Editors' Summary: Prof. Cass Sunstein compares the relative ease with which the United States adopted the Montreal Protocol against its rejection of the Kyoto Protocol to conclude that the perceived costs versus perceived benefits of climate change action will have to significantly improve before the United States adopts an international climate change treaty.
Of Montreal and Kyoto: A Tale of Two Protocols (Tale) includes several thought-provoking propositions and conclusions. I will discuss four: (1) winners and losers in climate change; (2) differences between the two Protocols; (3) the use of cost-benefit analysis; and (4) what motivates the United States (and other countries) regarding the Kyoto Protocol and other international issues.
In Of Montreal and Kyoto: A Tale of Two Protocols, Prof. Cass Sunstein compares the political economy dynamics leading up to the signing and ratification of the Montreal Protocol (governing substances that deplete the ozone layer) and the Kyoto Protocol (governing substances that contribute to global warming). He observes that the United States was a strong and early supporter of the control of ozone-depleting substances but has generally opposed binding controls on greenhouse gases (GHGs).
Editor's Summary: Mary Christina Wood delivered this presentation on February 19, 2008, as part of the University of Montana Wilderness Institute Lecture Series: Climate Change: Moving From Science to Solutions. She begins by describing the urgency of climate change and government's failure to address the problem. She then explains a legal principle that she hopes can catalyze the kind of paradigm shift needed to confront the crisis. Finally, she concludes with a call to citizenship that she hopes her audience will deliver to families, workplaces, churches, and schools.
Will the response to climate change require environmental lawyers and policymakers to finally confront limits on material consumption by individuals and households? The Articles in this issue are the product of an April 2008 Climate Change and Consumption Conference that addressed this question. In the last several years, numerous scholarly books, articles, and conferences in the natural and social sciences have focused on consumption and the environment.
A large body of literature has developed over the past several years on the economics of happiness. One of the key insights of this literature is that beyond a subsistence level of income, relative income is often more important than absolute income to individual well-being. This is true for both comparisons against a reference group, e.g., across a community or country, as well as comparisons for the same individual over time. Another key insight is that changes in income have only transitory effects on well-being.
In 1958, as part of the science education efforts for the International Geophysical Year, a National Academy of Sciences (NAS) publication, Planet Earth: Mystery With 100, Clues, explained that the natural greenhouse effect was being altered.
Examining individual consumption behavior is pertinent to both the current sources of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions as well as policies designed to limit these emissions. A wide variety of private household decisions generate externalities that have environmental ramifications both now and in the future. Because household decisions may not be fully aligned with broader societal objectives, improving these decisions could foster society's environmental policy objectives.
In the United States, the residential sector accounts for a significant proportion of the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions produced each year. Sixty-two percent of vehicle emissions come from passenger cars and light-duty trucks, and one-quarter of non-transportation emissions come from residential sources.
The price of grain is now directly tied to the price of oil. We used to have a grain economy and a fuel economy. But now they're beginning to fuse.