed-by-financial-crisis

I always wondered how environmental policies were able to escape the inevitable watering down in political horse-trading. For decades the over ambitious Kyoto targets for cutting carbon emissions have survived unblemished – thanks to powerful green lobbying. Yet finally this exception of the rule seems to be fading.

Firstly, many European countries, among them the United Kingdom, are trying to water down their Kyoto targets. They want to raise their allowance for offsetting emissions reductions under the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) by purchasing carbon credits from developing countries from 30 percent to 50 percent. However, the CDM is already regarded as dodgy because some cheat with the technology transfer to developing countries, which earns them credit points under Kyoto. For it sometimes counts investments that would have been done anyway and are only relabeled under Kyoto, achieving no CO2 savings whatsoever. According to the BBC:

Various reports suggest that between 20 percent and 60 percent of CDM projects do not save additional CO2.

Secondly, a recent revolt against the Kyoto targets has emerged from eight European countries, led by Catholic Italy and Poland. It seems the global financial crisis, as The Times reported, may be achieving what sound arguments against poor efficiency of cap and trade de-carbonizing of our economy failed to do. The whole European climate change push seems now in disarray.

Plans for binding European legislation by December were dropped as the EU watered down the carbon dioxide blueprint that it had announced with a fanfare 18 months ago.

And it is unlikely that the rotating French EU presidency will be able to sort out the mess until before 1 January 2009 when one of the most outspoken opponents of Kyoto policies, Czech president Vaclav Klaus will take over Sarkozy’s job. Oh well...

Costs and benefits, costs and benefits

2306

costs-and-benefits-costs-and-benefits

I think we'd all like to have a little more evidence based policy, no? Fewer courses of action based upon the spoutings of ideologues, yes? Which means that I get to return, boringly as ever, to my pet subject of cost benefit analysis studies.

A government report that found old-fashioned reusable nappies damage the environment more than disposables has been hushed up because ministers are embarrassed by its findings.

The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) has instructed civil servants not to publicise the conclusions of the £50,000 nappy research project and to adopt a “defensive" stance towards its conclusions.

The thing is though, there's no point is us just doing the research into what is the correct course of action, we also need to communicate our results. If it turns out that using real nappies simply boils Gaia then we need to tell the hippie dippies that they should get with the program and start throwing things into landfills. If they start complaining that this is simply burying resources we can point out that while this is true, it takes 100 years or more for a nappy to disintegrate and carbon sequestration is something we're all in favour of.

Still, now that we've got our result, that disposable nappies are better, what should we do with it? Banning real nappies would be most illiberal, as would insisting upon the use of none at all. (Weirdly, there is a really hippie dippy movement to use no nappies at all. Seriously, there is.) The best thing to do would be perhaps to just push the information out there and let people decide for themselves.

Oh, one other thing, we can stop paying for Real Nappy Officers, which would be a blessing for the taxpayer in these hard pressed times. Hmm, perhaps the report was suppressed because the real nappy officers are in fact the Illuminati?

Plane thinking

2262

plane-thinking

The decision to allow the expansion of Stansted and London City Airports makes good economic sense in the current climate. Granted, there will be some costs, mainly environmental, but these will be outweighed by the benefits on a much greater scale. It would have been foolish to stop this expansion.

The current overcrowding and delays at airports acts as an indication that they are inefficient and need improving. The market should be left to satisfy this consumer demand.

The expansion of the airports will facilitate economic growth (or at least help slow the decline of growth) by increasing the UK’s international competitiveness. Protestors are underestimating the significance of local multiplier effects from the expansions. With forecasts of large unemployment growth in the next two years, allowing airports to expand to meet demand is one thing that would would create sustainable jobs in the long term, and may also local businesses will benefit.

There is no ideal solution to this dilemma but the costs and benefits of this project are clear. If the local area is already blighted by noise and air pollution then there will be diminishing marginal costs to it from an expansion. Over time the market should enable the enterprise of greener and cleaner flight technologies to satisfy societies needs.

Test Driving

2241

test-driving

The Conservatives are planning a shake up of the driving test. The plan would have learner drivers undertake manoeuvres, such as the turn–in–the–road (three point or otherwise) and reversing round the corner, prior to an actual test. The test itself could then be taken if the manoeuvres had already been passed. The Tories believe that this would 'free–up' 10 minutes of test time to enable more concentration on driving and its associated hazards.

The current test's inclusion of these manoeuvres has sound reasoning behind it. You have to be aware of all of the hazards around you while performing them, failure to take notice of other road users and pedestrians while under current test conditions normally results in being marked down or automatic failure. These parts of the test are difficult in comparison with other parts, having to combine both the skill of controlling the car and awareness of the environment around the vehicle. To separate this out from the rest of the test will weaken the skills of those that would be driving away from the test centres without 'L' plates. This is just asking for trouble in the years ahead as the roads get more crowded and cars get faster.

Both parties are right to be concerned with the number of deaths caused by those who have recently passed their tests. But in the majority of the 300 deaths in accidents involving new drivers speed has a tendency to be the primary cause. The Conservative plan will not root out the over–confident driver they are concerned about, it will merely make it easier for all to pass the driving test. There is little that can be done to curb the excess and bravado of youth save for the shared experience of the consequences of an accident. But an accident where speed is a major factor tends to be fatal, and it's sometimes very difficult to learn from that.

Renewables aggravate gas dependence

2194

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Most consumers in Europe are forced to subsidize wind energy with their electricity bills, because it is argued that this is an investment in a secure and sustainable energy future. However, growing evidence shows that the opposite might be true. Weather conditions in most parts of the world mean that wind energy is not capable of maintaining a continuous and reliable power supply. And gas turbines are the best back up for wind turbines. The two leading countries in the use of wind energy demonstrate that.

In Spain natural gas is still the main source of electricity with 99.8 percent of it imported. By the end of 2007, Spain had 14,700 megawatts (MW) of installed wind capacity producing 8.7 percent of the country's total power supplies. However, the peak load of the Spanish power grid is in the summer when there usually isn't much wind, so more and more gas turbines are being installed. In 2007, Spanish power providers added 6,400 MW of gas-turbine power capacity, taking the total installed capacity of gas turbines to 21,000 MW.

In Germany more than 20,000 wind turbines with a total capacity of 21,400 MW are now "embellishing" landscapes. Germany's gas consumption for power generation more than doubled between 1990 and 2007, and now represents 11.7 percent of the country's total power generation with the country importing 83 percent of its supply. However, part of the wind power backup is still done by coal-fired plants.

That's why wind energy makes Vladimir Putin smile...

Fish n' rights

2151

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Throughout recent decades a stream of evidence has been produced that points to a continuing ‘tragedy of the commons’ across world's oceans. Such tragedy is especially evident in the Northern Atlantic, and the seas around the European Union. A recent study for Science Magazine has discovered that giving fisherman rights over the seas they fish, extends stock life and improves conservation.

In a piece entitled: “Privatization Prevents Collapse of Fish Stocks, Global Analysis Shows" [Sorry, subscription required], the results showed that when a fisherman has more rights concerning the quotas allocated to him, fishing stocks tended to remain healthy. Obviously for developed parts of the world, with established rules of law, the protection of fisherman's rights could easily be achieved. This, though, is only an extension of what those on the ‘right’ side of the argument have been continually arguing: that to protect fish stocks it is imperative to grant rights to those that fish and for those rights to be defended

A few days prior to this, the EU announced that it was to overhaul its fisheries policy. The investigation reviewed in Science is a weighty piece of research that the EU will most likely ignore and/or botch implementing. Ideally we would withdraw from the Common Fisharies Policy in its entirety and establish our own protected fishing grounds. This would save jobs, fish and decrease environmental damage. It's time for the waters to be privatized.
 

Cap and trade and carbon taxes

2125

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Much as it pains me to say so, Oliver Tickell has a good piece in The Guardian on the subject of carbon taxes and cap and trade systems. If we start from the point that climate change is happening and that we're causing it (not accepted by everyone I know, but let's just start from there shall we?) then obviously we will want to get those costs of emissions, currently not accounted for in market prices, accounted for in market prices.

We can do this in one of two ways, by issuing permits that allow emissions, or simply by adding a tax to carbon (more accurately, carbon dioxide equivalent or CO2-e) emissions. Under the EU's emissions trading system we've been shuffled into the former solution. Now this might seem a little odd, someone here arguing against what looks like the more market based solution. But cap and trade is the wrong one of the two to choose.

As Tickell points out, only a small fraction (under 10%) of these permits are in fact auctioned. Most are simply given away. The companies that receive them, most especially those that receive an excess over their needs can thus sell them. Yes, of course, this does indeed help to reduce emissions for incentives do indeed matter. But this give away is also corporate pork, a subsidy to those lucky firms. Given that allocations are based upon past emissions, it's also a subsidy to incumbents, a barrier to new entrants into the markets. Further, a subsidy in the future to those who have not as yet cut emissions from already available technology unlike some competitors. So we've got a problem in the implementation of the plan.

But more than that, we've also got a conceptual problem. With cap and trade we can set the amount of emissions but we don't know what that limit will cost us. With a carbon tax we can set the price but not the level of emissions. If the tax and the permit prices are the same then of course so will emissions be the same. If we're to be honest though, we don't actually want to set the emissions, we want to set the cost of them. As explained here, we only want to pay up to the amount that emissions will cost us to reduce emissions. We certainly don't want to pay more than that future cost. Thus the carbon tax method, the method that allows us to set the price, is the better one.

We can be thankful of course that everyone in the (serious part of the) debate is advocating more or less market based methods, rather than say legislating standards or technologies, but it is something of a pity that of the two major contenders we seem to be rushing headlong into adopting the wrong one.

Paddington greener than Poundbury

2109

paddington-greener-than-poundbury

Prof Edward Glaeser of Harvard has been studying environmentalism. His researches show the big chasm that often exists between local and global environmental concerns. Global warmists might believe we should move electricity production to renewable sources such as wind power; but environmentalists who value birdlife or open views might have doubts when turbines start chopping up birds and spoiling the view in their particular part of the world.

But, Glaeser finds, it is usually the local environmentalists who win out. A lot of local activists, for example, are trying to stop the spread of our cities. It's not just that they don't want new houses spoiling their view: it's the idea that our high-energy city lifestyles are wasteful and carbon-greedy, and mess up the planet.

Glaeser's actually looked into the energy that people use in US cities. And he's found that gasoline use is lower in large cities (in New York, everybody walks). Your January gas bill depends on how cold it is where you live, and your July air-conditioning bill on how hot the summers are – not the size of your town. And it is the places which regulate most that have the worst emissions record.

Places like London, with its draconian regulations to stop new building, might be a good example of the latter. Rather than try to push people out of cities into places and lifestyles where they will actually end up needing to dump more carbon on the planet, actually we should recognize that dense living is green. The local environmental groups might not like all the new building, but folk who look at the big picture should welcome it. (But of course, they don't.)