A new report claims policies to keep future global warming to internationally agreed upon limits by the end of the century could make the world $19 trillion richer.
The report by the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) was one of two commissioned by the German government to help convince President Donald Trump to stay in the Paris agreement.
If IRENA’s top-line findings sound too good to be true, that’s because they might be. The world would have to put $145 trillion into low-carbon energy to become $19 trillion richer by 2050 — a 13 percent return on investment over 33 years.
IRENA says $145 trillion would be needed to limits global warming to less than 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels by 2100. Even so, IRENA admits its plan only has a 66 percent chance of success.
Moreover, IRENA found that while 20 percent of the $19 trillion in economic benefits from more low-carbon energy “without consideration of welfare benefits,” 80 percent of the benefits were not.
Why is that significant?
IRENA is saying its plan to get about 70 percent of global energy from low-carbon energy by 2050 and double energy efficiency relies on taxes or fees on carbon dioxide emissions. Those taxes would also require “recycling” policies to offset higher energy cost for poor families.
“Increased economic growth is driven by the investment stimulus and by enhanced pro-growth policies, in particular, the use of carbon pricing and recycling of proceeds to lower income taxes,” IRENA found.
“The energy sector (including energy efficiency) will create around six million additional jobs in 2050,” IRENA found. “Job losses in fossil fuel industry would be fully offset by new jobs in renewables, with more jobs being created by energy efficiency activities. The overall GDP improvement will induce further job creation in other economic sectors.”
The report comes after G20 omitted any mention of climate finance from its annual communique over the weekend. Diplomats meeting in Germany on Saturday and Sunday walked back their previous support for funding green energy projects to fight global warming at the insistence of U.S. officials.
The German government commissioned the IRENA report in the run-up to the upcoming G20 climate talks. Germany will chair the G20 this year and plans to use its leadership role to pressure countries to stay party to the Paris climate agreement — specifically, the U.S.
European diplomats have lobbied the Trump administration to stay party to the Paris agreement that went into effect in November 2016. Nearly 200 countries agreed to the pact at the United Nations climate talks in Paris in 2015.
Chancellor Angela Merkel is leading a coalition of countries urging White House officials to stay in the Paris agreement by touting the economic and jobs benefits of the deal. The IRENA report is the latest German-led PR campaign surrounding Paris.
What a total load of bull excrement! Extrapolating specific trillion dollar pay-back numbers to far-fetched political-economic carbon emission schemes…
What could possibly illustrate how this whole man-made climate change plan is a socialist wealth redistribution charade rather than anything scientific.
I do have to hand it to the socialists however… When it comes to scamming the public they dream big.
Merkel is from the former German Democratic Republic. She’s asking Capitalism to join her Green Economy 3-legged race. One of Obama’s slogans was “lead from behind”. I don’t believe they will ever suffocate the competitive spirit. Socialists are selling stupidity and laziness and stupid lazy people are buying.
The most inefficient machine ever is socialism. It burns money. If a socialist like Merkel says she has a money maker, it’s probably a real good copier.
“‚ÄúThe energy sector (including energy efficiency) will create around six million additional jobs in 2050,‚Äù IRENA found.”
There is no freaking way that they can project jobs 33 years from now. How stupid are they and how stupid do they think we are? No freakin’ way!
When evaluating a potential employee companies want to know past performance. This is the best indication of how they will do in a new job.
Let’s apply the same standard to the claim that the climate change agenda will make the world richer. What has happened in the past? The two studies I’m aware of were done in Spain and Canada, I believe Quebec. One found that for every job created by green energy, 2.7 traditional jobs were lost, the other found a 2.1 ratio. I don’t believe there has been a study about the hundreds of thousands of jobs that the EPA destroyed, but there is no indication that many have been created by green energy.
In addition, even when such jobs are created, they are rarely filled by those who became unemployed, so a problem still exists. Just how many unemployed coal miners do you think found a job in green energy?
Past performance validates the “bull excrement” statement that G made.
There’s a good article by Peter Kuitenbrouwer in the Financial Post, March 18 detailing the damage being done to Ontario’s manufacturer’s. Ironically the company that supplies Tesla with wire is complaining about electricity costs. If electricity is cheaper in America and your customers are American, might as well set up shop there.
Ask the Germans and people in places like Ontario if they feel richer
every time they see their electric bills ? Bought and paid for fluff reports
are as credible as Al Gore saying the earth has a fever .
Mr. Trump’s Budget Director summarized it nicely . They aren’t going to waste peoples money on it . But go ahead Germany carbon tax yourselves out of relevance and while you are at it why not tax all the illegals swamping your social services too . A demand side price signal that socialist democracies thrive on .
Would the EU be disintegrating if the save the planet bullies weren’t imposing their
goofy views on others ?
The notion that by adjusting the Co2 knob will have any measurable effect at all let alone keeping the earth’s temperature increase to under 2 degrees is absurd .
Even if the earths temperature went up by 2 degrees no matter what the cause
there are benefits and not just costs . The climate models have proven to be highly ineffective at forecasting temperatures so how can anyone pretend to know what combination of natural variables and mann made CO2 would result in any temperature
certainty within 2 degrees ?
The USA is right. Adding even more to their $ 20 Trillion dollar debt even with a “66%” certainty is foolish . Wonder if the report writers at IRENA factored in the cost of never to be repaid capital cost and associated compounding interest will rob future generations of ? Let’s hope it keeps warming and save future generations this foolish avoidable cost . They already have already been left enough on their country credit card that they had nothing to do with .
How long would the baby boomers be talking about taking on new $trillions of global warming debt if the boomers had to pay off the current $20 trillion dollar debt by themselves over the next 30 years ? You know leave the younger generation a “sustainable’ debt .
The credit card is maxed out folks and a bump in interest rates will see this Ponzi scheme come down . Then you won’t hear a flipping word about the earth having a fever .
Canadian currency is now made of plastic. Nothing up with that?