When the Prime Minister gets serious, even he would slap his own face: Once an advocate of clean energy, now embracing fossil fuels

Before becoming Canada's Prime Minister in March this year, Mark Carney was most famously known as the Governor of the Bank of Canada and the first foreign-born governor of the Bank of England (the Bank of England). In fact, he also served as the UN Climate Change Envoy, a proponent of clean energy. But now, he is "slapping himself"...

According to a report by the Financial Times on December 13 local time, in response to the hostile actions of the US in trade, Carney has gradually begun to embrace fossil fuels, which is undermining the "political legacy" he had built up in his early years - where he had issued various warnings about climate change. Since taking office this year, Carney has canceled Canada's consumer carbon tax, actively courted the oil and gas industry, and canceled a plan aimed at promoting electric vehicle sales, all to counter the comprehensive tariff policies of President Trump.

In recent weeks, Carney also signed an agreement to commit to producing an additional one million barrels of crude oil per day. Previously, he had also pledged to double Canada's liquefied natural gas production to supply new markets in Asia.

Because of these policies, Steven Guilbeault, who previously served as Canada's Environment Minister, resigned from his position in Carney's cabinet in protest. Two founding members of the federal government's Net Zero Emissions Advisory Committee have also resigned. Guilbeault told the Financial Times, "I can no longer compromise. I am worried we are moving in the wrong direction."

Climate experts, as well as business and financial sector figures, say that Carney's policy decisions indicate that national sovereignty and short-term energy issues have taken precedence over the urgency of addressing global warming during the Trump era.

Paul Polman, former CEO of Unilever and an advocate for "responsible capitalism," said that Carney's "balanced shift" as a political and economic compromise is not surprising. However, this "green industrialism" strategy aimed at stabilizing domestic politics and economy comes at the cost of delaying the deeper structural changes needed.

"From the perspective of climate science, this may weaken the urgency of reducing emissions," he said: "At the same time, it heavily bets on unproven large-scale carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology and the promotion of clean oil... It seems like a gamble on global emission reduction targets and the credibility of net-zero by 2050. Betting against rigorous and solid science does not seem wise to me."

According to reports, Carney's current shift towards fossil fuels contrasts sharply with his actions in September 2015. At that time, as the Governor of the Bank of England, he warned in a landmark speech that "climate change is a tragedy of the future."

He then urged governments and regulators to push for a transition to renewable energy to prevent "catastrophic consequences." "Once climate change becomes a determining factor for financial stability, it may be too late," he said at a meeting in London's financial district.

Ben Caldecott, founder director of the Oxford Sustainable Finance Group, said that Carney's speech at the time played a key role in changing the agenda in the UK and other regions.

In 2021, ahead of the 26th United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26) held in Glasgow, UK, Carney was serving as the head of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) and impact investment at Brookfield Asset Management, overseeing billions of pounds in renewable energy investments.

He led the establishment of the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero (GFANZ), aiming to remove barriers to clean energy investment and promote science-based climate commitments, proposing an ambitious target of $13 trillion in financial sector investments by 2050.

Unfortunately, the fate of the alliance Carney established was already doomed during the Trump administration - the US government rolled back more than 70 climate measures, and attorneys general from a group of Republican-led states filed legal actions, claiming such alliances distorted competition.

As Trump strongly criticized green energy, most of the financial institutions involved in the initiative suspended operations. One of the main supporters of the financial initiative, BlackRock CEO Larry Fink, also followed the political winds and shifted toward advocating "energy pragmatism."

Original article: toutiao.com/article/1851650603143434/

Statement: This article represents the views of the author alone.