*[Enwl-eng] Proposal Seeks to Capture the Costs of Inaction OnClimate Change

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Apr 7, 2013, 1:57:45 PM4/7/13
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*Billionaire plans effort to calculate cost of inaction on climate*

Anne C. Mulkern, E&E reporter
Greenwire: Friday, March 22, 2013

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. -- A billionaire environmental activist from
California will launch an effort to quantify what inaction on climate
could cost the country, a study that could land just before the 2014
election.

Tom Steyer, a Democrat who's twice succeeded with efforts on California
ballot measures, said the move is needed to shift the dialogue on
climate and "try and systematically and rigorously quantify what it will
mean to move into a new energy economy, and what it will cost not to do it."

"We should address the question of what will happen to us economically
if we continue along the same path," said Steyer, whose background is in
finance.

Steyer, 55, revealed his plans yesterday as he spoke at The Wall Street
Journal's ECO:nomics Creating Environmental Capital conference here. He
and former Secretary of State George Shultz talked about the chances for
bipartisan action on energy. The two previously teamed up in California
to successfully fight off 2010's Proposition 23, which would have
squashed the state's climate law.

Illustration Omitted:
Tom Steyer. Photo courtesy of Russell Photography.

During yesterday's discussion, Steyer said that "the concept of global
warming is way too diffuse, it's unimaginable," and that "you have to
bring it down to somebody's kitchen table and put it in terms that they
can understand and think it's a good deal in a bipartisan fashion."

Otherwise, he said, support for action might not come until there's some
sort of calamity "that's so dramatic that [people] think this is the
biggest thing in the world."

Steyer, speaking after the session, said he wants to pursue the economic
analysis on climate and get "a whole bunch of people to go over the
numbers," in order to move away from the traditional argument over "jobs
versus the environment."

The inquiry, which could look at issues that include extreme weather,
national security and health, will total up the potential costs to the
entire country.

Steyer in January stepped down from Farallon Capital Management, the
investment firm he founded, in order to devote more time to goals that
include influencing climate and energy policies. A self-made
billionaire, he is seen as someone with the means and drive to have a
major impact on the political dialogue (Greenwire, Jan. 9). He's
currently leading an effort to pressure Rep. Stephen Lynch (D-Mass.) to
denounce the proposed Keystone XL pipeline as he runs in a special
Senate election (E&ENews PM, March 18). Lynch and Rep. Ed Markey, his
Democratic primary opponent, both denounced Steyer's tactics today (see
related story).

Steyer's new effort on climate will be run out of the Center for the
Next Generation in San Francisco, which Steyer funds, in conjunction
with his other ventures including the TomKat Center for Sustainable
Energy and the Steyer-Taylor Center for Energy Policy & Finance, both of
which are at Stanford University, and the Advanced Energy Economy
Institute, a nonprofit with chapters in several states.

Kate Gordon, vice president and director of the energy and climate
program at the Center for the Next Generation, described that as a plus.

"We're not in Washington. We're not an environmental group," Gordon
said. "We're not identified as having a particular dog in the fight,
other than Tom being passionate and thinking this is the right thing to
do, and having a lot of credibility on money and finances. I think it's
the perfect place to do it."
Independent analysis

The first step will be to commission a macro-economic analysis, Gordon
said. The research will be done independently.

"This is basically a larger project to change the conversation, but
we're imbedding a very independent economic analysis in that," Gordon said.

It will be similar in concept to the work done by Nicholas Stern, a
British economist who in 2006 issued "The Stern Review on the Economics
of Climate Change." That 700-page report, completed for the British
government, looked at how global warming would affect the global economy.

The one Steyer is seeking will be "much more of a market perspective
with U.S. as leader or U.S.-centric perspective," Gordon said.

The idea for the analysis came up during discussions between Steyer,
Gordon and others over the last six months about the "major gaps" in
work on climate, Gordon said.

"This was one of them, the need for sort of air cover on the argument
that we need to act on climate because it's more expensive or more risky
not to act than it is to act.

"We kept coming back to this question, what happens if we don't do
anything?" Gordon added. A lot of work has been done on solutions and on
the costs in various sectors, she said, like extreme weather events.

"But what we haven't seen is a comprehensive analysis, really a risk
analysis, the way the insurance companies do," Gordon said.

The goal would be to have the study done by summer 2014. There then
would be strategies to communicate the information and to get people
involved, Gordon said.

Asked about that time frame and the midterm election, Gordon said,
"Climate change is the biggest issue of our time. Is it inevitably
political? I don't know. I think it should be part of everybody's
conversations." But she said the timing was not part of a political
strategy.

Get voters, D.C. will follow

During the session yesterday, both Shultz and Steyer said there needed
to be efforts to find common ground between Republicans and Democrats.
Steyer said that could come in the form of money for research and
development on energy, which Shultz favors.

But Steyer also noted that there is a difference between politics and
policy.

"Politics are not a Yale-Harvard debate," Steyer said. "It's a much more
rough-and-tumble discussion."

Because of that, he said, "All of the attempts to put [climate] in a
scientific framework in my mind are almost inevitably bound to fail.
People did not like 11th-grade science class, by and large, in the
United States. And when you try to drag them back in when they'd rather
be watching 'Friends,' it doesn't go over that well."

What could work is getting voters behind the issue, he said. But that
requires convincing people that it's a concern when they also are
dealing with jobs, children and other priorities.

"If you can convince people not in Washington, D.C., but in different
parts of the country that it is relevant to them for whatever reason,
then Washington, D.C., will follow," Steyer said. "Elected officials
will follow if people care enough about it."




http://www.eenews.net/public/Greenwire/2013/03/22/4

*** NOTICE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this
material is distributed, without profit, for research and educational
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