As an Indian, I don’t know whether to be more annoyed by Al Gore’s condescension or his hypocrisy when he describes my country as “the world’s third-highest emitter” of carbon dioxide in a tweet congratulating it for pausing investments in coal-fired power plants for five years.
As the world’s most populous nation, India’s CO2 emissions are frequently cited by climate zealots in their demonization of the life-sustaining gas. However, such descriptions or “carbon pollution” lack as much in context as they do in scientific validity.
The per capita CO2 emissions for the United States is 14.24 tons per year (2021). The number would be higher for Al Gore, who owns expensive properties and travels in carbon-intensive modes to international events.
India’s per capita emissions for 2021 were just 1.9 tons. In other words, an Indian emits about 13% of the CO2 that an American! Yet, people like Al Gore use the smear of “polluter” to browbeat some of the planet’s poorest people into submitting to the climate cult.
