The world is in a weird prisoner’s dilemma right now. US, China, to some extent India, are pumping out CO2, and deriving a short term “co2” dividend of higher growth, unencumbered by green transition cost. Europe is somewhat trying harder to transition away, partly for “green” reasons, partly for sovereignty reasons, partly because they just outsourced their industry.
Europe is also potentially more affected by climate change than US and China, as I understand. India of course would be toast in a hotter world, but perhaps it too poor right now to do much about it easily.
But discoordinated action won’t move the dial. So should Europe continue on the green path while losing GDP share to US, China and India? Should it jump on the coal bandwagon and screw up the world since everyone else is? It’s not like green contrarian action will do much good on its own.
It’s altogether a not pretty picture…
Europe is also potentially more affected by climate change than US and China, as I understand. India of course would be toast in a hotter world, but perhaps it too poor right now to do much about it easily.
But discoordinated action won’t move the dial. So should Europe continue on the green path while losing GDP share to US, China and India? Should it jump on the coal bandwagon and screw up the world since everyone else is? It’s not like green contrarian action will do much good on its own.
It’s altogether a not pretty picture…