Copenhagen Conference Has Massive Carbon Footprint

FRIDAY, 04 DECEMBER 2009 14:21

The veracity of proponents of the theory of man-made climate change is very much in doubt in the days leading up to the UN conference in Copenhagen. However, one thing that will be proven beyond a doubt in the next several weeks is that not all pollution is created equal: Some pollution is apparently sanctified by the context of its generation. The upcoming UN Climate Change conference is going to have a carbon "footprint" that would not fit in a pair of snowshoes, and the delegates’ alleged contribution to global warming will not be limited to the political hot air of their speechifying. According to a report at FOXNews.com: The U.N. estimates the 12-day conference will create 40,584 tons of carbon dioxide equivalents, roughly the same amount as the carbon emissions of Morocco in 2006. Those greenhouse gas emissions are comprised of two parts: international travel and local emissions from hotels and transportation venues. Organizers will also reportedly lay 900 kilometers of computer cable and 50,000 square miles of carpet, along with more than 200,000 meals to be served and 200,000 cups of coffee. The one bright spot is that the announcement that former Vice President Al Gore will not be delivering one of his soporific speeches at Copenhagen may result in a statistically significant reduction in the amount of coffee consumed by delegates striving to remain awake. Given the sudden implosion of what little remained of the credibility of the global-warming theory in the wake of “Climategate,” the destruction of data at the Climate Research Unit of the University of East Anglia, and the embarrassing delays at NASA regarding their own ability to produce the data that allegedly informed that agency’s findings, one might wonder what could remain on the conference agenda. Nevertheless, lacking demonstrable scientific proof to support the radical agenda that was originally advanced for Copenhagen, it may still be expected that the “four essential” questions recently set forth by UN officials remain on track for discussion and action: 1. How much are the industrialized countries willing to reduce their emissions of greenhouse gases? 2. How much are major developing countries such as China and India willing to do to limit the growth of their emissions? 3. How is the help needed by developing countries to engage in reducing their emissions and adapting to the impacts of climate change going to be financed? 4. How is that money going to be managed? In short, while delegates whose raison d’être for gathering in the first place has been subjected to justified public ridicule, nothing will have changed concerning the fundamental policy goals that will be set forth before the world. And the United States delegation will apparently be leading the way to accomplishing an agenda that threatens the prosperity of their own nation. Again, according to FOXNews.com: President Obama will travel to the Danish capital on Dec. 9 to offer his goal of cutting emissions 17 percent by 2020, in line with a bill passed by the House in June and slightly less than a 20-percent decrease proposed in the Senate. “The president going to Copenhagen will give positive momentum to the negotiations,” Michael Froman, Obama’s deputy national security adviser for international economies, told reporters last month. “We think it will enhance prospects for success.” Joined by up to seven cabinet members, Obama will also propose reducing emissions by 83 percent by 2050 and a 30 percent reduction in 2005 levels by 2025. China and India have said industrialized countries like the United States — the biggest greenhouse gas producer among developed nations — must be willing to slash carbon output 40 percent by 2020 from 1990 levels if it expects poorer economies to agree to long-term goals. Such reductions can only be accomplished at a very great cost. That the rationale for enduring such costs has been undermined, if not eliminated entirely, why proceed? In part because the political elites cannot endure looking foolish, and in part because it is the environmental excuse for the agenda for a radical economic redistribution that will be pushed at Copenhagen, which has been about power and social engineering all along. In advancing their agenda, the internationalists can justify anything — even the pollution they produce while "saving the Earth from pollution."