Climate Alarmists Are Coming for Your Coffee
You've heard it before: "The planet is dying!" "Society is going to collapse!" "We are going to run out of water!"
Elite climate alarmists will stop at nothing to throw dirt on the things Americans love and enjoy in order to push the Left's radical Green New Deal.
The World Economic Forum (WEF) now has a new target: Coffee.
During last week's annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland, Swiss banker Hubert Keller told the WEF panel that too much CO2 is exerted into the atmosphere through coffee production, warning that "they're coming for your coffee."
In a clip posted to social media, Keller pointed to the amount of "tonnes" (metric units equivalent to 2,204 lbs) CO2 coffee makers put into the air globally when producing their product. He said that the "coffee that we all drink emits between 15 and 20 tonnes of CO2 per tonne of coffee. So we should all know that this is — every time we drink coffee, we are basically putting CO2 into the atmosphere."
These are the same global elitists who want us to get our protein from eating crickets and try to make us believe eating meat will cause the world to end.
"Most of the coffee plantation — most of the coffee's produced through monoculture, and monoculture is also affected by climate change. The quality of these nature assets is deteriorating quite rapidly," Keller added.
The global warming fear-monger said that making the coffee industry more eco-friendly is a $250 billion market— no wonder why the world's most elite Leftists want to push their new attack on one of the country’s most beloved beverage.
So, not only does drinking coffee cause damage to the climate, but cars do as well. Having children is irresponsible, and gas stoves are evil. Not only that, refrigerators and freezers are also the planet's enemy.
Journalist Tim Hinchliffe blasted the WEF elitists for putting a guilt trip on coffee drinkers.
"It's all a power grab to seize land and the means of production to carbon tax you and I to oblivion," Hinchliffe said. "When he says production is 'fragmented,' he's saying it has yet to be captured by corporations & centralized. The coffee farmers in the globalist-termed 'global south' are to be stripped of their livelihoods in the name of climate justice."
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Senate Opens Door to Massive Carbon Tax Despite Critical Economic Concerns
This week, Congress took a step toward passing a carbon tax—an inflationary, regressive tax on all products that would lower economic growth; make all Americans worse off; and disproportionately harm poor people, farmers, and small businesses. Politicians have rightly rejected carbon taxes in the past and should continue to do so.
On Jan. 18, the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee voted to send a proposed law to the full Senate that would require the federal government to conduct a study calculating the carbon emissions of a broad range of different products made in America and other countries. These include construction materials, plastics, and fertilizers—all vital to small businesses and corporations that power the economy.
This study is the first step to imposing a carbon tax on these products. The bill, sponsored by Sens. Kevin Cramer, R-N.D., and Chris Coons, D-Del., is titled the Providing Reliable, Objective, Verifiable Emissions Intensity and Transparency (PROVE IT) Act.
The bill’s proponents say they are responding to carbon taxes in Europe, which will be implemented in 2024. The European Union, which has 21 countries with a carbon tax, is preparing laws to tax imports based on greenhouse gases emitted in their production. This border tax proposal is meant to prevent companies from shifting production outside the EU to avoid carbon taxes.
The complexity of this proposed European legislation, and the pushback from emerging economies, is one reason that it is unwise for America to follow. Europe’s current carbon taxes do not cover carbon emissions from all products. On average, the carbon tax covers 38% of total national carbon emissions, ranging from a high of 81% in Liechtenstein with a rate of $131 per ton to a low of 2% in Spain with a rate of $16 per ton.
In taxing carbon dioxide, Congress would end up reducing energy use while, according to carbon tax proponents, raising revenue that might permit a reduction of income tax rates to compensate.
The U.S. Treasury estimated in 2017 that a carbon tax of $49 per ton, rising at 2% a year, would raise $2.2 trillion over 10 years. Such a carbon tax would raise taxes on gasoline by 44 cents per gallon, on natural gas by about $2.60 per thousand cubic feet, on oil by $21.50 per barrel, and on coal by $62 to $126 per ton, depending on its carbon content.
The carbon tax is a favorite of individual economists across the political spectrum for restructuring the tax system. Proponents include Tuft University’s Gilbert Metcalf, American Enterprise Institute scholar Alex Brill, and Donald Marron and Eric Toder of the Tax Policy Center. The Climate Leadership Council, which cleverly refers to the carbon tax as “carbon dividends,” has as its founding members former Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, Harvard professors Larry Summers and Greg Mankiw, and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen (listed on the website as inactive due to her current position).
But a carbon tax has four major disadvantages—it is inflationary and regressive, it causes regional disparities, it is complex, and it drives production offshore. America is stronger without it.
Inflationary and Regressive. One major problem with the carbon tax is that it would raise prices, because all products contain carbon. Inflation is running at almost 4% and has reduced Americans’ real incomes. Since low-income people spend more on energy as a percent of their income than high-income people, a switch to a carbon tax would have to be accompanied by income transfers to low-income groups—i.e., some type of subsidy paid for by taxpayers.
Proponents suggest that offsets, paid for by carbon tax revenues, can be returned to taxpayers through lower income taxes, perhaps with the proceeds going chiefly to poor people who are disproportionately hurt by what is in essence an energy consumption tax.
However, Congress rarely cuts one tax by as much as it raises another tax, so Americans will end up paying more in taxes. Further, many poor people are not required to file tax returns, and they would have to do so in order to be identified and compensated. That means extra work for them and for the Internal Revenue Service.
Regional Disparities. Another problem is that carbon-intensive sectors, such as coal, heavy manufacturing, and agriculture, would be the biggest losers under the new tax. This means higher prices for food and gasoline for everyone, especially in rural areas, as well as companies announcing that they are moving offshore. Farmers in Germany, France, the Netherlands, and Belgium are rioting against the new climate provisions.
Complexity. A carbon tax is complex to set up, as can be seen from the PROVE IT Act. The bill selects which products are analyzed and then open to be taxed. Practically all products have some carbon in the content or in the manufacturing process or both, even food and clothing. That is why European carbon taxes range from 2% to 81% of carbon emissions.
Proponents of the tax suggest putting tariffs on imports in proportion to their carbon content so that American companies will not be at a disadvantage. But the precise quantities are complex to calculate, and tariffs might be illegal under World Trade Organization regulations.
Greater Offshore Production Increases Global Emissions. Carbon taxes raise the prices of domestic energy-intensive goods compared to imports from countries without carbon taxes. If American goods were taxed, Americans would prefer to buy cheaper, untaxed imports, and American firms would relocate abroad to avoid the tax or lose business to foreign companies.
This potential relocation reduces the goal of the tax, namely to lower global emissions and global temperatures. It also potentially sends millions of jobs overseas.
With production going abroad to countries with less stringent environmental regulations, global emissions might well rise rather than decline. Without a carbon tax, U.S. carbon emissions declined by 1,000 million metric tons over the past 16 years due to the substitution of natural gas for coal. Other countries do not have America’s inexpensive natural gas and rely more on coal. Therefore, companies relocating overseas would rely on dirtier, coal-produced energy.
A carbon tax would hurt the poor and raise domestic prices relative to the prices of many imports. It would be another add-on levy, with exemptions for political friends and punishments for enemies. The PROVE IT Act is a first step toward the tax, and Congress would be wise to reject the bill.
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Creepy e-bike graveyards
Despite all the green hype surrounding the ‘dockless bike-share’ industry, it is producing an extraordinary amount of waste. Like wind turbine blades, these e-bikes are congregating in Xiamen and Shenyang, among other places, where they are largely left to rot in a sea of metal and rubber.
In some cases, these fields of bikes are several stories high, reshaping the landscape with the failed dreams of green urban enthusiasts. Not only are bikes dumped because they are damaged, some of China’s largest e-bike companies have collapsed. Many more are confiscated by government authorities. It is a disaster.
Even when the bikes are used as intended, they have created a major problem for already squeezed urban spaces. Residents have complained that bike-sharing has left their cities cluttered and a mess, with bikes discarded in the middle of footpaths, in hedges, rivers, parks – anywhere the careless user chooses.
Because bike-shares follow the old socialist principle of ‘people will take care of communal property’, it naturally fails in most places – with China’s problem of mistreated share-bikes repeated in America, Australia, and Europe. The largest measure for the success of a bike-share company appears to be the strict social order of society. Effectively, it operates on trust.
E-bike sharing is another one of those lovey-dovey Utopian ideas that woefully overlooks human behaviour. Just as public housing built on the taxpayer dollar is frequently neglected and destroyed, share-bikes are abused and abandoned because there is no significant punishment for the user. They didn’t buy it and they have no emotional attachment to it.
The globalist philosophy of ‘you will own nothing and be happy’ would likely turn the whole world into a slum. People don’t look after things if they can’t own them. We’re a nesting species, not squatters.
In 2020, there were over 10 million e-bikes in operation in China with the market continuing to grow despite teething problems. Where will they end up? In landfill? In the sea? Leaching into the dirt? In China, particularly, there are millions of early-model e-bikes with lead-acid batteries residing in these graveyards. They will be joined by the newer lithium-ion batteries. None of this is zero emission in the sense that the public expect.
‘Cities such as Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Shenzhen subsequently tightened up policies on bike-share operators to better manage the chaotic environments the oversupply and unregulated bikes have created,’ said the ITDP.
While making cities more ‘bike friendly’ might help the immediate safety requirements, we know from some European countries, which are already well adapted for bikes, that it does not solve the larger issue of customer use.
E-bike sharing in Australia is annoying. If you walk towards Broadway in Sydney, the chances are you’ll trip over one collapsed and abandoned in the middle of the footpath. Sometimes they are left on the road. They all have helmets hanging off the handlebar so you can put your head in the same spot as a hundred other strangers. This is an odd behaviour for the Covid hypochondriacs who still wear masks and overdose on hand sanitiser. They refuse to sit on trains or touch escalator handrails, but shared helmets? That doesn’t count. Woke maths.
Australia’s e-bikes have a history of being thrown into rivers and left in parks. Depressing photos surfaced in 2017 of a barge with a couple of blokes pulling dozens out of the Yarra River in Melbourne. E-bike companies are doing their best to combat poor customer behaviour, but they are like parents trying to get a TikToker to clean their room.
Why do people panicky about the end of the world go to the trouble of using an e-bike only to chuck it in the water?
I’ve seen shared bikes work. In a regional seaside town, old-school bikes are left neatly locked into position beside a major shopping centre right beside the bike tracks. They are unlocked via an app which is relatively cheap to use. If the bikes aren’t back in their little homes within 24 hours, the user is automatically charged the full cost of the bike. Weirdly, this threat sees all the bikes returned without a scratch.
Brisbane has also had some luck with e-bike sharing for two main reasons: the city is very hard to navigate for newbies (and Google Maps has no idea how to help), and there are some scenic purpose-built bike-ways that suit the ‘drop in, drop off’ model.
Riding in Sydney or Melbourne is more like an extreme sport where some bike lanes end on freeway ramps or tram tracks while others channel riders into death traps like lemmings to a cliff.
The dream of shared e-bikes is not evil, and I’m sure plenty of green advocates have an Eden-esque result in mind. What we have to be careful of is that we don’t choke the world with e-waste while trying to ‘save it’.
https://www.spectator.com.au/2024/01/creepy-e-bike-graveyards/
****************************************More coal coming from Australia
Dartbrook mine set to reopen after 18 years
Australian Pacific Coal and Tetra Resources have finalised a three year US$60 million debt facility with energy and commodity group Vitol Asia.
Dartbrook coal mine near Muswellbrook is a step closer to reopening, 18 years after it was placed into care and maintenance.
Australian Pacific Coal and Tetra Resources announced on Tuesday that they had finalised a three year US$60 million debt facility with energy and commodity group Vitol Asia to cover the cost of reopening the mine through to first coal.
The funding will cover equipment acquisitions, the completion of remediation work and the acquisition of additional mining systems during ramp-up to achieve full capacity.
The companies been working to recommission the mine since September 2022.
"This is a landmark event for Australian Pacific Coal, our shareholders, and the Dartbrook mine," Australian Pacific Coal interim chief executive officer Ayten Saridas said.
"Our ability to secure debt funding for Dartbrook during a period of high inflation and global tension is testament to the quality of the project, the vision and work ethic of the team of people bringing it back to market, and the commitment of our shareholders."
The debt facility will be structured as a loan notes issuance agreement and will involve a three-year facility with repayments commencing after an initial grace period to allow for mine production startup.
"From the moment we engaged with Vitol, they have seen the potential value we can create at Dartbrook," Saridas said.
"They have been thoroughly professional during this process and we are looking forward to working closely with them in coming years.
"Vitol will play a key strategic role in the development of the project following their appointment as sole marketing agent for Dartbrook coal. Dartbrook product is very high quality and we anticipate strong interest from export markets.
The schedule to first coal is under review and will be announced in AQC's quarterly report later this month, Saridas said.
The Independent Planning Commission approved an amended application to reopen the mine in 2019, despite community opposition.
The conditions stipulate that the mine will have to use the Hunter Tunnel rather than transport coal by truck. It must also use existing processing infrastructure and cannot mine the Piercefield Seam to reduce groundwater impact.
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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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