Thomas Sterner at The Economist says that there really is a near-consensus among economists on how to reduce carbon emissions.

Economists keep on repeating: all you need is a price on carbon. This is true in one narrow sense: had there—by some (peak-oil or other) magic had there been a high price on carbon then the world economy would just adapt and we would hardly notice—just like we have “adapted” to expensive gold and titanium.

But the problems are practical and political.

The problem lies in how to design the institutions and instruments that create that high price when the market does not. Subsidies must be removed, fossil fuels taxed (or subjected to permit trade) and all countries need to agree on the details in a way that all find “fair”. In Copenhagen, people hoped for a treaty that kept warming below two degrees and an agreement that was generous in giving poor countries more of the remaining space.

One idea is for a decentralized system where individual countries each create carbon markets, then link them later.

The negative attitude to heavy UN negotiations is so strong that some welcome a more “decentralised architecture” of the climate negotiations and policymaking. Some claim we do not need an agreement. It is sufficient for each country to have an individual target and permit trading scheme and then all the permit schemes could be linked together. Linked permit markets would exhibit all the advantages to trade and circumvent the need for an international agreement.

It sounds like the strategy is to set relatively low, realistic expectations for this summit and then meet them. You can say that doing something is certainly better than doing nothing. You could also say that whatever we do will be too little, too late to solve the problem. Our deeply flawed species has failed this test and we are going to suffer the consequences.