撤资运动 无益根治气候难题

It takes some variety of wilful ignorance to dismiss the need for action to avert the threat of climate change.

只有某些故意愚昧的人，才会认为针对气候变化威胁采取行动是没有必要的。

From imaginings of vast conspiracies to complacency that global warming can only be benign, the arguments against taking the danger seriously are rooted in a refusal to face reality. The climate is a complex system, of course, and forecasting it fraught with uncertainty. But the evidence is strong enough to make it clear that the risk of catastrophe cannot be dismissed.

反对严肃应对气候变化威胁的观点各式各样，从各种大阴谋论，到满不在乎地认为全球变暖可能没什么大不了的，其根源是不愿面对现实。当然，气候是个复杂的系统，对气候进行预测也充满了不确定性。但已有足够充分的证据表明，发生气候灾难的风险不容忽视。

Yet advocates of action on climate change often display their own varieties of irrationality. The campaign for universities, charities, local governments and others to sell their holdings in fossil fuel companies, which has been gathering momentum in recent years, is a case in point.

然而，主张就气候变化采取行动的人往往也表现出他们自身的种种不理性。一个例子是撤资运动(divestment campaign)，这场运动呼吁大学、慈善机构、地方政府、其他组织和个人出售所持化石燃料企业股份，其声势近年来不断增强。

The campaigners’ zeal is understandable. The potential consequences of unrestrained fossil fuel development are alarming, and if you are looking for someone to blame, the oil, gas and coal industries are an obvious target.

撤资运动人士的热忱可以理解。不受限制的化石燃料开发可能导致的后果令人担心，如果你试图就此责备谁，那么石油、天然气和煤炭行业是明摆着的靶子。

By focusing on divestment, however, the campaigners are channelling their efforts into an issue that is largely irrelevant to the ultimate objective of minimising the threat of climate change.

然而，我们最终的目标是要最大程度降低气候变化威胁，撤资运动人士一门心思呼吁人们出售上述企业的股票，是把力气使到了一个基本无关这个最终目标的问题上。

The financial impact of divestment is likely to be negligible. If charities sell their holdings in fossil fuel companies, other investors will buy them. If enough funds sell, the shares may fall, raising the companies’ cost of capital, but evidence from the divestment campaign over South Africa suggests the effect is unlikely to be large.

撤资的经济影响很可能微乎其微。如果慈善机构出售所持化石燃料企业股份，那么其他投资者会接盘。如果卖盘足够多，股价可能会下降，从而提高这些企业的资金成本，但南非撤资运动的经验证明，这种做法不太可能取得很大效果。

Divestment campaigners often say their objective is not so much financial as symbolic: they want to send a signal that fossil fuels are morally unacceptable. It is hard to see, however, how the world can be persuaded to shun voluntarily the source of more than 80 per cent of its energy. Fossil fuels offer enormous benefits as well as great risks, and their role in sustaining standards of living worldwide is for the time being irreplaceable.

撤资运动人士往往说，他们的目标更多是象征性的、而非经济上的：他们希望传递一个讯号，即化石燃料在道德上是不可接受的。然而，化石燃料占世界能源使用量的80%以上，很难想象他们如何能说服全世界主动弃用化石燃料。化石燃料带来了巨大的益处，也造成了巨大的风险，就目前而言，化石燃料在维持全世界民众生活水准方面发挥的作用仍是不可替代的。

Nor is it reasonable to expect fossil fuel companies to be the pioneers of the transition to other sources of energy; they have tried that many times in the past, always with disappointing results. The real advances recently in low-carbon energy, such as the plunging cost of solar power systems and progress in battery technology, have all come from outside the fossil fuel industries.

期待化石燃料企业充当向新能源转型的先锋也是不理智的。这些企业过去已尝试过那么多次，每次的结果都令人失望。低碳能源领域最近取得的实质性进步，比如太阳能发电系统成本的大幅下降以及电池技术取得的进展，都来自化石燃料行业以外。

It is true that as the world shifts away from high-carbon energy, the oil, gas and coal companies will become less attractive investments, but shareholders can take their own views about the timing and consequences of that transition. Divestment should be seen as an outcome, not an instrument.

没错，世界在逐步改用高碳能源以外的能源，这会使得石油、天然气和煤炭企业的投资吸引力下降，但持股人对这种转变的时机和后果可以拥有自己的看法。撤资应该被视为一种结果，而非一种手段。

If global greenhouse gas emissions are to be brought under control, governments will have to play a central role. That does not mean the state takeover of the economy sometimes imagined by climate sceptics, but there will have to be a framework, including taxes and other incentives, that changes the behaviour of both businesses and consumers.

如果想控制住全球温室气体排放，各国政府就必须发挥核心作用。这并不意味着如气候变化怀疑论者有时想象的那样，由国家来接管经济，而是意味着要建立一个包含税收激励和其他激励的框架，以改变企业和消费者的行为。

A genuine solution to the threat of climate change will require a price on greenhouse gas emissions, greater investment in energy innovation, switching from coal to gas to power generation, cost-effective means of storing carbon dioxide, and a global framework that encourages all the countries of the world to participate. Divestment helps with none of those.

要真正化解气候变化威胁，就必须对温室气体排放定价，加大能源创新投资，从使用煤炭发电改为使用天然气发电，找到划算的二氧化碳储存办法，建立一个全球性框架、以鼓励世界各国参与。撤资对这些都没有帮助。

At best, the divestment campaign will encourage a wider debate about those practical measures that are needed. At worst it will fool people, including the campaigners themselves, into believing that something significant is being achieved.

在最好的情况下，撤资运动会鼓励人们对有必要采取的那些切实措施展开更广泛的辩论。在最差的情况下，撤资运动会让民众（包括撤资运动人士自己）产生一种错觉，以为抗击气候变化之战正在取得什么重大的成果。