Friday - December 07, 2007

Have You Heard about the Climate Change Performance Index Released at Bali?

The Climate Conference in Bali is a showcase of leftist thinking.

The damnedest and probably the most humorous thing to come out of Bali is the "Climate Change Performance Index. The index, put out by this group, of course puts the evil United States at the bottom of their list. Here is their index of those who they consider the worst "climate" offenders. What you will see of course, is that their list has no relationship to actual pollution rates or policies.

In order to moderate the impact of these aspects on the index score, the CCPI takes a country's changes in actual emissions-the emissions trend-with a weighting of 50 percent and its climate policy with a weighting of 20 percent into account.

Moreover, a country's current positive ranking in the CCPI could not be maintained if the government decided to increase the use of coal due to rising gas and oil prices and concerns about energy safety. A strategy of this kind represents a step back from sustainable climate policy and shoes its negative effects on a country's index score.

So in their index, actual pollution counts for only 30%. 

Climate policy for 20% and "emissions trend" for a whopping 50%. And as the chart notes, fast growing third world countries get extra credit because they are poor and aren't the United States.

Let's think about this report rationally. It down plays actual emissions. 

It defines climate policy in terms of the left. In other words, government policy. Of course, that automatically penalizes free market systems where governments have limited roles due to the fact that in free societies, governments are limited by definition and depend upon market mechanisms to deal with pollution.

And it awards the largest curve to emissions trends. But on what planet do the years 1998 to 2000 and 2003 to 2005 constitute a trend? That's right, this group calculated a trend using 6 years as their data source.

In a nutshell, China, which has surpassed the U.S. in terms of real pollution, is awarded a better standing because, it is a third world country and it promises to do better in the future. 

Think about that. China, which has more coal fired plants than the U.S., is considered a more eco-friendly nation!

Trackposted to Outside the Beltway, Cao's Blog, Big Dog's Weblog, Faultline USA, and Wolf Pangloss,Rosemary's Thoughts, Right Truth, Adam's Blog, The World According to Carl, and The Yankee Sailor , thanks to Linkfest Haven Deluxe.