Latest in a series of articles by Richard Tol criticizing the IPCC AR4 WGIII report. This article focuses on the effect of using market exchange rates or purchasing power parity adjusted exchange rates (PPP) to project future emissions. Models that use market exchange rates, including the IPCC SRES projections project higher future emissions and emissions growth than models that use PPP exchange rates.
But recently emissions have been rising as fast as the most extreme IPCC scenarios. Ross Garnaut has called this phenomenon of very fast economic and emissions growth the "Platinum Age" If we buy Tol's arguments (which I do) this period will not be long-lasting and emissions growth will again slow down.
"If we buy Tol's arguments (which I do) this period will not be long-lasting and emissions growth will again slow down."
ReplyDeleteMaybe. But maybe not. The IPCC made an important assumption of rates of spontaneous decarbonization (Pielke, Green, Wigley, 2008) which works in the other direction.
It is very possible that Garnaut and Tol are both correct.