Skip to main content

The Ethical Nuclear Solution and the IPCC Report

WGIII_AR5_Cover_webThe IPCC report on mitigating climate change is now out and, it is, as you’d expect, a bone dry read considering how alarming it is. 

But one section that probably won’t get much attention is on ethical considerations when considering a world response to climate change. This is something that it would be good to see in legislation in general – it might forestall at least some obnoxiously partisan bills from emerging. This part of the report, is, if nothing else, a fascinating read, and nuclear energy, which is never mentioned, seems corrected fitted to such issues

The report says that some developed countries with heavy carbon emission output are expected to suffer relatively modest physical damage from projected climate change and some may even benefit from it. But some developing countries could experience significant physical damage from climate change while having no or little causal responsibility. How does policy develop that responds to this disparity? It’s not an easy question.

The report talks about moral justice, which strikes me as exceptionally tricky territory. We can think of instances in which the attitudes of modern society were applied to past events in order to achieve moral justice, but these often involved revised cultural norms that were highly contentious in their day – slavery, for example. But man-made climate change, as defined in the report, started occurring when the entire concept was unimaginable. If it has had consequences, they were unintended. And one intended consequence was the industrial revolution and the formation of modern societies.

That makes ideas like this tough to swallow:

The duty to make compensatory payments may fall on those who emit or benefit from wrongful emissions or who belong to a  community that produced such emissions.

Wrongful emissions? Since when? To whom? Now, remember, the report is summarizing the literature on the subject, not making specific recommendations (or accusations). The amount of time it spends on reparations suggests the weight the authors give it, but it is not explicit. (You could say it reflects the view of some impacted countries, but the report doesn’t address it from that angle.)

In any event, it would be a tough lift politically. And it creates a victim class in a way that seems unhelpful in addressing the issues. But the report does include much tougher lifts than reparation. Here’s a bit from its discussion of ethical methodologies:

The Kingdom of Bhutan has adopted an index of GNH [Gross National Happiness] as a tool for assessing national welfare and planning development. According to this concept, happiness does not derive from consumption, but  rather from factors such as  the ability to live in harmony with nature. Thus, GNH is both a critique of, and an alternative to, the conventional global development model.

Bhutan is a landlocked country between India and China with a population of about 750,000. The Gross National Happiness index was devised in 1972 and is rooted in the Buddhist religion. Its elements, as developed over time, measure physical, mental and spiritual health; time-balance between work and leisure; social and community vitality; cultural vitality; education; living standards; good governance; and ecological vitality.

Appealing approach to balancing national interests or utter hooey? You decide. The IPCC certainly won’t. You can see how big a net was cast over ethical issues, but that it raises them at all is fascinating in itself.

The  IPCC aims to provide information that can be used by  governments and other agents when they are considering what they should do about climate change. The question of what they should do is a normative one, so the answer(s) rests implicitly or explicitly on ethical judgments. What will work for Bhutan may not work for the Czech Republic – or the United States – or Vanuatu. Here’s how the report puts it:

Many different analytic methods are available for evaluating policies. Methods may be quantitative (for example, cost‐benefit analysis, integrated assessment modeling, and multi‐criteria analysis) or qualitative (for example, sociological and participatory approaches). However, no single‐best method can provide a comprehensive analysis of policies. A mix of methods is often needed to understand the broad effects, attributes, trade‐offs, and complexities of policy choices; moreover, policies often address multiple objectives.

Which is why the United Nations is often better at describing issues than resolving them. Luckily, this is all description, and luckily, too, nuclear energy seems a good fit for what’s being described – it promotes development while not adding greenhouse gas emissions and it’s an area where developed countries can take a positive and proactive role in helping developing nations, well, develop. It’s not reparations, it’s resource development, but you can define it however you will.

This section of the IPCC report completely ignores energy types, but it seems to me key to the case for nuclear energy, especially in the developing world.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

An Ohio School Board Is Working to Save Nuclear Plants

Ohio faces a decision soon about its two nuclear reactors, Davis-Besse and Perry, and on Wednesday, neighbors of one of those plants issued a cry for help. The reactors’ problem is that the price of electricity they sell on the high-voltage grid is depressed, mostly because of a surplus of natural gas. And the reactors do not get any revenue for the other benefits they provide. Some of those benefits are regional – emissions-free electricity, reliability with months of fuel on-site, and diversity in case of problems or price spikes with gas or coal, state and federal payroll taxes, and national economic stimulus as the plants buy fuel, supplies and services. Some of the benefits are highly localized, including employment and property taxes. One locality is already feeling the pinch: Oak Harbor on Lake Erie, home to Davis-Besse. The town has a middle school in a building that is 106 years old, and an elementary school from the 1950s, and on May 2 was scheduled to have a referendu

Why Ex-Im Bank Board Nominations Will Turn the Page on a Dysfunctional Chapter in Washington

In our present era of political discord, could Washington agree to support an agency that creates thousands of American jobs by enabling U.S. companies of all sizes to compete in foreign markets? What if that agency generated nearly billions of dollars more in revenue than the cost of its operations and returned that money – $7 billion over the past two decades – to U.S. taxpayers? In fact, that agency, the Export-Import Bank of the United States (Ex-Im Bank), was reauthorized by a large majority of Congress in 2015. To be sure, the matter was not without controversy. A bipartisan House coalition resorted to a rarely-used parliamentary maneuver in order to force a vote. But when Congress voted, Ex-Im Bank won a supermajority in the House and a large majority in the Senate. For almost two years, however, Ex-Im Bank has been unable to function fully because a single Senate committee chairman prevented the confirmation of nominees to its Board of Directors. Without a quorum

NEI Praises Connecticut Action in Support of Nuclear Energy

Earlier this week, Connecticut Gov. Dannel P. Malloy signed SB-1501 into law, legislation that puts nuclear energy on an equal footing with other non-emitting sources of energy in the state’s electricity marketplace. “Gov. Malloy and the state legislature deserve praise for their decision to support Dominion’s Millstone Power Station and the 1,500 Connecticut residents who work there," said NEI President and CEO Maria Korsnick. "By opening the door to Millstone having equal access to auctions open to other non-emitting sources of electricity, the state will help preserve $1.5 billion in economic activity, grid resiliency and reliability, and clean air that all residents of the state can enjoy," Korsnick said. Millstone Power Station Korsnick continued, "Connecticut is the third state to re-balance its electricity marketplace, joining New York and Illinois, which took their own legislative paths to preserving nuclear power plants in 2016. Now attention should