The Megyn Kelly Show - The Truth About Climate Change, Climate Realism and Climate Alarmism, with Bjorn Lomborg and David Wallace-Wells ｜ Ep. 239

00:00:00.000 When I found out my friend got a great deal

00:00:02.160 on a wool coat from Winners,

00:00:03.780 I started wondering,

00:00:05.440 is every fabulous item I see from Winners?

00:00:08.560 Like that woman over there with the designer jeans. 1.00

00:00:11.260 Are those from Winners?

00:00:12.780 Ooh, or those beautiful gold earrings.

00:00:15.260 Did she pay full price?

00:00:16.600 Or that leather tote?

00:00:17.620 Or that cashmere sweater?

00:00:18.500 Or those knee-high boots?

00:00:20.300 That dress?

00:00:21.080 That jacket?

00:00:21.740 Those shoes?

00:00:22.780 Is anyone paying full price for anything?

00:00:25.800 Stop wondering.

00:00:27.000 Start winning.

00:00:27.940 Winners.

00:00:28.520 Find fabulous for less.

00:00:30.620 Welcome to The Megyn Kelly Show.

00:00:32.520 Your home for open, honest, and provocative conversations.

00:00:42.160 Hey everyone, I'm Megyn Kelly.

00:00:43.800 Welcome to The Megyn Kelly Show.

00:00:45.480 I'm excited for today's show.

00:00:47.040 I think you're going to love this.

00:00:48.220 We have been warned that planet Earth is on a path to ruin

00:00:52.600 by the media and Democratic politicians.

00:00:55.780 But on this episode today, we wanted to take a step back,

00:00:58.760 take a look at the big picture,

00:01:00.820 and figure out what the science really says about climate change.

00:01:05.100 Is the alarmism justified?

00:01:07.740 And if so, what can we do about it?

00:01:09.820 Today, we are joined by two fantastic voices on this topic.

00:01:12.760 They agree on some things, and on others, not so much.

00:01:16.460 But we wanted to bring them together to have an informative,

00:01:19.240 respectful, and lively conversation,

00:01:21.180 and allow you, our audience,

00:01:22.540 the chance to hear from both sides in a way that rarely happens these days.

00:01:27.880 David Wallace-Wells is editor-at-large of New York Magazine

00:01:31.240 and author of The Uninhabitable Earth, Life After Warming,

00:01:36.860 a book that was based on an essay that I believe was the magazine's largest

00:01:42.560 or most circulated, most read ever in the history of the magazine.

00:01:47.300 All right?

00:01:47.540 So this has been very, very popular.

00:01:49.640 And he told us last time they're making a movie on it, too.

00:01:52.780 Also joining us today is Bjorn Lomborg.

00:01:55.340 He's president of the Copenhagen Consensus

00:01:57.740 and visiting fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution.

00:02:01.340 His latest book is False Alarm,

00:02:04.360 How Climate Change Panic Costs Us Trillions,

00:02:07.620 Hurts the Poor, and Fails to Fix the Planet.

00:02:09.520 So you can see where this is going.

00:02:11.340 They disagree.

00:02:12.400 They've debated before, but not quite like this.

00:02:15.520 Welcome, David and Bjorn.

00:02:16.480 Thank you so much for being here.

00:02:17.980 Thank you.

00:02:18.400 Thanks for having us.

00:02:18.940 Good to be here.

00:02:20.140 All right, David, let me start with you

00:02:21.160 as somebody who's pressing the case for,

00:02:24.860 yes, it's bad and worse than you know,

00:02:28.020 and immediate action is required.

00:02:29.640 And we can maybe kick it off on where you guys agree,

00:02:33.280 because I can remember when I first started at Fox News

00:02:35.300 back in 2004, I guess it was.

00:02:38.780 We were still at the point then, at least on Fox,

00:02:41.240 where people we'd have on would debate

00:02:44.440 whether we were even experiencing warming, right?

00:02:47.800 And if we are experiencing more warming,

00:02:50.280 is any of it attributable to man, right?

00:02:53.520 Like that we were still at that point.

00:02:54.900 I think everyone here agrees we're past that point.

00:02:58.860 We are warming.

00:03:00.280 The earth is warming.

00:03:01.640 And men, men, women are causing it for the most part. 1.00

00:03:05.860 Maybe not 100%, but it's what we've done

00:03:08.820 and are doing that's causing it.

00:03:10.200 Do you guys, just quickly, do you both agree with that?

00:03:12.340 Yes.

00:03:13.420 Yes.

00:03:14.340 Yeah.

00:03:14.660 Okay.

00:03:14.920 All right.

00:03:15.300 So that's where we're going to start from that premise

00:03:17.640 and figure out how bad is it and what can be done about it.

00:03:21.440 That's sort of our focus today.

00:03:22.420 So, David, your essay and then your book say it's bad.

00:03:26.520 It's really bad.

00:03:28.080 And we really do need to be alarmed.

00:03:31.600 And when I read the book, I was alarmed.

00:03:35.700 I was feeling, I was picking up what you were putting down.

00:03:38.420 I felt better after I read Bjorn.

00:03:40.520 But you, just to put it in perspective, are saying,

00:03:43.880 we are speeding blithely along to more than four degrees Celsius of warming

00:03:48.680 by the year 2100.

00:03:51.260 That could mean a sea level rise of between four and eight feet.

00:03:56.280 Now, this is our children who are alive right now.

00:03:58.540 You know, I've got a 12, 10, and eight-year-old.

00:04:00.440 You've got a new baby, I understand.

00:04:01.860 Would experience this, God willing.

00:04:03.600 You know, they'd still be around.

00:04:05.020 So this is not that far off in the future.

00:04:08.740 You say whole regions of Africa and Australia and the United States,

00:04:11.660 parts of South America, Asia, south of Siberia,

00:04:13.980 would be rendered uninhabitable if that happened.

00:04:17.160 And go on to talk about how we could eventually see Miami Beach

00:04:21.480 as a new Atlantis city underwater.

00:04:24.900 We could see more than 30 million people dealing with water scarcity,

00:04:31.000 major cities along the equator becoming unlivable.

00:04:33.920 Even in northern latitudes, heat waves that would kill thousands each summer,

00:04:38.200 massively deadly heat waves in India and elsewhere,

00:04:40.720 five times as long, 32 times as much extreme heat.

00:04:44.860 And you described that, that would be with just two degrees warming by 2100,

00:04:49.280 as the best case scenario.

00:04:51.180 So let me kick it to you from there and say,

00:04:53.640 where are you now since you've written your book

00:04:55.520 on best case scenario for 2100?

00:04:57.700 And is it as bad as you predicted in that book?

00:05:00.740 Do you still believe that?

00:05:02.500 Well, the book was looking at warming scenarios,

00:05:04.740 mostly in this range of two degrees Celsius of warming

00:05:07.140 to four or four and a half degrees of warming.

00:05:09.740 And actually, since I wrote it and since it was published,

00:05:11.760 I do think we're much likely to end up on the better half of that range

00:05:15.400 than the worst half of that range.

00:05:16.560 I think something between two and three as opposed to three and four

00:05:19.980 and maybe even between two and two and a half is our likely future.

00:05:23.140 I think that's in part because of market forces,

00:05:25.820 because the cost of renewables have fallen really dramatically,

00:05:28.960 making them a very appealing investment,

00:05:31.100 especially for the developing world,

00:05:33.020 which is planning almost from scratch energy build out.

00:05:37.400 It's also because of political pressure

00:05:39.060 and the changing perspectives on the economics of climate change

00:05:43.000 from where we were a decade or so ago,

00:05:45.080 when much of this may have seemed moral to economists to undertake.

00:05:49.220 It now seems like actually an opportunity for greater prosperity

00:05:52.620 in the medium and long term.

00:05:54.840 And I think that that consensus has really shifted the direction of policy,

00:05:57.700 which combined with the market forces and the political change means that

00:06:01.540 I think our baseline expectation should be something like

00:06:04.940 three or two and a half degrees.

00:06:07.400 And we're certainly in sight of something like two degrees of warming.

00:06:10.980 Now, that is a best case scenario based on where we were a few years ago, I think.

00:06:15.000 But it also is not fine.

00:06:17.620 It's a level of warming that climate scientists have long warned is catastrophic.

00:06:21.240 It would mean some estimates say 150 million additional people dying

00:06:25.760 from the air pollution that's produced by the burning of those fossil fuels,

00:06:29.280 storms that used to hit,

00:06:31.180 storms and flood events that used to hit once every century,

00:06:34.360 hitting perhaps every single year.

00:06:36.560 As you mentioned, cities in the Middle East and South Asia

00:06:38.800 regularly being so hot during summer that

00:06:41.620 walking around outside, working outside

00:06:43.880 would represent a real risk of heat stroke and for some death.

00:06:48.940 And, you know, by some estimates,

00:06:50.660 the possibility of climate refugees 0.98

00:06:52.580 numbering in the hundreds of millions and possibly more.

00:06:55.720 Now, all of those predictions may not come precisely true at two degrees.

00:06:59.460 But when you put together the whole body of climate science,

00:07:03.260 it's not a pretty picture.

00:07:04.960 It is only half the story.

00:07:06.220 Human adaptation and resilience is the other half.

00:07:08.880 But where I come from on this primarily

00:07:10.800 is the understanding that

00:07:13.120 we are already now outside the window of temperatures

00:07:16.040 that have enclosed the entire history of human civilization.

00:07:18.460 So from the dawn of agriculture

00:07:20.460 to the development of modern nation states

00:07:22.540 and where we are today,

00:07:23.360 all of that took place under climate conditions

00:07:25.540 we've already left behind.

00:07:26.860 We can live in the new future.

00:07:29.980 We can live in a future of two degrees,

00:07:32.400 at least in some parts of the world.

00:07:34.100 But it will be an incredibly difficult task

00:07:36.380 to adapt and respond to it,

00:07:38.600 especially in the Global South,

00:07:40.740 where they have the least resources

00:07:42.060 to do that build out,

00:07:43.920 are most vulnerable to direct climate impacts,

00:07:46.000 and have done the least to actually cause

00:07:47.880 the scale of warming that is now inevitable.

00:07:50.260 So from some perspective,

00:07:52.360 I'm considerably more optimistic

00:07:53.720 than I was a few years ago.

00:07:55.160 But I think it's also worth keeping in mind

00:07:56.580 that because of decades of inaction,

00:07:59.780 decades which have enclosed record carbon emissions

00:08:02.960 every single year,

00:08:04.240 we are now in a very different place

00:08:06.080 than in terms of what a best case scenario looks like

00:08:09.340 than say 20 or 30 years ago

00:08:11.240 when at climate conferences we might have said

00:08:13.980 we were going to avoid dangerous climate change.

00:08:16.740 That's no longer possible.

00:08:17.860 Dangerous climate change is already here.

00:08:19.640 The question is, how dangerous is it going to get?

00:08:21.860 What can we do to limit that warming?

00:08:23.480 And what can we do to respond on the back end

00:08:25.440 to make sure that human flourishing is maximal, optimal,

00:08:29.560 given the climate conditions

00:08:30.520 that we have already made inevitable?

00:08:34.160 All right, Bjorn.

00:08:34.620 So do you agree that the likely outcome

00:08:37.060 that we're looking at here

00:08:38.560 is by 2100, global warming of two degrees Celsius,

00:08:42.160 which again, according to what I read,

00:08:44.020 would be our best case scenario,

00:08:45.320 according to most, you know,

00:08:46.920 these climate scientists say two degrees

00:08:49.380 at this point would be a win,

00:08:50.820 but nobody thinks it's a great thing.

00:08:52.660 But do you think that's correct?

00:08:54.080 Do you think we're looking at two degrees warming by 2100?

00:08:57.920 Two or three degrees, just like David is saying.

00:09:00.840 And again, this is not surprising

00:09:02.900 because we're using the same scenarios

00:09:04.920 and we're using the same model.

00:09:06.780 So yes, it is a better outlook,

00:09:09.340 but we also have to be very careful.

00:09:12.600 A lot of this comes from us hoping

00:09:15.060 that countries far into the future

00:09:17.500 will be cutting what they're promising to cut.

00:09:20.240 But remember, our experience in the past

00:09:22.480 has certainly not been that people and countries

00:09:24.740 live up to what they promised.

00:09:26.500 So, you know, a reservation, an asterisk on that.

00:09:30.020 But yes, we are likely to see two to three degrees Celsius

00:09:34.120 or, you know, upwards of five and a half degrees Fahrenheit

00:09:38.020 by the end of the century.

00:09:39.560 So that sounds bad, right?

00:09:41.000 So why are you not alarmed?

00:09:42.400 Why aren't you jumping up and down like David?

00:09:45.020 So it's important to get a sense of proportion.

00:09:48.520 And I think this is really the conversation

00:09:50.760 that we'll probably be having

00:09:52.100 for most of the next hour and a half.

00:09:54.760 It's a question of saying,

00:09:56.360 how bad is this going to be?

00:09:58.020 Overall, global warming is a problem.

00:10:01.480 That's uncontrovertible.

00:10:02.900 That's what we just started off

00:10:04.400 and you asked us to sort of point out.

00:10:08.280 But it's how bad is it

00:10:09.860 compared to all the other challenges

00:10:11.980 that humanity is facing?

00:10:13.780 And of course, also at the same time,

00:10:16.020 and David was very right in saying this,

00:10:18.560 adaptation and human resilience

00:10:20.820 means that many of these scenarios

00:10:23.400 will actually not only not come to pass,

00:10:26.000 but they will become much, much better

00:10:28.840 than the living conditions

00:10:30.780 and the human flourishing

00:10:31.760 that we're seeing right now.

00:10:32.760 We will be in a much better state.

00:10:35.180 And what climate change really means

00:10:37.020 is instead of being

00:10:38.560 in a phenomenally much better place,

00:10:40.600 we'll only be in a slightly less

00:10:42.960 phenomenally much better place.

00:10:44.880 It's a question of saying

00:10:46.360 climate change slows down progress.

00:10:49.160 It slows down human flourishing

00:10:51.160 rather than this is the end of the world.

00:10:53.820 And I think that's the big difference.

00:10:55.660 A lot of people that listen to the news

00:10:57.900 think global warming is the end of the world.

00:11:00.960 And it's certainly being sold that way

00:11:02.440 if you listen to Biden

00:11:03.320 and many other politicians,

00:11:04.360 they will regularly say

00:11:06.140 this is an existential problem.

00:11:08.400 No, it's not.

00:11:09.080 It's nowhere near that.

00:11:10.460 That's not what the UN Climate Panel

00:11:12.140 is telling us.

00:11:12.940 It is a problem.

00:11:14.780 And it will mean that by mid-century,

00:11:17.640 by the end of the century,

00:11:18.640 we will be much better off,

00:11:20.420 but slightly less much better off

00:11:22.280 than we otherwise would be.

00:11:23.520 That's a very different sense of understanding.

00:11:25.840 And I think that's the conversation

00:11:27.220 that we need to have,

00:11:28.780 partly understanding it's a problem,

00:11:30.900 it's not the end of the world.

00:11:32.080 And then the second part is

00:11:33.780 we're being asked to consider,

00:11:36.540 or many people are just saying we should,

00:11:38.860 do policies that are going to be

00:11:40.620 phenomenally expensive,

00:11:41.900 but actually deliver fairly little benefit

00:11:44.700 in terms of climate.

00:11:46.300 And that's why the real risk is

00:11:48.340 that we not only exaggerate the problem,

00:11:51.400 but we end up paying,

00:11:53.400 or arguing for really poor policies

00:11:56.480 that will cost a lot,

00:11:57.520 that will help very little,

00:11:58.660 whereas other policies both could have fixed

00:12:01.100 much more of the global warming problem,

00:12:03.600 but also, of course,

00:12:04.480 recognizing that we live in a world

00:12:06.300 with many, many different problems,

00:12:08.100 climate change being one of them,

00:12:09.400 but not by any means

00:12:10.620 the defining issue of the 21st century,

00:12:13.220 which for most poor people,

00:12:15.040 especially, of course,

00:12:15.840 is just simply having their kids survive

00:12:17.560 easily curable, infectious diseases,

00:12:19.720 hunger, education,

00:12:20.940 all these other issues.

00:12:22.160 So yes, global warming is a problem.

00:12:25.000 It's not the end of the world,

00:12:26.200 and we're tackling it badly,

00:12:27.880 which, quite frankly,

00:12:29.180 hurts the world's poor right now,

00:12:30.720 and we can do a lot better.

00:12:32.420 Whereas you seem to suggest, David,

00:12:33.800 in your book that it actually

00:12:35.080 might be the end of the world

00:12:36.300 and kind of has been the end

00:12:38.580 of living species on Earth

00:12:41.060 repeatedly in the past.

00:12:43.220 This wouldn't be the first time

00:12:44.420 climate change wiped out

00:12:46.760 whatever was living on Earth,

00:12:48.520 and you think we're right in the midst

00:12:51.060 of the very next time.

00:12:53.060 Explain that.

00:12:53.580 Yeah, so there have been five

00:12:56.400 what are called mass extinctions

00:12:57.620 before in the Earth's planetary history,

00:12:59.740 and four of them,

00:13:00.740 we think the best scientific understanding now

00:13:03.020 is that where they were tied up

00:13:04.300 in temperature changes

00:13:05.840 having to do with greenhouse gas changes.

00:13:09.740 Some of those are quite devastating.

00:13:11.900 I mean, the most brutal one

00:13:14.260 killed off at least 90%

00:13:15.640 of all life on Earth.

00:13:17.400 Some of the others killed off

00:13:18.640 more than half.

00:13:19.640 And, you know,

00:13:21.960 it is quite conventional wisdom now

00:13:25.100 among those studying

00:13:25.940 the deep history of the planet

00:13:26.800 that we are in the midst

00:13:27.680 of just such an extinction event now,

00:13:30.740 where we're seeing, you know,

00:13:32.720 many, many species

00:13:33.600 declining and dying out.

00:13:35.300 On the human timescale,

00:13:36.700 in the space of a century or so,

00:13:38.680 it's not like we're seeing,

00:13:40.580 you know, all living Earth disappear.

00:13:43.640 But that wasn't the pace

00:13:45.640 of most of those changes

00:13:46.480 in the past either.

00:13:47.820 And in fact,

00:13:48.300 we're changing the climate much faster

00:13:50.040 than it changed

00:13:51.440 in those previous mass extinctions.

00:13:53.420 I think by most estimates,

00:13:54.740 about 10 times faster,

00:13:56.100 which means that the pressure

00:13:57.600 that we're putting on

00:13:58.380 the living ecosystem

00:13:59.260 that we've depended on

00:14:00.160 for all of human history

00:14:01.800 is really under some

00:14:04.300 dramatic amount of threat.

00:14:05.880 And ultimately,

00:14:06.380 what we are doing is

00:14:07.800 engineering an experiment

00:14:10.240 in which we will be testing

00:14:11.820 the capacity of the human species

00:14:13.720 to manage the world

00:14:15.260 because the kinds of climate changes

00:14:18.420 that we are initiating simultaneously

00:14:20.340 are beyond many

00:14:21.920 of these ecosystems' ability

00:14:23.320 to, you know, adapt

00:14:24.540 and respond to or endure unchanged

00:14:26.900 without any intervention.

00:14:28.960 And that is quite a scary prospect.

00:14:30.520 I have faith,

00:14:31.400 I think like Bjorn does,

00:14:32.400 that we can do a lot

00:14:33.520 to protect many of those ecosystems

00:14:35.020 to, you know, for instance,

00:14:36.760 produce new kinds of crops

00:14:38.780 that can thrive in heat-stressed areas

00:14:41.000 and, you know, that sort of thing.

00:14:43.840 But we're talking about

00:14:45.740 engineering challenges

00:14:47.340 in almost every area

00:14:49.300 of the natural world,

00:14:50.880 which we will have to engineer

00:14:52.480 some amount of response to,

00:14:54.180 often at great expense

00:14:55.360 and often in places

00:14:57.540 where people don't today

00:14:58.680 and I don't believe in the future

00:15:00.020 will have all that much,

00:15:01.840 you know, abundant resources

00:15:04.540 to respond adequately to.

00:15:06.920 And so I think the recipe

00:15:07.860 in the end

00:15:08.580 is for some serious

00:15:10.180 amounts of suffering,

00:15:11.580 especially in those parts

00:15:12.560 of the world

00:15:12.880 that are living closest to nature,

00:15:14.600 most dependent on ecosystems.

00:15:17.040 I do believe that

00:15:18.440 if those places

00:15:19.400 were to get more prosperous

00:15:20.820 over the next few decades,

00:15:21.980 that would certainly help

00:15:23.640 in their ability

00:15:24.240 to adapt to new conditions.

00:15:26.480 But I'm a little,

00:15:27.740 I'm a lot less confident

00:15:28.640 than Bjorn

00:15:29.020 that we are on that course

00:15:30.120 regardless of what happens

00:15:31.500 with climate change.

00:15:32.840 I've seen a number of studies

00:15:34.180 that I take very seriously

00:15:35.220 that suggest that

00:15:36.480 global inequality

00:15:37.340 has been increased

00:15:38.380 over the last few decades

00:15:39.280 because of the impacts

00:15:40.080 of climate.

00:15:41.200 And then over the next few decades

00:15:43.440 through to the end of the century,

00:15:45.580 we could be seeing

00:15:46.600 the possibility

00:15:47.900 of economic growth

00:15:48.800 really dramatically cut

00:15:49.960 in the global South.

00:15:51.100 There are some estimates,

00:15:52.260 global estimates,

00:15:53.380 that are as high as,

00:15:54.760 you know,

00:15:55.000 our potential GDP

00:15:55.700 could be cut by 20 or 30%.

00:15:57.860 There are others that are lower,

00:15:59.700 which we'll probably end up

00:16:00.580 talking about

00:16:01.060 during this conversation.

00:16:02.260 But when you look

00:16:02.760 at the effects concentrated

00:16:03.800 in the global South

00:16:04.620 where people are most vulnerable

00:16:06.120 and where that growth

00:16:06.820 is most important,

00:16:08.560 some of those studies

00:16:09.200 show cuts of 50,

00:16:10.320 70% of potential GDP

00:16:12.000 over the course of the century.

00:16:13.260 And that is really

00:16:14.060 quite a grim prospect

00:16:15.620 to look at a future

00:16:16.860 in which the global poor

00:16:18.220 now to,

00:16:19.480 you know,

00:16:19.780 30, 40, 50 years

00:16:20.780 down the road

00:16:21.920 are facing almost

00:16:23.060 no opportunity

00:16:23.780 for meaningful economic growth.

00:16:24.900 Explain why though.

00:16:25.860 Put some meat on those bones.

00:16:27.120 Why?

00:16:27.460 Why will the global South

00:16:28.340 be suffering so

00:16:29.160 in terms of

00:16:29.800 their ability

00:16:30.640 to sustain themselves,

00:16:32.140 make money,

00:16:32.660 and, you know,

00:16:32.980 support their families?

00:16:34.660 Well, it's a complicated equation.

00:16:35.800 I think the very basic,

00:16:37.040 you know,

00:16:37.840 as a baseline,

00:16:39.260 economists have found

00:16:40.920 that there's something

00:16:41.580 like an optimal temperature

00:16:42.600 for economic growth

00:16:43.580 and the farther you get

00:16:44.280 from that

00:16:44.660 in the temperature direction,

00:16:46.940 you know,

00:16:47.940 the worse off you'll be.

00:16:48.700 Your productivity declines,

00:16:49.820 your cognitive performance declines,

00:16:51.080 and we've observed that

00:16:51.840 even in well-off countries.

00:16:54.620 It's, you know,

00:16:55.200 this optimal temperature

00:16:56.180 was the historical temperature

00:16:57.380 of the United States.

00:16:58.120 It was the historical temperature

00:16:59.100 of Germany.

00:17:00.620 It's now the annual temperature

00:17:03.820 average of Silicon Valley,

00:17:05.140 but not the United States

00:17:05.840 as a whole.

00:17:07.800 And, but beyond that,

00:17:08.820 you know,

00:17:09.000 there are the impacts

00:17:09.700 on agricultural yields,

00:17:11.460 which without significant

00:17:13.020 intervention will fall

00:17:14.460 somewhat dramatically

00:17:15.920 because of the impacts

00:17:17.000 of heat

00:17:17.440 and because of other

00:17:18.660 unrelated factors

00:17:19.860 having to do with

00:17:20.680 the way that pests grow

00:17:22.840 under,

00:17:24.180 in hotter conditions,

00:17:25.200 fungus,

00:17:27.100 that kind of thing.

00:17:27.900 It has to do with

00:17:28.820 the effects on outdoor labor

00:17:30.260 and any,

00:17:31.060 any business

00:17:32.140 that's being conducted outside.

00:17:33.680 Then there's

00:17:34.260 the public health cost

00:17:35.600 of both the direct heat impact

00:17:37.600 and continuing to live

00:17:39.380 with fossil fuel pollution,

00:17:40.740 which I should just say,

00:17:42.860 you know,

00:17:43.360 these numbers are really enormous.

00:17:45.000 They're so big

00:17:45.380 you can't even

00:17:46.120 wrap your head around them,

00:17:47.040 but almost all estimates

00:17:48.560 suggest that air pollution

00:17:49.980 from the burning of fossil fuels

00:17:50.960 is today killing

00:17:51.640 millions of people every year.

00:17:53.260 There are some estimates

00:17:53.840 that run as high as 8 or 9 million.

00:17:55.740 Other estimates are

00:17:56.280 on the lower end of the spectrum,

00:17:57.220 but that is an unbelievably,

00:17:58.680 unbelievably large human toll

00:18:01.100 that we are enduring today.

00:18:03.520 And every year that we don't

00:18:04.900 cut our fossil fuel production,

00:18:06.260 we will continue to impose that cost.

00:18:08.720 It's most concentrated in India

00:18:11.160 and the rest of the developing world,

00:18:12.320 although we see even

00:18:12.980 in the United States,

00:18:14.340 there's some estimates

00:18:15.000 that 350,000 Americans

00:18:16.520 die every year

00:18:17.120 from the effects of air pollution.

00:18:18.700 India's air pollution 0.99

00:18:19.260 is really bad.

00:18:19.980 And basically,

00:18:20.780 their response,

00:18:21.600 India,

00:18:22.100 as far as I understand,

00:18:23.080 and China for right now

00:18:24.200 are saying,

00:18:25.060 we realize that we're bad,

00:18:27.020 but you,

00:18:28.120 United States,

00:18:28.780 were far worse than we were

00:18:30.140 for most of history.

00:18:31.340 And so you can't make

00:18:32.260 all the money

00:18:32.780 and put all the fossil fuels

00:18:34.800 to use

00:18:35.260 and emit all these carbons.

00:18:36.640 And then once you're in,

00:18:37.880 you know,

00:18:38.320 high cotton,

00:18:39.180 turn around to us and say,

00:18:40.260 no, you have to stop.

00:18:40.920 You have to stop right now.

00:18:41.640 So they're kind of saying,

00:18:43.040 eh, we'll curtail it

00:18:44.020 by like 2060,

00:18:45.300 you know,

00:18:45.660 we think.

00:18:46.660 And then we'll stop,

00:18:48.900 you know,

00:18:49.040 then we'll stop putting

00:18:49.660 out all these carbons.

00:18:50.380 But by that point,

00:18:51.900 you know,

00:18:52.280 we kind of need everyone

00:18:53.480 to stop right now

00:18:54.400 if we're going to avoid

00:18:55.180 some of these numbers

00:18:56.540 of, you know,

00:18:57.200 two degrees Celsius,

00:18:58.440 three degrees Celsius

00:18:59.600 by the end of,

00:19:01.400 by 2100.

00:19:03.840 I understand the point

00:19:04.880 because we're the most guilty,

00:19:06.660 but most of our sins

00:19:07.760 are in the past.

00:19:08.720 Not most.

00:19:09.920 I mean,

00:19:10.420 I guess most,

00:19:11.240 but we're still sinning.

00:19:12.080 Go ahead, David.

00:19:13.220 Yeah,

00:19:13.460 I would just say a few things.

00:19:14.500 The first is,

00:19:15.220 you know,

00:19:15.440 estimates for what it would take

00:19:16.460 to keep global warming

00:19:17.560 to two degrees,

00:19:18.880 which is,

00:19:20.280 as I said earlier,

00:19:20.800 not a happy outcome,

00:19:21.720 but is considerably happier

00:19:22.880 than three or four degrees,

00:19:24.320 suggests that we would have

00:19:25.660 to get to net zero globally

00:19:26.820 by somewhere like 2070,

00:19:28.520 2080,

00:19:29.520 not 2050 or 2060.

00:19:31.560 So while we can look

00:19:33.080 at the plans

00:19:34.000 that have been put forward

00:19:34.720 by China and India

00:19:35.580 to get to net zero

00:19:36.660 by 2060 or 2070

00:19:38.020 and say that they're failing

00:19:39.240 the 1.5 degree goal,

00:19:40.460 which they are,

00:19:41.460 they are actually

00:19:42.440 quite consistent

00:19:43.200 with the goal

00:19:45.580 of staying below two degrees

00:19:46.720 and are much more ambitious

00:19:48.920 in terms of the pace

00:19:50.280 of decarbonization

00:19:51.340 than would have been

00:19:53.180 considered possible

00:19:53.940 a few years ago.

00:19:55.020 And I think this is connected

00:19:56.220 to something I said earlier.

00:19:57.220 It's really important.

00:19:58.660 Five years ago,

00:19:59.940 most economists,

00:20:01.040 most policymakers

00:20:01.720 all around the world

00:20:02.680 would have said,

00:20:03.480 we need to do something

00:20:04.680 to make sure

00:20:05.220 that the climate vulnerable

00:20:06.300 people of the world

00:20:07.060 are not suffering

00:20:07.960 huge burdens

00:20:09.320 in the future.

00:20:10.120 But getting there,

00:20:11.580 doing what is necessary

00:20:12.420 is too hard for us.

00:20:13.600 It's going to be too expensive.

00:20:15.280 And that conventional wisdom

00:20:16.200 really has changed

00:20:17.320 over the last few years,

00:20:18.300 in part because

00:20:18.860 renewable energy prices

00:20:19.840 have fallen so much,

00:20:21.020 in part because

00:20:21.520 we have a greater sense

00:20:22.520 of the cost of inaction

00:20:23.660 through pollution

00:20:24.260 and other science

00:20:25.460 about climate impacts.

00:20:26.800 And that is why

00:20:27.600 we've seen over the last

00:20:28.400 year and a half

00:20:28.980 this huge wave

00:20:30.320 of commitments

00:20:30.960 all around the world,

00:20:32.240 China, India,

00:20:33.760 South Korea,

00:20:34.600 the EU,

00:20:35.420 Joe Biden,

00:20:36.220 the US,

00:20:37.100 to get to net zero

00:20:37.820 by 2050, 2060.

00:20:39.300 India is a little later.

00:20:40.120 Those pledges,

00:20:42.440 which I agree,

00:20:43.520 as Bjorn pointed out earlier,

00:20:44.860 we can only trust

00:20:45.600 so much.

00:20:46.740 Pledges have been made

00:20:47.600 in the past

00:20:48.100 and then unfulfilled.

00:20:49.740 In fact,

00:20:50.080 just about every pledge

00:20:50.900 that's ever been made

00:20:51.480 on climate

00:20:51.780 has gone unfulfilled.

00:20:53.140 But the fact that

00:20:53.960 they're being made at all,

00:20:55.060 to me,

00:20:55.480 signals a real change

00:20:56.780 in thinking of policymakers

00:20:57.620 and leaders the world over

00:20:59.140 where they see

00:21:00.100 that if at least

00:21:00.800 they were designing

00:21:01.940 their economic future

00:21:02.940 on a whiteboard

00:21:03.840 from scratch,

00:21:05.100 they would see

00:21:05.760 the value

00:21:06.560 in moving to renewables

00:21:08.280 quite quickly,

00:21:09.380 quite rapidly.

00:21:10.540 And in fact,

00:21:11.260 that is borne out

00:21:12.200 by what the IEA says,

00:21:13.800 the International Energy

00:21:14.600 Association,

00:21:16.240 which calls solar power

00:21:17.780 the cheapest electricity

00:21:19.060 in history.

00:21:20.280 Carbon Tracker,

00:21:20.940 which is a sort of

00:21:22.520 business-focused

00:21:23.660 environmental organization

00:21:24.900 in England,

00:21:26.260 says that 90%

00:21:27.120 of the world's population

00:21:27.940 now lives in places

00:21:28.680 where new renewables

00:21:29.640 are cheaper

00:21:30.000 than new dirty energy.

00:21:31.740 For all these reasons,

00:21:33.040 we see a real phase shift.

00:21:34.740 The IMF,

00:21:35.780 the World Bank,

00:21:36.260 these are not

00:21:36.720 left-wing

00:21:37.380 environmental organizations.

00:21:39.120 Almost everybody

00:21:39.860 who's looking at this,

00:21:40.820 I think with clear eyes,

00:21:42.220 sees that

00:21:42.720 a faster transition,

00:21:44.500 a full transition,

00:21:45.840 will lead us

00:21:46.720 to a better place

00:21:47.420 over the course

00:21:47.920 of the next couple of decades.

00:21:48.940 There will be bumps

00:21:49.500 along the way.

00:21:50.340 It won't be

00:21:50.820 a seamless transition.

00:21:53.080 But all of these countries,

00:21:54.920 from all of these

00:21:55.480 different political perspectives,

00:21:57.020 are looking at

00:21:57.660 the calculus.

00:21:58.360 I get your point.

00:21:59.320 They're taking it

00:21:59.680 more seriously.

00:22:00.180 But Bjorn,

00:22:00.820 I had Michael Schellenberger

00:22:01.860 on the show

00:22:02.560 last year.

00:22:04.060 I think it was in April.

00:22:05.360 It was actually

00:22:06.180 one of the most fascinating

00:22:06.960 interviews I've ever done.

00:22:07.940 It's in our archives.

00:22:08.860 We'll find out the number

00:22:09.740 if people want to listen to it.

00:22:11.140 But he wrote the book

00:22:12.060 Apocalypse Never.

00:22:13.280 He's big on nuclear power

00:22:14.540 as a solution.

00:22:15.900 And he talked about

00:22:17.460 renewables

00:22:18.280 in a way that

00:22:19.580 really cast doubt

00:22:20.600 for me on

00:22:21.220 their viability

00:22:22.260 as the solution

00:22:23.020 to this problem

00:22:23.700 because he was saying,

00:22:24.680 for example,

00:22:25.620 it takes,

00:22:26.540 I think,

00:22:27.460 I don't want to misquote him,

00:22:28.180 but it was something like

00:22:28.700 450 times

00:22:30.660 the amount of land

00:22:32.680 for like a wind turbine farm

00:22:37.580 than one little block

00:22:39.860 of nuclear energy

00:22:40.940 which could power

00:22:41.660 your entire life,

00:22:42.760 right?

00:22:42.960 Like,

00:22:44.080 I think we have the soundbite.

00:22:45.420 Do we have it,

00:22:45.780 you guys,

00:22:46.180 of him talking about?

00:22:47.280 Yeah, yeah,

00:22:47.660 here it is.

00:22:48.260 Number two,

00:22:48.800 he's talking about

00:22:49.360 the Rubik's Cube

00:22:50.140 and the amount of power

00:22:51.460 that you could get

00:22:52.840 from a Rubik's Cube

00:22:53.920 size of nuclear energy

00:22:55.320 versus it would take

00:22:56.880 450 times the land

00:22:58.560 to get the same amount

00:22:59.640 from like a wind energy

00:23:01.640 which is a renewable.

00:23:02.480 Listen to him.

00:23:04.200 Well,

00:23:04.580 I think a really easy way

00:23:05.440 to think about it

00:23:06.200 is that uranium fuel,

00:23:07.740 which is what we use

00:23:08.440 to power nuclear plants,

00:23:09.740 is just really energy dense.

00:23:11.820 About the same amount

00:23:13.280 of uranium

00:23:13.820 as this Rubik's Cube

00:23:15.900 can power all of the energy

00:23:17.660 that you need

00:23:18.280 in your entire life.

00:23:21.000 Which is pretty good.

00:23:22.060 It was episode 93.

00:23:23.280 I think my team just said,

00:23:24.380 is that what you said, Deb?

00:23:26.060 94.

00:23:26.520 Episode 94

00:23:27.060 if you want to go back

00:23:27.540 and listen to him.

00:23:27.920 So what do you make of it, Bjorn?

00:23:29.140 Because, I mean,

00:23:29.600 it's great to think about

00:23:30.480 wind and solar,

00:23:31.580 but the other thing

00:23:32.080 Schellenberger was pointing out

00:23:33.200 was solar doesn't work

00:23:34.900 when the sun goes down,

00:23:36.140 which is right when people

00:23:36.960 get home from work.

00:23:38.540 And wind turbines over time,

00:23:40.680 we haven't figured out

00:23:41.440 like the amount of lead

00:23:42.140 that's in them and so on.

00:23:43.220 And solar panels, same.

00:23:45.220 The damage that could do

00:23:46.380 to people and to the environment

00:23:47.580 once they're 25 or 30 years

00:23:49.500 into their lifespan.

00:23:51.440 They're not necessarily

00:23:52.740 the holy grail.

00:23:54.520 Yeah, no.

00:23:55.240 So, Megan,

00:23:55.700 I think there's a lot of things

00:23:56.880 to unpack because David

00:23:58.180 and I obviously disagree

00:23:59.340 on a number of different points.

00:24:01.280 So let me take your first point here.

00:24:03.340 A lot of people like to say

00:24:05.160 that solar is the cheapest thing

00:24:07.080 on the planet.

00:24:07.540 And David is absolutely right

00:24:09.440 to say that that's exactly

00:24:10.800 what the International Energy Agency

00:24:12.560 said last year.

00:24:14.560 But that's only true

00:24:15.740 when the sun is shining.

00:24:17.260 And now most people

00:24:18.140 actually want their energy

00:24:20.500 to be available 24-7.

00:24:22.200 then people sort of blithely say,

00:24:24.540 oh, but batteries,

00:24:25.880 we can fix that with batteries.

00:24:27.120 The truth is,

00:24:28.100 no, we can't in any realistic setup

00:24:30.340 anytime soon

00:24:31.980 because the U.S. right now

00:24:34.260 just have batteries enough

00:24:35.500 to power the electricity

00:24:38.220 that the U.S. uses

00:24:39.320 for three and a half minutes.

00:24:41.740 In 2030,

00:24:42.660 it might be even 12 or 11 minutes.

00:24:46.700 The point is,

00:24:47.620 you need this for at least,

00:24:49.020 obviously, a day or a night for solar.

00:24:52.440 But in reality,

00:24:53.240 because there's also less solar,

00:24:55.140 sometimes it's overcast,

00:24:56.540 wind doesn't blow,

00:24:57.640 you probably need it for days on end.

00:24:59.760 In Germany,

00:25:00.520 you have quiet wind periods

00:25:03.100 every year for at least five days.

00:25:05.860 That means you need

00:25:06.960 much, much more batteries.

00:25:08.820 And that's, of course,

00:25:09.520 why most poor countries,

00:25:11.900 David sort of suggests,

00:25:13.680 oh, they're rebuilding

00:25:14.580 their entire energy infrastructure

00:25:17.100 because, sorry,

00:25:17.980 they're not rebuilding it,

00:25:18.800 they're building it

00:25:19.440 for the first time

00:25:20.100 so they can just go renewable.

00:25:22.120 A lot of people like this idea,

00:25:23.620 oh, they're leapfrogging

00:25:24.560 just like they did with cell phones,

00:25:26.400 but they're not.

00:25:27.680 This is why China used to get 1.00

00:25:31.300 what about 40% of its energy

00:25:33.920 from renewables,

00:25:34.760 but now it gets just over 10%

00:25:37.020 from renewables

00:25:37.700 because they have industrialized

00:25:39.340 and they get most of their power

00:25:40.540 just like we do from fossil fuels.

00:25:42.980 The reality is

00:25:44.140 that when you put up solar panels

00:25:45.600 and wind turbines,

00:25:46.140 sure, you can cut down

00:25:47.880 on the time

00:25:48.840 that you use

00:25:49.580 your gas-powered stations.

00:25:51.900 That's nice

00:25:52.420 because the gas then kicks in

00:25:54.100 when the sun is not shining

00:25:55.300 or the wind is not blowing

00:25:56.280 and so the gas

00:25:57.500 really becomes your battery.

00:25:59.140 That's how we solve this today

00:26:00.560 and you can save

00:26:01.900 some of the gas cost,

00:26:03.580 but then you have to say

00:26:05.100 the cost of the new solar panel

00:26:07.660 or the cost of the new wind turbine

00:26:09.120 is not that you save

00:26:11.580 the whole infrastructure,

00:26:12.500 it's just that you save the gas

00:26:14.280 and that's why most renewable

00:26:16.980 still turn out to be

00:26:18.440 much more expensive,

00:26:19.820 which of course is why

00:26:20.620 we have all these

00:26:21.500 renewable conferences

00:26:22.800 or really climate change conferences

00:26:25.280 where you have to arm

00:26:26.460 towards everyone

00:26:27.220 to promise to cut

00:26:28.980 their carbon emissions,

00:26:30.000 go much more renewables,

00:26:31.520 which they really don't

00:26:33.020 because it ends up

00:26:34.040 costing a lot of money.

00:26:35.480 Now, eventually,

00:26:36.760 and this I'm sure

00:26:37.560 is one of the things

00:26:38.340 that we'll be talking about,

00:26:39.440 we will get to a point

00:26:41.180 where we have better technology

00:26:43.220 that people will want to buy

00:26:45.060 and once you're there,

00:26:46.720 you can get everyone to switch.

00:26:48.620 Remember what happened

00:26:49.700 with the U.S.

00:26:50.900 when you innovated fracking

00:26:52.700 around 2010?

00:26:54.660 Fracking made gas

00:26:55.840 much, much cheaper than coal

00:26:57.440 and so almost the entire U.S.

00:27:00.140 switched from coal to gas.

00:27:02.360 That happens to be

00:27:03.360 incredibly good for climate

00:27:04.620 because it emits

00:27:05.260 about half as much

00:27:06.220 CO2 per unit of energy.

00:27:07.940 That's why the U.S. 0.75

00:27:09.780 has reduced its emissions

00:27:10.860 more than any other country

00:27:12.300 in the 2010s,

00:27:13.680 not because of Obama,

00:27:15.420 not because of Trump,

00:27:16.800 but because of price.

00:27:18.800 And that's crucial

00:27:19.880 if we're actually going

00:27:21.160 to make good policy decisions

00:27:22.840 because, and again,

00:27:24.200 let's just rewind a little bit.

00:27:26.340 So David was telling us

00:27:27.700 that the global warming impact

00:27:29.960 could be huge,

00:27:31.580 especially on developing countries.

00:27:34.080 The papers that he's talking about

00:27:36.120 is by Burke and company

00:27:37.320 and they basically investigate,

00:27:39.540 as he was rightly telling us,

00:27:41.500 that there's an optimal level

00:27:43.200 of temperature

00:27:43.800 and once you get above that

00:27:45.120 or below that,

00:27:46.000 you actually grow less.

00:27:47.780 The outcome, unfortunately,

00:27:49.380 of their model,

00:27:50.300 and this is really something

00:27:51.360 you have to buy into,

00:27:52.860 is that the countries

00:27:54.660 that will win

00:27:55.580 in the 21st century

00:27:56.900 is going to be Iceland.

00:27:58.300 Iceland is going to be much richer 0.63

00:27:59.880 than the U.S.

00:28:01.420 because Iceland is in a cool place,

00:28:04.540 so they will actually grow a lot more.

00:28:05.980 And the second largest winner

00:28:08.020 is going to be Mongolia.

00:28:10.120 This is, I mean,

00:28:10.960 it doesn't really pass the smell test,

00:28:12.480 but more importantly,

00:28:13.640 and there's a lot of literature

00:28:15.940 out there that's criticized,

00:28:17.340 that fundamentally,

00:28:18.920 it shows that you believe

00:28:21.140 that the world

00:28:22.060 is mostly run on outdoor activity.

00:28:24.580 It's not.

00:28:25.160 Most activity,

00:28:27.000 and certainly most economic activity,

00:28:29.320 is indoor.

00:28:30.440 And that's, of course,

00:28:31.140 why most countries,

00:28:32.560 even in the global south,

00:28:35.220 will be run indoor,

00:28:36.780 where they'll often be air conditioned,

00:28:38.360 and they'll grow just as fast

00:28:39.900 as they would any other place.

00:28:42.240 What really matters,

00:28:43.500 and what is important,

00:28:44.540 and what these countries also get,

00:28:46.480 is that they want to make sure

00:28:47.940 that they're well-educated,

00:28:49.240 that they're well-fed,

00:28:50.180 that they don't die

00:28:51.080 from easily curable

00:28:51.820 infectious diseases.

00:28:53.060 That's why,

00:28:54.200 yes, global warming is a problem.

00:28:55.620 It's not by any means

00:28:56.720 this earth-shattering problem,

00:28:58.560 but it is a problem.

00:28:59.880 And that's why,

00:29:01.200 if we're going to get

00:29:02.220 the rest of the world to say,

00:29:03.580 yes, we want to actually

00:29:04.740 do these things

00:29:05.500 more than just promise it

00:29:07.280 at fancy meetings

00:29:09.360 in Glasgow and elsewhere,

00:29:11.760 we have to make sure

00:29:13.480 that the cost of the policy

00:29:15.420 is much lower than the benefit.

00:29:17.680 It's not right now,

00:29:18.580 and that's why most countries

00:29:19.780 will promise stuff,

00:29:20.720 but not actually deliver.

00:29:22.340 And that's why

00:29:23.160 the current problem

00:29:24.740 is not whether this is a problem,

00:29:27.080 we both agree that it is,

00:29:28.300 but it's that the solutions

00:29:29.720 that we're coming up with,

00:29:30.760 oh, just give them

00:29:31.380 a lot of solar panels,

00:29:32.260 is not actually the thing

00:29:33.940 that will solve the problem.

00:29:35.700 You know, I'm still fascinated by,

00:29:36.880 we're talking a little bit

00:29:37.880 about when the earth warms,

00:29:40.500 what will we do

00:29:41.540 to continue operating

00:29:43.420 as a society

00:29:44.800 to make sure people continue

00:29:46.100 to be able to be fed,

00:29:47.300 to be able to inhabit

00:29:49.120 certain parts of the country,

00:29:50.940 of the world?

00:29:52.440 I'm still really interested

00:29:53.420 in what does the world look like?

00:29:54.560 What does it look like

00:29:55.240 in 50 years?

00:29:56.080 What does it look like

00:29:56.940 in 100 years?

00:29:58.620 Do we, you know,

00:29:59.180 I saw in your book, David,

00:30:00.280 you had predictions of,

00:30:01.760 you know, in some of these regions,

00:30:02.980 you can kiss the beautiful,

00:30:04.140 like, northeast fall

00:30:05.500 with the beautiful colors goodbye.

00:30:07.380 You know, very likely

00:30:08.220 we're driving around

00:30:09.060 as just brown leaves

00:30:10.120 and people are confused

00:30:11.840 by the old portraits

00:30:12.920 of these beautiful falls.

00:30:14.740 And that kind of thing

00:30:15.660 really brings it home, right?

00:30:16.780 I think it's hard

00:30:17.580 for a lot of people to imagine,

00:30:19.220 wait, what's happening in India?

00:30:20.400 And why do I care?

00:30:21.520 And what's happening

00:30:22.000 with the food supply?

00:30:22.720 And I'm like,

00:30:23.160 I'll always get food.

00:30:23.940 I'm an American, right?

00:30:25.040 You start to talk about

00:30:25.980 how there's not going

00:30:27.580 to be any more skiing.

00:30:28.620 Like, you can say goodbye to that.

00:30:29.940 There's not going to be

00:30:30.540 any more beachfront property

00:30:31.740 on the eastern coast

00:30:32.580 of the United States

00:30:33.380 because we're going to have

00:30:34.160 a sea rise of eight feet

00:30:35.940 and you get people's attention.

00:30:37.920 And that's where

00:30:38.940 we're going to pick it up

00:30:39.800 right after this break.

00:30:42.100 Much more with David

00:30:42.900 and Bjorn ahead.

00:30:44.400 Don't go away.

00:30:45.020 So pick it up there, David,

00:30:53.720 on the, you know,

00:30:55.080 I'm fair to say

00:30:55.760 catastrophic predictions

00:30:56.740 on there's no more

00:30:58.500 colorful fall

00:30:59.700 and the sea rise

00:31:01.300 from your book.

00:31:02.280 You say even radical decreases

00:31:04.100 on our part

00:31:05.300 in carbon emissions

00:31:05.960 could still lead

00:31:06.860 to a six foot sea level rise

00:31:09.200 by 2100.

00:31:11.120 Six foot.

00:31:12.240 You write even by

00:31:13.280 intermediate to low

00:31:14.380 sea level rise scenarios

00:31:15.980 by 2100.

00:31:18.040 We could have

00:31:19.320 high tide flooding

00:31:20.220 on the east coast

00:31:21.660 every other day.

00:31:24.580 Yeah, I mean, you know,

00:31:25.820 just I'm summarizing

00:31:27.520 climate science research.

00:31:28.500 This isn't the work

00:31:29.060 that I've done myself.

00:31:30.060 And I think that one of the,

00:31:31.640 for me, one of the most

00:31:32.400 powerful things about

00:31:33.220 that portion of the book

00:31:34.600 in which I'm going

00:31:35.140 through that research

00:31:35.760 is just to see

00:31:36.600 how much of it

00:31:37.860 there is out there.

00:31:38.800 It's not one or two studies

00:31:40.420 that are way out of left field.

00:31:42.020 It is a huge

00:31:43.500 body of research

00:31:44.840 that even if you discarded

00:31:46.260 half of it

00:31:47.340 and half of the other half

00:31:49.240 got, you know,

00:31:50.580 rendered

00:31:50.840 too extreme

00:31:52.560 would still paint

00:31:53.180 a pretty dark picture

00:31:54.160 of our medium term future.

00:31:56.620 And I just want to pick up,

00:31:58.240 connect that to something

00:31:59.180 that Bjorn said earlier

00:31:59.920 when he was talking

00:32:00.440 about this particular

00:32:01.380 one paper

00:32:02.440 by Marshall Burke

00:32:04.020 et al.

00:32:04.780 about economic impacts

00:32:05.760 of climate change.

00:32:06.380 It's true that

00:32:06.880 there are other estimates

00:32:08.320 of those impacts.

00:32:10.160 There are different ways

00:32:10.740 of modeling the economic impacts

00:32:12.040 of climate change

00:32:12.720 and there's a pretty

00:32:14.000 wide range of what

00:32:15.240 experts believe

00:32:16.060 is likely

00:32:17.120 over the course

00:32:17.880 of the century.

00:32:19.160 Even the quite

00:32:20.720 Pollyanna-ish reads

00:32:22.880 do still find

00:32:24.040 some meaningful impact,

00:32:25.480 but it is considerably

00:32:26.160 smaller than

00:32:27.380 Burke and et al.

00:32:29.420 have found.

00:32:30.200 But when I look at,

00:32:31.420 you know,

00:32:31.620 the conventional

00:32:32.680 business-friendly

00:32:35.060 centrist figures

00:32:36.100 and institutions

00:32:36.820 in the world

00:32:37.420 and the messaging

00:32:38.420 that they've put out

00:32:39.080 and the reports

00:32:39.520 that they've put out

00:32:40.160 over the last few years,

00:32:41.640 you know,

00:32:41.800 the World Bank,

00:32:42.800 the IMF,

00:32:43.420 these are not institutions

00:32:44.360 that are,

00:32:45.280 you know,

00:32:46.120 freaky left-wing

00:32:46.980 environmentalist groups.

00:32:48.060 They are focused

00:32:48.740 on economic growth

00:32:49.700 and prosperity

00:32:51.080 above all

00:32:51.920 and they are

00:32:52.980 very clear

00:32:54.840 in stating

00:32:55.620 their fears

00:32:56.620 about the effects

00:32:57.500 of climate change

00:32:58.200 on economic growth.

00:32:59.560 Mark Carney,

00:33:00.080 who is the former

00:33:00.980 head of the Bank of England

00:33:01.660 and the Bank of Canada,

00:33:02.900 has been saying lately

00:33:03.760 that his quote-unquote

00:33:04.960 base case,

00:33:05.560 so his baseline

00:33:06.040 of expectation

00:33:06.640 is that climate change

00:33:08.280 will cut

00:33:09.420 global GDP

00:33:10.720 by 25%.

00:33:12.020 Now,

00:33:12.360 that's not

00:33:12.680 from where it is today,

00:33:13.480 it's from where

00:33:13.900 we would be

00:33:14.720 without climate change,

00:33:15.700 but that's a quite

00:33:16.360 dramatic impact.

00:33:18.240 And I think it's often,

00:33:19.780 you know,

00:33:19.960 Bjorn and others like him

00:33:21.580 will often talk about,

00:33:23.340 you know,

00:33:23.580 it's important

00:33:24.020 to keep in mind

00:33:24.500 perspective

00:33:24.980 and I think that's true.

00:33:26.160 We should keep in mind

00:33:26.980 that in the future,

00:33:29.660 barring really extreme

00:33:30.980 climate disaster,

00:33:31.900 we are probably going

00:33:32.740 to be a more

00:33:33.380 prosperous world

00:33:34.220 than the world

00:33:35.260 that we're living in today

00:33:36.200 in the world

00:33:36.600 than we've lived in

00:33:37.140 in the past.

00:33:37.800 But that's not

00:33:38.320 the only standard.

00:33:39.480 And if we're trying

00:33:40.040 to plot a course

00:33:40.740 into the future

00:33:41.440 in which we're choosing

00:33:42.540 between one in which

00:33:43.440 we have 75%

00:33:44.940 of our potential

00:33:45.480 economic growth

00:33:46.120 or 100%

00:33:46.820 of our potential

00:33:47.340 economic growth,

00:33:48.160 that's a really

00:33:48.720 meaningful difference.

00:33:50.040 And it would have

00:33:50.900 to be a quite strong

00:33:52.080 case that the cost

00:33:53.160 of getting from

00:33:54.400 that 75% to 100%

00:33:55.940 was really large

00:33:57.620 for us to avoid

00:33:58.760 taking it.

00:33:59.600 And I pretty strongly

00:34:01.060 disagree with a lot

00:34:01.760 of what Bjorn was

00:34:02.340 saying about those

00:34:03.280 cost issues.

00:34:03.960 And we can get

00:34:06.780 into the details,

00:34:07.480 but as with everything

00:34:08.120 there are reports

00:34:08.860 to point to in this

00:34:09.480 direction and that direction.

00:34:10.680 And what I look at

00:34:11.440 is just the broad

00:34:12.100 policy picture,

00:34:13.260 which is that

00:34:14.120 this stated goal

00:34:16.540 of more than 80%

00:34:18.920 of global GDP

00:34:19.940 and more than 80%

00:34:21.120 of global emissions

00:34:22.560 is now to get

00:34:23.940 to net zero carbon

00:34:25.500 by mid-century

00:34:26.600 or 20,

00:34:27.400 a little bit later.

00:34:28.660 And that is a really

00:34:29.900 dramatic break

00:34:30.980 from where we've been

00:34:31.660 in the past.

00:34:32.060 It's true.

00:34:32.940 There have been

00:34:33.300 climate conferences

00:34:34.040 in the past

00:34:34.520 where people pledged

00:34:35.340 to cut their emissions,

00:34:36.460 but never in as direct

00:34:38.000 and clear.

00:34:40.120 I got it.

00:34:40.820 I got it.

00:34:41.340 But you're kind of

00:34:41.800 getting ahead of me

00:34:42.320 because I think people

00:34:43.540 would benefit from

00:34:44.380 understanding what,

00:34:46.120 in figuring out

00:34:46.960 what the costs are

00:34:47.840 and so on.

00:34:48.660 What does life look like?

00:34:50.260 You know,

00:34:50.480 we have,

00:34:50.860 as I mentioned,

00:34:51.320 you just had a baby.

00:34:52.520 We've got three kids.

00:34:53.500 I'm trying to picture

00:34:54.100 when my kids are 80,

00:34:55.240 90,

00:34:55.800 what does this earth look like?

00:34:57.000 What is it like

00:34:57.400 for my grandkids,

00:34:58.240 basically?

00:34:58.660 What is it like

00:34:59.080 for your grandkids?

00:35:00.420 And I really,

00:35:01.500 I would like to understand

00:35:02.820 that, Bjorn,

00:35:03.260 because I will say,

00:35:04.320 you know,

00:35:04.820 if we have an eight-foot rise

00:35:07.080 in the Atlantic Ocean,

00:35:09.240 America does look 0.87

00:35:10.900 a lot different

00:35:11.560 than it looks right now.

00:35:12.780 The thought of Miami Beach

00:35:14.220 more like a city of Atlantis,

00:35:15.920 the thought of

00:35:16.320 no more colorful falls,

00:35:18.000 ski mountains going away,

00:35:19.620 that kind of,

00:35:20.060 like,

00:35:20.620 that brings it home.

00:35:21.780 But do you believe

00:35:22.540 that's likely?

00:35:24.180 So, Megan,

00:35:25.020 there's a lot of things

00:35:26.080 to unpack here.

00:35:26.820 First of all,

00:35:27.780 the UN Climate Panel,

00:35:29.160 which I think both Dave

00:35:30.120 and I agree

00:35:30.680 is the gold standard on this,

00:35:33.000 they talk about

00:35:33.780 two to three feet.

00:35:34.980 They say

00:35:35.500 very possible,

00:35:37.820 but in a very

00:35:38.600 outside range,

00:35:40.020 it could be up to

00:35:40.880 six feet

00:35:41.520 of sea level rise.

00:35:42.860 So it's certainly

00:35:44.120 pushing it,

00:35:44.920 what Dave is talking about.

00:35:46.420 And this often

00:35:47.540 is the case

00:35:48.240 that this is not

00:35:49.720 actually what

00:35:50.400 the best science

00:35:51.180 from the UN Climate Panel

00:35:52.180 tells us.

00:35:52.600 But yes,

00:35:53.740 two to three feet

00:35:54.580 of sea level rise

00:35:55.420 is a problem

00:35:56.380 and it is something

00:35:57.640 that we should be

00:35:58.320 concerned about.

00:35:59.200 But we should also

00:36:00.120 have a sense of proportion.

00:36:02.060 Remember,

00:36:02.860 over the last 150 years,

00:36:04.360 sea levels rose

00:36:04.980 about a foot.

00:36:06.220 Yet,

00:36:06.560 I doubt anyone

00:36:07.780 would ever,

00:36:08.600 you know,

00:36:08.820 talk about what happened

00:36:09.780 over the last 150 years

00:36:10.940 that that was

00:36:11.700 in any way important.

00:36:13.280 We actually saw

00:36:14.260 dramatically increasing areas,

00:36:16.560 for instance,

00:36:16.880 of the U.S.

00:36:17.500 and many other places

00:36:18.280 because,

00:36:19.220 as you know,

00:36:19.720 if you live in New York,

00:36:21.080 New York grew

00:36:22.240 because you actually

00:36:23.940 know how to do this.

00:36:25.000 We know that very well

00:36:25.980 from Holland,

00:36:26.640 which is probably

00:36:27.180 the best example.

00:36:28.480 Holland is a wonderful place

00:36:29.800 which has about 40%

00:36:31.080 of its land area

00:36:31.960 below sea level.

00:36:33.300 If you fly into

00:36:34.140 the world's 14th

00:36:35.420 largest airport

00:36:36.080 in Amsterdam,

00:36:37.340 you will fly into

00:36:38.860 an airport

00:36:39.340 that's much

00:36:40.680 below sea level

00:36:41.860 and is actually

00:36:42.560 probably the only

00:36:43.260 big international airport

00:36:44.440 that is a former site

00:36:45.840 of a big naval battle.

00:36:47.220 The point is,

00:36:48.780 we are actually

00:36:49.680 really, really good species

00:36:51.180 at dealing with these issues.

00:36:52.700 Of course,

00:36:53.500 Miami is not going to go away.

00:36:55.200 We know how to protect

00:36:56.400 this very cheaply.

00:36:58.200 Remember,

00:36:58.840 the entire cost

00:37:00.200 of the Dutch protection

00:37:01.800 over the last half century

00:37:03.300 has cost about

00:37:04.240 10 billion euros.

00:37:05.580 We estimate that

00:37:06.620 globally,

00:37:07.600 this is over 50 years,

00:37:08.840 it's a very,

00:37:09.540 very small cost.

00:37:10.680 And of course,

00:37:11.380 most rich countries

00:37:12.380 and most upcoming countries

00:37:14.580 will be easily able

00:37:16.180 to afford that.

00:37:16.900 Actually,

00:37:17.460 what the model show

00:37:18.280 is when you include

00:37:19.220 adaptation is

00:37:20.280 that we will be

00:37:21.340 better situated.

00:37:22.440 Right now,

00:37:23.240 about three and a half

00:37:25.200 million people

00:37:26.040 are flooded every year.

00:37:27.460 And remember,

00:37:27.880 this is a model estimate

00:37:28.900 because it's really,

00:37:29.820 really hard

00:37:30.140 to get good estimates

00:37:31.320 on this.

00:37:32.240 But if you look out

00:37:33.380 into the future

00:37:34.180 and David quotes

00:37:35.560 that very,

00:37:36.240 you know,

00:37:37.140 very specifically

00:37:38.000 in his book,

00:37:38.780 he says,

00:37:39.400 if we do nothing,

00:37:41.080 you will see

00:37:41.780 187 million people

00:37:43.260 being flooded

00:37:43.840 by the end of the century.

00:37:44.780 That's absolutely true.

00:37:45.880 And that would be

00:37:46.440 a terrible catastrophe.

00:37:47.860 It would also cost

00:37:48.800 a huge amount of money.

00:37:50.340 David mentions

00:37:51.320 more than $100 trillion.

00:37:53.000 But of course,

00:37:53.680 we won't just sit around

00:37:55.000 and do nothing.

00:37:55.940 And the very same models

00:37:57.520 that show us

00:37:58.320 what happens

00:37:59.100 if we do something,

00:38:00.440 if we actually take action

00:38:01.920 just like the Dutch 1.00

00:38:02.840 have done,

00:38:03.400 which we will have

00:38:04.140 strong individual

00:38:05.280 and statewide

00:38:06.900 incentive to do,

00:38:09.120 we will reduce

00:38:10.480 the number of people

00:38:11.360 that will be flooded

00:38:12.200 from about 3.5 million

00:38:13.780 down to about

00:38:14.860 15,000 people

00:38:16.660 per year,

00:38:17.260 despite us

00:38:18.080 being much richer,

00:38:19.140 despite sea level

00:38:19.880 being much higher,

00:38:21.020 and despite there will

00:38:21.980 be more people

00:38:22.680 in the world.

00:38:23.580 Why?

00:38:24.620 Because resources

00:38:26.060 and resilience

00:38:27.380 is what really matters.

00:38:29.100 And so there's a real risk

00:38:30.080 that we end up

00:38:30.940 focusing on the wrong thing.

00:38:32.840 We focus on these

00:38:33.840 very extreme

00:38:35.020 and slightly

00:38:35.780 exciting scenarios.

00:38:38.680 You ask,

00:38:39.400 what is the world

00:38:39.900 going to look like

00:38:40.520 for your kids

00:38:41.120 and grandkids?

00:38:42.420 Look back

00:38:43.340 at how well

00:38:44.360 we have done

00:38:44.900 these scenarios

00:38:45.480 in the past.

00:38:46.180 In 1970,

00:38:47.900 the first Earth Day,

00:38:48.960 there was a lot

00:38:49.780 of scenarios

00:38:50.260 about how the world

00:38:51.000 was going to look

00:38:51.580 for the next 50 years.

00:38:52.960 The UN told us,

00:38:54.200 actually to the date

00:38:55.880 on January 25, 1972,

00:38:58.780 told us the world

00:38:59.680 had only 10 years

00:39:00.780 left to live.

00:39:02.160 In 1970,

00:39:03.180 the Earth Day,

00:39:04.000 we were told

00:39:04.700 that we would only

00:39:06.500 be able to survive

00:39:07.760 if we were wearing

00:39:08.860 gas masks

00:39:09.880 by 1985

00:39:11.600 because there would

00:39:12.840 be so much pollution.

00:39:14.640 Paul Ehrlich

00:39:15.140 was talking about

00:39:15.940 in 2000,

00:39:16.820 the U.S.

00:39:17.220 would be decimated.

00:39:18.240 We'd basically

00:39:18.740 just be down

00:39:19.480 to 26,000,

00:39:21.560 sorry,

00:39:21.840 26 million people

00:39:23.160 starving in the U.S.

00:39:25.060 Of course,

00:39:25.480 nothing like that happened.

00:39:26.940 We're a thriving nation

00:39:28.140 living much longer,

00:39:29.760 being much better off

00:39:30.860 and nobody needs

00:39:31.680 gas masks.

00:39:32.660 So you have to be

00:39:33.580 really careful

00:39:34.280 about these

00:39:34.900 alluring

00:39:35.860 and intoxicating scenarios

00:39:37.500 that tell you,

00:39:38.020 oh, the world

00:39:38.540 is all going to fail.

00:39:39.580 No,

00:39:40.640 there's a very,

00:39:41.560 very good chance

00:39:42.260 that we'll be

00:39:43.540 much better off.

00:39:44.520 And again,

00:39:44.920 if I can just make

00:39:45.840 this point,

00:39:46.380 because I think

00:39:46.960 we'll be coming back

00:39:47.880 to this again and again,

00:39:49.700 even if you accept

00:39:50.840 these incredibly

00:39:51.840 high costs

00:39:52.560 of 10 percent,

00:39:53.540 Mark Carney,

00:39:54.300 I mean,

00:39:54.760 he's a climate

00:39:55.340 campaigner,

00:39:56.060 honestly,

00:39:56.720 but, you know,

00:39:57.400 even if you accept

00:39:58.200 the very high cost

00:39:59.360 of 10 percent,

00:40:00.800 the most of these

00:40:01.520 sort of academically

00:40:02.320 acceptable estimates

00:40:03.560 show four,

00:40:04.920 three percent

00:40:05.520 of cost

00:40:06.700 by the end

00:40:07.160 of the century.

00:40:07.980 But even if you

00:40:08.500 accept 10 percent,

00:40:09.940 the UN estimate

00:40:11.100 that each person

00:40:12.020 in the world

00:40:12.400 will be 450 percent

00:40:14.040 richer by the end

00:40:15.340 of the century.

00:40:16.200 So, yeah,

00:40:17.080 we will then only

00:40:18.100 be 400 percent

00:40:19.120 richer.

00:40:19.920 Yes, that's a problem.

00:40:20.980 I certainly want

00:40:21.780 to work with David

00:40:22.600 and many others

00:40:23.260 to make sure

00:40:24.020 that we get closer

00:40:24.860 to 450 rather than 400.

00:40:26.680 But let's not fool ourselves.

00:40:28.220 This is not a world

00:40:28.860 that's going to be worse.

00:40:29.960 Your kids,

00:40:30.480 your grandkids,

00:40:31.340 David's kids,

00:40:32.180 his grandkids

00:40:32.820 are going to be much

00:40:33.820 better off living

00:40:34.520 in a much better world.

00:40:35.860 But yes,

00:40:36.520 global warming

00:40:37.020 will be a problem.

00:40:38.200 Let's fix it smartly

00:40:39.540 instead of making

00:40:40.500 these policies

00:40:41.180 that won't work.

00:40:42.340 Go ahead, David.

00:40:44.400 Oh, well,

00:40:45.080 I think to some degree

00:40:45.960 that people living

00:40:46.700 in the global north

00:40:47.460 will will

00:40:48.680 they'll certainly

00:40:49.420 be protected.

00:40:50.120 I think they'll be

00:40:50.500 dealing with a world

00:40:51.080 that is defined

00:40:51.620 much more

00:40:52.100 by climate impacts

00:40:52.860 and climate disasters

00:40:53.680 than the one today.

00:40:54.600 But I hope

00:40:55.300 that we can engineer

00:40:56.080 some amount of adaptation

00:40:57.240 to protect them

00:40:57.980 and secure

00:40:58.620 the sorts of promises

00:41:00.060 that were extended

00:41:01.020 to us

00:41:01.640 into the future

00:41:02.880 that, you know,

00:41:03.480 people can continue

00:41:04.320 to live

00:41:04.780 prosperous,

00:41:05.660 flourishing lives.

00:41:06.740 I'm much more concerned

00:41:07.500 and actually I think

00:41:08.200 Bjorn stated concerns

00:41:09.860 line up with this

00:41:10.700 or with the lives

00:41:11.820 of people living

00:41:12.480 in the global south

00:41:13.720 and there I have

00:41:14.660 much bigger worries.

00:41:16.060 I don't think

00:41:16.560 that we can

00:41:18.020 blithely assume

00:41:19.100 that the world

00:41:20.100 will respond

00:41:20.620 to dramatically

00:41:22.220 intensifying weather

00:41:23.400 and much more

00:41:24.800 common droughts

00:41:25.880 and flooding events

00:41:27.640 and heat waves

00:41:28.240 in the same way

00:41:29.340 that we can,

00:41:29.980 you know,

00:41:30.180 we've done in Holland.

00:41:31.220 And in fact,

00:41:32.200 looking at the impacts

00:41:33.220 in the U.S.

00:41:34.760 of extreme weather

00:41:35.760 recently,

00:41:36.700 I think even

00:41:37.420 the American example

00:41:38.880 is a much more complicated

00:41:40.860 one than the Dutch one.

00:41:41.840 Not to say that we haven't

00:41:42.820 made some progress

00:41:43.580 in making the country

00:41:44.640 more resilient,

00:41:45.560 but I think we've

00:41:46.540 certainly failed

00:41:47.400 to take the,

00:41:48.960 you know,

00:41:49.260 sort of dramatic

00:41:49.940 total action

00:41:50.700 that would protect

00:41:51.340 people in the U.S.

00:41:53.280 from the kinds of impacts

00:41:54.300 that we're already seeing.

00:41:55.140 And, you know,

00:41:55.420 Hurricane Ida,

00:41:56.300 which, you know,

00:41:57.360 killed people

00:41:58.060 in New York City.

00:41:59.160 It's not like

00:41:59.680 we're living

00:42:00.000 in a perfectly

00:42:00.920 protected world.

00:42:02.820 Now, globally,

00:42:03.920 you know,

00:42:05.700 fatalities

00:42:07.620 from climate disasters,

00:42:09.300 from weather disasters

00:42:10.020 have fallen over time.

00:42:11.760 I expect that

00:42:12.420 that will probably continue

00:42:13.560 and that's a very good thing.

00:42:15.100 At the same time,

00:42:15.880 the impacts

00:42:16.440 of such weather disasters

00:42:18.800 in dollar totals

00:42:19.940 are growing.

00:42:21.260 They seem,

00:42:21.980 you know,

00:42:22.640 roughly flat

00:42:23.280 in terms of percentage

00:42:24.060 of GDP,

00:42:24.900 but in terms

00:42:25.600 of total dollars,

00:42:26.520 they're growing.

00:42:28.060 And that's

00:42:29.420 really concerning.

00:42:30.640 And I'm,

00:42:32.060 in all of these

00:42:32.740 contexts,

00:42:34.160 on all of these questions,

00:42:35.560 you know,

00:42:36.020 personally anchored

00:42:36.880 from the perspective

00:42:37.600 that we are

00:42:39.800 really entering

00:42:40.720 a new phase

00:42:42.060 with climate change.

00:42:42.880 That's not to say

00:42:43.540 that, you know,

00:42:45.560 1.4 degrees of warming

00:42:46.900 is going to look

00:42:47.440 like a completely

00:42:47.980 different world

00:42:48.420 than 1.2

00:42:49.040 or 1.6

00:42:49.820 than 1.4.

00:42:50.820 These are differences

00:42:52.360 that are,

00:42:53.180 you know,

00:42:53.680 it's a spectrum,

00:42:55.080 not a binary.

00:42:56.160 On the other hand,

00:42:56.800 I think it's really

00:42:57.320 important to keep

00:42:57.880 in mind.

00:42:58.380 We are already

00:42:58.940 today living

00:42:59.720 on a planet

00:43:00.300 that is warmer

00:43:00.880 than it has ever

00:43:01.800 been in the entire

00:43:02.380 history of human

00:43:02.980 civilization.

00:43:03.940 And that means

00:43:04.400 that much

00:43:04.840 of the infrastructure

00:43:05.480 that we built

00:43:06.220 to protect ourselves

00:43:08.140 and to allow us

00:43:09.120 to thrive

00:43:09.680 under previous

00:43:10.920 climate conditions

00:43:11.780 simply won't

00:43:13.520 hold up.

00:43:14.240 Now,

00:43:14.480 take,

00:43:15.180 for example,

00:43:15.460 what happened

00:43:15.820 in Vancouver

00:43:16.720 and British Columbia

00:43:17.380 this past summer.

00:43:19.880 You know,

00:43:20.120 they experienced

00:43:21.120 a heat dome

00:43:21.900 that was not

00:43:22.520 so hot.

00:43:23.180 It wasn't like

00:43:23.660 no humans

00:43:24.480 had ever experienced

00:43:25.120 temperatures

00:43:25.500 of this kind.

00:43:26.880 But this region

00:43:27.800 of this country,

00:43:28.480 which,

00:43:28.900 of course,

00:43:29.140 is a prosperous,

00:43:30.200 climate-conscious,

00:43:30.980 environmentally-friendly

00:43:31.880 place,

00:43:33.500 simply wasn't prepared

00:43:34.620 in the way

00:43:35.140 that they would

00:43:35.500 have hoped to be.

00:43:36.220 Now,

00:43:36.720 if that same heat wave

00:43:37.560 had happened 50 years ago,

00:43:38.780 maybe the death toll

00:43:39.620 would have been

00:43:40.140 in the tens of thousands

00:43:41.500 rather than just

00:43:42.100 in the hundreds.

00:43:43.320 But that's not to say

00:43:44.380 that the impacts

00:43:44.880 are not quite dramatic

00:43:45.780 and tragic

00:43:46.600 when you see,

00:43:47.400 you know,

00:43:48.420 all those lives lost

00:43:49.520 and then as a partial

00:43:50.960 result of the heat dome,

00:43:52.520 record wildfires,

00:43:53.940 mudslides,

00:43:54.820 crippling the Vancouver port,

00:43:56.320 stopping trains

00:43:57.540 and highways

00:43:58.260 out of one of the busiest

00:43:59.320 ports in the world

00:44:00.100 for a period

00:44:00.980 of a week or so.

00:44:02.800 These are the sorts

00:44:03.440 of disruptions

00:44:03.980 that we're likely

00:44:04.460 to see even

00:44:05.140 in the developed world,

00:44:06.800 in the rich world,

00:44:07.620 I think,

00:44:08.220 in increasing number,

00:44:09.540 even as we develop

00:44:10.360 more and more

00:44:10.760 of our resources

00:44:11.380 to protecting ourselves

00:44:12.280 against them.

00:44:14.900 That's one of the big

00:44:15.540 questions people have,

00:44:16.400 right,

00:44:16.580 is like,

00:44:16.840 what's going to happen

00:44:17.520 every time there's

00:44:18.840 a major weather event,

00:44:19.920 you know,

00:44:20.100 whether it's a hurricane

00:44:20.960 or it's,

00:44:21.960 you know,

00:44:22.820 tornadoes

00:44:23.960 that we saw recently,

00:44:25.380 wildfires,

00:44:26.040 certainly you start

00:44:26.760 to hear droughts

00:44:27.440 anyplace,

00:44:28.360 climate change,

00:44:29.060 climate change.

00:44:29.880 And I know

00:44:30.420 there's a real debate

00:44:31.060 about whether that's

00:44:32.460 actually what's causing

00:44:33.420 these things

00:44:34.020 or whether they are

00:44:35.300 actually getting worse

00:44:36.180 because of climate change.

00:44:37.500 That's where I'm going

00:44:37.780 to pick it up

00:44:38.260 right after this quick break.

00:44:39.920 Guys, don't go away.

00:44:40.740 Thank you so much

00:44:41.220 for being here,

00:44:41.760 David and Bjorn.

00:44:42.380 We continue with them

00:44:43.260 after this quick ad

00:44:45.020 and we will be right back

00:44:46.020 and don't forget,

00:44:46.560 folks,

00:44:46.740 that you can find

00:44:47.320 The Megyn Kelly Show

00:44:48.020 live on Sirius XM

00:44:49.380 Triumph Channel 111

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00:44:51.760 at noon east.

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00:45:12.040 with more than 230 shows,

00:45:13.500 including some of our

00:45:14.220 past great debates

00:45:15.640 like this one.

00:45:17.360 One on Israel and Gaza, 0.91

00:45:19.200 that's episode 104.

00:45:20.600 One on critical race theory,

00:45:22.340 that's episode 128.

00:45:24.300 Or as I said,

00:45:25.120 Michael Schellenberger,

00:45:25.940 who's well worth your time

00:45:26.780 at episode 94.

00:45:28.200 I'll kick this one off

00:45:37.060 with you, Bjorn.

00:45:37.700 How much should we be blaming

00:45:39.500 the, you know,

00:45:41.600 the hurricanes that we see,

00:45:43.220 the tornadoes that we see,

00:45:45.520 the flooding that we see

00:45:46.900 in various parts of the world

00:45:48.060 on climate change?

00:45:49.540 Well, so there's two problems

00:45:51.060 to this conversation.

00:45:52.080 One, of course,

00:45:52.600 is that everything you see

00:45:54.400 is being blamed

00:45:55.460 on global warming.

00:45:56.180 So every hurricane, of course,

00:45:57.580 it's not like there weren't

00:45:58.620 hurricanes in the past.

00:46:00.100 What we're actually expecting

00:46:01.320 is that we will see fewer

00:46:03.200 but stronger hurricanes.

00:46:04.520 Overall, that will probably

00:46:05.380 be a bad thing.

00:46:06.580 But again,

00:46:07.260 and I think it's important

00:46:08.380 to just,

00:46:08.940 just before the break,

00:46:10.360 David was telling us,

00:46:11.720 sure, there are few people dying,

00:46:13.180 but the,

00:46:14.000 and the percent of cost

00:46:15.780 stays about the same,

00:46:17.000 but they're going up

00:46:17.960 in real terms.

00:46:18.760 Let's just be honest

00:46:19.760 about what he just said.

00:46:20.860 And this, of course,

00:46:21.440 is what the numbers tell us.

00:46:22.780 Over the last hundred years,

00:46:23.840 the number of people

00:46:25.080 that have died

00:46:25.780 from climate-related disasters

00:46:27.540 has gone down by 99%.

00:46:30.400 It's gone down

00:46:31.220 from about half a million people

00:46:32.640 per year

00:46:33.320 to about 6,000 people.

00:46:36.220 That's a fantastic achievement.

00:46:38.320 And he even said

00:46:39.100 that it's likely

00:46:39.920 to continue

00:46:40.720 in that direction.

00:46:42.020 It's hard to know,

00:46:42.920 but it's certainly

00:46:43.560 a lot lower

00:46:44.880 than it's ever been.

00:46:45.780 Likewise,

00:46:46.520 with costs,

00:46:47.220 obviously,

00:46:47.580 they're going to go up

00:46:48.460 as we get richer

00:46:49.340 because if you have

00:46:50.200 twice the number of houses,

00:46:51.720 you will also get

00:46:52.780 twice the number of damage

00:46:54.120 from a similar kind of flood.

00:46:55.800 But the real point here

00:46:57.060 is that we're actually

00:46:58.460 also getting

00:46:59.060 lower damage cost

00:47:00.360 and percent of GDP.

00:47:01.520 What that tells you

00:47:02.620 is very unlike

00:47:03.960 the story that you hear,

00:47:06.060 namely,

00:47:06.760 that this is just going

00:47:07.740 to be worse and worse

00:47:08.540 and that I fear

00:47:09.960 that in the future

00:47:10.820 we'll be all consumed

00:47:12.260 by these terrible disasters.

00:47:14.140 The reality is,

00:47:15.260 no,

00:47:16.160 they are actually

00:47:17.080 going to be less damaging

00:47:18.500 both to lives

00:47:19.460 and to cost.

00:47:20.540 But yes,

00:47:20.920 we'll probably hear

00:47:21.680 a lot about them

00:47:22.500 because that's what

00:47:23.920 fits into the narrative

00:47:24.940 and that's,

00:47:25.780 of course,

00:47:25.900 what gives us

00:47:26.540 this bad conversation

00:47:27.780 on climate change.

00:47:28.820 Well,

00:47:28.860 that makes sense

00:47:29.400 because you think about,

00:47:30.200 for example,

00:47:30.540 the rise of the oceans.

00:47:31.400 It's not like

00:47:31.880 it happens overnight

00:47:32.620 like a tsunami.

00:47:33.780 It happens over time

00:47:34.840 and houses get built up

00:47:36.780 and they do more

00:47:38.320 sort of dumping

00:47:39.880 from the Army Corps

00:47:40.700 of Engineers.

00:47:41.360 We've seen that

00:47:41.780 just in our little

00:47:42.300 New Jersey town.

00:47:43.380 A lot to discuss there

00:47:44.620 and also with respect

00:47:45.780 to the celebrities

00:47:46.560 and world leaders

00:47:47.640 who have been 0.99

00:47:48.240 rather hypocritical 0.98

00:47:49.180 on this issue. 0.99

00:47:50.280 Don't go anywhere.

00:47:50.920 So I want to pick it up

00:47:57.060 again with the hurricanes

00:47:57.960 and the natural disasters,

00:47:59.000 guys,

00:47:59.160 because what I understand

00:48:01.160 on where we are now

00:48:03.480 in terms of how bad

00:48:04.160 the problem is,

00:48:04.960 global temperature's gone up

00:48:05.960 about 2.12 degrees

00:48:07.440 Fahrenheit.

00:48:08.780 That's 1.18 degrees Celsius

00:48:10.660 since 1880.

00:48:12.620 The rate of warming

00:48:13.840 over the past 40 years

00:48:15.060 is accelerating

00:48:16.840 and we've had 19

00:48:18.880 of the warmest years

00:48:19.680 on record

00:48:20.200 since the year 2000.

00:48:22.260 The 10 warmest years

00:48:23.240 on record

00:48:23.640 have occurred

00:48:24.200 since 2005.

00:48:26.940 There's a phrase

00:48:29.700 in your book,

00:48:31.180 David,

00:48:31.420 I want to make sure

00:48:31.940 I get it right.

00:48:32.800 That reads,

00:48:33.680 more than half

00:48:35.100 of the carbon

00:48:36.060 exhaled into the atmosphere

00:48:37.680 by fossil fuels

00:48:38.580 has been emitted

00:48:39.840 in just the past

00:48:41.380 three decades.

00:48:42.880 So we're experiencing

00:48:43.920 a lot of warming

00:48:44.700 right now,

00:48:45.220 more than we have

00:48:47.040 over the past 100 years.

00:48:48.080 And we're not doing

00:48:49.100 so well at cutting back

00:48:50.140 on our fossil fuel emissions

00:48:51.560 because of that stat

00:48:53.660 we just read from David.

00:48:55.420 So without sounding

00:48:58.120 too cheeky,

00:48:58.820 where are all the hurricanes?

00:49:00.860 Like where's the increase

00:49:01.760 in the hurricanes

00:49:02.540 and the natural disasters

00:49:03.660 and so on?

00:49:04.220 Because what I read

00:49:05.600 in terms of the hurricanes

00:49:06.760 is if you look

00:49:07.300 at sort of the worst ones

00:49:08.620 and look at the stats

00:49:09.960 over time,

00:49:11.080 they took place

00:49:12.240 a long time ago.

00:49:13.200 Seasons with the most

00:49:13.900 named storms,

00:49:16.880 1851 through present,

00:49:19.220 2005 was the worst,

00:49:21.940 1933 second worst,

00:49:23.840 2012 and 11

00:49:25.120 weren't so great,

00:49:26.680 2010 to 1995,

00:49:28.620 1887 had 19,

00:49:30.900 1969 had 18 and so on.

00:49:33.640 It doesn't sound,

00:49:34.520 I don't see it reflected

00:49:35.740 in the hurricanes exactly.

00:49:37.800 Am I,

00:49:38.140 where am I going wrong

00:49:38.860 there, David?

00:49:41.060 Well, I would say

00:49:41.860 a couple of things.

00:49:42.320 The first is

00:49:42.940 we are seeing

00:49:44.260 some bigger,

00:49:45.400 stronger storms.

00:49:46.260 There's this,

00:49:46.820 in particular,

00:49:47.440 this problem

00:49:47.820 that we've observed

00:49:48.320 just over the last

00:49:48.960 couple of years

00:49:49.480 where hurricanes

00:49:50.440 are slowing

00:49:51.040 as they approach land

00:49:52.020 which makes them

00:49:52.580 much more punishing

00:49:53.240 when they do

00:49:54.580 make landfall

00:49:55.280 because they have

00:49:56.180 accumulated more strength

00:49:57.340 and move more slowly

00:49:58.520 over the coast,

00:50:02.900 meaning like more rainfalls,

00:50:04.540 more, you know,

00:50:05.140 longer time

00:50:05.660 with the terrible wind.

00:50:07.640 And, you know,

00:50:08.860 on the big picture,

00:50:09.640 I think the stats there

00:50:10.800 are somewhat messy.

00:50:13.080 There's a lot of chance

00:50:13.760 in weather data.

00:50:15.220 But also,

00:50:16.240 I don't think

00:50:16.840 looking at data

00:50:19.580 over the course

00:50:20.080 of a century

00:50:20.640 is all that eliminating

00:50:22.100 because most of the trend

00:50:23.100 you're observing there

00:50:23.800 is a period of time

00:50:24.620 in which there's not

00:50:25.500 been much climate change

00:50:26.860 at all.

00:50:28.620 I think we're likely

00:50:29.360 to see,

00:50:29.720 as I was saying earlier,

00:50:30.960 significantly more changes

00:50:32.040 over the next decade

00:50:33.300 or two

00:50:33.760 than we've seen

00:50:34.440 over the past decade

00:50:35.220 or two

00:50:35.640 because we're in

00:50:36.640 a meaningfully different

00:50:37.760 climate state now

00:50:38.900 than we have been

00:50:40.220 for all of human history

00:50:41.480 and the patterns

00:50:43.840 that we've observed

00:50:44.460 and adjusted to

00:50:45.600 over the last few generations

00:50:47.400 are no longer going

00:50:48.560 to hold precisely.

00:50:50.220 But I would say,

00:50:50.920 you know,

00:50:51.140 beyond that,

00:50:52.640 hurricanes are not

00:50:53.140 the only measure here

00:50:54.460 of climate change.

00:50:55.860 We, you know,

00:50:56.920 there are literally

00:50:58.080 hundreds of different impacts

00:50:59.440 that have been observed,

00:51:00.840 projected, monitored.

00:51:02.580 Some of them

00:51:03.060 are more dramatic

00:51:03.660 than others.

00:51:04.160 Some of them

00:51:04.460 are more intense

00:51:05.020 than others.

00:51:06.300 You know,

00:51:06.660 droughts,

00:51:07.180 heat waves,

00:51:08.540 flooding,

00:51:08.900 you know,

00:51:10.620 wildfire,

00:51:11.180 which is a complicated one

00:51:11.980 because there is

00:51:12.340 a significant human

00:51:13.240 contribution too.

00:51:14.320 But nevertheless,

00:51:15.360 human wildfire last year,

00:51:17.220 wildfire last year

00:51:18.300 produced more,

00:51:19.320 put more carbon

00:51:19.900 into the atmosphere

00:51:20.540 than all but,

00:51:23.080 you know,

00:51:23.320 the only country

00:51:23.800 in the world

00:51:24.100 that produced more carbon

00:51:24.740 than wildfire last year

00:51:25.640 was China.

00:51:27.380 And, you know,

00:51:28.400 in all of these ways,

00:51:29.540 there's messy data,

00:51:31.260 but the way

00:51:32.420 that I read the science

00:51:33.080 is that the directions

00:51:33.920 are quite clear.

00:51:35.280 The magnitude of change

00:51:36.760 differs from impact

00:51:38.440 to impact.

00:51:39.260 But if we continue

00:51:40.120 warming at the pace

00:51:41.020 that we're warming on,

00:51:42.020 we're going to see

00:51:42.800 in a very predictable way

00:51:43.960 dramatically more

00:51:45.140 of these events.

00:51:46.440 That's not to say

00:51:47.280 that in any given year

00:51:48.200 or even in any given

00:51:49.060 half decade,

00:51:50.100 you're going to be

00:51:50.680 setting records

00:51:51.380 on all of them.

00:51:52.920 That's not the timescale

00:51:53.760 at which climate changes.

00:51:55.060 But we're moving

00:51:55.540 into a different climate

00:51:56.440 that is going to be

00:51:57.820 dominated by extreme events

00:52:01.200 much more than the ones

00:52:02.180 that we've lived through.

00:52:03.800 And it's going to take

00:52:04.660 an enormous amount

00:52:05.400 to adapt to that future.

00:52:07.460 The fact that we've been

00:52:08.360 able to respond

00:52:08.980 to some degree

00:52:09.460 to this point

00:52:10.020 is not in my mind

00:52:11.580 all that comforting

00:52:12.440 given how much more

00:52:13.340 dramatic the likely

00:52:14.000 impacts are going to be

00:52:14.940 in the decades ahead.

00:52:16.600 Well, we certainly

00:52:16.920 have adapted in some ways

00:52:18.080 already on the hurricane front,

00:52:19.520 right?

00:52:19.700 It's like cities are built

00:52:21.160 in a more strong way.

00:52:22.460 The buildings can withstand

00:52:23.420 more of a beating

00:52:24.660 if they're about

00:52:25.960 to get more intense

00:52:26.880 and or more frequent.

00:52:28.820 You know,

00:52:29.040 who knows whether

00:52:29.520 it will hold up.

00:52:30.880 But there are a bunch

00:52:32.180 of things that we have

00:52:32.840 to worry about.

00:52:33.340 Now, the wildfires,

00:52:34.040 that's another thing

00:52:35.780 I guess we're going

00:52:36.220 to have to adapt to.

00:52:37.040 One other thing

00:52:38.060 about the hurricanes

00:52:39.280 is, yes,

00:52:39.780 we are in a better place,

00:52:41.180 especially in countries

00:52:42.200 like the U.S.

00:52:42.880 dealing with these issues

00:52:43.680 that we have in the past.

00:52:44.560 But the path of hurricanes

00:52:45.840 is likely to change,

00:52:46.880 which means the places

00:52:47.600 dealing with them

00:52:48.260 are likely to change, too,

00:52:49.720 which means a lot

00:52:50.540 of local knowledge

00:52:51.220 will be lost.

00:52:52.600 We saw, for instance,

00:52:53.440 with Hurricane Sandy,

00:52:54.160 this was not a record storm

00:52:55.760 that hit New York City.

00:52:56.580 It was just hitting a city

00:52:57.440 that was totally unprepared.

00:52:59.240 Ideally, in the future,

00:53:00.000 we'd be better prepared.

00:53:01.280 But I would just return

00:53:01.960 again to a point

00:53:02.520 that I was making earlier

00:53:03.660 maybe even several times,

00:53:05.300 which is the only comparison

00:53:06.660 here isn't to the past.

00:53:08.240 If our only standard is

00:53:09.620 are we going to be better

00:53:10.560 in 2100

00:53:11.400 than we were in the year 1900?

00:53:13.400 I don't think

00:53:13.980 that's a very useful standard.

00:53:15.140 I think we should be

00:53:15.820 trying to make ourselves

00:53:17.020 as healthy, prosperous,

00:53:19.520 and safe and stable

00:53:20.620 as we possibly can.

00:53:22.060 And I think climate

00:53:22.800 represents a really

00:53:23.640 dramatic threat

00:53:24.320 to all of those promises

00:53:25.200 into the future,

00:53:26.140 even if we may still

00:53:27.640 be better off in 2050

00:53:29.060 than we were in 1950

00:53:30.020 and dealing with, say,

00:53:31.000 a Category 5 hurricane.

00:53:32.180 I'd rather be much,

00:53:33.380 much better off

00:53:33.860 as well prepared

00:53:35.540 as we possibly could be.

00:53:36.880 And I think those standards

00:53:38.020 are really important too,

00:53:38.920 not just how far we've come,

00:53:40.860 but also what we can do

00:53:41.820 to protect ourselves

00:53:42.560 going forward.

00:53:43.500 And I think we've talked

00:53:44.480 a lot about,

00:53:44.940 Bjorn has talked a lot

00:53:45.700 in this conversation

00:53:46.540 about the ways in which

00:53:47.620 we are capable of changing

00:53:49.140 to protect ourselves.

00:53:50.420 That really does imply,

00:53:51.680 among many other things,

00:53:52.840 a much larger appetite

00:53:54.040 and budget for climate adaptation

00:53:55.680 than almost anyone in the world,

00:53:57.180 I think,

00:53:57.420 is talking about openly.

00:53:58.700 And I think that's

00:53:59.620 an important thing

00:54:01.720 to talk about as well.

00:54:03.340 It's, you know,

00:54:03.700 if we can't just sit back

00:54:05.620 and let these forces unfold

00:54:07.320 and trust that, you know,

00:54:09.820 everything will work out,

00:54:10.680 it's working out fine.

00:54:12.340 And there's quite a lot

00:54:13.280 to deal with,

00:54:13.880 even the amount of extreme weather

00:54:15.040 that we're dealing with today.

00:54:16.060 And it's going to require

00:54:17.000 a lot more of us

00:54:17.640 to deal with the extreme weather.

00:54:18.920 Well, it's almost like

00:54:19.580 a form of Darwinism.

00:54:20.940 It's like we will change

00:54:22.280 because we have

00:54:23.120 an inherent desire to live

00:54:24.900 and to live well.

00:54:26.540 And that's why, you know,

00:54:27.500 that's the instinct

00:54:28.840 from which most innovation is born.

00:54:31.460 I will give you a quick aside,

00:54:32.800 just a moment of levity.

00:54:33.720 You mentioned Superstorm Sandy

00:54:35.500 in New York

00:54:35.940 and how New York

00:54:36.420 wasn't prepared for it.

00:54:37.640 I remember being on the air

00:54:38.480 right after it hit.

00:54:39.880 And there were all sorts

00:54:40.840 of weird things happening

00:54:42.180 in New York

00:54:42.600 that people hadn't anticipated,

00:54:43.800 like the flooding

00:54:44.900 of this massive bank

00:54:45.920 in downtown Manhattan,

00:54:47.460 which they didn't anticipate

00:54:48.960 the water ever getting to it.

00:54:50.100 And it did get to it.

00:54:50.920 And they lost a bunch

00:54:52.280 of old artifacts

00:54:53.880 and, you know,

00:54:54.700 different types of monies.

00:54:56.260 And I remember reading

00:54:57.400 the prompter at Fox News

00:54:58.680 and it said,

00:54:59.300 they've lost thousands

00:55:01.020 of irreplaceable bongs.

00:55:03.660 And I thought,

00:55:04.500 bongs?

00:55:06.580 And it was a young producer

00:55:09.260 who had typed bongs

00:55:11.440 instead of bonds

00:55:12.600 with a D.

00:55:14.940 It was one of those things

00:55:15.820 I remember catching it

00:55:16.820 thinking, okay,

00:55:17.520 that could have been

00:55:18.020 a great, great moment

00:55:19.240 in anchor screw-ups.

00:55:21.140 But it was avoided.

00:55:22.460 Okay.

00:55:23.680 Bjorn, yeah, go ahead.

00:55:26.380 Yeah.

00:55:26.720 So, I mean, look,

00:55:27.760 I think the point

00:55:29.060 is still valid.

00:55:29.900 If you look at how

00:55:31.180 the media represents

00:55:32.640 every hurricane we see,

00:55:35.960 you get the feeling

00:55:36.900 that this really is a question.

00:55:38.480 We're seeing a much,

00:55:40.260 we're seeing many more hurricanes.

00:55:42.280 We're seeing much more damage.

00:55:44.140 We're seeing them

00:55:44.860 linger longer,

00:55:46.240 they flood more,

00:55:47.040 all these kinds of things.

00:55:48.120 But when you actually

00:55:49.400 look at the statistics,

00:55:50.540 that's not what you see.

00:55:52.560 I think it's sort of amusing

00:55:54.820 how the last two years

00:55:56.460 we've been told

00:55:57.120 there's more Atlantic hurricanes

00:56:00.460 than there normally is.

00:56:01.600 Yes, that's true.

00:56:02.780 But we're not being told

00:56:04.160 the global picture,

00:56:05.600 which, of course,

00:56:06.040 is the one that matters

00:56:07.060 when you're talking

00:56:07.660 about global warming.

00:56:08.880 We actually,

00:56:09.820 last year,

00:56:10.340 and this is unreported,

00:56:11.980 I haven't seen it

00:56:13.020 reported anywhere,

00:56:14.180 we have since 1980

00:56:15.880 had global coverage

00:56:17.400 of satellites

00:56:18.100 to identify

00:56:18.980 all hurricanes

00:56:20.360 in the world.

00:56:21.840 There's normally

00:56:22.600 about 47 hurricanes

00:56:24.140 in the world.

00:56:25.240 Last year,

00:56:26.080 there were 37.

00:56:27.600 We've never had

00:56:28.740 this few hurricanes

00:56:30.080 in this satellite history.

00:56:32.000 Now,

00:56:32.320 we may have had that before,

00:56:33.620 we don't know,

00:56:34.160 we don't have good enough data,

00:56:35.580 but it's two less

00:56:36.840 than the second lowest

00:56:39.660 number of hurricanes

00:56:40.620 we've ever had.

00:56:41.800 How come we don't hear this?

00:56:43.300 Well,

00:56:43.460 it's because it doesn't

00:56:44.540 fit the narrative.

00:56:46.020 So, again,

00:56:47.060 this is not to say

00:56:48.140 that hurricanes

00:56:48.800 are not a problem.

00:56:49.740 It's not to say,

00:56:50.760 as David rightly points out,

00:56:52.700 that some places

00:56:53.560 don't get hit

00:56:54.800 often enough

00:56:56.140 with hurricanes

00:56:56.760 that they will build up

00:56:58.300 sort of knowledge

00:56:59.040 about this.

00:56:59.600 And yes,

00:56:59.980 there will have to be investment,

00:57:01.560 but we also need to hear

00:57:02.960 that this is not a world

00:57:04.620 where you see

00:57:05.220 more and more damage.

00:57:06.180 You see 99% reduction in death.

00:57:08.480 You see reduction

00:57:09.320 in percent of GDP losses,

00:57:11.460 even though you only hear

00:57:13.280 about these great,

00:57:14.180 great hurricanes

00:57:14.940 and we actually see

00:57:16.160 fewer hurricanes,

00:57:16.940 not bigger,

00:57:17.700 more.

00:57:18.100 And again,

00:57:18.740 that's just a statistical artifact.

00:57:20.940 It's not likely

00:57:21.720 that 2022 is suddenly

00:57:23.480 also going to be smaller.

00:57:24.700 That's not the point

00:57:25.580 that I'm making.

00:57:26.180 I'm simply saying

00:57:26.800 you only hear one side.

00:57:28.660 And let me show you

00:57:29.380 another one

00:57:29.900 because David mentioned

00:57:30.980 earlier on

00:57:31.760 the idea of the heat dome

00:57:34.580 in northwest U.S.

00:57:36.640 That certainly got

00:57:37.540 a lot of attention.

00:57:38.300 And yes,

00:57:38.740 that was terrible.

00:57:39.800 More than 700 people

00:57:41.080 lost their lives

00:57:42.180 during this heat dome.

00:57:43.820 And if you actually

00:57:45.020 look at the statistics,

00:57:46.200 so there's been

00:57:46.840 great modeling done

00:57:47.880 in Lancet

00:57:48.400 and many other places,

00:57:49.500 we know that a lot

00:57:51.000 of people lose their lives

00:57:52.260 each year from heat waves.

00:57:54.040 So about 20,000 to 30,000

00:57:56.660 people in U.S.

00:57:57.540 and Canada

00:57:58.060 lose their lives

00:57:59.460 because of high temperatures

00:58:03.000 of heat deaths

00:58:03.860 every year.

00:58:04.720 We should certainly

00:58:05.640 be aware of that.

00:58:06.440 And as temperatures rise,

00:58:08.200 we are going to see

00:58:09.080 more of those.

00:58:09.700 We've actually seen

00:58:10.560 over the last 20 years

00:58:11.480 about 8,000 more people

00:58:13.260 die every year

00:58:14.540 because of increasing temperatures.

00:58:17.260 That's terrible.

00:58:18.020 But what you haven't heard

00:58:19.140 is that 10 times

00:58:20.840 as many people

00:58:21.460 die from cold,

00:58:22.840 so almost 300,000

00:58:24.460 people die every year

00:58:25.540 from cold

00:58:26.360 in the U.S.

00:58:27.160 and Canada.

00:58:27.840 And every year

00:58:28.800 because temperatures

00:58:29.640 have increased,

00:58:30.580 we actually now see

00:58:31.780 about 25,000,

00:58:33.860 almost three times

00:58:34.720 as many people

00:58:35.300 not die every year.

00:58:37.160 We're not well informed

00:58:38.840 when we only hear

00:58:39.820 one side of the story

00:58:40.980 and not the other side.

00:58:42.100 And again,

00:58:42.480 my point here

00:58:43.120 is not to say

00:58:43.900 that overall global warming

00:58:45.720 will be a net negative.

00:58:47.080 That's why it's a problem

00:58:48.200 that we should talk about.

00:58:49.520 But when you only hear

00:58:50.440 one side of the story

00:58:51.560 and especially then

00:58:52.660 you only hear

00:58:53.540 these fantastical stories

00:58:55.900 that go out to 2100

00:58:57.400 and, oh,

00:58:57.880 we're not going to have

00:58:58.900 any forest,

00:58:59.580 we're not going to have

00:59:00.120 any snow,

00:59:01.540 we're not going to have,

00:59:02.240 the world is just

00:59:03.180 going to be terrible.

00:59:04.080 Well,

00:59:04.400 those are the kind

00:59:05.360 of predictions

00:59:05.840 that we've heard

00:59:06.540 many times before.

00:59:07.580 They always turn out

00:59:08.340 to be wrong.

00:59:09.180 We will be much better off,

00:59:10.520 but I totally agree

00:59:11.480 with David.

00:59:12.860 We should try to make sure

00:59:13.980 that we're not just better off,

00:59:15.480 but that we're

00:59:16.040 the best possible off we can.

00:59:18.060 And that, of course,

00:59:18.780 comes down to

00:59:19.420 are we picking solutions

00:59:21.160 that will end up

00:59:22.040 costing the world a lot

00:59:23.500 and not doing very much

00:59:24.940 or are we picking

00:59:25.920 smart solutions?

00:59:26.680 And I think that's really

00:59:27.660 where the meat

00:59:28.660 of this conversation

00:59:29.500 should be.

00:59:30.560 Yep,

00:59:30.680 and we're getting

00:59:31.060 to that one second,

00:59:31.680 but I do want to spend

00:59:32.360 one minute on misinformation.

00:59:34.660 On the hurricane front,

00:59:35.800 I remember Al Gore's

00:59:36.680 Inconvenient Truth,

00:59:37.660 of course,

00:59:38.620 he used horrifying footage

00:59:41.320 from 2005's Hurricane Katrina

00:59:43.260 and suggested that

00:59:44.460 climate change

00:59:44.980 was the cause

00:59:45.720 of frequent

00:59:46.640 and more intense hurricanes,

00:59:48.120 but since then,

00:59:48.880 hurricane frequency

00:59:49.720 has gone down,

00:59:51.560 mostly,

00:59:52.000 and the storm's intensity

00:59:53.100 has not yet grown significantly.

00:59:56.100 He also took

00:59:57.260 the polar bear

00:59:58.880 and really wanted us

01:00:00.560 to believe the polar bear

01:00:01.500 was going away.

01:00:02.340 If we didn't do something

01:00:02.860 about climate change,

01:00:03.740 we actually have a clip.

01:00:04.440 This is Soundbite 1.

01:00:07.180 So there is a faster

01:00:08.760 buildup of heat

01:00:09.840 here at the North Pole

01:00:12.340 in the Arctic Ocean

01:00:13.640 and the Arctic generally

01:00:15.080 than anywhere else

01:00:16.460 on the planet.

01:00:19.100 That's not good

01:00:20.140 for creatures

01:00:20.720 like polar bears

01:00:21.840 who depend on the ice.

01:00:24.720 A new scientific study

01:00:26.220 shows that

01:00:27.020 for the first time,

01:00:27.920 they're finding polar bears

01:00:29.160 that have actually drowned

01:00:31.600 swimming long distances

01:00:34.760 up to 60 miles

01:00:35.980 to find the ice.

01:00:38.260 Well, that pulls

01:00:38.980 right at your heartstrings

01:00:39.780 because there's nobody

01:00:40.700 who doesn't love

01:00:41.160 the polar bear,

01:00:41.900 but Bjorn,

01:00:43.000 is it true?

01:00:44.200 Did that turn out

01:00:44.660 to be true?

01:00:45.900 No.

01:00:46.480 I mean, again,

01:00:47.480 there's some part

01:00:48.680 of this that's true

01:00:49.800 that there are

01:00:50.780 some concerns

01:00:51.540 about the fact

01:00:52.360 that polar bears

01:00:53.360 might actually have

01:00:54.520 a problem

01:00:54.940 in the long run future,

01:00:56.060 but the reality,

01:00:57.400 of course,

01:00:57.680 is what really kills

01:00:59.380 a lot of polar bears

01:01:00.500 is that we hunted them.

01:01:01.600 We hunted them enormously

01:01:02.680 back in the 1960s and 70s

01:01:04.740 and what we've seen

01:01:05.980 when we actually look

01:01:07.020 at the inventory,

01:01:08.520 so the number

01:01:09.280 of polar bears,

01:01:10.500 they have kept going up

01:01:11.960 and we're actually

01:01:13.220 having more polar bears

01:01:14.420 now than we've ever had

01:01:15.660 since at least

01:01:16.740 the 1960s

01:01:17.820 and again,

01:01:18.960 I'm sort of,

01:01:19.720 I'm blown away

01:01:20.740 by the idea

01:01:21.520 that people are saying,

01:01:22.400 I love the polar bears

01:01:23.620 so we should,

01:01:24.320 you know,

01:01:24.540 stop all industrialization

01:01:26.040 and we should stop

01:01:26.700 all this fossil fuel nonsense

01:01:27.960 to save a few polar bears

01:01:29.920 when right now,

01:01:31.400 every year,

01:01:32.220 we shoot about

01:01:32.860 a thousand polar bears.

01:01:34.120 I don't know,

01:01:34.740 but if we want

01:01:35.680 to not damage polar bears,

01:01:37.480 maybe we should stop

01:01:38.360 shooting a thousand

01:01:39.220 polar bears first.

01:01:40.540 Good call.

01:01:41.520 However, David,

01:01:42.140 when you think about

01:01:42.740 the Arctic,

01:01:43.380 there was just an article

01:01:44.120 recently about how

01:01:45.760 the Atlantic

01:01:46.600 is spewing

01:01:47.780 a lot more warmer

01:01:49.360 waters into the Arctic

01:01:51.120 Sea than we thought

01:01:52.500 it was going to

01:01:53.440 and so the Arctic

01:01:54.480 is getting warmer

01:01:55.400 at a faster rate.

01:01:57.020 NASA says

01:01:57.520 the Arctic Sea ice,

01:01:59.700 the extent of it,

01:02:00.420 is down 13%

01:02:01.520 per decade

01:02:02.480 since 1979

01:02:03.600 and satellite data

01:02:05.420 shows Earth's

01:02:07.340 polar ice sheets

01:02:08.400 are losing mass,

01:02:09.740 down 428 billion

01:02:11.700 metric tons

01:02:12.720 per year.

01:02:14.460 So,

01:02:15.260 it's not wrong

01:02:16.440 to say that

01:02:16.900 the ice sheets

01:02:17.600 are melting

01:02:18.440 and that we have

01:02:19.440 to keep a look

01:02:20.020 on,

01:02:20.640 you know,

01:02:21.620 the icebergs

01:02:23.280 and that the Arctic

01:02:24.380 is getting warmer

01:02:25.440 in a way that could

01:02:26.260 have profound effects

01:02:27.320 on the rest

01:02:28.560 of the Earth.

01:02:30.940 That's true.

01:02:32.800 Yeah,

01:02:33.280 what's happening here?

01:02:33.880 And we agree.

01:02:34.660 Yeah.

01:02:35.580 And there's some

01:02:36.640 concerning possibilities

01:02:38.180 about the way

01:02:38.840 that those changes

01:02:39.760 may scramble weather

01:02:40.560 patterns beyond

01:02:41.600 the Arctic.

01:02:42.440 We don't exactly

01:02:43.280 know how

01:02:44.660 likely those are

01:02:47.440 or how quickly

01:02:48.200 they will come about,

01:02:48.920 but the changes

01:02:50.720 to the circulation

01:02:51.580 patterns of the ocean

01:02:52.520 can have some

01:02:53.160 quite dramatic

01:02:53.820 climate effects

01:02:54.640 that extend

01:02:55.260 well beyond

01:02:55.840 the Arctic

01:02:56.780 and indeed

01:02:57.320 a lot of the analysis.

01:02:58.900 We were talking

01:02:59.340 about how much

01:03:00.140 of recent extreme

01:03:01.380 events we can

01:03:01.900 attribute to

01:03:03.060 global warming

01:03:03.900 and climate change.

01:03:05.480 That's a booming

01:03:06.500 field and they're

01:03:07.740 producing much more

01:03:08.640 rapid response

01:03:09.840 analyses now

01:03:10.720 than they did

01:03:11.180 in the past

01:03:11.620 and a lot of

01:03:12.360 the analysis

01:03:12.840 of the Pacific heat

01:03:14.580 on the extreme

01:03:15.080 event in the

01:03:16.320 northwest U.S.

01:03:16.920 and Canada

01:03:17.360 last year

01:03:17.900 focused on the

01:03:19.140 way that changing

01:03:19.740 ocean patterns

01:03:20.540 has made some

01:03:21.160 of these events

01:03:22.120 considerably more

01:03:24.220 likely.

01:03:25.120 I wanted to go

01:03:25.820 back to something

01:03:26.240 that Bjorn said

01:03:26.700 a few minutes

01:03:27.100 ago,

01:03:27.420 which was

01:03:27.840 thinking about

01:03:31.120 the impact

01:03:31.760 of these disasters,

01:03:32.780 thinking about

01:03:33.500 declining mortality,

01:03:35.640 thinking about

01:03:36.120 declining.

01:03:38.120 I would say

01:03:38.780 that the impact

01:03:39.400 in terms of

01:03:39.880 percentage GDP

01:03:40.460 is basically

01:03:40.920 flat statistically,

01:03:41.980 but technically

01:03:42.600 I guess there's

01:03:43.060 been a small

01:03:43.620 decline in any

01:03:44.280 event.

01:03:45.960 In the big

01:03:46.640 picture,

01:03:46.980 there are

01:03:48.600 all of these

01:03:49.080 impacts that

01:03:49.960 we're watching

01:03:50.460 all the time

01:03:51.240 and they

01:03:52.520 all present

01:03:54.960 some amount

01:03:55.560 of challenge

01:03:56.040 to human

01:03:56.440 flourishing.

01:03:57.040 I am not

01:03:57.620 all that

01:03:58.000 concerned about

01:03:58.520 the plight of

01:03:58.960 polar bears

01:03:59.320 personally.

01:04:00.220 I'm much more

01:04:00.620 concerned about

01:04:01.120 the plight of

01:04:01.700 humans.

01:04:02.560 I just think

01:04:03.580 really big

01:04:04.380 picture.

01:04:06.520 The views

01:04:07.420 that I'm

01:04:07.780 expressing here

01:04:08.460 are not

01:04:09.340 the views

01:04:11.240 of fringe

01:04:12.380 alarmist

01:04:13.180 climate

01:04:14.500 warriors.

01:04:16.160 They are

01:04:16.600 the views

01:04:17.180 of the

01:04:18.140 IPCC.

01:04:18.860 They are

01:04:19.120 the views

01:04:19.600 of the

01:04:20.160 IMF and

01:04:20.780 the World

01:04:21.060 Bank.

01:04:21.380 They are

01:04:21.640 the views

01:04:22.140 of Hank

01:04:23.260 Paulson and

01:04:24.120 Mark Carney.

01:04:25.000 These are

01:04:25.380 people who

01:04:25.980 represent the

01:04:27.260 business and

01:04:28.460 economic growth

01:04:29.300 minded

01:04:29.840 perspective of

01:04:31.400 the Western

01:04:32.520 establishment.

01:04:34.840 these are

01:04:37.060 not Greta

01:04:39.820 Thunberg

01:04:40.200 talking.

01:04:41.160 This is not

01:04:41.740 Berkshini

01:04:42.100 Prakash

01:04:42.480 talking.

01:04:43.300 I have

01:04:43.480 great respect

01:04:43.900 for those

01:04:44.180 people.

01:04:44.440 I don't

01:04:44.560 mean to

01:04:44.860 demean

01:04:45.360 them.

01:04:45.860 I'm saying

01:04:46.320 the people

01:04:46.800 who are

01:04:47.080 at the

01:04:47.300 center of

01:04:48.900 the cold

01:04:50.500 cost-benefit

01:04:51.600 calculus that

01:04:52.400 runs the

01:04:52.940 world in

01:04:54.360 very general

01:04:55.440 ways see

01:04:56.780 climate change

01:04:57.460 as a

01:04:57.760 dramatic

01:04:58.280 challenge,

01:04:59.140 which is

01:04:59.580 the number

01:05:00.100 one challenge

01:05:00.840 of our

01:05:01.240 time.

01:05:02.900 Ten years

01:05:03.640 ago, 20

01:05:04.000 years ago,

01:05:04.380 that was

01:05:04.720 not the

01:05:05.380 case.

01:05:05.780 The

01:05:05.880 business

01:05:06.160 world, the

01:05:07.680 central banks

01:05:08.200 of the

01:05:08.420 world, we're

01:05:09.040 not talking

01:05:09.580 about climate

01:05:10.040 in these

01:05:10.420 terms, and

01:05:11.180 they very

01:05:11.560 much now

01:05:12.260 are.

01:05:13.340 I think

01:05:13.660 that is a

01:05:14.080 very powerful

01:05:15.040 message that

01:05:16.760 whatever

01:05:17.640 quibbles you

01:05:18.580 want to take

01:05:18.980 with this

01:05:19.600 study, that

01:05:20.080 study, this

01:05:20.580 data point,

01:05:21.040 that data

01:05:21.340 point, looking

01:05:22.040 at the

01:05:22.620 holistic

01:05:23.320 collective

01:05:23.940 picture,

01:05:25.280 anyone who

01:05:25.740 is worrying

01:05:26.220 about the

01:05:26.940 prosperity of

01:05:27.760 the planet

01:05:28.100 in the

01:05:28.580 future is

01:05:29.420 worrying about

01:05:29.900 climate change

01:05:30.520 quite significantly.

01:05:32.220 And well

01:05:32.420 beyond that,

01:05:33.100 of course, we

01:05:33.840 know that there

01:05:34.280 are many

01:05:34.660 things that

01:05:35.060 are being

01:05:35.260 affected by

01:05:35.800 these changes

01:05:36.400 that are not

01:05:37.220 easily captured

01:05:37.960 by economic

01:05:38.720 data and are

01:05:39.480 not represented

01:05:40.340 by matters of

01:05:41.120 economic growth.

01:05:41.880 I mentioned

01:05:42.160 earlier, we're

01:05:43.100 talking about

01:05:43.580 air pollution

01:05:44.160 produced by

01:05:44.720 fossil fuels

01:05:45.380 killing millions

01:05:46.360 of people a

01:05:46.920 year.

01:05:47.020 That is an

01:05:47.800 unbelievably large

01:05:49.380 scale impact.

01:05:50.960 And the

01:05:51.260 benefits of

01:05:52.080 reducing that

01:05:52.980 pollution and

01:05:53.880 reducing that

01:05:54.400 public health

01:05:54.820 impact would

01:05:55.620 be, you

01:05:56.380 know,

01:05:56.660 astronomically

01:05:57.500 positive for

01:05:59.020 the flourishing

01:05:59.620 of the planet.

01:06:00.240 And they

01:06:01.180 are concentrated

01:06:01.800 in countries

01:06:02.580 in the world

01:06:02.880 that we don't

01:06:03.360 tend to pay

01:06:03.920 all that much

01:06:04.280 attention to

01:06:04.800 in the U.S.,

01:06:05.440 but those lives

01:06:06.280 are still very

01:06:07.100 much worth

01:06:08.140 our time and

01:06:09.120 attention.

01:06:09.960 You know,

01:06:10.080 just in Delhi,

01:06:10.640 the average

01:06:10.980 resident is

01:06:11.920 having their

01:06:12.500 life expectancy

01:06:13.160 cut by nine

01:06:14.520 years by the

01:06:15.480 effects of air

01:06:16.360 pollution.

01:06:17.000 Now, that's not

01:06:17.740 entirely due to

01:06:18.560 the burning of

01:06:19.060 fossil fuels,

01:06:19.760 but that's a

01:06:20.140 significant

01:06:20.440 contributor.

01:06:21.400 And when you

01:06:21.620 look at air

01:06:22.640 pollution issues

01:06:23.260 across sub-Saharan

01:06:23.960 Africa, South

01:06:24.560 Asia, Southeast

01:06:25.680 Asia, fossil fuels

01:06:27.440 are a major,

01:06:28.280 major force there.

01:06:29.080 So even putting

01:06:29.960 aside hurricanes,

01:06:31.940 you know, floods,

01:06:33.060 droughts, which of

01:06:33.600 course we shouldn't

01:06:34.120 be putting aside,

01:06:35.060 but just thinking

01:06:35.620 about the direct

01:06:36.240 impacts of burning

01:06:37.560 fossil fuels,

01:06:38.680 according to our

01:06:39.700 world in data,

01:06:40.320 which is, again,

01:06:40.960 no fringe

01:06:41.440 organization,

01:06:42.120 it's a quite,

01:06:42.580 you know,

01:06:43.040 centrist data

01:06:44.980 organization,

01:06:46.240 for every thousand

01:06:48.100 Europeans that coal

01:06:49.180 power provides

01:06:49.800 electricity for,

01:06:50.620 it kills one.

01:06:52.180 You have to think

01:06:52.620 like how much more

01:06:53.380 expensive would

01:06:54.000 that, would,

01:06:54.660 would renewable

01:06:55.620 energy have to be

01:06:56.580 for that bargain

01:06:57.640 to be worth making?

01:06:59.080 And as Bjorn pointed

01:06:59.920 out, there are

01:07:00.860 complications with,

01:07:01.820 much earlier,

01:07:02.660 there are complications

01:07:03.280 with rolling out

01:07:03.900 renewables to 100%

01:07:05.540 capacity.

01:07:06.540 There are limitations

01:07:07.120 to wind and solar,

01:07:08.200 but most industry

01:07:10.220 analysts agree that

01:07:12.100 getting to about 80%

01:07:13.180 capacity is quite

01:07:14.440 doable and in the

01:07:15.940 relatively short term

01:07:16.880 and figuring out that

01:07:18.460 last chunk is the

01:07:20.000 challenge.

01:07:20.720 And we're very,

01:07:21.400 very, very, very far

01:07:22.220 from that 80% level

01:07:23.300 today, which means

01:07:24.120 we're subjecting many

01:07:24.980 more people all around

01:07:26.160 the world, but even in

01:07:26.920 the prosperous, clean

01:07:28.020 air places in the

01:07:28.700 world, to air pollution

01:07:29.640 that damages their

01:07:30.300 health and, you know,

01:07:32.040 well-being in many

01:07:32.840 other ways.

01:07:33.880 And even just look-

01:07:34.680 Okay, I got it.

01:07:35.320 Let me get Bjorn to

01:07:36.440 wait until we end on

01:07:37.220 that because what

01:07:37.660 we're hearing on the

01:07:38.800 other side, Bjorn, is

01:07:39.600 like, like here

01:07:40.880 domestically, you know,

01:07:41.800 the Green New Deal,

01:07:43.520 AOC's Green New Deal

01:07:44.520 was like, well, stop,

01:07:45.600 no more eating meat,

01:07:46.680 right?

01:07:47.040 And we got to reduce

01:07:48.100 the amount of methane

01:07:49.100 that comes from cows. 0.51

01:07:50.860 And we need everybody

01:07:52.240 to be in an electric car.

01:07:54.460 You know, meanwhile,

01:07:54.980 we don't have the

01:07:56.000 batteries for that and

01:07:56.700 we don't have, you

01:07:57.500 know, we don't have

01:07:58.640 the capacity to sort

01:07:59.480 of make that happen

01:08:00.600 on a countrywide

01:08:02.760 basis.

01:08:03.580 But it's really the

01:08:05.840 fossil fuels.

01:08:06.940 That's what's doing it.

01:08:08.020 It's not me eating a

01:08:09.660 hamburger.

01:08:10.400 That's if everybody

01:08:11.420 gave up meat, you tell

01:08:12.500 me you're a vegetarian.

01:08:13.180 I know for because you

01:08:14.260 don't like killing

01:08:14.660 animals, but it's not

01:08:15.420 about this.

01:08:17.320 Realistically, there's

01:08:18.360 no way of combating

01:08:19.320 this right now without

01:08:21.120 targeting the fossil fuels.

01:08:23.600 It's not about meat.

01:08:24.460 It's not about dairy.

01:08:25.780 And it's it's not

01:08:26.920 about even cars going

01:08:28.580 into, you know, electric

01:08:30.280 cars versus ones

01:08:31.600 powered by gasoline.

01:08:33.360 Well, I suspect David

01:08:34.420 and I would actually

01:08:35.160 agree.

01:08:35.580 And this is also what

01:08:36.340 the data shows.

01:08:37.220 This is not predominantly

01:08:38.260 about what you and I

01:08:39.460 and everybody else make

01:08:40.600 some personal choices.

01:08:41.440 This is very much about

01:08:42.780 how the world is set up.

01:08:45.220 And that's, of course,

01:08:46.040 the whole conversation

01:08:46.920 that David also just

01:08:48.320 engaged in.

01:08:49.220 He says that the World

01:08:50.220 Bank and many other

01:08:50.940 organizations are telling

01:08:52.120 us we really need to

01:08:53.680 focus on climate

01:08:54.420 change.

01:08:54.940 That's absolutely true.

01:08:56.220 But remember, these

01:08:57.020 organizations are driven

01:08:58.340 by politicians who

01:09:00.280 have decided that this

01:09:01.720 is what voters,

01:09:02.880 especially in rich

01:09:03.700 countries, want.

01:09:05.320 China, India are not 1.00

01:09:06.620 doing this.

01:09:07.640 And for good reason,

01:09:08.360 because they want to

01:09:09.480 focus on getting their

01:09:10.700 populations out of

01:09:11.840 poverty.

01:09:12.660 And so in some sense,

01:09:13.660 we're having this grand

01:09:15.020 global conversation.

01:09:16.760 Should we be spending

01:09:17.660 most of our time and our

01:09:18.860 focus on spending it

01:09:20.960 on climate and often

01:09:22.120 pretty badly or should we

01:09:24.320 be more concerned about

01:09:25.320 these many other things

01:09:26.460 that are also going to

01:09:27.400 decide most of what will

01:09:28.760 happen in the 21st century

01:09:30.000 and most poor people are

01:09:31.860 very clear in saying this

01:09:33.680 is much, much more about

01:09:34.920 being able to lift my kids

01:09:36.040 out of poverty, giving them

01:09:37.360 an education, allowing

01:09:38.800 them to survive than just

01:09:40.660 not dying from easily

01:09:41.600 curable infectious diseases

01:09:42.740 and all these other

01:09:43.980 things.

01:09:44.320 And that gets back to this

01:09:46.500 whole conversation of

01:09:47.560 saying, so what should we

01:09:49.720 do?

01:09:50.260 We are talking about

01:09:51.780 spending lots of money.

01:09:53.000 And again, David is

01:09:55.200 absolutely right that we

01:09:56.280 can obviously, because we're

01:09:58.020 rich civilization, we can

01:09:59.760 obviously allow ourselves to

01:10:01.240 see electricity prices go

01:10:02.660 up and pay more for having

01:10:04.680 essentially two

01:10:05.680 infrastructures, one that

01:10:07.300 almost entirely powers us

01:10:09.120 with green energy when the

01:10:10.860 wind is blowing and the sun

01:10:12.000 is shining, and a fossil fuel

01:10:14.000 infrastructure that powers

01:10:15.240 us when that's not the

01:10:16.580 case.

01:10:17.040 But that's not what most

01:10:18.720 countries in the world can

01:10:19.840 afford.

01:10:20.520 And so we're left with this

01:10:21.780 situation where maybe the

01:10:23.100 European Union, the U.S., a 0.94

01:10:25.280 few other well-meaning

01:10:26.180 countries will do some of

01:10:27.540 this.

01:10:27.840 They won't go anywhere near

01:10:29.020 to what they've actually

01:10:29.860 promised.

01:10:30.640 They will incur huge costs

01:10:33.160 and they will have most of

01:10:34.560 their voters eventually say,

01:10:35.880 no, don't want to do it.

01:10:37.280 So my concern about this, and

01:10:38.760 that's also the subtitle of

01:10:39.900 my book, right, is that we

01:10:41.320 really end up picking a

01:10:42.960 solution that very easily

01:10:43.960 makes it worse for the

01:10:45.240 world's poor, and it's

01:10:46.440 unsustainable because it

01:10:47.580 doesn't actually fix climate

01:10:49.320 change.

01:10:50.060 I think, you know, David and

01:10:51.920 most other people who want

01:10:53.260 to do something about

01:10:54.080 climate change, they come

01:10:54.900 from a good place.

01:10:55.600 They certainly want to make

01:10:56.740 sure this actually helps the

01:10:58.720 world.

01:10:59.040 And yes, we need to find a

01:11:01.300 solution, but we need to

01:11:02.640 find a solution that's so

01:11:04.020 sufficiently cheap that not

01:11:05.940 just rich, well-meaning

01:11:06.980 Americans and Europeans will

01:11:08.440 pay for it, but that everyone

01:11:10.120 in the U.S., and that's

01:11:11.260 certainly not what's the case

01:11:12.840 right now, and that

01:11:13.900 everyone in China and

01:11:14.920 India and Africa will pay 1.00

01:11:16.640 for it, and they're not

01:11:17.580 anywhere close to this.

01:11:19.040 We're talking about spending

01:11:20.120 $5 trillion a year, and

01:11:21.800 look, nobody, when you look

01:11:23.600 around, and especially not

01:11:24.880 after COVID, is willing to

01:11:26.260 pay that amount of money.

01:11:27.320 So I think the conversation

01:11:28.920 really should be, how do we

01:11:30.860 get a much cheaper and much

01:11:33.100 more effective policy?

01:11:34.380 That's not by forcing a lot of

01:11:36.480 solar panels and wind turbines

01:11:37.980 down people's throat right now, 0.82

01:11:39.380 but it's about innovating

01:11:40.880 them to become much, much

01:11:42.420 better, and innovating

01:11:43.680 fusion and fission and all

01:11:45.000 these other things.

01:11:45.940 So that's really where the

01:11:47.200 solution goes.

01:11:48.420 Get cheap green energy going,

01:11:50.280 and everybody will want to

01:11:51.720 buy it, but that's not where

01:11:52.920 we are right now.

01:11:53.980 Well, yeah, get cheap green

01:11:56.160 energy going and make it more

01:11:58.260 reliable.

01:11:59.500 But you also have some

01:12:00.740 interesting passages in your

01:12:01.740 book about innovation and

01:12:03.320 what else we could do.

01:12:04.780 Is there a way, other than

01:12:07.100 stopping with fossil fuels and

01:12:09.400 so on, of some sort of

01:12:10.960 technology that could

01:12:12.520 actually lower the Earth's

01:12:14.220 temperature?

01:12:15.800 We're going to talk about

01:12:16.660 solutions, innovations, and

01:12:18.660 what we actually are prepared

01:12:20.380 to do about this problem right

01:12:21.840 after this quick break.

01:12:23.560 More with David Wallace-Wells

01:12:24.760 and Bjorn Lomberg in just a

01:12:26.600 minute.

01:12:30.920 So I cannot have this

01:12:33.200 discussion without mentioning

01:12:34.340 some of the hypocrisy.

01:12:35.540 I, that's my word, we see 0.75

01:12:37.760 with some of these Hollywood

01:12:38.960 celebrities and climate

01:12:40.720 activists.

01:12:42.140 We just saw them go to the

01:12:43.760 climate summit in Glasgow,

01:12:45.620 Scotland, and all these

01:12:47.280 people flew in to lecture us

01:12:48.840 on how we need to cut back on

01:12:50.600 their private jets.

01:12:51.660 Right?

01:12:51.940 Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, Prince

01:12:53.400 Charles, Prince Albert of

01:12:54.340 Monaco, others.

01:12:56.700 I mean, of course, our

01:12:57.420 president was on Air Force

01:12:58.280 One.

01:12:59.340 And, you know, you can say,

01:13:00.800 OK, fine.

01:13:01.740 You know, Prince Charles needs

01:13:03.080 to be on a private jet.

01:13:04.040 Tell it to my imaginary

01:13:05.700 viewer, Madge, who's

01:13:07.300 sitting in Iowa, who is being

01:13:09.200 lectured to by AOC about how

01:13:10.660 not only does she not need to

01:13:12.080 stop eating meat, she needs to 1.00

01:13:14.000 get rid of her cattle farm and 0.99

01:13:16.160 she needs to lower the 0.99

01:13:17.160 temperature in her house and

01:13:18.860 she needs to get rid of her 1.00

01:13:19.900 SUV because she uses it to 0.99

01:13:21.880 drive around her four kids and

01:13:23.020 use an environment or an

01:13:24.540 electric car.

01:13:26.020 And then she says she sees

01:13:27.060 that.

01:13:27.660 And Madge says, you can pound

01:13:29.460 sand.

01:13:30.020 I'm going to continue living the

01:13:30.980 way I live because in my life,

01:13:32.320 I will never put out as much

01:13:33.880 carbon emissions as Prince

01:13:35.720 Charles did in that one

01:13:37.500 flight.

01:13:38.220 How about it, David?

01:13:40.220 Well, that's probably

01:13:40.980 technically not true.

01:13:41.980 She probably will put out more

01:13:42.920 carbon than that one flight,

01:13:43.980 but certainly private jets are

01:13:45.340 five to 14 times more

01:13:46.840 polluting than commercial

01:13:48.000 planes and 50 times more

01:13:49.760 polluting than trains.

01:13:50.900 And that's just talking about

01:13:51.900 means of travel.

01:13:52.520 I'm not saying that they make

01:13:52.880 no difference.

01:13:54.140 The carbon footprint is huge,

01:13:55.280 but it's probably not bigger

01:13:56.100 than the lifetime carbon

01:13:57.020 footprint of the average

01:13:57.700 American, although it is 0.61

01:13:58.520 probably bigger than the

01:13:59.280 lifetime carbon footprint of

01:14:00.520 the average sub-Saharan

01:14:01.440 and everything.

01:14:03.180 You know, in general, I think

01:14:04.200 that personal lifestyle

01:14:05.680 changes are significant

01:14:07.820 primarily in this fight to

01:14:09.220 signal to others that you are

01:14:10.340 concerned and to sort of

01:14:11.640 suggest to leaders your

01:14:13.100 willingness to, you know, to

01:14:15.240 push for a different future.

01:14:16.600 I think it's a virtue signal.

01:14:18.940 Well, no, I think it's more

01:14:20.100 about organizing and signaling

01:14:21.380 political commitment.

01:14:22.480 I think, you know, systemic

01:14:23.700 changes, what is required to

01:14:25.940 meaningfully reduce our carbon

01:14:27.140 emissions.

01:14:27.720 It doesn't matter.

01:14:29.000 You know, I can't build my own

01:14:29.880 electric grid.

01:14:30.460 I can't build my own EV

01:14:32.200 charging station.

01:14:33.040 I can't rebuild New York City's

01:14:35.120 infrastructure to make it

01:14:36.400 more carbon sensitive.

01:14:37.840 Those are things that are well

01:14:39.000 beyond my capacity to influence.

01:14:41.160 And I think the role of

01:14:42.020 individuals is essentially to

01:14:43.160 try to make those who can

01:14:45.460 drive large-scale policy

01:14:46.820 changes make them more

01:14:48.540 sensitive to the demands and,

01:14:49.620 you know, to the demands of

01:14:52.600 climate change and what

01:14:53.480 mitigation will have to be.

01:14:54.740 You can do that while eating

01:14:55.920 meat and driving an SUV.

01:14:56.980 Well, I just also want to be

01:14:58.600 clear about, you know, the AOC

01:14:59.660 thing.

01:15:00.080 Like, the Green New Deal, as 0.95

01:15:01.820 put forward, does not call for

01:15:03.600 any abandonment of meat.

01:15:04.960 There was, like, an unfortunate

01:15:06.520 FAQ that was put out early on

01:15:08.380 about that.

01:15:08.980 I think that most people looking

01:15:09.980 at this problem globally think

01:15:11.800 that to get our carbon emissions

01:15:14.460 down to 1.5 degree compliant

01:15:17.620 will require some amount of

01:15:19.300 consumer consumption changes in

01:15:21.660 the wealthy West.

01:15:22.340 exactly what degree of that is

01:15:24.480 not entirely clear.

01:15:26.680 But personally, I'd like to look

01:15:27.980 past the net zero scenario and

01:15:31.560 say, if we get to a place where

01:15:32.920 we are doing all of this stuff in

01:15:34.700 carbon neutral ways, then the

01:15:36.080 amount of what we are consuming,

01:15:37.780 the amount of travel that we're

01:15:40.140 undertaking, the amount of energy

01:15:42.080 that we're using, all of these are

01:15:43.760 not ultimately material from a

01:15:45.880 climate perspective.

01:15:47.000 And if we can engineer that future

01:15:48.380 over the course of the next half

01:15:49.540 century, I think we're going to be

01:15:50.820 in a much more prosperous and

01:15:52.040 comfortable and stable place than

01:15:53.660 we would be if we're going to

01:15:54.800 have to, you know, if we're

01:15:55.520 dealing with considerably more

01:15:57.240 warming, but also worrying about

01:15:58.700 the impact of the consumption

01:16:00.160 that we're undertaking.

01:16:01.000 I don't know.

01:16:01.480 It's very hard for me to take

01:16:03.080 John Kerry seriously when he flies

01:16:04.820 over there in a private jet and he

01:16:05.940 uses a private jet to fly his

01:16:07.100 family around.

01:16:08.340 No, I'm not going to listen to

01:16:10.040 somebody like that.

01:16:10.640 I'm not lowering my thermostat.

01:16:12.260 I'm not getting rid of my

01:16:13.300 enormous Chevy Suburban, which I

01:16:15.200 love.

01:16:15.920 I'm not doing it.

01:16:17.180 Let them start practicing what they

01:16:19.800 preach before they look at the

01:16:21.540 rest of us and tell us we've got

01:16:23.320 to sacrifice while John Kerry

01:16:25.160 doesn't sacrifice one thing.

01:16:27.660 Prince Charles doesn't need to be

01:16:30.040 on a private jet.

01:16:31.380 Neither did Jeff Bezos.

01:16:32.600 They don't need to be.

01:16:33.420 They can go on a regular

01:16:34.160 commercial jet like Leonardo

01:16:35.640 DiCaprio, to his credit, finally

01:16:36.920 did it going to this summit after

01:16:38.480 he got pummeled on the earlier

01:16:39.840 ones for doing it with a security

01:16:41.280 guard.

01:16:41.640 There's a way of doing it.

01:16:42.780 And I'm telling you, I speak for

01:16:44.780 I speak for middle America and

01:16:46.660 most of the right half of the

01:16:48.140 country on this and you can laugh

01:16:49.540 at me, but I'm telling you this

01:16:51.420 is an obstacle to people getting

01:16:52.900 on board.

01:16:54.140 This is what politics is for.

01:16:55.580 We organize our societies

01:16:56.740 differently than we live as

01:16:58.000 individuals.

01:16:58.440 And you don't ask Americans to 1.00

01:17:00.300 donate their half their money to

01:17:01.560 charity before they want more

01:17:03.360 money for their local public

01:17:04.260 schools.

01:17:04.800 We have great.

01:17:05.560 Well, then I'll behave like John

01:17:06.480 Kerry.

01:17:06.980 I will do what I want to do and I

01:17:09.240 will just use words to advocate

01:17:10.800 for the positions I want, just

01:17:12.500 like he does.

01:17:13.260 I'm not going to start changing my

01:17:14.380 behavior while none of our

01:17:15.580 leaders does.

01:17:16.100 I mean, that's what politics is

01:17:18.280 for, so that we can make changes

01:17:19.480 at a systemic level rather than

01:17:20.660 requiring individuals to do

01:17:21.680 everything on their own.

01:17:22.780 That's why we have social

01:17:23.760 organizations and politics.

01:17:25.360 And I would say to your point

01:17:26.120 about the difference between a

01:17:27.480 private jet and your own carbon

01:17:29.640 emissions, it's also really

01:17:30.840 important for Americans to keep 0.99

01:17:31.940 in mind that compared to most of

01:17:33.480 the people in the world, we are

01:17:34.880 consuming an unbelievable amount

01:17:36.860 of carbon, even if we are living

01:17:39.040 in very modest ways, even if we

01:17:40.900 are never traveling much compared

01:17:42.620 to the life of an average

01:17:44.100 sub-Saharan Africa, we are doing

01:17:45.780 unbelievably large amounts of

01:17:47.240 damage to the environment.

01:17:48.820 I saw a chart recently that was

01:17:50.000 published in Foreign Policy

01:17:51.000 suggesting that the average

01:17:52.840 American fridge consumes more

01:17:55.820 electricity than people living in

01:17:58.920 dozens of sub-Saharan African

01:18:00.460 countries.

01:18:01.520 So there's a difference between you

01:18:03.380 and Leonardo DiCaprio, perhaps,

01:18:05.120 but there's also an unbelievable

01:18:06.660 difference between you and most of

01:18:08.640 the people living on this planet,

01:18:09.840 many of whom are subject to much

01:18:11.420 more intense impacts from climate

01:18:12.760 changes.

01:18:13.160 Well, I don't disagree with that.

01:18:14.500 I don't disagree with that, but I

01:18:15.520 also feel like, I'm sorry, I was

01:18:17.280 born in America.

01:18:18.180 I have the fridge I have.

01:18:19.660 Like, by the way, most of my life

01:18:21.280 I've lived in cities and, you know,

01:18:22.620 high-rise buildings, which are very

01:18:24.080 efficient when it comes to carbon

01:18:26.060 emissions, way more so than the big

01:18:27.800 house that John Kerry lives in out

01:18:29.480 in Massachusetts and then his beach

01:18:31.240 house on top of it and so on.

01:18:32.520 I just feel like, you know, the

01:18:34.220 hypocrisy is a real problem and these

01:18:36.300 people should understand how visuals

01:18:37.700 work on the American public and

01:18:39.720 beyond.

01:18:40.100 And I just, you tell me, Bjorn,

01:18:41.960 because I just don't think the

01:18:42.720 average American is going to be 0.54

01:18:43.620 moved by the fact that sub-Saharan

01:18:44.960 Africans have a different lifestyle 1.00

01:18:46.760 and our refrigerators need to be

01:18:48.860 guilted.

01:18:49.620 I'm like, I hear this.

01:18:50.320 No, no, but I think there's a

01:18:52.400 larger point.

01:18:53.180 I totally get your point.

01:18:54.720 There's something phenomenally wrong

01:18:56.220 about all these, you know,

01:18:57.580 airplanes, private airplanes going

01:18:59.880 down to listen to Greta Thunberg.

01:19:01.980 But the fundamental point is, yes, 0.76

01:19:04.200 they're hypocrites, but we are all 0.97

01:19:05.880 hypocrites in the sense that we say 0.99

01:19:08.480 we want something done about 0.96

01:19:11.180 climate change, but we actually

01:19:12.360 really like our good life.

01:19:14.480 And I think that tells us something

01:19:16.420 about the solution that we're

01:19:18.060 currently proposing, namely making a

01:19:20.200 solution where everyone has to do

01:19:21.820 with a little less and it's going to

01:19:23.200 be a little less good.

01:19:24.280 And, you know, you have to turn down

01:19:25.380 your thermostat and you have to

01:19:27.220 freeze a little more and be a little

01:19:28.480 poorer and drive a little less and all

01:19:30.100 that stuff.

01:19:30.660 It's never going to work.

01:19:31.700 It's not going to work for rich

01:19:33.340 Americans.

01:19:33.940 It's not going to work for normal

01:19:35.700 Americans.

01:19:36.280 And it's certainly not going to work

01:19:38.080 for people who live in sub-Saharan

01:19:39.460 Africa.

01:19:40.140 And I think that underscores why this

01:19:42.940 is never going to work.

01:19:44.580 The solution that we're being tried to

01:19:46.560 being told here from World Bank and

01:19:49.000 many other places, you've got to learn

01:19:50.560 to live with less.

01:19:51.680 No.

01:19:52.240 The only way you're going to get

01:19:53.840 political buy-in in the long run for

01:19:55.640 this is if you can show you can live

01:19:57.880 better, you can live more and emit

01:20:00.680 much less CO2.

01:20:01.800 So we've gotten this wrong in a sense

01:20:04.820 that we think this is all about

01:20:06.380 squeezing everybody to buy a few more

01:20:09.220 solar panels, even though they kind of

01:20:11.280 don't want because they don't provide

01:20:12.720 quite as good electricity as the one

01:20:14.420 that we already have, instead of

01:20:16.580 focusing on making green energy much

01:20:19.300 cheaper.

01:20:19.900 Imagine, just for a second, nuclear power

01:20:22.940 right now costs a lot, especially in

01:20:25.300 the first world, for a variety of

01:20:27.820 reasons that we can talk about, but

01:20:29.040 it's very, very hard to get rid of this

01:20:30.920 very high cost.

01:20:32.420 But Bill Gates and many others are

01:20:34.040 investing in what's known as fourth

01:20:35.620 generation nuclear that potentially

01:20:37.780 could be a lot cheaper for a wide range

01:20:40.760 of reasons.

01:20:41.940 Imagine if we could innovate the price of

01:20:44.860 nuclear down below fossil fuels.

01:20:47.140 Everyone in the world would switch.

01:20:49.280 Imagine if we could do that for fusion. 0.79

01:20:51.660 Imagine if we could do it for solar and

01:20:53.680 lots and lots and lots of batteries.

01:20:55.780 Imagine if we could do it for a lot of

01:20:57.620 different technologies.

01:20:58.400 Now, the point is, we're not going to

01:21:00.500 succeed with most of these, but we don't

01:21:02.400 need to.

01:21:03.120 We just need one of these technologies to

01:21:05.280 come through and be cheaper than fossil

01:21:07.300 fuels.

01:21:07.740 Then everyone will buy them, not just rich

01:21:10.700 while meaning Americans, but also the

01:21:12.580 Chinese, the Indians, the Africans, 0.98

01:21:14.140 everybody else.

01:21:15.000 And so the solution to climate change is

01:21:17.520 not first and foremost these grand

01:21:20.240 places where we all meet and make promises

01:21:22.580 we don't actually intend to do.

01:21:24.340 But the solution is to invest a lot more

01:21:28.200 in research and development.

01:21:29.480 Actually, on the sidelines of Paris in

01:21:31.940 2015, which everybody talks about, this

01:21:34.780 was the place where we promised to cut

01:21:36.200 carbon emissions and then we didn't.

01:21:38.020 But we also had another promise.

01:21:40.220 So President Obama and many other world

01:21:45.500 leaders, Bill Gates and many other

01:21:47.420 billionaires got together in what they

01:21:49.360 called mission innovation to promise to

01:21:51.580 double investment in green energy R&D.

01:21:54.400 That's what's going to solve climate

01:21:56.520 change.

01:21:56.980 Unfortunately, we didn't live up to that

01:21:58.780 either.

01:21:59.380 Why?

01:21:59.980 Because everybody focuses so much on

01:22:02.560 pushing.

01:22:03.120 Let's get up the next solar panel part

01:22:05.060 or the next wind turbine part instead

01:22:07.200 of funding eggheads, which, quite

01:22:09.700 frankly, doesn't feel all that sexy, but

01:22:11.880 just happens to be the way that we've

01:22:13.920 solved all of the problems in the past

01:22:15.660 and that we will solve this problem

01:22:17.000 through innovation.

01:22:17.820 We need better ideas.

01:22:18.560 That's what you're saying.

01:22:19.200 We need better ideas that account for

01:22:20.720 Well, more investment in getting those

01:22:22.900 better ideas to be cost effective.

01:22:25.420 Yeah.

01:22:25.760 I think the world that Bjorn's describing

01:22:27.760 as an optimistic future is the one in

01:22:29.420 which we are here already.

01:22:30.800 I mentioned earlier the IEA calls solar

01:22:32.700 power the cheapest electricity in

01:22:34.800 history.

01:22:35.360 But only when the sun is shining.

01:22:38.660 But when you look around the world, you

01:22:40.260 see we've talked about the IMF, the

01:22:41.740 World Bank, all of these

01:22:42.520 recommendations.

01:22:43.180 I also think it's quite important to

01:22:44.320 recognize that many developing nations,

01:22:46.260 many middle income nations, up to and

01:22:47.960 including China and India, have made these

01:22:50.460 quite dramatic promises over the last

01:22:52.500 year, 18 months.

01:22:54.420 China in particular is not promising to 0.78

01:22:57.360 decarbonize quite as quickly as quite as

01:22:59.060 quick as the U.S., but they're promising to

01:23:01.300 decarbonize by 2060.

01:23:02.740 They're building out a huge amount of

01:23:04.300 solar and wind power.

01:23:06.440 To power that, they're also promising to

01:23:08.060 dramatically expand their nuclear capacity.

01:23:10.380 I believe they're promising to build as much

01:23:11.720 nuclear in the next 15 years as the entire

01:23:13.920 world has built in the last 30.

01:23:15.260 That may also have cascading effects that

01:23:17.980 make nuclear cheaper elsewhere.

01:23:20.460 But when I look at all of these net zero

01:23:22.860 pledges made, again, by 85 percent of the

01:23:25.220 world's GDP and 85 percent of our global

01:23:29.020 carbon emissions to get to net zero by

01:23:31.300 2050, 2060, when I see those pledges being

01:23:34.180 made, what I see is policymakers taking

01:23:36.400 a really clear-eyed, cold-hearted look at

01:23:40.080 the dollars and cents cost benefits, thinking

01:23:42.220 about how they can design the next decades of

01:23:44.200 their country's prosperity, and saying, seeing

01:23:47.060 clearly that the path through renewables will

01:23:50.640 be better for them.

01:23:51.480 They may not actually fulfill those pledges.

01:23:56.080 I think that that's a real concern, and I think

01:23:57.940 there are real obstacles, some of which Bjorn

01:24:00.260 has mentioned, some of which we haven't talked

01:24:01.500 about to making them real, and those are

01:24:03.160 concerns as well.

01:24:03.920 But the fact that sitting in front of the

01:24:06.740 whiteboard, mapping out these countries'

01:24:09.020 future, countries from as diverse places as

01:24:11.580 China and India and South Korea and the U.S. are 0.51

01:24:14.120 all saying, well, if we were doing this in a

01:24:16.220 laboratory, if we were really making

01:24:18.020 plans from scratch, we would be pushing very

01:24:21.140 quickly towards decarbonization.

01:24:22.720 And Bjorn talked a minute ago about the possible

01:24:24.920 additional costs that would be shouldered by rich

01:24:27.380 countries in the world to build a stable,

01:24:29.440 renewable system.

01:24:30.440 That is just not the analysis that I see or

01:24:32.960 trust out there.

01:24:33.920 Princeton University put out an incredibly thorough

01:24:36.440 project called Net Zero America about six months ago

01:24:39.340 that found that, you know, a transition to a

01:24:42.340 renewable power sector in the U.S. would have no

01:24:44.640 impact on energy costs at all.

01:24:46.920 In fact, it would be, you know, in terms of

01:24:49.340 whether you'd want to stay where we are and move

01:24:51.320 there, it would be better for the average American

01:24:53.200 simply just looking at the cost of electricity.

01:24:55.660 And there have been other analyses showing that

01:24:57.820 we could entirely pay for the green transition

01:24:59.740 in the U.S. just through the public health

01:25:01.620 benefits of cleaner air.

01:25:02.920 And that's in the U.S., which has relatively

01:25:04.640 clean air.

01:25:05.460 And yet the additional benefits of cleaner air are

01:25:08.600 such that the entire green energy transition

01:25:10.500 could be paid for by those benefits.

01:25:12.720 So I think both in the global south and in

01:25:15.300 middle-income countries in the world and in the

01:25:17.280 rich countries of the world, we're talking about

01:25:18.680 a new economic calculus, very different from the

01:25:21.140 one five or ten years ago, very different from

01:25:22.960 the one that was sort of prevailing at the time

01:25:26.240 that Bjorn was first writing about climate change,

01:25:28.020 in which we are we are now seeing and almost

01:25:30.100 everyone engaged in long-term planning is seeing

01:25:32.680 that a greener, more decarbonized future

01:25:35.960 will be more prosperous, healthier, and more stable.

01:25:39.780 In addition-

01:25:40.340 Go ahead.

01:25:40.620 Go ahead and respond, Bjorn.

01:25:42.280 Yeah.

01:25:43.120 And it's wonderful because this really sets out

01:25:46.020 the sort of argument very clearly.

01:25:48.900 David says he's seeing a lot more countries

01:25:51.440 making grand promises.

01:25:52.680 That's absolutely true.

01:25:53.820 Almost everyone have made promises that they

01:25:55.500 really don't believe.

01:25:56.740 Remember, the reason why China and India have put 1.00

01:25:58.920 them later on is because then they can reasonably

01:26:01.340 claim, oh, the other countries, all the rich countries

01:26:05.560 didn't actually live up to them, so we can also

01:26:07.540 abandon them.

01:26:08.520 I think the best example of how they don't really

01:26:11.180 trust them is that India said that they were going

01:26:13.480 to go carbon neutral by 2070, but they want a

01:26:17.820 trillion dollars from the world by 2030 in order to

01:26:21.720 start the process.

01:26:23.580 Hands up anyone who actually believes that anyone is,

01:26:27.100 and certainly the US, is going to give India a 0.96

01:26:29.560 trillion dollars, and remember, all the other

01:26:31.860 countries will want that sort of sum of money as

01:26:34.660 well.

01:26:35.060 This is pie in the sky.

01:26:36.600 This is basically to avoid being taxed, especially

01:26:39.160 by the European Union, so you make these political

01:26:42.300 claims.

01:26:43.160 Again, yes, the world is moving towards cleaner

01:26:47.080 energy, and that's great and wonderful, but most of

01:26:50.140 it comes in the back of a lot of middle Americans and 0.95

01:26:53.140 middle everywhere paying up huge extra cost for their

01:26:57.240 electricity, fundamentally because you are now

01:26:59.380 buying two sets.

01:27:00.780 You're both having to pay for the gas generator and the

01:27:03.680 solar panel, if you want to put it very bluntly.

01:27:06.260 And that's, of course, why energy prices got doubled in

01:27:10.360 the UK over the last two decades.

01:27:13.160 That's why we've seen almost everywhere where you have more

01:27:15.600 renewable energy, it becomes more expensive.

01:27:18.060 That's why the academic estimates show that if you actually

01:27:20.480 want to go to two degrees, it's going to cost you in the

01:27:23.060 order of $8 trillion by 2050.

01:27:25.900 That's why studies show that for the US, it's going to cost

01:27:30.040 much more than $5,000 per person per year in the US.

01:27:35.200 I'm aware, and I agree, that there are some really

01:27:38.400 outrageously optimistic studies out there that show we'll

01:27:41.420 actually make money off of it.

01:27:42.900 Well, if that was the case, then, of course, we wouldn't

01:27:45.720 actually see energy prices spiraling out of control.

01:27:48.900 We wouldn't see nations say, oh, I'm not sure I really want to

01:27:53.300 go down this road.

01:27:54.660 David makes it sound like we're all just happy and rushing

01:27:57.980 towards this wonderful utopia.

01:27:59.880 But the reality is, we are all saying all these nice things,

01:28:04.380 but we're not actually doing it.

01:28:05.740 Let me just show you this one thing.

01:28:07.400 So the UN Environment Program, so the guys who run part of the

01:28:12.640 climate discussion, they did a survey of the 2010s climate

01:28:17.080 policy, which includes the Paris Agreement.

01:28:19.640 Now, they did it in late 2019, just before COVID hit.

01:28:23.440 What they found was that despite the fact that we have promised

01:28:27.240 and we've had immense amount of talk and we had the Paris Agreement,

01:28:30.160 they said they could not tell the difference between a world

01:28:33.540 where we didn't care about climate change since 2005

01:28:36.720 and the real world.

01:28:39.040 And what that tells you is that there's this enormous amount

01:28:42.280 of people saying we're doing all these things.

01:28:44.660 We've certainly spent a lot of money, one academic study estimate,

01:28:47.560 we've spent about $500 billion every year for the last eight years

01:28:50.700 on climate policies that have basically not changed the trajectory

01:28:54.760 at all.

01:28:56.220 Again, if you want to go much further, you have to spend a lot more.

01:29:00.780 And most countries, most voters, most electorates are not willing

01:29:04.240 to do that.

01:29:04.880 And that's why when David says, I see a lot of countries carefully

01:29:09.540 mapping this out.

01:29:10.400 Well, if you look at Europe, if you look at the US, all the leaders

01:29:14.300 are phenomenally scared about the fact that energy prices are now

01:29:18.260 going up, which, of course, is exactly what they're designed to do.

01:29:21.840 It's not just because of climate policies, but exactly what they're

01:29:25.080 designed to do if you want to do climate policies.

01:29:27.960 And now politicians are really saying, oh, God, no, we don't actually

01:29:30.680 want that because then we'll be thrown out of office.

01:29:33.580 Again, my point is, I think David and I agree that we want to do stuff

01:29:38.220 to actually fix climate change.

01:29:40.340 But David's solution and the solution that most people have embraced,

01:29:43.320 certainly most rich Western elites have embraced, will not get us there

01:29:47.940 because it's phenomenally expensive and it'll never get completed when

01:29:52.740 people start realizing what the real costs are.

01:29:55.060 And on that note, there was just a report that just hit that the United

01:29:59.700 States saw an inflation rate soar by 7 percent.

01:30:03.900 The inflation soared by 7 percent in the past year, which is the most

01:30:07.660 since 1982.

01:30:10.060 Americans definitely not in the mood to pay more for anything at the

01:30:13.660 moment because they already are.

01:30:15.160 All right.

01:30:15.280 We're going to save until the next time the discussion on geoengineering.

01:30:20.000 This is from Bjorn's book.

01:30:21.980 I'll just give you a little tease for our next discussion on this, where he

01:30:24.540 says it essentially means deliberately adjusting the planet's temperature

01:30:28.420 controls.

01:30:29.740 This is uncharted territory.

01:30:31.360 Humanity has never purposefully made planet wide efforts to change the

01:30:35.740 climate.

01:30:36.800 Many of the geoengineering technologies sound like science fiction.

01:30:40.120 The entire field of study provokes fear, but it's and it's not a policy we

01:30:43.300 should implement right now, he writes.

01:30:44.520 But it is a partial solution that is worth researching.

01:30:48.140 I'm so intrigued.

01:30:49.240 I sadly have to save it because we just filled the show with just chock full of 0.99

01:30:53.440 goodness on other fronts.

01:30:54.660 But you guys are great.

01:30:55.540 And I really I learned a lot and I really appreciate the respectful back and

01:30:58.460 forth.

01:30:58.740 David and Bjorn, thank you both so much for being here.

01:31:01.360 Thanks.

01:31:02.320 We'll see you tomorrow.

01:31:03.240 Don't miss the show.

01:31:03.900 Check us out on YouTube in the meantime.

01:31:06.800 Thanks for listening to The Megyn Kelly Show. 0.94

01:31:08.760 No BS, no agenda and no fear.

The Megyn Kelly Show - January 12, 2022

The Truth About Climate Change, Climate Realism and Climate Alarmism, with Bjorn Lomborg and David Wallace-Wells ｜ Ep. 239

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