CNNMoney [1] mustn’t pay very well, because writer Steve Hargreaves is moonlighting as a PR flack for the International Energy Agency. At least, that’s the impression given by his June 12 article on the IEA’s 700-page "sharply-worded" report that called for an additional $36 trillion of clean energy investment by 2050.
According to Hargreaves, IEA Executive Director Maria van der Hoeven doesn’t think governments are doing enough to keep global warming in check. “Our ongoing failure to realize the full potential of clean energy technology is alarming,” she said. “Under current policies, both energy demand and emissions are likely to double by 2050.”
Hargreaves parroted the report’s claims, explaining that renewable energy sources like wind, solar, geothermal are free. He noted that the savings would far outweigh the cost at some point, and work out to $130 per person [2] each year.
The report also asserted that our current habits could have catastrophic consequences. “Continued heavy reliance on a narrow set of technologies and fossil fuels is a significant threat to energy security, stable economic growth and global welfare, as well as to the environment.” it said.
There were no critiques of these claims, however, or even an acknowledgement that the science behind them is disputed. Hargreaves did allow that there were “naysayers who think renewable technology cannot be scaled up to produce the magnitude of energy the world demands.”
Those “naysayers” increasingly have experience on their side, The Obama Administration invested billions in at least a dozen green energy companies that declared bankruptcy or continued to suffer serious financial issues. Mainstream media outlets [3] neglected to mention them all; Solyndra was more than enough of a scandal.