As self-described “world leaders” gather in Copenhagen to lecture the Earth’s population about carbon-dioxide (plant food) emissions, international news reports have revealed that the COP15 Climate Summit ringleaders are arriving in the Danish capital on hundreds of carbon-spewing private jets and riding around in more than 1,200 gas-guzzling limousines once there.
Copenhagen’s international airport reported that just during the peak period of the climate-change summit, it is expecting almost 150 private jets — so many luxury planes, in fact, that they will have to fly to other nearby airports to wait for their passengers after dropping them off in Copenhagen. Ironically, one of the main talking points right now is the imposition of high global taxes on air travel, presumably to fund more "green" initiatives (more likely to fund government largesse like private planes and limos).
“We haven’t got enough limos in the country to fulfill the demand," said Majken Jorgensen, the managing director of the city’s biggest limousine firm. "We’re having to drive them in hundreds of miles from Germany and Sweden." Jorgensen also told the U.K.’s Daily Telegraph that only about five of the climate dignitaries’ vehicles are hybrids. "The government has some alternative fuel cars but the rest will be petrol or diesel. We don’t have any hybrids in Denmark, unfortunately, due to the extreme taxes on those cars. It makes no sense at all, but it’s very Danish."
In an article entitled “Carbonhagen: World Leaders Drive to Climate Summit in Gas-Guzzling Luxury Fleet,” Fox News reported that a bus reserved for the summit delegates “rode along empty outside the conference center.” The delegates who did not arrive in limos showed up in other luxurious gas-guzzlers.
As reported previously by The New American, the so-called “carbon footprint” of the spectacle in Copenhagen will be in excess of 40,000 tons — about the amount emitted by the entire nation of Morocco during 2006. “The upcoming UN Climate Change conference is going to have a carbon ‘footprint’ that would not fit in a pair of snowshoes, and the delegates’ alleged contribution to global warming will not be limited to the political hot air of their speechifying,” pointed out James Heiser.
The revelations have sparked sharp criticism and cries of elitist hypocrisy, even among supporters of anthropogenic global-warming theories and cap-and-trade solutions. Even the leftist Huffington Post had a comment thread about the jets and limos that was filled with harsh words from angry readers. “Do conference organizers and participants not grasp that their behavior undermines the claim the world faces imminent disaster?” wondered one commentator. “Peons go back to the dark ages so we can make room for our stretch limos and private planes,” wrote another.
The Heritage Foundation compared the outlandish situation to an “Alcoholics Anonymous meeting where all the members showed up drunk and with extra cases of wine, beer, and booze to keep them happy.” The difference, the conservative non-profit group notes, is that these metaphorical drunks are “empowered to make trillions of dollars worth of economic decisions for everybody in the world.”
Other observers have highlighted the similarity between the gargantuan amounts of energy being consumed for this summit and Al Gore’s hypocrisy in gobbling up 20 times the annual energy levels of average American households in just one of his mansions. Of course, Gore apparently also makes up for his emission sins by purchasing carbon indulgences (also known as carbon offsets or carbon credits) from his own companies.
As for President Barack Obama, he will fly into Copenhagen on Air Force One, a true gas-guzzler if there ever was one. In addition, his private limo will be flown in on a separate plane. Including the hundreds of staff that Obama will bring along, America’s eco-President and his entourage will release unfathomable amounts of CO2.
The U.K. Taxpayers’ Alliance estimates the cost of this conference at around $215 million. "A huge amount of money is going to be spent on the summit, and thousands of tons of carbon dioxide emitted to get there, just to give the delegates a good photo opportunity," said the group’s research director, Matthew Sinclair. In addition to the millions wasted on the actual summit, organizers will also squander taxpayer money purchasing carbon offset credits.
Perhaps the delegates have read all about “Climategate” and already know the science behind global warming is a fraud, so they realize that their carbon footprints are not all that important. But it is simply unacceptable that this group of hypocritical elitists should be chastising regular people for trying to live a decent life while they emit more CO2 than average American families could ever dream of producing. If the United Nations was hoping to get “global governance” and global taxes out of this manufactured crisis, the image of these bureaucrats burning vast sums of taxpayer money and fossil fuels for personal comfort will not help their cause, to say the least.
