Judith Curry wonders if it is a “ruin” problem.
I continue to think it cries out for a serious regret analysis.
2 thoughts on “Climate Change And The Precautionary Principle”
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Judith Curry wonders if it is a “ruin” problem.
I continue to think it cries out for a serious regret analysis.
Comments are closed.
Correct application of the precautionary principle demands a regret analysis. Sometimes a “preventative” just isn’t worth the cost for a low probability or not so severe outcome.
But admitting that doesn’t advance the Narrative.
If the chance of a problem is 100 years off and the cost to pre-treat it is 1% GDP growth vs. 3% GDP growth, the precautionary principle suggests we should probably have a 20 times bigger economy in 100 years instead of a 3 times bigger economy. Why ruin the economy over an unknowable harm? Fortunately, carbon abatement is no big deal so even a more-likely-than-not test is reasonable for the small cost of abatement. Carbon dioxide abatement is trading at ~$5/ton of CO2 which translates to less than $100/year (about 0.2% of per capita GDP) to abate each person’s share at least for the first chunk–11 of the 18 tons of CO2 come from burning coal which could be switched to natural in a 25 year time scale to cut about 5 tons of CO2 per person. If only the climate models didn’t give people like Sen. Cruz pause, there might be justification to tax carbon more and everything else less.