One of the qualities that make the greens so interesting is their ability to get away with the most alarming and fatuous exaggerations. Who else would have said, as Greens Senator Bob Brown did two weeks ago, that we have just reached "a low point in world environmental history"?
This is quite a statement, given the damage we humans have inflicted on our poor planet in the past, particularly before the current wave of environmental concern began three decades ago. Brown's seemingly chilling assessment was occasioned by US President Bush's decision to abandon the 1997 Kyoto Protocol on Climate Change, signed by the previous Clinton administration and more than 100 other countries.
But despite the moral panic that President Bush's decision has caused, the demise of the Kyoto agreement should not cause much concern, even if we accept that human activities are affecting the world's climate through an increase in greenhouse gases. From the start, the agreement was deeply flawed.
For one thing, irrespective of the Bush administration's position, the Kyoto agreement in its present form would never have been ratified by the United States Senate. Shortly before the Protocol was signed, the Senate -- a body with at least a few green-thinking members in its ranks -- voted 95 to zero to reject any climate treaty which would result in serious economic harm to the US, and which did not force developing nations to cut greenhouse gas emissions. Kyoto fails both of these requirements.
Developing countries are exempt, even though some, like India and China, produce substantial and rapidly increasing amounts of greenhouse gases. And the protocol is much tougher on the US than on any other country. Estimates of the total costs America would face in complying with its Kyoto targets vary widely, but some respectable assessments indicate that it could be as much as $A600 billion a year, or $A5,400 per household.
Part of the problem is the aversion that greens and European governments have towards using market mechanisms such as emission trading. This would allow countries which are below their Kyoto targets, such as Russia, to receive credits which they could then sell to countries which are unable to meet their targets, such as the United States.
Although this would be a cheaper and more flexible way of reducing the overall global level of greenhouse gases, most greens find the idea that a country could buy "rights to pollute" morally unacceptable. They seem to think that, as the United States accounts for around a quarter of the world's human-induced greenhouse gases, it should be made to suffer for its profligacy. European governments may also like the prospect of imposing pain on a rival economic power.
But it is fanciful to think that harming the American economy would be good for the world's environment. Prosperity, rather than a declining economy, is more likely to foster the kind of technical and social innovation and commitment necessary to solve environmental problems.
Kyoto also has another serious failing. Despite its high economic costs, it would have only a minimal effect on possible temperature increases.
Estimates vary, because the computer models which predict the effects of climate change are still fairly crude, and important unknowns remain about the world's climate system -- matters to remember when considering the frightening forecasts of temperature and sea level rises and more frequent storms. But at best, Kyoto is unlikely to reduce global average temperatures by more than 0.2 degrees centigrade by the year 2050.
Supporters of the agreement would probably respond that we have to start somewhere, and imposing tough initial requirements on the developed nations will force people to face up to the problem of climate change. While this argument has some merit in principle, a closer examination suggests that our local greens don't treat it too seriously in practice.
Take Senator Bob Brown, for instance. This weekend he is hosting a Global Greens conference in Canberra, which will have climate change as a major focus. Over the past fortnight his office has put out 5 media releases railing against John Howard for not demanding that President Bush reverse his decision on Kyoto, and attacking the Labor opposition's unwillingness to take a tougher stand.
One of these releases had the hip Senator picking up "street vibes", which supposedly indicate that the Kyoto Protocol "will rival the GST" as an election issue. But where were Bob Brown and the "street vibes" in the six months before March, when the Howard government finally succumbed to intense pressure to cut fuel prices and abandon the automatic indexation of the petrol excise?
There are many ways to achieve the Kyoto targets, but lower petrol prices is almost certainly not one of them. The greens had a great opportunity to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with John Howard on a major issue. They could have told Australians that our petrol prices are among the cheapest in the world, and that higher prices would provide incentives for the adoption of more fuel efficient cars.
In fact, this is what Michael Krockenberger, strategies director with the Australian Conservation Foundation, said this week, in an article published in some southern newspapers. He made a few sensible points, but why weren't he and his influential organisation shouting the message from the rooftops before Howard's humiliating and foolish petrol price backflip?
There is an obvious but depressing answer. When greens are faced with the choice of saving the planet or lining up against a hated conservative politician, the interests of the planet have to give way.
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