Misguided Arguments about Carbon and Climate
October 19, 2017
10/14/17 – As part of its drive to overturn the Obama-era Clean Power Plan, the Environmental Protection Agency recently released significantly lower estimates of the so-called social cost of carbon dioxide, a measure widely used to weigh the value of actions aimed at stopping climate change. Arguments about the numbers ensued. But in Issues, analysts have identified a more fundamental problem—the social cost of carbon dioxide is the wrong guide to follow—and they proposed an alternative method that better reflects what is known about long-term effects of climate change and how these effects should be valued by today’s decision-makers.