The green bubble is slowly deflating. Grand UN conferences and massive amounts of government subsidies to green enterprises notwithstanding, people around the world are rapidly becoming disenchanted with the green promises.
The Durban Event
The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change recently concluded in Durban, South Africa, was a massive gathering of (mostly) like-minded souls. Actually, it was the 17
th of such gatherings, hence abbreviated as COP17. You may remember some of the earlier venues: Bali, Cancun, Copenhagen, Rio, Kyoto, etc. Among the 7,000+ (excluding media)
registered participants of COP17, governments of most countries and lesser bodies were well represented. Environment Canada alone sent 25 or so representatives. However, countries that hope to extract "guilt money" from other nations via the carbon-dioxide global warming hoax, were most heavily in attendance. On a per capita basis, some of the Pacific island nations, which claim to be in danger of drowning from supposedly rising ocean levels but have steadily increasing populations, had the highest number of delegates. Table 1 below provides some insights.
Table 1. Official pre-registrants at the Durban conference (COP17).
| Country | Federal Government participants *) | Population [millions] | Government Reps. / million population |
| Tuvalu | 8 | 0.01 | 800 |
| Palau | 5 | 0.02 | 250 |
| Marshall Islands | 11 | 0.06 | 183 |
| Seychelles | 16 | 0.09 | 178 |
| Maldives | 12 | 0.3 | 40 |
| France | 87 | 62 | 1.4 |
| Mali | 15 | 12 | 1.3 |
| Canada | 40 | 35 | 1.2 |
| Germany | 60 | 83 | 0.7 |
| Britain | 43 | 61 | 0.7 |
| USA | 72 | 302 | 0.2 |
| China | 86 | 1325 | 0.06 |
| India | 35 | 1125 | 0.03 |
*) Data from
unfccc.int; some registrants' government affiliations are uncertain.
Clearly there are groups which were represented at extraordinarily high levels on a per capita basis. Without fail, they are the ones who feel that much (or any) of the "green" dollars to be funded (by other countries on this table) are owed to them. To underline the need and claim, the myths about "drowning in a rising sea" are perpetuated. Unfortunately, for them, the facts are somewhat different. Rather than becoming de-populated as we are told, and just prior to the last ocean wave sloshing over the remaining few square miles of land, their populations are doing the opposite. They are expanding in size and "happily living thereafter". Table 2 provides some actual numbers.
Table 2. Recent population dynamics in some ocean island nations.
| Nation | Time period | Population change |
| Solomon Islands | last decade | +100,000 |
| Seychelles | 2002/2010 | +7,000 |
| Maldives | last decade | growing |
All of the ocean island nations claiming to be inundated by rising seas have had growing populations in recent years, without exception. If you really want to see what is happening, just look, for example, at a Google Earth picture of the Maldives' main island Male at the coordinates 4° 10' N, 73° 30' E. You'll see luxury yachts at the moorings, hotels, buildings, and residences from shore to shore. Perhaps, check out the Hilton Maldives / Iru Fushi Resort & Spa, or any of the other 163 upscale resorts in the Maldives listed on Google's "Maldives Hotel Deals," many with five-star ratings.
The Money Train
There is a simple rule for all of this: JUST FOLLOW THE MONEY.
One of the great green developments touted were thousands of wind mills, sorry, wind turbines, installed in California. Under various state governments, generous tax-subsidized handouts were given to manufacturers and buyers of such. But now, some 14,000 of such turbines are cluttering the landscape of the western US, without producing any power whatsoever. Their gear boxes are broken and they just keep on flailing without generating anything. (But they still keep shredding any bird getting into their path). As the tax subsidies have disappeared, it is not even profitable to repair them any longer, even with the existing (and generous) "feed-in" tariffs. Of course, the groups which were early in the game and have all left the game since, were the real winners. Who cares about any electricity actually being produced?
Certainly, California was not the only one to be duped. In fact, the Province of Ontario, Canada, is not far behind. Its Premier for quite some time, Dalton McGuinty, has nearly "gone ballistic" on wind turbines. In the area of Windsor, the southwestern end of the province, new turbines are being installed at breakneck speed. They are rising like mushrooms in a forest after a good summer rain. So do the electricity rates for the Ontario consumers and, I predict, some of the "feed-in" tariffs, and "alternative energy" system manufacturers and buyers are soon going to be revised.
The Future
Having been in research for most of my professional life, I feel is both mandatory and interesting to look ahead. What I see is that the bubblers will continue to bubble for some time, but
the green bubble has burst.
