(p. A11) The Paris Agreement will cost a fortune but do little to reduce global warming. In a peer-reviewed article published in Global Policy this year, I looked at the widely hailed major policies that Paris Agreement signatories pledged to undertake and found that they will have a negligible temperature impact. I used the same climate-prediction model that the United Nations uses.
. . . , consider the Obama administration’s signature climate policy, the Clean Power Plan. The U.N.’s model shows that it will accomplish almost nothing. Even if the policy withstands current legal challenges and its cuts are totally implemented–not for the 14 years that the Paris agreement lasts, but for the rest of the century–the Clean Power Plan would reduce temperatures by 0.023 degrees Fahrenheit by 2100.
. . .
The costs of the Paris climate pact are likely to run to $1 trillion to $2 trillion annually throughout the rest of the century, using the best estimates from the Stanford Energy Modeling Forum and the Asia Modeling Exercise. Spending more than $100 trillion for such a feeble temperature reduction by the end of the century does not make sense.
For the full commentary, see:
BJORN LOMBORG. “Obama’s Climate Policy Is a Hot Mess; The president hails the Paris Agreement again–even though it will solve nothing and cost trillions.” The Wall Street Journal (Fri., July 1, 2016): A11.
(Note: ellipses added.)
(Note: the online version of the commentary has the date June 30, 2016.)
The academic version of Lomborg’s argument, is:
Lomborg, Bjorn. “Impact of Current Climate Proposals.” Global Policy 7, no. 1 (Feb. 2016): 109-18.