Technology Skepticism is Not Denial

This commentary is in reference to a Financial Times (1/18/24) article “Warning of new wave of climate change denial” by Emilia Mychasuk, Climate Editor, in which she reports on the findings of the Center for Countering Digital Hate. The organization reviewed online videos on climate change for the past six years. The videos were collectively viewed, according to the Center, 325 million times. Using Artificial Intelligence the Center sorted and classified climate denial assertions made about the issue of climate change.

The Center reported that…

“…the majority of claims focused on three new main categories: that the consequences of global warming were either harmless or even beneficial;
that climate science was unreliable; and that climate solutions would not work [ or maybe are not yet available] the most predominate theme.”

The first is easily dismissed. The second theme that “climate science was unreliable” is best left to climate scientists themselves.

The last theme seems to me an appropriate one for public policy discussion and debate without technology commentators incurring the label of “climate denial.” Surely someone disputing the effectiveness of a claimed cure for cancer does not mean they don’t believe that cancer exists.

The issues involved in climate “solutions” are not climate science but issues of: cost and availability of carbon-free energy sources, size of new infrastructure investment , and lifecycle analysis of greenhouse gas emissions from manufacture, operation and disposal at retirement.

Writing something similar Bill Gates observed “Climate science tells us why we need to deal with this problem but not how to deal with it. For that we’ll need biology, chemistry, physics, political science, economics, engineering and other sciences.”

Preferred “climate solutions” are usually based on public policy decisions with respect to choice of competing technologies accompanied by public budget expenditures, tax incentives and increases in utility rates and energy prices. To claim that a specific climate solution “would not work” is an appropriate public position to take if supported by facts and analysis. Those who disagree have the opportunity to offer their own studies but not the right to label opposing studies as “climate denial.”

After-all what is one to make, in a climate denial analysis, of Gate’s observation that “Although we have a number of cost-competitive low-carbon solutions today, we still don’t have all the technologies we need to get to zero emissions globally.”

Technology Skepticism is Not Denial

By Branko Terzic

By
Branko Terzic