Does nature need a price tag??

In Season 13, Episode 3 of the NPR radio show RadioLab, there was a segment titled, "How Do You Put a Price Tag on Nature?"  The segment was about a group of researchers in 1997 who attempted to place a value on the natural processes of the world.  Their answer.... $142 trillion.  Just for reference, the 2013 total World GDP was $75 trillion.  Put another way, all of the economic effort of all of humanity on the planet produces barely 1/2 the value of all natural process (back in 1997 that is.  It has undoubtedly gone up since then).

When published, this research caused more controversy over the fact that it was placing economic value on what many believe to be priceless, the raw beauty, brutality and truth of nature, than any values that were actually assigned to natural processes.  But another way to think about this is to use such economic analysis as a starting point for making real progress towards actual carbon policy.  Let me use a story to illustrate my point.

Recently in discussing the topic of emissions with a friend, I mentioned how I understand the need of modern society and the modern economy to use fossil fuels.  I think most pragmatic environmentalists understand that.  However, what I don't understand is why a power company using coal, who produces carbon emissions known to contribute to global climate change, is "charged" the same amount as the emissions from a solar panel.  That amount is $0, and that amount seems very unfair, given the KNOWN environmental impact of emissions.  Therefore, my beef was not with the concept of fossil fuels, it was with the practice of "free emissions" into a global economy where it is a fact that emissions cause problems which cost money (through pollution, climate change, ect).

Therefore, I said, the solution is easy, producers of carbon emissions need to pay a tax for the privileged of polluting.  My friend's response was simple.  Who decides the amount of this tax?

This is a good question, which requires first that the topic of emissions be taken seriously (which government (at least Federal Government) is currently unwilling to do) and second that a debate start around the cost of carbon.  While placing a value on natural processes (such as extraction of carbon from the atmosphere!) can seem uneasy, it bares exploration to see if it can bridge a gap between two areas currently very far apart, the natural world and the human economic engine.  These worlds have to come closer together to ever make real meaningful progress on emissions control from a policy perspective, which will definitely be necessary in a world looking to do some serious clean up over the next 50 - 100 years.