September 26, 2012
100 million will die by 2030 if world fails to act on climate - report
Nina Chestney at Reuters:
More than 100 million people will die and global economic growth will be cut by 3.2 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) by 2030 if the world fails to tackle climate change, a report commissioned by 20 governments said on Wednesday.
As global average temperatures rise due to greenhouse gas emissions, the effects on the planet, such as melting ice caps, extreme weather, drought and rising sea levels, will threaten populations and livelihoods, said the report conducted by humanitarian organisation DARA.
It calculated that five million deaths occur each year from air pollution, hunger and disease as a result of climate change and carbon-intensive economies, and that toll would likely rise to six million a year by 2030 if current patterns of fossil fuel use continue.
More than 90 percent of those deaths will occur in developing countries, said the report that calculated the human and economic impact of climate change on 184 countries in 2010 and 2030. It was commissioned by the Climate Vulnerable Forum, a partnership of 20 developing countries threatened by climate change.
"A combined climate-carbon crisis is estimated to claim 100 million lives between now and the end of the next decade," the report said.
It said the effects of climate change had lowered global output by 1.6 percent of world GDP, or by about $1.2 trillion a year, and losses could double to 3.2 percent of global GDP by 2030 if global temperatures are allowed to rise, surpassing 10 percent before 2100.
More here.
Posted by S. Abbas Raza at 11:41 PM | Permalink
Comments
Even assuming we believe this story, the question to ask is: How many will die if we "act"? Will the "humanitarian organization DARA" work on that question next?
Posted by: Sundar | Sep 27, 2012 6:20:56 AM
Five Million die a year now, as a result of green house gas pollution, the equivalent of one holocaust per year.
How far in the past do people have to be living to think that global warming induced climate change is something that will only affect the future?
On a similar note, another garbage continent has been found in the Southern Ocean, which was unexpected.
Posted by: Dredd | Sep 27, 2012 9:59:53 AM
What I cannot believe is our continued need to correlate current climate change and fossil fuel use (already implicated in the greatest extinction episode in 64 million yrs) with economic indicators and human loss, as if there is some sensible empirically-determined number of lives and dollars that will finally trigger change in what we already know are unsustainable (self-destructive, world-destructive) behaviors.
What I cannot believe is our unshakeable self-image of autonomy, certainty, and control, in wanton disregard of all proofs to the contrary and despite the current and ultimate costs. I cannot believe how highly we regard ourselves as a species and yet how we fail to rise to the occasion in a moment when our communal inaction (and/or slo-mo reaction) could bring down the whole show for all time. The great 4 billion yr experiment of life and sentience on this lovely lonely little planet could easily collapse in but a few centuries as a direct result of the heartless empirical and economic hubris of modern man.
What I do understand is why Sundar and many others would be so deeply cynical and pessimistic. How does one remain fully awake and engaged in this day and age without the heart hardening or breaking or both? I suspect there has never been another time in history when it has been this excruciating to be aware and stay engaged, empathetic, and responsive to the exigencies of the immediate moment.
Courage, All!
Posted by: Christopher Holvenstot | Sep 27, 2012 10:07:52 AM
@Christopher, @Dredd,
Before you dismiss me as cynical, consider the following:
1. What does it even mean to say that x million people die due to pollution? How does one decide what the ultimate cause of death is? E.g. Is it diabetes or heart disease? Or both? Are you sure that this is even a meaningful statistic?
2. How do you square these alarming numbers with the fact that life expectancy has been going up EVERYWHERE ? The increase in life spans in the last 50 years is amazing and has no equivalent in human history.
3. The record of collective action in the 20th century is, to say the least, mixed. It is entirely appropriate to approach grand plans with healthy skepticism.
Cheers
Posted by: Sundar | Sep 27, 2012 12:54:04 PM
My apologies, Sundar, for making you feel dismissed as a mere pessimist. You have to admit though that ‘healthy skepticism’ has been the diverting response of corporations and governments that hold the lion’s share of resources with which to act yet do not see it in their best interest to act on this issue at all, preferring instead the diversion of argument over the use of statistics. Your intelligence is being usurped in that game. It is safe to assume (and is not the sole privilege of skeptics or intellectuals) that all statistics are manipulations of one kind or another. The actual problem still remains: what are we going to do about climate change, species die-off, health and economic factors, etc. when corporations and governments refuse to act responsibly?
Posted by: Christopher Holvenstot | Sep 28, 2012 10:38:43 AM
@Sundar, I don't think that anyone will argue that pollution is good for health. So, without pollution life expectancy could have improved even more for those it has and also not been as injurious to the health for others. Make sense?
Did you notice that in the last 50 years health care and diet has improved. So there are many factors at work and we need to keep the good ones and remove the bad ones.
Posted by: Raza Husain | Sep 28, 2012 11:13:59 AM
@Raza, Many of the factors that lead to higher living standards and thereby increase life expectancy are the VERY SAME ONES that have increased pollution. For example, economic growth leads to better diet but also more pollution.
You want a "magic solution" where you keep all the good parts of growth and leave out the bad parts... Guess what, so do I, so does everybody. The hard part is suggesting a path to getting there. Concrete steps.
Its not enough to spout high minded pieties
about collective action. What specifically is to be done, and who is to do it? Are we to coerce people to act? Or are we to set up incentives for them to act? If so what incentives?
The next person who uses the word "we" in a sloppy way (as in "why can't we act") is going to make me bash my head against the wall.
How can I say this without coming across as a condescending jerk? Lets see.... Perhaps you need to think through these issues a little further? (Especially before you ask me if it "makes sense")
Posted by: Sundar | Sep 28, 2012 1:08:33 PM
sundar lets say you are right that life expectancy is directly the result of the things that cause climate. does that mean that life expectancy will go down if clinate is addressed. many of these life expectamcy improvements were the result of collective action. at one time the polio vaccine was viewed skeptically by the public
Posted by: jon | Sep 28, 2012 6:29:26 PM
"does that mean that life expectancy will go down if climate is addressed"
I think it is fairly safe to say that any drastic reduction in the amount of energy and petro-chemicals we consume is going to result in increased mortality. Most of the "damage" comes from agriculture. If we stop growing food it is no mystery what will happen.
Posted by: Carlos | Sep 28, 2012 8:49:33 PM
"many of these life expectancy improvements were the result of collective action"
1. There is a reasonable case to be made that our prosperity is mainly due to free markets. voluntary exchange. economic freedom.
2. Collective action was sometimes successful (don't know enough about the polio vaccine, the March of Dimes, a private organization, had a major role)
3. Collective action has had some SPECTACULAR failures. cough cough stalin cough cough mao cough cough pol pot.
One doesn't need to be for or against coercive collective state action across the board. But it is important that we understand that state action can sometimes make things worse.
So we can't give politicians free rein to "solve" problems. Rather, specific solutions must be debated by citizens and we must proceed with great caution.
Posted by: Sundar | Sep 28, 2012 10:17:17 PM
Basically agree with Sundar. In fact, this study is a really cruel joke upon the world's poor, for the following simple reason:
The poor people who suffer most from air pollution aren't burning fossil fuels to begin with. They're burning biomass for their carbon, not coal. This burning of wood, animal dung etc actually ISN'T contributing to climate change. They're not extracting carbon that's hundreds of millions of years old and releasing it. That animal dung and wood carbon comes from the air and goes right back, so it's carbon neutral. (Roughly; if you wanted to get the math exactly right you'd have to consider the effects because of deforestation, overgrazing etc, but it's the zeroth order truth). These people suffer and die in their uncounted and unlamented millions, but they're not causing CO2 rise while doing it.
In fact, as they get richer, one of the first things they seek is better, safer fuel, so their children don't have to eat food cooked using animal shit they've collected. They invest in better stoves, charcoal and coal, and eventually in gas and electric cooking. THAT change actually does cause climate change, since they go from burning biomatter to coal / oil / gas. So, against the hideous misaccounting of this NGO, it's in fact the USE of carbon intensive gas stoves that's going to worsen climate change AND save these 100 million lives. To put the tradeoff starkly if loosely, it's the LACK of climate change that's killing these people, not climate change.
Posted by: prasad | Oct 14, 2012 10:56:43 AM
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