WTH is Neocolonialist Environmentalism? Todd Moss Explains

One of America's greatest engines of growth is fossil fuels –
cheap, reliable energy that jumpstarted the industrial revolution
and paved the way for the security and prosperity we enjoy today.
Others will not be so lucky. Many African countries lack energy
security and are reliant upon foreign aid and international
organizations that impose environmentally correct conditions on
assistance. Indeed, rather than affording African nations the
same pathway to prosperity that Western countries used, the left
has decided that ‘what is for me is no longer acceptable for
thee’ and is pushing green energy on the African continent.
Africans like clean energy as much as the next guy (Kenya has
geothermal, Ethiopia has hydro) but others (Mozambique, Tanzania,
Ghana, Senegal, Nigeria…) are forced to rely on natural gas. But
the future of Africa and engines of growth are uninteresting to
climate crusaders, who embrace neocolonialist conditions for aid
to Africa, all the while jetting about in private planes. Instead
of forcing climate terms on critical Africa assistance programs,
as John Kerry is intent upon doing, or degrading the efficacy of
the Power Africa initiative, perhaps the US and Europe should
focus on alleviating poverty, truthfully.


Todd Moss, formerly Deputy Assistant Secretary of State, is the
Executive Director of the Energy for Growth Hub, a fellow at the
Center for Global Development, and a nonresident scholar at Rice
University’s Baker Institute and the Colorado School of Mines. He
has a substack called Eat More Electrons.


Download the transcript here.