Download BAM Nordenstahl RuppaKasani vs MS Lee Meyer

TPP
TPP will pass during the lame duck
Corsi 7/4 (Jerome Corsi: Harvard Ph.D., author of No. 1 N.Y. Times best-sellers, “Obama advances
stealth plan to pass TPP,” 7/4/16, http://www.wnd.com/2016/07/obama-advances-stealth-plan-to-passtpp/, Accessed: 7/12/16, RRR)
NEW YORK –
The Obama administration is betting on a stealth plan to secure final passage of the massive TransPacific Partnership, or TPP, before Obama leaves office by pushing the bill through Congress in the “lame duck”
session between Election Day Nov. 8, and Jan. 6, 2017, the date the new Congress is sworn in, despite growing voter opposition that now has
Hillary Clinton joining Donald Trump in opposing the bill. Tactically,
the Obama administration has decided to postpone a
TPP vote until after the election, concerned that pushing TPP passage now would risk damaging
Clinton’s chances, given her enthusiastic support for TPP during her tenure as secretary of state. The push to pass TPP is
consistent with a New York Times report published Sunday by Mark Landler in his “White House Letter,” indicating
President Obama plans to travel this week to North Carolina, where he joins Hillary Clinton, campaigning with her for the first time this year;
and to Europe, where he joins Britain’s lame-duck prime minister David Cameron, who ended his political career opposing Brexit. In both trips,
Obama is expected to press the globalist message that “Americans and Europeans must not forsake
their open, interconnected societies for the nativism and nationalism preached by Donald J. Trump or Britain’s Brexiteers.”
Obama needs all his PC to get it done
Hufbauer, senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, ‘15 (Gary
Hufbauer, Will Congress Unravel the Trans-Pacific Partnership?, Oct 16 2015, The Dialogue,
http://www.thedialogue.org/resources/will-congress-unravel-the-trans-pacific-partnership/)
Gary Hufbauer, senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics: “While Hillary Clinton may have reversed her prior
enthusiastic support of the TPP, if elected president, she can rediscover the geopolitical virtues that led her to embrace the TPP project when
she served as secretary of state. And Clinton can toss in a couple of ‘side agreements’—reminiscent of NAFTA—to nudge the TPP closer to her
concept of a gold standard. But between
now and 2017, the TPP must survive a perilous journey through
Congress. The timelines specified under Trade Promotion Authority mean that the soonest President Obama could sign the TPP text will be
late January 2016. Meanwhile, Obama will need to agree with his Congressional counterparts— Senate
Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and probable House Speaker Paul Ryan—on the text of the TPP
implementing legislation, including any ‘sweeteners’ inserted to attract the votes of wavering
congressmen. Then, in the midst of the presidential election campaign, the House and Senate must vote the implementing legislation up
or down, without amendments. If he sees no clear shot at reaching ‘yes’, President Obama can elect to not submit implementing legislation to
Congress, and instead leave the task of securing ratification to his successor. On balance, it
appears that President Obama will
use every ounce of his dwindling political capital stock to secure Congressional approval of the TPP in
2016 and, at the same time, secure his own historic legacy. But if the critical vote is postponed until 2017—when
ratification seems all but certain, provided that Sanders and Trump remain far from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue—the TPP will still enjoy a fine
launch into the annals of path-breaking trade agreements.”
Climate change coop causes aggressive GOP backlash
Nakamura 14[David Nakamura, Ed O'Keefe, Steven Mufson, Washington Post, 11-12-2014, "GOP
congressional leaders denounce U.S.-China deal on climate change,"
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/gop-congressional-leaders-denounce-us-china-deal-onclimate-change/2014/11/12/ff2b84e0-6a8d-11e4-a31c-77759fc1eacc_story.html
Any hope for Congress to reconvene with a sense of bipartisanship was quickly erased Wednesday
morning as Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and House Speaker John A. Boehner (ROhio) sharply criticized the announcement of a new climate deal between the United States and China.
McConnell made his comments during a morning coffee with 10 newly elected Republican senators in
his office off the Senate floor. As his new colleagues stood beaming, McConnell was asked by reporters
whether he planned to shift the Senate to the political middle in hopes of reaching accord with
President Obama and Democrats. “The president continues to send a signal that he has no intention of
moving toward the middle,” said McConnell, who is in line to become the new Senate majority leader in
January. “I was particularly distressed by the deal he’s reached with the Chinese on his current trip,
which, as I read the agreement, it requires the Chinese to do nothing at all for 16 years, while these
carbon emission regulations are creating havoc in my state and other states across the country.” In his
initial reaction, McConnell said, “This unrealistic plan that the president would dump on his successor
would ensure higher utility rates and far fewer jobs.” Boehner denounced the agreement as “the latest
example of the president’s crusade against affordable, reliable energy that is already hurting jobs and
squeezing middle-class families.” The speaker, who will preside over an increased GOP majority when
the new Congress convenes, charged in a statement that Obama “intends to double down on his jobcrushing policies no matter how devastating the impact,” and he pledged that Republicans would
continue to make blocking Obama’s energy policies a priority for the rest of his term. Top administration
officials made it clear Wednesday the president would pursue some of his top priorities despite GOP
opposition. Speaking to reporters on a press call Wednesday, Environmental Protection Agency
administrator Gina McCarthy said Obama has emphasized the importance of curbing greenhouse gas
emissions linked to climate change for months. “The president has been very clear in the direction in he
is moving,” McCarthy said. “He is not changing at all.” While there is little lawmakers can do to block the
U.S.-China climate agreement McConnell’s aides have already started investigating ways they could
block or delay implementation of the EPA’s proposed rule to limit greenhouse gas emissions from
existing power plants, which is set to become final next June. Rather than pushing for an outright
reversal of the rule before it’s finalized, according to individuals familiar with these deliberations, Senate
Republicans are looking at passing language that would give states the option of not complying with the
EPA mandate until litigation on the issue is resolved, or that would bar federal authorities from
enforcing the rule. “You can issue all the executive orders you want. If you don’t have any money to
enforce them, they don’t go very far,” said Rep. Tom Cole (R-Okla.) “We’re going to be pretty aggressive
in using the power of the purse.”
TPP key to global economy and trade-rejection triggers spiraling protectionism and
world war-makes effective security cooperation over multiple international threats
impossible.
Boskin 15-[prof economics Stanford-10/30 http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/oct/30/tpp-trans-pacific-partnership-the-case-for-trade
Trans-Pacific Partnership: the case for trade] [MB]
If the US fails to ratify the TPP because of fears about immigration, it would be a damaging blow to international
cooperation Past experience reinforces the view that, ultimately, voluntary trade is a good thing . Extreme
protectionism in the early 1930s, following an era of relatively free international trade, had devastating
consequences, ultimately setting the stage for the second world war. As the MIT economist Charles Kindleberger
showed, America’s Smoot-Hawley tariff, in particular,helped to turn a deep recession into a global depression. Even
before the war was over, major powers convened in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, to establish a new international trade and finance regime,
including the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade. Through a succession of lengthy and difficult global negotiations – the so-called “GATT
rounds” – tariffs were steadily lowered for an increasing variety of goods. As a result, global trade grew faster than world GDP for most of the
postwar period. After five years of talks, a wide-ranging trade deal is close between Pacific rim countries which could have long-reaching
economic consequences. Here is what you need to know about the TPP Virtually all economists agree that this shift toward freer
trade greatly benefited the world’s citizens and enhanced global growth. The economistsJeffrey Frankel and David
Romer estimate that, in general, trade has a sizeable positive effect on growth. At a time when growth is failing to
meet expectations almost everywhere, the TPP thus seems like a good move. To be sure, because tariffs in the TPP member
countries are already low (with some exceptions, such as Canada’s tariffs on dairy products and Japan’s on beef), the net benefit of eliminating
them would be modest (except for a few items that are very sensitive to small price changes). But the TPP is also expected to reduce
non-tariff barriers (such as red tape and protection of state enterprises); harmonise policies and procedures; and include
dispute-settlement mechanisms. Though the TPP’s precise provisions have not been made public, political leaders in the member
countries predict that the deal, once ratified and implemented, will add hundreds of billions of dollars to their economies and
bolster employment. Smaller and developing economies will probably gain the most, relative to size, but everyone will benefit overall. Other
important outcomes are not included in these calculations. The alternative to liberalising trade is not the status quo; it is a
consistent moveaway from openness. This can occur in a number of ways, such as the erection of non-tariff barriers that favor domestic
incumbents at the expense of lower-priced potential imports that would benefit consumers. Moreover, it is much easier to build
mutually beneficial trade relationships than it is to resolve military and geopolitical issues, such as combating the
Islamic State or resolving tensions in the South China Sea. But strong trade relationships have the potential to
encourage cooperation – or, at least, discourage escalation of conflict – in other, more contentious areas. Still, there
are some legitimate concerns about the TPP. Some worry that it could divert trade from non-member countries or undermine the moribund
Doha round of multilateral trade negotiations (though 20 years ago, the North American Free Trade Agreement had the opposite effect, kickstarting the Uruguay round). Given all of this – not to mention renewed attention to national borders, owing to contentious immigration issues,
such as the influx of Middle Eastern refugees in Europe – the TPP’s ratification is far from certain, especially in the US. The concentrated interests
that oppose the agreement may turn out to be more influential than the diffuse interests of all consumers. That would be a major loss.
Allowing existing protectionist trade barriers to remain in place – or worsen – would not only deprive citizens in TPP
countries of higher incomes; it would also deal a damaging blow to international cooperation.
Causes global hotspot escalation---trade solves
Sapiro 14-[ Visiting Fellow in the Global Economy and Development program at Brookings, former Deputy US Trade Representative, former Director
of European Affairs at the National Security Council, “Why Trade Matters,” September
2014, http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/research/files/papers/2014/09/why%20trade%20matters/trade%20global%20views_final.pdf] [MB]
This policy brief explores the economic rationale and strategic imperative of an ambitious domestic and global trade agenda from the perspective of the United States. International trade is often viewed through the relatively narrow
prism of trade-offs that might be made among domestic sectors or between trading partners, but it is important to consider also the impact that increased trade has on global growth, development and security.
With that context
implications of the Asia-Pacific and European trade negotiations underway
in mind, this paper assesses the
, including for countries that are not participating
but aspire to join. It outlines some of the challenges that stand in the way of completion and ways in which they can be addressed. It examines whether the focus on “mega-regional” trade agreements comes at the expense of
broader liberalization or acts as a catalyst to develop higher standards than might otherwise be possible. It concludes with policy recommendations for action by governments, legislators and stakeholders to address concerns that
dire developments are threatening the
security interests of the United States and its partners in the Middle East, Asia, Africa and Europe. In the Middle East, significant areas of Iraq have been overrun by a toxic
offshoot of Al-Qaeda, civil war in Syria rageswith no end in sight, and the Israeli-Palestinian peace process is in tatters. Nuclear negotiations
with Iran have run into trouble, while Libya and Egypt face continuing instability and domestic challenges. In Asia, historic rivalries and disputes over territory have
heightened tensions across the region, most acutely by China’s aggressivemoves in the South China Sea towards Vietnam, Japan and the Philippines. Nucleararmed North Korea remains isolated, reckless and unpredictable. In Africa, countries are struggling with rising terrorism, violence and corruption. In Europe, Russia continues
to foment instability and destruction in eastern Ukraine. And within the European Union, lagging economic recovery and the surge in support for extremist parties have left people fearful of increasing
have been raised and create greater domestic support. It is fair to ask whether we should be concerned about the future of international trade policy when
violence against immigrants and minority groups and skeptical of further integration. It is tempting to focus solely on these pressing problems and defer less urgent issues—such as forging new disciplines for international trade—to
advancing trade
liberalization now is precisely the role that greater economic integration can play in opening up new avenues of opportunity for promoting development and increasing economic prosperity. Such initiatives can help
stabilize key regions and strengthen the security of the United States and its partners. The last century provides a powerful example of how expanding trade
relations can help reduce global tensions and raise living standards. Following World War II, building stronger economic cooperation was a centerpiece of allied efforts to
another day, especially when such issues pose challenges of their own. But that would be a mistake. A key motivation in building greater domestic and international consensus for
erase battle scars and embrace former enemies. In defeat, the economies of Germany, Italy and Japan faced ruin and people were on the verge of starvation. The United States led efforts to rebuild Europe and to repair Japan’s
A key element
was to revive trade
economy.
of the Marshall Plan, which established the foundation for unprecedented growth and the level of European integration that exists today,
by reducing
tariffs.1 Russia, and the eastern part of Europe that it controlled, refused to participate or receive such assistance. Decades later, as the Cold War ended, the United States and Western Europe sought to make up for lost time by
providing significant technical and financial assistance to help integrate central and eastern European countries with the rest of Europe and the global economy. There have been subsequent calls for a “Marshall Plan” for other parts
economic
development can play in defusing tensions, and how opening markets can hasten growth. There is again a growing recognition that economic security and national security are two sides of the same
of the world,2 although the confluence of dedicated resources, coordinated support and existing capacity has been difficult to replicate. Nonetheless, important lessons have been learned about the valuable role
coin. General Carter Ham, who stepped down as head of U.S. Africa Command last year, observed the close connection between increasing prosperity and bolstering stability. During his time in Africa he had seen that “security and
stability in many ways depends a lot more on economic growth and opportunity than it does on military strength.”3 Where people have opportunities for themselves and their children, he found, the result was better governance,
increased respect for human rights and lower levels of conflict. During his confirmation hearing last year, Secretary John Kerry stressed the link between economic and national security in the context of the competitiveness of the
United States but the point also has broader application. Our nation cannot be strong abroad, he argued, if it is not strong at home, including by putting its own fiscal house in order. He asserted—rightly so—that “more than ever
Every day, he said, “that goes by where America is uncertain about engaging in
unwilling to demonstrate our resolve to lead, is a day in which we weaken our nation itself.”4
Strengthening America’s economicsecurity by cementing its economic alliances is not simply an option, but an imperative. A strong nation needs a strong
foreign policy is economic policy,” particularly in light of increasing competition for global resources and markets.
that arena, or unwilling to put our best foot forward and win,
economy that can generate growth, spur innovation and create jobs. This is true, of course, not only for the United States but also for its key partners and the rest of the global trading system. Much as the United States led the way in
forging strong military alliances after World War II to discourage a resurgence of militant nationalism in Europe or Asia, now is the time to place equal emphasis on shoring up our collective economic security. A
act now could undermine international security and placestability in key regions in further jeopardy.
failure to
Xi
Xi’s Anticorruption campaign = mistrust, declining pc
Tom Phillips, 5-3-2016, writer for the guardian “China's Xi Jinping denies House of Cards power
struggle but attacks 'conspirators'," Guardian,
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/may/04/china-xi-jinping-house-of-cards-attacksconspirators
Roderick MacFarquhar, a Harvard University expert in elite Communist party politics, said: “Xi
Jinping’s donning of uniform and
giving him his new military title is a warning to his colleagues that he has the army behind him. Whether he
actually has or not, one doesn’t know. But that is his bulwark, as it was Mao’s.” However, MacFarquhar said the new title could be a
sign of weakness rather than strength, noting that not even Mao Zedong had accumulated such a glut of titles. “Chairman
Mao never needed titles. Everyone knew who was in charge,” he said. Advertisement Xi has made a high-profile
anti-corruption campaign one of his administration’s key missions, disciplining hundreds of thousands of
officials, including top party and military figures. But experts say the war on corruption has generated discontent
among officials, caused political paralysis and fuelled suspicions Xi is using the campaign as a pretext to purge
his political enemies. In his recent speech, Xi denied those charges and vowed to “step up” the anti-corruption drive, according to
Xinhua, China’s official news and propaganda agency. “We must make it clear that our party’s fight against corruption is not a snobbish affair
that discriminates between different people, and it is not a House of Cards power struggle,” Xi said.
Chinese leadership on a global scale through climate talks means Xi gains power –
climate talks a crucial part of Xi’s leadership and makes China a powerful global entity
Ye and Wu, 12-4-2015. (Qi Ye, a leading expert on China’s environmental policy, is a senior fellow and
director of the Brookings-Tsinghua Center for Public Policy in Beijing. His research focuses on China’s
policies on climate change, environment, energy, natural resources, and urbanization. Tong Wu is a
visiting Scholar at Tsinghua University, Beijing, China. "China's 'yes' to new role in climate battle,"
Brookings Institution. Accessed 7/21/16. http://www.brookings.edu/research/articles/2015/12/04chinas-yes-new-role-climate-battle-qi-wu --DDI CT.)
A year ago, China and the United States surprised the world by signing the Joint Announcement on Climate Change and Clean Energy. One
major reason for its importance is that China,
for the first time, committed to a target of absolute emissions
control, something that had been demanded by developed countries for years. Under the agreement, China also committed to increasing its
share of nonfossil fuels use to 20 percent of total primary energy consumption, which means that it must increase its power generation
capacity by 1,000 gigawatts - equivalent to the generation capacity of the United States - over the next 15 years. Vowing
to build the
largest low-carbon economy in the world, China has been leading the world in clean-energy investment
since Copenhagen and now contributes 30 percent of the world's share of clean-energy finance. Two months
before the Paris meeting, Xi announced, in another joint presidential statement with Obama, that China would build the
world's largest nationwide carbon market by 2017 - this despite the fact the West has never recognized
China's status as a "market economy" in trade-related negotiations. Furthermore, in the year leading up to
Paris, China has signed a number of bilateral and multilateral agreements on climate change and clean
energy, including with Germany, France, the United Kingdom and India. No other country has achieved a similar level of
success in climate and clean energy diplomacy. Considering the slow progress in international
negotiations on climate finance, China has stepped up to the plate, and in a big way. First, it doubled its
contribution to the South-South Climate Cooperation Fund last year, and recently it pledged 20 billion yuan
($3.1 billion; 2.9 billion euros) to
further low-carbon initiatives in developing countries. For a country in which
per-capita GDP is still a fraction of the US level, this shows a remarkable level of commitment to solving
a global problem. Only a decade ago, Robert Zoellick, a former US deputy secretary of state and World Bank
president, exhorted China to be a more "responsible stakeholder" in the global system. With regard to
climate change, and under the leadership of Xi, that is exactly what has been happening. In previous years,
some Western negotiators - half-jokingly and half-mockingly - nicknamed the Chinese climate negotiator "Mr No" for his consistent rejections
of Western proposals. Today,
China has given a resounding "yes" to climate leadership, demonstrating through
actions that it is both willing and capable of building global governance. From Copenhagen to Paris, China's role
in global climate governance has changed: from a seemingly passive participant to a proactive builder.
Underlying this transition is the vision of a more inclusive system of international cooperation. China's new
leadership has been advocating a vision of human beings as a community with a common destiny. Xi has stressed the need to
recognize that all people and countries face common challenges, and through their actions will arrive at
a common fate. In the 21st century, the world will succeed or fail together. On no issue has this been
more evident than on climate change, and nowhere has Xi's leadership of China been more important
at the global level.
Xi’s agenda crushes CCP stability by angering other party members and attempting to
consolidate military power.
Phillips 5/3 Tom Phillips, Beijing correspondent for the Guardian, “China's Xi Jinping
denies House of Cards power struggle but attacks 'conspirators',” The Guardian, 3 May
2016, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/may/04/china-xi-jinping-house-of-cards-attacksconspirators
Xi Jinping has rejected claims that a “House of Cards power struggle” is raging at the pinnacle of Chinese politics,
but claimed “conspirators” were attempting to undermine the Communist party from within. In a speech
published in Beijing’s official newspaper this week, the Chinese president warned that the presence of “cabals and
cliques” inside the party risked “compromising the political security of the party and the country”.
“There are careerists and conspirators existing in our party and undermining the party’s governance,” Xi
said, according to the People’s Daily transcript of his comments. “We should not bury our heads in the sand and spare these members but
must make a resolute response to eliminate the problem and deter further violations.” The speech
comes at a time of growing speculation over possible factional struggles within the 88 million-member Communist
party that Xi has led since late 2012. As evidence of those rifts, experts point to recent moves by Xi to rein in the
influential Communist Youth League, which is the power base of former president Hu Jintao and current
prime minister Li Keqiang. This week it emerged that the Youth League’s budget had been slashed by more than
50% following a damning investigation into its activities by Xi’s anti-corruption agents. Experts also see
Xi’s decision last month to take on the title of commander-in-chief of China’s joint battle command
centre as a potential indicator of trouble at the top. Since coming to power Xi has amassed an unusual
plethora of official titles including general secretary of the Communist party, president of the People’s
Republic of China, chairman of the central military commission, leader of the national security
commission and head of the leading group for overall reform. One academic has dubbed him the “chairman of
everything”. Roderick MacFarquhar, a Harvard University expert in elite Communist party politics, said: “Xi Jinping’s donning of
uniform and giving him his new military title is a warning to his colleagues that he has the army behind
him. Whether he actually has or not, one doesn’t know. But that is his bulwark, as it was Mao’s.” However, MacFarquhar said
the new title could be a sign of weakness rather than strength, noting that not even Mao Zedong had accumulated such a glut of titles.
“Chairman Mao never needed titles. Everyone knew who was in charge,” he said. Xi has made a high-profile anti-corruption campaign one of
his administration’s key missions, disciplining hundreds of thousands of officials, including top party and military figures. But experts
say
the war on corruption has generated discontent among officials, caused political [stalemate] paralysis
and fuelled suspicions Xi is using the campaign as a pretext to purge his political enemies. In his recent
speech, Xi denied those charges and vowed to “step up” the anti-corruption drive, according to Xinhua, China’s official news and propaganda
agency. “We must make it clear that our party’s fight against corruption is not a snobbish affair that discriminates between different people,
and it is not a House of Cards power struggle,” Xi said. Andrew Wedeman, a political scientist who is writing a book called Swatting Flies and
Hunting Tigers: Xi Jinping’s War on Corruption, said continuing
to pursue the campaign carried severe risks for China’s
leader. “There is a certain point where the elite would want to wind this down because at the end of the
day – as perhaps suggested by the revelations in the Panama Papers – there is enough guilt to go around among the
leadership that if you really push this thing too far then an awful lot of people would be in trouble.
“Given the extent of corruption, you can only push this thing so far without doing serious damage to
the integrity and the unity of the party,” Wedeman added.
CCP collapse causes regional instability and nuclear war
Yee and Storey 13 Herbert - Professor of Politics and International Relations at the Hong Kong Baptist
University. Ian - Lecturer in Defence Studies at Deakin University, Geelong, Australia. The China Threat:
Perceptions, Myths, and Reality 2013 p. 15
The fourth factor contributing to the perception of a China threat is the fear of political and economic
collapse in the PRC, resulting in territorial fragmentation, civil war and waves of refugees pouring into
neighbouring countries. Naturally, any or all of these scenarios would have a profoundly negative
impact on regional stability. Today the Chinese leadership faces a raft of internal problems, including the
increasing political demands of its citizens, a growing population, a shortage of natural resources and a
deterioration in the natural environment caused by rapid industrialisation and pollution. These
problems are putting a strain on the central government’s ability to govern effectively. Political
disintegration or a Chinese civil war might result in millions of Chinese refugees seeking asylum in
neighbouring countries. Such an unprecedented exodus of refugees from a collapsed PRC would no
doubt put a severe strain on the limited resources of China’s neighbours. A fragmented China could also
result in another nightmare scenario—nuclear weapons falling into the hands of irresponsible local
provincial leaders or warlords.12 From this perspective, a disintegrating China would also pose a threat
to its neighbours and the world.
CP
The United States Federal Government should increase funding for renewables by four
times its current amount.
CP is the only way to solve warming the NB is Xi and TPP
Avoids the link because the CP does not engage with China
Singer, 5-13-2016. (Dr. Stephan Singer is WWF International’s director for global energy policy. "100%
Renewable energy must be key point for future climate talks," WWF Accessed 7/23/16. http://climateenergy.blogs.panda.org/2016/05/13/100-renewable-energy-must-key-feature-future-climatediscussions-starting-bonn/ --DDI CT)
Climate negotiators will have to give substance to important elements of the new global deal on climate
change if they want to deliver on their promise to try to keep warming under 1.5° Celsius above preindustrial temperatures. A meeting next week in Bonn, Germany is the first opportunity for governments to add content to key
elements of the climate agreement since its adoption in Paris last year. This meeting is where governments must demonstrate
they will deliver on the promises made in Paris. But the real proof of political will only be evident when
we see how countries act to mobilise resources to cut carbon pollution. There is no time left for
countries, companies and funders to delay embarking on a just transition to stay within planetary
survival boundaries, to limit irreversible and disastrous climate damages to 1.50 Celsius global warming. The
zero carbon requirement for the energy sector The key sector to address immediately and everywhere is energy
supply from fossil fuels, which are responsible for about two thirds of global warming pollution. Science
tells us that in order to stay well below 2 degrees Celsius global warming – and even not violate the 1.50
Celsius threshold commitment in the Paris Agreement (PA) – we must reduce global emissions 80 per
cent by 2050, and the foundation for that is zero emissions from the energy sector. The global carbon budget,
the allowable cumulative greenhouse gas emissions to the atmosphere, from now on to meet the temperature objective, does not permit any
deviation from that. Together with
seriously enhanced efforts of energy efficiency and conservation, a global
move to 100 per cent renewables within the next few decades is the crucial part of this global
decarbonisation. Based on financial analysis, to embark on this pathway requires a four-fold increase in
annual renewable energy investments in the next 15 to 20 years. Similar investment growth is needed with
energy efficiency. During the same period, investments into fossil fuels and nuclear need to decline by
more than 50 per cent from present (about $US 1 trillion annually), which currently represents about twice as much as financing renewables
and energy efficiency combined. But is that likely to happen under the PA? Depending on who you listen to, the
PA had been dubbed
one of the greatest breakthroughs and successes of global diplomacy amidst a planetary crisis. But it is
also an inconsistent deal that cements a pathway to a climate future that violates the survival needs of
fragile ecosystems and poor communities. But let’s be clear, this deal is a floor – the new business as usual. It
is not a ceiling. Without this floor, the world will be a more disastrous place. If the commitments are
implemented, they will violate the 2 degrees Celsius objective. Yet they will also avoid a much worse run-away climate
change of 3 degrees and higher by the end of this century. Together with the many activities and announcements by a
plethora of regional, national and international governmental and non-governmental stakeholders under
the Lima Paris Action Agenda (LPAA), the overall ‘Paris package’ has the potential – no guarantee – to boost
climate actions worldwide everywhere and overshoot the agreed conservative climate pledges by
nations. We are certainly not there yet, but as an analyst said: “It all depends what we make out of it in
reality”. The PA, the growing climate movement driven by civil society organisations, trade unions and clean businesses alike, the declining
faith in fossil fuels and in conjunction with the agreed Sustainable Development Goals by the UN in September, all inspires actions. But
to be clear, it does not legislate them; it encourages and shows further policies and measures, it does
not regulate or finance those. We’re currently observing the highest CO2 concentration in the
atmosphere for probably more than 10 million years. The impacts of the climate change-induced El Nino
have triggered global temperatures in 2015 to a record high of 10 Celsius warmer than in 1900, when
mankind started to reliably record global temperatures. One degree does not sound like much. But as a global average,
this is enormous and happening probably twenty to fifty times faster than observed under natural climate
changes in the geological past. The impacts are visible too. In South Africa, more than 30 million people
are now likely to suffer from food shortages. In Indonesia, El Nino caused forest fires to emit about half of the
annual CO2 emissions of the entire EU – but in just two months, September and October 2015. Coral bleaching and enhanced
mortality is now a sad wide-spread phenomenon observed across the Equatorial waters of the Indian
and the Pacific Ocean between Africa, South East Asia, Australia and South America. To limit global warming to no more
than 1.50 Celsius– and we have even not reached this temperature limit – is without doubt a Herculean
task. But there is no alternative. The world has to reduce CO2 pollution, primarily because this is by far the most
important and longest-lasting climate gas in the atmosphere. Up to 40 per cent of CO2, once in the atmosphere, will remain there for 1 000
years and longer. The
job of all is to fully decarbonise the entire energy sector, the main emitter of CO2 –
emitting sectors and gases have to be cleaned up drastically as well –
but all is nothing without a full move to 100 per cent renewables and shifting the trillions away from
investments into and subsidies for fossil fuels and nuclear. The PA provides one fundamentally
important base to do so. Although clean new renewables, mainly wind and solar, have exponentially grown in
last decade – from literally zero by 2004 to now more than 6 per cent of all global power, this is still very
low in terms of overall energy sector supply. Their growth contributed significantly to stalling global CO2
pollution from the energy sector in last two years – but did not lead to a CO2 decline. The carbon budget for not violating the
1.5 and well below2 degree objective gives the world less than 20 years of present emissions – so there are no alternatives to rapid
and significant cuts in fossil fuel use. To grow renewables to 100 per cent, we need to do a few things
primarily and immediately, well before 2020: First is to accept that all renewables have a place in the future
sustainable economy. Not all renewables are as clean as wind and solar, but we need the other ones as
well and to make them more sustainable, such as bioenergy and hydropower. Second, we cannot rely just
on markets to get renewables in the system. Not only do we need to stop new coal use, but we also
need to start phasing out existing coal plants and avoid a new lock-in into “low-carbon” fossil gas. Third,
we need to speed up alternatives to oil use, particularly in the transport and heating sector, such as renewably-based
electrification. Fourth, governments need to regulate, legislate, incentivise the massive shift to
investment into renewables and foremost significantly increase support poor countries for their
“Energiewende”. Fifth, policy regulation needs to include significant enhancement of energy efficiency and
conservation across all consumption sectors and products. It is almost impossible to reach a fully
renewable-based energy and industry system in case the world does not harvest the many and mostly
cost-effective options and technologies already available on the market. Lastly, the narrative and advocacy on the
move to 100 per cent renewables needs to include the many non-climate benefits of doing so. Avoiding
deadly air pollution and health damages as well as erratic fuel import prices, reduced manufacturing
costs, enhancing water conservation and providing many more jobs than fossil fuels or nuclear are all
additional drivers for many countries to invest in renewables. And all has to happen in record speed if
we want to limit irreversible climate damages. Let’s all work together to make this happen. The PA provides one
before 2050, preferably. Of course, other
excellent platform, but again it is not a silver bullet, nor is there any excuse to delegate action to the UN
system alone. Actions have to happen everywhere by everyone.
1NC – Climate Advantage
1. no impact - BioD resilient
Kareiva et al, 12 (Peter, Chief Scientist and Vice President, The Nature Conservancy Michelle Marvier
– professor and department chair of Environment Studies and Sciences at Santa Clara University, and
Robert Lalasz – director of science communications for The Nature Conservancy, Winter, “Conservation
in the Anthropocene,” Winter 2012, http://thebreakthrough.org/index.php/journal/past-issues/issue2/conservation-in-the-anthropocene/, accessed 2-1-13 /Buchholz, DDI)
As conservation became a global enterprise in the 1970s and 1980s, the movement's justification for saving nature shifted from spiritual and
aesthetic values to focus on biodiversity. Nature was described as primeval, fragile, and at risk of collapse from too much human use and abuse.
And indeed, there
are consequences when humans convert landscapes for mining, logging, intensive agriculture,
and urban development and when key species or ecosystems are lost. But ecologists and conservationists have
grossly overstated the fragility of nature, frequently arguing that once an ecosystem is altered, it is gone forever. Some
ecologists suggest that if a single species is lost, a whole ecosystem will be in danger of collapse, and that if too much
biodiversity is lost, spaceship Earth will start to come apart. Everything, from the expansion of agriculture
to rainforest destruction to changing waterways, has been painted as a threat to the delicate inner-workings of
our planetary ecosystem. The fragility trope dates back, at least, to Rachel Carson, who wrote plaintively in Silent Spring of the
delicate web of life and warned that perturbing the intricate balance of nature could have disastrous consequences.22 Al Gore made a similar
argument in his 1992 book, Earth in the Balance.23 And the 2005 Millennium Ecosystem Assessment warned darkly that, while the expansion of
agriculture and other forms of development have been overwhelmingly positive for the world's poor, ecosystem degradation was
simultaneously putting systems in jeopardy of collapse.24 The trouble for conservation is that the data simply do not support the idea of a
fragile nature at risk of collapse. Ecologists
now know that the disappearance of one species does not necessarily
lead to the extinction of any others, much less all others in the same ecosystem. In many circumstances, the demise
of formerly abundant species can be inconsequential to ecosystem function. The American chestnut, once a dominant tree in eastern
North America, has been extinguished by a foreign disease, yet the forest ecosystem is surprisingly
unaffected. The passenger pigeon, once so abundant that its flocks darkened the sky, went extinct, along with
countless other species from the Steller's sea cow to the dodo, with no catastrophic or even measurable
effects. These stories of resilience are not isolated examples -- a thorough review of the scientific literature identified 240 studies of
ecosystems following major disturbances such as deforestation, mining, oil spills, and other types of pollution. The abundance of plant
and animal species as well as other measures of ecosystem function recovered, at least partially, in 173 (72 percent) of these
studies.25 While global forest cover is continuing to decline, it is rising in the Northern Hemisphere, where
"nature" is returning to former agricultural lands.26 Something similar is likely to occur in the Southern Hemisphere, after poor countries
achieve a similar level of economic development. A 2010 report concluded that rainforests
that have grown back over
abandoned agricultural land had 40 to 70 percent of the species of the original forests.27 Even Indonesian
orangutans, which were widely thought to be able to survive only in pristine forests, have been found in surprising numbers in oil palm
plantations and degraded lands.28 Nature
is so resilient that it can recover rapidly from even the most powerful
human disturbances. Around the Chernobyl nuclear facility, which melted down in 1986, wildlife is thriving, despite
the high levels of radiation.29 In the Bikini Atoll, the site of multiple nuclear bomb tests, including the 1954
hydrogen bomb test that boiled the water in the area, the number of coral species has actually increased relative to
before the explosions.30 More recently, the massive 2010 oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico was degraded and consumed by bacteria at a
remarkably fast rate.31 Today, coyotes roam downtown Chicago, and peregrine falcons astonish San Franciscans as they sweep down
skyscraper canyons to pick off pigeons for their next meal. As we destroy habitats, we create new ones: in the southwestern
United States a rare and federally listed salamander species seems specialized to live in cattle tanks -- to date, it has been found in no other
habitat.32 Books have been written about the collapse of cod in the Georges Bank, yet recent trawl data show the biomass of cod has
recovered to precollapse levels.33 It's doubtful that books will be written about this cod recovery since it does not play well to an audience
somehow addicted to stories of collapse and environmental apocalypse. Even
that classic symbol of fragility -- the polar
bear, seemingly stranded on a melting ice block -- may have a good chance of surviving global warming if the changing
environment continues to increase the populations and northern ranges of harbor seals and harp seals. Polar bears
evolved from brown bears 200,000 years ago during a cooling period in Earth's history, developing a highly specialized carnivorous diet focused
on seals. Thus, the fate of polar bears depends on two opposing trends -- the decline of sea ice and the potential increase of energy-rich prey.
The history of life on Earth is of species evolving to take advantage of new environments only to be at
risk when the environment changes again. The wilderness ideal presupposes that there are parts of the world untouched by
humankind, but today it is impossible to find a place on Earth that is unmarked by human activity. The truth is humans have been impacting
their natural environment for centuries. The wilderness so beloved by conservationists -- places "untrammeled by man"34 -- never existed, at
least not in the last thousand years, and arguably even longer.
2. No mitigation spillover – adaptation better
Lilico, Economist with Europe Economics, a London-based private economics consulting firm, 2014
[Andrew, The Telegraph, “We have failed to prevent global warming, so now we must adapt to it,”
February 17, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/economics/10644867/We-have-failed-to-preventglobal-warming-so-we-must-adapt-to-it.html
There are many interesting questions one can raise about how climate scientists and economists model both climate change and the human contribution to it. But
I’m not going to discuss any of those here. I’m going to take as a given that global
warming does exist and has many accepted, worrying effects – and
try to argue that we should not be attempting to prevent it, but instead be looking to adapt to it. It is interesting to
enquire initially just whose job is it to tell us how to respond if we believe climate change is happening and materially human-induced. When various clever nonscientists raise concerns about climate change models they are waved away by specialists in the area, told that these are proper scientific questions for proper
scientists. Yet all too often scientists fail to apply the same rules to themselves. The issue over whether there is global warming and what the human contribution to
it might be is – at least to a material extent – a scientific question. But whether we should do anything about it and, if so, which of the available technical options is
best to adopt, is emphatically not a question for scientists. Instead, it is a question for economists, which then puts you very much in my world. For any ongoing
event, there are at least five kinds of potential policy responses: ignore, accelerate, prevent, reverse or adapt. Assuming we do not wish to accelerate or ignore
global warming, the three relevant options are reversal, prevention (called “mitigation” in the climate change jargon) or adaptation. For 25 years the main approach
politicians have discussed has been prevention. Margaret Thatcher led the way, with her November 1989 speech to the UN General Assembly. Later we had Kyoto
and Al Gore and the Stern Review and David Cameron with the huskies, and now Philip Hammond and Ed Miliband arguing about who sees climate change as the
greater “national security threat”. In the late 1980s and early 1990s it seemed plausible that prevention (or even reversal) was a genuine option. We had great
successes with limiting sulphur emissions causing acid rain, chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) destroying the ozone layer and (earlier) smoke that had caused the famous
fogs of London. Yet the
past 25 years have taught us that our scope, capacity and will to prevent climate change by
limiting CO2 emissions is much less than was the case for these other pollutants. These decades of devising fabulously
expensive mitigation schemes are hoped, at best, to take a few tenths of a degree centigrade off global warming during the 21st century, compared with a likely rise
of two to four degrees. The low-end estimates of the cost of such futility is put at 1pc to 3pc of GDP, with some models suggesting the actual cost is much higher.
Those of a scientific bent respond by saying we must enormously increase our efforts, doing far more to prevent warming proceeding. But the Chinese and Indians
and Americans will never agree, and in economically depressed Britain the public appetite for even the sacrifices we make at present has all but evaporated, let
alone asking for more. Even
if prevention were feasible, standard policy analysis suggests it would be a terrible
idea. Already, according to UK government criteria, it is rare to find a global warming mitigation policy that comes anywhere near having benefits that match
costs. For example, the renewable energy strategy was found to have a 20-year cost of £57bn to £70bn but benefits of only £4bn to £5bn. This problem is so
endemic that a few years ago the guidance for ministerial sign-off of policy impact assessments had to be changed so that ministers no longer declare that they are
satisfied that benefits exceed costs. Nowadays they sign to say they merely believe that benefits “justify” costs. Even those few assessments that did find positive
net benefits, such as the 2008 UK Climate Change Act, assumed international agreement that has never come through. Given this, it is preposterous to suggest that
the UK’s doing 10 or 50 times as much to prevent global warming could possibly be a good policy, even if it could work. The
economics of trying to
prevent global warming has simply never added up. Before the notorious Stern Review of 2006, economists studying the area typically
thought adaptation to climate change should be the central focus of policy. What would “adaptation” mean in practice? The
first principle is this: it’s easier to adapt to change if you’re richer. Green policies that force us to use overly expensive energy or that make us spend inefficiently
large amounts of resources on insulation or that tax our travel in ways that make us do less business will damage growth, and make adapting to climate change
harder. In 2012 the UK government received £44.5bn from environmental taxes (mainly fuel duties), equivalent to 2.9pc of gross domestic product, while the
Government estimates green policies will raise typical medium-sized business bills by 39pc by 2030. Conversely, the more successful policy is in inducing GDP and
wage growth, the more inclined folk will be to act in environmentally favourable ways. The next principle is: do not waste resources on futile mitigation efforts while
cutting resources on adaptation. If government budgets are tight and you must choose between subsidies for green energy and money for flood defences, that
should be a no-brainer. There are many ways we may need to adapt to a warmer world with potentially more violent extremes of weather. That may change the
ways our houses are roofed and our river banks are buttressed, the clothes we wear, the ointments we put on our children. Adaptation
will not be
easy or cheap. But it will be feasible (unlike preventing climate change) and it will be much, much cheaper. Furthermore, adaptation is
much less risky than mitigation in two important ways. First, there is obviously some chance that climate
change will not turn out as expected. In the past decade or so climate scientists have been struggling to explain the fact that global surface
temperatures have not risen since the late 1990s. They insist that makes no difference to their long-term story about whether the Earth is warming and what the
eventual impacts may be. And perhaps that’s right. But it does make a difference to policymaking. If we had known in 1998 that even if we had tried nothing more
to prevent climate change there would be no warming for two decades, that ought to have changed very markedly the policy assessment. Almost no policy that
would have no impact within five years is ever a good idea, because of the ways the future is discounted. The
second way adaptation is less
risky is that we know relatively little about the effects of mitigation strategies and they may not work as
expected or might even have perverse long-term effects. By adapting as and when we need to, we cut
down on the risks of doing something counterproductive by accident or of simply wasting our time and money. The last
advantage of adaptation is that as we become richer our tastes and technology will change automatically. It is perfectly possible that we shall naturally find ways to
change our behaviour that stop climate change in its tracks, or alternatively we may devise some clever way of cleaning up after our grandparents. We’ve spent 25
years trying to prevent global warming, and have barely scratched the surface. In doing so we have spent untold billions and plan to spend countless more. One
does not need to doubt that climate change is happening to doubt that this is the strategy we should stick to. Prevention is dead. Long live adaptation.
3. Alt Cause Aviation contrails contribute to warming more than CO2 emissions
Webster. 7-2016
(Ben Webster. Staff Writer for the London Times. June 23, 2014. “Take longer flights to cut global warming”. The London
Times. Lexis Nexis. Date Accessed July 22. 2016. DDI-AC)
Contrails disperse into wispy clouds which trap heat in the atmosphere, a study showed. These clouds, which can be 100 miles
long, could contribute more to global warming than the carbon dioxide in the fuel burnt by the aircraft
which formed them. Contrails form only in regions of the sky where the air is very cold and moist, which is often in the ascending air around highpressure systems. On average, 7 per cent of the total distance flown by aircraft is in such areas. Researchers from the
University of Reading found that aircraft would have less impact on the climate if they flew up to 1,000 extra miles to avoid these regions. The contrails formed on
the shorter route would cause more warming than emissions from the extra fuel burnt on the longer route. A short-haul aircraft such as a Boeing 737 could fly up to
10 times the length of the contrail it would have formed and still cause less environmental damage, even though it would have burnt more fuel. Larger aircraft such
as the Boeing 747, which emit more CO2 than smaller aircraft for each mile flown, could reduce their warming contribution by flying up to three times the distance
of the contrail they would have formed. Dr Emma Irvine, one of the authors of the study published in Environmental Research Letters, said: "Burning
less
fuel and cutting greenhouse gases ... is a good strategy for limiting aviation's climate impact . But it could be
better for aircraft to stay in the air longer, if it means slightly altering their flight paths to avoid forming contrails. "Airlines already take weather forecasts into
account to avoid bad weather when planning flight paths. Forecasters can predict where contrails are likely to form, so airlines could use this to attempt to avoid
creating contrails and ... make the impact of aviation greener. "Air traffic control agencies would need to consider whether such flightby-flight re-routing is feasible
and safe." Dr Irvine said it was difficult to compare the climate impacts of contrails and CO2 because the former can last hours while the latter can last decades. She
said that governments needed to consider the impacts of aviation when setting green targets because a measure designed to reduce fuel use could be
counterproductive for some flights. "Current
mitigation targets do not yet address the non-CO2 climate impacts
of aviation, such as contrails, which may cause an impact as large, or larger, than aviation CO2 emissions."
4. ALT Cause Methane: Cows are a major contributor to warming
McTAGUE. 2014
(Tom McTAGUE. Chief UK Political Correspondent. April 2014. “Beanz meanz not greenz; Climate change
fears over 'smelly emissions'”. Daily Mirror. Lexis Nexis. Date Accessed July 23, 2016. DDI – AC0
Concerns have previously been voiced about the effect of methane coming from cow flatulance
But Climate Change
Minister Lady Verma yesterday urged the public to "moderate" their behaviour after Labour peer Viscount Simon raised questions in the House
of Lords about the impact of human eating habits. Viscount Simon, 73, said: "A programme on the BBC stated this country has the largest
production of baked beans and the largest consumption of baked beans in the world. "Could you say whether this affects the calculation of
global warming by the Government as a result of the smelly emission?" Lady Verma replied that people needed to think twice about
overindulging in beans. She added: "You raise a very important point, we
do need to moderate our behaviour." A study last
December suggested nearly £340million of baked beans were sold in the UK in 2012. Carbon dioxide from fossil fuels is the
primary gas causing global warming but methane has an effect more than 20 times greater. Animals
such as cows produce a sixth of all methane. America's 88 million cattle produce more methane than
landfill sites, natural gas leaks or fracking
5. . 4 Degree warming is inevitable even with any emissions reductions
Davenport, energy and environment policy reporter for NYT, 2014 (Coral, “Optimism Faces Grave
Realities at Climate Talks”, New York Times, 30 November,
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/01/world/climate-talks.html
But while scientists
and climate-policy experts welcome the new momentum ahead of the Lima talks, they warn that it now may
be impossible to prevent the temperature of the planet’s atmosphere from rising by 3.6 degrees
Fahrenheit. According to a large body of scientific research, that is the tipping point at which the world will be locked into a near-term future of
drought, food and water shortages, melting ice sheets, shrinking glaciers, rising sea levels and widespread flooding — events that could harm the world’s population
and economy.
Recent reports show that there may be no way to prevent the planet’s temperature from
rising, given the current level of greenhouse gases already in the atmosphere and the projected rate of
emissions expected to continue before any new deal is carried out. That fact is driving the urgency of the Lima talks, which
are expected to produce a draft document, to be made final over the next year and signed by world leaders in Paris in December 2015. While a breach of
the 3.6 degree threshold appears inevitable, scientists say that United Nations negotiators should not give up on their efforts to cut
emissions. At stake now, they say, is the difference between a newly unpleasant world and an uninhabitable one. “I was encouraged by the U.S.-China agreement,”
said Michael Oppenheimer, a professor of geosciences and international affairs at Princeton University and a member of the United Nations Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change, a global body of scientists that produces regular reports on the state of climate science. But he expressed doubts that the threshold rise in
global temperature could be prevented. “What’s already baked in are substantial changes to ecosystems, large-scale transformations,” Mr. Oppenheimer said. He
cited losses of coral reef systems and ice sheets, and lowering crop yields. Still, absent a deal, “Things could get a lot worse,” Mr. Oppenheimer added. Beyond the
3.6 degree threshold, he said, the aggregate cost “to the global economy — rich countries as well as poor countries — rises rapidly.” The objective now, negotiators
say, is to stave off atmospheric temperature increases of 4 to 10 degrees by the end of the century; at that point, they say, the planet could become increasingly
uninhabitable. Officials at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration are already reporting that 2014 appears likely to be the warmest year on record.
Since 1992, the United Nations has convened an annual climate change summit meeting aimed at forging a deal to curb greenhouse gases, which are produced
chiefly by burning coal for electricity and gasoline for transportation. But previous agreements, such as the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, included no requirements that
developing nations, such as India and China, cut their emissions. And until now, the United States has never headed into those summit meetings with a domestic
climate change policy in place. This spring, a report by 13 federal agencies concluded that climate change would harm the American economy by increasing food
prices, insurance rates and financial volatility. In China, the central government has sought to quell citizen protests related to coal pollution. In June, Mr. Obama
announced a new Environmental Protection Agency rule forcing major emissions cuts from coal-fired power plants. State Department negotiators took the decision
to China, hoping to broker a deal for a similar offer of domestic action. That led to November’s joint announcement in Beijing: The United States will cut its
emissions up to 28 percent by 2025, while China will decrease its emissions by or before 2030. “Our sense is that this will resonate in the broader climate
community, give momentum to the negotiations and spur countries to come forward with their own targets,” said Todd Stern, Mr. Obama’s lead climate change
negotiator. “The two historic antagonists, the biggest players, announcing they’ll work together.” Other negotiators agree. “The prospects are so much better than
they’ve ever been,” said Felipe Calderón, the former president of Mexico and chairman of the Global Commission on the Economy and Climate, a research
organization. The aim of negotiators in Lima is, for the first time, to produce an agreement in which every nation commits to a domestic plan to
reduce
greenhouse gas emissions, along the model of the United States-China agreement. Negotiators expect that by next March, governments will make
announcements similar to those made by the United States and China. The idea is for each country to cut emissions at a level that it can realistically achieve, but in
keeping with domestic political and economic constraints. World leaders would sign a deal in Paris next year committing all those nations to their cuts, including a
provision that the nations regularly reconvene to further reduce their emissions. The problem is that climate experts say it almost
certainly will not
happen fast enough. A November report by the United Nations Environment Program concluded that in order to avoid the 3.6 degree increase, global
emissions must peak within the next 10 years, going down to half of current levels by midcentury. But the deal being drafted in Lima will not even be enacted until
2020. And the structure of the emerging deal — allowing each country to commit to what it can realistically achieve, given each nation’s domestic politics — means
that the initial cuts
by countries will not be as stringent as what scientists say is required. China’s plan calls for its
in India, the world’s third-largest carbon polluter, have said they do
not expect to see their emissions decline until at least 2040. While Mr. Obama has committed to United Nations emissions cuts
emissions to peak in 2030. Government officials
through 2025, there is no way to know if his successor will continue on that path. That reality is already setting in among low-lying island nations, like the Marshall
Islands, where rising seas are soaking coastal soil, killing crops and contaminating fresh water supplies. “The groundwater that supports our food crops is becoming
inundated with salt,” said Tony A. deBrum, foreign minister of the Marshall Islands. “The green is becoming brown.” Many island nations are looking into buying
farmland in other countries to grow food and, eventually, to relocate their populations. In Lima, those countries are expected to demand that a final deal include aid
to help them adapt to the climate impacts that have already arrived.
6. Turn - Claims to solve the climate problem make climate change worse because
don’t change consumption patterns
Batta and Bohm, Sustainability Institute—University of Essex, December 4, 2014
(Aanka and Steffen, “Even climate change experts and activists are in denial about climate change,”
Washington Post, accessed at http://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2014/12/04/evenclimate-change-experts-and-activists-are-in-denial-about-climate-change/
Not a week goes by without the media showing catastrophic
images of environmental damage and social suffering seemingly caused by a
changing climate. Research suggests that such threats lead us to adopt various unconscious coping and defense mechanisms.
Many people try to keep the catastrophe at bay or deny it is happening. Vested interests such as the Koch brothers in the United States and other conservative
forces have cleverly exploited this unconscious response by supporting a small group of scientists, politicians and think tanks to spread the message of climate
skepticism and denial. This stuff works. Climate
denial is undoubtedly on the rise, particularly in those media-saturated markets of North
America, Europe and Australia. The Kochs and others are clearly filling a psychological void. Research also has shown that “people want to protect themselves a
Another popular
coping and defense mechanism is to pretend that we can address this global and urgent problem by
tinkering at the edges of “business as usual.” For example, politicians and business leaders widely believe
that we can achieve a decarbonization of the global economy while maintaining high economic growth.
Social psychologist Matthew Adams says such a response is part of an unconscious coping mechanism that simply
implies that we have pushed the problem onto a distant future. As the geographer Erik Swyngedouw shows, climate change
little bit,” particularly in times of crisis and uncertainty. If climate change simply isn’t happening, there’s nothing to worry about.
politics could in fact be seen as a “post-political” phenomenon where apocalyptic images of environmental destruction and human suffering are used to justify swift
action without allowing any real political and economic choices. For example, while on one day the U.K. government is acknowledging that climate change is having
stark impacts on developing countries by pledging 720 million pounds (about $1.1 billion) to poor countries, another day of the political calendar is dominated by
rhetoric that emphasizes economic growth and even the expansion of the oil and gas industry in the United Kingdom. Urgent
action on climate
change is thus to be implemented within a business-as-usual framework of high growth and high
consumption, despite growing evidence that such growth doesn’t make us happier and that it is very likely to deliver
increasing carbon emissions for years and decades to come. In psychosocial theory, these defense mechanisms also are referred
to as “splitting.” Consciously we might be talking about the impending sustainability crisis, but unconsciously
we find ways to maintain the status quo. This is also true for those climate experts who fly around the world, going from one global climate
change summit to the next. The very carbon emissions associated with their work can be seen as part of a denial strategy. In fact, one could argue that those who
are very close to the reality of climate change are particularly prone to a need to split their identity. The knowledge they have, and the images they have seen,
might unconsciously lead them to the above-mentioned counter-balancing and coping behaviors. Not a good omen for the latest round of climate talks in Peru.
1NC - Solvency
1. The aff is non-inherent - The Holbrooke ev from 2009 says that an agreement
between the US and China is needed to solve warming, like the Paris agreement –
which meets Holbrooke’s requirements
1NC – Framing
1. Low risk is still a risk—evaluating magnitude doesn’t rig the game
Sunstein 7 (Cass R. Felix Frankfurter Professor of Law at Harvard Law School. Clerked for Justice Thurgood Marshall of the U.S. Supreme
Court; "Worst-Case Scenarios" Harvard University Press 2007 pg.138-9) //MG
A Catastrophic Harm Precautionary Principle, of the modest kind just sketched, raises several questions. The most
obvious is whether a low-probability risk of catastrophe might not deserve more attention than higher-probability risks, even when the
expected value appears to be equal. The reason is that the loss of 200 million people may be more than 1,000 times worse than the loss of
2,000 people. Pause over the
real-world meaning of a loss of 200 million people in the United States. The
nation would find it extremely hard to recover. Private and public institutions would be damaged for a
long time, perhaps forever. What kind of government would emerge? What would its economy look like? Future generations would
inevitably suffer. The effect of a catastrophe greatly outruns a simple multiplication of a certain number of
lives lost. The overall "cost" of losing two-thirds of the American population is far more than 100,000
times the cost of losing 2,000 people. The same point holds when the numbers are smaller. Following
the collapse of a dam that left 120 people dead and 4,000 homeless in Buffalo Creek, Virginia, psychiatric
researchers continued to find significant psychological and sociological changes two years after the disaster occurred. Survivors still
suffered a loss of direction and energy, along with other disabling character changes.41 One evaluator
attributed this "Buffalo Creek Syndrome" specifically to "the loss of traditional bonds of kinship and neighborliness."42 Genuine
catastrophes, involving tens of thousands or millions of deaths, would magnify that loss to an
unimaginable degree. A detailed literature on the "social amplification of risk" explores the secondary social losses that greatly outrun
the initial effects of given events.43 The harm done by the attacks of 9/11, for instance, far exceeded the deaths
on that day, horrendous as those were. One telling example: Many people switched, in the aftermath of the attack, to driving
long distances rather than flying, and the switch produced almost as many highway deaths as the attacks themselves, simply because driving is
more dangerous than flying.44 The attacks had
huge effects on other behaviors of individuals, businesses, and
governments, resulting in costs of hundreds of billions of dollars, along with continuing fear, anxiety,
and many thousands of additional deaths from the Afghanistan and Iraq wars. We might therefore identify a
second version of the Catastrophic Harm Precautionary Principle, also attuned to expected value but emphasizing some features of catastrophic
risk that might otherwise be neglected:
Regulators should consider the expected value of catastrophic risks, even
when the worst-case scenario is highly unlikely. In assessing expected value, regulators should consider
the distinctive features of catastrophic harm, including the "social amplification” of such harm.
Regulators should choose cost-effective measures to reduce those risks and should attempt to compare the expected
value of the risk with the expected value of precautionary measures.
2. The Guth 7 ev
a. Non-unique – we needed Guth’s point back in 2007 – the impacts of costbenefit analysis exist within the squo and aren’t solved by the aff
b. We also work to prevent climate damage – the use of nuclear weapons would
destroy some of the largest carbon sinks in the world and after nuclear war,
climate change would be put on the backburner
3. They say that war’s not an impact, but
A. Their ev is talking about how global institutions check aggression by countries
in terms of expansion in the squo – doesn’t account for shifts in the current
situation like our DAs – prefer our specific internal link scenarios
B. The effects of nuclear winter are immediate and devastating – the threat is very
real and to treat it otherwise is to endanger the global population – prefer
Robock and Toon who directly study the effects of nuclear winter on climate
change
Robock and Toon, 2012. (Adam Robock is a distinguished professor in the Department of
Environmental Sciences, and the associate director of the Center for Environmental Prediction, at
Rutgers University. Previously, he was a faculty member of the Department of Meteorology at the
University of Maryland and the state climatologist of Maryland. He researches the climatic effects of
nuclear weapons, the effects of volcanic eruptions on climate, geoengineering, and soil moisture. Owen
Brian Toon is a professor in the Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences, and a research
associate at the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics, at the University of Colorado, Boulder.
He leads a research group that studies aerosols and cloud physics, and investigates climate and
atmospheric chemistry on Earth and other planetary bodies. “Self-assured destruction: The climate
impacts of nuclear war.” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. Accessed 7/20/16.
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1177/0096340212459127 --DDI CT)
While the United States and Russia possess the bulk of the global nuclear arsenal, as of 2010 France had
300 nuclear weapons, the United Kingdom had 225, China had 180, Pakistan had between 70 and 90,
Israel and India each had between 60 and 80, and North Korea was thought to have fewer than 10
nuclear weapons (Norris and Kristensen, 2010). By 2012, Robock and Toon 67 Downloaded by
[Dartmouth College Library] at 17:06 20 July 2016 the arsenals of India and Pakistan had grown by an
estimated 20 weapons each (Kristensen and Norris, 2011, 2012). Studies of the effects of nuclear
weapons began soon after their invention. These studies were largely based on the military view that
damage to specified targets had to be assured to maintain a deterrent. Hence, only the most certain and
quantifiable effectsÑsuch as blast and prompt radiationÑwere considered. Nuclear winter That changed
in 1982, when the journal of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, Ambio, published a
groundbreaking article (Crutzen and Birks, 1982) that identified the issue of smoke generated by
nuclear-ignited forest fires as a global concern, following earlier suggestions by a graduate student in
political science that the burning of forests and grasslands could cause changes in continental weather
(Lewis, 1979). We and our colleagues then discovered that smoke from urban fires posed an even
greater global hazard in the form of climate anomalies, defined as a Ònuclear winter,Ó capable of
causing the worldwide collapse of agriculture (Aleksandrov and Stenchikov, 1983; Robock, 1984; Turco
et al., 1983). A nuclear war would also threaten much of the worldÕs population by causing societal
chaos and the loss of transportation and energy production. Modern climate models not only show that
the nuclear winter theory is correct, but also that the effects would last for more than a decade (Robock
et al., 2007a, 2007b) because of an unexpected phenomenon: Smoke would rise to very high
altitudesÑnear 40 kilometers (25 miles)Ñwhere it would be protected from rain and would take more
than a decade to clear completely. As a consequence, the smokeÕs climate impacts would be more
extreme than once thought. For example, the new models show that a full-scale nuclear conflict, in
which 150 million tons of smoke are lofted into the upper atmosphere, would drastically reduce
precipitation by 45 percent on a global average, while temperatures would fall for several years by 7 to 8
degrees Celsius on average and would remain depressed by 4 degrees Celsius after a decade (Robock et
al., 2007a). Humans have not experienced temperatures this low since the last ice age (Figure 2). In
important grain-growing regions of the northern mid-latitudes, precipitation would decline by up to 90
percent, and temperatures would fall below freezing and remain there for one or more years.
4. Nuclear war carries severe consequences – even if we survived nuclear winter the
atmosphere would be kept heated at 50 C for several years
Robock and Toon, 2012. (Adam Robock is a distinguished professor in the Department of
Environmental Sciences, and the associate director of the Center for Environmental Prediction, at
Rutgers University. Previously, he was a faculty member of the Department of Meteorology at the
University of Maryland and the state climatologist of Maryland. He researches the climatic effects of
nuclear weapons, the effects of volcanic eruptions on climate, geoengineering, and soil moisture. Owen
Brian Toon is a professor in the Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences, and a research
associate at the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics, at the University of Colorado, Boulder.
He leads a research group that studies aerosols and cloud physics, and investigates climate and
atmospheric chemistry on Earth and other planetary bodies. “Self-assured destruction: The climate
impacts of nuclear war.” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. Accessed 7/20/16.
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1177/0096340212459127 --DDI CT)
For example, consider a nuclear war in South Asia involving the use of 100 Hiroshima-size weapons. In
these simulations, more than five million tons of smoke is lofted to high altitude, where it absorbs
sunlight before the light can reach the lower atmosphere (Toon et al., 2007b). As a result, surface
temperatures fall and precipitation declines (Robock et al., 2007b). The calculated results show a 10
percent global drop in precipitation, with the largest losses in the low latitudes due to failure of the
monsoons. Our climate model also shows global average temperatures colder than any experienced on
Earth in the past 1,000 years and growing seasons shortened by two to three weeks in the main
midlatitude agricultural areas of both hemispheres. These effects persist for several years, which would
threaten a significant fraction of the worldÕs food supply, perhaps jeopardizing a billion people who are
now only marginally fed as it is (Helfand, 2012). New simulations of the effects of these climate changes
on crop production predict reductions of soybean and corn production in the US Midwest, and of rice
production in China, of 20 percent for several years and 10 percent even after a decade (O¬zdogùan et
al., 2012; Xia and Robock, 2012). These impacts could be felt even in a warming world. Imagine the
disruption in world food trade with such heavy losses of production. The smoke would also heat the
upper atmosphere by as much as 50 degrees Celsius for several years. As a consequence, ozone levels
over the mid-latitudes of both hemispheres would be reduced to values now found only in the Antarctic
ozone hole (Mills et al., 2008).