It's time to privatize the provision of clean air

Pro did not raise any objections to any of my rebuttals, and thus it can be assume that he accepts all of them.However, Pro did raise a couple of objections to my alternative proposal (Polluter Pays).Firstly, because there are many diverse causes of pollution - sources include farm animals emitting methane from their digestive systems; factories pumping out harmful gasses; exhaust fumes from cars, trucks and planes; erupting volcanoes; methane leaking from defrosting tundra and many more...The Cost associated with controlling “the pollution that is said to cause global warming” results only from anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions (GGE’s). That is, we do not spend any money to control the GGE’s of non-anthropogenic sources. Therefore, volcanoes and other non-anthropogenic sources of GGE’s are completely irrelevant in the context of this debate. In order to implement a Polluter Pays system, we only need to calculate GGE’s from the various anthropogenic sources. This is not difficult to do, and indeed we have already done it. Greenhouse gas emissions inventories have for years been kept by all the big emitters, including (but not limited to) the US [1], UK [2], China [3] and India [4]....and with the pollution being produced worldwide and blown around the globe by weather systems...Obviously, this has absolutely no effect whatsoever on our ability to calculate GGE’s from anthropogenic sources....it's impossible to hold any single company or individual accountable for a certain percentage of the total pollution in the atmosphere.It is simply not true that it is impossible to have a system where the Polluter Pays. It is a simple task to conduct an independent GGE’s audit for an individual company; individual companies do this all the time in order to comply with Government regulations. There are a number of ways to do it, including the use of Continuous Emissions Monitoring Systems [5], and the application of Emissions Factors that reflect the carbon content of different fuels [6]. Individuals do not need to be audited, as they will pay for their pollution when they purchase goods and services at the adjusted price that reflects the cost of GGE’s.Secondly, even if financial penalties are placed upon manufacturers in the West that do pollute the atmosphere, similar penalties are not imposed upon factories in emerging economies such as China and India, thus leaving the Western firms at a competitive disadvantage...I do not dispute that some firms in the West may be at a competitive disadvantage if they have to pay for their emissions whilst their competitors in emerging economies do not. This would not occur if wealthy and emerging economies could agree on a carbon price. Such an agreement has not yet been reached, and probably will not be reached in the immediate future. However, it is at least a possibility, whereas citizens agreeing to pay companies to breathe, is not. ConclusionPaying to breathe is an absurd idea that: Demands payments for something that does not cost anything. It completely unfair. Does not provide any incentive to reduce GGE’s. Will never gain acceptance anyway. Polluter Pays is the fairest and most sensible way to go. It is not time to privatise the provision of clean air. Thank you to Brian for this debate. I quite enjoyed it. [1] http://www.epa.gov... [2] http://www.decc.gov.uk... [3] http://www.fas.org... [4] http://cs-test.ias.ac.in... [5] http://en.wikipedia.org... [6] http://www.decc.gov.uk...