When it comes to hypocrisy, climate catastrophists win gold, silver and bronze
If virtue-signalling were an Olympic sport, Labor would be utterly unbeatable.
Climate hypocrisy comes in many forms, but it is rarely as blatant as when virtue-signalling politicians turn up in separate VIP jets from the same location to stage a renewable energy picture opportunity. This was sanctimony on steroids; activism on Avgas.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and his Climate and Energy Minister Chris Bowen took off from Fairbairn Air Force base in Canberra on two French-built Dassault Falcon jets 20 minutes apart on Maundy Thursday, displaying none of the humility this holy day commemorates.
Flying to Scone in NSW’s Hunter Valley, the pair showed scant regard for their own carbon footprints, and perfectly encapsulated the Canberra bubble’s insulation from the cost-of-living crisis.
Showing the lack of self-awareness we have seen from climate evangelists like Al Gore, John Kerry and Leonardo DiCaprio, Albanese and Bowen travelled in style to deliver a lecture on climate and energy that translates to parsimony for others. They announced another billion dollars of taxpayers’ money to be doled out to companies planning to build solar panels – more public funds fuelling the “renewable transition” that has made our electricity more costly and unreliable than ever before.
About four million photovoltaic panels have been installed in Australia, giving us what is claimed to be the highest penetration of solar energy in the world. Yet Bowen claims we will need another 60 million over the next eight years – fitted at the rate of 20,000 per day – to meet his net-zero goals.
With such lofty targets perhaps their moonshot-inspired moniker of “Solar Sunshot” should be re-tagged as Solar Longshot. If it is to happen, then surely the staggering demand triggered by this guaranteed domestic market for solar cells might attract enough investment from private investors without the need for a shot of taxpayers’ funds.
The likes of Atlassian/AGL billionaire Mike Cannon-Brookes and former prime ministerial millionaire Malcolm Turnbull are involved in companies lining up for this largesse. It would seem like an ideal opportunity for them to put their money and climate altruism on the line without government subsidies.
One of the most critical factors killing off manufacturing jobs over recent decades, and sending them overseas, has been escalating power costs. The subsidy circle in our national energy self-harm is difficult to follow and would have been ruled out of any scripting workshop for Yes, Minister on the grounds of incredibility.
Our governments subsidise and mandate renewable energy generation to force the closure of coal generation. They also provide direct grants to renewable energy projects and subsidise consumers to install solar cells.
The resultant power price increases have seen governments directly subsidise consumers to help them pay their high electricity bills. Yet because the renewable subsidies successfully forced out large amounts of coal and gas generation, they created an energy reliability crisis, and governments now subsidise some coal generation to remain in operation.
This means that taxpayers are subsidising renewables for the express purpose of forcing coal-fired generation to close down, while they also subsidise coal-fired generation to withstand the impact of those subsidies. This surely is to government policy what Dr Doolittle’s “Pushmi-pullyu” was to zoology – an absurd and impossible creature pulling in two directions at once leading, naturally enough, to extinction.
If there is any more absurd example of disastrous government intervention, I am yet to hear of it. Yet, ever on the lookout for additional opportunities for intervening in this field, Bowen and Albanese came up with Solar Sunshot.
And they did not spare the jet engines getting to a pointless photo opportunity to announce it. Calling a press conference in Canberra just would not cut it, nor would a smaller group of people on a single plane – the same politicians who are hitting us with tax and price penalties to try to corral us into electric vehicles flit about on multiple jets with no compunction.
Albanese and Bowen are sticking their intrusive hand of government into our carports and family vehicle choices, demanding we abandon our practical and trusty internal combustion engines. Yet for their own transport choices, they do not see much of a bother between one jet or two.
As it happens, the return flights for each of those VIP jets would have emitted about six tonnes of CO2 – more than the annual emissions for an average car. Do as we say, not as we do.
Like Al Gore living in a mansion that consumes 20 times the energy of the average American home. Like DiCaprio travelling the world on private jets and holidaying on luxurious motor yachts while lecturing us on climate. Like teal MP Allegra Spender not bothering with solar panels of her own and keeping the gas-guzzling four-wheel drive so she can get to her other properties on weekends. Like another teal, Zali Steggall, also reluctant to embrace the electric vehicles she demands for others, while she takes hidden donations from people who made much of their fortune from coal. Like anti-capitalism, pro-environment Greens senator Mehreen Faruqi applying to clear native trees for her property development project. Like the airports at Davos filling up with private jets as the World Economic Forum mob turn up to discuss ways to make the rest of us cut our carbon footprints.
Ditto for the COP28 crowd in Dubai.
Nobody does hypocrisy like the climate catastrophists. If cant converted to kilowatts, our problems would be over.
While the photo of those twin Falcons on the tarmac at Scone will stand the test of time as the epitome of domestic climate hypocrisy, this is an infestation that is all around us. Many of the most evangelistic proponents of emissions reduction are well-heeled types who might drive a Tesla to the office but keep a Range Rover for weekends.
Those who own second homes such as hobby farms and beach houses are indulging themselves with larger than necessary carbon footprints and have no right to lecture anybody else on climate, renewables and emissions. Those who regularly holiday overseas or enjoy high-energy sports such as snow or water skiing also should keep their preaching to themselves.
If they regularly eat out, eat meat or keep pets, they should stay schtum (the average family dog has a similar annual carbon footprint to a small car). Yep, dog owners, shack owners, globe trotters, barbecue owners, horse owners, the list goes on, they should all be disqualified from virtue-signalling or lecturing anyone else on their carbon footprints.
Those who talk the talk must walk the walk. A credible advocate for lower emissions will live a life of privation.
They will eat mainly leaf vegetables and presumably look to the insect world for protein. They will not own a dog, or any pet for that matter. They will have an all-electric house with no airconditioning or gas barbecue. They will own only electric vehicles and holiday only in places they can drive to in their EV or reach on the electric train network.
Then these people would be in a reasonable position to lecture others on how to live their lives. And the good news is they would not even need to signal their virtue because it would be evident to all of us, plain as the misery on their faces.
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