Baku, Azerbaijan

Examples of the perpetual masquerade of the climate industry were on display at the United Nations COP29 “Green Zone,” where private companies underwriting the cost of the summit, along with participating governments, virtue-signaled their embrace of the cause of changing the climate.

The Socar Oil Company, owned by the government of Azerbaijan, had a large vendor display. The company is the nation’s major developer of oil and gas, with revenue that funds 60 percent of government budget and provides more than 90 percent of the nation’s electricity. Earlier this year, just in time for hosting COP29, Socar created a subsidiary, Socar Green, to develop wind turbines and solar panels with the goal of making the company carbon “net zero” by 2050.

I asked Fidan Zeynalova, a senior commercial analyst for Socar, how it was possible for renewable energy to replace or offset carbon from oil and gas production. She acknowledged it would take years and that oil and gas extraction will continue, basically until it runs out, but that it was wise to prepare for that future possibility. Without her saying so, it was clear the goal of “net zero” carbon emissions was more public relations imagery and unserious.

Around the corner from Socar was the consulting giant, McKinsey Sustainability, ever seeking more climate change clientele. The entrance to its make-shift room displayed a large aerial photo of acres of green countryside and trees, overtaken by rows of solar panels. Obviously, this lucrative firm promoted this as a good thing, despite the manifest despoiling of bucolic land mass. When I raised this concern, the two employees at the entrance wanted no part of such discussion.

Then there was the FINS organization, Fighting for International Nautical Species, which is based in the United Kingdom and is dedicated to preserving sea creatures and opposing whale hunting. Whales have “ecological importance” and are “the giants that sustain our planet” its wallpaper displayed. Of course, CFACT agrees with these facts and sentiments, and I complimented the mission to Elissa Phillips, a FINS official. In fact, in downtown Baku, I visited the traveling statue of a dead whale to highlight their endangerment.

I then asked Ms. Phillips if FINS was concerned about the deleterious effect of offshore wind turbines on whales, including dozens of beached whales on the northeastern U.S. coast in recent years. She claimed unawareness of this well-documented tragedy and said whales die for lots of reasons. I mentioned CFACT’s fight to protect whales against wind turbines, including our lawsuit against Dominion Energy for its inadequate environmental impact study required by federal law.

If a changing countenance reveals anything, Ms. Phillips found herself in a quandary of not wanting to oppose one of the central climate change tenets of wind power, even at the high plausibility they were killing whales that her organization purports to champion. Alas, if the choice is between dead whales and offshore wind turbines, climate change dogma stipulates that whales lose.

Lastly, on a more pleasant note, I encountered many of the UN summit volunteer staff assisting with the blizzard of mundane tasks to operate this massive event. All those with whom I spoke were native to Azerbaijan and spoke at least two languages, English being one of them. At one point during the conference, I needed workspace, and they graciously accommodated me. They also were fascinated by the U.S. election and the return of Donald Trump to the presidency, including trying on “MAGA” hats and taking selfies.

Now, that was irony at a UN climate summit.