UN official calls fossil fuels ‘high-risk’ investment

Recent drops in the price of oil show the great risks that come from investing in fossil fuels, the United Nations’ top climate official said.

Christiana Figueres, who is overseeing the U.N.’s attempts to forge an international agreement to fight climate change, gave her remarks Monday in Lima, Peru, at a two-week meeting of the nations involved in the climate pact, according to Reuters.

{mosads}She dismissed the thought that oil prices, which have recently fallen below $70 a barrel, would be so low as to discourage countries from trying to reduce the use of fossil fuels.

Figueres said price volatility “is exactly one of the main reasons why we must move to renewable energy which has a completely predictable cost of zero for fuel,” she said at a news conference, according to Reuters.

“We are seeing more and more the realization that investment in fossil fuel is actually a high risk, is getting more and more risky,” she added.

But other energy experts told Reuters that low oil prices should concern anyone pushing for a move away from fossil fuels.

“It’s hard to tell what the total net impact will be here,” Alden Meyer of the Union of Concerned Scientists told the news service.