George Bush: Staunch Anti-Global-Warming Warrior

Consider what Al Gore thinks we need to do, right now:

Gore: Time Is Running Out, Freeze All C02 Emissions NOW...

From Al Gore's Speech At NYU Law Today:

So, what would a responsible approach to the climate crisis look like if we had one in America?

Well, first of all, we should start by immediately freezing CO2 emissions and then beginning sharp reductions. Merely engaging in high-minded debates about theoretical future reductions while continuing to steadily increase emissions represents a self-delusional and reckless approach. In some ways, that approach is worse than doing nothing at all, because it lulls the gullible into thinking that something is actually being done when in fact it is not.

Al Gore talks the talk, but George Bush walks the walk:

U.S. Carbon Emissions Fell 1.3% in 2006

By Juliet Eilperin
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, May 24, 2007; A14

U.S. carbon dioxide emissions dropped slightly last year even as the economy grew, according to an initial estimate released yesterday by the Energy Information Administration.

The 1.3 percent drop in CO-2 emissions marks the first time that U.S. pollution linked to global warming has declined in absolute terms since 2001 and the first time it has gone down since 1990 while the economy was thriving. Carbon dioxide emissions declined in both 2001 and 1991, in large part because of economic slowdowns during those years.

Actually, the US economy expanded slightly in 2001 relative to 2000. Growth was weak, but there was still growth, not shrinkage. Despite the fact that economic output increased from 2000 to 2001, CO2 emissions declined.

The article goes on to say:

In 2006 the U.S. economy grew 3.3 percent, a fact President Bush touted yesterday as he hailed the government's "flash estimate" that the country's carbon dioxide emissions dropped by 78 million metric tons last year.

In fact, the news is even more interesting than that. Emissions statistics are available for the first 6 years of Bush's term in office (2001-2006). Contrary to what you might believe, CO2 emissions in 2006 were a mere 1.1% higher than they were in 2000, which was Clinton's last year in office. By comparison, CO2 emissions over the last 6 years of Clinton's term increased by more than 10%. Here is a chart showing the emissions trend since 1990:


The red dots depict the Bush years. You can see that the value for 2006 is about the same as the value for 2000. This is true even though the U.S. economy in 2006 was a whopping 16% larger than it was in 2000. If you think that 2000 was a statistical aberration, then we can use 1999 instead. The economy was 21% larger in 2006 than it was in 1999, but CO2 emissions were only 4% higher than they were then.

Here is a chart that captures both economic growth in America and CO2 emissions since 2000:


The magenta symbols show the U.S. GDP in constant dollars, and the blue symbols show our CO2 output. As you can see, economic growth has been substantial during the Bush years (increasing by 16%). Despite that, CO2 emissions have not changed appreciably (increasing by only 1%). Thus, for the moment at least, we seem to have achieved the freeze on CO2 emissions that Al Gore thinks we need to legislate before time runs out.

We obviously don't know that this favorable trend will continue, but can't we give George Bush at least one tiny iota of credit here? The credit he deserves is approximately equal to the hysterical opprobrium and scorn you would have heaped upon him had greenhouse gas emissions increased by 10% on his watch. I suspect that this graph -- which shows that we have almost "frozen" CO2 emissions on Bush's watch -- does not correspond to what most green-oriented liberals believe to be true.

There is something else you need to think about if you are green activist working to curtail greenhouse gas emissions in America. It is a noble gesture, but it is also largely irrelevant. Why? Because, in the future, the greenhouse gas emissions problem is largely going to be caused by non-OECD nations, as this chart from the Department of Energy shows:


The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) is described like this:

The OECD is a group of like-minded countries. Essentially, membership is limited only by a country’s commitment to a market economy and a pluralistic democracy. It is rich, in that its 30 members produce almost 60% of the world’s goods and services, but it is by no means exclusive.

As you might expect, the relatively rich nations of the OECD produce a lot greenhouse gas emissions. As best I can tell, the US -- with its large population and vibrant economy -- contributes about half of the OECD total. However, the chart presented above shows that it is the non-OECD nations that will soon take the CO2 emissions lead (and then they will dwarf the non-OECD nations on that score). Countries like China and India have huge populations and rapidly growing economies. As you can see in the chart above, by 2030, CO2 emissions for the OECD nations will not have increased a great deal. By contrast, the CO2 emissions of developing nations are going to skyrocket. It does not really matter much what the OECD nations do (e.g., imagine the OECD bar being 20% lower in 2030 than the estimate that is shown in the chart -- would that help?). It is India and China that are the problem.

Now, if you are on the left of the political spectrum, you are likely to subscribe to the fanciful theory that if America would just take the lead and torpedo our own economy in a futile effort to rescue the planet from greenhouse gas emissions, then the developing nations of the world would be so mightily impressed by our altruistic leadership that, instead of seizing the glorious opportunity to dethrone America as the world's only superpower, they would follow our lead and reduce their own emissions (despite the fact that they would be plunging themselves right back into third-world status). That's not a theory I share. A more believable theory is that substantial greenhouse gas reductions in the OECD nations will do far more to shift the economic and military center of gravity to the Far East than it will to stave off global warming.

But here's the main point. America is doing something about its greenhouse gas emissions already. As our economy grows, it is becoming ever less dependent on greenhouse gas emissions. I am reasonably sure that this is not the case in China and India, where GDP growth is being fueled by greenhouse gas emissions. Thus, if you are feeling green and want to do something about global warming, you are largely wasting your time by focusing on SUVs in America. Here is the real problem:

New coal plants bury 'Kyoto'
New greenhouse-gas emissions from China, India, and the US will swamp cuts from the Kyoto treaty.

So much for Kyoto.

The official treaty to curb greenhouse-gas emissions hasn't gone into effect yet and already three countries are planning to build nearly 850 new coal-fired plants, which would pump up to five times as much carbon dioxide into the atmosphere as the Kyoto Protocol aims to reduce.

This article includes a helpful chart showing that the US is building some of the coal-fired power plants, but China and India are the real culprits:


Look at the "likely scenario" and then forget about SUVs in America. If you want to fight global warming, you need to either fight power-plant construction in China or, better yet, support research on making emissions from coal-fired power plants cleaner (e.g., by sequestering CO2 emissions underground). The real point is that coal-fired power plants are the problem, the world is going to build a lot of them (including signatories of the Kyoto Protocol who want to keep their lights on), and nothing is going to help unless that problem is addressed.

Oh, and one more thing: those theoretical savings that will come from the Kyoto Protocol? It's not going to happen. Kyoto was a feel-good agreement, not a serious attempt to do anything about global warming, as I explained here. And this brings me to my final point. Politically, the U.S. should do what the left leaning nations of the world do: make a big fuss about the dangers of global warming, triumphantly commit to achieving various green goals, and then ignore those commitments completely. A recent article suggests that China may be cutting back on its power plant construction but also acknowledges uncertainty about that because it is based on little more than vows made by the Chinese government. And the Chinese have turned out to be just like the Kyoto nations:

In 2002, the Chinese government vowed to cut sulfur emissions by 10 percent by 2005. Instead, they rose 27 percent. If Chinese officials act swiftly, sulfur emissions could be halved in the next couple of decades, power officials and academic experts say. But if China continues to do little, sulfur emissions could double, creating even more devastating health and environmental problems.

Politically, we should do what everyone else has learned to do (i.e., make vows). It's not serious, but it's cheap and it seems to make some people less angry than they otherwise would be. Meanwhile, we should also do something serious, like fund research investigating how to make the burning of coal a cleaner process. A substantial reduction in CO2 emissions depends on the success of that research (nothing else).