No joking.

Dec. 6 (Bloomberg)—Government officials and activists flying to Bali, Indonesia, for the United Nations meeting on climate change will cause as much pollution as 20,000 cars in a year.

The delegates each will produce an average 4.07 metric tons of carbon dioxide, or CO2, to reach the resort island 950 kilometers (600 miles) from Jakarta, according to estimates e- mailed to Bloomberg by the UN agency holding the conference.

Some of the 187 nations participating in the two-week forum promised to offset their so-called carbon footprint by planting trees or buying emission credits.

The offsets thing is such a crock.  When you emit carbon, you emit carbon.  Planting a tree isn’t going to change that.

You’d think these people could all get together via the internet or something.  Or at least pick a somewhat less remote part of the globe to go to.  But then that’d mean they wouldn’t be able to go to Bali.

And what good is holding a global warming conference to talk about the coming environmental apocalypse if you can’t do it from a cushy resort on the sun-drenched beaches of some tropical paradise?