Environment slips in the rankings

From a recent Gallup poll:

For the first time in Gallup's 25-year history of asking Americans about the trade-off between environmental protection and economic growth, a majority of Americans say economic growth should be given the priority, even if the environment suffers to some extent.

This follows an earlier poll:

Although a majority of Americans believe the seriousness of global warming is either correctly portrayed in the news or underestimated, a record-high 41% now say it is exaggerated. This represents the highest level of public skepticism about mainstream reporting on global warming seen in more than a decade of Gallup polling on the subject.

Before jumping to conclusions, please read the results of a Harris poll as well:

As the economic crisis continues, some other issues may be put on the back burner as the government focuses on getting the economy back on its feet. One such issue could be environmental conservation, but 46% of Americans say that the issue of environmental conservation is something that is more important to them personally than it was a few years ago while 47% say it is no more or less important. Just 7% of Americans say it is less important to them. Furthermore, most people do not believe the government needs to choose between the economy and the environment and that the government should be making more of an effort to be environmentally conscious. 

Is this maybe an indication of some important nuances developing in perceptions about the environment? Or just a straightforward polarisation?

On crises and the oversupply of bad news

Crises is a word that became part of our daily vocabulary in recent months. It can be defined as a time of intense difficulty, trouble or danger. It also seems as if there is an incentive (at least in some circles) to keep the fires of crises burning. Or to put it differently: bad news sells. 

Julian Simon, renowned resource optimist had this to say in an article in Science on the question why bad news dominate public discussion on topics such as natural resources, population and the environment, way back in 1980:

Why do false statements of bad news dominate public discussion of these topics? Here are some speculations. 

1) There is a funding incentive for scholars and institutions to produce bad news about population, resources, and the environment. The AID and the U.N.'s Fund for Population Activities disburse more than a hundred million dollars each year to bring about fertility decline. Much of this money goes to studies and publications that show why fertility decline is a good thing. There are no organizations that fund studies having the opposite aim.

2) Bad news sells books, newspapers, and magazines; good news is not half so interesting. Is it a wonder that there are lots of bad-news best-sellers warning about pollution, population growth, and natural-resource depletion but none telling us the facts about improvement?

3) There are a host of possible psychological explanations for this phenomenon about which I am reluctant to speculate. But these two seem reasonably sure: (i) Many people have a propensity to compare the present and the future with an ideal state of affairs rather than with the past or with some other feasible state; the present and future inevitably look bad in such a comparison. (ii) The cumulative nature of exponential growth models has the power to seduce and bewitch.

4) Some publicize dire predictions in the idealistic belief that such warnings can mobilize institutions and individuals to make things even better; they think that nothing bad can come of such prophecies. But we should not shrug off false bad news as harmless exaggeration. There will be a loss of credibility for real threats as they arise, and loss of public trust in public communication. As Philip Handler, president of the National Academy of Sciences, testified to congressmen. in the midst of the environmental panic of 1970: "The nations of the world may yet pay a dreadful price for the public behavior of scientists who depart from . . . fact to indulge ... in hyperbole".

Why does bad news flourish? In short, according to Simon,  due to R&D funding and media incentives, idealistic/utopian expectations of reality and a (dangerous) sense that communicating a crises/alarmism will lead to action or at least will not be harmful.

My apologies for not being able to finish this post. I have to run, have a project crises to attend to...

H/T: The Encyclopedia of the Earth

Image: tralfaz-archives

The Geotourism Challenge 2009

Ashoka's Changemakers in collaboration with National Geographic are searching for innovations that protect destination quality through tourism that "sustains or enhances the geographical character of a place — its environment, culture, aesthetics, heritage and the well-being of its residents.” In Africa there are many such opportunities, so let us see if Africa can gain in prominence with more entries to The Geotourism Challenge 2009: Power of Place with Entry Deadline on 20 May 2009.

Some of the past African nominations:
Fair Trade in Tourism , South Africa: nomination
Urban Walkabout , South Africa: nomination
Campi ya Kanzi, Kenya
Bulungula Lodge, South Africa: nomination

See also a related Changemakers Competition

Water pricing: insights from Harvard

It has been argued on this blog ("Should water be priced according to its market value?", "On the municipal price of water") that water pricing is an important policy instrument to manage water scarcity and risks.

A recent blogpost (As reservoirs fall, prices should rise) from Prof. Robert Stavins, environmental economist at Harvard University again states this clearly in the US context:

Throughout the United States, water is under-priced.  Efficient use of water will take place only when the price reflects the actual additional cost of making that water available.  Lest one fear that higher water rates would mean that Americans would go thirsty, take note:  On average, each of us uses 183 gallons of water a day for drinking, cooking, washing, flushing, cleaning, and watering, but less than 5% of that is for drinking and cooking combined.  There is plenty of margin for change if people are given the right price signals.

Fifty years of economic analyses have demonstrated that water demand is responsive to price changes, both in the short term, as individuals and firms respond by making do with less, and in the long term, as they adopt more efficient devices in the home and workplace.  For example, when Boulder, Colorado moved from unmetered to metered systems, water use dropped by 40% on a sustained basis.

But prices are typically set well below the social costs of the water supplies, since historical average costs are employed, rather than true additional (marginal) costs of new supplies.  Although water scarcity typically develops gradually across seasons of low rainfall and low accumulations of snow pack, pronounced droughts are usually felt in the summer months of greatest demand.  The economically sensible approach is to charge more at these times, but such “seasonal pricing” is practiced by less than 2% of utilities across the country.

A reasonable objection to jacking up the price of water is that it would hurt the poor.  But we can take a page from the play book of electric utilities who subsidize the first kilowatt-hours of electricity use with very low “life-line rates.”  Indeed, the first increment of water use can be made available free of charge.  What matters is that the right incentives are provided for higher levels of usage.

Climate Change: South Africa's options

The South African government is currently hosting a climate change summit. According to the designated website the purpose and objectives of the summit are as follows:

PURPOSE

The purpose of the Climate Change Summit 2009 is to:

• Provide all key climate change response stakeholders with an update on the most recent climate change research and other current South African initiatives and interventions; and
• Provide a platform for all key climate change response stakeholders to discuss and agree the framework for a National Climate Change Response Policy that includes, among others, fiscal, regulatory and legislative packages as well as sectoral implementation plans.

OBJECTIVES

By the end of the summit –

• All key climate change response stakeholders have a common understanding of the most recent climate change research and other South African climate change response initiatives and interventions;
• A detailed policy framework (comprehensive annotated table of contents) is broadly supported;
• The roles and responsibilities of sector departments in respect to the development of the sector policy components is agreed;
• All policy development timelines and milestones are agreed;
• The implications and intentions of all policy directions are understood.

On this blog this topic has also been discussed in bits and pieces. A short synthesis that may help in further debating South Africa's options:

- CDM may be an obstacle rather then a solution to climate stabilisation. Yes, it may offer some benefits and help finance reduction of greenhouse gases, but CDM has not (yet?) made a discernable impact in Africa. CDM may prove to be a stepping stone towards a more efficient multi-lateral market on carbon credits in the medium to longer term.

- Adaptation is the name of the game in Africa. Africa contributes little to overall greenhouse gases and is most vulnerable to climate change. With persistent poverty and increasing socioeconomic vulnerability, no climate change response strategy worthy its salt will ignore or only pay lip service to strengthening adaptive capacity. Let's not forget adaption.

- In South Africa we have a few very large greenhouse gas emitters. Eskom is the second highest CO2 emitting power company in the world. South Africa has a high energy and carbon intensive economy. This suggests that environmental effectiveness and efficiency gains are most likely be possible, but the risks of not doing anything need to be included in a future strategy. Increasing climate risks may start affecting planned expansions in coal-fired power stations (see also here and related story from the World Bank here). The point is that coal-fired power is an increasing risky business. These risks need to be reflected within a country development and company strategy, not only in a national climate response strategy.

- The pertinent question is at what cost greenhouse gases can be reduced. Marginal cost curves for greenhouse gas reduction (see Global cost carbon reduction, US cost curves) illustrate that some options may yield net benefits while others can be very expensive.  However, these studies did raise questions on the assumed behaviour of consumers, whether the costs of transacting have been included and the discount rate. The South African Long-Term Mitigation Scenarios (LTMS) also proposes a list with the costs of country specific interventions. This is useful work, but as the authors themselves suggest, need to set the basis for a more detailed scrutiny of the proposed options.

- The climate system may be forced into abrupt changes. In some circles this has been referred to as tipping points. The need to responding to extreme climatic events and disasters need to be acknowledged and response options for such climatic events included in a disaster management strategy.

- The Kyoto Protocol is fragile and pressure is mounting for a new climate policy regime.  Any national policy on climate change need to anticipate and plan for a future international climate policy regimes which may include wider cap-and-trade systems (cap-auction-and-trade), trade rules and border tariff adjustments to name a few.

Changemakers

From my Inbox :

Dear Martin,

We are launching an online competition to search for system-changing innovations in agriculture and rural development.

“Cultivating Innovation: Solutions for Rural Communities” is hosted at http://www.changemakers.net/agriculture. Please find below today’s news release. Please share this information with your readers and help us promote this initiative.

If you would like banners and buttons relevant to this initiative for your website, please do not hesitate to contact me by email, or visithttp://www.changemakers.net/agriculture/mediacenter

Thank you so much for your support.

Done!

Click on the Changemakers button for more information.

China's costly environmental crises

China's environment is in bad shape according to Kenneth Lieberthal, visiting fellow at The Brookings Institution.  This sends out a strong warning to other developing nations to better manage the environmental impacts of economic development.

 From ResponsibleChina.com:

China’s environmental crisis is wide-ranging, complex, and consequential

It threatens the pace of economic growth

Addressing it effectively will be expensive, and will require changes in the political economy

Challenges will evolve over time

The environment may well be the most consequential factor in shaping the country’s future

Why the Kyoto Protocol is so fragile

This graphic tells it all. From the New York Times.

The Reality of Recycling

The Guardian published a good piece called 'the truth about recycling'.  

A small selection from a very long article:

Wakelin [CEO of Greenstar] believes that one of the tricks to winning over a sceptical public is to make recycling far easier for the average householder. "I always get asked the same questions at dinner parties," he says. "Why do I have to have so many bins at home? And why can't I recycle more plastic?"

The solution, says Wakelin, is to "leave it to the machines", rather than have "Mr and Mrs Average sorting it all at home". His company's philosophy for waste is that "co-mingled" collections (where all dry recyclables are placed by householders into just one bag ready for collection) are the way forward, as opposed to kerbside collections (where householders are expected to separate their recycling at home for refuse workers working "kerbside" to then put these sorted materials by hand into separate containers on their vehicle) which, he says, are less efficient, both environmentally and economically. The MRF at Aldridge processes 500-600 tonnes of municipal recycling (collected from households, restaurants, small businesses etc) a day, serving 15 local authorities, some as far away as London and North Wales. This represents 3-4% of the UK's dry recyclate.

A key learning point for developing cities is to critically examine and pilot alternative waste management options before making any prescriptive choices.

Air pollution down, life expectancy up

A study in the New England Journal of Medicine again raises the importance of dealing with air pollution for its health impacts. 

The study argued that for an approximate period of 1980 - 2000 average increase in life expectancy in certain selected counties in the US was 2.72 years. Using regression modelling techniques, it is argued that reduced air pollution (defined as fine particulate matter PM2.5) is one factor contributing to increased life expectancies.  It is estimated that the individual effects of reductions in air pollution account for as much as 15% of the overall increase.

What Environmentalists Should Know about Economics

Dispelling misconceptions and myths about economics to environmentalists became such a large part of my work that I started thinking to write a book about it. Luckily, someone has done it already. 

Jason Scorse from Monterey Institute of International Studies published an on-line book on the topic. 

Further good news is that no economic background is required. The book is also fully downloadable.

Download the Book

What Environmentalists Need to Know about Economics - Entire Book

Download by Chapter

Table of Contents and Introduction

Part I: How Economists Approach Environmental Issues

Chapter 1 - The Root Causes of Environmental Problems

Chapter 2 - Determining the "Optimum" Amount of Pollution

Chapter 3 - Valuing Ecosystems

Chapter 4 - Putting Monetary Values on the Environment and Living Things

Chapter 5 - Valuing Future Generations

Chapter 6 - Tools to Address Environmental Problems: Taxes, Property Rights, Information, and Psychological Insights

Part II: Putting Economic Analysis to Work

Chapter 7 - Climate Change

Chapter 8 - Conservation and Biodiversity Preservation

Chapter 9 - Agriculture

Chapter 10 - Chemical Pollution

Chapter 11 - Fisheries

Chapter 12 - Deforestation

Chapter 13 - Population Growth & Technological Change

Chapter 14 - Demand-Side Interventions

Final Thoughts & Additional Resources

Comments and constructive criticism are welcome at: jason.scorse@miis.edu.

Image: Flickr

H/T: Globalisation and the Environment

SAs response to the international crises

See this draft, from Business Day.

CDM: Part of the problem?

A new working paper from the Statistics Norway, Research Department "Does the Clean Development Mechanism have a viable future" argues that CDM is an obstacle rather then a solution to dealing with climate change:

The developed countries can meet part of their Kyoto commitments by investing in emission-reducing projects in developing countries (the Clean Development Mechanism, CDM). Since the developing countries have so far not been willing to accept binding emission commitments, the CDM has been the only mechanism available for ensuring emission-abatement measures in developing countries. We argue that the CDM is not an efficient tool for achieving deep cuts in global emissions and conclude that maintaining the CDM as an option for developing countries may in itself be a serious obstacle to more binding participation by these countries.

Well-being: Income and Social Context

From a new study published by the NBER :

We find strong evidence for the importance of both income and social context variables 

in explaining differences in well-being. For most specifications tested, the combined 

effects of a few measures of the social and institutional context exceed that of income in 

equations explaining international differences in life satisfaction. Calculation of 

compensating differentials also reveals large income-equivalent values for improvements 

in the social context, with much of this value flowing via positive national spillover 

effects for key social variables.

Improvements in factors such as corruption, freedom, friends to count on, care and helping others, importance of religion can go a long way in improving human well-being.

Roaring China-Africa trade in 2008

China-Africa trade increased by 45% from 2007 to 2008 - reaching a record $107bn in 2008. The biggest trading partners are Angola and South Africa. This places even more emphasis on the question whether these deals are sustainable (see earlier post: China: Doing Deals that last?)

From ChinaView:

BEIJING, Feb. 11 (Xinhua) -- Trade between China and Africa reached a record 106.84 billion U.S. dollars in 2008, up 45.1 percent from a year earlier, customs figures showed Wednesday.

    Exports to Africa reached 50.84 billion U.S. dollars, up 36.3 percent. Imports from Africa hit 56 billion U.S. dollars, up 54 percent.

    China had a trade deficit of 5.16 billion U.S. dollars with Africa in 2008, compared with a surplus of 940 million U.S. dollars in 2007.

    The number of African countries with which China had more than 1 billion U.S. dollars in trade increased to 20 in 2008 from 14 in2007.

    Angola remained China's largest trading partner in Africa and South Africa came the second.

H/T: Centre for Chinese Studies

On carbon taxes and a sense of proportion

Three pieces of information showing the importance to keep a sense of proportion in the carbon tax debate:

A total of 735,000 automobiles were sold in China last month, compared to 656,976 vehicles were sold in the US. BBC News

and this:

FINANCE Minister Trevor Manuel’s plan to tax vehicles emitting more than 300g of carbon dioxide per kilometre from next year should be welcomed. The sentiment brings SA closer to international best practice in sharing in the responsibility to mitigate climate change.

While it is fair to argue that private vehicles do not add nearly as much carbon to the atmosphere as heavy industry does, changing the way we think about the environment may begin to make the big difference that the world needs.

Even if the effect of the tax is negligible in the greater scheme of global warming and climate change, its symbolic value and the awareness it creates is likely to have an important effect. (Business Day)

and this:

According to the National Association of Automobile Manufacturers of SA (Naamsa) 22,473 passenger cars were sold in January. But light commercial vehicle sales declined 9.4% over December last year to 8,978 units. The net effect was a total January new vehicle sales figure of 32,999 units - a mere half a percent increase over the previous month. (Bizcommunity)

Conclusion: Symbolic values and facts are not always good partners.

Rising temperature, decreasing income?

Hotter means lower income, even within countries, but there is a theory of longer-term adaption. 

From a new NBER paper, "TEMPERATURE AND INCOME: 

RECONCILING NEW CROSS-SECTIONAL AND PANEL ESTIMATES":

This paper provides new evidence on the relationship between temperature and income. 

Using sub-national data from 12 countries in the Americas, we show that the negative cross- 

sectional relationship between temperature and income exists within countries, as well as across 

countries. We then provide a theoretical framework for reconciling the substantial, negative 

association between temperature and income in cross-section with the even stronger short-run 

effects of temperature shown in panel models. The theoretical framework suggests that half of 

the negative short-term effects of temperature are offset in the long run through adaptation. 

Manuel's Greenery

Min Manuel's Budget Speech, delivered 11 Feb, highlights a continued focus on improving South Africa's environmental performance. Here are a the few extracts dealing with incentives for energy efficiency, environmental fiscal reform and favourable tax treatment on carbon credits:

A further R1 billion is added for electricity demand management, together with tax incentives for investment in energy- 

efficient technologies. 

Tax tips continue to make up the majority of the tips submitted. Mr. Saul Margolis of 

Johannesburg called for a tax to be imposed on incandescent light bulbs to encourage 

people to use compact fluorescent lightbulbs and save energy. Mr. Margolis, I have 

asked that this be included in the revenue proposals this year.  

We propose taking further steps to encourage energy efficiency and reduce harmful 

emissions, some of which have tax implications. 

• An incentive for investments by companies in energy-efficient equipment will be 

introduced, in the form of a supplementary depreciation allowance.  

• The levy on plastic shopping bags will be increased from 3 cents to 4 cents. 

• An increase is proposed in the international air passenger departure tax, which was 

last raised in 2005/06.  

• The existing excise duties on motor vehicles will be adjusted to take into account 

carbon emissions. 

It is important, furthermore that we should encourage South African companies to take 

advantage of the clean development mechanism established in the Kyoto Protocol. A 

favourable tax treatment will therefore be introduced for the recognition of income 

derived from the sale of emission reductions, as certified through this mechanism.  

RWE: No new coal fired power stations

RWE AG said it won’t build new coal- fired power stations in western Europe after the European Union forced utilities there to buy all carbon dioxide allowances starting 2013, newswire Dow Jones reported, citing Johannes Lambertz, chief executive of RWE Power.

Full story: Bloomberg.

Image: Flickr

H/T: Environmental Valuation & Cost-Benefit News

Discover Africa

A website called Discover Africa pulls together a wonderful set of images from Flickr on the continent. 

Well worth a visit! I tried one search. Good images, but just not clear how one will make sense, filter narrow or rank the 162784 images found matching “Cape Town”.

H/T: White African

Image: Bo-Kaap, Cape Town from Flickr

On free choice and planning in natural resource management

Aren’t economists often seen as the defenders of free choice and are they not sceptical about any intervention or planning that could hamper that choice? When one picks up a textbook on the subject this might easily be your first conclusion. However, further developments in the discipline have pointed out that focusing only on either planning or markets is untenable. This post will attempt to point out some of the bridges between free choice and planning within the context of natural and environmental resource management.

The first important concept is that of external effects or externalities. These negative or positive effects of certain economic activities are not accounted for in market prices. An example of a negative effect could be air or water pollution, while an example of a positive effect is that private research could lead to new general knowledge. Policy adjustments are often necessary, especially to internalise negative impacts, which, ceteris paribus, would ultimately lead to better-informed choices. 

Another important development in economic theory is the contributions of neo-institutional economics. The focus here is on the rules and contracts that guide exchange. In this view the market, or any other institution for that matter, is just one way of exchange and could be efficient, but should be measured according to the costs of performing such transactions. The focus is not on a choice between planning or market frameworks, but on the relative costs of keeping such institutions intact. 

The third, and least developed concept in economic theory, is one related to the burgeoning sciences of systems theory, complexity theory and chaos theory. With the holistic focus on the interrelationships between objects, rather than on objects themselves, the contribution of this subject field for our purpose lies in the emphasis on continuous feedback from the system under study. The ex post planning of complex systems is almost a contradiction in terms, one which will only make sense if applied in a process of experiential learning. 

These three concepts are important when evaluating the importance of  theories on economy-environment interactions for planning purposes. The fact is that the tension between the amount and type of planning, and the amount and type of free choice differ on deep philosophical grounds. Even the views of scholars within the subject field of economics and the environment (including environmental economics, ecological economics, neo-institutional economics and other more peripheral approaches) differ vastly on the relative roles they would like to assign to free choice and to planning. 

Without going into the details of such a debate, it would possibly be valuable to point out some environmental issues where such a debate will continue to flourish:

• The economic value of open spaces in urban environments
  
• The prioritisation of alternative environmental planning options
  
• The economic assessment of environmental policies and plans
  
• The economic valuation of alternative land uses in applications such as city planning, rural development or spatial development initiatives (SDIs)
  
• The planning of an international or national trading system for carbon credits

In all these examples, some will argue that more planning means more economic costs, while others will continue to argue that more individual choice means more potential for anarchy, and thus failure to reach environmental objectives. It can be foreseen that this debate will reach an academic stalemate if not guided by a learning process that facilitates such interactions. The context of natural and environmental resource management will be an important factor in determining the best mix between planning and markets.

Urban natural capital

Urban centres do not only pose a threat to the sustainable delivery ecosystems goods and services, but also provide the infrastructure and the people to realise the economic value of such goods and services.  

A study done in Canada argued that a supply of urban natural capital provides residents (and visitors!) with a connection to nature as well as benefits such as improved health, recreational and educational opportunities, increased property values, encouraging tourism and attracting and retaining skilled labour and businesses.

Investing in urban natural capital has some tangible socio-economic benefits that can be quantified.  The challenge remains to make a compelling business case to municipalities and local authorities to invest in natural capital, which by nature is often a public good.

Picture: Flickr

Environmental damage and the rising price of flying

A British surveys reveals that people are more readily accepting the idea that the price of air travel will have to rise to better reflect environmental damage. Usually when prices rise, demand will fall. Will this affect long-haul destinations like South Africa, and particularly the Western Cape with its increased reliance on tourism for economic growth and development? 

Their is no direct answer, but it will make sense to start measuring and monitoring tourist behaviour and not only aggregate tourism number on arrivals and expenditure. For example, how sensitive are tourists to a rise in ticket prices? Does this affect both business and leisure travel? What options do tourists have to adapt to rising prices and which are they most likely to follow? 

From the annual British attitude survey as reported in the Guardian:

Voters are ready to accept a steep rise in air fares to reduce the environmental damage caused by flying, the annual British social attitudes survey reveals today.

Each year, they have asked a representative sample of more than 4,000 people whether they agree or disagree that "the price of a plane ticket should reflect the environmental damage that flying causes, even if it makes air travel much more expensive".

The proportion of those agreeing rose steadily from 36% in 2004 to 49% in the most recent survey, in 2007, while those disagreeing fell from 34% to 28%, with the rest undecided.

Analysts from the National Centre for Social Research (NCSR), which conducted the surveys, said: "We found remarkably low levels of opposition to the idea that ticket prices may have to rise in order to offset environmental damage. This remains the case among current flyers as well as non-flyers and holds across the political spectrum."

Picture: courtesy SA Tourism

Obama: a welcome sensitivity to green and poor?

From the UNEP website an overview of Obama's promises on greenery (and poverty):

Here is a selection of the environment-related points from US President Barack Obama's Inauguration Speech on 20 January 2009

"Homes have been lost, jobs shed, businesses shuttered. Our health care is too costly, our schools fail too many, and each day brings further evidence that the ways we use energy strengthen our adversaries and threaten our planet."

"We will harness the sun and the winds and the soil to fuel our cars and run our factories. And we will transform our schools and colleges and universities to meet the demands of a new age."

"With old friends and former foes, we'll work tirelessly to lessen the nuclear threat and roll back the specter of a warming planet."

"To the people of poor nations, we pledge to work alongside you to make your farms flourish and let clean waters flow; to nourish starved bodies and feed hungry minds."

"And to those nations like ours that enjoy relative plenty, we say we can no longer afford indifference to the suffering outside our borders, nor can we consume the world's resources without regard to effect. For the world has changed, and we must change with it."

Read the full speech at http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/20/us/politics/20text-obama.html

Green Jobs

A recent study by the Institute for Energy Research in the US agues that subsidising "green jobs" may not be such a good idea after all:

Unfortunately, it is highly questionable whether a government campaign to spur “green jobs” 

would have net economic benefits.  Indeed, the distortionary impacts of government intrusion 

into energy markets could prematurely force business to abandon current production 

technologies for more expensive ones. Furthermore, there would likely be negative economic 

consequences from forcing higher-cost alternative energy sources upon the economy.  These 

factors would likely increase consumer energy costs and the costs of a wide array of energy- 

intensive goods, slow GDP growth and ironically may yield no net job gains. More likely, they 

would result in net job losses. 

For full report see here.

Happy Planet?

From the new economic foundation a new Happy Plant Index. If you look at the HPI map Africa does not really succeed in translating the consumption of natural resources into human well-being.

From the nef website:

The Happy Planet Index (HPI) is an innovative new measure that shows the ecological efficiency with which human well-being is delivered around the world. It is the first ever index to combine environmental impact with well-being to measure the environmental efficiency with which country by country, people live long and happy lives.

The Index doesn’t reveal the ‘happiest’ country in the world. It shows the relative efficiency with which nations convert the planet’s natural resources into long and happy lives for their citizens. The nations that top the Index aren’t the happiest places in the world, but the nations that score well show that achieving, long, happy lives without over-stretching the planet’s resources is possible. The HPI shows that around the world, high levels of resource consumption do not reliably produce high levels of well-being (life-satisfaction), and that it is possible to produce high levels of well-being without excessive consumption of the Earth’s resources. It also reveals that there are different routes to achieving comparable levels of well-being. The model followed by the West can provide widespread longevity and variable life satisfaction, but it does so only at a vast and ultimately counter-productive cost in terms of resource consumption.

The Happy Planet Index (HPI) strips the view of the economy back to its absolute basics: what we put in (resources), and what comes out (human lives of different length and happiness). The resulting Index of the 178 nations for which data is available, reveals that the world as a whole has a long way to go. In terms of delivering long and meaningful lives within the Earth’s environmental limits - all nations could do better. No country achieves an overall ‘high’ score on the Index, and no country does well on all three indicators.

H/T: RFF library blog

The benefit of being gloomy

It is that time of the year again when we tend to take stock and speculate on what the future will bring. With persistently bad news on many fronts one can expect a lot of us to be quite gloomy. In a world obsessed with happiness (see related blogpost on the philosophy of happiness), the first reaction is often to banish those dark moods out of our lives.

Sadness is not all bad argues the New Scientist in a recent editorial. Sadness may help us to learn from our mistakes, may help facilitate a need for deeper reflection and may even stimulate creativity.  As Terence Ketter, psychiatrist at Stanford University remarked in the article: 'The cost of happiness is complacency. Discontent can drive change'.

Feeling gloomy? Time for reflection and change.