This study examines the costs and benefits of an aggressive program of global action to limit the greenhouse effect. Cline summarizes the issues from the standpoint of an economist and estimates the damages of long-term warming.
Despite the growing consensus on the need for action to counteract climate change, complex economic and political forces have so far prevented international actors from making much headway toward resolving the problem. Most approaches to climate change are based in economics and environmental science; in this book, Parkash Chander argues that we can make further progress on the climate change impasse by considering a third approach—game theory. Chander shows that a game-theoretic approach, which offers insight into the nature of interactions between sovereign countries behaving strategically and the kinds of outcomes such interactions produce, can illuminate how best to achieve international agreements in support of climate-change mitigation strategies. Game Theory and Climate Change develops a conceptual framework with which to analyze climate change as a strategic or dynamic game, bringing together cooperative and noncooperative game theory and providing practical analyses of international negotiations. Chander offers economic and game-theoretic interpretations of both the Kyoto Protocol and the Paris Agreement and argues that the Paris Agreement may succeed where the Kyoto Protocol failed. Finally, Chander discusses the policy recommendations his framework generates, including a global agreement to support development of cleaner technologies on a global scale.
The Economics of Globally Shared and Public Goods responds to an urgent need to consolidate and refine the economic theories and explanations pertinent to globally shared resources. Making a clear distinction between theories and empirical models, it elucidates the problem of global public goods while incorporating insights from behavioral economics. Its comprehensive and technical review of existing theoretical models and their empirical results illuminate those models in practical applications. Relevant for economists and others working on challenges of globally shared goods such as climate change and global catastrophes, The Economics of Globally Shared and Public Goods provides a path toward greater co-operation and shared successes. - Offers an encompassing description of the economics of global public goods - Provides an ensemble of empirical analyses of behavioral complexities - Defines a set of optimality conditions for a solution applicable to many problems
Climate change threatens the economy of the United States in myriad ways, including increased flooding and storm damage, altered crop yields, lost labor productivity, higher crime, reshaped public-health patterns, and strained energy systems, among many other effects. Combining the latest climate models, state-of-the-art econometric research on human responses to climate, and cutting-edge private-sector risk-assessment tools, Economic Risks of Climate Change: An American Prospectus crafts a game-changing profile of the economic risks of climate change in the United States. This prospectus is based on a critically acclaimed independent assessment of the economic risks posed by climate change commissioned by the Risky Business Project. With new contributions from Karen Fisher-Vanden, Michael Greenstone, Geoffrey Heal, Michael Oppenheimer, and Nicholas Stern and Bob Ward, as well as a foreword from Risky Business cochairs Michael Bloomberg, Henry Paulson, and Thomas Steyer, the book speaks to scientists, researchers, scholars, activists, and policy makers. It depicts the distribution of escalating climate-change risk across the country and assesses its effects on aspects of the economy as varied as hurricane damages and violent crime. Beautifully illustrated and accessibly written, this book is an essential tool for helping businesses and governments prepare for the future.
An “essential” (Times UK) and “meticulously researched” (Forbes) book by “the skeptical environmentalist” argues that panic over climate change is causing more harm than good Hurricanes batter our coasts. Wildfires rage across the American West. Glaciers collapse in the Artic. Politicians, activists, and the media espouse a common message: climate change is destroying the planet, and we must take drastic action immediately to stop it. Children panic about their future, and adults wonder if it is even ethical to bring new life into the world. Enough, argues bestselling author Bjorn Lomborg. Climate change is real, but it's not the apocalyptic threat that we've been told it is. Projections of Earth's imminent demise are based on bad science and even worse economics. In panic, world leaders have committed to wildly expensive but largely ineffective policies that hamper growth and crowd out more pressing investments in human capital, from immunization to education. False Alarm will convince you that everything you think about climate change is wrong -- and points the way toward making the world a vastly better, if slightly warmer, place for us all.
Showing how political theory challenges and is challenged by global climate change, the book both demonstrates and evaluates innovative approaches in the developing field of environmental political theory.
Heal presents a coherent framework for understanding the Earth's future from an economic perspective and offers a dynamic new blueprint for comprehending sustainability.
According to many scientists, climate change is a growing threat to life as we know it, requiring a large-scale, immediate response. According to many economists, climate change is a moderately important problem; the best policy is a slow, gradual start, to avoid spending too much. They can't both be right. In this book, Frank Ackerman offers a refreshing look at the economics of climate change, explaining how the arbitrary assumptions of conventional theories get in the way of understanding this urgent problem. The benefits of climate protection are vital but priceless, and hence often devalued in cost-benefit calculations. Preparation for the most predictable outcomes of global warming is less important than protection against the growing risk of catastrophic change; massive investment in new, low carbon technologies and industries should be thought of as life insurance for the planet. Ackerman makes an impassioned plea to construct a better economics, arguing that the solutions are affordable and the alternative is unthinkable. If we can't afford the future, what are we saving our money for? Can we Afford the Future? is part of The New Economics series, which uses the ideas behind a new, more human economics to provide a fresh way of looking at major contemporary issues.
This book reflects the futuristic scientific view of the consequences of transition to Industry 4.0 for climate change. The authors present a systemic overview of the current negative consequences of digitization for the environment, new outlines of the energy sphere in Industry 4.0 and the change of the environment pollution level in Industry 4.0. The book also analyses the ecological consequences of growth and development of Industry 4.0, and considers Industry 4.0 as an alternative to fighting climate change. The book presents a view on fighting climate change in Industry 4.0 from the positions of shifting the global community’s attention from environment protection to formation of the digital economy. A logical continuation of this book is a view from the opposite side, which would allow reflecting the contribution of Industry 4.0 into fighting climate change and the perspectives of harmonization of these top-priority directions of the global economy’s development. This book will be of interest to academics and practitioners interested in climate change and development of Industry 4.0, as well contributing to a national economic policy for fighting climate change and corporate strategies of sustainable development in Industry 4.0.