Assessing Anticipatory Approaches to Climate Change Policy. K. Green, Reason Public Policy Institute, 2612 Julianne Rd., Belton, TX 76513
Like most of the actions we take to improve our safety, actions intended to reduce environmental health risks are rarely pure in their effects. We know that choices have consequences, and that any significant action, risk-reducing or otherwise, can have purely positive consequences.
We also know that our available risk-reduction actions are not unlimited, but are constrained by the resources available to us as individuals and societies over a given span of time.
Making sound decisions regarding risk-reduction measures requires an easily understood framework for choosing a strategy, whether that strategy is intended to head off a specific risk in a specific way, or is intended to help society and its members prepare for suspected, but poorly-defined risks looming in the distance. It also requires a balanced net-benefit framework for portraying both the nature of environmentally conveyed health risks and the consequences of taking action or choosing not to take action to reduce them.
This study evaluates the Kyoto-Protocol approach to climate change using a framework that evaluates the soundness of our chosen strategy as well as the likelihood that our actions will produce a net risk-reduction benefit.
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