Comments 4

停止补贴气候变化

Nov 6, 2013 Kevin Watkins

伦敦—下周，各国政府将汇聚在波兰华沙展开气候变化谈判的关键轮次，而期望和雄心都处于历史最低点。但本来没必要如此：华沙会议提供了一次刺激对最强力地推动气候变化的行为——政府对化石燃料的数十亿美元的补贴采取行动的机会。

华沙谈判是2015年巴黎联合国气候峰会之前的预热。在巴黎峰会上，各国政府将寻求形成防止气候变化（其定义是全球变暖超过二摄氏度）的协定。失败将让子孙后代面临灾难性气候风险，让几百万人因为更频繁、剧烈和长期的干旱、洪水和风暴而陷入贫困。

基本碳算术说明了问题的严重性。根据政府间气候变化委员会（IPCC）的最新评估，我们在2030年就将用完二十一世纪的全部碳预算。

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0 Comments on this paragraph, 4 in all 4 Comments on this article

Douglas Costello Dec 3, 2013

One of the problems we face with getting serious progress on the addressing of Climate Change is that while the science is showing temperatures rising, CO2 levels increasing noticeably year on year the numbers and effects are almost incomprehensible to the average citizen and the time horizon is well beyond their capacity to relate to.

There is little point in relying upon politicians and special interest groups to drag or push society into addressing Climate Change. The majority of people need to want and demand it and not unrealistic solutions. If this isn't effected then we may as well give up as politicians will prevaricate forever and the special interest groups will become ever more extreme alienating the rest of society.

The energy efficiency gains envisaged by the renewable energy advocates are unrealisable unless there is significantly greater funding put into the R&D for that specific area of need. The net impact upon GDP for any Nation is likely to be negative for a period of time before growth returns it to positive additions.

I think the answers so far have been simplistic, overly optimistic and not attainable without greater society involvement.
Jörg Haas Nov 17, 2013

Germany is subsidising unprofitable hard coal mining, not the construction of new coal plants. Please correct this. In effect this support to coal mining is a huge waste of money, but it is only helping to extract a relatively modest amount of carbon. So the climate effect is limited. Without the subsidy, the domestic coal would probably be replaced by imported coal, but the overall emissions would not change. The hard coal emissions are largely a result of the amount of renewables, lignite and nuclear in the power system, and how much remaining demand is then filled by hard coal which comes higher up in the merit order. Unfortunately, given low coal prices of imported coal and low CO2 prices, hard coal comes first in the merit order compared to gas.
- Douglas Costello Dec 3, 2013
  
  Jorg,
  
  I understand that there is a debate also going on about the feed in tariffs for renewable energy sources that result in tariffs and levies (50% 0f energy bills) totaling some $18bn euros for an energy market that is worth only $3.5bn euros. I haven't checked the figures but feel free to. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-23127175
  
  The question it appears being asked is can Genrmany afford to pay such a high cost for renwables.
Jörg Haas Nov 17, 2013

Germany is providing support for unprofitable coal mining, but not for construction of coal fired power plants. As bad as the coal subsidies are, they don't necessarily increase coal burning, as they just help domestic coal with imported coal. So cutting the subsidies would change the trade balance, but not change the use of hard coal for power production.
Please look up in the ODI report, which correctly states that the German subsidies are for hard coal mining, not for power plants.