Prophets of Doom: The Green Elite’s War on Human Progress

Why the 2024 climate report is more about fear than facts.

The recent article published in BioScience, “The 2024 state of the climate report: Perilous times on planet Earth,” is a parade of exaggerated claims and half-truths, a propaganda piece designed to scare the public into adopting misguided policies while turning a blind eye to the real drivers of human progress. While it projects an image of scientific rigor, a closer look reveals that most of these dire warnings don’t even align with the IPCC‘s latest report, particularly when scrutinizing the IPCC AR6’s scientific foundations.

Source: https://academic.oup.com/bioscience/advance-article/doi/10.1093/biosci/biae087/7808595?login=false

Let’s break this down.

Heat and Cold: Cherry-Picking for Panic

The article wildly exaggerates heat extremes and cold spells, ignoring that most of these changes are well within natural variability, as even the IPCC AR6 admits. According to IPCC’s AR6 Chapter 12 (Table 12.12), heat extremes are increasing in some places, but not uniformly across the globe. What the BioScience article ignores is that most of these heat extremes are natural fluctuations. Meanwhile, extreme cold, which kills far more than heat, is thankfully on the decline, as energy access has improved globally.

Source: https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/wg1/chapter/chapter-12/

And let’s look at the actual data: A Lancet study found that cold temperatures are responsible for far more deaths than heat, yet cold extremes are on the decline, thanks, in large part, to modern energy sources like coal, oil, and gas. These are the very energy sources the article demonizes.

Fraction of all-cause mortality attributable to moderate and extreme hot and cold temperature by country. Source: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(14)62114-0/fulltext

For those in developing nations, these so-called temperature extremes aren’t even on their radar. The reality is that access to cheap, reliable energy is what allows people to survive both heat and cold. Western elites conveniently forget that the world’s greatest public health achievements, from heating homes to powering air conditioning, have been driven by fossil fuels, not solar panels or wind farms.

Wet and Dry: The Fear of Floods and Droughts Misplaced

The article’s ominous portrayal of floods and droughts paints a picture of the world on the verge of catastrophe. But according to the IPCC, the patterns of precipitation are far more complex and regionally specific. There’s no evidence to suggest that the developing world is suddenly facing greater risks from floods than they have for centuries. Sure, some regions may see slight increases in flood risks, but is it an “emergency”? Absolutely not.

The focus on “hydrological drought” and “agricultural drought” as ticking time bombs is equally misleading. Historically, humans have managed droughts through technology, irrigation, innovation, and improved agricultural practices, not by cutting emissions. Global agricultural productivity is at an all-time high, and hunger levels have declined in the era of so-called “climate emergency,” thanks to fossil fuel-based fertilizers and mechanization.

Source: https://ourworldindata.org/agricultural-production#all-charts

Snow and Ice: Hyping Glaciers and Sea Level

The BioScience piece laments the melting of glaciers and the threat of sea-level rise. Again, the IPCC contradicts this alarmism. Yes, glaciers are retreating, but even in the most extreme models (RCP8.5 or SSP5-8.5, which the IPCC admits is unrealistic), sea level rise remains manageable. And let’s be clear: for the 7 billion people outside the pampered West, these changes are hardly a concern compared to the real existential challenges of energy poverty and infrastructure deficiencies.

The article also sounds the alarm on permafrost melt, but the risk is localized and pales in comparison to the daily struggles of communities striving to lift themselves out of poverty. The alarmists miss the point that the biggest threat to the world’s poorest isn’t climate change; it’s the elite’s war on affordable energy, the very thing that could pull millions out of poverty.

Coastal and Open Ocean: Erosion Myths and Overblown Heatwaves

Coastal erosion and sea-level rise have been favorite talking points for alarmists for decades. And yet, here we are. Despite projections that should have seen islands like Tuvalu disappear years ago, they’re still standing. The IPCC AR6 is clear, yes, relative sea levels will rise in some places, but it’s far from a global crisis. And let’s not forget that many coastal areas are already sinking due to geological factors, not rising seas.

Recent research published in the ISPRS Journal of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing, gathered Landsat imagery between 1984 and 2019, indicating that the globally averaged shoreline change rate is approximately +0.26 meters per year, suggesting that the global coastline is, in fact, prograding (growing outward) rather than retreating universally due to rising sea levels.

What’s more, the real drivers of coastal resilience, economic development and infrastructure, are completely ignored by the article. Look at the Netherlands: a country below sea level, which has used engineering and innovation to thrive for centuries. Coastal erosion is a non-issue when economies have the resources to adapt. The poor countries most often cited in these papers don’t need “climate reparations,” they need the ability to develop their economies using the same cheap energy that the West used.

As for the oceans, the fear of marine heatwaves and ocean acidification is vastly overstated. The IPCC’s own findings indicate that while there are regional concerns, the global picture is far from catastrophic. A recent article published in the journal Nature titled, “Marine heatwaves are not a dominant driver of change in demersal fishes”, highlights this point and states…

We investigated the effects of 248 sea-bottom heatwaves from 1993 to 2019 on marine fishes by analysing 82,322 hauls (samples) from long-term scientific surveys of continental shelf ecosystems in North America and Europe spanning the subtropics to the Arctic. Here we show that the effects of marine heatwaves on fish biomass were often minimal and could not be distinguished from natural and sampling variability.

The hypocrisy here is staggering. Wealthy nations that built their economies on fossil fuels are now pushing developing nations to “go green,” fully aware that renewables cannot yet provide the energy scale needed to pull billions out of poverty. It’s not about saving the planet; it’s about controlling the world.

Conclusion: Human Progress Has Never Been Better, Thanks to Fossil Fuels

Here’s the simple truth: humanity has never been better off, and it’s not despite the warming, it’s because of the industrial revolution powered by fossil fuels. Life expectancy is up, poverty is down, and we’re producing more food than ever before. These advancements haven’t come from cutting emissions, they’ve come from embracing industry, energy, and progress.

The BioScience article reads as little more than a diatribe against human progress, rejecting the very innovations that have allowed billions to escape poverty. It’s propaganda aimed at an audience that has the luxury of fretting over future hypothetical scenarios because they’ve already reaped the benefits of industrialization. For the 7 billion people not living in the privileged West, the real emergency isn’t climate change… it’s the war on affordable energy.

Source: https://ourworldindata.org/the-future-is-vast

This article was originally published at Irrational Fear, the substack page of Matthew Wielicki. Please subscribe to his substack page to read more articles by him.

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