Politics – Page 198 – a sibilant intake of breath

Climate and the rainforest

Picture a square of tropical rainforest 100m to a side. According to a study from 2000, it is heavily laden with carbon: between 155 and 187 tonnes for wet forest and between 27 and 63 tonnes for dry. That means that each square kilometre of rainforest is holding between 2,700 and 18,700 tonnes of carbon: with about 70% of that in trees, 20% in the soil, and the rest in roots, understory, and litter.

Cutting down the trees for timber and to open farmland releases some portion of that stock into the atmosphere: with the amount dependent on how the soil’s carbon absorption changes and what is done with the wood and wood waste. When the forest is burned, either intentionally to clear land or unintentionally, the bulk of that carbon gets released into the atmosphere more of less immediately. As a result of both land use change and forest burning, the World Resource Institute estimates that deforestation represents about 18.3% of all human greenhouse gas emissions. As such, tackling it is a priority.

Arguably, the best thing individuals can do is refuse to eat meat or use first-generation biofuels. A considerable amount of cattle production takes placed in cleared areas of rainforest, with additional land cleared to grow soya to feed to cattle. On the biofuels front, there are both situations where rainforest is cleared directly for biofuel plantations (palm oil) and situations where the use of agricultural land to grow biofuel crops (corn) increases the overall need for agricultural land, pushing things like soy production into previously forested areas.

One other element to be aware of is the connection between population growth, urbanization, and deforestation. Several states actively encourage people to relocate from crowded areas to more sparsely populated zones bordering forested areas. Indonesia has sought to shift people away from Java in the same way Brazil has encouraged development in the Amazon to try to reduce crowding in the south.

Addressing deforestation is thus a two-fold proposition. In the first instance, the developed world needs to be aware of how commercial activities directly encourage deforestation. Restricting the use of tropical hardwoods, encouraging vegetarianism and veganism, and improving public transit would all help. Secondly, developing states must be encouraged to value their forests at a level high enough to prevent their destruction. That will probably require some kind of international financial instrument whereby the states actually protecting forests receive payments from all the states that benefit from ecological services those forests provide. The latter is a more wide-ranging solution, but the former can be more immediately implemented. If we are to keep that carbon in rich tropical soil and majestic tree trunks, action on both fronts needs to be undertaken.

Sources:

Papdopol, C.S. “Impacts of climate warming on forests in Ontario: options for adaptation and mitigation.” Forestry Chronicle. 76(1): 139-149 (2000).
Livingston, Nigel and G. Cornelis van Kooten. “Terrestrial Carbon Sinks and Climate Change Mitigation.” in Coward, Harold and Andrew Weaver eds. Hard Choices: Climate Change in Canada.

Reloaded with non-fiction

I have officially abandoned my earlier initiative to finish all my pending books before purchasing more. Mostly, that is because I finished all the non-fiction on my list and all of the fiction I have read recently has been depressing. While much of the non-fiction can also be dispiriting, it feels less like emotional self-flagellation to read it.

My new crop of non-fiction:

Bodanis, David. Passionate Minds. 2006
Collier, Paul. The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries are Failing and What Can Be Done About It. 2007
Easterly, William. The White Man’s Burden: Why the West’s Efforts to Aid the Rest Have Done So Much Ill and So Little Good. 2006.
Overy, Richard. Why the Allies Won. 1995.

The Easterly book was endorsed by Emily Paddon during one of our pre-seminar conversations in Oxford. It is also one of those books that I have heard mentioned in conversation often enough to feel concerned about not having read. The Collier book is clearly on a related theme. I saw Paul Collier speak many times at Oxford and always found him candid and informative. Richard Overy’s book was one of the best I read in the course of two history seminars at Oxford; I look forward to having the chance to take my time in reading it, rather than having it as one of several urgent items in an essay’s source list. Finally, I got the Bodanis book because I have heard it well recommended and know little about Voltaire and even less about Emilie du Chatelet.

I will certainly finish the fiction eventually, but I will do so interspersed with meatier stuff.

Climate ethics principles

Last November, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change convened a meeting in Nairobi. One document that resulted from that meeting was the White Paper on the Ethical Dimensions of Climate Change (PDF). On the basis of arguments similar to those I have heard from Henry Shue and Stephen Gardiner, the document lists seven things that states intending to behave ethically on the climate change problem should do:

Immediately acknowledge that they have a duty to reduce their emissions as quickly as possible to their fair share of safe global emissions;
Immediately agree that an international greenhouse gas atmospheric stabilization target should be set as low as possible unless those who are most vulnerable to climate change impacts have consented to be put at risk from higher levels;
No longer use scientific uncertainty or cost to their economies alone as justification for refusing to reduce GHG emissions;
No longer refuse to reduce GHG emissions now on the basis that new less-costly technologies will be available in the future or that not all other nations have agreed to reduce their GHG emissions;
Accept national targets for assuring that atmospheric concentrations of GHG are protective of human health and the environment that are based upon ethically supportable allocation criteria;
Acknowledge that nations commit human rights violations that refuse to reduce their GHG emissions to their fair share of global emissions needed to protect those most vulnerable from climate change to loss of life, health, and well-being;
Accept that those who are responsible for climate change have a duty to pay for costs of adaptation to and unavoidable damages from climate change.

Generally speaking, these are fine principles. If every major emitting state adopted them, it is entirely plausible that emissions could be brought down to sustainable levels within the next couple of decades and that the inevitable consequences of climate change from past emission could be equitably addressed. What the list fails to consider is the inherent Nash Equilibrium problem. States do not act as all states would act in an ideal world; rather, they generally act in a way that is rational given their inability to control the actions of other states. Given the Stern conclusion that mitigation is far less expensive than inducing and enduring climate change, it would be in the interest of all states to mitigate. Given how many states are proving reluctant to take that seriously, states that are serious about tackling the problem find themselves pushed towards a rationality of building up adaptive capacity instead of reducing emissions.

All that said, ethicists are not meant to be pragmatists. Having a well-argued idea of what ethical behaviour in the face of climate change would be provides a cognitive platform from which to evaluate current actions. It may also help to raise the overall profile of the issue in democratic states where moral and ethical argumentation can be an important element of the political process.

Banning photography reduces our security

Yet another story has surfaced about the authorities being overly heavy handed in response to photography. This time, it a Japanese man threatened and detained because he was taking photos from the window of a moving train. There are two important responses to this trend. The first is to stress that it is useless for security purposes. If there is a situation in which taking a photo would help a terrorist to achieve their objectives, no enforceable anti-photo policy will deter them. Anyone willing to plan or undertake a terrorist attack will be able to tolerate any punishment that could conceivably be imposed for taking photos. They are also likely to be able to take photos in a way that will not be noticed: either with sneaky hidden cameras or with a simple camera phone or by developing an awareness of when the authorities are watching. Banning photography in places like vehicles and bridges punishes photography enthusiasts and serves no security purpose.

Secondly, the ability to take photographs is an important check against the abuse of authority. Without the infamous videotape, it is likely that the Rodney King beating would never have received public attention and that the officers involved would have been able to lie their way out of the situation. Similar abuses, such as the inappropriate use of tasers, have been appropriately documented because people present had the capability and initiative to make a recording. Photos, videos, and other recordings can provide a vital record of interactions with authority: both allowing people whose rights are abused to provide evidence and allowing frivolous claims to be dismissed. A security force that is serious about good conduct and oversight has nothing to fear and much to gain from a bit of public surveillance.

More generally, banning photography is symptomatic of the demise of open society. While there are legitimate security risks that exist and reasonable steps that should be taken to protect against them, reducing oversight and individual liberty both undermines the very things we are trying to protect and creates new risks of abuse at the hands of modern society’s burly new enforcers.

[Update: 15 November 2007] This post on Classical Bookworm, about a recent incident at the Vancouver airport, highlights how important it is for private citizens to be able to record the actions of police and other security officials.

Pakistan’s state of emergency

While I cannot speak on them with any particular knowledge or authority, it does seem that the unfolding events in Pakistan generate some ominous possibilities within the region. A recent Stratfor briefing argues that:

Whether Musharraf himself survives is not a historically significant issue. What is significant is whether Pakistan will fall into internal chaos or civil war, or fragment into smaller states. We must consider what that would mean.

One can only begin to imagine how the Middle East would change if Pakistan disintegrated. It’s a nuclear power bordering a huge but relatively fragile democracy, as well as Iran and Afghanistan. Furthermore, that exists in the context of the Iranian drive for nuclear weapons, the weakness of the Afghan federal government, and. the possibility of the breakup of Iraq (as well as a Turkish attack against the northern Kurdish region). Even for a region that has frequently been in turmoil, this is quite a confluence of events.

Given the context, it is unsurprising that climate change is not the top priority in Pakistan, though the inevitable disruption a changing climate will bring in future decades does seem likely to exacerbate tensions in this part of the world.

Brief post on the Alberta oil sands

“If anything characterizes the 21st century, it’s our inability to restrain ourselves for the benefit of other people.”

This quotation from James Katz comes from an article on the annoying use of cellular phones in public or at inappropriate times. It applies just as well to an issue currently being protested in Alberta as a new legislative session begins: the oil sands.

If oil companies had to bear all the direct and indirect costs associated with production in the oil sands, it seems doubtful that the industry would exist. Those costs include air and water pollution, the large-scale use of fresh water supplies, deforestation, soil contamination, the wholesale destruction and of large tracts of land, and heavy greenhouse gas emissions.. The Pembina Institute – probably Canada’s best environmental NGO – has a website devoted to oil sands issues.

With oil likely to hit $100 a barrel this week, it seems probable that ever more of Alberta’s northern boreal forest will be carved up for petroleum.

Reliable Replacement Warheads

Since July 16th, 1945 the United States has been a nuclear power. The first American thermonuclear weapon was detonated in 1952. During the span of the Cold War, tens of thousands of hydrogen bombs were assembled and mounted inside artillery shells, torpedoes, submarine launched missiles, cruise missiles, land-based ICBMs, and aircraft-mounted bombs. Now, these weapons are starting to age and a debate has emerged on what should be done with them.

Many of these weapons are highly complex. A standard submarine-based missile has a conical warhead. Inside is a uranium casing that serves to contain the original blast until a maximum amount of fission has occurred. At the bottom of that casing is a ‘pit’ of plutonium which is at a sub-critical density. Around that is a casing of brittle, toxic, neutron-reflecting beryllium. Inside it may be a cavity containing tritium and deuterium gas (in the case of a “boosted” primary). Around the beryllium outer sphere is a shell of high explosives designed to explode with fantastic precision, crush the plutonium pit to supercritical density, and initiate the fission reaction.

This whole assembly exists to initiate fusion in the ‘secondary,’ located higher in the outer uranium casing. The material that undergoes fusion – usually lithium deuteride – is wrapped around another sphere of uranium and is, in turn, wrapped in more uranium. All this is to create the largest possible yield in a relatively small and light package. The small size and conical shape allow eight or more of these devices to be placed on a single missile and then independently targeted once that missile is at the height of its ascent.

The 2008 budget allocated $6.5 billion for the maintenance of the American nuclear stockpile. That consists of 9,900 assembled warheads – 5,700 of them deployed operationally. In addition to these, about 7,000 plutonium pits are stored at the Pantex Plant in Amarillo, Texas. As the weapons age, concerns are developing about their reliability. They all contain high explosives, toxic chemicals, and corrosive agents. While it is possible to upgrade many of the non-nuclear components and replace them with more stable variants, the newly assembled bombs could not legally be tested: potentially leaving military commanders in doubt about their usability.

That is, in essence, the core of the ongoing debate about the Reliable Replacement Warhead (RRW). The program would begin by refurbishing 100 kiloton W76 warheads, which is already undergoing a less ambitious retrofitting. The hope is that the program can produce weapons with long durability and lower maintenance costs, and be able to do so without requiring full-scale tests of the devices, as were conducted in Nevada and the Marshall Islands during the Cold War. I won’t get into the details of the debate here. More than sufficient information exists online and in recent newspapers and magazines. What is less frequently considered are some of the aspects of international law relevant to nuclear weapons.

The whole program should remind people about an oft-forgotten element of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Everyone remembers the bit about signatories without nuclear weapons pledging not to acquire them. People forget that the treaty also obliges existing nuclear powers to reduce their arsenals as part of an overall progression towards de-nuclearization. Upgrading your nuclear arsenal to endure further decades of operational status is hardly consistent with this requirement. It also signals to other states that the United States continues to consider operationally deployed nuclear weapons an important part of their overall military strategy.

Individuals and organizations contemplating a sizable RRW program might also do well to re-read the Advisory Opinion on the Legality of the Threat or use of Nuclear Weapons set down by the International Court of Justice. While such legal considerations are relatively unlikely to affect whatever decisions are made in relation to the RRW, examining the status of the law can be a good way to reach decisions about the respective rights and obligations of states.

Voting is inadequate

A post over on Shifting Baselines got me thinking about voting. People often equate voting with being politically engaged and argue that falling voter turnouts demonstrate the failure of democracy. While that is a potentially valid interpretation, another possibility comes to mind. Namely, that the complexity of contemporary policy issues makes voting for a political party too blunt an instrument by which to express yourself meaningfully.

When voting in the Canadian system, the first question is whether or not to vote for a hopeless party. That is to say, anybody except the Liberals, Conservatives, NDP, and perhaps the Bloc depending on where you are. Voting for a different party – or for one of these in a riding where that party has no chance of winning – does demonstrate a kind of clear political preference. Even so, the message is ambiguous. For example, it is unknowable to anybody else whether you voted Green because you like their policies the most, because you liked their local candidate most, or because you wanted to protest the behaviours or policies of alternative parties. The Green Party, other parties, the media, and others could interpret your action in any of those ways. As such, your vote hasn’t sent a clear message to anybody.

Voting for a party with a chance of winning is even more problematic, when it comes to determining what your vote implies. Voting Liberal in a riding that pitches a plausible Liberal candidate against a plausible Tory candidate suggests that, overall, you prefer either that particular candidate or the Liberal Party in general. You may actually support more Conservative Party policies than Liberal ones but have certain points of irreconcilable disagreement with the Tory platform. You might prefer NDP policy on every front, but have chosen to reduce the chances of a Conservative victory, rather than expressing that preference in a more obvious way.

In short, it is impossible for anybody other than a particular voter to derive much information from a vote. Voting isn’t useless in this situation: it allows the electorate to turf out particularly corrupt, scandal-laden, or incompetent legislators or parties. What it does not do is allow voters to meaningfully signal their policy preferences through the act of voting alone. In situations where no plausible candidate is overtly unacceptable and all available choices are flawed, choosing not to vote may not be a betrayal of democratic ideals. Indeed, the idea that 100% voter turnout would be the epitome of a politically engaged populace really misses the extent to which a choice that is so constrained is so devoid of politically actionable content.

Being politically engaged thus means being much more overt about supporting or opposing particular policies during the time between elections: writing letters or articles, attending protests, calling your Member of Parliament, etc, etc. By itself, voting gives you very little meaningful voice in a Parliamentary democracy. Contributing to the political life of your state simply requires a lot more effort.

Political markets

One interesting way to try to predict political outcomes is to allow people to bet on who will win and look at the odds that emerge. A number of sites are allowing people to do this for the 2008 American presidential election, with interesting results. Such sites include InTrade, Iowa Electronic Markets, and Casual Observer.

One option is to buy the right to $100 if a particular candidate wins the presidency. The cost of such a contract is reflective of the market’s presumed probability of that candidate winning. Here are some of the most recent prices:

Hillary Clinton: $46.70
Rudy Giuliani: $17.00
Mitt Romney: $9.50
Al Gore: $7.00
Barack Obama: $6.70
John McCain: $3.50
…
Newt Gingrich: $0.10

The people betting on Al Gore are probably wasting their money, given his repeated assertions that he will not be running. It will be interesting to see how the figures change when more candidates drop out, people choose running mates, and the two parties finally decide upon their nominations.

It is also possible to bet on which party will win the presidential vote. Bets on the Democrats are selling for $63.00. The Republicans only cost $36.40, reflecting much lower expectations about their probable electoral success.

Today’s best biofuel: Brazilian ethanol

Many people see biofuels as a promising replacement for oil in transportation applications. Indeed, being able to replace the oil that contributes to climate change and must often be imported from nasty regimes with carbon-neutral fuels from domestic crops has a great deal of intuitive appeal. For this process to be worthwhile, however, there is a need to consider both life-cycle energy usage and net carbon emissions.

A study conducted in 2004 by Isaias de Carvalho Macedo at the University of Brazil focused on the production of ethanol from Brazilian sugarcane. This is considered by the majority of commentators to be the most energy efficient source of biofuel currently available. This is because most Brazilian sugarcane requires no irrigation and must only be ploughed up and replanted once every five years. The Macedo study found that producing a tonne of sugarcane requires 250,000 kilojoules of energy. This represents the need for tractors, fertilizers, and other elements of modern mechanical farming. The ethanol from one tonne of sugarcane contained 2,000,000 kilojoules of energy. Furthermore, the plants that produce it burn bagasse (the pulp left over when sugarcane has the sugar squeezed out) and can contribute net electricity to the grid. Corn ethanol (the kind being heavily subsidized in the United States) takes about as much energy to grow as is ultimately contained in the fuel.

In terms of net carbon emissions, cane ethanol is also fairly good. Using one tonne of ethanol instead of the amount of gasoline with the same energy content produces 220.5 fewer kilograms of carbon dioxide, when all aspects of production and usage are considered. Burning one litre of gasoline produces about 640 grams of carbon dioxide. Since ethanol has about 25% less energy than gasoline, the relevant comparison is between 1,000 kilograms of ethanol and 750 kilos of gasoline. The gasoline would emit 460 kilos of carbon dioxide, while the ethanol would emit 259.5 kilos.

This is an improvement over the direct use of fossil fuels, but not a massive one. The Macedo study concludes that widespread ethanol use reduces Brazilian emissions by 25.8 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent per year. Their total carbon emissions from fossil fuels are about 92 million tonnes per year – a figure that increases substantially if deforestation is included.

The conclusion to be drawn from all of this is that ethanol – even when produced in the most efficient way – is not a long-term solution. Producing 259.5 kilos of carbon is more sustainable than producing 460, but it isn’t an adequate reduction in a world that has to cut from about 27 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent to five. Bioethanol may become more viable with the development of cellulosic technology (a subject for another post), but is certainly no panacea at this time.

References:

Macedo, I. et al. Assessment of Greenhouse Gas Emissions in the Production and Use of Fuel Ethanol in Brazil (prepared for the Government of the State of São Paulo) (March 2004).
Environmental Protection Agency. Emission Facts: Average Carbon Dioxide Emissions Resulting from Gasoline and Diesel Fuel.

[Update: 8:54am] The above numbers on carbon dioxide emissions produced by gasoline per kilometre are disputed. If someone has an authoritative source on the matter, please pipe up.