As you know, I think and speak a lot about subsidies, and their impacts in market distortion as well as environmental & social damage. Data unfortunately is hard to come by, so please let me know any good sources you know of. Two suggested to me today: Earthtrack, and the Global Subsidies Initiative which says (in their Policy Brief Achieving the G-20 Call to Phase Out Subsidies to Fossil Fuels (PDF)
It is difficult to postulate a global figure for fossil-fuel subsidies, but the GSI estimates that the annual figure could be at least $500 billion—the majority (around $400 billion) from subsidized end-user prices, and the balance from producer subsidies. Roughly $500 billion a year is equivalent to 1 per cent of world gross domestic product, the figure that the Stern Review1 estimated was required to limit global warming to no more than a 2° Celsius rise in temperature.
Got that? Subsidize energy, or limit global warming. Same price. You pays your money and you takes your choice.
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