Lomborg's Second Key Argument

The conclusion of Lomborg’s second key argument is that the poor countries must rely on cheap fossil fuels to sustain their growth and improve people’s lives. This argument contains three premises. The first premise is that fossil fuels are absolutely necessary for providing 81% of the planet’s energy needs today and the percentage will be almost as high in 2035. The second premise is that coal is the only plentiful and cheap choice for poor countries to sustain their development. The third premise is the case of China, which used coal to generate energy and moved about 680 million people out of poverty.

Lomborg’s second key argument is a deductive argument because the first premise is broad and the following premises become increasingly specific, the conclusion fits into the specific condition and follows logically from the three premises. This key argument is valid since if the three premises are true, the conclusion must be true. I intended to argue that this argument is not sound because its premises are not true.

For Lomborg’s first premise, it is true that 81 percent of the planet’s energy needs are met by fossil fuels, but it is inconclusive that the percentage will be as high in 2035.

Though this statement is supported by the International Energy Agency (IEA), an authoritative international institution that making his statement much credible, we should realise that there is an underlying assumption for this premise to be true, that is, the current policies are unchanged. Since we are not sure whether the current policies would continue or not, this premise is not necessarily true. On the contrary, according to another report by IEA, solar electricity is estimated to cover 25% of the world’s total electricity needs by 2050, taking up the largest portion of all sources of electricity (IEA,

2011).

Lomborg’s second premise is that fossil fuels are the only cheap and plentiful choice for poor countries to grow. He justifies this premise by quoting what South Africa’s finance minister said in the Washington post. While he is right to point out the necessity for these poor nations to have low-cost and abundant energy, he has overstated the absolute importance of fossil fuels by assuming it is indispensable and ignoring the potentiality for the poor countries to produce energy with self-sufficiency (Atmospheric Environment, 2010). It was found that 38 poorest countries out of 47 have substantial agricultural bases to grow energy crops that satisfy most of their fuel needs through biofuel production (Pohit et al., 2009). Thus, this premise is doubtful for being exaggerated.

As for the third premise, it is true that China used coal to generate electricity and lifted millions of people out of energy poverty; however, the case of China is not representative of all the other developing nations. With its particular historical background over the last 30 years, China’s national conditions are quite different from the other poor nations. Therefore it is unconvincing for us to simply conclude that cheap fossil fuels are the only effective solution for poor countries to grow.

Since there are doubts about the truth of the premises, and the case used to support the argument is not representative enough, we have reasons to conclude that Lomborg’s second key argument is not sound enough and hence is not convincing.