On November 23, 2015 Boston Globe had an op-ed by Joshua Goldstein and Steven Pinker concerning some “Inconvenient Truths for the environmental movement.”  I’m sorry to say that I agree with pretty much every word of it.  Why am I sorry?  Because Goldstein and Pinker make clear – even though they don’t mention his name – that the Pope was completely wrong in his prescription for addressing climate change.  How so?  It’s really pretty straightforward.

People want more economic development, not less.  They want more markets, not less.  It may be that some wealthy societies could still have a relatively smooth transition to renewable fuels without sacrificing economic growth.  Unfortunately, that’s not where we have to address the demand for fossil fuels.  We have to do so in China and India and other developing countries.  I’m sorry, but I’ve seen the projected demand for fossil fuels outside the US and Europe and it’s not pretty.  Anyone who thinks that we can quickly and easily eliminate fossil fuel use in those countries and still allow them the economic growth that their citizens demand is delusional.

Which brings us to Goldstein’s and Pinker’s second inconvenient truth; nuclear power has to be a large part of the solution.  And I’m afraid that’s probably the end of the conversation for many of my environmental friends, so I’ll cut this short.

I’m still an optimist.  I believe that we can still solve climate change.  We can do so however, with more use of markets, not less.  And we must do so with more economic growth, not less, because the rest of the world won’t be satisfied with less.