以技术革命拯救地球 A moonshot to save a warming planet

Every silver lining has a cloud. The technologies that offer human beings comforts and opportunities that would have been unimaginable two centuries ago ultimately depend on an abundance of energy. Fire is the source of that energy. But the burning of fossil fuels, from which we gain so much, also releases the carbon dioxide that threatens to destabilise the climate.

每一线光明都伴随一片乌云。技术给人类带来的舒适生活和机遇，是两百年前无法想象的，这些技术从根本上来说都要依赖大量的能量。而火是能量的来源。但化石燃料的燃烧虽然给我们带来许多好处，其释放的二氧化碳却会威胁气候稳定。

For some, the answer to this challenge is to embrace poverty. But humanity will not — and should not be expected to — give up the prosperity that some already enjoy and others greatly desire. The answer lies instead in breaking the links between prosperity and fossil fuels, fossil fuels and emissions, and emissions and the climate. We must not reject technology, but transform it.

有些人认为，解决这一问题的办法就是安于贫困。但人类不会——也不应当——放弃一些人已经享有、而其他人还极其渴望的繁荣。相反，解决办法在于打破繁荣与化石燃料之间、化石燃料与排放之间以及排放与气候之间的联系。我们决不能抵制技术，而是要进行技术变革。

This is not yet happening. BP’s latest Statistical Review of World Energy shows that global demand for commercial energy continues to grow, largely driven by growth of emerging countries, despite improvements in energy efficiency. Moreover, fossil fuels meet the bulk of that demand. In 2014, renewables contributed just over 2 per cent of global primary energy consumption. Together, nuclear power, hydroelectricity and renewables contributed merely 14 per cent. (See chart.)

然而，目前还未形成这种局面。英国石油公司(BP)最新的《世界能源统计年鉴》(Statistical Review of World Energy)显示，虽然能源效率有所提高，但全球对商业能源的需求仍在继续增长，主要受新兴国家增长的驱动。此外，化石燃料满足了其中大部分需求。2014年，可再生能源仅占全球一次能源消费的2%多一点。核电、水电和可再生能源加在一起仅占14%。（见图表）

A report entitled “A Global Apollo Programme to Combat Climate Change”, written by a number of high-profile British scientists and economists, offers a bold answer. It argues that carbon-free energy has to become competitive with fossil fuels. “Once this happened, the coal, gas and oil would simply stay in the ground.”

由英国多位著名科学家和经济学家撰写、题为《应对气候变化全球阿波罗计划》(A Global Apollo Programme to Combat Climate Change)的报告，提出了一个大胆的解决方法。该报告认为，无碳能源必须能够与化石燃料竞争。“在那种情况下，煤炭、天然气以及石油就会保留在地下了。”

The need, then, is to generate a technological revolution. The paper (named after the successful mission to the moon of the 1960s) argues that this will require rapid technological advances. Progress is happening, notably the collapse in the price of photovoltaic panels. But this is not enough. The sun provides 5,000 times more energy than humans demand from industrial sources. But we do not know how to exploit enough of it.

所以，我们需要的是一场技术革命。该报告（根据上世纪60年代的登月计划命名）认为，这将要求快速的技术进步。进步正在发生，尤其是光伏电池板价格在大幅下跌。但这还不够。太阳提供的能源是人类在工业方面的能源需求的5000倍，但我们还不知道如何充分利用太阳能。

Despite the evident need, publicly-funded research and development on renewable energy is under 2 per cent of all publicly-funded R&D. At just $6bn a year, worldwide, it is dwarfed by the $101bn spent on subsidies for renewable production and the amazing total of $550bn spent on subsidising fossil fuel production and consumption.

尽管有明显的需求，但在公共资金支持的所有研发活动中，可再生能源研发仅占不到2%。全世界每年仅有60亿美元的资金用于可再生能源研发。相比之下，用于补贴可再生能源生产的资金为1010亿美元，补贴化石燃料生产和消费的资金更是高达5500亿美元。

This is a grotesque picture. Far more money needs to go to publicly funded research. The public sector has long played a vital role in funding scientific and technological breakthroughs. In this case, that role is particularly important, given the agreed goal of reducing emissions and the fact that the energy sector spends relatively little on R&D.

这是一幅怪诞景象。必须在可再生能源研发方面投入更多的资金。长期以来，来自公共部门的资金在实现科学技术突破方面发挥了至关重要的作用。就可再生能源领域来说，考虑到各国协商的减排目标以及能源行业在研发上投入相对较少的事实，公共部门的作用显得尤为重要。

The envisaged programme would have a single purpose: “To develop renewable energy supplies that are cheaper than those from fossil fuels.” The authors suggest that to do this, research should focus on electricity generation, storage and smart grids. The suggested programme would amount to $15bn a year, still a mere 0.02 per cent of world output. That is indeed a minimal amount, given the goal’s importance.

该报告中提出的计划只有一个目的：“开发比化石燃料更便宜的可再生能源。”几位作者认为，要做到这一点，应把研究重点放在发电、存储和智能电网方面。所提议的计划每年需花费资金150亿美元，这样也仅占全球产出的0.02%。考虑到该目标的重要性，这是一个最低限度的数额。

Any country that decided to join would commit to spending this proportion of its national income. While the money would be spent at each country’s discretion, the programme would generate an annually updated road-map of the breakthroughs needed to maintain the pace of cost reduction. The suggestion is that heads of government agree such a programme of accelerated and targeted research by the time of the Paris climate conference later this year.

任何决定加入该计划的国家都要承诺将占国民收入0.02%的资金投入可再生能源研发。虽然各国可自行决定如何使用这些资金，该计划每年都将发布一份新的科技突破路线图，这些突破是维持成本削减步伐所需要取得的。该报告建议各国政府首脑在今年晚些时候巴黎气候会议召开之前，一致通过这一关于加快和有针对性地进行研究的计划。

Improved technology might end our dependence on the burning of fossil fuels. It might also reduce the emissions of carbon dioxide that accompany that burning. But Climate Shock by Gernot Wagner and Martin Weitzman, notes that new technology might also break the final link — that between emissions and climate. This then raises the seductive, but dangerous, possibility of geo-engineering — seductive because it may seem cheap, and dangerous because its results are so uncertain.

技术水平提高或许会结束我们对燃烧化石燃料的依赖。它或许也会减少伴随燃烧过程的二氧化碳排放。赫尔诺特•瓦格纳(Gernot Wagner)与马丁•威茨曼(Martin Weitzman)合著的《气候冲击》(Climate Shock)指出，新技术也可能打破最后一个联系——排放与气候之间的联系。这就引出了实施诱人但危险的“地球工程”(geo-engineering)的可能性——诱人，是因为它可能看起来便宜；危险，是因为其后果非常不确定。

Some ideas for geo-engineering are close to carbon capture and storage, which is aimed at eliminating emissions from specific facilities. Carbon-dioxide removal might be applied to the atmosphere: this is what plants do. Another idea is “ocean fertilisation”, to accelerate natural absorption of carbon dioxide.

地球工程方面的一些构想接近于碳捕获和储存，旨在消除特定设施的排放。去除二氧化碳的做法可能适用于大气：植物就起到这样的作用。另一种想法是“海洋施肥”(ocean fertilisation)，加速对二氧化碳的自然吸收。

Replication of the atmospheric impact of a volcanic eruption would directly offset the impact of greenhouse gases. The matter emitted by the eruption at Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines in 1991 lowered global temperatures by 0.5C. The 20m tonnes of sulphur dioxide emitted dimmed the amount of radiation from the sun by 2 to 3 per cent in the following year. If we continue on our present path, that is the sort of measure people might well try to replicate.

再现火山爆发对气候的影响将直接抵消温室气体的影响。1991年菲律宾的皮纳图博火山(Mount Pinatubo)爆发所产生的物质使全球气温下降了0.5摄氏度。喷发出的2000万吨二氧化硫在随后一年里削弱了来自太阳的2%至3%的辐射。如果我们继续现在的道路，将来人们很可能会尝试这类措施。

It is not hard to envisage the dangers of such an intervention. It could not be a one-off, since particles put into the atmosphere would quickly fall out of it again. So the actions would have to be repeated on an ever-larger scale, as concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere increased.

不难想象此种干预带来的危险。它不可能是一次性的，因为排放到大气中的微粒很快会再次掉下来。所以，随着大气中温室气体浓度的增加，这样的行动将不得不以越来越大的规模反复进行。

Such a programme of deliberate pollution of the global atmosphere might well be viewed as an act of war. The consequences of repeated large-scale planetary engineering of this kind would also be highly unpredictable. This must be a very last resort.

这样一个故意污染全球大气的计划很可能被视为一种战争行为。反复进行这种大规模行星工程的后果也极难预测。这只能作为最后的手段。

The best way of responding to the challenge of climate change is through changed incentives and accelerated innovation aimed at making carbon-free technologies competitive with fossil fuels. Both demand more active public policies. The proposed Apollo programme would be an essential element. Its proposed costs are modest; its potential upsides are enormous. Success would be transformative. It would be far better to try and fail than not to try at all.

应对气候变化挑战，最好的方法是改革激励机制，同时加快创新步伐，使无碳技术能够与化石燃料竞争。这两方面都需要更积极的公共政策。拟议的阿波罗计划将是至关重要的一环。其实施的成本并不大，而潜在的好处是巨大的。成功在于变革。试错要远胜于根本不去尝试。