KING Charles has been slammed as a “climate change hypocrite” after making a speech to Cop28 calling for “transformational action” when he is one of the UK’s biggest polluters.
The monarch told heads of state, heads of government and business and climate delegates at the summit in Dubai that the dangers of climate change are “no longer distant risks” and that nature was being taken into “dangerous, uncharted territory”.
Anti-monarchy campaigners said following the speech at Expo City Dubai that Charles’s “huge carbon footprint” from helicopter and private jet flights, as well as maintaining numerous large properties, make him a hypocrite.
Campaign group Republic pointed out that despite painting himself as an environmentalist, Charles’s carbon footprint will “dwarf” that of ordinary citizens.
In his speech, the monarch said he hoped the summit would be “another critical turning point” towards change when “alarming tipping points are being reached”.
“Despite all the attention, there is 30% more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere now than there was back then, and almost 40% more methane,” he said.
“Some important progress has been made, but it worries me greatly that we remain so dreadfully far off track as the global stocktake report demonstrates so graphically.
“The dangers are no longer distant risks. I have seen across the Commonwealth, and beyond, countless communities which are unable to withstand repeated shocks, whose lives and livelihoods are laid waste by climate change.
“Surely, real action is required to stem the growing toll of its most vulnerable victims.”
In 2022, it emerged that the late Queen Elizabeth’s lawyers had secretly lobbied for the Royal Family to be immune from parts of a major Scottish law cutting carbon emissions.
According to climate group The Eco Experts, the Royal Family has a carbon footprint of 3810 tonnes of CO2 equivalent (tCO2e) each year, with Charles’s personal footprint estimated to be 423.3 tonnes. The average UK resident's carbon footprint is 11.7 tCO2e.
Graham Smith, CEO of Republic, said that Charles is “playing at environmentalism”.
“While churning out a huge carbon footprint with regular flights by helicopter and private jet, maintaining several huge homes and living a luxury, high-carbon lifestyle,” he said.
"We need an elected head of state, someone who can speak sincerely and intelligently about the crisis facing the planet, not someone who plays at environmentalism as a prop to promote his own credentials."
The Cop28 summit is the first time countries will conduct a “global stocktake” of progress made since the Paris Agreement in 2015, where states agreed to limit the average global temperature rise to 2C above pre-industrial levels and aim to stop it from rising above 1.5C.
But the United Nations has warned that the planet is on course for a catastrophic 3C increase by the end of the century under current climate policies, despite efforts.
Republic pointed out that for this to be achieved the biggest, and richest, polluters will have to make significant changes.
"Tackling climate change means tackling those who produce the biggest carbon footprints, which means the richest countries and the richest people,” Smith (above) added.
"Charles is one of the super rich whose carbon footprint dwarfs that of ordinary people.
"By allowing Charles off the hook, by letting him play the environmentalist, we are being distracted from the real issues that are impacting the environment.
"On the environment Charles should be in the dock, not on the witness stand."
During his trip to Cop28, Charles held bilateral talks with the Amir of Qatar, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al Thani, and the president of Israel, Isaac Herzog.
He also met the French president, Emmanuel Macron, and President Lula of Brazil, who is the president-elect of Cop30 in Belem in 2025.
