FLOP26’s ‘Deluge’—Rain, Garbage and Rats—Not What the Queen Ordered

Oct. 29, 2021 (EIRNS)—The city of Glasgow is, as of this writing, a flooded mess, with the U.K. Met Office “yellow weather” warning extending into noon tomorrow as guests are arriving for what is looking more like the real Flop26. Torrential rains have flooded the streets, forcing some people to abandon their cars, stopping traffic, halting train service from London to Glasgow, etc., raising the question of how people are going to be able to get to the Malthusian lovefest scheduled to begin on Hallwe’en on Sunday. The small city of Glasgow is overwhelmed. The Washington Post today reports that on the eve of the summit, trash collectors are threatening to go out on strike, which would certainly be an embarrassment; but even if they don’t, trash and recyclables are collected only three times a month, leading to overflowing trash cans and dumpsters and a big increase in the rat population.

And all this is taking place against a backdrop of a full-blown energy crisis, which the weekly The Spectator blames on the green movement’s push for renewables, added to which was the U.K.’s decision to reduce domestic storage capacity during the COVID pandemic, and failing to carry out maintenance on the all-important North Sea gas rigs. Calmer weather has also caused many wind turbines built around the U.K. to cease operating. No wonder coal stations are being restarted. With fuel and food shortages, The Spectator points out, this is no time to be talking about net zero emissions.

All of this could amount to a big political setback for Boris Johnson, and even for the broader environmental movement, the weekly reports, because there will be such a sharp contrast between expectations and actual results, combined with a severe energy crisis. Aside from the no-shows—Putin, Xi, Japan’s Kishida and Modi undecided—there is the other problem that developing countries are demanding many billions of dollars to cover the cost of meeting emission reduction demands. A meeting held in London last July estimated that developing nations would initially need $100 billion annually which would eventually increase to $700 billion. Another leaked draft resolution that came out of this same meeting was that production and consumption of vegan meat should be promoted—which didn’t sit well with Australia, Argentina, Brazil and other beef producers.