Highlights from the SNS report
Photo: Allan Seppa
The SNS Economic Policy Council (2020) recently released a report that presents how policy should be designed to curb, and in the long term, stop global climate change. The report was presented in two seminars in January. The seminars were attended by some 300 people in total and the release caused a lot of media attention.
Examples of items highlighted in the report:
The abundance of coal is a main threat to climate change. Coal intensive countries, such as China, should get rid of their coal dependency.
The global community should strive to introduce a global minimum price for carbon dioxide emissions and to phase out fossil fuel subsidies.
Green subsidies are not enough to reduce carbon emissions, as long as emissions from the burning of fossil fuels – and in particular coal – is priced sufficiently high.
Swedish climate policy should support technologies and measures which are scalable and can be applied to global markets.
Introduction of the CCS technology (carbon dioxide collection and storage) could be supported by a storage fund. It has been shown that applying CCS to the 27 largest industrial emission sources could remove more than half of Sweden’s total CO2 emissions at a cost equal to what the state collects via the current carbon dioxide tax.
Filip Johnsson is a member of the SNS Economic Policy Council 2020 and also vice programme director of Mistra Carbon Exit.
The full list of SNS Economic Policy Council 2020
John Hassler (chairman), Professor of Economics, Institute for International Economic Studies (IIES), Stockholm University
Björn Carlén, Ph.D. in Economics, Researcher at the Environmental Economics unit at the National Institute of Economic Research
Jonas Eliasson, Visiting Professor in Transport Systems, Linköping University, former Director of the Stockholm City Transportation Department, and Professor of Transport Systems Analysis, Royal Institute of Technology
Filip Johnsson, Professor of Sustainable Energy Systems, Chalmers University of Technology
Per Krusell, Professor of Economics, Institute for International Economic Studies (IIES), Stockholm University
Therese Lindahl, Ph.D. in Economics, Researcher at the Beijer Institute of Ecological Economics
Jonas Nycander, Professor of Physical Oceanography, Stockholm University
Åsa Romson, Doctor of Legal Science (environmental science), Researcher at the IVL Swedish Environmental Research Institute, former Minister for the Environment
Thomas Sterner, Professor of Environmental Economics, University of Gothenburg
For more information and for downloading the report see: https://www.sns.se/aktuellt/konjunkturradets-rapport-2020-svensk-politik-for-globalt-klimat/