1,200 Limousines for the Copenhagen Climate Summit

This is an absolute farce. It's really a New World Order meeting. There's nothing "green" going on here at all.

What's the carbon footprint of that whole thing?

Maybe they are secretly roadtesting hydrogen-based limos

Let them eat cake!

Richard Jeni has this called perfectly 4 years ago:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rhw8DFSGzvg
the whole thing is great, but the relevant part starts at 2:38

I'm NOT defending these guys, but my guess is that most people when they fly into a foreign country need transportation, so they get a rental car. If that car is driven by a paid driver, it's called a Limousine. Now, yes, these foreign leaders and their large staffs perhaps could take public transportation, or find some kind of alternate travel, but I doubt these guys are all driving around Copenhagen in stretch Limos. If they actually are doing this, then yes, they are hypocritical jerks.

Again, I'm not defending these guys, but I think it might be a little more complicated than how this story portrays it. If you were in North or South America, and had to go to Copenhagen with a large group, how would YOU handle it?

Perhaps in the future these types of meetings could be done over video conferencing?

None of the conference is talking about the environment. All the discussions are about the money. Who gets what when the CO2 legislation goes through in each trade zone.

"If you were in North or South America, and had to go to Copenhagen with a large group, how would YOU handle it?"

I'd take a group of them in my 20-person private jet, instead of flying in it alone. Or, use these strange things called 'commercial flights', rather than create a new flight with all of it's new pollution. Either way, I'd then take the same group from the airport in a chartered bus. There's no reason to take 20 private planes and twenty cars of any type when the same group of people can get from the same place to the same place in 1 plane and 1 wheeled vehicle. And yes, alot of people will end up on a similar route, at least in part. Most from the US, for example, end up in NY, and go from there to London, then to Copenhagen.

A big conference will cause more pollution than if the conference didn't take place, but there are very easy ways to minimize that pollution. If these anti-pollution, pro-environment people were that serious, they'd find a way to minimize, but many simply refuse. Many of them are green to look good, not help the Earth. Not all, of course, but far too many.

From the same article, regarding the private planes to Copenhagen:
"The airport says it is expecting up to 140 extra private jets during the peak period alone, so far over its capacity that the planes will have to fly off to regional airports – or to Sweden – to park, returning to Copenhagen to pick up their VIP passengers."

Hyprocisy Now!

Wouldn't a giant teleconference have been more eco-friendly?

it is worth pointing out that plenty of opponents to environmental regulation and climate change are there as well. and also lots of hypocrites, of course.

@Kelvin

If that happened, each of those jobs would be filled by limo drivers from India, and they would probably be just as competent then their predecessor. I'm also curious about what this "mysterious force" you're referring to could be.

@CM

I probably will have to agree with you on this one. Limousine can just mean a taxi service that charges a flat rate instead of a distance charge, and probably only so many of them being stretch ones. But even though, 1,200 is excessive.

@Zero

Great vid, thanx! I think the whole thing was pretty relevent concidering the comments and the topic.