October 30, 2006

reactions to the Stern review on the economics of climate change

Sir Nicholas Stern’s independent report on the impact of climate change for the Chancellor of the Exchequer demands that the world acts now or faces devastating economic consequences.

Ian Arbon, Chair of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers’ Energy, Environment and Sustainable Group, said:

“In my view (and I have been dealing with scientists on these issues for years) this report doesn’t go anywhere near far enough. The IMechE does welcome this report but is exactly what we, as engineers, have been saying for 5/6 years – and we will be in a much worse state than Stern predicts in this report. And anyone who believes Climate Change is a cyclical effect of nature is delusional – it isn’t. Is it normal that we are experiencing something like 19 degrees Celsius at the beginning of November? Of course not.

“On his claim that we need a stabilisation of greenhouse gas levels in the atmosphere of 500 to 550 parts per million of carbon dioxide by 2050 – that is crazy. Our levels at the moment are around 380 ppm – and we need to be stabilising at 450 – nobody can predict the state the world will be in at 550 – it will be too late by then. Look at what we are experiencing now at 380 ppm! I think Stern is being hopelessly optimistic in his figures.

“Fundamentally I agree with the principals of this report and that 1% of GDP must be spent on tackling this immediately – anyone who thinks they will not be financially affected by this is mistaken. It will cost us all.””

Dr Dave Reay, NERC Research Fellow, University of Edinburgh, said:

“A truly landmark report. As the delegates take their seats for the UN Climate Change conference in Nairobi this weekend, one thing should be clear to all: the time for procrastination is over. Climate change is the ultimate loan shark and, with every extra day of inaction, the interest rate goes up. Pay today and it might take your savings, pay tomorrow and it will take your shirt.”

Professor Stuart Haszeldine UK Energy Research Centre, University of Edinburgh, said:

“Geologists know that humans have only just started to burn fossil carbon. Don’t bother worrying about peak oil. There is 100 times more coal, tar sand, shale oil, and frozen gas hydrate accessible to extract and burn than we have already exploited. Our choices are: to change the way humans meet their demands, to use decarbonised energy, or to become extinct. There is no need to wait for EU and world consensus. The Government can sell permits now, to produce electricity from coal and gas, with CO2 stored below ground. The public can pay just half the extra price given to wind-generated electricity, $20-30 per ton CO2 will enable profitable cleanup. This is much cheaper than the $85 /ton CO2 cost of BaU damage derived by Stern. The UK would see really big CO2 cuts from 2010, and a 15-30% national CO2 reduction by 2020. If we don’t act fast and tough, then humans would not be the first great ape to become extinct, but could be the last. Early purchase offer: chance to win a habitable planet.”

Dr Chris Huntingford, Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, said:

“I welcome this comprehensive assessment by Sir Nicholas Stern. It provides the vital missing link between global economics and the emerging and overwhelming evidence of human influence on climate change.

“In response to the Stern review, the scientific research community needs to work on reducing the uncertainty in climate predictions, so we fully understand the risks involved. We will use this report as a basis for collaboration with economists to ensure this pressing issue is tackled.”

Shaun Fitzgerald, BP Institute, University of Cambridge, said:

“Improving energy efficiency of buildings, transport and industry is key as the Stern Review points out. However, this has been cited before such as in the Govt White Paper and the EU Buildings Labelling Directive. The practical steps to ensure these great ideas get implemented appear to be overlooked. For example, all buildings will need to have a certificate that rates their energy consumption, say from A rated to G rated, in a similar way to white goods (freezers, fridges etc.). Getting the energy rating for a particular model of fridge which is then sold by the thousands is easy — what about existing buildings? Who is going to do this? This means 1) trawling through the utility bills or fuel purchases or 2) modeling the building in some fashion. The resource required to do this is simply not there at the moment. Unless these practical steps are thought through, there will be delays in implementing the policy (e.g. time required to train more engineers to model buildings etc.)… And this will have severe economic penalties.”

Dr David Viner, Director Climate Impacts LINK project, University of East Anglia, said:

“The scientific community has through numerous scientific publications and reports been informing the public and politicians about human induced climate change since the early 1980s. The Stern Review presents the icing on the cake.

“The review presents for the first time a full assessment of the economic costs about human induced climate change. We can not however overlook the human costs in terms of lives lost and livelihoods destroyed.

“Climate change impacts upon the global community, developed countries are not spared, one only has to examine the European Heatwave of 2003 and Katrina in 2005.”

Professor Ian Colbeck, Director, Centre for Environment and Society, University of Essex, said:

“The report highlights the need for immediate action to tackle climate change but to be successful it requires international agreement akin to the Montreal protocol. It only needs two or three of the major CO2 emitting countries to ignore the warnings to offset any reductions made elsewhere.”

Dr Edward Hanna, Lecturer in Climate Change, University of Sheffield, said:

“We are far too complacent about the potentially very damaging effects of climate change and urgently need to put words about energy efficiency and conservation into practice. Rising sea levels from increased melt of many glaciers and ice sheets, and increased climate variability and unpredictability, are especially scientifically concerning.”

Professor Chris Thomas, University of York, said:

“There is already compelling evidence that climate change is changing natural ecosystems and driving species extinct. Natural ecosystems freely provide trillions of pounds worth of benefits to human societies every year, amongst other things by forming soils and regulating water supplies, so how can we possibly afford not to take action?”

Professor Matt Bentley, Professor of Marine Biology, Newcastle University, said:

“It is clear from Sir Nicholas’ report that acting now to reduce the impact of climate change will impose a real cost on us all, most particularly on those in developed countries. We must all be prepared to accept this cost as any further delay will lead to unimaginable economic and environmental consequences.”

Hannah Chalmers, Energy Technology for Sustainable Development Group Imperial College London, said:

“The Stern Review provides a solid basis for real action to tackle climate change. It is crucial that Government uses this report as a springboard for national and international progress to develop and deploy the range of technologies that could be used to avoid the most serious impacts of dangerous climate change. This should include support for technologies such as carbon capture and storage to tackle carbon dioxide emissions from fossil-fired plants, alongside other measures which have featured more strongly in UK policy in recent years.”

Dr Jeremy Leggett, CEO of Solarcentury and a previous member of the government’s Renewables Advisory Board, said:

“This report attaches some numbers to what has been obvious for a long while: that global warming left unmitigated will wash ruinously across our economy as effectively as an axis of invading armies. Will the government now come up with some policies appropriate to the scale of this national security emergency?”

Professor Bill McGuire, Director, Benfield UCL Hazard Research Centre, said:

“The scariest thing about the Stern report is that it may not be scary enough. If we lose the Greenland ice sheet in the next few centuries, leading to a 7 m rise in sea level – as well we might – then Stern’s £3.68 trillion will be a drop in the ocean compared to the ultimate cost of climate change.”

Professor Mike Hulme, the Director of the Tyndall Centre, said:

“The Tyndall Centre is pleased to see the Stern Review released today. Too many debates about climate change policy rely on partial or inappropriate economic analyses. By undertaking this comprehensive assessment of what is known about the economics of climate change (and identifying what we just don’t know), the Stern Review offers the prospect of a better informed and more transparent debate about how economics can inform national and international climate policy-making.”

Professor Neil Adger, environmental economist at UEA and the Tyndall Centre, said:

“The Tyndall Centre is pleased to see the Stern Review released today. Too many debates about climate change policy rely on partial or inappropriate economic analyses. By undertaking this comprehensive assessment of what is known about the economics of climate change (and identifying what we just don’t know), the Stern Review offers the prospect of a better informed and more transparent debate about how economics can inform national and international climate policy-making.”

Professor Michael Grubb, Prof Of Climate Change & Energy Policy, Imperial College and Cambridge University, said:

“The Stern Review finally closes a chasm that has existed for 15 years between the precautionary concerns of scientists, and the cost-benefit views of many economists. It finds that most economists’ methods have been inadequate for a problem of this scale. Argued with meticulous economic detail, Stern concludes that the problem is indeed massive and urgent – but that it can be solved.

“The most encouraging feature of the Stern review is it’s conclusion that the problem can be solved by building upon the existing foundations of emissions trading and the Kyoto Protocol, combined with strengthened attention to the other pillars of behaviour, efficiency and technological innovation.”

Professor Jeffery Burley, Chairman of the Board, C-Questor, said:

“The report notes that 18% of global emissions result from deforestation (which is largely tropical) and that renewable energy will continue to account for less than half of global energy supply in 2050. This challenges governments, development agencies, researchers and industries to develop land use tenurial policies and financial incentives to occupiers together with improved afforestation and reforestation technologies and agricultural cropping to maximise the use of degraded and deforested lands while reducing further deforestation.”

Miles Seaman, Independent Energy Consultant, said:

“The earth receives sufficient energy from the sun more than one thousand times over to sustain the current level of economic activity. Mastering fusion would make energy availability almost limitless. Hence sustainable energy is within our grasp.

“The science and engineering challenge is to realise a transformation to sustainable energy.

“The only realistic instrument to affect this is global rationing of carbon dioxide emissions. This way, the equity issues can be faced head on. At a national and European level we need to devise means of rationing so that all activities that imply a significant emission of carbon dioxide. The information age equips us to do this fairly easily. Engineers would happily apply themselves to a new industrial revolution if faced with this challenge. We can only guess at the outcome.

“The Stern report rightly identifies the catastrophic consequences of deferring the decision on bold and imaginative ways of facing this challenge.

“Let the political establishment throw down the gauntlet to scientists and engineers and we will herald a new age of technological inventiveness.”

Dr Andrew Challinor, Senior Research Fellow, National Centre For Atmospheric Science, University Of Reading, said:

“The (Stern) team have not been content to merely summarise current knowledge; they have made it their job to understand it. I have been very impressed with the depth of research that has gone into this review.

“It is very useful to have this breadth and depth of detail in a report published independently of the IPCC reports – for one thing it may silence those who claim that the IPCC act partially. The Stern review goes much further than the economics of climate change.”

Phil Sivell, Team Leader, Climate Change, Transport Research Laboratory, said:

“TRL welcomes the publication of the Stern Report. It is a persuasive analysis of how the world’s economy will be damaged, unless we all change how we behave.

“The report’s importance is in its call for immediate and sustained action to address the emissions of greenhouse gases. Both new technologies and behaviour change are required, and a combination of legislation and education is the best way to do this.

“Currently, emissions from the transport sector are growing rapidly. It is critical that the users and providers of transport recognise this and look to cover its full costs.”

Professor John Thornes, from the University of Birmingham’s School of Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences, said:

“The Stern Report suggests a form of ”green” insurance for the Earth’s climate, the premium for which is rather cheap at 1% of global GDP. If we don’t take out this climate policy then the risk of severe global damage is overwhelming.”

Professor Bob Spicer, Centre for Earth, Planetary, Space and Astronomical Research (CEPSAR), The Open University, said:

“This comprehensive and authoritative report underscores the importance of improving climate models but uncertainty is no longer an excuse to ignore reality.

“Based on geological evidence from when the Earth was previously warmer it is likely that the models will underestimate the degree of future change near the poles and in continental interiors – the former important for ice melt and sea level rise, and the latter for agricultural impacts. One thing is certain though, this report makes it crystal clear that the future spells disaster for the world’s poorest and will be difficult to live with for everyone if we don’t act now.”

Prof Chris Rapley CBE, Director British Antarctic Survey, said:

“I welcome the Stern report – especially its emphasis on the rigour of scientific evidence and the need for international action. Our experience as the discoverers of the Ozone Hole, which was followed within two years by the Montreal Protocol, shows that once an international agreement has been reached on the need for action and a means of achieving it, real progress can be made.”