Showing 1 - 9 of 9
Climate change discourse takes a new turn
Oped, Bjorn Lomborg, Published on 09/02/2026
» What a difference a single year makes. The once-dominant push to radically reshape society to avert climate catastrophe has collapsed. Look at Davos -- the talkfest long dominated by climate advocacy. That consensus has been abandoned by its once strongest proponents.
What climate spending really costs the globe
Oped, Bjorn Lomborg, Published on 24/01/2025
» Across the world, public finances are stretched dangerously thin. Per person growth continues dropping while costs are climbing for pensions, education, healthcare, and defence. These urgent priorities could easily require an additional 3-6% of GDP. Yet green campaigners are loudly calling for governments to spend up to 25% of our GDP choking growth in the name of climate change.
Pricey policies to curb climate change 'dead'
Oped, Bjorn Lomborg, Published on 28/11/2024
» The latest climate summit has been as hypocritical and dysfunctional as every one before, with most world leaders not even bothering to turn up. Still, 50,000 people flew in from across the world, while essentially telling the rest of us to stop flying. Poor-country politicians performatively staged a "walk-out", and rich nations ended up promising a climate slush fund of US$300 billion (about 10 trillion baht) a year.
The education policy that can bridge the gap
Oped, Bjorn Lomborg, Published on 11/10/2024
» Children's educational test scores are a major cause for concern across the world. Learning plummeted nearly everywhere during the Covid-19 pandemic -- but even before that, standardised test result measures in mathematics, science and reading were heading in the wrong direction.
Eyeing climate change, follow science, warily
Oped, Bjorn Lomborg, Published on 06/06/2024
» We endlessly hear the flawed assertion that because climate change is real, we should "follow the science" and end fossil fuel use. We hear this claim from politicians who favour swift carbon cuts, and from natural scientists themselves, as when the editor-in-chief of Nature insists "The science is clear -- fossil fuels must go".
Politicising novel solutions to climate change
News, Bjorn Lomborg, Published on 13/05/2024
» Climate studies are increasingly becoming politicised. Harvard University recently shut down a key geoengineering research project because of intense backlash, despite the college's aspiration to become "a global beacon for climate change."
Development goals need to be prioritised
Oped, Bjorn Lomborg, Published on 20/09/2023
» The world is failing on its development promises. These are known as the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), agreed by all governments in 2015 to be achieved by 2030. Progress across all these promises -- including in areas as important as eradicating poverty and ending hunger -- is happening at less than one-fourth of the pledged speed. On current trends, the world will reach its 2030 promises half a century late.
Two education policies to make a difference
News, Bjorn Lomborg, Published on 15/05/2023
» One thing that taxpayers and politicians agree on practically everywhere is that more money should be spent on children's education. This seems like a no-brainer: better education means children get a better start in life. But we need to be careful. Many popular educational investments deliver little or no learning, while we rarely hear about the most effective investments.
Reducing emissions not so easy
Oped, Bjorn Lomborg, Published on 10/11/2021
» At the UN Climate Summit in Glasgow (COP26), most leaders of rich nations are eagerly promising to decarbonise their economies by mid-century or even sooner. Yet, it is highly questionable if they and their successors will want or be able to keep their promise. Even worse, growth-reducing climate policies won't convince developing countries who need to lift their populations out of poverty and whose emissions matter most this century.