Cool it: an essay on climate change - Climate Change: The Facts - page 70

But let us assume that the global temperature hiatus does, at some point, come to an
end, and a modest degree of global warming resumes. How much does this matter?
The answer must be that it matters very little. There are plainly both advantages and
disadvantages from a warmer temperature, and these will vary from region to region
depending to some extent on the existing temperature in the region concerned. And it is
helpfulinthiscontextthattheclimatescientistsbelievethattheglobalwarmingtheyexpect
from increased atmospheric CO 2 will be greatest in the cold polar regions and least in the
warmtropicalregions,andwillbegreateratnightthanintheday,andgreaterinwinterthan
in summer. Be that as it may, studies have clearly shown that, overall, the warming that
the climate models are now predicting for most of this century (I referred to these models
earlier, and will come back to them later) is likely to do more good than harm.
This is particularly true in the case of human health, a rather important dimension of
wellbeing. It is no accident that, if you look at migration for climate reasons in the world
today, it is far easier to find those who choose to move to a warmer climate than those who
choose to move to a colder climate. And it is well documented that excessive cold causes
far more illnesses and deaths around the world than excessive warmth does.
Pressing down on the alarm button
The2013-14IPCCAssessmentReportdoesitsbesttorampupthealarmisminadesperate,
and almost certainly vain, attempt to scare the governments of the world into concluding a
binding global decarbonisation agreement at the crunch UN climate conference due to be
heldinParis,2015.Yetacarefulreadingofthereportshowsthattheevidencetojustifythe
alarm simply isn't there.
On health, for example, it lamely concludes that 'the world-wide burden of human
ill-health from climate change is relatively small compared with effects of other stressors
and is not well quantified' 3 —adding that so far as tropical diseases (which preoccupied
earlier IPCC reports) are concerned, 'Concerns over large increases in vector-borne
diseases such as dengue as a result of rising temperatures are unfounded and unsupported
by the scientific literature.' Moreover, the IPCC conspicuously fails to take proper account
of what is almost certainly far and away the most important dimension of the health issue.
And that is, quite simply, that the biggest health risk in the world today, particularly of
course in the developing world, is poverty.
We use fossil fuels not because we love them, or because we are in thrall to the
multinational oil companies, but simply because they provide far and away the cheapest
source of large-scale energy, and will continue to do so, no doubt not forever, but for the
foreseeable future. And using the cheapest source of energy means achieving the fastest