The God Species_ How the Planet Can Survive the Age of Humans - Mark Lynas [131]
The transition of humanity toward a sustainable presence in the Earth system will constitute an epochal event, equivalent at least to the Industrial Revolution that so transformed our civilization over the last two centuries. It represents an enormous opportunity for business, as happened with ozone regulation, and can increasingly be seen in the sphere of climate change. From being concerned that cutting carbon emissions will damage competitiveness, many governments are beginning to see going low-carbon as the very engine of future growth and competitiveness that they are looking for. Led by the Maldives, a growing number of developing countries are pledging themselves to carbon neutrality, now including Costa Rica, Ethiopia, and Samoa, and many others have upped their levels of ambition in going for low-carbon status. Many small island states and least developed countries, fed up with being seen as silent victims of climate change, are determined to become the low-carbon winners of a more innovative future. This change in narrative has begun to transform the climate-change negotiations: In Cancún, amidst an atmosphere of unprecedented trust and goodwill, 193 countries agreed to put the process back on track—laying to rest the ghost of Copenhagen. Central to this success has been the quiet emergence of a new alliance, the Cartagena Dialogue, which brings together upwards of 30 countries—rich and poor, large and small—in a shared ambition to increase the pace of global action on climate change.
And here is the really big story. China’s emissions may be rising, but its investment in low-carbon technologies leads the world. In September 2010 China overtook the stalling U.S. as a destination for renewable investment. “China has all the benefits of capital, government will, and it’s a massive market,” gushed an analyst from Ernst & Young.12 China has already overtaken the U.S. in terms of installed wind-energy capacity, and in 2010 added a colossal 16 gigawatts—nearly half the entire world total of new wind installations.13 Despite the shock of the Fukushima accident, I would expect China to quickly resume its heavy investment in new nuclear generating capacity, which is likely to include launching a research program on cleaner fourth-generation nuclear power using thorium reactors. Many in the U.S. are increasingly rattled about being overtaken in the clean-energy race: Not for nothing did President Obama’s 2011 State of the Union address raise the specter of a “Sputnik moment,” with China now in the place of the old Soviet Union.
The U.S. is being left behind, and for one reason: It refuses to be bound by clean-energy regulation. Without the political driver of new markets, technological innovation in low-carbon alternatives cannot take off. In contrast, China has aggressive targets both for the reduction in carbon emissions per unit of GDP and for the penetration of renewables and nuclear into the grid. China may have played a wrecking game in Copenhagen, but since then the country has proved that it is deadly serious about dealing with climate change—and winning massive economic gains in the process. As I argued earlier, strong and binding international agreements will be vital if this clean-energy revolution is to continue to accelerate globally—and this must include the emerging big emitters just as it does the rich countries, perhaps in a revamped and expanded version of the Kyoto Protocol.
Equally strong action will be needed in other areas if equivalent progress is to be made in meeting and respecting the other planetary boundaries too. While 2010 saw some hope that biodiversity is beginning to become a global policy concern on the scale