Can Bjorn Lomborg walk AND chew gum?

onSep 27, 2006 @ 08:44 PDT

The Guardian’s Science Podcast this week features interviews with Bjorn Lomborg, the self proclaimed “Skeptical Environmentalist” and Tony Juniper of the Friends of the Earth environmental society.

Lomborg makes his same old argument against action on climate change, that the world’s economic resources are finite and that we should dedicate them to his top priorities – a list that misses climate change.

To quote Lomborg, “We’re focussed very much on climate change, and we are not focussed very much on all the other issues in the world and quite frankly we don’t have infinite resources.” Friend of the Earther, Tony Juniper retorts, “Lomborg’s logic breaks down somewhat in trying to trade these things off against each other. I don’t think the world works like that.”

No, the world doesn’t work like that, but yes, as Lomborg most astutely observes, we don’t have infinite resources. But as the more innovative northern European countries are already demonstrating, addressing climate change can be affordable – and can create economic opportunity – if approached sensibly. To do otherwise, on the single issue that could remake the face of the earth’s environment as we know it, would be irresponsible in the extreme.

Lomborg is smart enough to know it. The fact he won’t admit it makes the rest of his arguments equally suspect.

By Kevin Grandia

Kevin is a contributor and strategic adviser to DeSmog. He runs the digital marketing agency Spake Media House. Named a “Green Hero” by Rolling Stone Magazine and one of the “Top 50 Tweeters” on climate change and environment issues, Kevin has appeared in major news media outlets around the world for his work on digital campaigning. Kevin has been involved in the public policy arena in both the United States and Canada for more than a decade. For five years he was the managing editor of DeSmogBlog.com. In this role, Kevin’s research into the “climate denial industry” and the right-wing think tank networks was featured in news media articles around the world. He is most well known for his ground-breaking research into David and Charles Koch’s massive financial investments in the Republican and tea party networks. Kevin is the first person to be designated a “Certified Expert” on the political and community organizing platform NationBuilder. Prior to DeSmog, Kevin worked in various political and government roles. He was Senior Advisor to the Minister of State for Multiculturalism and a Special Assistant to the Minister of State for Asia Pacific, Foreign Affairs for the Government of Canada. Kevin also worked in various roles in the British Columbia provincial government in the Office of the Premier and the Ministry of Health. In 2008 Kevin co-founded a groundbreaking new online election tool called Vote for Environment which was later nominated for a World Summit Award in recognition of the world’s best e-Content and innovative ICT applications. Kevin moved to Washington, DC in 2010 where he worked for two years as the Director of Online Strategy for Greenpeace USA and has since returned to his hometown of Vancouver, Canada.