by David Wojick, CFACT, ©2021
(Sep. 8, 2021) — It is less than 60 days until COP26 convenes in Glasgow. We can expect a flood of climate horror stories (including flooding). But there will also be some discussion of the actual issues, so here is a brief breakdown of the big four.
Keep in mind that the alarmists have a bit of a civil war going on, between what I call the moderates and the radicals. The moderates have been at it for over 30 years and the radicals are fed up. The moderates now have a net zero target of 2050, while the radicals want 2030, so the difference is pretty stark. The last two COPs were partly paralyzed by this split, especially COP25. This fight will be a major factor in Glasgow.
The first two big issues are old business, money business to be precise. Of course it is all about money but these two are that by name — trading and finance.
Trading
The first big money issue is finalizing and launching the emissions trading scheme. This is part of the so-called Paris rule book, which was supposed to be settled well before now. The developed countries are depending on buying emission indulgences, which the developing countries dearly want to sell to them. This is the “net” in net zero.
Also some countries have indulgences left over from the now ended Kyoto trading. They want to bring these forward to be included in the new scheme. Some moderates oppose this.
The real problem is the radicals despise emission trading. They want every country to eliminate its own emissions, at home. Thus their target is actually more like gross zero, although some might allow domestic offsets. That issue has yet to really arise, but the trading fight froze COP25.
Finance
The second money issues is code named “finance”. This refers to the $100 billion a year the developed countries are supposed to pay the developing ones. The money tap was supposed to turn on in 2020 but did not. Nor will it in Glasgow, so the big question is how the developing countries will react? The Paris Accord could collapse, but probably not.
The OECD has cooked up some funny numbers saying we are already giving $80 billion a year, but the developing countries are not buying it. They say it is mostly old foreign aid streams relabeled as climate, plus private investment that would happen anyway. Even worse much of the so-called aid is in loans! They want to see big bucks going to the UN Green Climate Fund, which is not happening and will not happen. In fact the GCF is shrinking.
The radicals seem to have little interest in this issue, probably because for them money is no object. Some have called for a WWII scale climate effort, which would be 60% of GDP, a staggering sum indeed. On the other hand the Covid spending has caused some to up the ante. Africa reportedly now wants $700 billion a year or something preposterous like that.
Read the rest here.