I would have to question the supposed pragmatic approach to energy generation in developing countries proposed by Professor Phil Hart (Comment, January 2022). In his analogy, he suggests that forcing developing countries to stop extracting fossil fuel and instead buy an expensive hydrogen stove for ￡250 is not practical. Instead, he proposes allowing them to continue extracting fossil fuels to help fund purchasing the stove at some unknown future date - by which time it will have probably been superseded by an even more expensive stove, and carbon-emission targets will have been missed. This is driven by the same economics that led to the environmental issues. A more pragmatic approach would be for developed countries to honour their pledges to fund and facilitate technology transfer. The resultant increase in productivity, supported by writing off debts and reducing trade barriers, would reduce carbon emissions while supporting economic development.
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