Can societies have strong economies, and still address climate change?

The EID paper shows that for the US, we have been able to increase GDP, whilst reducing emissions. I agree. Looking outside the US demonstrates even more clearly that large scale reductions in emissions are possible, even in a thriving economy.

The EDGAR data [1] includes data on both emissions and GDP, for all countries going back till 1990. The table below shows the % change of GDP and CO2 emissions, for the US vs some other comparable European countries.

Countries like Sweden, with 87.6% growth in GDP whilst reducing emissions 23.3%, clearly demonstrate that strong economies and action on climate change are not mutually exclusive (and they have universal health care, and they live 3 years longer than us in the US [2] - I’m not saying the US isn’t a great country, which is why I’m in Seattle and not Stockholm, but sometimes I feel we could be greater still if we were more prepared to learn from other countries). The UK similarly reduced emissions even more, by 36.3%, whilst still growing 72.8% (despite the Brexit debacle!).

Of course, the reductions now needed are larger than the ones achieved so far, but the changes needed - promote a move to other forms of power, thereby generating jobs in those sectors, and make (by carbon tax or regulations) the oil and gas companies deploy technologies for carbon capture, do not have to cripple growth. Even if it does slow growth now, what value is growth given the dire state we are currently heading towards?