Transcripts For CSPAN Economic Costs Of Climate Change 20140

Coming up, next on cspan treasury secretary jack lew talking about the economic effects of Climate Change followed by president obamas recent visit to the u. N. Where he addressed the General Assembly and led a Security Council meeting on foreign terrorist fighters. Good afternoon. On behalf of the hamilton project thank you for joining us this afternoon for a public discussion of the Economic Costs of Climate Change. It is our privilege today to host u. S. Treasury secretary jacob lew who will give remarks on Climate Change and followed by a roundtable discussion between secretary lew and former treasury robert l suching bin and professor of economics at chicago Michael Green stone, before i turn it over to secretary ruben i would like to give a brief introduction to the project, and this is at the brook ings institution is named after Alexander Hamilton the first secretary who laid the foundation for the modern American Economy so its fitting we welcome two u. S. Treasury second secretaries. This is to prevent evidencebased policies to work to secure Economic Growth, shared prosperity and economic security. Our goal is to foster innovative, nonpartisan ideas and ultimately to introduce new and effective policy options into the national conversation. We at the project aquarius knowledge that a defining history is succeeding generations of americans have enjoyed standards of living higher than the generations that came before. Looking around us today we see that america is failing to make critical investments in areas that would contribute to our nations Economic Growth and security. Within this vision we recognize Climate Change as posing real and present challenges to our nation and indeed our globe economic future. Climate change is fundamentally about risks to safety and academy and we seed serious policy conversations about what actions to take to address those risks. Though is what we are focused on here this afternoon. Again, thank you for joining us. I now invite secretary ruben to introduce our futured guest. [applause] thank you, melissa and let me apologize for starting a little bit late. I had to fly from laguardia and if there is a doubt in the mind of the desperate need for infrastructure take that flight and separate question on how to pay for it but that is aside for a moment. The subject of the topic is Climate Change and two comments and then ask jack and lew and Michael Green stone to join me. One is i have gotten pretty involved in this and the reason ive gotten pretty involved are twofold, one, as i learn more about it i began to realize you not only have the most likely scenarios which are pretty serious and in many cases severe over time but you also have the real possibility unfortunately and maybe a fairly high probability that what ultimately happens are consequences that are vast multiples of the base case and effects instead of just being i shouldnt say of just being severe but in addition to being severe in the long run become catting catastrophic and we can expand on that in your conversation. Secondly, i said to a friend of mine the other day who is a wellknown business man that i developed this intense concern about this and he said well you know there are a lot of pressing issues and i think could are right but we can deal with this decades down the road and i said no and the reason no and many of you may know this a k rate of Greenhouse Gasses in the atmosphere is hundreds of years and what we do today is going to affect us for hundreds of years. Greenhouse gas emissions in the atmosphere are cumulative, they are irreversible and as a consequence this is an issue that cannot wait and has to be dealt with now and it was observed to me the other day and he is right about it, if you look over the last ten years and see the projections scientists have made they are bringing forward the times that are severe and catastrophic effects occur so this is a sense of urgency and an issue that we have to deal with now and with that context let me invite to the podium secretary of treasurer lew and Michael Green stone and that is you, michael, and Michael Green stone. Let me make a brief, i guess not. [applause] im going to uninvite michael and i will invite jack. Jack as you know is secretary of the treasury and distinguished and i will not go in to hamilton project and not in the resume because its in your material but i will say one thing when jack and the Clinton Administration and head of omb he was a pleasure to deal with and substantive as you probably know and also very sensitive with politics and issues he deals with and knows washington and knows how to work with cabinet members dealing with issues and its not often you see someone say nice about the head of omb or rice which is even worse so with that i introduce the distinguished secretary of the treasury, jack lew. [applause] thanks, bob for that introduction and your leadership on combatting Climate Change and thank you to the hamilton project for hosting this event. This is an issue of great significance to our economy and the nations future. I want to talk today about the economic implications of a changing climate. But before i begin i would like to say just a few words about the u. S. Economy. The u. S. Economy emerged from the financial crisis that had a devastating recession going to the brink of a great depression, through effective policy responses and recouncil resiliance and gdp increased in the Second Quarter and had more jobs in 54 months and the longest growth in history. While more work remains confidence in the future is strong at home and internationally and what i saw over the last few days at the g 20 finance ministers meeting and in addition to take Decisive Action to grow Global Economy and create jobs we discussed level the Playing Field on tax policy so that we would stop the erosion of tax base and going to the bottom of International Tax policy. Later today i will have more to say about our on going efforts for a loophole in the tax codes and unfair practices which corporations acquire foreign businesses and switch citizenship outside of the United States to avoid paying u. S. Taxes. In addition to leadership on a host of Global Economic issues the United States used the g 20 as a forum to drive progress on Climate Change policy and the need for action is clear, the world can choose to ignore the challenge today and be forced to take more drastic action further down to road at greater cost or sensible and modest and gradual changes now and in the process create jobs, reduce business and Household Expenses and drive technology and new industries. This choice should also be clear. As an economic matter the cost of inaction or delay is far greater than the cost of action. Cost associated with extreme weather events like rising sea level, drought, heat waves and wildfi wildfires and floods and severe storms demonstrate economic exposure and the advisors estimates if warming above preindustrial levels increases 3 degrees instead of 2 there could be a decrease in global out put annually. The cost of cli mitt change is not limited to one sector of the economy and threatens productivity and transportation infrastructure and power grids and drives up the incidents of healthcare problems. We are facing historic levels of extreme weather from a range of conditions, some parts of the country have flooding and others face severe droughts and the agriculture regions are threatening losing 5070 of crop yields and livestock productivity is threatened as well. No where is the Economic Cost of Climate Change more clear than in the area of infrastructure which is fundamental to our economys productivity and competitiveness. The fact is our water and sewer systems and power plants and grids and roads and airports were not designed or built for the extreme climate conditions we are facing now and expect to face in coming decades. Super storm sandy in 2012 closed every tunnel and most bridges leading into new york city while a large part of the subway system below 34th street including all 7 tunnels under the east river was flooded by storm surges. Increased healthcare costs associated with pollution and extreme heat are documented and high temperatures threaten the health and safety of construction workers, farmers and others who workout doors and putting Industries Like housing and agricultural at risk and lead to heat rerelated illness and similar negative consequences for the health and safety of americans across the county. On the other hand much less said about the impact of Climate Change on our nations fiscal situation. When the federal government has to step in and do things like provide Disaster Relief and protection from wildfires, healthcare, taxpayers pay the cost. Already the National Flood Insurance Program has had to borrowry 24 billion because of pay outs from hereins katrina, rita, wilma and sandy which occurred over the past nine years and if this continues to rise it will create budgetary pressures to force tradeoffs and larger deficits and higher taxes and these tradeoffs would make it more challenge to invest in growth and meet the needs of an aging population and meet defense. R such rubin says if you care about deficits and tax rates and government investing from National Security to job creation you should care about coping with climaterelated damage. In short we must do all we can to limit this burden and to manage the fiscal risk. President obama understands what is at stake and after years of talk in washington about facing up to the challenge of a changing climate he has taken action reducing Carbon Pollution, increasing Energy Efficiency and investing in natural gas, solar and wind power. I know that some of you combatting Climate Change is a choice between investing in our future and growing our economy in the near term but that is a false choice. Making the right investments will make our economy stronger today, create tens of thousands of new jobs and position the United States to lead the world in technologies and the industries of the future. And we have already seen this work. Our new fuel economy standards will double the distance our cars will go on a gallon of gas by the middle of the next decade and we have doubled the amount of Renewable Energy we produce. This means our cars, trucks and Renewable Technology will compete effectively in a world looking for cost and lower emissions. The fact of the matter is over the past few years solar installations increased by 500 and a home and business goes solar in the United States. At the same time when the president s Better Building Initiative the americas commercial buildings is improving, making buildings more Energy Efficient creates jobs and lowers cost and reduces pollution. So far this Initiative Led to 300 million in Energy Savings for organizations and businesses. To be sure, changing how we power our country is good economic policy. Today the Fastest Growing is renewables and commit for a fifth of generation globally and renewables produce as much electricity worldwide as gas and more than twice of that for nuclear. In the coming years and expanding world will depend more and more electricity and renewables are the Fastest Growing source for the increased demand so the more we do at home to encourage low Carbon Energy generation the better positions and workers will be to take advantage of the new business opportunities. To build on what we accomplished is part of the administrations Climate Action plan, the president announced new rules this summer for existing power plants. These rules represent the most significant policy to arrest Climate Change the United States has taken to date. And they will help us cut Carbon Pollution and increase clean energy production. Much needs to be done it has the commitment of the meeting the challenge of Climate Change head on and tomorrow the president will join more than 120 heads of state in new york to mobilize Global Action to address Climate Change because this is a global problem that requires collective action, Global Action is imperative and its a good investment in global Economic Growth. First making these changes is cost effective. Look at the new power plant rule that i just mentioned. This policy will reduce greenhouse emissions by 30 relative to 2005 levels. And meeting these standards will cost a fraction of the benefits associated with increased efficiency of coal power plants and renewable natural gas. Producing more clean energy and reducing the dirty energy is expected to be worth between 5593 billion dollars in 2030. Second, if we fail to make changes now it will be much more costly to deal with the problem later. Some options may be foreclosed entirely. The right approach Going Forward is to use Market Forces that balance the cost of reducing emissions with what the latest science tells us we need to do to keep temperature increases below dangerous levels. The alternative allowing Greenhouse Gas emissions to go to levels will require expensive and difficult action later. Recently released report the council of economic advisors found that for each decade of delay the cost of hitting a climate target goes up on average by approximately 40 . We must adopt a Risk Management approach to Climate Change. We must do what we can to substantially lower the risk of the most catastrophic climate impacts and means reducing emissions. As former secretary of the treasury hank paulson wrote there is a time for weighing evidence and a time for acting and if there is one thing i learned its to act before problems become too big to manage. The fact that secretary rubin and paulson are taken leadership positions in making the case to address Climate Change under score the economic urgency of action. Let me close with two points. The first is that we cannot do this alone. We must work with the rest of the world to address this challenge. We must work with other industrialized economies so that everyone is cutting Carbon Pollution in a sustainable way. G 20 last week discussed the importance of this issue and agreed to continue its work to study ways to effectively mobilize climate finance and must work with developing countries many of which are the Fastest Growing carbon admiters so as they grow they move to cleaner energy production. Thats why treasury has made the case to finance Clean Energy Programs and substantially reduce support in the Multi Lateral Development Banks for new coal projects and its helping to level the Playing Field and supporting Power Generation worldwide. We are actively working to secure the agreement of other countries and the Multi Lateral Development Banks to adopt similar policies as soon as possible. We are also strong supporters of the Green Climate fund, a Multi Lateral fund created to help developing countries to limit or reduce greenhouse emissions and adapt to the impact of Climate Change. Second, we must continue to seek the most efficient market oriented ways to reduce Carbon Pollution, congressional action based on market based approaches is the most effective way to do it in transition to a cleaner economy. With that let me say Climate Change