It's a message no one wants to hear: To slow down global warming, we'll either have to put the brakes on economic growth or transform the way the world's economies work.
That's the implication of an innovative University of Michigan study examining the most likely causes of global warming.
The study, conducted by José Tapia Granados and Edward Ionides of U-M and Óscar Carpintero of the University of Valladolid in Spain, was published online in the peer-reviewed journal Environmental Science and Policy. It is the first analysis to use measurable levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide to assess fluctuations in the gas, rather than estimates of CO₂ emissions, which are less accurate.
"If 'business as usual' conditions continue, economic contractions the size of the Great Recession or even bigger will be needed to reduce atmospheric levels of CO₂," said Tapia Granados, who is a researcher at the U-M Institute for Social Research.
For the study, the researchers assessed the impact of four factors on short-run, year-to-year changes in atmospheric concentrations of CO₂, widely considered the most important greenhouse gas. Those factors included two natural phenomena believed to affect CO₂ levels—volcanic eruptions and the El Niño Southern oscillation—and also world population and the world economy, as measured by worldwide gross domestic product.
Tapia Granados and colleagues found no observable relation between short-term growth of world population and CO₂ concentrations, and they show that incidents of volcanic activity coincide with global recessions, which may confound any slight volcanic effects on CO₂.
With El Niño outside of human control, economic activity is the sole modifiable factor. In years of above-trend world GDP, from 1958 to 2010, the researchers found greater increases in CO₂ concentrations. For every $10 trillion in U.S. dollars that the world GDP deviates from trend, CO₂ levels deviate from trend about half a part per million, they found. Preindustrial concentrations are estimated to be 200-300 parts per million.
To break the economic habits contributing to a rise in atmospheric CO₂ levels and global warming, Tapia Granados says that societies around the world would need to make enormous changes.
"Since the mid 1970s, scientists like James Hansen have been warning us about the effects global warming will have on the earth," Tapia Granados said. "One solution that has promise is a carbon tax levied on any activity producing CO₂ in order to create incentives to reduce emissions. The money would be returned to individuals so the tax would not burden the population at large.
"What our study makes clear is that climate change will soon have a serious impact on the world, and the time is growing short to take corrective action."
Established in 1949, the University of Michigan Institute for Social Research is the world's largest academic social science survey and research organization, and a world leader in developing and applying social science methodology, and in educating researchers and students from around the world. ISR conducts some of the most widely cited studies in the nation, including the Thomson Reuters/University of Michigan Surveys of Consumers, the American National Election Studies, the Monitoring the Future Study, the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, the Health and Retirement Study, the Columbia County Longitudinal Study and the National Survey of Black Americans. ISR researchers also collaborate with social scientists in more than 60 nations on the World Values Surveys and other projects, and the institute has established formal ties with universities in Poland, China and South Africa. ISR is also home to the Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research, the world's largest digital social science data archive. For more information, visit the ISR website at www.isr.umich.edu.