Lomborg: Kyoto Would Save Only One Polar Bear a Year

Climate Expert: Kyoto Would Save Only One Polar Bear a Year

“My point is simply: if we actually care about the polar bear, why is that we are so intent on only discussing one option – that is cutting carbon emissions?” Lomborg said. “Nobody ever talks about what would be the effect of cutting carbon emissions. Well, let me show you – if everybody did the Kyoto Protocol all the way through the century, which is very, very far away, but if everybody actually did that, we’d save one polar bear every year.”

Lomborg said he was all for saving that one polar bear a year, but questioned the costs. He estimated the worldwide annual cost of the Kyoto Protocol to be $180 billion. Kyoto is a treaty supported by Gore and the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. He proposed a simpler solution:

“It strikes me as odd, that in this conversation, nobody seems to mention the fact that every year, we shoot somewhere between 300 and 500 polar bear,” Lomborg said. “Wouldn’t it be smarter to first stop shooting the polar bear?”

“Why is it we care about polar bears in the least effective way and the most costly way, rather than dealing with the issue where we would do a lot of good?” Lomborg added.