Garnaut’s dismal view

There was a slightly defeated tone to Ross Garnaut when he presented his penultimate report. Today, despite attempting to be more upbeat, he cemented economics as the ‘dismal science’ by accepting that people are ultimately more interested in the cult-like pursuit of economic growth, than in the preservation of the biosphere.

I was speaking last week with a climate scientist who is a contributing author to the IPCC 4th Assessment Report. He described climate change as posing an ‘existential risk’ for human society. What he meant, roughly speaking, is that there is a risk that climate change may render the earth largely uninhabitable for humans.

Garnaut, I think, understands this risk, which makes his intellectual balancing act all the more remarkable. While Al Gore, and renowned NASA climate scientist, James Hansen are encouraging people to take civil disobedience to physically stop the construction of new coal power stations, Garnaut argues that we need to find the balance between continued economic growth and ‘cost effective mitigation’.

The low emissions reduction targets that Garnaut has proposed, if adopted by the world community, would all but guarantee that the earth’s climate would slip out of control towards the ‘catastrophic’ end of the scale.

Well, I don’t know about you, but if you’ve got the choice between more economic growth and a liveable planet, it doesn’t exactly pose a dilemma. I’m with Hansen and Gore.

Garnaut has applied abstract and complex methodologies to ultimately conclude that we have some very difficult political decisions to make, and that we need people power to overcome the vested interests of the big polluters.

The message to Kevin Rudd is that leadership is required. Not the bureaucratic balancing of competing interests – we need leadership. It starts with vision, it inspires hope, and it requires a bold plan. And 10% cuts aint it.

At the upcoming International climate negotiations in Poznan, if Kevin Rudd flops out a proposal for Australia to cut emissions by 10% by 2020, it’ll be laughed out of the meeting room, not least by the Europeans who have already committed to 20% cuts, with up to 30% pending an international agreement.

If we are to resolve the prisoner’s dilemma of international climate negotiations that Garnaut describes, we’ll only do it by rich countries like Australia putting a strong foot forward to cut emissions at home – and taking the lead in signing up for deep cuts as part of the negotiations.

As for Garnaut’s message for everyday Australians? It’s that climate change is too hard for politicians and economists – so it is up to us. Our challenge it to make it impossible for business as usual to continue. It doesn’t seem like we have much choice.