From NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT

By Paul Homewood

Much gnashing of teeth at the Guardian!

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/jun/20/fossil-fuel-use-reaches-global-record-despite-clean-energy-growth

I don’t know why anybody should be surprised by any of this. Anyone with an ounce of common sense could have predicted this years ago.

Most of the world are not bothered about climate change – their priorities are economic growth and improving living standards for their people.

And even in the West we are discovering that reducing emissions is a very slow and extremely expensive process.

Governments may make grandiose promises at COPs, but time after time the real world trumps them.

The report from the Energy Institute is the latest annual update of what used to be the BP Energy Review. The highlights are:

• CO2 emissions are up 1.6% year-on-year
• Fossil fuel consumption is also up, by 1.5%
• Primary energy consumption up 2.0%
• Wind and solar power only account for 6.0% of total energy, up from 5.3% in 2022

Below are the key charts:

It must be painfully apparent, even to the Milibands of the world, that the rich OECD countries are rapidly becoming irrelevant in overall terms. Whatever sacrifices we make, the rest of the world will carry on with business as usual.