The Great Green Bust: Why Green Ethics Are Crumbling, By Bob Farmer, Dairy Farmer

Out in rural Australia, where the hum of a diesel generator powers the farmhouse and the nearest wind turbine is a distant rumour, the promise of "green ethics" feels like a city slicker's fever dream. For years, we've been sold a vision: ditch fossil fuels, embrace renewables, and follow ESG rules to save the planet. It's a moral code that's driven policy, shamed industries, and guilt-tripped homeowners into solar panels they can't afford. But in 2025, that vision is cracking. Soaring energy bills, failing green projects, and a backlash from investors and everyday folks are exposing green ethics as a luxury belief—one that's collapsing under the weight of economic reality.

Green ethics, at their core, demand prioritising the environment over profit or convenience. No oil rigs, no coal plants, just wind, solar, and a warm glow of virtue. ESG frameworks pushed investors to fund "ethical" companies—think Tesla over Exxon. Governments, from Canberra to Brussels, doubled down with Net Zero targets, subsidies for renewables, and taxes on carbon sinners. In rural communities, this meant lectures about swapping diesel utes for electric ones, even when the nearest charging station is 200 kilometers away.

The pitch was seductive: a cleaner planet, energy independence, and moral high ground. But the fine print was brutal. Solar farms need vast tracts of land, often cleared from bush or farmland. Wind turbines kill birds and blight horizons. And the batteries powering this green utopia? Mined with diesel machines in far-off pits, often under dubious labour conditions. Rural folks started asking: is this really ethical?

The first cracks appeared when energy prices spiked. In Australia, electricity costs rose 15-20% annually in some regions by 2024, driven by coal plant closures and sluggish renewable rollout. The Australian Energy Market Operator warned in 2023 of potential blackouts as renewables struggled to replace baseload power. In Europe, Germany's green push left households paying €0.40 per kWh—double Australia's average. For rural families, already stretched by fuel costs for long drives, these bills were a gut punch. "Ethical" energy wasn't just expensive; it was unaffordable.

Investors noticed too. ESG funds, once Wall Street darlings, started bleeding. A 2024 Bloomberg report showed global ESG fund inflows dropping 30% from their 2021 peak, as returns lagged. Big banks like Goldman Sachs, per CNBC, began urging clients to rethink shunning oil and gas. Why? Energy security. The Ukraine war and OPEC cuts exposed the folly of relying on intermittent renewables without fossil fuel backups. In the U.S., banks exited Net Zero alliances formed at COP26, with 2024 seeing $1 trillion in fossil fuel investments rebound.

High-profile flops didn't help. In Australia, the $20 billion SunCable solar project, meant to power Singapore via undersea cable, faced delays and cost blowouts by 2024, with critics questioning its feasibility. In Sweden, Northvolt's "green" battery start-up collapsed in 2025, unable to compete with China's cheap, coal-powered factories. These weren't just financial failures; they were ethical ones. Green ethics promised jobs and innovation but often delivered subsidies to shaky ventures while reliable industries—like Australia's coal exports—were demonised.

Rural communities felt the sting most. In Victoria, farmers fought wind farm proposals that threatened prime grazing land, citing noise, fire risks, and slashed property values. A 2024 Rural Councils Victoria survey found 60% of regional residents opposed new renewable projects without clear community benefits. The "ethical" push for green ignored the livelihoods of those living closest to the land.

Then came the hypocrisy. Green ethics preached purity but bent when convenient. In 2024, UK Labour MPs pushed to redefine ESG to include weapons manufacturers, arguing bombs for Ukraine were "ethical." If missiles could be greenwashed, why not oil? The logic unravelled further when "green" policies enriched elites. Australia's rooftop solar subsidies, costing $1.5 billion annually, mostly benefited wealthy urban households, while rural renters got nothing."Green washing" was an inevitable scam, where optics trumped impact.

The moralising also grated. Green advocates shamed rural folks for driving petrol utes but stayed mum on private jets to climate conferences. A 2023 ABC report noted Australia's top 1% emit 17 times more carbon than the bottom 50%—yet the finger-wagging aimed at farmers, not billionaires. Rural residents, scraping by on patchy roads and pricey fuel, saw green ethics as a city-centric sermon, not a universal truth.

In 2025, the pushback is palpable. Rural Australia, from Queensland's coal towns to Victoria's dairy country, is done with green dogma. Community groups rally against solar farms gobbling up arable land. Farmers demand compensation for infrastructure disruptions. Even globally, the tide's turning. The U.S., under Trump's "Drill, baby, drill" mantra, boosted oil production, slashing energy costs and exposing Europe's green struggles.

For rural households, the collapse of green ethics is personal. Take the farmer patching a shed with diesel-powered tools, or the family budgeting for generator fuel when the grid fails. These aren't anti-environment rebels; they're pragmatists who see through the rhetoric. Green ethics assumed everyone could afford to care. Reality proved otherwise.

The implosion of green ethics doesn't mean abandoning the environment. It means rethinking what's ethical. Is it moral to price pensioners out of heating? To bulldoze farmland for solar panels? To ignore the human cost of "green" mining? A new ethic could prioritise cheap, reliable energy, community input, and innovation that doesn't bankrupt the bush. Australia's $395 million Roads to Recovery boost for 2024-25 shows infrastructure matters—maybe it's time to fund reliable power grids with the same zeal.

Green ethics promised a utopia but left rural Australia with higher bills and half-baked plans. The bust is here, and it's time for an ethic that serves the land and the people who live on it.

https://dailysceptic.org/2025/04/22/the-implosion-of-green-ethics/