REVIEW
A race to the top, the bottom – or back to the Dark Ages?
Climate Race: Collected Essays (Bilingual English & German Edition) Gernot Wagner. Leykam Universitätsverlag. 2024, 188 pages
R aging fires and floods are part and parcel of climate change narratives. They’re also part of mythology and even the original meaning of “race”, from Old Norse dating back over a thousand years. Race in terms of Vikings “running the course of life” along perilous rivers against dangerous rivals, culminating in the battles of “Ragnarok” between the gods and the giants – as flames and floods consume the land. The archetypal race to the bottom. Taking us in the other direction is climate economist Gernot Wagner, who in his latest book Climate Race says: “The climate race is on, and despite the best attempts by some, there’s no going back. Low-carbon, high-efficiency technologies will only get better and cheaper over time. Oil, coal, and gas, meanwhile are commodities, whose prices will always fluctuate due to geopolitical vagaries… The best medicine for addressing ‘fossilflation’? Getting off fossil fuels… The one clear winner: the planet.” How to convert apocalypse now into a joint endeavor, in which cooperation – rather than competition – is in everyone’s best interest By Howard Hudson, OPEC Fund
leads to higher growth and more jobs even in the near term,” according to Wagner. Key to this new reality and “what really matters,” says the economist, “is the interplay between technology, policy, and behavioral change” – which is the driving force of this climate race. It is what we might call “comprehensive innovation” – a term used in UN circles, but not one that appears in the book. In other words, technology is the spearhead, but it needs the right (policy) ecosystem and (social) uptake to succeed. Focusing on issues including climate- tech solutions, climate-risk accounting and the green growth mindset, this collection of essays from June 2021 to September 2023 does get technical, but is surprisingly accessible thanks to Wagner’s clear and confident handling of the subject matter. Each of the 13 chapters is peppered with helpful data and pithy summaries. There are no footnotes or fancy infographics, just clear and compelling arguments – busting myths and challenging assumptions, while batting away doomsday pessimists. “Yes, we can [because we’d better]!” is the post- Obama tone at play. Most helpful is Wagner’s weighing up of the different kinds of “moral hazard” – when people take risks out of complacency or because they think others will bear the burden. Some critics have framed the debate between climate adaptation and mitigation in
Sound too good to be true? Despite the headwinds of the second Trump term, the energy transition is clearly in everyone’s best interest – existentially, environmentally, even economically – irrespective of identity politics. In this collection of essays Wagner points to the Texas Land and Liberty Coalition, a group of conservative farmers and ranchers who (having “struck wind”) are doing what was previously unthinkable: Lobbying hard for renewable-energy policies and investments. It’s not just grassroots groups that are running this race. This “revolutionary” climate optimism is echoed at the highest levels, including the International Monetary Fund and the International Energy Agency. Both institutions now state that “ambitious climate action
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