Last month’s UN climate change report spelt out what needs to be done to save the planet from catastrophe.
The report of the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has been compiled from evidence from 209 “Lead Authors”, 50 Review Editors from 39 countries and more than 600 Contributing Authors from 32 countries. It is by far the most authoritative assessment ever made of the contribution of human activity to global warming. It puts the level of certainty that the warming of the oceans, the melting of ice and the rise in sea levels is mainly down to human action at 95 percent.
Despite this, media outlets, including national broadcasters, have consistently felt it appropriate in the interests of “balance” to give the sceptics – in the main, outright deniers – equal time with the vast majority of the world’s scientists in discussion of the issue.
This is a major factor in up to 50 percent of respondents in some surveys expressing a belief that the jury is still out.
Far from the major producers of carbon emissions pausing for thought, Greenpeace activists protesting against Arctic drilling are arrested at gunpoint in Russia and charged with “piracy”, while protestors against fracking or the construction of new coal-fired power plants are harassed and in some instances attacked by police.
Leaders of industry argue that the disruption in the world economy necessary to deliver the measures which the scientists say are necessary would itself be disastrous for the world economy, and anyway would be impossible to deliver. Governments would have to take control of industry, direct investment and even instruct mining companies, manufacturers etc. what to produce and in what quantities.
This in turn would mark an end to free markets - an unthinkable proposition. The question which immediately occurs is: has anything like it ever been done before?
The example we will take is the United States between 1941 and 1945 - from Pearl Harbour to the end of World War Two. The US, then as now, was the chief proponent of free-market economics.
Pearl Harbour was bombed by the Japanese on December 7th 1941. By Xmas, the shape of the US economy had been transformed in ways and to an extent that had been regarded as, well, unthinkable.
The Roosevelt administration understood immediately that winning the war would depend on equipping US forces with vastly greater numbers of ships, airplanes, tanks, artillery, anti-aircraft guns etc. He sent Congress a list of what was required: 60,000 planes, 45,000 tanks, eight million tons of warships, 20,000 anti-aircraft pieces, etc. He estimated the likely cost at just over $50 billion - equal to the entire US Gross National Product that year.
Roosevelt brought the leaders of industry together and won - demanded - their approval for an effective takeover of the economy. The top managers of major industries and leaders of unions joined government and military officials on the War Production Board (WPB), which set about issuing “conversion orders” telling industries what to produce.
Car companies switched to military vehicles. By 1945, the industry’s contribution included 2.6 million military trucks, four million engines, more than 50,000 tanks and 27,000 aircraft.
Productivity rocketed. The time needed to build “Liberty Ships” - specialised cargo vessels designed to carry war material to the allies in Europe and supply US forces in the Pacific - fell from 245 days in 1941 to 39 days in 1945.
All house-building came to a halt so construction could concentrate on new factories and military bases.
Steel producers were instructed on what kind of steel to make and where it was to be delivered. The recipient companies were handed specifications on what to use the steel to manufacture.
Many contracts were issued before the work was costed. There was no question of competitive tendering or selection of sub-contractors prior to start-up. The unions cooperated fully. The resolution of grievances was put off until peacetime, although nobody could be certain when that would be.
All this was unprecedented and hasn’t been repeated in any free-market country.
In his invaluable book, Stop Global Warning, Jonathan Neale reports that there was total chaos within the WPB for the first year. “But somehow it all worked - and worked fast. Everybody was entirely committed. Nobody blamed anybody else for blips but strove together to repair the problems.”
In 1942 alone, $26 billion was invested in new manufacture. Of this, $16 billion came from the government. Taxes rose sharply. In 1940, only seven percent of Americans paid any income tax. By 1944, 64 percent were coughing up - with little protest.
What made all this possible was the realisation across the population that the US faced an unprecedented challenge, even, perhaps, a threat to its existence. Same as now - except that this time it’s not a single country or group of countries which faces disaster but every country on earth.
To say all this is not to suggest there are easy answers if only everyone could see them. The point is that those who say that the necessary measures are too outlandish to contemplate are as wrong on this as they are on man-made global warming. We know it can be done because it has been done before.
The most urgent and important task before us is to campaign relentlessly to expose the deniers and popularise the remedies.
Stop Global Warming: Change The World by Jonathan Neale is available now