FACTORS AFFECTING LEVELS OF INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION IN CARBON ABATEMENT PROJECTS

The Clean Development Mechanism, a provision of The Kyoto Protocol, allows countries that have pledged to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions to gain credit toward their treaty obligations by investing in projects located in developing (host) countries. Such projects are expected to benefit both parties by providing low-cost abatement opportunities for the investor-country, while facilitating capital and technology flows to the host country. This paper analyzes the Clean Development Mechanism market, emphasizing the cooperation aspects between host and investor countries. The analysis uses a dichotomous (yes/no) variable and three continuous variants to measure the level of cooperation, namely the number of joint projects, the volume of carbon dioxide abatement, and the volume of investment in the projects. The results suggest that economic development, institutional development, the energy structure of the economies, the level of country vulnerability to various climate change effects, and the state of international relations between the host and investor countries are good predictors of the level of cooperation in Clean Development Mechanism projects. The main policy conclusions include the importance of simplifying the project regulation/clearance cycle; improving the governance structure host and investor countries; and strengthening trade or other long-term economic activities that engage the countries.Abatement; animal waste; Approach; atmosphere; availability; barrier; bilateral trade; biomass; Business Climate; business environment; business regulation; business regulations; capital investments

Carbon markets, institutions, policies, and research

The scale of investment needed to slow greenhouse gas emissions is larger than governments can manage through transfers. Therefore, climate change policies rely heavily on markets and private capital. This is especially true in the case of the Kyoto Protocol with its provisions for trade and investment injoint projects. This paper describes institutions and policies important for new carbon markets and explains their origins. Research efforts that explore conceptual aspects of current policy are surveyed along with empirical studies that make predictions about how carbon markets will work and perform. The authors summarize early investment and price outcomes from newly formed markets and point out areas where markets have preformed as predicted and areas where markets remain incomplete. Overall the scale of carbon-market investment planned exceeds earlier expectations, but the geographic dispersion of investment is uneven and important opportunities for abatement remain untapped in some sectors, indicating a need for additional research on how investment markets work. How best to promote the development and deployment of new technologies is another promising area for study identified in the paper.Carbon Policy and Trading,Energy and Environment,Environment and Energy Efficiency,Climate Change,Transport and Environment

Beyond the Stern Review: Lessons from a risky venture at the limits of the cost–benefit analysis

International audienceThis paper argues that debates amongst economists triggered by the Stern Review are partly relevant, focusing on key parameters translating real ethical issues, and partly misplaced in that they do not consider enough other determinants of climate change damages: i) the specifications of the utility function used for the assessments (preference for the environment, preference for smooth growth paths), ii) the interplay between uncertainty and the sequentiality of the decision, and iii) whether the growth engines behind the integrated assessment models can account for transient disequilibrium and sub-optimality. We derive some suggestions for any future research agenda in integrated assessment modelling, whatever the position of the analysts about the relevance of the intertemporal optimisation framework and the Bayesian approach to uncertainty in the climate affair

Optimal control models and elicitation of attitudes towards climate damages

This paper examines the consequences of various attitudes towards climate damages through a family of stochastic optimal control models (RESPONSE): cost-efficiency for a given temperature ceiling; cost-benefit analysis with a "pure preference for current climate regime" and full cost-benefit analysis. The choice of a given proxy of climate change risks is actually more than a technical option. It is essentially motivated by the degree of distrust regarding the legitimacy of an assessment of climate damages and the possibility of providing in due time reliable and non controversial estimates. Our results demonstrate that a) for early decades abatement, the difference between various decision-making frameworks appears to matter less than the difference between stochastic and non stochastic approach given the cascade of uncertainty from emissions to damages; b) in a stochastic approach, the possibility of non-catastrophic singularities in the damage function is sufficient to significantly increase earlier optimal abatements; c) a window of opportunity for action exists up to 2040: abatements further delayed may induce significant regret in case of bad news about climate response or singularities in damages.Cost-efficiency; Cost-benefit; Climate sensitivity; Climate change damages; Uncertainty; Optimal climate policy; Decision making frameworks

Usefulness of serum albumin and serum total cholesterol in the prediction of hospital death in older patients with severe, acute heart failure

SummaryBackgroundAcute heart failure (HF) carries high hospital mortality rates in older patients; a multimarker strategy may help identify patients at high risk.AimsTo investigate prospectively the prognostic relevance of serum albumin and serum total cholesterol (TC) in older patients with severe, acute HF.MethodsUsual prognostic variables were collected on admission in 207 consecutive patients aged>70 years with severe, acute HF. Serum albumin and serum TC were obtained soon after clinical improvement.ResultsHospital mortality rate was 19%. Patients who died were similar to patients who survived in terms of age, sex, heart rate, serum haemoglobin and left ventricular ejection fraction. Patients who died had higher concentrations of B-type natriuretic peptide (BNP), blood urea nitrogen, serum creatinine, C-reactive protein and serum troponin I, lower systolic blood pressure, and lower concentrations of serum albumin and serum TC than patients who survived (P<0.01 for all). Serum albumin was the best independent predictor of hospital death (odds ratio 0.82 [0.74–0.90], P<0.001), with blood urea nitrogen (P=0.02) and log (BNP) (P=0.02). A simple risk score based on serum albumin (<3g/dL; 2 points), BNP (>840pg/mL; 1 point) and blood urea nitrogen (>15.3mmol/L; 1 point) discriminated patients without (score 0 to 1, hospital death 4%) from patients with (score 2 to 4, hospital death 35%, P<0.001) a high risk of death.ConclusionHypoalbuminaemia offers powerful additional prognostic information to usual prognostic variables in older patients with severe, acute HF, and deserves further attention in multimarker strategies

Attention au rythme du changement climatique !

Pour évaluer les politiques climatiques dans un cadre coût-efficacité sous contraintes d'évolution du climat (amplitude du réchauffement et son rythme), nous avons développé RESPONSE_Θ, un modèle intégré de contrôle optimal. Nos résultats montrent que l'incertitude sur la sensibilité du climat implique de suivre une trajectoire d'émissions très contraignante à court terme, d'autant plus que l'information sur ce paramètre arrive tard. En raison de cette incertitude, un objectif comme +2 °C pourrait donc impliquer une contrainte très lourde sur les émissions. Nous montrons en outre qu'il est encore plus important pour la décision de court terme de résoudre l'incertitude sur la contrainte de rythme que l'incertitude sur la sensibilité du climat ou l'amplitude du réchauffement. Il est donc urgent de poursuivre l'effort de recherche sur les risques du changement climatique, afin de caractériser un garde-fou acceptable pour limiter le rythme du réchauffement

Mind the rate ! Why rate of global climate change matters, and how much

Pour évaluer les politiques climatiques dans un cadre coût-efficacité sous contraintes d'évolution du climat (amplitude du réchauffement et son rythme), nous avons développé RESPONSE_ ?, un modèle intégré de contrôle optimal. Nos résultats montrent que l'incertitude sur la sensibilité du climat implique de suivre une trajectoire d'émissions très contraignante à court terme, d'autant plus que l'information sur ce paramètre arrive tard. En raison de cette incertitude, un objectif comme +2°C pourrait donc impliquer une contrainte très lourde sur les émissions. Nous montrons en outre qu'il est encore plus important pour la décision de court terme de résoudre l'incertitude sur la contrainte de rythme que l'incertitude sur la sensibilité du climat ou l'amplitude du réchauffement. Il est donc urgent de poursuivre l'effort de recherche sur les risques du changement climatique afin de caractériser un garde-fou acceptable pour limiter le rythme du réchauffement

Changement climatique et enjeux de sécurité

This paper explores the relationships between climate change and security. Potential threats from climate change, as a unique source of stress or together with other factors, to human security are first examined. Some of the most explicit examples illustrate this section : food security, water availability, vulnerability to extreme events and vulnerability of small islands States and coastal zones. By questioning the basic needs of some populations or at least aggravating their precariousness, such risks to human security could also raise global security concerns, which we examine in turn, along four directions : rural exodus with an impoverishment of displaced populations, local conflicts for the use of natural resources, diplomatic tensions and international conflicts, and propagation to initially-unaffected regions through migratory flows.Quels sont les liens entre changement climatique et enjeux de sécurité ? C'est ce que se propose d'explorer cet article en considérant d'abord les menaces qu'il fait peser sur la sécurité humaine, seul ou conjugué à d'autres facteurs. En sont présentés les exemples les plus significatifs, comme les questions de sécurité alimentaire, de disponibilité de l'eau, de vulnérabilité aux événements extrêmes ou de vulnérabilité des territoires insulaires et des régions côtières. Dans un second temps, on examine comment de tels risques pour la sécurité humaine, avec une remise en cause des besoins fondamentaux de certaines populations ou une accentuation de leur précarité, peuvent se muer en enjeux de sécurité collective, notamment selon quatre modalités : exode rural accompagné d'une paupérisation des populations, sources de conflits localisés pour l'usage des ressources, tensions diplomatiques et conflits internationaux, et propagation à des régions initialement épargnées via des flux migratoires

Few lessons from a risky venture, the Stern report

Débats/opinions in : Revue d'Economie Politique 117, 4 (2007)National audienceDrawing on an alarming diagnosis on climate change damages, the Stem Review calls for immediate and strong collective action, Many have questioned this unambiguous message on the ground of methodological and parametric options, deemed arbitrary. Above all, such options emphasize the current limits of the integrated assessment toolbox as well as the challenges for applying the frontier of economic theory to empirical studies. The present article reviews these shortcomings and draws a joint agenda for both integrated modelling and economic theory, including notably. assessing preferences for the environment, modelling singularities in damages, develop growth models with transient frictions and disequilibria and better account for uncertainties (eventuality of surprises)