The madness of Net Zero
John Gideon Hartnett
How crazy has the world become? What we are watching is the most insane delusion faced by humankind.
To believe that carbon dioxide, plant food, is a pollutant is an idea that would have put you in the asylum 40 years ago. But not now. The climate cult has taken this bizarre ideology mainstream and the asylum is being run by the inmates…
Some sane voices are still speaking up.
Princeton University’s Emeritus (retired) Professor of Physics William Happer is one of them. The Institute of Public Affairs was proud to host his tour around Australia. A video of his presentation may be viewed on YouTube.
Professor Happer is one of the world’s leading scientists and climate realists, having made extensive contributions to the debate about climate science. He has often spoken on the crusade against carbon dioxide and the importance of integrity within the body of climate science. He has played a vital role in ensuring the community is exposed to information and arguments that many major institutions in our society seek to censor.
As a physics professor (now retired also), I found his approach to fundamental issues, like thermal radiation into space, refreshing. He has looked at the fundamentals of the laws of nature and shown that there cannot be any climate emergency based on carbon dioxide accumulation in the atmosphere.
In recent times, whole communities have suddenly fixed ‘their minds upon one object Net Zero’ and have subsequently gone ‘mad’. He stated, ‘Millions of people [have] become simultaneously impressed with one delusion and run after it.’ This is what has happened regarding the war against alleged anthropogenic global warming caused by carbon dioxide, water vapour, and cow farts (he never said that; the last one was just me).
When it comes to his background, Professor Happer described his involvement in developing artificial stars for the US military. It is a technique that uses a powerful laser and adaptive optics to cancel the speckling effects of temperature variations in the atmosphere from the ground up to high altitudes. Details aside, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, this research was declassified and now astronomical observatories routinely use the technique to improve their image quality from light passing through the atmosphere.
A side benefit of this research was that scientists could measure the temperature profiles of the atmosphere precisely up to an altitude of 100 km. This meant they could measure the thermal radiation being emitted into space.
More than 100 years ago, German physicist Max Planck figured out radiation from a ‘blackbody’, beginning what is now known as quantum mechanics. The measurements that Happer et al. made fell within standard predictions of that physics. But more importantly, they discovered that the atmospheric greenhouse gases reduced the emissions into space. This is due to the effects that certain features of those molecules (their vibrational and rotational states and Karl Schwarzschild’s research) have on the emissions at various wavelengths, particularly in the infrared. In total those features reduce the amount of radiation into space by about 30 per cent less than would be radiated if there were no gasses such as carbon dioxide (CO2) and water vapour in the atmosphere. CO2 particularly has a very strong effect and it is easily observed how much it reduces emissions. In fact, without CO2 there would be way too much emission of heat into space and the Earth would be too cold to live on.
The physics also showed that ‘if you double CO2 it almost doesn’t affect the radiation to space’. You can hardly tell any difference in the emissions. It is only a 1 per cent increase. Prof. Happer said, ‘100 per cent increase of CO2 [give you a] 1 per cent effect on radiation to space, so of course the mainstream media would never tell you that but the UN knows perfectly well this is true.’ This is hard physics as he says. It is not debatable. It is not consensus physics like the UN IPCC likes to use. It is by measurement with very accurate instruments.
Now I don’t want to get too nerdy into the physics, but Prof. Happer went on to describe the Stefan-Boltzman equation that tells us the relationship between the emission of radiation into space and the temperature of the radiating body (the Earth in this case). It turns out the emission of radiation into space goes as the fourth power of the temperature. That’s a huge effect. It means if you double the temperature you increase the radiation by 16 times. But if you invert this – a 1 per cent change in radiation into space means 0.25 per cent change in absolute temperature and that is not centigrade (C), but absolute temperature measured in kelvin (K). An atmospheric temperature at sea level of 15.5 C is about 288.7 K. That means 0.25 per cent of 288.7 K change, which is about 0.71 of a degree C. In this case that change is the same in C or K. 0.7 degrees is tiny but that is all you would get from a doubling of the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, from 400 ppm to 800 ppm, which at current accumulation rates would take a very long time, maybe another hundred years.
There is much more to the story. He explains the invocation of huge positive feedback in all the UN climate models which are not in any normal systems. They have to have these unknown feedback systems to get temperature changes way beyond any understanding in the standard physics. This is because ‘CO2 is too wimpy to be worried about,’ Prof. Happer said. So the climate cult makes up something that Happer called ‘affirmative action for CO2’. He then commented that the French chemist Le Chatelier noted that in most natural processes in nature, feedbacks are negative. Positive feedbacks almost never occur. But unremarkable negative-feedback-stabilised Earth temperatures are hardly likely to secure the next lucrative research grant and so the gravy train continues.
There is nothing to get excited about. Well-established standard physics and experimental observations tell us that it doesn’t matter how much CO2 density in the atmosphere varies around the 400 ppm to 800 ppm range; it does very little to change Earth’s temperatures.
Net Zero emissions is total madness. Even if humans could reduce their CO2 output to the atmosphere it will reduce plant food production, create famines and unnecessarily cool the planet by less than 1 degree. Reject the propaganda!
https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/10/the-madness-of-net-zero
************************************************Mega-Jolt: The Costs and Logistics of Plugging In EVs Are About to Become Supercharged
U.S. Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm gave Americans an unintended glimpse of the future during her road trip this summer touting the wonders of electric vehicles. Far from spotlighting the promise of EVs, her public relations misadventure in Georgia involved one of her staff in a gasoline-powered vehicle blocking off a coveted charger in advance of her arrival, leading to frayed tempers and a local EV owner calling the cops. It was an illustration of the challenges drivers could face as governments push the public to embrace plug-in vehicles.
Hyped as technological marvels, EVs are boobytrapped with a host of inconveniences and tradeoffs. By now many people have heard about range anxiety, exploding lithium-ion batteries, and the environmental destruction caused by global mining for battery minerals.
But another wave of challenges is in the offing as the federal government and state officials pump in billions of dollars to build out a massive national infrastructure of charging stations to power the EVs.
The sheer scale of a charging infrastructure means recruiting retailers and businesses to install and maintain chargers that are expected to lose money in the near future, with some likely to be written off as economic losses.
In California, which is slated to ban sales of new gasoline-powered cars in just 12 years, government estimates indicate the state may need to install at least 20 electric chargers for every gas pump now in service to create a reliable, seamless network.
Massive public subsidies will be a crucial part of this effort because private industry is not willing to take the financial risks of betting on an uncertain future. Government subsidies mean complying with recordkeeping and reporting mandates and making sure chargers are online 97% of the time, while bearing the financial risk of vandalism, mechanical malfunctions, daily fluctuations in electricity pricing, and cashflow unpredictability.
A “net zero” society inherently favors the haves over the have-nots. Renters and low-income families aren’t as likely to own private chargers, and electricity purchased from public chargers can cost five to 10 times as much as charging privately in a garage at home. To avoid penalizing the little guy, federal EV mandates require that 40% of benefits pay for public chargers in disadvantaged areas, while California requires that at least half go to such “equity” communities, where relatively few people currently drive EVs.
The rapid transition from a reliable legacy energy infrastructure that’s more than a century old to emerging technologies in just a few decades will require the buy-in of virtually every American, including relearning driving habits and adopting charging patterns that right now constitute the leisurely prerogative of early adopters and trend-setters.
“We need to make sure the infrastructure is overbuilt, oversupplied and over-capacity so that nobody as a driver gets stranded,” said John Eichberger, executive director of the Transportation Energy Institute, a nonprofit research organization. “When you point out the challenges to a believer or a staunch advocate, well now you’re just being negative, you’re just trying to impede progress.”
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Beware the offshore wind oligarchy
The Atlantic coastal states are painting themselves into a financial corner with offshore wind targets and mandates. These purchase requirements may be creating a seller’s market for offshore power providers. Even worse, given that there are only a handful of developers, it may well become an oligopoly market. If so, then the question is how high the prices to the states will go.
This alarming possibility is in sharp contrast to how the situation is being reported. Some developers have bought out their existing power purchase (supply) agreements as uneconomical. In New York, the State rejected a large-scale request from a bunch of developers for price increases averaging over 50% on the grounds that it violated their competitive procurement policy.
These events have been reported as serious setbacks for the industry, but in every case, the developers are expected to rebid the PPAs at much higher prices. In fact, these States are rushing to get new procurements underway. Other states are doing likewise.
The New York developers can hardly be expected to bid lower than they already asked for, as that would suggest their ask was dishonest. They may well bid higher, arguing that their costs have continued to increase. Developers for other states are likely to want similar amounts.
The driver here may be the huge targets already set by the states. Reports often cite the Biden target of 30,000 MW, but the combined state targets are much bigger. Just New York, New Jersey, and Virginia sum to over the Biden target. The combined targets from Maine to North Carolina exceed a whopping 50,000 MW of offshore wind capacity.
Given the huge targets, the question is how high a price will these states eat? If I were the developers, I would come in very high. As the saying goes, it is easy to go down but hard to go up.
Not only is it a mandated seller’s market, it has the makings of an oligopoly. These are short-term procurements, so the only viable bidders are those ready to build. That is a very small number of developers, perhaps a dozen or so, if that. For each state, there may only be a very small number that can deliver to them.
There are lots of leases, but it takes 5 years or more to get to the construction stage. Even though the Environmental Impact Statements are a cruel joke on the environment, they still require a lot of research. Smoke and mirrors take time to build.
So I would not be surprised if the bids on the first state’s procurement were very high and they kept getting higher, state by state and procurement by procurement. Of course, the states will scream and squawk. They may even reject these high prices at first, but they have huge targets and mandates to meet. The developers are mostly big, global companies, so they can afford to take their time, holding out for their high prices.
This particular issue storm is going to be very interesting. Nor will it be over quickly. Green politics meets green business head-on. We are talking about something like $200 billion in offshore wind projects. A titanic struggle.
Of course, it is possible the states will simply ditch the targets or slip them harmlessly into the future so they can repeatedly reject the high bids. This might even wipe out offshore wind, which is what it deserves. Watching that happen, perhaps even helping it along, could be great fun.
https://www.cfact.org/2023/10/22/beware-the-offshore-wind-oligarchy/
*******************************************Do We Really Know That Human Greenhouse Gas Emissions Cause Significant Climate Change?
It’s by far the most important scientific question of our age: Do human emissions of CO2 and other such “greenhouse gases” cause significant global warming, aka “climate change”? Based on the belief that an affirmative answer to that question is a universally accepted truth, our government has embarked on a multi-trillion dollar campaign to transform our economy by, among other things, eliminating hydrocarbon fuels from electricity generation (without any demonstrated workable plan for the replacement), outlawing the kinds of vehicles we currently drive, suppressing fossil fuel extraction, banning pipeline construction, making all your appliances work less well, and much more. Express any doubt about the causal connection between human activities and climate change, and you could very well get labeled as a “climate denier,” fired from your academic job, demonetized by Google or Facebook, or even completely ostracized from polite society.
But is there actually any real proof of the proposition at issue? In fact, there is not.
I had two important posts on this subject back in 2021: one from January 2, titled “Causation Of Climate Change, And The Scientific Method,” and the other from October 28, titled “‘The Climate Is Changing And Human Activities Are The Cause’: How, Exactly, Do We Know That?” Those posts covered the basics of how causation is generally established under the scientific method. Those posts also reviewed certain articles published at the time that gave good reasons to doubt the truth of the proposition that human greenhouse gas emissions are a main driver of significant climate change. Go to those posts for discussions of and links to the 2020/21 articles that I reviewed at the time.
The reason for today’s post is that a couple of important new articles have come to my attention that further make clear that the proposition that human activities, particularly “greenhouse gas” emissions, are causing significant climate change has not been proved and, based on existing data, cannot be proved. I’ll provide links and summaries, and let you draw your own conclusions as to the significance of these new articles.
But before that, let’s review one more time the basics of how causation is extablished under the scientific method. This is from my January 2, 2021 post:
We start with the basic maxim that “correlation does not prove causation.” Instead, causation is established by disproof of all relevant alternative (“null”) hypotheses. Everybody knows how this works from drug testing. We can’t prove that drug A cures disease X by administering drug A a thousand times and observing that disease X almost always goes away. Disease X might have gone away for other reasons, or on its own. Even if we administer drug A a million times, and disease X almost always goes away, we have only proved correlation, not causation. To prove causation, we must disprove the null hypothesis by testing drug A against a placebo. The placebo represents the null hypothesis that something else (call it “natural factors”) is curing disease X. When drug A is significantly more effective at curing disease X than the placebo, then we have disproved the null hypothesis, and established, at least provisionally, the effectiveness of drug A.
And yet somehow these principles don’t apply in the field of climate science. Instead, all the inside clique of the climate science community have decided to agree that the new way to prove causation is to show really, really good correlation with the preferred hypothesis, in which case subjecting the proposition at issue to a test of invalidation against a null hypothesis can be dispensed with. The climate science community calls its system for establishing causation “detection and attribution” studies. The basic idea is to come up with a model (i.e., a hypothesis) that predicts global warming based on increased greenhouse gases, and then collect data that show a very close match between what the model predicted and the data. Correlation with the model predictions is the claimed proof of causation. There are hundreds of such studies in the climate literature. My January 2, 2021 post linked to a classic of the genre, a 2018 IPCC-sponsored article written by a collection of some 36 co-authors who constitute a virtual “who’s who” of the insiders of the climate science cult (e.g., Michael Mann, Phil Jones, Tom Wigley, Ben Santer, etc., etc., etc.). The title is “Detection of Climate Change and Attribution of Causes.” Key quote:
There is a wide range of evidence of qualitative consistencies between observed climate changes and model responses to anthropogenic forcing, including global warming, increasing land-ocean temperature contrast, diminishing Arctic sea-ice extent, glacial retreat and increases in precip- itation in Northern Hemisphere high latitudes.
Just get yourself enough “qualitative consistencies” with your hypothesis and proof of causation will be yours!
The authors of the two new papers beg to differ. First, we have a paper by John Dagsvik and Sigmund Moen of Statistics Norway, dated September 2023, titled “To what extent are temperature levels changing due to greenhouse gas emissions?” This paper is particularly significant because it has been issued by a governmental agency — the government statistical agencies being otherwise all in lockstep in support of the human-caused global warming narrative. Excerpt from the Dagsvik and Moen paper (page 5):
At present, there is apparently a high degree of consensus among many climate researchers that the temperature increase of the last decades is systematic (and partly man-made). This is certainly the impression conveyed by the mass media. For non-experts, it is very difficult to obtain a comprehensive picture of the research in this field, and it is almost impossible to obtain an overview and understanding of the scientific basis for such a consensus (Koonin, 2021, Curry, 2023). By looking at these issues in more detail, this article reviews past observed and reconstructed temperature data as well as properties and tests of the global climate models (GCMs). Moreover, we conduct statistical analyses of observed and reconstructed temperature series and test whether the recent fluctuation in temperatures differs systematically from previous temperature cycles, due possibly to emission of greenhouse gases.
And the conclusion of Dagsvik and Moen (from the abstract):
[W]e find, . . . that the effect of man-made CO2 emissions does not appear to be strong enough to cause systematic changes in the temperature fluctuations during the last 200 years.
A good deal of the discussion in Dagsvik and Moen covers various deficiencies and inadequacies of the existing temperature data series — inadequacies that make it impossible to draw conclusions from existing data about causation of temperature increases from human greenhouse gas emissions. Here is one comment on the data from page 10 that I find particularly significant:
For all three surface air temperature records, but especially NCDC and GISS, administrative changes to anomaly values are quite often introduced, even for observations several years back in time. Some changes may be due to the delayed reductions of stations or addition of new station data, while others probably have their origin in a change of technique to calculate average values. It is impossible to evaluate the validity of such administrative changes for an outside user of these records.
For more than you will ever want to know on that subject, see my thirty part series “The Greatest Scientific Fraud Of All Time.” Bureaucrats altering the data to support their preferred narrative have rendered the data completely useless for any legitimate public policy purpose.
A second important new paper is from Antonis Christofides and co-authors dated September 26, 2023. They introduce their paper with a long post of that date at Climate, Etc. titled “Causality and Climate.” The part of the full technical paper relating to the climate science application can be found at this link. If you go to that last link and try to read through it, you will find technical math that will quickly have your head swimming, even if you are a quasi math geek like myself. However, their fundamental point as to causality in climate science is not very complicated: if you plot recent temperature increases against increases in CO2 in the atmosphere, it’s the temperature increases that come first, and the CO2 increases follow. Thus, if there is causality, it must be that the temperature increase is causing the CO2 increase, rather than the other way around.
More here:
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My other blogs. Main ones below
http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM )
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)
http://jonjayray.com/blogall.html More blogs
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Jim Hansen and his twin
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