From Energy Now

By Tammy Nemeth and Ron Wallace

It is high time that Canadians discuss and understand Mark Carney’s avowed plan to re-align capital with global Net Zero goals.

Mark Carney’s economic vision for Canada, one that spans energy, housing and defence, rests on an unspoken, largely undisclosed, linchpin: Climate Finance – one that promises a Net Zero future for Canada but which masks a radical economic overhaul.

Regrettably, Carney’s potential approach to a Net Zero future remains largely unexamined in this election. As the former chair of the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero (GFANZ), Carney has proposed new policies, offices, agencies,  and bureaus required to achieve these goals.. Pieced together from his presentations, discussions, testimonies and book, Carney’s approach to climate finance appears to have four pillars: mandatory climate disclosures, mandatory transition plans, centralized data sharing via the United Nations’ Net Zero Data Public Utility (NZDPU) and compliance with voluntary carbon markets (VCMs). There are serious issues for Canada’s economy if these principles were to form the core values for policies under a potential Liberal government.

About the first pillar Carney has been unequivocal: “Achieving net zero requires a whole economy transition.”  This would require a restructuring energy and financial systems to shift away from fossil fuels to renewable energy with Carney insisting repeatedly in his book that “every financial [and business] decision takes climate change into account.” Climate finance, unlike broader sustainable finance with its Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) focus would channel capital into sectors aligned with a 2050 Net Zero trajectory. Carney states: “Companies, and those who invest in them…who are part of the solution, will be rewarded. Those lagging behind…will be punished.”  In other words, capital would flow to compliant firms but be withheld from so-called “high emitters”.

How will investors, banks and insurers distinguish solution from problem? Mandatory climate disclosures, aligned with the International Sustainability Standards Board (ISSB), would compel firms to report emissions and outline their Net Zero strategies. Canada’s Sustainability Standards Board has adopted these methodologies, despite concerns they would disadvantage Canadian businesses. Here, Carney repeatedly emphasizes disclosures as the cornerstone to track emissions data required to shift capital away from “high emitters”. Without this, he claims, large institutional investors lack the data on supply chains to make informed decisions to shift capital to businesses that are Net Zero compliant.

The second pillar, Mandatory Transition Plans would require companies to map a 2050 Net Zero trajectory for emission reduction targets. Failure to meet those targets would invite pressure from investors, banks, or activists, who may pursue litigation for non-compliance. The UK’s Transition Plan Task Force, now part of ISSB, provides this standardized framework. Carney, while at GFANZ, advocated using transition plans for a “managed phase-out” of high-emitting assets like coal, oil and gas, not just through divestment but by financing emissions reductions. “As part of their transition planning, [GFANZ] members should establish and apply financing policies to phase out and align carbon-intensive sectors and activities, such as thermal coal, oil and gas and deforestation, not only through asset divestment but also through transition finance that reduces real world emissions. To assist with these efforts GFANZ will continue to develop and implement a framework for the Managed Phase-out of high-emitting assets.” Clearly, the purpose of this is to ensure companies either decarbonize or face capital withdrawal.

The third pillar is the United Nations’ Net Zero Data Public Utility (NZDPU), a centralized platform for emissions and transition data. Carney insists these data be freely accessible, enabling investors, banks and insurers to judge companies’ progress to Net Zero. As Carney noted in 2021: “Private finance is judging…banks, pension funds and asset managers have to show where they are in the transition to Net Zero.” Hence, compliant firms would receive investment; laggards would face divestment.

Finally, voluntary carbon markets (VCMs) allow companies to offset emissions by purchasing credits from projects like reforestation. Carney, who launched the Taskforce on Scaling VCMs in 2020, has insisted on monitoring, verification and lifecycle tracking.  At a 2024 Beijing conference, he suggested major jurisdictions could establish VCMs by COP 30 (planned for 2025 in Brazil) to create a global market. If Canada mandates VCMs, businesses especially small and medium enterprises (SMEs) would face much higher compliance costs with credits available only to those that demonstrate progress with transition plans.

These potential mandatory disclosures and transition plans would burden Canadian businesses with material costs and legal risks that constitute an economic gamble which few may recognize but all should weigh. Do Canadians truly want a government that has an undisclosed climate finance agenda that would be subservient to an opaque globalized Net Zero agenda?

Tammy Nemeth is a U.K.-based strategic energy analyst. Ron Wallace is an executive fellow of the Canadian Global Affairs Institute and the Canada West Foundation.

From LifeSiteNews

By Jonathon Van Maren

Schwab’s World Economic Forum became a globalist hub for population control, radical climate agenda, and transhuman ideology under his decades-long leadership.

Klaus Schwab, founder of the World Economic Forum and the face of the NGO’s elitist annual get-together in Davos, Switzerland, has resigned as chair of WEF. 

Over the decades, but especially over the past several years, the WEF’s Davos annual symposium has become a lightning rod for conservative criticism due to the agendas being pushed there by the elites. As the Associated Press noted: 

Widely regarded as a cheerleader for globalization, the WEF’s Davos gathering has in recent years drawn criticism from opponents on both left and right as an elitist talking shop detached from lives of ordinary people. 

While WEF itself had no formal power, the annual Davos meeting brought together many of the world’s wealthiest and most influential figures, contributing to Schwab’s personal worth and influence.

Schwab’s resignation on April 20 was announced by the Geneva-based WEF on April 21, but did not indicate why the 88-year-old was resigning. “Following my recent announcement, and as I enter my 88th year, I have decided to step down from the position of Chair and as a member of the Board of Trustees, with immediate effect,” Schwab said in a brief statement. He gave no indication of what he plans to do next. 

Schwab founded the World Economic Forum – originally the European Management Forum – in 1971, and its initial mission was to assist European business leaders in competing with American business and to learn from U.S. models and innovation. However, the mission soon expanded to the development of a global economic agenda.  

Schwab detailed his own agenda in several books, including The Fourth Industrial Revolution (2016), in which he described the rise of a new industrial era in which technologies such artificial intelligence, gene editing, and advanced robotics would blur the lines between the digital, physical, and biological worlds. Schwab wrote: 

We stand on the brink of a technological revolution that will fundamentally alter the way we live, work, and relate to one another. In its scale, scope, and complexity, the transformation will be unlike anything humankind has experienced before. We do not yet know just how it will unfold, but one thing is clear: the response to it must be integrated and comprehensive, involving all stakeholders of the global polity, from the public and private sectors to academia and civil society …

The Fourth Industrial Revolution, finally, will change not only what we do but also who we are. It will affect our identity and all the issues associated with it: our sense of privacy, our notions of ownership, our consumption patterns, the time we devote to work and leisure, and how we develop our careers, cultivate our skills, meet people, and nurture relationships. It is already changing our health and leading to a “quantified” self, and sooner than we think it may lead to human augmentation.

How? Microchips implanted into humans, for one. Schwab was a tech optimist who appeared to heartily welcome transhumanism; in a 2016 interview with France 24 discussing his book, he stated:  

And then you have the microchip, which will be implanted, probably within the next ten years, first to open your car, your home, or to do your passport, your payments, and then it will be in your body to monitor your health.

In 2020, mere months into the pandemic, Schwab published COVID-19: The Great Reset, in which he detailed his view of the opportunity presented by the growing global crisis. According to Schwab, the crisis was an opportunity for a global reset that included “stakeholder capitalism,” in which corporations could integrate social and environmental goals into their operations, especially working toward “net-zero emissions” and a massive transition to green energy, and “harnessing” the Fourth Industrial Revolution, including artificial intelligence and automation. 

Much of Schwab’s personal wealth came from running the World Economic Forum; as chairman, he earned an annual salary of 1 million Swiss francs (approximately $1 million USD), and the WEF was supported financially through membership fees from over 1,000 companies worldwide as well as significant contributions from organizations such as the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Vice Chairman Peter Brabeck-Letmathe is now serving as interim chairman until his replacement has been selected. 

 Jonathon Van Maren

Jonathon’s writings have been translated into more than six languages and in addition to LifeSiteNews, has been published in the National Post, National Review, First Things, The Federalist, The American Conservative, The Stream, the Jewish Independent, the Hamilton Spectator, Reformed Perspective Magazine, and LifeNews, among others. He is a contributing editor to The European Conservative.

His insights have been featured on CTV, Global News, and the CBC, as well as over twenty radio stations. He regularly speaks on a variety of social issues at universities, high schools, churches, and other functions in Canada, the United States, and Europe.

He is the author of The Culture War, Seeing is Believing: Why Our Culture Must Face the Victims of Abortion, Patriots: The Untold Story of Ireland’s Pro-Life Movement, Prairie Lion: The Life and Times of Ted Byfield, and co-author of A Guide to Discussing Assisted Suicide with Blaise Alleyne.

Jonathon serves as the communications director for the Canadian Centre for Bio-Ethical Reform.