February 26, 2021 - 5:17pm
Mark Carney is Davos Man personified — one of those globetrotting super-leaders untroubled by the messy business of actually getting elected (or, at least, not anymore). Other examples of the caste include Bill Gates, Christine Lagarde, John Kerry and David Miliband.
These folk don’t have to signal their virtue; it is simply assumed as part of that aura of liberal respectability at that surrounds them at all times.
Except that Carney’s halo looks a little tarnished today. Since his stint as governor as the Bank of England (and high-status Brexit antagonist), he’s been earning a crust at Brookfield Asset Management which invests in “long-life, high-quality assets and businesses in more than 30 countries around the world.”
However, when Greenpeace took a look at those “high-quality assets”, they found they were reported to include major investments in the fossil fuel industry (including some of the dirtiest sectors like coal and oil sands).
But so what? We all use fossil fuels — both directly and indirectly. Indeed, for the time being, our whole way of life still depends on them. Someone’s got to fund the infrastructure that makes it all work.
However, Mark Carney’s problem is that his other jobs since leaving the Bank of England include United Nations Special Envoy for Climate Action and Finance and Boris Johnson’s finance advisor for the forthcoming COP26 climate change conference.
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SubscribeNo let’s not bother. Let’s end the hypocrisy by giving up banging on about climate change and zero carbon instead. I’m sitting by a huge, open, blazing coal and coke fire.
We sit around a camp fire in the evening of 2-3 burning tires, warm and bright, keeps the bugs away, and is green as they are ones I gather from the local fly-tipped woods and I leave the trees un-cut.
Obviously it is not great having tires lying around in the woods but burning them is not good for you. tires are better recycled in designed plants or used in construction projects.
See https://www.elaw.org/content/health-impacts-open-burning-used-scrap-tires-and-potential-solutions-science-memo
“Air emissions from open tire fires have been shown to be more toxic (e.g., mutagenic) than those of a combustor, regardless of the fuel. Open tire fire emissions include “criteria” pollutants, such as particulates, carbon monoxide (CO), sulfur oxides (SO2), oxides of nitrogen (NOx), and volatile organic compounds (VOCs). They also include “non-criteria” hazardous air pollutants (HAPs), such as polynuclear aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), dioxins, furans, hydrogen chloride, benzene, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs); and metals such as arsenic, cadmium, nickel, zinc, mercury, chromium, and vanadium. Both criteria and HAP emissions from an open tire fire can represent significant acute (short-term) and chronic (long-term) health hazards to firefighters and nearby residents. Depending on the length and degree of exposure, these health effects could include irritation of the skin, eyes, and mucous membranes, respiratory effects, central nervous system depression, and cancer.
Yes I’m just thinking about setting mine actually as it is turning a bit chilly now. I have no children and I suppose I’m a selfish old so as the earth can burn for all I care as long as my evenings and my tootsies are nice and warm. Chin chin and bottoms up I say! Have a great evening Alison.
“Keep the home fires burning!”
What about the future of the planet that your grandchildren might hope to inherit? Does that mean nothing as you toast yourself ‘medium rare’ by your “huge,open, blazing coal and coke fire”?
Is it really that cold in Goole?
It means nothing because it isn’t real, only perceived as such.
I’m glad you believe all the crystal ball gazing the MMCC group are doing. These are the same ones who predicted peak oil for ages, and ice age (back in the 1970s) global warming then climate change because people hadn’t noticed it getting warm etc etc
Would you prefer a crystal ball instead?
Everyone’s goolies will be cold under net zero.
Not sure if the world should worry about your open coal and coke fire but you should. The micro particulates from all solid fuel fires are horrendous even if in the latest high efficiency and sealed burner. In Copenhagen the particulates from solid fuel fires exceed those from all transport throughout the entire year. Similar in UK with even fewer solid fuel users. Wood, in particular, is much better as a building material than it is as a fuel.
This article is Woke to the level of nuttiness. If anyone does investing they need a pallet of investing. You will have a long wait till the electric ambulance arrives at your house so grow up about oil.
Indeed. Or the electric plane to the climate conference.
Quit with the phoney fait accompli.
Bank execs are morally wrong to play politics with other people’s money and that’s the end of it.
Please don’t call them “Bank execs”, they are and always have been, ‘Money Lenders’, and incidentally work in ‘Counting Houses, not Banks.
As for this Zero Carbon piffle, they would sell their own grandmothers for sixpence given half a chance!
I don’t understand this laser-like focus on Co2 emissions (hinging on shadowy models and global diktats) and the relative quiet about oceans, land management and the like.
The disconnect fuels my suspicion that the Green movement has nothing to do with ecology.
I agree with you, Lauren. However, I suggest you use the term greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, rather than CO2 emissions? This is really what is at issue, since a tonne of methane emissions actually contributes much more to global warming than a tonne of CO2 emissions. Of course emissions of other gases are always measured in terms of their carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e) to allow for apples to apples comparisons. Sloppy language leads to sloppy thinking, which is why the green warriors indulge in it, and the rest of us should avoid it.
“it undermines the moral authority of those in power to tell the rest of us to change the way we live”
Who doffs their hat and does what ‘those in power’ say? In a democracy, those in power are there as servants and representatives working for the people – not our overseers.
Meanwhile environmental campaigners like Greenpeace bang on about the climate, while trying to curtail investment in nuclear power – the fastest and most practical solution to CO2 emission in our armoury.
That’ll be the day when they consider themselves OUR servants I fear..
James Lovelock (101) the High Priest of Green tosh in the 70’s and co- contributor the Gaia Hypothesis, did quite an amazing volte face in 2004 by proclaiming that Nuclear Power was the only way to stop Global warming and move forward.
Needless to say he has hardly been heard of since, which is a great pity.
Lovelock is a traitor pure and simple!
Obviously holding any view at odds with virtue signalling herd is traitorous
Hopefully countries are not going for net zero.
Mind you people like Peter, who pretends he can count seems very keen on it.
Look at the actual numbers for electricity production today (27/02/20). Wind power is producing one thirtieth (yes 1/30) of its rated capacity. Which is 1 / 50 of total electricity demand (as at 19.00 hrs).
In other words Peter we need 50 times as many Wind Turbines as we have now, to meet this evenings demand. When EV cars are fully introduced we would need 100 times the number of Wind Turbines.
Peter, how much would this cost?
More to the point, what is the point when huge carbon hogs like China are intent on massive growth in their own output. China may very well be the greatest producer of solar panels, I would not dispute that for a moment, but how much of its power generation is dependent upon them? What I am sure of is that China lone is responsible for one third of all the carbon output to the atmosphere and the UK is responsible for less than one percent. We could all vanish tomorrow up the fundament of virtue signalling, zero carbon output, and the planet would not notice at all, because China’s growth will replace it in a heartbeat.
While we freeze cowering over our ineffective air source heat pump radiator systems – and they are spectacularly bad at space heating in our climate, the Chinese will be happily digging up coal, importing coal in massive quantities and burning it in old fashioned coal fired power stations. As I understand it, it is already illegal to install an oil fired boiler, but a huge number of rural people have no gas supply. In a short time, you won’t be allowed to install a gas boiler even if you have gas, and according to my research, the suppliers of air source heat pump systems warn you very clearly that unless your house is totally draught proof and insulated to ridiculous standards (for my house which is a solid stone building, walls two feet thick and no cavity walls) the systems won’t heat adequately such a property. So – what on earth are the politicians doing banning any sort of practical heating system in pursuit of votes from the Green Party loons and Greta Thunberg fans?
What about Roman style underfloor heating?
What about it? While we are on about the Roman’s what about throwing green fools to the lions?
There might be some animal welfare issues to contend with, but otherwise why not?
Yes – indeed – the lions might be harmed by ingesting the bile filled eco loons. One ought to take care not to poison big cats. They deserve better.
What an outrageous suggestion! Do you really not believe in the forthcoming catastrophe of Global Warming?
No
What about it – did they power it with windmills?
I think its a bit unfair to leave Germany out – shut nuclear and use lignite.
Oil and gas companies are set to be a fantastic investment over the next few years as ‘ethical ‘ investors bail out, driving share prices down, but the likely failure of other energy sources to meet demand in the short term maintains profits (current oversupply notwithstanding).
Pace Peter, Carney has no halo to tarnish.
When he was Governor of the Bank of Canada he accepted, quite improperly, the offer of at least one family vacation at the Nova Scotia home of the then Liberal Finance critic, Scott Brison. (I write at least one, because when asked if the 2012 summer vacation was his only family vacation at Brison’s home, Carney refused to reply, maintaining that this was a purely personal matter.) After that, for a while, he was a Liberal Party of Canada attack dog, digging his fangs into Thomas Mulcair, the NDP leader of the Opposition. (The Liberal Party was then the third party in the House of Commons.) In a September 7 speech in Calgary called “Dutch Disease” he attacked, without naming him, one of Mulcair’s signature issues. Long a defender of a tax on greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, Mulcair, a former Quebec Environment Minister, drew on a paper by Serge Coulombe and others that claimed the Canadian manufacturing sector had lost 200,000 jobs between 2002 and 2008 due to the oil boom. The speech, showing Carney’s usual talent for forecasting, predicted continued expansion of oil prices for years in the future, so don’t worry about Dutch Disease. When asked to reconsider or clarify his remarks, which Opposition Leader Mulcair found highly offensive, he refused to do so, not even deigning to say that the kind of tax on GHG emissions Mulcair called for was a policy question that was not, and should not, be addressed in his speech. The speech continued to be widely referenced as an economic expert’s takedown on Mulcair’s proposed tax.
Not long after, Carney decided he would rather be Governor of the Bank of Canada, and his crusade in support of the Alberta oil sands came to an end. Even before he got the job, he had already decided that his new gig required him to support the UK CPI as the best British inflation measure available, although the Canadian CPI, which he had supported without a single caveat his entire public career, was very much more like the about-to-be-introduced RPIJ, which he never seems to have mentioned ever. He would go on to trash the RPI for alleged ( and imaginary) errors in the measurement of housing costs that had never bothered him in the Canadian CPI.
While still Governor of the Bank of England he suddenly emerged as a green warrior, seeing this as a way to become head of the IMF or the ECB or whatever he might have been angling for. The oil sands went from wonderful to awful. However, the big jobs never materialized. He didn’t even get a call to be Justin Trudeau’s Finance Minister, that post going to an economic illiterate who doesn’t know the difference between the deficit and the debt. But I digress. Now Peter asks if Carney isn’t betraying his principles by his current activities at Brookfield Asset Management, investing in the oil sands. Obviously not. Carney has no principles to betray. Peter hasn’t been paying attention.
I checked out my bills today. My electricity costs 19.68 pence per KWH. My gas, on the other hand, only costs 3.32 pence per KWH.
At the present time that seems to mean giving subsidies for which we either pay directly (windfarms feed in tariff) or are carbon taxed. NOt to optimistic for the future.
We didn’t sign up to net zero targets or for equally an ridiculous ‘decommissioning of dirty industries that have no place in the future.’
What planet are you on?
Things are so simple to the simple minded. Franklin on a thinly disguised witch hunt,
If this man is tarnished by his association with Brookfield, where does that leave David and Ruth Archer?