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A self-described “climate crisis skeptic” who was to speak at a Regina sustainability conference in May has been dropped from the program.
Regina city councillor Mike O’Donnell — one of the co-chairs of the Reimagine Conference — announced Friday that Patrick Moore will not be speaking during the event.
“For the last week, there has been lots of debate about our conference,” O’Donnell said during a media conference at City Hall. “Unfortunately (the debate) is not about sustainability, it’s about climate change. We’re not hosting a climate change conference, so we feel that we need to refocus and get that back to our topic.
“We wish to have wholesome discussion on what sustainability is, about the use of alternate energy sources and how that can help us as a city and other municipalities as well.”
Moore, a co-founder of Greenpeace, has said he’s skeptical of the hysteria surrounding climate change.
O’Donnell said Moore initially was invited because the conference topic suggested to him was about a sustainable energy future, which Moore was eminently capable of discussing.
“He had done some work previously and presented previously on the transition away from the traditional fossil fuels to an alternate,” O’Donnell said. “That’s what we wanted to pick up on. He has now announced in this last while that he wants to speak about a different topic (and) I’m not interested in that.”
Moore’s inclusion in the conference drew some criticism, including an online petition calling for his ouster. O’Donnell said he expected some reaction to the news that Moore was to speak, but admitted what he heard was “more reaction that I anticipated.”
As for Moore, he responded to the negative take on his speech during a recent appearance on Gormley.
On Friday, he greeted the news that he wouldn’t be speaking at the Regina conference with a tweet.
“I have been de-platformed, cancelled, and round-filed by the great City of Regina for daring to question the God-Given wisdom of the catastrophists,” he wrote. “Actually, I don’t want to be part of such a stupid exercise. It’s impossible to make a city 100% renewable.”
O’Donnell said the City of Regina will be honouring its contract with Moore, who was to receive $10,000 plus expenses. However, O’Donnell said the city will be pursuing some clauses in the contract.
In the interim, conference officials have to answer why they included Moore on the schedule in the first place given his views.
“We wanted to make sure that everybody could come, sit in a conference, learn a ton and start going forward with how we’re going to deal with this very important topic and how we can make our community sustainable,” O’Donnell said.
“Do I worry about how this (decision) affects that? Of course I do. I’m human. Do I rethink my decisions? I do not. I did my best job at that time and I’ll stand by that.”
— With files from 980 CJME’s Evan Radford