The renewable power industry and other corporate entities who stand to profit from international carbon dioxide restrictions are funding the United Nations’ March 2009 International Scientific Conference, casting severe doubt on the conference’s objectivity.
“It is completely unseemly that ‘renewable energy’ profiteers are paying the U.N.’s scaremongers to help keep them in the business of insulting true science,” said Robert Ferguson, president of the Science and Public Policy Institute.
“The Indian government is questioning the U.N.’s credibility, with India’s Science and Technology minister Kapil Sibal describing the latest climate-related report as ‘propaganda,'” Ferguson noted.
The conference’s “star sponsors” include the world’s leading installer of wind turbines, a developer of electric/hybrid car batteries, an ethanol development company, the developer of a carbon tax model for new cars, a “climate-neutral” building constructor, an insulation manufacturer, and a “carbon-neutral” building engineer company.
All stand to profit handsomely from significant carbon dioxide restrictions that would simultaneously force an increase in consumer energy prices.
Big Money at Stake
Nicholas Stern, who as a political appointee of British Labour politician Gordon Brown wrote a widely discredited report asserting the world will face economic and social chaos unless immediate carbon dioxide restrictions are adopted, summarized what is at stake for the sponsors and other “green” companies if the conference does not throw its support behind severe carbon dioxide restrictions.
Speaking September 10 at the Sustainable Leadership Symposium, Stern warned carbon dioxide emissions markets would “collapse” if the Copenhagen conference does not agree to new carbon dioxide restrictions. “Markets depend on confidence, and rule structures, and if you lose the confidence, and lose the rule structures, you will badly damage the carbon markets,” he said.
Stern has been invited to be a keynote speaker at the conference.
Climate scientists at universities and research institutions around the world have criticized the U.N. for bias and cronyism in its global warming conferences and reports. While the U.N. claims its Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) represents the consensus view of more than 2,000 of the world’s leading scientists, the content of IPCC’s final reports are determined by merely a few dozen lead authors, including staffers for Greenpeace, Environment Canada, and Environmental Defense.
The latest IPCC report received thousands of critical comments and suggested corrections from IPCC participants themselves.
Dueling Conferences
Although the U.N.’s March conference has a self-described goal of gathering and sharing the latest developments in global warming research, the preconceived conclusions are apparent from the conference’s agenda. Topics to be addressed include “Global Warming: How to Solve an Intractable Problem?” “Preparing for Impacts: Adapting to the Inevitable,” “Managing the Planet,” and “Mobilizing the Populace.”
On March 8-10, just days before the U.N. conference, climate experts from around the world will gather in New York City for a more objective discussion of global warming. The 2009 International Conference on Climate Change will feature climate scientists from many of the world’s most prestigious universities and will have no corporate sponsors.
More information about the latter conference, including attendance opportunities, can be found at http://www.heartland.org/events/NewYork09/newyork09.html.
James M. Taylor ([email protected]) is a senior fellow of The Heartland Institute and managing editor of Environment & Climate News.
