The tragedy of the tragedy of the commons and GHG.

Category: Greenhouse Gas Emissions

posted by Haefen

Sunday, November 15, 2009 10:06 PM

The tragedy of the tragedy of the commons and GHG.

It is often said that global warming actions are being hindered by the Tragedy of the Commons effect but the real tragedy is that people believe such nonsense.

The idea is that people will destroy a shared resource because no one individual owns it or is responsible for it. That is very true and we can see that in action as Asia strips the oceans bare but they do this only because they are allowed to. If we wanted to save ocean life all we would have to do is tell Asia to live within their borders. Fish their own waters.

But while the fish are in no way Canadian the carbon sinks being used to sink the excess carbon Asia emits is Canadian. The only common carbon sink is the ocean, not the atmosphere. The Atmosphere is merely the transport mechanism.

The tragedy of the tragedy commons is that people think it is the atmosphere that is the commons. A better analogy would the idea of people using the public or common roadway to dump their manure unto the neighbours field because the neighbour has room.

As we can see even Canada does not have enough carbon sinking ability to handle Asia’s output but that is not a tragedy of the commons but a failure of Asia to live within their own carbon sinking ability.

Unlike the commons they are imposing on other countries property and for that they should have to pay.