Let’s face it: Al Gore has money. Wherever he invests, he will continue to have money.
So he can either (a) invest in green energy, the cause which has occupied much of his public life, and be accused of opportunistically advocating policies from which he profits; or (b) invest elsewhere, and be accused of hypocritically paying lip service to green energy while putting his own money out for better profit.
To which I have two comments:
- It’s not at all as clear to me as it seems to be to some of my conservative friends that (b) is the nobler option. In fact, I applaud Gore for taking course (a). Those who wittingly or unwittingly support pollution-based billionaires like the Koch brothers will attack with equal vigor either way, so Gore may as well invest in what’s best for the planet.
- Even if my conservative friends are correct and Gore is entirely self-serving, it still doesn’t follow that we can therefore disregard mountains of statistical data from around the world, a wide and steady stream of scholarly journal articles, and the consensus of 97% of the world’s climate scientists that the earth is warming in part due to human activity (National Academy of Sciences survey). In the absence of any data and any body of scholarly literature showing the opposite, your opinion of Mr. Gore, right or wrong, or your view that this or that scientist wrote a disingenuous e-mail, is irrelevant to the larger issue.
shakemyheadhollow 
Al Gore has made the science public. BP and Shell are making huge investments in the “green” area of new energy alternatives. Al Gore has continually said that the economy did not have to suffer because lots of money would be made in the new “greening of the world”. Obviously oil will not last forever, and CO2 is definitely building up in the atmosphere. A person would have to be an idiot to believe that higher CO2 in the atmosphere will tter bnot cause an increasing “greenhouse”, but I met a guy from New Zealand that used to grow vegatables in greenhouses by adding CO2 to them, and he told me that the problem was only North of the equator. The earth is warming, there is a a lot of money to be made for those who help solve the problem with alternate energy inventions and investments. If people don’t want to follow the clear instructions of Al Gore where the money will be made, they are obviously temporarily in denial of what is happening to the earth, and will be left out of the future. How long can Fox News tell people that it is not getting hotter, but is only “cycling” when Texas could be the poster child for human induced global warming ?
LikeLike
A friend of mine for instance doesn’t recycle because someone else is going to sell his trash and make money with it. Well, that is perfect, isn’t it? I just have to say, why not investing in clean energy if you can make a profit with it? That is even better, especially in a capitalist world that only understands the word MONEY.
However, people don’t see the elevated cost of ecological services such as O2, clean water, ozone, etc. We take them for granted but if made in a “factory” they would be worth billions of dollar, so the problem is not making a profit but how to guarantee that we and our offspring keep receiving the same benefits for years to come.
LikeLike
OK, let me first explain how investment works in a true free market. Capital flows to the business or industries where it can make the most profit at the highest level of risk the investor is willing to accept. What Al Gore is doing is NOT an investment. He is creating shell companies which can then receive massive smart / alternative energy grants from the US government, such as Solyndra. These shell companies then pass on the grants to the ‘investors’ and employ enough people to appear to be working toward some goal. Now, this can be a large number of employees. For example, Solyndra had over 1,100 employees. Unfortunately, the employment of each person cost the U.S. government approximately $434,000 each ($535 million / 1100 employee = $434,364).
When Al Gore left government service in early 2001, he was worth less than $2 million. His wealth is now estimated at nearly $40 million. A 2000% return in approximately 10 years, especially when you consider the recessions of 2001 and 2008, is impossible unless you:
a.) Create a ponzi scheme
b.) Use government to give you massive grants.
I am not accusing Al Gore of committing a fraud, only using government to create his fortune. Before any launches a reply based on Dick Cheney and Halliburton, please save it as this has nothing to do with Dick Cheney. I am not a fan or his nor am I a defender of his, I am simply exploring the issue of Al Gore.
Al Gore has made small investments in companies which will generate carbon credits. Along with Obama and the UN, he is attempting to create a carbon market, much like the US stock market. This market will allow trading of carbon credits. Ford, GM, Entergy, and the Koch Brothers, along with many other companies, will have to buy carbon credits on the open market. When the market opens, the price of carbon credits will skyrockets because the supply will be limited while the demand will be tremendous. Who will then owns billions of dollars worth of carbon credits? Al Gore. Who will pay for his billions? Everyone in America who pays a utility bill or fills up their vehicle with gasoline.
LikeLike