– Tired of lies from climate activists

The economist who has recently published the book “Oljeboka: How Norwegian oil and gas make the world a better place”, says he is critical of the media’s ” uncritically conveys doomsday claims ,” and he tells NTB that he is tired of what he believes are untruths from climate activists.

– When Thunberg talks about a “deadly industry,” she is thinking of climate change. The use of oil and gas leads to climate change, that is true, but the welfare effect of oil and gas is much stronger, he says.

– One example is modern food production. The farmers use diesel to produce food, and this means that they produce much more food than they otherwise would, he says.

– The UN climate panel says that if we continue the current climate policy, the number of people suffering from hunger will fall from 700 million today to 250 million in 2050. But if climate policy is tightened, in a rational way in line with 1.5- degree target, the number of people suffering from hunger will only fall to 400 million, points out Sjølie.

– But even with such a strict policy, there will be a great need for a lot of oil and gas, including from Norway, he says.

Sjølie, who is a lecturer at Høgskolen i Innlandet, acknowledges that we are getting more extreme weather as a result of climate change, but says we have never been safer than today.

– The energy from oil allows us to build safer homes, which has contributed to the fact that we have never had as few deaths due to extreme weather as we have today.