A few days before the inauguration of, the global alliance of financial institutions to reduce carbon emissions. Then Blackrock, the world’s largest funds manager ,. I was very sorry for what seemed to me to be a lack of real commitment to a cause that affects all humanity.
Reluctant to issue judgments about actions practiced under different circumstances of mine, I tried to understand the causes of this movement. It seemed to me that, more than an opportunistic maneuver, the bank movement responded to the enormous pressure of 22 Republican prosecutors, whose antitrust actions, in any case, would make the acting according to NZBA precepts.
The story is full of examples of people and institutions that give in to pressures. The case of American banks reminded me of galilee galilei abjuration before the Inquisition in 1633. His denial of heliocentrism did not prevent the land from revolving around the sun, as well as the retreat of financial institutions will not use fossil fuels to leave to accelerate global warming.
When will pressure from climate accidents finally cause accelerated reduction in emissions?
In August 2021, renowned biologist Jared Diamond attributed the reaction to the climate crisis, regarding the speed of the COVID response to two main factors: 1) Covid deaths occur immediately, while the effects of climate change gradually evolve causing causing Deaths in the future, and 2) Covid deaths are clearly attributable to the virus, while those resulting from warming result from indirect effects such as flooding, fires and hunger, making the denial of the root cause easier.
At the time, reasoning seemed elegant and convincing. Today, given the evidence of the worsening global warming and death directly attributable to heat, it is no longer convinced.
The realization that such aggravation has not brought advances in coordinating climate policies made it evident that there is at least one factor that Jared Diamond failed to consider: unlike Covid, environmental warming reaction policies have powerful opponents.
I explain: there was no organized opposition to the development of covid vaccines; Yes, there were rulers who crossed their arms and reacted to distancing policies, nothing more than that. In the case of climate change, and A, and A, disinformation campaigns and maneuvers to weaken global climate agreements.
Ostensive oil and gas support for the republican candidate in the latest US elections was rewarded already in the announcement of their first “executive orders”, which included the revocation of environmental regulations and supporting the expansion of fossil fuel infrastructure,.
Recently, reading the extensive coverage of the, there was another incorrect thesis that I at first considered so enlightening: Diamond starts from the idea that the deaths are the factor of the confrontation, both pandemic and global warming. Today I have the clear impression that financial losses, not deaths, are the determining motivation for the reaction.
According to this hypothesis, COVID’s confrontation would not have been so fast to avoid the death of 5 million, 10 million, 30 million or even 100 million people (which, it is good to remember, would correspond to “only” 1.25 % of the world population).
The speed would have been due to the fact that the world economy faced a sudden stop and financial losses would be unbearable to all economies on the planet.
The economic cost of global warming is undeniable, but gradually occurs and unevenly among countries, especially affecting the most fragile economies. For some countries and agents, such as the oil sector, immediate gains far outperform costs, explaining their attitude of undermining global efforts to the accelerated reduction in carbon emissions.
This perception-that, for now it seems obvious, is no less shocking-it has become clear in comparing the intense coverage of Los Angeles fires with care reduced to disasters with equal or more deaths, such as floods in Kentucky or the fires in Hawaii.
American press articles soon ceased to deal with the 25 deaths to worry about the economic effects of the fires. . What worries is not exactly the damage that insurers can incur, not even the increase in the cost of insurance for property owners; The great fear is that insurers refuse to hold properties in a growing number of areas of the country.
The absence of insurance, given the conditions of the American real estate market, makes it virtually impossible for the owner to sell his property. This is because buyers always make use of mortgage financing and this only is done by insurance of the good. The content of reports seemed to me to classify the risk of illiquidity in the real estate market as more threatening than the 25 deaths.
If the above considerations are correct, global coordination to face warming will only come when financial losses overcome immediate gains from burning fossil fuels.
I thought that familiarity with the financial market makes it difficult to understand my surprise and disappointment with the supremacy of the economy about life in the real world.
The expectation that those who profit from oil and gas will align with the strategy that aims to preserve the living conditions on Earth reminded me of a passage from the wonderful 1973 “Giordano Bruno” movie (available on Youtube, with Gian Maria Volonté and the stunning Charlotte Rampling).
Accused of heresy for the Roman Inquisition, Bruno – differently of Galileo Galilei, a few decades later – decides not to abjure and is sentenced to death at the fire. Just before this outcome says the phrase that I, teenager, I heard my mother quote so many times:
“Ask for the power that reforms power; what naivete!”
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