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2019-03-06-The Energy 202: Oil g

2019-03-06  本文已影响3人  相思清狂

原文载于The Washington Post杂志：https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/paloma/the-energy-202/2019/03/05/the-energy-202-oil-giant-makes-business-case-for-taking-climate-change-seriously/5c7db0c81b326b2d177d5fc7/?utm_term=.d06702be0669

The Energy 202: Oil giant makes business case for taking climate change seriously

By Steven Mufson
March 5 at 7:54 AM

原文 译文（机译+略改）
The chief economist of one of the world’s biggest oil companies is urging other companies to take climate change seriously — and sooner rather than later.

If not, it might be bad for business. 		全球最大石油公司之一的首席经济学家正在敦促其他公司认真对待气候变化问题，而且越早越好。

否则，这可能对企业不利。
That’s the warning from BP’s Spencer Dale, who made the rounds in Washington last week explaining the business case for finding a solution for the warming planet.

“All the climate arguments are real, urgent and important,” Dale said in an interview with The Washington Post.		 这是英国石油公司(BP)首席执行官斯宾塞•戴尔(Spencer Dale)发出的警告。戴尔上周在华盛顿四处游说，解释为全球变暖寻找解决方案的商业理由。

"所有的气候争论都是真实的、紧急的、重要的，"戴尔在《华盛顿邮报》的采访中说。
Despite working for one of the world’s biggest producers of fossil fuels, Dale said the longer the world waits to address rising emissions, the more “draconian” the changes in the global economy will have to be. 尽管戴尔为世界上最大的化石燃料生产商之一工作，但戴尔说，解决排放增长问题的时间越久，全球经济变化就将会越“严峻”。
“How do I run a business, how do I make a business plan if I know that the path I’m on is unstable?” Dale asked.

For a multinational energy firm operating in dozens of countries, that could mean having to scrap assets, Dale said.		 如果我知道我所走的道路是不稳定的，我该如何经营企业，如何制定商业计划?”Dale问道。

Dale表示，对于一家在数十个国家开展业务的跨国能源公司来说，这可能意味着必须报废资产。
The provocative economist spent more than a decade working for the Bank of England before joining the oil giant. At the end of February, Dale led the publication of BP’s annual energy outlook, which is widely anticipated among energy industry followers. 这位颇具煽动力的经济学家在加入这家石油巨头之前，曾在英国央行(Bank of England)工作了10多年。2月底，戴尔领导出版了英国石油公司的年度能源展望，这在能源行业的追随者中受到广泛关注。
At the center of the report’s most likely scenario for the future is the tension between the pressing need to slash carbon emissions and the growing demand for energy as the global population grows and seeks better livelihoods.

The best way to deal with that, Dale said, is to boost the energy efficiency of buildings and other systems.		 该报告对未来最可能设想的中心是，随着全球人口数量的增长和对更加美好生活的追求，大量削减碳排放的需求与不断增长的能源需求之间存在紧张关系。

戴尔说，解决这个问题的最好办法是提高建筑物和其他系统的能源效率。
Still, in all of BP’s scenarios, oil would still be widely used in 2040. The amount could vary from 80 million barrels a day to 130 million barrels a day — a huge gap. Yet even the low-end scenario would require trillions of dollars of investment just in petroleum over the next 20 years. 尽管如此，在英国石油公司的所有设想中，石油在2040年仍将被广泛使用。其需求量可能从每天8000万桶到每天1.3亿桶不等，这是一个巨大的缺口。然而，即便是最低端的情况，也需要在未来20年仅在石油领域就投入数万亿美元。
Indeed, history shows how hard it has been for societies to move from one form of power production to another, Dale said. Previous energy transitions have taken about four or five decades, he said. 事实上，历史表明，社会从一种形式的能源生产转移到另一种形式是多么困难，戴尔说。他说，上一次的能源转型大约花了四五十年的时间。
It took almost 45 years, for example, for oil to go from 1 percent of world energy in the late 1800s to 10 percent. It took natural gas more than half a century to catch on.

Renewables will penetrate the global energy system faster than any fuel in history, Dale said, going from 1 percent to 10 percent in just 15 years.		 例如，石油占世界能源的比例从19世纪末的1%上升到10%，用了将近45年的时间。天然气用了半个多世纪才流行起来。

戴尔说，可再生能源将比历史上任何一种燃料更快地渗入全球能源系统，在短短15年内从1%增长到10%。
But BP’s analysis suggests that is not fast enough to stem the growth of climate-warming emissions. Even though new renewable energy will satisfy about half of the new energy demand, carbon dioxide emissions are likely to increase by about 10 percent instead of falling sharply as needed to stem climate change. 但英国石油的分析表明，这一速度不足以遏制气候变暖排放的增长。尽管新的可再生能源将满足大约一半的新能源需求，但二氧化碳排放量可能会增加约10%，而不是像遏制气候变化所需要的那样急剧下降。
Overall, global energy demand probably will grow by around a third by 2040, slower than the previous 20 years but still enough to make it difficult to lower greenhouse gas emissions as needed. 总体而言，到2040年，全球能源需求可能将增长约三分之一，增速低于此前20年，但仍足以使温室气体排放量难以按需降低。
Around 80 percent of that increase in demand will come from the developing world, yet a substantial proportion — two-thirds — of the world’s population will still consume low amounts of energy 21 years from now. 需求增长的80%左右将来自发展中国家，但21年后，世界人口中很大比例——三分之二——仍将消耗较低的能源。
BP has said it wants the federal government to take action, having endorsed a $40-a-ton nationwide tax. But that doesn't mean the company always supports carbon taxes in practice. BP spent more than any other company last year to defeat a carbon-fee ballot initiative in the state of Washington that the company said was "poorly designed." The proposal ultimately fell short with voters in November. 英国石油公司表示，希望联邦政府采取行动，并支持在全国范围内征收40美元一吨的石油税。但这并不意味着该公司在实践中总是支持征收碳排放税。英国石油公司去年在华盛顿州花费了比其他任何公司都多的钱来挫败一项碳排放税的投票提案，该公司称这项提案“设计得很糟糕”。这项提案最终未能在11月获得选民的支持。
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