A leading German scientist has called for individual carbon dioxide (CO2) limits to be placed on the public as part of an effort to “fight climate change.”
Hans Joachim Schellnhuber from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK) argues that a CO2 limit should be applied to every person in order to establish a “planetary guardrail.”
Schellnhuber says that every person should have a limit of three tonnes of C02 emissions per year.
Those who exceed their limit should be forced to pay for the privilege, according to Schellnhuber.
In comments reported by Taagesschau, Schellnhuber said that there are two competing property rights issues at hand.
Namely, those issues are the right to spend one’s money on high emissions activities and the rights of the rest of the population to “have an environment worth living [in].”
In a carbon credit style scheme, those who emit over the three-tonne limit by the middle of the century would need to privately purchase credits from those who are under the limit, he suggested: “Every person gets three tons of CO2 per year, but if you need more, you just have to buy it.”
According to the news outlet, the average German is far above Schellnhuber’s proposed limit, however.
At present, ten tonnes of C02 emissions are produced by the average citizen.
Citing the Paris World Inequality lab, there are some millionaires within the country that produce over 100 tonnes of CO2 per year.
Meanwhile, thousands of elites worldwide emit over 2,000 tonnes per year.
Schellnhuber failed to address the obvious issue that allowing people to pay for the privilege of carbon output would limit things such as air travel and car ownership to only the wealthy.
Nor did he explain how he expects people to drastically reduce their carbon emissions.
The German scientist also failed to elaborate on how exactly this will be tracked and monitored.
However, at last year’s World Economic Forum (WEF) meeting in Davos, Alibaba Group President J. Michael Evans said that the Chinese tech giant is currently developing a digital “individual carbon footprint tracker.”
Evens boasted that the tracker will be able to monitor the emissions of the public.
“We are developing through technology the ability for consumers to measure their own carbon footprint… where are they traveling, how are they traveling, what are they eating, what are they consuming on the platform,” the former Goldman Sachs banker explained.
Ironically, given that the annual meeting — which will convene again next week — sees thousands of private jets descend upon the Swiss ski retreat, Evans went on to say that the tracker would ensure that people are “incentivized to do the right thing even if they were provided the opportunity to do the wrong thing.”
Following the release of a report this week on the future of the British Conservative (Tory) government’s net zero agenda, which called for the banning of new gas boiler sales within ten years, Brexit leader Nigel Farage said that the green movement will only serve to make the citizens of the West poorer while enriching the likes of Communist China.
“We are engaged in an act of self-harm,” Farage said.
“It will not bring us economic benefits, it will make everybody a whole lot poorer and yet the lemmings in Parliament are all taking us toward the economic cliff.”
“I can’t think of an issue in which the public and the politicians are now more divided.”
READ MORE: World Economic Forum Calls for Ban on ‘Wasteful’ Private Car Ownership
