The 30th annual Congress of the Parties (COP30), which began Monday and will run through November 21, is being held in the Amazon rainforest.
The Brazilian government carved a small city out of tens of thousands of acres of pristine rainforest. It doubled the airport’s capacity to accommodate all the private, carbon-spewing jets that will carry attendees to the conference. And it built a brand new, eight-mile-long highway to move the 150,000 delegates, press, observers, and the 50,000 “civil society” representatives of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) from the airport to the conference center.
Tens of thousands of acres of protected rainforest cut down in the Amazon for a **CLIMATE SUMMIT** highway
— End Wokeness (@EndWokeness) March 12, 2025
The whole thing is put on for the benefit of the NGOs. They’re the ones who are lined up to receive the goodies from the developed world to cut carbon emissions and save the planet. This is the biggest party of the year, and they’re pulling out all the stops with the booze flowing, gift bags crammed with loot, and celebrities mixing with common folk as an extra added attraction.
The Greens were careful in their criticism, but they weren’t happy. Tens of thousands of animals have been injured during construction, and Professor Silvia Sardinha fails to see any advantage to the road. “We are going to lose an area to release these animals back into the wild, the natural environment of these species,” she said.
I’m all for progress, and if a snail darter or a rare nesting bird is inconvenienced, that has to be weighed against what is gained. I think, in this case, the greens have a point. Cutting down an Amazon rainforest for a conference that’s trying to save the Amazon rainforest is just plain nuts.
Many world leaders will be there. Donald Trump has passed, as have China and India. Many major corporations are also not in attendance. With the world falling far short of the emission goals it set in Rio ten years ago — the Paris Climate Accords — most non-fanatics realize that the empty promises from the COP are not to do anything about the climate but to fill the pockets of the corrupt leaders of poor countries who are trying to finagle cash, credit, and sympathy from the rich nations. It’s a racket, pure and simple.
UN Climate Change Executive Secretary Simon Stiell told delegates in Brazil, “We are now bending the curve of planet-heating emissions downwards — for the very first time.”
In the immortal words of Secretary of Defense Albert Nimzicki in Independence Day, “That’s not entirely accurate.”
So why have more than three decades of international negotiations largely failed? Because they have run headlong into what political scientist Roger Pielke, Jr. calls the “iron law of climate policy.” As Pielke puts it, “when policies focused on economic growth confront policies focused on emissions reductions, it is economic growth that will win out every time.”
In their October 2025 article in Communications Earth & Environment, a team of researchers at the University of Washington more or less confirmed Pielke’s law. The researchers note that “overall carbon emissions rose, due to the rapid rise in world GDP, which more than canceled out the progress” made in reducing emissions. On the other hand, they report the good news that carbon intensity—carbon emissions per unit of GDP—has been steadily declining. Basically, markets are encouraging the adoption of low-carbon energy technologies and ever greater fuel efficiency. The researchers calculate that if carbon intensity continues to improve at current rates that global emissions will fall by 64 percent by 2100. That implies a projected increase in global average temperature of 2.4 degrees Celsius by 2100 and basically rules out the worst-case climate change scenarios.
In other words, it’s much better to grow our way out of the problem rather than impose draconian restrictions on emissions that no nation can achieve anyway.
The COP conferences are hugely expensive to put on and gain nothing for the planet. “Scrutiny is growing over whether flying thousands of them across the world, and the infrastructure required to host them, is undermining the cause,” writes the BBC.
Maybe they’ll hold the next one in Norway near the Arctic Circle and build an “ice hotel” like they did in the James Bond film Die Another Day. That would inconvenience a few hundred seals and perhaps reduce the polar bear population a bit.
It’s all for a good cause, though.
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