It’s not a matter of “stupidity,” but the desire for a better life. A “do nothing” climate change scenario will be bad for Bangladesh, but not as bad as hampering economic growth. By 2060, it will cost Bangladesh a third of its GDP. But put differently, losing a single percentage point of annual GDP growth over that period will be just as bad as the impact from climate change.
New technology will be adopted, but not fast enough. Bangladesh is currently at 4% renewables. But half the country doesn’t even have electricity. It’s building 10 GW of coal capacity by 2030 which will double per capita CO2 output. Gas is still the major energy source with some nuclear being built. There is nowhere to build solar or windmills, though off shore wind is a possibility in the long term. It will be many decades before Bangladesh uses primarily electric vehicles and vast numbers of ICE vehicles will be purchased in the meantime. The number of registered motor vehicles has tripled in the last decade—those are nearly all gas vehicles, and half are used vehicles imported from elsewhere. 80% are motorcycles, with very inefficient gas engines. And there are no alternatives to CO2-production for many construction and industrial processes.
Bangladesh will certainly take some measures to be greener. It has no economic incentive to use more fossil fuels than it needs to: it imports gas and coal and has no domestic industry or jobs in that area to protect. But it also can’t afford to subsidize renewables. It will deploy technologies based on true cost, and right now the cost of renewables + storage isn’t there, neither is the domestic infrastructure to go fully electric.