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The chattering classes who jet to conferences at Davos or Aspen have for years been telling the rest of us that our biggest immediate threats are climate change, environmental disasters and biodiversity loss. Yet, their singular focus on climate change ignores that people are much more worried about rampant inflation, especially rising food and energy prices.
Unfortunately, climate policies are making those problems worse. Lomborg writes in The Wall Street Journal that when people are cold, hungry and broke, they rebel. If the elites continue pushing incredibly expensive policies that are disconnected from the urgent challenges facing most people, we need to brace for chaos.
He also discussed this topic in interviews with Paul Gigot on The Journal Editorial Report, with Laura Ingraham and with Stuart Varney.
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The rich are denying the poor the power to develop
Rich countries - despite their climate rhetoric - are heavily relying on coal, oil and gas to cope with the current energy crisis. Yet, the G7 recently decided to stop funding any fossil fuel projects in the developing world, immorally blocking the path for poorer countries to develop. This is clearly not what developing countries want, as their leaders and ordinary citizens have made very clear.
Read Lomborg's latest column which is being syndicated around the world, with publications so far including newspapers across the US such as Detroit News and Las Vegas Review-Journal, Financial Post (Canada), Business Day (South Africa), The Australian, Tempi (Italy), Berlingske (Denmark), Finmag (Czech Republic), Portfolio (Hungary) and Morgunbladid (Iceland).
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The Copenhagen Consensus approach has successfully introduced a rational, data-driven input to national priority-setting in many countries, including Bangladesh, Haiti, India, Ghana and Malawi in recent years.
With the UN's Sustainable Development Goals reaching their halfway mark by the end of this year, it is time to assess how much progress countries have made towards the goals, and what they should focus on over the following eight years to create the largest-possible benefits for their societies.
Lomborg argues in a full page article for the leading Honduran newspaper El Heraldo that data from economic science can help politicians and their officials pick more of the really effective programs and slightly fewer of the less so, to maximize social returns for every dollar spent.
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President Biden enthusiastically describes his administration's new Inflation Reduction Act as "the most significant legislation in history to tackle the climate crisis." Curiously though, neither officials nor media praising the IRA are stating the actual climate impact of spending $369 billion on the bill's climate provisions.
There's a good reason for this: As Lomborg explains on social media and TV interviews, e.g. with Varney and Kudlow, the UN's own climate model shows that the impact will be impossible to detect by mid-century and still unnoticeable even in the best case by the year 2100.
Lomborg's findings were also highlighted in a Wall Street Journal editorial and by Fox News which reported that the White House and leading proponents of the bill "didn't respond to inquiries" pointing out that the bill would slow down rising temperatures by merely 0.0009°F to 0.028°F in 2100.
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The climate-policy approach of trying to push consumers and businesses away from fossil fuels with price spikes is causing substantial pain with little climate pay-off. In rich countries, this approach risks growing resentment and strife, as France saw with the “yellow vest” protest movement.
But for the poorest billions, rising energy prices are even more serious because they block the pathway out of poverty and make fertilizer unaffordable for farmers, imperiling food production. The well-off in rich countries might be able to withstand the pain of some climate policies, but emerging economies like India or low-income countries in Africa cannot afford to sacrifice poverty eradication and economic development to tackle climate change.
Read Bjorn Lomborg's globally-syndicated column in publications such as New York Post and Press of Atlantic City (both USA), Financial Post (Canada), Neue Zürcher Zeitung (Switzerland), O Globo (Brazil), The Australian, Berlingske (Denmark), de Telegraaf (Netherlands), Tempi (Italy), Listy z naszego sadu (Poland), Addis Fortune (Ethiopia), Milenio (Mexico), El Periodico (Guatemala), La Prensa (Nicaragua), La Tercera (Chile), El Pais (Uruguay), La Prensa Grafica (El Salvador), El Universal (Venezuela), CRHoy (Costa Rica) and Listy z naszego sadu (Poland).
Lomborg also discussed the importance of affordable and reliable energy on Tucker Carlson Tonight.
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Bjorn Lomborg's bestselling book False Alarm* is now available in more than a dozen languages. Here is the Chinese edition, other translations include German, Czech, Spanish, Finnish, Norwegian and many more.
The book remains an international success. The English original has been reprinted eight times in hardcover and six times in paperback, and several translations are also being reprinted now.
*As an Amazon Associate Copenhagen Consensus earns from qualifying purchases.
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