Issue 103: Carbon Dioxide Emissions and Global Warming

Though not a unanimous view, a large number of scientists believe that unabated growth of greenhouse gas emissions might increase global mean temperature by two to five degrees centigrade, raise sea levels by 30 to 100 centimeters, and significantly alter weather patterns over the next century. These changes could threaten economic and social well-being through impaired agricultural productivity, regional water shortages, coastal flooding, and other impacts. Policy discussions dealing with global warming have focused on controlling greenhouse gas emissions, particularly carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from fossil fuel combustion—the dominant contributor to the greenhouse effect. However, limiting CO2 emissions to ameliorate climate change will be difficult.

Contributors to this issue of Resources examine the major issues that policy-makers would face in controlling carbon emissions. Peter M. Morrisette and Andrew J. Plantinga explore the positions that various countries have taken on the global warming issue and the political and economic factors that may govern their willingness to support an international agreement to control emissions of carbon dioxide. In his analysis of one of these factors—the cost of CO2 abatement—Joel Darmstadter scrutinizes the limitations of the two modeling approaches used to calculate the economic burden that a specific emissions limit would entail. Michael A. Toman and Dallas Burtraw concentrate on the question of equity in the sharing of this burden and on how fairness standards may evolve in negotiations to limit carbon emissions. Given the inability of traditional command-and-control measures to achieve emissions control at the least cost to society, Wallace E. Oates and Paul R. Portney appraise the relative merits of two incentive-based approaches to implementing greenhouse gas limits, both domestically and internationally. Finally, Pierre R. Crosson and Norman J. Rosenberg examine the often ignored role of adaptation to prospective climate change. In particular, they outline the nature and sequence of two kinds of adaptive response.

Research on climate change has been a growing activity at Resources for the Future since the establishment of its Climate Resources Program in 1987. The complex scientific, economic, and political issues surrounding climate change have stimulated many research efforts in other RFF programs. This special issue of Resources reflects this body of RFF investigation.

The first three articles that follow are based on research partially funded by the U.S.-Japan Foundation and the National Science Foundation under grant number DIR-9012507.