Ahead of his trip to the United States, King Carl XVI Gustaf of Sweden sat down for an interview with the AP, where he asked Americans to be more environmentally aware. 
The King confessed that he is toning down his own carbon emissions. He added he drives an ethanol-fueled Volvo to work and hopes to start small-scale biofuel production at his farm outside Stockholm.
“If my dreams come true I’m going to put up a small biogas plant just using manure from my cattle,” the 62-year-old monarch said in a rare interview with U.S. media at the Royal Palace. “You can use it for heating the house.”
Carl Gustaf will be in the United States this Wednesday until Saturday. He will attend energy seminars in New York and Detroit, and a groundbreaking ceremony for a planned biogas plant in Flint, Michigan, that would be modeled after a similar facility in Sweden.
If scheduling allows it, the King will also test drive some green cars from General Motors and Ford.
King Carl Gustaf admitted that he had viewed the documentary, “An Inconvenient Truth” by former Vice President Al Gore, and found it to be truthful.
“I liked it,” he said. “Everything he said I heard before and I thought (it) was right.”
As King of one of the leading countries of alternative fuels, His Majesty suggested Americans need to take the threat of global warming more seriously.
“There are still a lot of people who don’t see the necessity in solving these problems,” he said. “This is the biggest issue ever.”
He declined to say whether the U.S. ought to join international efforts for a new global treaty on greenhouse gas emissions, but called for serious reflection.
“I’m not going to discuss what you are going to do in your country. That is (for) your politicians. But you just have to think twice,” said the king, who has no political power. “We just have to work together around the globe to solve this.”
Recent Comments