U.N. Seeks Supervision Of 'Reordered' World Economy In Copenhagen Accord

Former Czech President and current President of the E.U. Vaclav Klaus shocked reporters last May when he said, I understand that global warming is a religion conceived to suppress human freedom. It is used to justify an enormous scope for government intervention vis-a-vis the markets and personal freedom. These stunning and revelatory words carry the weight of someone whose people experienced firsthand the disgraceful betrayal of Czechkoslovakia in the Munich Accords of 1938. Under the regime of appeasement which was all the fashion of the time, Neville Chamberlain of England and Édouard Daladier of France surrendered 11,000 miles of Czech territory to Adolf Hitler without any participation of the Czech government. Left without the defensible and fortified territory that bordered a menacing Nazi Germany under Adolf Hitler, the remainder of Czechkoslovakia was annexed just a few weeks later without a rebuke from the perpetrators of the outrage in Munich.

Today, March 29th 2009, in Bonn, Germany, the first of three long drawn-out negotiating sessions on Climate Change will begin, culminating in the planned signing of the Copenhagen Accord in December of this year. Fox News broke the story of the Accord when it received a copy of a 16 page Information Note issued by the United Nations to attendees of today's conference.

Fox News reported that the conference on 'climate change' envisions a huge reordering of the world economy, likely involving trillions of dollars in wealth transfer, millions of job losses and gains, new taxes, industrial relocations, new tariffs and subsidies, and complicated payments for greenhouse gas abatement schemes and carbon taxes — all under the supervision of the world body.

The Copenhagen Accord is the ugly big brother to the infamous Kyoto Protocol that was rejected by the Bush Administration. In contrast, the Obama Administration is supportive of the treaty process, provided it can provide an effective framework for global warming.

From Fox News:

The paper makes no effort to calculate the magnitude of the costs and disruption involved, but despite the discreet presentation, makes clear that they will reverberate across the entire global economic system.

Among the tools that are considered are the cap-and-trade system for controlling carbon emissions that has been espoused by the Obama administration; 'carbon taxes' on imported fuels and energy-intensive goods and industries, including airline transportation; and lower subsidies for those same goods, as well as new or higher subsidies for goods that are considered "environmentally sound."

Other tools are referred to only vaguely, including 'energy policy reform,' which the report indicates could affect "large-scale transportation infrastructure such as roads, rail and airports." When it comes to the results of such reform, the note says only that it could have 'positive consequences for alternative transportation providers and producers of alternative fuels.'

A 'climate change levy on aviation' for example, is described as having undetermined 'negative impacts on exporters of goods that rely on air transport, such as cut flowers and premium perishable produce,' as well as 'tourism services.' But no mention is made in the note of the impact on the aerospace industry, an industry that had revenues in 2008 of $208 billion in the U.S. alone, or the losses the levy would impose on airlines for ordinary passenger transportation. (Global commercial airline revenues in 2008 were about $530 billion, and were already forecast to drop to an estimated $467 billion this year.)

In an influential but highly controversial paper called 'Key Elements of a Global Deal on Climate Change,' British economist Nicholas Lord Stern, formerly a high British Treasury official, has declared that industrial economies would need to cut their per capita carbon dioxide emissions by 'at least 80% by 2050,' while the biggest economies, like the U.S.'s, would have to make cuts of 90 percent.

Investor's Business Daily weighs in on the latest convocation for collective madness coming out of turtle bay.

The document speaks of a "climate change levy" on maritime shipping and aviation that is certain to devastate foreign trade and tourism. The American aviation industry had revenues of $208 billion in 2008. Unless we can come up with a hybrid 747 real quick, there's trouble ahead.
There is talk of signatories implementing cap-and-trade policies that the note admits "would involve negative consequences for the implementing country." Such policies "may induce some industrial relocation . . . to less-regulated host countries." Gee, ya think?

The Obama administration supports a domestic cap-and-trade policy and included it in its deficit-creating budget proposal. As we've noted, cap and trade, through its limit on total carbon emissions, is really a cap on economic growth. An analysis by the George C. Marshall Institute estimates GDP losses of as much as 3% in 2015 and as much as 10% in 2050 as a result of this measure

The effect of this accord if we participate is incalculable. According to the Department of Energy, roughly 72% of U.S. electrical power generation in 2007 was derived from burning fossil fuels. Some 6% came from hydropower and less than 3% came from solar, wind and "other" sources.

I can just see the kleptocrats at the U.N. positively licking their chops at the prospect of administering all those American and European generated carbon tarriffs from the evil industrialists. Just look at how efficient and beyond reproach the U.N. was in handling the Oil for Food program. Not to mention how pure as the driven snow are the motives of some of the many cavalcade of activists and politicos who line up regularly to make war on U.S. wealth, influence, and policies. Y'a know, come to think about it, guys who make a living selling carbon credits now will make money hand over fist under this kind of regime.

Back in October 3rd 2007, Human Events cited the Money and Connections behind Al Gore's Carbon Crusade:

To resolve the “climate crisis,” Gore wants to put a cap on the production of greenhouse gases. He calls for an immediate freeze on U.S. emissions, a ban on new coal-fired power plants, tough new fuel-economy and energy-efficiency standards, renewable energy mandates, carbon taxes and mandatory targets and timetables for reducing greenhouse-gas emissions. Those emissions consist mostly of carbon dioxide (CO2), the byproduct of fossil fuels such as oil, coal and natural gas, which supply 85% of all U.S. energy. Gore’s blueprint to save the planet moves the United States towards a command economy in which government regulators hold sway over what kinds and amounts of energy will be made available to the private sector. His principal regulatory tool is what’s called carbon-credit trading.

Gee, that sounds familiar. How did those guys at turtle bay and some prominent U.S. politicians get onboard with the very same talking points?

The article continues:

Al Gore is chairman and founder of a private equity firm called Generation Investment Management (GIM). According to Gore, the London-based firm invests money from institutions and wealthy investors in companies that are going green. “Generation Investment Management, purchases -- but isn’t a provider of -- carbon dioxide offsets,” said spokesman Richard Campbell in a March 7 report by CNSNews.

GIM appears to have considerable influence over the major carbon-credit trading firms that currently exist: the Chicago Climate Exchange (CCX) in the U.S. and the Carbon Neutral Company (CNC) in Great Britain. CCX is the only firm in the U.S. that claims to trade carbon credits.

GIM’s “founding partners” are studded with officials from Goldman Sachs. They include David Blood, former CEO of Goldman Sachs Asset Management (GSAM); Mark Ferguson, former co-head of GSAM pan-European research; and Peter Harris, who headed GSAM international operations. Another founding partner is Peter Knight, who is the designated president of GIM. He was Sen. Al Gore’s chief of staff from 1977-1989 and the campaign manager of the 1996 Clinton-Gore re-election campaign.

Like CCX, the ECX has about 80 member companies, including Barclays, BP, Calyon, Endesa, Fortis, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley and Shell, and ECX has contracted with the European Union to further develop a futures market in carbon trading. What’s in it for the companies? They will benefit either by investing in carbon credits or by receiving subsidies for doing so.

Clearly, GIM is poised to cash in on carbon trading. The membership of CCX is currently voluntary. But if the day ever comes when federal government regulations require greenhouse-gas emitters -- and that’s almost everyone -- to participate in cap-and-trade, then those who have created a market for the exchange of carbon credits are in a position to control the outcomes. And that moves Al Gore front and center. As a politician, Gore is all for transparency. But as GIM chairman, Gore has not been forthcoming, according to Forbes magazine. Little is known about his firm’s finances, where it gets funding and what projects it supports.

We do know that Goldman Sachs has commissioned the World Resources Institute (affiliated with CCX), Resources for the Future, and the Woods Hole Research Center to research policy options for U.S. regulation of greenhouse gases. In 2006, Goldman Sachs provided research grants in this area totaling $2.3 million. The firm also has committed $1 billion to carbon-assets projects, a fancy term for projects that generate energy from sources other than oil and gas. In October 2006, Morgan Stanley committed to invest $3 billion in carbon-assets projects. Citigroup entered the emissions-trading market in May, and Bank of America got in on the action in June.

Predictably, the media ignore glaring conflicts of interest when it involves cap and trade and carbon credit schemes that involve the Global Warming storyline.

A copy of the Copenhagen information note can be accessed here.