Why settle for a slice of the economic pie when you can get 1% of the world’s GNP for saving your own life?

We’ve all heard how the planet is doomed to catastrophic events of Biblical proportions because of human recklessness and greed, i.e., Western capitalists. (Pay no attention to the CRU scientists behind the curtain.) The big climate conclave is about to begin in Copenhagen. Despite the fact—don’t you dare try to deny it—that poorer nations will suffer most from climate change, they are holding out on an agreement to save the planet for the other precious green—money. Lots of it and paid upfront. There will be a bunch of financiers and industrialists looking to make some green too.

Copenhagen summit: It’s money that matters in the backroom talks

Vast sums will be needed to lubricate the settlement rich and poor nations must achieve to combat global warming. John Vidal considers the prospect of the biggest transfer of funds in history.

Ecology and morals count in the public arena, but as the negotiations progress and world leaders arrive to take the stage, money will dominate the backroom talks. It is likely to be the deal maker or breaker. Copenhagen may lead over the next 20 years to the largest transfer of money in history from the global north to the south, dwarfing the amount that developing countries now receive in aid.

Industrialists, financiers, bankers, business groups and carbon traders know there is much more in play at the Danish capital than a concern for the health of the planet. They all have a stake in the decisions made and see climate change as the driver of a global energy revolution and the chance to trade in technologies that could shift the world economy.

The developing countries have listened and learned from the bailouts and health care politics.

…developing countries say that rich countries must contribute at least 1% of their GNP by 2020. It’s not much, they argue, compared to what was found to stave off a global recession, and nothing at all compared to the eventual likely costs of ignoring climate change altogether.

But the total on the table is just one source of the deadlock. Rich countries insist that any money raised for climate adaptation or mitigation be channelled through the World Bank or the Global Environmental Facility. But these two New York-based institutions are perceived to be controlled by the rich. Instead, poor countries want a separate climate adaptation fund which would be administered by the UN. This they say, would give them an equal voice on how the money is spent.

With only a few days’ negotiating time left before the politicians arrive in Copenhagen, it is extremely unlikely that any financial agreement will be reached except on the broadest of principles. The danger is that the negotiations on who pays what to whom will not just stretch into next year, but will become intractable ‑ a cheque that never gets signed.

So is this the way the world ends, greed infects the poor and dooms the planet sickened by the greed of the rich? The history of the human race from the Garden of Eden to Tivoli Gardens. That would be Biblical.

How curious that it comes down to haggling over money, especially when the holdouts demanding money are the ones who will presumably suffer the most from climate change devastation. But no time to think about such things. We have to hurry and pay the Maldives 1% of the world’s GNP to keep polar bears off our front porches.

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