Britain’s “conservative” administration led by Rishi Sunak has opened the door to paying “climate reparations” to poor countries:
Britain has opened the door to paying climate change reparations to developing countries by supporting talks on the issue at the Cop27 summit.
On Sunday, at the meeting in Egypt, UK negotiators backed a last-minute agreement to address “loss and damage” payments to countries badly affected by climate-related disasters.
Climate-related disasters have existed from the beginning of time. “Reparations” are based on the assumption that “climate change” has made such disasters worse for poor countries, which is not true. But science has no role here; we are in the realm of politics and propaganda.
The good news is that the contemplated reparations are cheap:
Rishi Sunak will appear at the conference in Sharm el-Sheikh on Monday, where he will pledge £65.5 million for green technology in developing countries.
That is peanuts, of course. But I doubt that it will stop there. Once you concede a principle, you have to live with the implications of your concession.
Sadly, the Conservatives’ leadership seems to be entirely on the “green” train:
Boris Johnson will also deliver a speech warning against the “naysayers” who threaten Net Zero targets.
“Net zero” is a horrible idea that will vastly degrade the quality of life for pretty much all human beings. Politicians throw around these phrases without having any understanding of the relevant sciences, or of the implications of their commitments.
Pakistan is leading a push by developing countries including Bangladesh and the Maldives for compensation from richer countries responsible for most of the world’s pollution.
That isn’t true, actually. Pollution occurs mainly in poor areas, like socialist countries. Prosperity is the best antidote to pollution, as experience has shown. It is mostly the poorer areas of the world that pollute. For example, one of the world’s most significant environmental issues is the vast amount of plastic that flows into the oceans. Nearly all of that plastic–from memory, 90%–comes from seven rivers in Africa and Asia.
The reality is that poorer countries are polluting the Earth, to the detriment of the rest of us. It might make sense to give them some money to help clean up their pollution, but pumping dollars into “green” climate projects will do nothing to address actual pollution, and will only make the situation worse.
UPDATE: It turns out that China has emitted more CO2 in the last years than the U.K. has since the Industrial Revolution:
China has emitted more carbon dioxide over the past eight years than the UK has since the start of the Industrial Revolution, figures have shown.
Between 1750 and 2020, the UK emitted 78 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, compared with China’s emissions of 80 billion tonnes since 2013.
Of course, no one is asking for reparations from China. Can the Western powers really be dumb enough to fall for this scam? I don’t know. They might be.
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