keela to copenhagen climate change and vulnerable societies we are very happy and honored to have some of our distinguished members of the panel to join us this afternoon giving us their sense of expertise and understanding of the serious issue now facing not only our country but other countries and regions of the world i think for purposes of expediting our effort hearing that this afternoon in consultation with my  i would like to begin our hearing this afternoon with my opening statement and my opening statement to the fact that we held a hearing th last year february and of course at that time the political climate in our country was very heavy in terms of presidential elections that were then pending and the issues  what came about in the bali conference concerning the issue of climate change i thought we had a very lively debate with some of the members of our committee especially my good friend the gentleman from california mr rob rocco who happens to be a senior member of the science and technology committee he had expressed some concern even about the science if there really is global warming or climate change  occurring in our and our planet we also had the distinction of several members of the pacific island nations credited to both new york and to the united states with a public briefing that was held and in view of not anointed with any sense of certainty what would be the political climate and the issues that were raised during the height of the presidential elections  is quite obvious that the new administration under president obama has made climate change is one of his top priorities of his administration and addressing the issue of the fact that for some eight years because our country never signed on to the kyoto protocol it became very difficult to really know what the what really is our fundamental foreign policy towards the issue of climate change that was clearly we were one of the two or three countries of all that never did sign on to the kyoto protocol but i will say that in fairness to the bush administration there have been efforts during the bush administration in discussing environmental and climatic  issues maybe not in the scale where the expectations were the whole world was focusing on the kyoto protocols in the post kyoto protocols where we are supposed to come up with some resolution to the issue by the year two sure believes that our country and probably the most of the industrialized countries don't take on the fact that this issue is a lively debate it among the industrialized countries  change you're talking about population as you're talking about whether or not the science is still holed up to some of the criticisms that have been raised or concerns of whether or not there really is  house and in that bill contains some attention given to the international recognition of the problems it has isn't just in the united states but all countries in the world and i just want to say that climate change presents an enormous threat to every country in every region of the world are rising temperatures as she levels decrease supplies of fresh water and increasing frequency and severity of hurricanes and other weather events have already had a significant negative impact on the physical and the biological environment on human health in terms of national security climate change has been termed as a threat accel which may turn existing instabilities into open conflict the most serious impacts are coming and sooner than even the most pessimistic predictions made by the world's best scientists a recent study made by the with greater speed and intensity than initially predicted safe levels of atmospheric greenhouse gases may be far lower than previously thought and we may be closer to an in reversible tipping point than  envoy for climate change mr todd stern he said in one of the greatest as in climate change is that the developing countries indeed the poorest of developing countries are suffering serious impacts they have done to contribute to the problem and they are set up to be the most badly affected by it there are two ways to address climate change and its impacts first we can try to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions or secondly we can try to adopt by responding to rising sea levels ocean acidification roshan's lower crop yields and fisheries productivity increasing numbers are extreme weather salinity resistant rice and drought resistant crops as well as financial support to strengthen public health infrastructure the recent g eight summit and the major economic forum  represents seventeen countries accounted for eighty percent of the world's greenhouse gas emissions the meeting held in italy did move the ball forward on addressing climate change by agreeing to a global long term global goal of reducing global commitments as the secretary general of the united nations mr bunn ki moon said the outcome was not sufficient according to the congressional research service report that was submitted to the subcommittee for  added information about the issue there were several pledges made by certain leaders in the country i believe it was prime minister brown of england suggested that one hundred billion dollars be allocated to address climate change to the vulnerable society some of the n g o s suggested maybe one hundred sixty billion dollars china the group of seventy seven suggested one percent of the coalition in discussing the issue with the members of the african states and i noted with interest emphasized the whole question did you just knowledge climate changes in that continent has to be taken into account with and of we may be able to offer some legislation based on the witnesses and whatever data and information we can have and hopefully that my working closely with my right team member we will be able to produce something that will be helpful  especially to those countries and regions that are most vulnerable when it comes to this subject matter so with that i think i will part of the record and i will say without objection all the voyaging canoe without our modern navigation by traditional navigation that it took us about twenty seven days to sail on a double hull polynesian canoe built wind cousins and it was a real experience for me because i got to see the environment the ocean the air the water and let me tell you there was a lot of pollution and things floating survey continues to serve on a variety of national research council committee he's a fellow of the american media logical siding currently serving as president is also a fellow of the american geophysical union and the national association of the eight u s drought to climbing and biodiversity currently chairs and coeditor of the chief for the one thousand and nine state of knowledge report by the united states global change research program and the global climate change impact  year dr jervis was the executive head of the united nations development program of the un to share all of the united nations development group committee consisting of the heads of all u n funds programs  departments working on development issues as the country levels and two thousand and one of two thousand and two as minister of economic affairs and treasurer of turkey in the republic of turkey dr jervis was responsible economics and his doctor from princeton university also taught economics at princeton in the middle east technical university before joining the world bank served twenty two years career in the world bank and became the vice president for the middle east modeling and the global carbon cycle dr jemison graduated magna cum laude from harvard university with a bachelor's degree in biology and earned both his master's and doctor as well in biology from princeton university indicators of the allocation of development and for three years from ninety three to two thousand that's the lead economist in the world bank development research group he directed a team that worked on environmental policy and research collaboration with policy makers academics in latin america and southeast asia just about everywhere else in the world and africa as well also worked on the priorit concrete evidence that impacts are not only affecting the contiguous but other areas around the world including the pacific islands in the caribbean other scientific assessments have documented a variety of important identifies communities like those in asia and the pacific region as particularly vulnerable to climate change and very deliberate i would like to highlight climate impacts for which i observed and projected changes are relative relevant in the pacific region water is an area in which the impacts of global climate change will be increasingly felt and large ways including increasing intensity of extreme precipitation events and drought and changes in the quality in abundance of water resources asia's a region where water distribution is uneven and large areas are under water even in humid  future projections include more dry days as the intensity of precipitation increases when it does actually rain in india pakistan bangladesh water shortages have been attributed to rapid and inefficient water use these are all aggravated by changing climate in some tropical regions climate change is expected to reduce water resources on many small islands by mid century these water resources may be insufficient to meet the growing demand during low rainfall periods the oceans will feel projected impacts of global climate change which in turn will have negative impacts on the most vulnerable societies the oceans have absorb expected to impact the value of these areas nations an important resource of income in some of the coastal areas in asia in the pacific islands another impact on the world's oceans a sea level rise will rise expected to amplif facing many areas to the sea level rise by the end of this century projected to increase the annual number of people experienced flooding and coastal populations from thirteen million to ninety four million and this is likely to be an underestimate of the asian summer monsoon one impact of this variability an increase in temperature is increased water and lower production of rice and in many parts of asia during periods of monsoon failure these climate change will be  the world's oceans surface temperature was the warmest on record for june no is predicting a strength over the coming months in recognition of the climate challenges already facing many parts of the globe noah has supported efforts to understand and predict environmental change we're working to provide the tools that allow for more effective management of resources impacted by climate change for example no researchers are working with partners understand how climate change is altering global ocean conditions these conditions include water temperature and others we seek to understand how these changes affect habitat range in abundance of economically important fish and protected species and closing climate change impacts across the globe are emerging serious challenges for virtually all nations including our own no is taking action to assist in improving understanding and prediction of climate change and providing information tools necessary to improve the think is that it is true that we we do know that climate change is happening i think there is overwhelming scientific evidence that effect we heard dr call it is also true that gas emissions the he trapping gas emissions are playing a critical role at the same time i think it's fair to add that there is still a lot of uncertainty on exactly how these processes work how fast they take place what the exact impact is on on the climate and on various parts of the world but here the point i'd like to make is that the fact that there is such uncertainty cannot be interpreted as allowing inaction uncertainty means yes we don't know exactly what's going to happen but we do know that there is potentially catastrophic risk down the road so in situations like that i do believe that the wife's course is to take insurance to ensure the world and particularly of course also the united states against the potentially catastrophic impact that may happen forty eight hundred years from now as we get more information from research and data we can adjust the exact action we take but in the meantime i do believe that action is urgent so this is a an overall reason i think why policy is so important and why why action has become so urgent the second point and this is a point where i think this committee is concentrating on is the fact that the most vulnerable the poorest society in the world are the most and i won't repeat what dr col already eloquently told us about agriculture about ocean chemistry about water level rise levels and other toure's that unfortunately impact those were the least able to protect themselves they're also the poorest and most vulnerable countries are also those who contribute the least accumulation of greenhouse gases so it's a particularly difficult ethical and political situation where those with contribute to this story be the least and who are not contributing now because of the level of their g d p level of their development are in fact going to be those who are impacted soonest and with the with the great support there for helping them adapt help and helping them control the impact of climate change is i think a global  imperative a global need that is being preaching the recognize that the amounts of resources needed are quite large estimates range into tens of billions of dollars a year there's a wide range and i think what makes these estimates particularly difficult it's not easy to separate climate adaptation needs from general development the extreme climate the events are much more frequent in parts of the world the least developed and even if there wasn't climate change there's a need to help these societies withstand the effect such as the cyclons for example in bangladesh and the devastating drought that we've seen in africa and other parts of the world with climate change makes these things worse increases their frequency increases their impact i do believe however that it is important to approach the issue broadly and not just separate at the station to climate change from the general fight against poverty but to integrate these measures and the policies toward the developed countries the international organization and the united states provide into a framework that is fighting poverty and where within that fight against is one important component the final point i'd like to make relates to trade i think it is very important that the effort against climate change the effort to protect the world to ensure the world is widely shared the particularly the rapidly growing emerging market economies do participate in their own way in this effort and i do therefore understand sometimes the debates relating to trade and to the need to have an equal playing field however i think is very very important to realize that trade measures could hurt the poorest and the most vulnerable countries in very important ways because tr rules cannot be discriminatory so when when thinking about trade policy i think it's very very important to keep in mind also the interests of the most vulnerable and the poorest countries thank you very much for allowing me to share my perspective milestone in terms of presenting our evolving knowledge of climate impacts provided documentation of literally thousands of impacts of natural resources on coastal regions on human health on animal and plant species and on agricultural productivity out of this report emerge a clear consensus that not only are we beginning to see the impacts of long term changes in the climate system but also that we expect such impacts to continue to grow into two decades especially if greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere continue to rise have been doing but our scientific knowledge has continued to evolve since the i p c c reports many publications indicate for example that their projections of sea level rise may have been conservative raising additional concerns for low lying island nations  coastal barrier islands and such parts of the world that are around south east coast and gulf region we now have a better appreciation of the challenges to marine and coastal resources presented by the acidification of the oceans which inhibits the abilities of many organisms including many species corals to form the calcium carbonate based exoskeletons that we notice from above in addition such reports as the u s government's own assessment of the impacts of climate change on agriculture land resources water resources and biodiversity indicated widespread current impacts on us now for resources the recent publication of the u s global change research programs report global climate change impacts in the united states demonstrates a concerned over both observed and projected been projected impacts extent of the transportation sector to health and nutrition to agricultural productivity into the energy sector as well as the impact that we already know well on natural resources that report also begins to outline how some sectors and regions are beginning to respond to climate change as they develop their own adaptation strategies have the next slide please finally the i p c c and subsequent reports have convincingly demonstrated that well no nation or region of the world is immune from the impacts of climate changes in the climate system or a systematic additional vulnerability in the developing world and many although not all parts of the tropics and subtropics the impact of even modest climate changes in agricultural productivity are expected to far outweigh those in the productive regions of the us and western europe for example the influence of the sea level rise in island nations are clearly more problematic than they are for us although different regions of the u s clearly have different vulnerabilities in the overall national picture moreover the supply of fresh water on many islands is clearly affected by rising sea level what are some of the factors that determine vulnerabilities of natural resources and societies the changes in climate there are many such factors for the physical world  there are different characteristic responses for example in crop plants both the increases in aventura concentrations of carbon dioxide and changes in temperature and rainfall even very common crops such as corn have characteristic times during the growing season where they are extraordinarily sensitive to high temperatures we know that the major cereal we know about the major cereal crops in the temperate zone significantly more than we understand about most tropical crops although rice is beginning to be particularly well understood societal vulnerabilities though are more complicated our current understanding indicates that there are a combination of both sensitivities in natural resources in the physical systems but they also include economic wellbeing the distribution of resources human capital and knowledge and access to resources that can be mobilized and impacts are beginning to be felt in the i p c c we began to analyze some of these factors and how they might change over time using research published by our own institute and that from other colleagues we find in such analyses are some general principles or countries are in general more vulnerable than richer although within every country there are four regions and populations of people that are more vulnerable than the average countries in the tropics and subtropics have more apparent vulnerabilities and those in the northern temperate latitudes coastal regions islands and mountainous regions will suffer from more immediate impacts in other places but perhaps the most important insight was the realization that the adaptive capacity of many countries including our own is not unlimited and that under wraps scenarios a rapid and large climate change that capacity can be  overwhelmed have the next slide how are people beginning to respond we now see evidence of people beginning to respond by trying to adapt to changes in large part because they feel they must because we are beginning to experience them but there are challenges that continue to face us in my own view it is critically important to begin to develop adaptation strategies to take into account known sensitivities of natural resources and of transportation energy and health and begin to institute programs to build resiliency i particularly vulnerable parts of the world at the same time it is crucial to begin collecting information on the cost and effectiveness of such different strategies we have very little information although the scientific community has been calling for this cut type of knowledge for well over a decade as we need to begin to understand both this fundamental science and the economics of adaptation for our own resources our own society equally important that we begin to understand and assist countries less fortunate than our own several studies of the national security implications of climate change for the us have concluded that severe climate impacts in the developing world could reduce our own security for many reasons it's also been argued that countries such as the us could dramatically improve our collective understanding of these features and that this knowledge could serve the developing world as well as ourselves a lot of progress will not pretend to offer prescriptions for success it's clear that the policy process will have to wrestle with  these observations and finding but it's equally clear that adapting to changes in climate that cannot be avoided is an essential part of an overall strategy of response to climate change and that the most vulnerable parts of the world in general or those countries that are less fortunate than our own thank congressman manzullo today i'm going to talk about climate change but i spent fifteen years in the world bank where about pollution all over the world so if you have some questions about that i'd be happy to entertain those and i should say as well if you like to talk us the football we can talk afterwards my brother security of united states and i thought i would take as my keynote senator lugar's remarks yesterday he really said that we should think of the foreign assistance assistance problem and climate change as evoking real national security problems for the united states and so i want to offer a perspective on are really two aspects both of which have been mentioned one is the potential impact of climate change on the united states the other is obviously the potentially horrific impact on developing countries and and that may well have implications for our security so both are very important i think think about in the context of u s foreign assistance i'd like to make an assertion here today and then back it up for a few minutes and that is that in the confrontational climate change worldwide the struggle is going to be won or lost in the developing world and there really two reasons for that one has to do with sort of what we might call a direct defense the united states against climate change and the other has to do with indirect defense through impacts of the developing world but directly we've got this problem there's no doubt that climate change is going to impact the united states severely but there's also very little doubt when you look at the record that emissions in developing countries are growing so quickly now they've already surpassed emissions from developed countries year by year and by the year two thousand and thirty they're probably going to match the emissions from developed countries as a source of global warming so the bottom line here is we won't solve this problem without addressing emissions problem in developing countries credible now how do we do that there really two ways to address it one is leveling up by taking punitive measures trade sanctions other approach that would penalize countries that continue to emit carbon without restriction while we restrict ourselves my own view is that that's going to backfire it's not a smart policy because we're really trying over time to foster development in the world we're trying to foster good relations with developing countries for the sake of our own security for the sake of world prosperity if we enact a number of measures like that in the face of the fact the developing countries really can't afford a lot of measures in the near term to finance a rapid transition to low carbon growth we're going to we're basically going to build a back fire that we're going to regret i think there's another approach which is smarter and more targeted and it's being discussed in the context now of the legislation in congress and the waxman marky bill includes features of both aspects of this one is promoting the spread of clean technology in developing countries to targeted subsidies and there's a lot to be said about that i won't dwell on it right now but i think there's a lot of room there for progress about a billion dollars has been targeted on that by the bill through offsets and direct measures and the administration has suggested four hundred million be spent through the global clean technology fund of the world bank for that i think that us but that leads to a host of questions about how you administer that and how you pay for it again in the us and mark a bill about a billion dollars has been allocated for that purpose of offsets i think that's probably not sufficient but it's least a start but in the final analysis here the real issue i think for the united states in sustainability and taxpayer support is going to be monitoring these arrangements here i think there's a real opportunity for american leadership you know it's our ethic to be transparent we have the technological capability to monitor i think the u s should step up and take the lead in the world movement for public disclosure emissions from deforestation and from industrial sources accessible all as a way of making sure that when one accords are reached they can be monitored effectively otherwise i'm afraid credibility is going to suffer we say a quick word on the other side about adaptation and vulnerability as my colleague has said there's very little doubt that the impacts are going to be severe i think there are two two aspects of the problem that are really critical for foreign assistance might call it application the eighty twenty rule you know that it says usually you know twenty percent of the sources of a problem are accountable for eighty percent of the problem here it's more like ninety ten rule if you look at the impacts that we anticipate for climate change in the developing world they're going to be very focused on a few unfortunate places it's true for sea level rise it's also true for bad weather there's really a disproportionality here if we're going to do assistance we need to target it if we're going to be effective we need to look at this very carefully having worked at the world bank for a long time i can tell you that it goes against the grain to target instead of spreading it around but we're not going to have enough resources here to dissipate the money we really need to think carefully about where these problems are going to hit and what we can do secondly in the domain of uncertainty as my friend come all said i think we've got a real opportunity here if you look at the history of confrontation with climate variability in the past this is not new there have been numberless tragedies in developing countries involving climate events droughts floods thousands of people killed millions of people affected question which countries have confronted this most effectively among developing countries and there's very little doubt about the answer it's countries that have focussed on developing their economic and human resources and let me put the plus here on human resources if you actually look at the evidence it's quite remarkable how much better on the resilience front countries do if they have focused on empowering and educating women and there are lots of reasons why that's true there's a important kind of nexus here so in closing i guess i would say even if you're a climate skeptic even if climate change itself is second for you but you're really interested in promoting development in other countries it seems really don't know how to do that we know how to get part of the way there but we don't know the rest of the way so this is going to be a leap of faith for all of us the developing nations as previously indicated they're vulnerable to climate change they're very sensitive to climate treaty because large quantities they've got a better opportunity to bring their forward and live the kind of life that they experienced in the developed nations at the same time the develop nations are straining their ecosystems in a number of different ways  and there is some incredible challenges that are out there we don't see how they're going to be resolved in the next cycle and it's a great challenge to the negotiators to come up with something that's going to work is acting now on a that means that they're going to have to continue to push large quantities of energy into their industrial operations in order to continue in that in that they are doing so because they've got four hundred million people that are in other developing nations away from the developed nations and into their own economy as developed nations and we do not ask the developing nations to participate we the ramifications of these decisions are going to show up in all kinds of impacts in a number of different areas so what do we do what do we do when we step forward in these negotiations and i think it was a doctor wheeler who indicated that he thought taking a hard line was probably a mistake my suggestion is that i would agree with him we need to speak softly but i think we also need to have a very  teams as well but our feeling is that if we're going to go into these negotiations we need very simply we need carbon fuel reduction agreements from all of the key players including the developing nations whether it's a reduction  and over and over again so they can return to the same floodplain build their homes and get flooded out again and mitigation process that we came up with was we will invest but we will invest as we address the problem  anybody dr i'll be happy to take that one it is clear that there are natural variations of climate particularly on a regional scale such as the one you just identified the issue of whether humans are responsible for the changes that we've seen over the last fifty years there's no question any longer we've been able to look at observed changes and link them quite convincingly to the patterns of changes we've seen not only in temperature changes and precipitation changes in water vapor changes in atmospheric circulation they all put together a comprehensive picture of human induced climate change now that doesn't negate the fact that climate can change on its own due to natural purposes however what we're seeing today is clearly linked to human activities and the projections for the future are such that with unabated increases in greenhouse gases the rate of changes that we're expecting over the course of this century are beyond anything that we've seen in human mankind civilization these changes in fact will have some really significant impacts one of which our civilization hasn't yet been able to address haven't haven't had to address anybody analogy that may not be completely fair and if you go to if you go to las vegas and you sit down at the blackjack table and you play twenty hands it's possible that you can  estimate of how much we're changing the odds and the work that's been done that we have changed your point which is that there is there is a natural environment fluctuating  important political distinction my sense right now is that for example as far as the house is concerned the house made a determination that they are going to accept the science and we accept that and we run down that policy court or what does it mean and as we drive down that policy court or from my personal perspective many many issues that we've talked about differences between nations are going to be forced and they're going to be discussed and but we've got to have that debate we have a debate i suspect it needs to be less about the science and more about the economic follow through that comes from a scientific argument that's been made and that's a very important distinction hopefully  disagreement and that is we all agree that there's a lot of uncertainty here and there are differing opinions about where climate change will impact and how much and the science is not yet certain for example on the pattern of rainfall that we may expect over large areas of the world  very difficult to plan ahead in agricultural policy for example but what we do need is resilience what we have seen in the past that have made certain policy progressive moves become more resilient and so there is force in that and if we can orient our policies toward promoting resilience regardless of climate change we can only help on the climate front at the same time we can benefit from a standard development perspective so those i think there's an enormous common agenda here that can be promoted aggressively without even referring to the onset of climate change simply as a confrontation of the problems that the world is facing right now so i would i would urge that wherever possible we seek this common ground and what would we do and there's a little bit of that it's an extreme example but we did a lot of uncertainty but there's enough of a threat of a possible threat that i think the serious action should be taken as insurance without in this silly being sure of how things of all will evolve over time and of course taking that action globally where we i think we all agree if the united states action and others don't it won't help with about china and india and their stance and then go see ations from many conversations i've had with colleagues international community who are working in china in india and here i would urge the committee and the congress philip carefully at what our friends in those countries are doing as opposed to what they may be saying in the run up to copenhagen because the measures that they are actually taking are consequential for a noble energy and for climate change and in some cases quite major the chinese arguably right now are moving more quickly to develop or noble energy than we are it's just that they're moving their energy system so quickly that they're also increasing their use of coal fired power but they're increased use of wind power and solar power quite spectacular on the indian front we look at the question of intellectual property i would simply cite a recent arrangement between the solar which is a u s company and the acme group in india to develop solar thermal power rajastan in the desert possibly without any subsidies at all as a business venture that's going forward both sides have agreed to it the indian government likes the idea they may provide some subsidies for that because they see solar as an important potential part of india's future so i hope that we won't be too bamboo by some of the rhetoric running up to copenhagen here there are threats of common interest in the world there are ways in which we can target our assistance progressively on measures that would assist countries to do what they are intending to do anyway better energy resources that we use to drive the world economy it's changing it's changing what we're seeing dramatic changes now and there are significant changes in the future as an economic and environmental challenge and and again i think dr wheeler  i are close together on our thoughts watch very carefully what they are doing rather than just listening to the rhetoric because again you know what we see in terms of activity are people that are preparing for  unfair one sided and it put the united states in a very i think an equal level playing field when you compare it to china india and other countries about emissions but the next thing in agreeing to the administration's then policy was just to completely take ourselves off the table and not to continue the negotiation process and letting the kyoto protocol members to know that  the distribution of whatever resources that we were to address the problem so now johnny come lately eight years later the new administration comes up as we do definitely look at climate change as a very serious issue and a very top priority by this administration and my question to you gentlemen of course we're taking the sense now we are the leader of the world and without us nothing moves well if you  among the group of seventy seven countries or however number one hundred whatever that have signed on to kyoto protocol that for the last eight years they've been deliberating they've been discussion they've been debating issues how do you expect the reaction from other countries  so india and china make their point of all the years that they've discussed with the russians whatever the other countries that were coming in do what we tell you to do because we know we have the best scientists we know the best way to countries like india and china don't consider themselves up to par with japan or the european countries as far as development is concerned they feel that they're still below to these two countries other than the fact that they have tremendous population and i think that alone would be the driving force as to why they ought to be given a different treatment in company of they just won't play  and thank you mr chairman for holding this very timely hearing on climate change as the climate conference in copenhagen draws near as we all know president obama recently completed his meeting with the g eight in italy to discuss climate change and though the group made progress notably pleading twenty million dollars pledging twenty billion dollars in food aid and to prevent a dangerous increase in global temperature the most vulnerable populations those who are poor and have limited options will feel the most repercussions from climate disasters the floods will destroy their homes droughts will destroy their farms and changes in ocean temperature will destroy their fishing businesses thus as we begin to address the issues we must keep in mind that climate change is not about just saving the polar bears are the arctic rabbits and majestic  l humans will face many challenges in the coming years food economic productivity and infrastructure well all be negatively affected by an increase in global temperature i hope that all of our panelists and i'm sorry to have missed probably the first panel but our panel can enlighten us on this being made to make developing nations more capable of responding to natural disasters caused by climate change and there are some among us mr chairman as you know who don't point thank you talked to general later for comments of her opening statement i just wanted to follow up a little bit of what my friend from illinois had raised concerning greenland and i think maybe some of your experts on  geography or topography and i have always looked at greenland as a huge continent some really seemingly and then just recently if i read the media report denmark has finally given sovereignty back had watching the fire in a twenty thirty or fifty year period there has been definite indications all melt down of the glaciers in greenland as an indication that there definitely is an impact over changes  get the military plane i think to all come together and just take a very quick trip to greenland so we can visually attest to what climate change is bringing about that the climate the global climate is this common good we have and it would be terribly sad if it led to conflict rather than cooperation you know it's the ultimate global good if you don't like globalization you could possibly close your borders to trade or you could possibly not accept foreign investment but even if you every country closed their borders the emissions the heat trapping gases will still operate and the climate change would affect everybody so it is something which the whole of humanity shares and in the discussions in the debates which will be tough there will be you know different interests different countries will argue for resources some countries will say there should be rather than really conflict and i think company going is a great opportunity and the fact that the united states takes a strong role now and fully participating is very welcomed by by everybody around the world and i think that's a that's one important point i want to make the second point following on david wheeler's we have examples of adopt a sion climate of action in the poorest and well most vulnerable countries that have actually worked reasonably well one example that bangladesh and the cyclons a controversy the exact date but i think it was about twelve years ago there was a devastating cycle in bangladesh and more than a hundred thousand people got killed there was another one three years ago in the meantime in cooperation with many countries and also the united nations development program bangladesh had taken measures early warning systems a plan what to do when it's happened what to do with people who would take care of whom and it's still devastating it was a about of equal strength but instead of more than hundred thousand people dying less than six thousand died which is still a huge number of course but which shows the kind of progress that the monger that was able to make with international so it is important to focus on the positive it is important i think to realize that we can build more resilient systems and that that is part of the overall development effort thank you i appreciate  significant amount of modeling of the energy economy and the prospects for global emissions as they relate to the spread of energy technologies and use of patients in a whole range of different action one conclusion of those studies and from some of our sister colleagues is the importance of joint actions to reach emission that particular emissions and concentration targets that no one country or even large groups of they know this of course i've been fortunate to participate as an advisor for example you know in a very large environmental assessment of the provinces the western provinces in china and the environmental concerns and my how do they continue to satisfy their increasing and legitimate demands for energy and growth while building the resilience they need to combat climate change and its consequences as they continue to occur at the end of the day for the members of the subcommittee and i just want to share with the members of the panel for your comment in a little dispute remains in peer reviewed scientific literature that greenhouse gases concentrations in the atmosphere increase global average temperatures volcanoes contribute to climate variability as they have throughout history scientists however have been unable to show that natural forces alone could have driven recent warming and additional climate change patterns that is climate modelers can produce patterns of climate change only when they include the effects of greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuel use land clearing and some cultural and industrial process how adverse impacts would be most climate models project that without strong stabilizing greenhouse gas concentrations global average temperatures during the twenty first century  likely above natural variability by at least one point five celsius or two point seven degree fahrenheit compared to nine hundred ninety and not by more than six point four degrees celsius some hands are ready and i'm glad you're getting the attention of the greenhouse induced climate change would result in this is what the more heat waves in droughts extreme cold episodes increase summer warming and dryness in the central portions of continent more intense precipitation when it occurs thereby increasing runoff and flooding generated melting and loss of snow and ice and global sea level rise over several atlantic changing european and north american weather patterns and natural positive feedback to global warming that would reinforce an accelerated initial human induced greenhouse gas i appreciate the fact that the prospect if we're smart about it and if we craft assistance that will be truly helpful they're to arrive at a situation in mid century where even despite climate change we can have fewer losses and we do know there's tremendous room for improvement there and that's a development task and i think we should pursue it in good faith and it will have many benefits the second point i wanted to make just to reinforce again the points they made everyone saw about sparks at copenhagen but i think that this is actually misplaced if you just to reiterate let me cite the case of south africa for a minute now the south africans have had a remarkable history in the last few years as we know the transformation they've gone through is an extraordinary they still face tremendous poverty problems and they are sitting on a huge drove a cheap coal so for south africa the poverty perspective what makes sense is full steam ahead and burn that coal and they burn a lot of it but this year they've made a remarkable commitment to switch toward renewable energy as fast as they can because they have a solar belt in their own desert north in bo can be exploited and they're willing to sacrifice to attain that and they're willing to put some of the cost in their rate base but they've come to the world bank and i'm sure they've come to our colleagues in our government and they said can you help us with this we've made this commitment i think they would fight a legal restriction in copenhagen on their emissions but they are paying the price themselves so i'm asking you in good faith shouldn't we help them with that and isn't that something we can agree on that involves no spark and progressive change  have been mistakes made in the past by various actors i would think that there's tremendous opportunity for renewables and unconventional sources of energy including wind and solar of course it depends on the particular climate the particular area is talking about nonetheless there is a problem for all these sources worldwide and that's the extreme variability in the cost of various sources of energy i know many countries where wind energy would become the cost of a competitive provided the cost of fossil fuels is not subsidized or provided it doesn't go below below a certain level so the pricing of energy various sources of energy including oil and gas is an important component of this whole problem and we of course of course faced extreme ups and downs in the price of oil last year around this time it was hundred forty five dollars a barrel then and you know people were predicting it was going to be two hundred and then it collapsed to thirty five now it's up to between sixty and seventy so this extreme variability makes it hard to choose best mix but coming back to your particular question i think it's very important to look at the particular place to use whatever resources that place has in the best possible way and to have long term approaches to these problems because and i think you hit it right on the nail in terms of this issue and not be taken aback or just affected we're just going to put it in the back burner and it's not going to go away i do want to offer my provides for a an international adaptation program trading a fund to carry out the program consultations with usa treasury and u p a and the two mechanisms that are also outlined in this particular section of the bill i'm going to be writing to each of you specifically for your comments and for your input on the substance of this proposed bill because this is the only reference that we now have in the congress on how we're going to address this issue of climate change and what we should be doing to help the most vulnerable societies as has been the patients of this hearing i'm not so much that i don't care about the rich countries because they already have the expertise they have all the people to confront and be able to debate and discuss the issues but it's a poor country the most vulnerable who don't have the resources who don't have the means who don't have the financial capabilities and the resources to address these issues and i think we ought not miss this point of making sure that they are just as important in our deliberative process when it comes before copenhagen and the meeting coming up in january so if it's alright with you gentlemen i will be writing to you specifically and i do want to say that i do value very much and put in comments of this very important issue i cannot thank you enough for your taking the time to come and to have be to share your expertise and your understanding of this very important issue and it is my hope that in a coming week as i will be consulting with my colleagues in the subcommittee and also with chairman bourbons that we will move this forward and just see that maybe we could finesse and make the legislation better than what it has now what has been proposed of course the other matter is the fact that  we don't know what the senate is going to do with this bill but at least we have a starting point and i think this is where i was deeply your suggestions how we can maybe make improvements on the proposed legislation that is now before the congress and of course will be before the senate and as i said earlier i will specifically be writing to each of you for your comment and and help on this all legislation that will address the issues that are needed especially on the question of climate change gentlemen i i have no further questions if i could like to give each of you any further comments before i close i'd be very happy to i'd like to just one closing question there seems to be some concern about china in terms of my understanding china has done for the last eight and are moving aggressively and interesting emission standards pollution and the problems that they face probably even a lot more than what we've done in our own country and my understanding almost of the energy resources from our those i'm personally aware of a lot of legislative reform in china as of two years ago passed a national law requiring that all major polluting facilities disclose their pollution to the people in the communities which was in china in that context a pretty revolutionary change and the party is behind the communist party itself is no model and they have different factions they have an environmentalist faction and my colleagues in the academic community in china in the research community are very aware of the potential impact of climate change on programs with the china bilateral programs where we shareable data observations observing systems that are a critical component for us to better understand what we discussed earlier with respect to those important regional impacts and  we've had some good relationships with them over the course of years  station yourself extremely well and one can add or can summarize it following your words that never in history have so many poor people being lifted out of poverty but still there are still many many many that still need to progress a lot i do believe one has to keep that in mind one has to be particularly careful in the trade issues which have the greatest potential for very tough behavior and we really conflict that could hurt everybody because while  obviously the u s market is extremely important for china we also have seen just three days ago that their reserves have now surpassed trillion dollars of which almost one trillion is in u s treasury bills so there are you know there are points on both sides to be very careful about but i would like to say also that with with growth with importance with strength that china has achieved now does call most of the time the china has to join the international community of a constructive way that gradually it has to take greater responsibility for the state of the world in a way and i hope that it will do that and that we all the world community will encourage them in that direction thank you world for the first time two of the problems thirteen provinces in china have not reached the point where their citizens are making enough money so that they can go out and they can buy cars washing machines microwave it's not just climate change this is going to be about the economic future of the developed in the developing nations and how they're going to coexist not only environmentally but economically i think that's going to show up with once they g that there needs to be a change on economic policy for fifty or even maybe a hundred years again i'm not an economist the whole world is always dependent on the dollar as the basis of determining what would be the best decisions  not just putting our economy situation in a more stable condition but the western model really the best way to fall as a result of what we have produced and causing  lateral model and i think that's under active discussion along the lines of the point you just made i would i would say the clean technology fund of the world bank which is now been chartered with twenty members representing the g twenty basically so it's a new model of governance not like the old model in the world bank and that could be an important channel for the funds that will be to address all of these problems but i think for the congress is a very important issue to resolve there on bilateral versus multilateral the somewhere between twenty five or thirty percent of the ash in the world by the asian development bank and the international monetary fund are from the un i said maybe we could use that as a source of influence on how we can better allocate the you gentlemen have had experience sure is experience in dealing with these regional banks and i just wonder how certain are twenty five percent ownership of these banks in such a way that maybe addressing the very issue that we're discussing this afternoon there i would i would defer to my a global and involves so many countries in the world i think is a good argument for strongly involving the multilateral that the world bank on energy in particular because it has long term ability to lend to discuss policy two or three decades we will have both channels the national channels channels and the multilateral ones i have of course lived in the multi left once for a good part of my life and i do believe they're quite useful but they're also taxpayers like to see their own country act you know not always just multilateral so it's a question of a kilogram when one has to use well i do believe that but the very fact that the world bank is in washington just very close makes it makes makes it an institution that is close to american policy makers it is easy to talk to discuss things and at the same time it is multilateral the whole world is there and therefore it's an instrument that i think can be used very effectively thank you gentlemen i think i've held your too long here this afternoon and again i really really appreciate your participation in the comments that you raise is going to be a tremendous help to the subcommittee again you will be getting a letter from from me in the very near future and see how we can better attack the watch an market your version of how we could be helpful to these vulnerable societies dealing with climate change thank you very very much hearings