Climate Change Is Not an Emergency: A Discussion With Bjorn Lomborg

Climate change is a practical problem, not a moral one Has ‘skeptical environmentalist’ and scourge of Greenpeace Bjorn Lomborg really had a change of heart and turned green? Er, no, he tells spiked. Rob Lyons ‘“Skeptical environmentalist” and critic of climate scientists to declare global warming a chief concern facing world’, declared the front page of a British broadsheet newspaper in August this year. It suggested that recent comments made by the Danish author Bjorn Lomborg were ‘an apparent U-turn that will give a huge boost to the embattled environmental lobby’. (...) 

Environmental protesters and politicians around the world are calling for countries to become carbon neutral by 2050, if not sooner. These proposals get a lot of attention, but they would incur far higher costs than almost any electorate is willing to pay.

The Covid-19 pandemic has whittled away two years of economic development. It has also made it difficult for countries worldwide to adhere to 2030 Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) targets. The world pledged to, among other things, end extreme poverty, ensure universal healthcare and provide education for all children by 2030.