To save the planet, it is time poor nations get paid for protection
DRC is only the first developing nation to decide that, if rich countries aren’t serious about paying for the costs that their centuries of carbon emissions will impose on poorer ones, they will have to raise the cash themselves. Other countries will follow. During the punishing heat waves and power shortages in India this spring, one local politician told me that if India failed to raise funds for its energy transition from the international community, it would be forced to open up more coal plants “to run a billion air-conditioners, if nothing else. And that is why outrage is also impractical. There is no reasonable way of forcing countries to decarbonize. Whether autocrats or democrats, their leaders will always focus on the immediate needs of their citizens over any global priorities.