PARIS (AP) – Low oil prices could paradoxically help the world reach an international agreement to fight global warming, according to the French ambassador charged with organizing a key climate conference in Paris.
France is spending the next 11 months trying to cajole more than 190 countries into overcoming disagreements about acceptable greenhouse gas emissions levels and who should pay to achieve them to produce a binding accord to limit emissions.
Laurence Tubiana, France’s special representative for the 2015 climate conference in Paris, says now nations can’t cite high energy prices as a reason to avoid taking action.
“Several years ago, I would have said it (low oil prices) complicates things,” she told The Associated Press in an interview this week. “(But) lower energy prices give more maneuvering room for investment and could ultimately allow the introduction of a carbon tax or something that works like one.”
In fact, she said, forward-looking governments will be able to use the money saved on oil and gas to develop renewable technologies, rather than increasing their fossil fuel extraction. And lower costs at the pump means consumers will be less opposed to new taxes to offset greenhouse gas emissions. Those taxes, sometimes called carbon taxes, have faced resistance in the United States, but many other countries have adopted some versions of them, using the proceeds to invest in renewable resources.