What if everyone had a personal carbon quota? This idea circles around from time to time, and cropped up most recently in this discussion piece in The Independent.
I know nobody wants to be thinking about COP27 right now, but Afrik21 points out that the next global climate talks will be held in Egypt, a country that is already being seriously affected by the climate crisis. Will that change the dynamic?
Luton Airport’s holding company has rebranded, and great is the eye rolling from local environmentalists.
Katherine Trebeck and I have a chapter on the Economics of Arrival in this new book about the wellbeing economy that’s just been released in the Netherlands: Thrive – Fundamentals for a New Economy, by Kees Klomp and Shinta Oosterval.
For local readers, a couple of events coming up this week in Luton. I’m speaking briefly at the Climate Cafe at St Mary’s Church (6:30 start), and then jogging down the road to talk to Friends of the Earth Luton about climate change and race. 7:30 at the Quaker Meeting House, Crawley Green Road.
Film review: Dear Future Children
We live in an age of activism. Protest is regularly in the news. Despite the handful of activists that have become globally recognised, movements are by nature not about individuals, and personal experiences can get lost in the overall story. Dear Future Children is a new documentary that personalises this age of activism through the…
Why climate change needs all of us
If you’re at all invested in climate negotiations and their outcomes, then you’ll probably have read a handful of COP26 debrief articles already. I’m not planning to repeat their work. Suffice to say that it’s a mix of outcomes – some steps forwards and some glaring omissions. There has been progress. Let’s not throw out…
Book review: We are the weather, by Jonathan Safran Foer
We Are the Weather is an unusual book on several different fronts. It’s a book about climate change that is actually about lots of other things. Or maybe it’s a book about lots of other things – family, grief, responsibility, food – that is actually about the climate. Either way, it’s in a climate book…
The Earthbound Report 
As you say, how could personal carbon quotas be enforced? The extent of bureaucratic intrusion into all our lives would be enormous. Why?
I think a carbon tariff on international trade would be much easier to introduce and enforce. It would ensure that outsourcing and offshoring of carbon outputs would carry a real price, which would encourage the creation of more low carbon production closer to home. The proceeds of the tariffs could be shared between domestic economies and international bodies like the UN, which would assist them in coping with the impact of the negative externalities of carbon and other polluting emissions.
This could replace the principle of carbon trading, which I believe is an utter nonsense, which does nothing to reduce polluting emissions but simply rewards and encourages the continuation and expansion of polluting activities.
With regard to holding the next COP in Egypt: will that coincide with another mass movement of scorpions as a result of heavy rainfall?
It will certainly focus the minds of all delegates if it does.
Re. Luton Airport rebranding, I am sure the consultancy hired for the job has done very well out of it. What real value has been created for the people of Luton is – however – probably much harder to quantify and qualify.
I can imagine the Tuvalu sinking midnight rebranding exercise