What a grandiose mouthful of verbiage.
The Subsidiary Body for Implementation of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (SBI-UNFCCC) just wrapped up its latest session in Bonn, Germany. Abbreviated SB64, it was the 64th meeting of this austere group of “multi-stakeholder coalitions” — politicians, government bureaucrats, business rent-seekers and “civil society” activists — some 7,000 strong.
They chattered and schemed for ten days (June 8-18) to set the stage and agenda for COP31, the 31st UN Conference of the Parties, set to take place in Turkey later this year — the annual gathering of climate-obsessed and cash-hungry countries.
SB64 was determined to “accelerate implementation” of previous climate goals, intoned Turkey’s COP31 President-Designate Murat Kurum. Why? Because “our common home, the Earth, is passing through one of the most critical periods it has ever faced.” (How many times have we heard that one?)
Indeed, following last year’s COP30 in Brazil, the International Court of Justice proclaimed that greenhouse gas emissions “unequivocally” affect Earth’s “entire climate system” and pose an “existential” threat to “all forms of life and the very health of our planet.”
Therefore, the court decreed, any developed countries that fail to do their part in preventing further climate change will violate the fundamental “human right” to a “clean, healthy, and sustainable environment” — and could face civil and criminal actions for their “internationally wrongful acts.” How convenient.
SB64 and the upcoming COP31 set “clear, measurable targets” that they expect countries worldwide to achieve by 2035. This is to ensure, say they, that previously set goals “are translated fully into action,” through “shared responsibility, strong cooperation, and determined implementation.”
Of course, you everyday workers and other folks weren’t invited. You had no say about your planet-saving future. That was the job for government, NGOs, and other far-Left “stakeholders” who know what is best for you and your family, community, country, and planet. Among their action items:
- Accelerate the clean energy transition by raising the global electrification rate to 35% — with wind and solar power.
- Reduce the energy intensity of buildings 25% to make cities “more resilient and efficient.”
- Advance green industrialization, production, and manufacturing by increasing “circular material use” to 15% or more globally.
- Give “every young person” worldwide access to education “that builds awareness of the climate crisis” and every young farmer training in “climate-resilient agricultural practices.”
- Help countries turn “Nationally Determined Contributions” into “investable project portfolios” in the future “global green economy.”
Allow me to translate this into plain English and real-world actions. In short, the UN wants to ram through a fantasy of unreliable wind and solar “electrification,” inefficient “efficiency” mandates, mandatory recycling quotas, youth indoctrination, and a massive wealth transfer disguised as a “green economy” slush fund.
All this is a pipe dream.
The only things African, Asian and other emerging economies are “transitioning” to are coal, oil, gas, and nuclear. And who can blame them?
It beats burning wood and dung and living a life of energy poverty. They’ve watched Germany, Britain and other countries wreck their economies, job creation, and living standards with hairbrained Green energy schemes. They know electrifying everything and running it on intermittent wind and solar power is a prescription for disaster.
As for “recycling,” well, that will work when it makes practical and economic sense — not when unelected UN bureaucrats demand it.
And all this talk of “building awareness” of the alleged climate crisis is nothing but spreading alarmist climate hype to young people — all designed to ensure that sober facts and alternative viewpoints are never heard.
Regarding Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), investable project portfolios, global green economies and shared responsibility and cooperation — these are pure UN-speak for seizing billions and trillions of dollars from currently wealthy nations and handing their money over to developing countries (especially their kleptocrat rulers) as “reparations” for past climate sins.
Other UN climate goals and action items, typical at these conferences, include replacing meat with insect-based protein, crowding people into high-rise apartment buildings in “walkable, sustainable” cities, slashing annual economic growth, and telling people what jobs they may hold, how many square feet they may inhabit, how and how often they may travel, and how many “climate migrants” they will be required to accept in their communities.
Thankfully, President Donald Trump has pulled the United States out of the UNFCCC, Paris Treaty, and attendance at climate COPs. Other countries are also reconsidering their subservience to UN ruling elites and energy and climate control fantasies.
The charade is likely to continue, because so much money, prestige, and power is at stake. But the future still belongs to coal, oil, natural gas, and nuclear power — and a willingness to stand up to bullies and charlatans.
Craig Rucker is president of the Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow (www.CFACT.org)
The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the Daily Caller News Foundation.
(DCNF)
