The Bush Administration and Climate Change

U.S. Secretary of Energy Spencer Abraham's Policy Forum “The Bush administration's approach to climate change” (30 July, p. [616][1]) is founded on an error of omission and an error of economic understanding. The error of omission is to imply that President Bush's policy to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) intensity will meaningfully slow GHG emissions. GHG intensity naturally declines in the increasingly service-oriented U.S. economy. For example, even as actual GHG emissions increased by 22.5% from 1990 to 2000, GHG intensity decreased by 34.7% ([1][2]). The nonpartisan General Accounting Office (GAO) projects that between 2001 and 2012, GHG intensity will decline 14% even with no emission reduction policy in place. Bush's voluntary approach, if successful, will lead to an additional reduction in GHG intensity in 2012 of only 4% and an actual increase in GHG emissions of over 13%. Abraham also appears to misunderstand basic economics. Economic improvement would provide additional resources for society to deal with climate change, as he suggests. But Bush's approach, which allows us to emit GHG to the atmosphere for free, constitutes a subsidy for polluting activities and a drag on the economy. For example, warmer temperatures, sea level rise, more intense storms, and more severe droughts, which are all expected to accompany global warming, would cause economic damage to human society. Because we do not pay for that damage, we all see an incentive to pollute more than the economic optimum (where the economic optimum is the point at which the considerable benefits we reap from activities that result in GHG emissions equals the growing cost of those emissions). In such cases, even “costly” emission reduction schemes may constitute clear economic improvements. 1. 1.[↵][3] General Accounting Office (GAO), GAO-04-131T, 2003. # {#article-title-2} In the Policy Forum “The Bush administration's approach to climate change” (30 July, p. 616), U.S. Secretary of Energy Spencer Abraham states that the Administration's near-term goal is to “reduce the greenhouse gas intensity of the U.S. economy by 18% by 2012,” that is, to reduce the amount of greenhouse gases emitted per unit of real gross domestic product by 18% by 2012. Although this is a substantial reduction in relative terms, it is essentially in line with how the U.S. economy has been performing in the recent past. According to the Pew Center on Global Climate Change ([1][4]), greenhouse gas intensity decreased by 21% during the 1980s and by 16% during the 1990s. An 18% goal for the coming decade is just slightly better than business as usual and would still cause a net increase in emissions of about 10% because of continued economic growth. Although goals need to be realistic, it is equally important that they be ambitious. If a company like Dupont can reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 65% since 1990 or an Alcoa believes it can cut its actual emissions by 25% by 2010 ([2][5]), surely, we can do much better than business as usual. 1. 1.[↵][6] See [www.pewclimate.org/policy\_center/analyses/response\_bushpolicy.cfm][7]. 2. 2.[↵][8] “Global warming: Why business is taking it so seriously,” BusinessWeek , 16 Aug. 2004. # Response {#article-title-3} The Bush administration believes that its goal of reducing the emissions intensity of the U.S. economy—measured as the ratio of total greenhouse gas emissions per unit of economic output—by 18% from 2002 to 2012 is ambitious but achievable. Although the nation's greenhouse gas emissions intensity improved 17.5% between 1990 and 2000 ([1][9]), the Energy Information Administration, taking into account current and anticipated factors in energy markets, projects an emissions intensity improvement of 13.8% from 2002 to 2012 ([2][10]). Achieving the president's goal, therefore, would increase the projected rate of improvement over the period by about 30%. Higgins states that once the economic benefits and costs of greenhouse gas emissions achieve parity, costly emission reductions may make economic sense. Our present state of knowledge on climate change is insufficient to determine where that point is or when it might be reached. Reducing such uncertainty is a major feature of the Bush administration's policy. The Climate Change Science Program is addressing fundamental questions about climate variability and sensitivity to help clarify risks and benefits. The Climate Change Technology Program is working on advanced technologies to improve the performance and reduce the cost of mitigation options. We believe that this approach, coupled with near-term efforts to reduce emissions intensity, is sound and offers the greatest potential for addressing what is a long-term challenge. 1. 1.[↵][11] Energy Information Administration, Emissions of greenhouse gases in the United States 2001: Historical and projected U.S. carbon and total greenhouse gas intensity; Emissions of Greenhouse Gases in the United States 2001 [DOE/EIA-0573 (2001)]; available at [www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/1605/gg02rpt/gas.html][12]. 2. 2.[↵][13] Energy Information Administration, Issues in focus: U.S. greenhouse gas intensity, Annual Energy Outlook 2004 [DOE/EIA-0383 (2004)]; available at [www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/aeo/issues_8.html][14]. [1]: /lookup/doi/10.1126/science.1098630 [2]: #ref-1 [3]: #xref-ref-1-1 "View reference 1. in text" [4]: #ref-2 [5]: #ref-3 [6]: #xref-ref-2-1 "View reference 1. in text" [7]: http://www.pewclimate.org/policy_center/analyses/response_bushpolicy.cfm [8]: #xref-ref-3-1 "View reference 2. in text" [9]: #ref-4 [10]: #ref-5 [11]: #xref-ref-4-1 "View reference 1. in text" [12]: http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/1605/gg02rpt/gas.html [13]: #xref-ref-5-1 "View reference 2. in text" [14]: http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/aeo/issues_8.html