This year’s Conference of the Parties to the U.N. climate agreements, or COP, is being held in the Emirate of Dubai, arguably the world’s most extravagant display of oil wealth. Ironies abound. The host and president of this year’s conference, Sultan Ahmed al Jaber, happens also to be the CEO of the United Arab Emirates’ national oil company. An embarrassing contretemps was inevitable and finally materialized on no less a subject than “net zero,” the COP’s essential objective of reducing global “greenhouse gas” emissions through a combination of reduced emissions and carbon sequestration.
“There is no science out there, or no scenario out there, that says that the phaseout of fossil fuel is what’s going to achieve 1.5 C [degrees Celsius],” said al Jaber onstage recently, “unless you want to take the world back into caves.” Climate activists…
