‘Greenwashing’ has gone mainstream, with both governments and corporations profiting without taking any real steps to protect the climate Rachel Marsden is a columnist, political strategist, and host of independently produced talk-shows in French and English.Rachel Marsden is a columnist, political strategist, and host of independently produced talk-shows in French and English.rachelmarsden.comUN Secretary General Antonio Guterres speaks at the COP27 climate Conference in Egypt. © Joseph EID / AFP
Banks and corporations making pledges of ‘net-zero’ emissions are taking the public for a ride, according to a new United Nations report released at this week’s COP27 climate change conference. “We must have zero tolerance for net-zero greenwashing,” UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said, in reference to the concept of virtue-signaling a green agenda for marketing purposes as a strategy to gain more business, all while failing to back up the claims in practice.
Oh, so the airlines asking whether you want to freely donate extra cash when buying a plane ticket to offset the carbon footprint of your flight aren’t technically achieving much beyond making the insufferably sanctimonious feel good about themselves? Or that the energy companies using renewables as window dressing are nonetheless continuing to invest in fossil fuels? You don’t say! In case the idealists haven’t noticed, there’s currently an energy crunch in the West due to Western sanctions on fuel from Russia – and renewables aren’t anywhere near ready for prime time as a replacement.
Germans are turning instead to coal and firewood, while France is scrambling to ramp up nuclear power. The EU even backpedaled at the beginning of the year in labeling gas and nuclear ‘green’ – which now conveniently allows its leaders to run around to fossil fuel pariah countries asking for desperately needed energy.
Might as well, though, for all the good that this pricey and pretentious charade is doing. The UN says that more financing, to the tune of up to $340 billion per year by 2030, is the key. Anything less is apparently futile. The notion of massive funding being necessary to prevent Earth’s temperature from increasing by 1.5C above pre-industrial levels is a tough sell, particularly in the absence of any logical explanation of how the cash would credibly be used to realistically adjust the thermostat, so officials now seem to be trying a new sales pitch. “The world must step up and protect people and communities from the immediate and ever-growing risks of the climate emergency. We have no time to lose,” Guterres said, with the UN citing things like flooding in Pakistan and multi-year droughts as justification for the funding.
Greenwashing is just another way of scamming the hopelessly naive. And no one does it better than governments themselves, who have managed to relieve taxpayers of countless billions to fill slush funds under the guise of saving the world.
And now US President Joe Biden is using a green pretext to protect US economic interests to the detriment of European allies – even as the US ramps up fossil fuel liquefied natural gas exports to the EU. Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act is conveniently framed as a green energy initiative, offering US consumers tax incentives to buy American electric cars with batteries that have at least 40% of components from the US or a country with which it has free trade. Germany and France view the measures as blatant protectionism.
“We must react fast. I’m calling for a united, strong and coordinated response from the EU to our American allies. There is a risk of a major shock for French and European industry. Either they will be resolved there, and we hope they will, that’s why we have the task force to discuss this, or we will have to go to the WTO and envisage retaliatory measures,” French Economy Minister Bruno Le Maire said. “I have not been assured that the American side has completely grasped how great our concerns about the consequences are,” German Economy Minister Christian Lindner added. Japan and South Korea are also protesting the new move, demanding equal treatment for their products.
It was only a matter of time before a Western government would use an environmental pretext for self-serving economic reasons. “The Americans are buying American and pursuing a very aggressive strategy of state aid. The Chinese are closing their market. We cannot be the only area, the most virtuous in terms of climate, which considers that there is no European preference,” Macron told Les Echos last month, suggesting that the greenwashing of the protectionism scam is something that the EU should be copying. Macron even greenwashed his anger and frustrations at the Cop27 conference, with a jab at the US and China to “pay their climate fair share.”
Is there any limit to greenwashing? Apparently not. Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky said in a recorded message to the conference that “there can be no effective climate policy without peace.” Since Zelensky apparently considers peace to be won only through endless cash and weapons, it looks like he’s now greenwashed those, too.
Why should the elites have all the fun? The average person might want to try greenwashing their life by projecting environmental virtue everywhere they go in order to extract a few extra bucks out of folks on a daily basis – like from the taxi driver who spent too long idling in traffic, or from the houseguest who opened the window and made you have to use that much more heat, or from the friend who ordered the meat dish at dinner responsible for the most Earth-killing flatulence while it was alive.
Anyone who hasn’t caught on to the green scam by now would likely welcome the increased citizen policing and be only too happy to comply with demands that they empty their wallet – into your hands, into a lake, or a toilet, for that matter – to compensate for their transgressions.
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He’s baaaaack!!!
Look who’s spewing his rhetoric again!
“We need four and a half trillion dollars per year to make this transition and that can only come by unlocking access to private capital in the United States and in Canada.”
We were past the point of no return 25x’s or more now. Funny how it all comes down to $$$$$$$…..yours.
ssdd
It’s just another 3-card monte shakedown:
They couldn’t care less about humanity or the Earth.
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The kakistocracy’s (from Greek kakistos ‘worst’ + -cracy [from Kratos]; in Greek mythology, Kratos is the divine personification of strength.) useful idjits:
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Hundreds more well-written links:
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https://www.technocracy.news/category/climate-change/
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All roads lead to depop: https://www.technocracy.news/category/sustainable-development/ – Humanity is the carbon they wish to reduce.
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You will be digitized and assimilated:
From this tag/category:
https://www.technocracy.news/category/technocracy/
Speaking of COP27….
Burst sewage pipe adds to infrastructure woes at COP27
First there was no water. Then there was too much of the wrong kind.
Attendees of this year’s U.N. climate conference in Egypt found themselves stepping over streams of foul-smelling fluid Wednesday after a pipe or tank holding liquid waste appeared to have burst near one of the venue’s main thoroughfares.
The incident was the latest of several infrastructure and planning problems that have emerged this week during the conference, which runs through Nov. 18. Participants have complained that basic necessities such as drinking water and food are not available or require lengthy queuing under the simmering Sinai sun. Floors sometimes buckle and toilet paper in the various venues has frequently run out.
The problems raise broader issues about planning for an event meant to help solve climate change and promote green living.
Giant AC units blow cold air into vast tent-like buildings with little insulation and doors wide open. Empty rooms are brightly lit into the night. Solar panels, wind turbines or electric vehicles are hard to find.
https://apnews.com/article/middle-east-africa-egypt-climate-and-environment-2834d271dcd0aa686b7a30bf13db85af
Okay … since we must make a choice, Al … we choose death … yours …
it is the big lie. What they don’t want you to know is that the real issue is pollution of the environment which the global corporations are most responsible for.
Credit-fueled excess consumerism contributes.
A Billionaire Is Responsible for a Million Times More Emissions Than the Average Person: Oxfam Report
The investments of 125 of the world’s richest billionaires yield an annual average of three million tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions a year, more than a million times the average for someone in the bottom 90% of humanity, according to a new report by the non-profit group Oxfam.
The super-rich have a collective $2.4 trillion stake in 183 companies and cumulatively, these 125 billionaires fund 393 million tonnes of CO2e (carbon dioxide equivalent) per year, which is equal to the annual carbon emissions of France, a nation of 67 million people…
The report says that the actual figure is likely to be higher still, as published carbon emissions by corporates “have been shown to systematically underestimate the true level of carbon impact”
https://thewire.in/environment/billionaires-greenhouse-gas-emissions-oxfam-report
CO2 is plant food.
And plants are oxygen; ergo, all the green agenda we need.
Let nature do its work, econazis. Humans are part of nature.
I just gotta say…fuck these idiots and their 1st world bullshit delusions. I’ve had enough.
Here is the trajectory for slavery
Cease carbon energy production, prohibit ICE engines, tell everyone they will buy electric vehicles in the future, when the future arrives tell them the EVs are not environmentally friendly and will be limited therefore the slaves will have to move to the cities and take the bus.
Agenda 21/20230/2060.
Went to Meijer in Highland today .Roads are packed with idiot niggers.Watched some black imbecile go through a red light to turn on to Indianapolis Blvd from 173rd st to get on I80 .The car he was driving 25 years old held together with tape and bungee cords lol. The poor old white guy that hit him was driving an 80 k truck niggers gonna sue his ass off and make money guaranteed.
My jeep’s 25 years old. Runs fine and I’ll keep driving it until the seat brackets rust through the floor and it falls thru until you can’t see the top of my head…. I just replaced the struts on all 4 corners as they were all busted. I wondered why it wiggled a little at 70 mph on the interstate. Drives like new now… Sorta..
No duct tape or bungee cords ?
Shoe Goo, bitchez . . .
https://dks.scene7.com/is/image/GolfGalaxy/16IFOUSHGXXXXXXXXGSA?wid=2000&fmt=pjpeg
Zip ties
cotter pins
They are gonna make it so bad we’ll have no choice but to join or die .I don’t have many years left If family history is an indicator,but then we all might be leaving together sooner than we think.Money buys half of what it did 10 years ago.I so tired of this shit.
‘ … like from the taxi driver who spent too long idling in traffic, or from the houseguest who opened the window and made you have to use that much more heat, or from the friend who ordered the meat dish at dinner responsible for the most Earth-killing flatulence while it was alive.’
I recently bought a 2022 VW Golf GTI … which is, rather distressingly, more like a video game console than an automobile — what with all of the IQ.drive bullsnit and such … It recently splashed a ‘warning’ on the touch screen in the center of the dash panel that warned me to close my car windows — having them open was lowering my fuel economy. Strangely, though, no such warning appeared when I turned on the A/C … which has been shown for decades to cause a 10-12% drop in fuel economy … or by my use of 10% ethanol gasoline in the US, which also causes a 12-15% loss of fuel economy.