‘I cannot stress too much about it’: Monaco yacht buyers shrug off climate concerns

At annual yacht show, only a handful of customers said they were troubled by vessels’ disproportionate carbon footprint

The largest of the yachts in Monaco’s harbour were worth more than the annual GDP of some small island states. But few of the customers touring their decks seemed to care that buying the former would help drown the latter. “I don’t think about this yet,” said Elena Papernaya, an artist who had set her eyes on a mid-sized yacht, when asked if she worried about the damage it would do to the climate.

Kasper Hojgaard, a regional manager for an industrial company who charters yachts for a few weeks each year, said he did not consider climate change “at all” when doing so. His friend Lasse Jensen, a pension fund manager, nodded in agreement. “We are beginning to look a bit more into it, but it’s not playing a role.”