Luxury Beliefs And Energy Policy: The Fatal Conceit
Tilak Doshi
Apr 15, 2023,03:25am EDT
In a remarkable interview on Wednesday with anchor Laura Ingraham of Fox News, Norman Fenton, Professor Emeritus of Risk at Queen Mary University of London, spelt out just what the “net zero” economy really means. Net zero, to remind ourselves, is the rallying policy battle cry of all major governments in the West and intergovernmental agencies such as the International Energy Agency, the World Bank and the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. In the UK context, Prof. Fenton points out that all airports except Heathrow, Belfast & Glasgow will close by 2030. No one will be flying at all by 2050. There will be no new gasoline or diesel cars by 2030 and by 2050 road use will be restricted to 60% of today’s level. Food, heating and energy will be restricted to 60% of today’s levels by 2050. Beef and lamb will be off the menu by 2050.
Many of the restrictions on mobility and social activity will be achieved by “15-minute cities”. These are, Wikipedia informs us, where daily necessities and services, such as work, shopping, education, healthcare, and leisure “can be easily reached by a 15-minute walk or bike ride from any point in the city.”
Prof. Fenton put out his observations in a twitter thread that scored an astonishing number of views — some 3.3 million — which was then followed by the Fox News interview. These consequences of net zero for the UK — and by extension, the rest of the collective West — are not mere conjectures by him. They are derived from a detailed document issued by UK FIRES, a research program funded by the government. The program informs the government’s policy strategy to achieve the “net zero by 2050” goals of the 2019 Climate Change Act amendment. The Act was enthusiastically supported by every political party without public consultation and astonishingly without a debate over the costs and benefits of the legislation.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/tilakdoshi/2023/04/15/luxury-beliefs-and-energy-policy-the-fatal-conceit/?sh=6dd2246eeaa5
