Copenhague, 2009

El semanario económico más influyente del mundo considera oportuno gritar: “Detengan el cambio climático”. Y consagra un informe de veintiseis páginas a los grandes desafíos económicos del cambio climático: de las catástrofes previsibles a las inversiones en energías renovables.

[ .. ]

“El mundo en sus manos” [ .. ] “El 40 por ciento de la población de 13 grandes países estaría dispuesta a pagar más” [ .. ]

[ .. ] Governments see subsidies as a convenient way of easing in emissions curbs which businesses would otherwise resist. That may be so in the short term. But in the long run they make cutting emissions harder. The notion that dangerous climate change can be averted for a mere 1% of global GDP depends on policy being efficient. If it isn’t, the costs will mount—and so will the chances that the effort will fail.
The leaders gathering in Copenhagen need to come to an agreement, even if it isn’t a very good one. But that will only be the start. The national policies used to implement cuts need to be more efficient than the ones that are so far in place. That requires leadership from the politicians, and support from the voters. The world is, in the end, in their hands. [ .. ] [The Economist, 3 diciembre 2009. Stopping climate change]
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[ .. ] The cost of averting an even bigger rise in temperature is put at a relatively small 1% of global output—a price, it seems, that many people are happy to pay. In a poll for the World Bank, over 40% of people in 13 countries said they would be willing to pay this extra amount for energy and other goods to help tackle climate change. [ .. ] [The Economist, 7 diciembre 2009. Costing the earth].

Las negritas son mías.

• “El más complejo de los desafíos de la historia de la humanidad”.
• Importancia histórica de la Conferencia de Copenhague.
• Ecología en este Infierno.

TheEconomist, Who would pay more to tackle climate change?.