Planet Earth is being choked by greenhouse-gas emissions. As fires rage and floods devastate, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has issued a code red. Investors are urging companies to close their fossil-fuel operations. Simultaneously, they are daring them not to sell these offending assets on to others to perpetuate the problem.
Glasgow’s upcoming United Nations Climate Change Conference of the Parties is promising greater pressure than ever on carbon transgressors. It would be terrible if all of this did not have a silver lining, but it does. In fact, it presents a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for South Africans to generate jobs and create wealth.
The country must seize this opportunity to go green and it must do so with great enthusiasm, taking full advantage of the low-interest funding available to those who do the right thing.