Author: Robert Stavins

Robert N. Stavins is the A.J. Meyer Professor of Energy & Economic Development, John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, Director of the Harvard Environmental Economics Program, Director of Graduate Studies for the Doctoral Program in Public Policy and the Doctoral Program in Political Economy and Government, Co-Chair of the Harvard Business School-Kennedy School Joint Degree Programs, and Director of the Harvard Project on Climate Agreements.

Why the U.S. Should Remain in the Paris Climate Agreement

            It was widely reported last week that a White House meeting scheduled for Tuesday, April 18th, was to consider whether the United States should remain a party to the Paris Climate Agreement.  At the last second, that meeting was postponed.  As of today, there is no public information about when it may occur.  All that is known is that the Trump Administration had indicated previously that it will make known its position on the Paris Agreement before the G7 Summit, which takes place in Italy in late May.

With that in mind – and with Earth Day being celebrated on April 22nd – I was pleased to co-author with Ban Ki-moon an op-ed which just appeared in The Boston Globe, “Why the US Should Stay in the Paris Climate Agreement” (April 21, 2017).  As you no doubt know, Ban Ki-moon was Secretary-General of the United Nations (2007-2016), but what you may not know is that he is currently my colleague at the Harvard Kennedy School, where he is the Angelopoulos Global Public Leaders Fellow.

Before the Secretary-General Emeritus and I produced the final version of our Boston Globe op-ed, we had written a considerably longer, more detailed essay on the same topic, and so in today’s blog essay, I’m pleased to provide below an expanded version of that longer essay, with hyperlinks added.  I hope you find this of interest.

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Why the U.S. Should Remain in the Paris Climate Agreement:  An Earth Day Message for President Trump

 by Ban Ki-moon and Robert N. Stavins

In the five decades since the first Earth Day was celebrated in 1970, remarkable economic growth around the world has inevitably been accompanied by significant environmental challenges.  While tremendous progress has been made to address concerns about air and water quality, hazardous waste, species extinction, and maintenance of stratospheric ozone, leaders around the world continue to struggle to address the threat of global climate change in the face of the steady accumulation of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.

The Necessity of International Cooperation

There is broad scientific consensus that human-based emissions of greenhouse gases – including carbon dioxide (CO2) from fossil-fuel combustion and land-use changes – will change the earth’s climate in ways that will have serious environmental, economic, and social consequences. Sixteen of the warmest years on record have occurred since 2000, including 2016 as the warmest of all.  At the same time, winter arctic sea ice is at its lowest extent in recorded history.

Increased temperatures – which might be welcome in some places – are only part of the story.  More important are changes in precipitation, decreased snowpack, glacier melting, droughts in mid to low latitudes, decreased cereal crop productivity at lower latitudes, increased sea level, loss of islands and coastal wetlands, increased flooding, greater storm intensity, species loss, and spread of infectious disease.

These biophysical impacts will have significant economic, social, and political consequences. Estimates of economic damages of unrestrained climate change vary, with most falling in the range of 1 to 3% of world GDP per year by the middle of the current century.

In order to have a 50-50 chance of keeping temperature increases below 2o C (a long-term goal acknowledged by most national governments), it would be necessary to stabilize atmospheric concentrations at 450 parts per million, which in principle could be achieved by cutting global emissions by 60 to 80% below 2005 levels by 2050.

Reducing emissions will not be cheap or easy, but the greatest obstacles are political.  The severe political challenges are due to the fact that greenhouse gases mix in the atmosphere, and so the location of damages is independent of the location of emissions. Any political jurisdiction that takes action incurs the direct costs of that action, but the climate benefits are spread globally. Hence, for any country, the direct climate benefits of taking action will likely be much less than the costs, despite the fact that the global benefits may exceed, possibly greatly, the costs. Therefore, due to the global commons nature of the problem, meaningful international cooperation is necessary.

The Paris Climate Agreement:  A Breakthrough After 20 Years

The countries of the world have been struggling to come up with a solution since they agreed in 1992 to establish the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). After more than 20 years of negotiations, an important, historic breakthrough came with the signing of the Paris Climate Agreement in 2015, a path-breaking approach that increased the scope of participation from countries accounting for just 14% of global emissions (in the current, second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol) to countries accounting for 97% under the Paris Agreement!

Contrary to some claims, China, India, Brazil, Korea, South Africa, Mexico, and the other large emerging economies do have obligations under this new approach.  Far from being a “bad deal” for the United States, as EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt has asserted, the Paris Agreement is actually the answer to U.S. prayers going back to the U.S. Senate’s bipartisan (95-0) Byrd-Hagel Resolution in 1997, which rejected the Kyoto approach and called for an agreement that would include not only industrialized countries, but the large emerging economies as well. That is precisely what the Paris Agreement has finally delivered!

Will the U.S. Remain Part of the Process?

This is a pivotal moment.  President Trump’s recent executive order in which he laid out his plans to roll back much of the Obama administration’s climate policy, was silent on the Paris Agreement, reportedly reflecting disagreements among the President’s closest advisers.

During the campaign last year, the President said he would “cancel” the Paris Agreement.  But because it has already come into force, under its rules, any party must wait three years before requesting to withdraw, followed by a one-year notice period.  The United States is part of the agreement for the next four years. Any White House announcement of pulling out of the pact will have no direct effects for this Presidential term.

In theory, the President could try to bypass that four-year delay by taking the one-year route of dropping out of the overall UNFCCC — signed by President George H.W. Bush and ratified by the Senate in 1992. But that could require another two-thirds vote of the Senate, would be challenged in the courts, and would be unwise in the extreme, given that the U.S. would then be the only one among 197 countries in the world not to be a party to the Climate Convention. At a time when the United States wants cooperation from a diverse set of countries around the world on matters of national security, trade, and a host of other issues, it would be counter-productive in the extreme to willingly become an international pariah on global climate change.

Key Support Inside and Outside the Administration

Fortunately, key voices in the Administration have argued for remaining in the Paris Agreement. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has stated that it is better for the U.S. to be at this table of ongoing negotiations. More broadly, Secretary of Defense James Mattis said in Congressional testimony that he views climate change as a national security threat.

Remarkably, support for the Paris Agreement is broad-based within U.S. private industry – from electricity generators such as PG&E and National Grid, to oil companies such as BP, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, Exxon-Mobil, and Shell, mining companies such as Rio Tinto, and a very long list of manufacturers, including giant firms such as General Motors. Even some of the largest coal producers, such as Arch Coal, Cloud Peak Energy, and Peabody Energy, have told the President about their support for the U.S. remaining in the Agreement. This broad support is due to a simple reality – leaders of successful businesses make decisions not on the basis of ideology, but based on available evidence.

True enough, there is also opposition from some especially vocal coal industry executives, and the President seems to have shaped his domestic climate policies around their interests, with his repeated pledge to “bring back coal.” But the job losses in coal mining over the past decades have been due to technological change (increased productivity) in the coal sector, and more recently by low natural gas prices, not by environmental regulations (particularly not by regulations – such as the Clean Power Plan – that have not even been implemented).

The Paris Agreement Provides Flexibility

The U.S. could stay in the Paris Agreement, and seek to revise the Obama-era numerical target of a 26% reduction in emissions below 2005 levels by 2025, an approach recommended by North Dakota Republican Representative Kevin Cramer. However, by 2016, energy-related emissions were already down by 14% below 2005, so it is not clear that the existing pledge even needs to be re-assessed. Also, state climate policies in California, Oregon, Washington, and the Northeast will remain in place, and likely be strengthened. And more than half of all states have renewable energy policies; just since election day, the Republican governors of Illinois and Michigan have signed legislation aimed at increasing solar and wind generation. At the Federal level, the important tax credits for wind and solar power continue to receive bi-partisan support in the Congress.

Putting it All Together

In summary, climate change is a serious threat, which requires international cooperation because of its global commons nature.  After twenty years of negotiations, the path-breaking Paris Climate Agreement, with its exceptionally broad participation, is the answer to long-standing, bipartisan appeals, and provides an excellent foundation for progress.

The President cannot “cancel” the Agreement, and it would take four years for the U.S. to withdraw. Pulling out of the foundational United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change might be quicker, but would be unwise in the extreme, jeopardizing U.S. relationships with countries around the world on a host of pressing issues, ranging from national security to international trade.

Fortunately, key voices in the Administration have argued for keeping the U.S. in the Paris Agreement, and support from the business community is exceptionally broad and deep. If necessary, the U.S. can seek to revise the specific U.S. pledge under Paris made by the Obama administration, while remaining a party to the Agreement. But given the pace of emissions reductions already achieved, combined with ongoing state and Federal climate policies, it is not clear that those targets need to be changed.

Having considered this diverse set of considerations that should bear upon this U.S. decision, we find the arguments for the country remaining in the Paris Climate Agreement to be compelling. The truth is that in the 47 years since the first Earth Day, much has been accomplished.  But much of that remarkable progress could be undone in the short span of 4 years or less. We are confident – or at least hopeful – that this will not happen.

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Ban Ki-moon was Secretary-General of the United Nations (2007-2016), and is the Angelopoulos Global Public Leaders Fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School.  Robert Stavins is the Albert Pratt Professor of Business and Government at the Harvard Kennedy School, and was Coordinating Lead Author of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

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Delighted and Depressed

I’m pleased to announce that my blog website – An Economic View of the Environment – has been thoroughly cleaned and purged of the malware that had plagued it since the website was attacked in January.  That’s the source of my being delighted.

It’s probably not necessary to state that the source of my “depression” is the ongoing attack by President Trump and his administration on sensible public policy – in the environmental and energy realm, as well as so many others.  In nearly every case, the administration’s combination of incompetence and malevolence has been breathtaking.

Goodbye to the Malware Attack

As for the malware attack on my blog website, which occurred shortly after I had written and posted two blog essays that were harshly critical of Presidential candidate and then President-Elect Trump, quite a few of you wrote to me suggesting that the timing was not a coincidence and that the attack was probably from supporters of the administration (if not from people in the administration).  I do not believe that was the case, although I honestly don’t know.  Rather, I believe it was simply an attack intended to drive traffic to particular websites.  I’m hoping that the outside firm we hired to clean the site may be able to give us the answer.  Stay tuned for that.

Back to Business

Much has transpired since I announced the hiatus in my blog posts (An Explanation and Apology, February 5, 2017) and even more has transpired since I last wrote a regular essay here before the presidential inauguration (Trying to Remain Positive, January 3, 2017).  It would take more time than you or I have — for you to read and for me to write – about all that’s transpired in this policy realm since Inauguration Day, including:

Saving Us Time

Happily, I can save you time for reading – and myself for writing – by referring you to two new audio recordings:

Speaking of saving time, if you have time for only one of these, I suggest the second one, which is both briefer (about 17 minutes) and more comprehensive.

The Path Ahead

With my blog website having been purged of its contamination and with my feeling that I’ve more or less caught up, I will return to my usual approach with a brief essay in my next posting at this blog.  In the meantime, thanks for your tolerance of the recent hiatus and your interest in what transpires here.

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An Explanation and Apology

I have been writing essays at this blog for more than seven years, and until recently, through 100 essays, I tried very hard to keep politics at bay, and to view each and every issue I discussed from a politically neutral, yet analytical economic perspective.

But in October, 2016, as the U.S. presidential election approached, I found it difficult – for the first time – to remain neutral, and in a blog essay, “This is Not a Time for Political Neutrality,” I carefully explained why I feared what the consequences would be for the United States and the world if Donald Trump were elected president.  I followed that up with a post-election essay in November, “What Does the Trump Victory Mean for Climate Change Policy?”  (I am not providing hyperlinks to those essays at my blog’s website for reasons that will be clear as you read on.)

For anyone who harbored hopes that Mr. Trump would change as an individual after his inauguration and/or that a Trump administration would not be as problematic (in so many dimensions) as many of us feared, the first two weeks have shown that the concerns were fully justified.

So, I have been eager to post a new essay, because the early days of the new administration have been very disturbing, along at least three dimensions:

First, the introduction and the announcement of plans to introduce public policies that are not simply conservative (which would be acceptable, given that the Republican candidate did win the election – no matter how problematic the methods of the campaign may have been).  Rather, these policies come from the extreme “Alt-Right,” including its base of xenophobia, veiled racism, and unapologetic sexism.  One, but only one set of these misguided policies has been in the area of my interest and expertise – environmental and natural resource policy, including climate change policy.  The combined intentions of the Administration and the Congress to turn back so many environmental and natural resource policies, ranging from climate change to water pollution, deserve a full assessment (at my blog and elsewhere).

Second, there is the glaring presence in the most important office in the land of an individual who – given that the nature of that office – should be serving as a positive and inspiring role model for others, including our young people, but instead repeatedly displays the basest of human traits.

Third, and of greatest concern to me, this President and his Administration – with the tacit support (for the time being) of majorities in both houses of Congress – increasingly represent the greatest threat to American democracy I have witnessed in the past half-century.  Gratuitous and unapologetic lies and distortions, total disregard – indeed, expressed contempt – for the separation of powers that is so key to the endurance of the U.S. constitution, demonization of the essential role played by the news media, and much more – all of this combines to represent a threat to the republic unlike anything we have experienced in our lifetimes.

For all of these reasons, I have been eager to write yet another essay – focused on my area of expertise and experience – but shortly after posting my essays on Mr. Trump, my blog website was attacked and digitally contaminated with “malware,” as some of you know.  I believe this is nothing more than a coincidence of timing, but it is a challenge nonetheless.

I’m pleased to say that emails directly from me and emails from my blog will present no problems whatsoever, but links to my blog website can produce automated warnings of the presence of malware.  Our information technology people have been working very hard to clean the website thoroughly; and we are cautiously optimistic that this has now been accomplished.  However, until Google, Firefox, and any other services have removed all warnings, I will cease from sending messages that would direct readers to the website.

So, I apologize for the recent hiatus in communications from “An Economic View of the Environment.”  I would not want you to think that the reason for my silence is satisfaction with recent developments in environmental policy (and the larger body politic).  Far from it!  I hope to be back with essays – blog posts – in the very near future.

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