In just 14 days, those at the United Nations’ conference of the parties (UNCOP) climate change meeting in Copenhagen excreted 40,000 tons of CO2 into the atmosphere, more than 60 of the world’s smallest countries produce in an entire year combined!

 

40,000 protestors, 30,000 delegates and almost 100 world leaders slept on the streets or in luxurious 4 Star Hotels, rented 1,200 limos and 140 private jets.

 

So, I must ask, “Did they really ALL have to go to the UNCOP in Copenhagen?”

 

 

To offset this one UN meeting hot air, Denmark is forced by UN treaty and EU law to pay $17.50/ton, a cool $1 million in taxpayer funds, for 40,000 tons of UN-certified emissions reductions (UNCERs). Annually, Denmark’s citizens must pay $2 million buying 115,000 tons worth of UNCERs for UN Project #1901, 20 new brick making businesses in Bangladesh. Over the lifespan Project #1901, 20 years, Denmark will pay at least $40 million. 

 

Go to www.gefonline.org and search by “brick”. UN Project #1901 is one of three such projects in Bangladesh, India and China. These three projects are valued by the UN at $51.7 million in taxpayer funds transferred via the UN from developed countries such as Denmark and the United States to these developing countries.

 

Every UN meeting generates more cash. More protesters equal more carbon equals more cash.

 

Take a look at the 777 climate change projects in developing countries; projects that we in developed countries are paying billions for. http://www.gefonline.org/ And the climate change treaty is only one of dozens of UN-administered treaties.

 

In Bangladesh, you can buy the UNCERs for $15.20 per ton from UNGEF-certified brick businesses. So Denmark’s 115,000 tons worth of UNCERs, at $17.50 per ton, will generate $5.29 million in gross profits over 20 years for the owners of 20 brick businesses and their financiers in Bangladesh where per capita income is $1,500/year. Without ever making a single brick. Risk free.

 

Bangladesh’s carbon credit marketers expect Denmark’s UNCER costs to double after the meeting in Copenhagen. Ouch.

 

A cut goes to the Industrial and Infrastructure Development Finance Company (IIDFC) (79% privately owned) via a $10.85 million line of credit with the World Bank, with funds from -- you guessed it -- developed countries.

 

The UNGEF also hands out millions in grants to supervise, monitor and sell these projects while keeping about 10% as agency fees.

 

Obama’s motto -- “Mitigation. Transparency. Financing.”  -- now takes on a whole new meaning.  “Green jobs – at the expense of blue and purple and jobs – depends on billions moving via the UN to China and other developing countries. The bricks in Bangladesh are just window dressing. Mitigation means buying more UNCERs. Transparency equals more UN paperwork jobs. Financing means taxpayer dollars moving from the developed world to Bangladesh, China and India with lots of people taking a cut along the way.  It’s all very white collar and three piece suits.

 

So let’s ask that question again:

 

“Did they really ALL have to go to the UNCOP in Copenhagen?” In Bangladesh, China and India, at the World Bank and the UN, the answer is Yes! Yes! Yes! 

 

 

 

But the IIDFC, the carbon finance company that has the $10.85 million credit line at that World Bank, tripled this to almost 9 million tons of CO2 annually from 6,000 small kilns. Both reports estimate that using modern, more efficient kilns would reduce energy use and therefore emissions by half. Neither report mentions that, based on basic capitalist principles -- to save energy and labor while increasing the bottom line -- over a 20-year period all these small kilns will eventually be upgraded.

 

But the UNGE Project #1901 will replace the small kilns with mega-sized brickfields covering 4 to 5 acres each but requiring only 88 operators per brickfield. There is no mention of training or resettlement costs for kiln workers displaced by these large   subsidized projects competing against the thousands of small kiln operators. Costs for transporting bricks to where the demand is located are not factored into the project in calculating CO2 emissions. And there is no recognition of the impacts these large-scale projects will generate after a 20-year lifespan. 

 

So, in additional to making a profit from making bricks – IF they make any bricks -- 20 Bangladesh brick makers and their investment consortium will make  $5.29 million for modernizing, something they would have done anyway over time, just probably not on this scale.

 

Now double that figure, as predicted by the carbon marketers.

 

But wait…

 

The UN Development Program (UNDP) estimates it costs $50,000 to build a large brickfield plus $400,000 in “back process” – whatever that is. So the total cost to build 20 new large-scale brickyards in Bangladesh is only $9 million.

 

It would be far cheaper for the developed countries to transfer humanitarian aide to Bangladesh, China and India to build bricks than to participate in this ridiculous UN program.

 

But then, nobody would have to go anywhere at all and everyone at the UNGEF and the UNDP and the World Bank and all these government agencies would having nothing to do. They’d have to find jobs making bricks. And burgers. And widgets.

 

No more exotic meetings. No more 4 Star Hotels. No more limos and private planes.

 

But just think of all the fossil fuel we would save! 

 

And that is how you build a brick, UN-style.

 

NOTES:

 

Citizens and elected officials seeking more info will find the Chamber of Commerce's special section on climate change policy an excellent starting point.

The climate-change travesty. By George Will, Washington Post, Dec. 6, 2009.

 

 

 

 

 

Full text of President Obama's speech and WSJ analysis.

 

You can REALLY get a feel for the size of our President's entourage from this video, which shows fleets, yes, fleets of vehicles, for a President Obama visit to Copenhagen earlier this year.

 

List of delegates from all over the world, including the U.S., which sent pages and pages and pages of delegates. Did they really all have to go?

 

As for the delegates? Lots of limos! No one took the free shuttle bus.

 

I’ve actually been to Copenhagen several times and love the city. Take a cybertour of Copenhagen.

 

I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them. - Thomas Jefferson

 

========================================================================

What if…..

 

What if CO2 emissions from 6,000 PCs in Duluth could be reduced by half by replacing them with one big 5-acre computer in Des Moines run by just 88 people? Think of what we’d save in CO2 emissions! 

 

We’ll establish another UN bureaucracy with green jobbers to monitor this mitigation plan! And we’ll finance it all – and a make a ton of money - with an annual fee per ton of CO2 emissions saved – paid by New Yorkers required by law to pony up, year after year after year! We’ll ignore the CO2 generated shipping documents printed in Des Moines to the people in Duluth.

 

Along with the Teamsters, NGOs and bureaucrats, New Yorkers will be thrilled by this plan since these are green jobs and, after all, we’re saving the planet!