THOUGHT LEADERS

Global Warning

Bjørn Lomborg

Should addressing climate change be the leading global priority? Can economic growth and environmental protection be reconciled? Who should pay the costs of pollution: Consumers? Big business? Government? Can we really feed the world on organically grown food?

RECENT COMMENTARIES

FEATURED COMMENTARIES

Cars, Bombs, and Climate Change

Bjørn Lomborg Series: Global Warning

2010-03-12

Why are we willing to calculate costs and benefits when it comes to addressing traffic safety and terrorism, but not when devising policies to deal with climate change? A constructive dialogue about the smartest policy responses to global warming requires replacing our fixation on far-fetched, Armageddon scenarios with realism about the true costs of confronting this challenge.... read

Comments: 1 Recommended: 0 Read: 2653

Climate Science or Climate Evangelism?

Bjørn Lomborg Series: Global Warning

2010-02-12

As George W. Bush and Tony Blair learned the hard way, the public does not take kindly to being misled about the nature of potential threats. A similar shift in global public opinion is occurring with respect to climate change, owing to a stream of revelations about climate scientists' sloppy, if not tendentious, practices.... read

Comments: 15 Recommended: 0 Read: 5071

Two Cheers for China’s Climate Obstruction

Bjørn Lomborg Series: Global Warning

2010-01-13

Since the Copenhagen climate summit’s failure, many politicians and pundits have pointed the finger at China’s leaders for blocking a binding, global carbon-mitigation treaty. But the Chinese government’s resistance was both understandable and inevitable.... read

Comments: 7 Recommended: 1 Read: 5010

Climate Change and “Climategate”

Bjørn Lomborg Series: Global Warning

2009-12-11

Spin always trumps substance at gatherings like the COP15 climate-change summit in Copenhagen. Consider how quick the delegates were to dismiss "Climategate," the scandal caused by the release of thousands of disturbing emails and other documents from a prestigious British climate-research center.... read

Comments: 8 Recommended: 3 Read: 8599

Global Warming’s Misunderstood Victims

Bjørn Lomborg Series: Global Warning

2009-11-12

Media organizations in wealthy countries regularly send forth reporters to find “victims of global warming.” But when we actually listen to local people who are said to be in danger, it turns out that they are worried about far more immediate problems.... read

Comments: 2 Recommended: 0 Read: 7185

The Copenhagen Panic

Bjørn Lomborg Series: Global Warning

2009-10-13

A sense of panic is setting in among many campaigners for drastic cuts in global carbon emissions as It is becoming obvious that the meeting of world leaders Copenhagen this December will not deliver a binding international treaty that will make a significant difference to global warming. It is time for a different, cheaper, and more effective approach.... read

Comments: 2 Recommended: 1 Read: 5768

Global Warming’s Technology Deficit

Bjørn Lomborg Series: Global Warning

2009-09-02

Many countries are now setting ambitious carbon-cutting goals ahead of global negotiations in Copenhagen this December to replace the Kyoto Protocol. But, to meet these goals, non-carbon-based sources of energy would have to be an astounding 2.5 times greater in 2100 than the level of total global energy consumption was in 2000.... read

Comments: 2 Recommended: 0 Read: 6961

Adapting to Climate Change

Bjørn Lomborg Series: Global Warning

2009-08-24

According to the conventional wisdom of many environmental campaigners, we should first do everything we can to mitigate global warming, and only then focus on adaptation strategies. But this seems wrong – even immoral – if we could do more for people and the planet through adaptation.... read

Comments: 2 Recommended: 0 Read: 6186

Beyond the Carbon Crusade

Bjørn Lomborg Series: Global Warning

2009-08-17

At its heart, much of the debate over climate change deals with just one divisive and vexing question: How big should cuts in carbon emissions be? But we should be open to other ways to stop global warming – such as cutting carbon emissions in the future instead of now, or focusing on reducing emissions of other greenhouse gases. ... read

Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 6170

Global Warming’s Cheap, Effective Solution	Bjørn Lomborg
Much of the current debate about how to combat global warming remains focused on cutting carbon, but there are many ways to go about repairing the global climate. But climate engineering - deliberately manipulating the Earth’s climate - would cost much less and bring greater benefits far more quickly.... read

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The Green Inquisition

Bjørn Lomborg Series: Global Warning

2008-07-11

Because of climate panic, our attempts to mitigate climate change have provoked an unmitigated disaster. We will waste hundreds of billions of dollars, worsen global warming, and dramatically increase starvation.... read

Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 21906

Global Warnings

Bjørn Lomborg Series: Global Warning

2007-09-12

From global warming to the threat of terrorism, pesticides, and the loss of bio-diversity, the media pelt us with a constant barrage of one-sided warnings. We need to put all of these warnings in perspective, so that we can figure out which ones really should concern us, and when we should act on them.... read

Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 18783

Lights Out?

Bjørn Lomborg Series: Global Warning

2008-04-11

The recent “lights out” campaign was intended to energize public opinion about the problems of climate change by urging citizens in 27 big cities to turn out their lights for an hour. But, as has become typical of environmental debates, no one pointed out that the event was immensely futile, and that it caused much higher overall pollution.... read

Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 18273

Money for Nothing

Bjørn Lomborg Series: Global Warning

2008-05-12

The EU's plan to reduce carbon emissions by 20% by 2020 will most likely cost at least €150 billion a year, yet it will postpone temperature increase due to global warming by just two years, from 2100 to 2102. For that money, we could provide clean drinking water, sanitation, education, and health care to everyone on the planet, while increasing CO2-reducing R&D ten-fold. ... read

Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 16755

McCain, Obama, and Hot Air

Bjørn Lomborg Series: Global Warning

2008-06-25

Both John McCain and Barack Obama have promised tough action on global warming. But the cornerstone of their plans – a cap-and-trade system to reduce carbon emissions - is expensive, unwieldy, and would mainly benefit politicians and big businesses in privileged positions.... read

Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 16195

Misusing the Inaction Argument

Bjørn Lomborg Series: Global Warning

2008-09-12

One commonly repeated argument for doing something about climate change is based on comparing the cost of action with the cost of inaction. This argument sounds compelling, and almost every major politician in the world uses it, but it turns out to be entirely fallacious.... read

Comments: 3 Recommended: 0 Read: 16136

Re-Thinking Counter-Terrorism

Bjørn Lomborg and Todd Sandler Series: Global Warning

2008-03-03

Although rich countries' citizens regard terrorism as one of the world’s greatest threats, trans-national terrorists take, on average, just 420 lives each year. So, have the terrorists succeeded in getting the developed world to invest poorly in counterterrorism, while ignoring more pressing problems involving health, the environment, conflict, and governance?... read

Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 15263

Free Trade Breakdown

Bjørn Lomborg Series: Global Warning

2008-08-12

Global fear about free trade, reflected in the breakdown of the Doha Round, leaves the planet at risk of missing out on the extraordinary benefits that it offers. Free trade is good not only for big corporations, or for job growth. It is simply good.... read

Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 14867

A Time for Clarity

Bjørn Lomborg Series: Global Warning

2008-02-12

A roundtable of international economists, including five Nobel Laureates, will convene in May to assess more than 50 solutions to different global challenges as part of the “Copenhagen Consensus” project. We will then discover what could happen if politicians would rise above the distortion of the media’s intense concentration on terrorism and climate change.... read

Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 14463

The Green Pseudo-Revolution	Bjørn Lomborg
President-elect Obama is now facing countless people who claim that subsidies for renewable energy and CO2 taxes are great ways to tackle global warming and forge a new green economy. But the way to tackle global warming and support a genuinely vibrant economy is with lean investments in future breakthroughs, not bloated subsidies for inefficient technologies.... read
The Worst of All Worlds	Bjørn Lomborg
Environmental campaigners frequently say that not only is global warming happening and bad, but that its effects are even worse than expected. But temperatures in this decade have actually been decreasing, and, while Arctic sea ice has melted more quickly than expected, climate change is only part of the reason, while Antarctic sea ice has been above average for the past year.... read

AUTHOR INFO

Bjørn Lomborg

Bjørn Lomborg is the author of The Skeptical Environmentalist and Cool It, head of the Copenhagen Consensus Center, and adjunct professor at Copenhagen Business School.

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THOUGHT LEADERS

Global Warning

Bjørn Lomborg

Cars, Bombs, and Climate Change

Climate Science or Climate Evangelism?

Two Cheers for China’s Climate Obstruction

Climate Change and “Climategate”

Global Warming’s Misunderstood Victims

The Copenhagen Panic

Global Warming’s Technology Deficit

Adapting to Climate Change

Beyond the Carbon Crusade

The Green Inquisition

Global Warnings

Lights Out?

Money for Nothing

McCain, Obama, and Hot Air

Misusing the Inaction Argument

Re-Thinking Counter-Terrorism

Free Trade Breakdown

A Time for Clarity

AUTHOR INFO

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