ANALYSIS/OPINION:
At first glance, it appeared as if this month’s energy and environment conferences in Houston and Bonn were being held in two vastly different universes.
At Houston’s America First Energy Conference on Nov. 9, leading experts explained that fossil fuels such as coal, oil and natural gas has given us a world vastly more healthy, wealthy and clean than that of our ancestors. The event, organized by the Heartland Institute, a free-market think tank, called for a rapid expansion of America’s hydrocarbon fuel usage to yield even greater benefits for people and the environment. Mainstream media showed little interest and what coverage the event generated was mostly negative.
The exact opposite message was broadcast during the United Nations Climate Change Conference that wrapped up recently in Bonn. Conference attendee Marc Morano, publisher of the influential Climatedepot.com, said, “The U.N. climate summit was a bizarro world of condemnation for the use of fossil fuels while living in a dream world by calling for the world to immediately switch to alternative energy sources to avert an alleged climate crisis.”
The U.N. event was covered uncritically by most of the press, leaving the public with the impression that the science of climate change, and the case against fossil fuels, is a fait accompli. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Unlike Heartland’s 12 international conferences on climate change, their Houston conference focused primarily on energy, not climate science.
