Academic freedom at UW

A few days ago on this site (scroll down) I put up an article about the persecution of Cliff Mass, a climate scientist at the University of Washington who believes  in global warming to a degree but objects to it becoming a honeypot for its disciples. The persecution seems to have amplified since then so Don Easterbrook has written in support of him. The support is in the form of a letter sent to the UW president, dean, and faculty secretary. Easterbrook is a UW grad. He is incensed about the blatant violation of the official UW policy on academic freedom.  The letter is below:

The most precious aspect of a university is academic freedom, providing a forum for free and open discussion of any subject. I have always taken for granted that a university is a place where open exchange of ideas and debate was encouraged, not suppressed. But as a UW grad (PhD)and long-time financial contributor to the UW, I am totally disgusted by the way the academic freedom of Cliff Mass of the Atmospheric Sciences Dept is being trashed by department chairman Dale Durran. Prof Mass posted a blog stating why he thought I-1631 was not a good bill. Chairman Dale Durran then called a department meeting about the blog post Mass wrote, with the event billed as ‘controversy.’ An ombudsperson was enlisted to run the meeting, but chairman Durran took over the meeting, serving as inquisitor and critic. He prevented Mass from finishing his opening comments and harassed Mass throughout the meeting. Professor Mass was the subject of insulting, personal, inappropriate remarks. An attack on his academic freedom is an attack on the academic freedom of all faculty.

This treatment of a UW faculty member is totally against the UW official policy of academic freedom (Section 4-33), which states “Academic freedom is the freedom to discuss all relevant matters in teaching, to explore all avenues of scholarship, research, and creative expression, and to speak or write without institutional discipline or restraint on matters of public concern as well as on matters related to shared governance and the general welfare of the University. Faculty members have the right to academic freedom and the right to examine and communicate ideas by any lawful means even should such activities generate hostility or pressure against the faculty member or the University. Their exercise of constitutionally protected freedom of association, assembly, and expression, including participation in political activities, does not constitute a violation of duties to the University, to their profession, or to students and may not result in disciplinary action or adverse merit evaluation.”

Chairman Durran has clearly violated this official UW policy. May I therefore ask if you intend to discipline him, and what do you intend to do to restore Professor Mass’s academic freedom?

Email from Dr. Don J. Easterbrook, Professor of Geology, Western Washington University





Environmental Protection Agency Gives $45,000 Grant to Help Non-Profit Build Sea Turtle-Shaped Trash Can

The movement to crack down on plastic straws is finally getting a little financial help from the federal government, which last week announced that it would be spending tens of thousands of dollars to help build a see-through mesh trash receptacle shaped like a sea turtle.

On December 4, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced $2.57 million in grants to environmental nonprofit groups in New York and Connecticut working to clean up Long Island Sound. The recipients include the Citizens Campaign for the Environment (CCE), whose "Going Strawless to Save the Sea Turtle" campaign received $45,000 in federal cash.

The EPA's press release announcing the awards says CCE will use that money to "conduct comprehensive public education to reduce the use of plastic." As part of this campaign, CCE will collect up to 500 pledges from people promising to use less plastic, and organize a beach clean-up involving roughly 200 volunteers.

CCE's Executive Director Adrienne Esposito told Newsday that refuse from beach clean-ups will be deposited in a mesh sea turtle statue which is also being funded by the federal grant.

According to the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, a Congressionally-chartered organization responsible for administering the EPA's Long Island Sound clean-up grants, the sea turtle trash statue portion of the project serves an important educational role.

"The waste receptacle is viewed as a creative and targeted strategy [to] educate the general public, and especially youth about the negative impact of plastic debris on the living resources and recreational uses of Long Island Sound," the NFWF said in a statement to Reason.

It's not clear how much of the $45,000 in federal grants will be eaten up by the trash turtle statue. CCE did not respond to repeated requests for comment. The environmental group's federal grant is being supplemented by $45,000 in non-federal matching funds.

Needless to say, $45,000 in federal spending is not going to break the bank. And while I am critical of the focus on plastic straws, CCE's plans for a voluntary coastal clean up are laudable. Nevertheless, federal taxpayers should not be on the hook for such projects.

SOURCE 





Follow the (Climate Change) Money
   
The first iron rule of American politics is: Follow the money. This explains, oh, about 80 percent of what goes on in Washington.

Shortly after the latest “Chicken Little” climate change report was published last month, I noted on CNN that one reason so many hundreds of scientists are persuaded that the sky is falling is that they are paid handsomely to do so.

I said, “In America and around the globe governments have created a multibillion dollar climate change industrial complex.” And then I added: “A lot of people are getting really, really rich off of the climate change industry.” According to a recent report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office, “Federal funding for climate change research, technology, international assistance, and adaptation has increased from $2.4 billion in 1993 to $11.6 billion in 2014, with an additional $26.1 billion for climate change programs and activities provided by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act in 2009.”

This doesn’t mean that the planet isn’t warming. But the tidal wave of funding does reveal a powerful financial motive for scientists to conclude that the apocalypse is upon us. No one hires a fireman if there are no fires. No one hires a climate scientist (there are thousands of them now) if there is no catastrophic change in the weather. Why doesn’t anyone in the media ever mention this?

But when I lifted this hood, it incited more hate mail than from anything I’ve said on TV or written. Could it be that this rhetorical missile hit way too close to home?

How dare I impugn the integrity of scientists and left-wing think tanks by suggesting that their findings are perverted by hundreds of billions of dollars of taxpayer handouts. The irony of this indignation is that any academic whose research dares question the “settled science” of the climate change complex is instantly accused of being a shill for the oil and gas industry or the Koch brothers.

Apparently, if you take money from the private sector to fund research, your work is inherently biased, but if you get multimillion-dollar grants from Uncle Sam, you are as pure as the freshly fallen snow.

How big is the climate change industrial complex today? Surprisingly, no one seems to be keeping track of all the channels of funding. A few years ago, Forbes magazine went through the federal budget and estimated about $150 billion in spending on climate change and green energy subsidies during President Obama’s first term.

That didn’t include the tax subsidies that provide a 30 percent tax credit for wind and solar power — so add to those numbers about $8 billion to $10 billion a year. Then add billions more in costs attributable to the 29 states with renewable energy mandates that require utilities to buy expensive “green” energy.

Worldwide the numbers are gargantuan. Five years ago, a leftist group called the Climate Policy Initiative issued a study that found that “global investment in climate change” reached $359 billion that year. Then to give you a sense of how money-hungry these planet-saviors are, the CPI moaned that this spending “falls far short of what’s needed” a number estimated at $5 trillion.

For $5 trillion we could feed everyone on the planet, end malaria, and provide clean water and reliable electricity to every remote village in Africa. And we would probably have enough money left over to find a cure for cancer and Alzheimer’s.

The entire Apollo project to put a man on the moon cost less than $200 billion. We are spending twice that much every year on climate change.

This tsunami of government money distorts science in hidden ways that even the scientists who are corrupted often don’t appreciate. If you are a young eager-beaver researcher who decides to devote your life to the study of global warming, you’re probably not going to do your career any good or get famous by publishing research that the crisis isn’t happening.

But if you’ve built bogus models that predict the crisis is getting worse by the day, then step right up and get a multimillion-dollar grant.

Now here’s the real scandal of the near trillion dollars that governments have stolen from taxpayers to fund climate change hysteria and research. By the industry’s own admission, there has been almost no progress worldwide in combatting climate change. The latest reports by the U.S. government and the United Nations say the problem is getting worse, and we have not delayed the apocalypse by a single day.

Has there ever been such a massive government expenditure that has had such miniscule returns on investment? After three decades of “research” the only “solution” is for the world to stop using fossil fuels, which is like saying that we should stop growing food.

Really? The greatest minds of the world entrusted with hundreds of billions of dollars can only come up with a solution that would entail the largest government power grab in world history, shutting down industrial production (just look at the catastrophe in Germany when they went all in for green energy), and throwing perhaps billions of human beings into poverty? If that’s the remedy, I will take my chances on a warming planet.

President Donald Trump should tell these so-called scientists that “you’re fired.” And we taxpayers should demand our money back.

SOURCE 





How Can We Address Climate Change? Here Are Three Ideas

A social media challenge that went around not long ago asked people “what three things will you do to combat climate change?” If you google the phrase, you get tons of results. Here are three suggestions--they are by no means an exhaustive list, but I think these would all be positive steps.

1. Get out of the way of nuclear energy. The climate is changing because we’re turning carbon dioxide currently stored underground into carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Even advances like electric cars aren’t going to do that much because they just move the emissions from the tailpipes of the cars on the road to the smokestacks of coal-burning power plants.

We could avoid a lot of these emissions by removing barriers to more widespread adoption of nuclear energy. Technological advances have made reactors far safer and, importantly, have made it easy to store waste safely, as well. Nuclear is also far safer per unit of energy generated: the number of deaths per kilowatt of nuclear energy is a fraction of a fraction of the number of deaths per kilowatt of other energy sources, particularly coal.

2. Stop encouraging and subsidizing rural living. In his 2011 book Triumph of the City: How Our Greatest Invention Makes Us Richer, Smarter, and Happier, the economist Edward Glaeser asks people to consider who lived more sustainably: urbanites or Henry David Thoreau at Walden Pond (see also his 2011 article “New Land of Opportunity” here)? Compared to the urban Bostonian Thoreau’s adventures in the rural idyll were an environmental disaster (in part because he burned a ton of forestland). Urban environmental footprints are far smaller than rural environmental footprints for a whole host of reasons, and by using tax and regulatory policy to encourage people to move to or stay in rural areas we are actually subsidizing climate change rather than fighting it. Policy should be aimed at moving under-served populations to services like health care, transportation, and high-speed internet rather than moving these services to under-served populations. If someone wants to live next to Walden Pond or in rural Alabama, I certainly won’t object; however, I will expect them to bear the full cost of their lifestyle choices. And that brings us to the last suggestion.

3. Stop discouraging new development—especially of housing—in urban areas, and really especially in places with moderate temperatures.Regulations making it prohibitively expensive to build new housing in places like the Bay Area and the northeast corridor are turning these regions into private enclaves for the rich and powerful. The climate effect is that we get less density and considerable misallocation of land that would be better used for residential, industrial, and commercial purposes. Urban growth boundaries and greenbelts and strict regulations might look environmentally friendly, but I think this is an illusion. “Greenbelts” around cities that are there to preserve farm and forest lands have the unintended consequences of raising housing prices within the green belt and potentially pushing commuters beyond the greenbelt where they then drive farther—from Guelph to Toronto, for example. When you make something more expensive, people search for substitutes, and as Glaeser points out, housing in cities like Houston, Dallas, and Atlanta where air conditioning is practically a necessity is a substitute for housing in cities like San Francisco where people regularly do without it. NIMBY--Not In My Back Yard--has persisted for far too long. Let’s say “YIMBY” instead.

SOURCE   





Australian Big Green can afford to buy what it wants

Climate change is already shaping up to be a major election issue and a $495,000 donation to GetUp spells trouble for the beleaguered Adani coal mine.

Environmental group The Sunrise Project is providing the money to support its efforts to make climate change the number one issue at the next federal election.

Former Greenpeace activist John Hepburn, who is the founder and executive director of The Sunrise Project, said people had lost faith in Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s capacity to effectively tackle climate change.

“The community is crying out for political leaders who will stand up to multinational corporations like Adani which wants to force through its climate-wrecking projects, putting at risk Queensland’s precious water resources and adding fuel to the fire, cooking an already distressed Great Barrier Reef,” Mr Hepburn said.

“Political leadership is what’s needed to put a stop to Adani’s controversial coal mine. The world just can’t afford to mine and burn the coal from the Galilee Basin which is one of the largest untapped coal reserves in the world. If we do we will see even more dangerous climate change and extreme weather events in Australia such as fires, storms and droughts.”

The Sunrise Project has been lobbying for the transition away from fossil fuels and previously campaigned to stop Adani’s Carmichael coal mine from going ahead. It generally keeps a low profile, working to co-ordinate efforts between different groups.

The organisation gets part of its funding from the US-based charitable trust, the Sandler Foundation, which has led to it being criticised for being part of a co-ordinated push against coal.

Its $495,000 donation will be used to lobby for action on climate change and will be a significant contribution to GetUp’s election war chest.

In the past year GetUp has received $10 million in donations but national director Paul Oosting said most of its funding came from everyday people who pay on average $17 or less. He said last financial year more than 104,905 individuals donated to GetUp.

“This support will help supercharge the great work GetUp members are already doing to make climate action a reality,” Mr Oosting said. “For politicians standing in the way of climate action, this summer promises to be unbearable.”

The collaboration is an ominous sign for climate change deniers as GetUp has shown itself to be an effective campaigner.

GetUp helped to make climate change an issue in the Wentworth by-election, contributing to the win by independent Dr Kerryn Phelps in the former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull’s seat.

About 78 per cent of Wentworth voters surveyed in an exit poll commissioned by The Australia Institute said climate change had some influence on their vote.

In the four weeks leading up the poll GetUp members made more than 90,000 phone calls to voters in the electorate and more than 300 volunteers handed out how to vote cards.

The donation also puts Adani on notice that protests about its proposed Carmichael coal mine will continue, despite it announcing a scaled-back project.

GetUp believes the public don’t want Adani to go ahead.

Mr Oosting pointed to a recent ReachTel poll of 2345 Australians commissioned by the Stop Adani Alliance that found 40 per cent “strongly agreed” that digging new coal mines in Australia was no longer in the national interest as it was making climate change worse. Overall the poll conducted on December 4 found 56.3 per cent agreed and 27.7 per cent didn’t agree.

Mr Oosting said Australia was recently ranked the fifth worst performing country in the world when it came to climate action.

The 2018 Climate Change Performance Index ranked Australia 55 out of 60 countries for climate change action, putting it in the same group as the United States and Saudi Arabia.

SOURCE 

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For more postings from me, see  DISSECTING LEFTISM, TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC and AUSTRALIAN POLITICS. Home Pages are   here or   here or   here.  Email me (John Ray) here.  

Preserving the graphics:  Most graphics on this site are hotlinked from elsewhere.  But hotlinked graphics sometimes have only a short life -- as little as a week in some cases.  After that they no longer come up.  From January 2011 on, therefore, I have posted a monthly copy of everything on this blog to a separate site where I can host text and graphics together -- which should make the graphics available even if they are no longer coming up on this site.  See  here or here

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Jo Nova - How to Destroy a Perfectly Good Electricity Grid in Three Easy Steps






Trump was right

President Donald Trump claims the fuel-tax riots in France justify his decision to yank the United States out of the “fatally flawed” Paris climate deal.

“I am glad that my friend @EmmanuelMacron and the protestors in Paris have agreed with the conclusion I reached two years ago,” Trump tweeted. “The Paris Agreement is fatally flawed because it raises the price of energy for responsible countries while whitewashing some of the worst polluters in the world.”

Trump added he has been “making great strides in improving America’s environment,” but suggested the Paris agreement put the burden for environmentally friendly policies on American taxpayers.

The tweet came after France delayed plans to implement steep taxes on diesel fuel and gasoline as part of Macron’s effort to reduce emissions.

SOURCE 





Ecofascism







The Long Road to Energy Independence

For the first time in 75 years, the U.S. is a net exporter of oil. That's great news.

America’s energy outlook is changing significantly for the better, which is obviously welcome news … that you’re unlikely to hear from the mainstream media.

Last week, the United States officially became a net oil exporter, a dramatic shift for the country’s energy sector. It’s been 75 years since we could say that we ship out more oil than we take in.

Increased oil production in Texas, New Mexico, North Dakota, and Pennsylvania are responsible in part for this new state of affairs. And a recently discovered oil and natural gas reserve in Texas and New Mexico should keep the pumps going for years to come. The massive reservoir contains 281 trillion cubic feet of natural gas and 46.3 billion barrels of oil. It’s the largest such resource ever assessed and is enough to fuel the United States alone for up to seven years.

President Donald Trump campaigned on American energy independence, and since taking office, Trump has initiated several steps to move toward that goal. Those include relaxed federal restrictions on oil and natural gas exploration and drilling, and lifting draconian Barack Obama-era restrictions designed to bring an end to coal production in the U.S.

True energy independence has been a stated goal of every president since Richard Nixon, but no one ever went about it correctly or whole-heartedly. Several Republican and Democrat presidents embraced a policy concoction of more regulation, a reliance on “alternative” energy sources, and austerity measures to manage America’s energy needs. Not surprisingly, all fell short of energy independence.

Meeting America’s energy needs means producing more energy (a.k.a. supply-side economics) — it’s as simple as that. Our last president, who laughably insists he is responsible for America’s current energy boom, was in favor of driving up energy costs for consumers to force less usage (a.k.a. demand-side economics.) The Obama administration was also in favor of betting the ranch on unproven clean-energy technologies that were prohibitively expensive and not all that efficient or clean.

The energy boom that we are currently experiencing makes us less reliant on foreign energy producers, which in turn improves our national security. It also means more jobs to produce energy here at home, and that means a strengthened economy. Good news all around. Well, except for the climate doomsayers.

At the recent climate conference in Poland, alarmists continued their tirade against CO2 emissions, claiming that the world has just 10 years to lower those emissions before we reach the point of no return on rising surface temperatures. They also literally mocked the Trump administration’s efforts to tout fossil fuels.

Many nations at the conference unquestioningly accepted the UN’s latest report, which calls for unspecified drastic changes to industrial emissions. The United States, joined by Russia, Saudi Arabia, and Kuwait, challenged the report’s findings, with each nation saying they would only note the report rather than accept it.

The U.S. also refused to reaffirm the Paris climate deal at November’s G20 summit, much to the consternation of ecofascists. Yet by following its own policies, the U.S. has lowered emissions during seven out of the last 10 years — something that none of the nations supporting the Paris accords can say. That proves as much as anything that Paris emissions-control standards are about control, not emissions.

Climate change is a ruse to hide a leftist takeover of the economy. America’s rising energy production, and the vigorous economy that comes with it, stands in the way of that goal. So expect leftists to continue targeting Trump’s energy policy and to continue screaming hyperbolic claims that he is destroying the Earth.

SOURCE 





The sky is falling?!?

Ridiculous report claims humans have killed more than half the world’s wildlife in past 48 years

Greg Walcher

A recent World Wildlife Fund (WWF) report claims humans have killed more than half of all the wildlife in the world since 1970. The report attracted media mass attention, even though the actual 145-page essay doesn’t really say that, much less prove it.

More ironic, the political focus is mostly on countries where the declining wildlife populations do not live, and the solution suggested is so vague it couldn’t possibly address the issue.

The hype about the document, an annual harangue called the “Living Planet Report,” is not surprising, considering the source. This is the same organization that told us a decade ago we would all have to abandon Planet Earth.

“Earth's population will be forced to colonize two planets within 50 years if natural resources continue to be exploited at the current rate, according to a… study by the WWF. [The study] warns that the human race is plundering the planet at a pace that outstrips its capacity to support life. The report… reveals that more than a third of the natural world has been destroyed by humans over the past three decades.”

That was a remarkable conclusion, especially considering that 71% of the Earth’s surface is water. That means humans would have to have destroyed virtually every square inch of land on Earth for the report to be credible. So it’s incredible that the WWF and its annual report continue to attract media attention.

This year’s diatribe claims almost 60% of all the fish, birds and animals on Earth have been killed by people in two generations. It proposes “a new global deal for nature,” a companion for the Paris Climate treaty. Except unlike Paris, the proposed “new deal for nature” has no numbers and no specific goals. In fact, there is no definition of what the agreement might entail.

Rather, it includes vague suggestions that we’re not locking up enough land from public access, nor creating enough national parks, wildlife refuges, wilderness areas and other “unpeopled” places. For the United States, that means the WWF is not satisfied that laws, regulations and other actions have already prohibited mining, drilling, timber harvesting and other human activities on 427 million acres of federal land. That’s the size of Arizona, Colorado, Montana, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming combined, and it does not include state and private lands that have also been closed to most human activity.

The report’s language is decidedly European and American, using policy terms common to the western environmental industry. For example, it discusses the “progress” in removing dams in the USA – levying special criticism on agriculture in the Rio Grande Valley – and approvingly cites efforts to designate more wild and scenic rivers.

It continues the ongoing criticism of western mining, timber production and “unsustainable agriculture,” accusations with which we’re all too familiar. In truth, these people simply want to stop most human uses of land, water and other resources of the American West.

There is another major problem with using this report to further that goal. The wildlife it laments do not live in the American West. Many are found in countries where energy-deprived, jobless, hungry, desperate people cut down forest habitats for fuel, eat wildlife to survive, and kill other species to sell their ivory, horns or meat for a few dollars.

Also, keep in mind that the reported declines in wildlife populations are based on computer modeling, not actual counting of actual animals. Still, even if you give such a report the benefit of the doubt, as many will, the dangers cited are from “warming oceans choked with plastic,” allegedly toppled rain forests, and supposedly dying coral reefs. Thus, populations are said to be tanking worst in the oceans and tropics, including an 89% decrease in South and Central America.

But make no mistake – the U.S. is nonetheless at fault. The report claims “crop failures brought on by climate change” are the reason caravans of Central Americans stream to the United States illegally. That’s why we must “urgently transition to a net carbon-neutral society and halt and reverse nature loss – through green finance and shifting to clean energy and environmentally friendly food production.”

How those terms are defined or implemented in a truly ecological, sustainable manner (more vague, malleable, politicized terms), the report does not say.

In a way, the details in this report may actually disprove its own conclusions. The U.S. and Canada are among the countries that use the most natural resources. Yet the worst wildlife declines are in the tropics, not in North America. The prime examples cited are African elephants, whale sharks, orangutans in Borneo, wandering albatross near Antarctica, jaguars in South America, gharial crocodiles in India and Nepal, and giant salamanders in China.

To note just one example where the WWF gets its “green finance” and “clean energy” facts completely upside down, a major reason orangutans are disappearing is that their habitats are being cleared to make room for palm oil biofuel plantations. How that is ecological or sustainable the WWF does not say.

The World Wildlife Fund is not the only Chicken Little constantly warning of a dire future. A similar article, published in the National Academy of Sciences journal last spring, was even more shocking. It claimed that since the dawn of civilization, humans have caused the loss of 83% of all mammals and half of all plants on Earth.

That’s because, WWF says, “the vast and growing consumption of food and resources by the global population is destroying the web of life.” However, the WWF and many other environmental industry groups, also oppose modern mechanized farming practices and seeds that significantly increase yields, allowing farmers to feed more people from less land. Still more ironies and non sequiturs.

So while you stop driving cars and heating your homes, you might also need to stop eating – while you pack for the trip to some other planet.

If we are not Chicken Little, is the sky still falling?

Via email

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For more postings from me, see  DISSECTING LEFTISM, TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC and AUSTRALIAN POLITICS. Home Pages are   here or   here or   here.  Email me (John Ray) here.  

Preserving the graphics:  Most graphics on this site are hotlinked from elsewhere.  But hotlinked graphics sometimes have only a short life -- as little as a week in some cases.  After that they no longer come up.  From January 2011 on, therefore, I have posted a monthly copy of everything on this blog to a separate site where I can host text and graphics together -- which should make the graphics available even if they are no longer coming up on this site.  See  here or here

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PURPA should be modernized or repealed

By Robert Romano

At the height of 1970s inflation and in response to the 1973 Arab oil embargo, Congress passed the Public Utility Regulatory Policies Act (PURPA) of 1978. The legislation requires electric utilities to purchase energy from small renewable generators.

It has also outlived its usefulness. Since that time, wind, solar and other renewables, excluding hydroelectric, have grown to almost 10 percent of U.S. electricity generation according to data compiled by the U.S. Energy Information Agency. Back in 1978, it was 0.14 percent.

Obviously, a lot can change in 40 years. Fortunately, in 2005, Congress amended PURPA in order to take stock of rapid changes in the utility marketplace. In 2018, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) announced it was considering changes and reforms to the program, including which entities ought to be excluded from PURPA’s mandatory purchase of renewable energy requirement.

One argument is that the renewable generators have a large enough market footprint to compete on their own without compelling utilities to use the renewable energy. Each local market is different, whereas in some areas, the additional generation can offset potential brownouts and might be desirable, in other areas with more abundant supplies, it’s simply a wealth transfer from the utility to the small generator as the additional renewable electricity adds little benefit to consumers and instead drives up costs higher than they might otherwise be.

In one comment to FERC, the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners noted that some states already require competition, making PURPA redundant. The association urged that utilities that “are subject to state competitive solicitation requirements and other best practices that ensure all technologies access to the market” ought to be exempt.

It’s a reasonable comment. In states where consumers already get to choose where to purchase their electricity, what is the sense in compelling competing utilities to subsidize one another? Shouldn’t they be allowed to compete price and benefit consumers?

The real question is whether FERC and Congress are going to let states develop their own energy grids and their own requirements for how competition ought to take place on these modern grids. One size does not fit all, and depending on supplies and abundance, the current requirements could be discouraging some potential utilities from coming online if subsidizing smaller generators is a cost that must be taken into account.

Going even further is S. 2776 by Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), which would eliminate the mandatory purchase requirements by utilities altogether. And maybe it’s time.

In the least Congress should take into consideration what FERC comes up with to modernize PURPA and the electric grid based on industry comments, and potentially act accordingly if it is found that PURPA’s mandates are no longer necessary to support the renewable electricity industry. PURPA should be modernized or if it is no longer needed, repealed.

SOURCE   




There Is No Economic Reason to Continue Federal Tax Credit for Electric Vehicles

Electric vehicles are the darlings of the automobile industry. In addition to Tesla, all of the traditional automakers – both here and abroad – have been pouring billions of dollars into developing new EVs while slowly abandoning the production of gasoline-powered vehicles.

But while EVs may be innovative technological marvels, old-fashioned subsidies continue to drive the industry. The federal government provides a tax credit to EV purchasers of $7,500 for the first 200,000 vehicles sold by any individual manufacturer. Once an EV manufacturer reaches that sales milestone, the tax credit is gradually decreased over the subsequent 15 or so months. Individual states have sweetened the subsidy pot further, offering rebates up to $5,000, along with subsidies for installing home and business charging stations, subsidies for installing home and business solar panels, “free” charging stations along major highways, and even preferred access to carpool lanes. And just to make sure EVs are adopted, some states have implemented mandates that require increasing percentages of new vehicles sold to be EVs.

Now, two bills introduced in the Senate propose radically different paths for the EV industry. Senator John Barrasso’s (R-WY) legislation (S. 3559, the “Fairness for Every Driver Act”) would eliminate the federal tax credit for EVs immediately and impose a user fee on EV owners to compensate for their not paying the gasoline taxes that are used to maintain the federal highway system. Senator Dean Heller’s (R-NV) bill (S. 3582), on the other hand, would expand the federal tax credit by eliminating the 200,000 vehicle cap, but then would phase out subsidies beginning in 2022.

Subsidies, however, are like powerfully addictive drugs: once started, they are a difficult habit to kick. The production tax credit for wind generators, for example, was supposed to have ended years ago. Instead, it has been extended numerous times. And, while it is now slated to end with wind turbines built next year, there are moves in Congress to extend it yet again. Thus, Senator Barrasso’s bill, while noble in its economic intent, will likely to face fierce opposition from automobile manufacturers and states who believe EVs will help “solve” climate change.

Because of the allure of subsidies, Senator Heller’s bill may become a fiscal nightmare. For example, if EV sales increase to one million per year – a relatively small percentage compared to the 16 million or so annual sales of gasoline-powered vehicles – the tax credit alone would cost $7.5 billion each year. And as EV sales increase – helped by the continued Federal tax credit – the loss of revenues to the Highway Trust fund that maintains the federal highway system will accelerate. For example, an EV owner who would otherwise purchase 500 gallons of gasoline per year in a similar gasoline-powered vehicle avoids about $95 per year in federal gasoline taxes (to say nothing of lost state gasoline taxes). As EV sales increase, the annual loss in gasoline tax revenues will grow rapidly. If an additional one million EVs are sold each year, the tax loss would increase at a rate of $100 million dollars per year.

With massive investment in EVs by automobile manufacturers, there is simply no economic reason to continue the federal tax credit, much less expand it as Senator Heller’s bill would. Nor is there any reason to subsidize EV owners who use federal highways, but do not pay the gasoline taxes needed to maintain them.

Yet, EV subsidies have an even more pernicious impact owing to their inequality. As my recent Manhattan Institute report on EVs discussed, EV subsidies have primarily benefitted the wealthy. A 2017 nationwide survey found that over half of EV buyers had annual household incomes of at least $100,000, and almost one-fifth had household incomes above $200,000. These subsidies, therefore, come at the expense of lower-income consumers, many of whom cannot afford to purchase new vehicles of any kind, much less EVs that are, on average, costlier. Moreover, these lower-income drivers of gasoline-powered vehicles will shoulder an increasing burden of highway maintenance costs.

Senator Barrasso’s bill would address this fundamental inequality and introduce sorely needed economic and fiscal sanity to the EV gravy train. In contrast, Senator Heller’s bil would make things even worse.

SOURCE   





As France Burns Over Fuel Tax, Democrats In The US Call For A ‘Green New Deal’

As the worst unrest to grip France in 50 years rages on, triggered by a pending climate change fuel tax (since postponed), President Macron announced a slate of measures designed to appease the masses. Included in the government giveaways: a minimum wage hike of about $1.75 an hour, no taxes on overtime pay and reforming pension benefits for low-wage earners.

Macron said in a national address, “I know I’ve hurt some of you with my words” and then declared “an economic and social state of emergency.” But perhaps that state of emergency is due to the protesters viewing the proposed “green” fuel tax increase is a little more harmful than words.

Meanwhile, the unrest in France appears to be spreading elsewhere in Europe.

Here in America, will Democratic members of Congress and their climate activist allies learn the lessons of France?

If France can erupt into riots over what amounted to a 25 cent per gallon tax hike on gas — 10 cents on diesel — on top of fuel prices of a little more than $7 per gallon, imagine the electoral drubbing that awaits a party that enacts far higher fuel taxes. But more on that in a moment.

Of course, prior to enacting any ambitious program of tax hikes, carbon dioxide emission restrictions, mandates, subsidies, and a large government R&D push, the stage must be set. These ideas must gain public acceptance.

With only 45 percent of Americans seeing global warming as a serious threat in their lifetimes, more work has to be done to convince U.S. voters to accept actions that will cause their standards of living to fall.

That’s where climate change studies, with their temperature models and allied economic assumptions come in. It’s also where things start to get hinky. The global temperature predictions published by the latest U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change say the planet is likely going to be another 0.5 degrees Celsius warmer sometime between 2030 and 2052.

To prevent that 0.5-degree increase from going higher, the U.N. experts estimate that there will have to be some sort of global tax on carbon dioxide equivalents of something in the range of $157 to $7,018 per ton by 2030 (in current dollars).

Since each gallon of gasoline produces about 20 pounds of CO2 when it’s burned, the U.N. recommended carbon tax on gas could range from $1.41 per gallon all the way up to $63.66 (revised up from $49 per gallon in 2010 dollars in the U.N. climate report draft released in October).

This is a pretty wide range for both the projected rate of warming and the costs estimated to combat it.

So here’s an analogy. As a homeowner, you suspect your roof may leak in bad weather. But you’re not sure if there’s really a leak, or how bad it may be. You do know that the weather forecast says a category 5 hurricane may hit in a week or so (and it may not), and that weather event could include tornados and lightning. You’re understandably worried, so you call a roofer for a repair estimate.

But when that estimate comes back, it’s anywhere from $1,570 to $70,180. And the roofer warns you that if the worst-case scenario happens, your house will be flattened anyway, so the roof won’t matter.

With such big unknowns for the weather and no firm cost—or real guarantee—for the roof repair, no one would blame you for putting off the repair, until you were sure there’s a leak in the first place.

In the same way, we have no firm costs and no real guarantees with carbon taxes. Those unelected U.N. report-writers may be comfortable calling for climate change gas taxes as high as $64 per gallon — or just $1.41 per gallon — but the actual elected politicians in France are about to be turned out of office for daring to impose a 25-cent-per-gallon tax.

American climate activists are trying to be a little more subtle about it, and this is where the “Green New Deal” comes in. As Representative-Elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez describes it, “This is going to be the New Deal, the Great Society, the moon shot, the civil-rights movement of our generation.”

Rather than raise taxes directly on energy — something that would be transparent, honest and efficient economically (while being deadly at the ballot box) — the Green New Deal aims to seize control of the economy by promising a “green” job to every American who wants one.

The promised employment would include things like building electric cars and installing wind turbines and solar panels. And of course, the jobs would be union jobs (with the added bonus that 99.9 percent of the dues money would go to Democrats).

This massive intervention in the American economy would end up costing voters the equivalent of $1.41 to $64 dollars per gallon in indirect costs brought about by government intervention. It’s just that the costs would be hidden. The cost of living — for fuel, food, electricity — would soar, but direct taxes on the consumer would be obscured.

The funny thing about the Green New Deal is how much it looks like standard, old-school progressive politics from the 1930s, just dusted off and given a new, urgent patina to address the threat of climate change.

The Green New Deal isn’t green, it isn’t new, and it’s not a deal.

SOURCE   





“We are still in” totalitarians flunk basic reality

They raged against energy and climate realists in Katowice, but should serve time for fraud

Paul Driessen

The 30,000 alarmists gathered in Katowice, Poland expected to slam-dunk their report proclaiming a planet-threatening climate crisis, finalize rules for implementing the Paris accords, redistribute infinite billions of dollars from industrialized nations to “climate victim” countries, and solidify their control over people’s energy, jobs, living standards and liberties. It didn’t work out quite that way.

They got blindsided by millions of French citizens angrily denouncing their government’s plans to carbon-tax them into worse poverty and joblessness. They were furious that the US exhibit profiled the benefits of fossil fuels – and outraged that the United States, Russia, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait were willing to “note” the climate report and express appreciation to the scientists who developed it, but not to “welcome” it or “accept” its assertions about climate cataclysms and the need to slash fossil fuel use.

They were appalled that countries the world over are using more and more fossil fuels every year.

One of the more amusing “climate chaos” exhibits at the IPCC gabfest targeted President Trump’s decision to take the USA out of the Paris not-a-treaty. It proudly declared “We are still IN” – and asserted that its “movement” represents “thousands” of American cities, states, businesses, universities and other entities that “have taken up the mantle of climate leadership.”

Climatologist David Legates and I wrote about this fatuous, fraudulent, hypocritical outfit a year ago. But it’s useful to reexamine the various ways it actually is (or is not) “still IN.”

* We are still IN and committed to the restrictive, punitive, anti-hydrocarbon Paris regime – except when it comes to benefitting ourselves from coal, oil and natural gas … to fly or drive to Poland; heat and light our homes, offices, hotel rooms and exhibits; eat well; dress in synthetic fibers, or in cotton or woolen garments made possible by fossil fuels; and utilize hydrocarbons for cell phones, computers, cosmetics, chairs and display boards at our exhibits, eyeglasses, wind turbine blades and countless other products.

Despite their interminable moral preening, does anyone really think they will ever give any of this up?

* We are still INtransigent in our demands, our refusal to civilly debate any climate or energy issues – and our determination to ignore the horrendous ecological impacts of our ideas, and the even worse impacts that our demands have on other people’s jobs and living standards. And especially how our demands ensure that African and Asian parents and children have energy-deprived, impoverished, malnourished, diseased, brutally short lives.

In fact, instead of acknowledging any of this, the “still IN” crowd – the arrogant, callous, totalitarian ruling elites … and renewable energy crony corporatists allied with them – simply double down on their demands and plans. The new crop of “progressive” Democrat-Socialists coming to the US House of Representatives in 2019 intends to emphasize “dangerous manmade global warming and climate change” in numerous hearings, policies and bills.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-S–NY) and colleagues have already proposed a separate House global warming committee, a Green New Deal – and 100% wind, solar and biofuel power by 2030!

* We are still IN contempt of what poor, middle class, blue collar and Third World families so desperately need: affordable, reliable energy – and the well-paying jobs and affordable goods, services and healthcare that come with it. We will “allow” them to improve their lives, but only as far as may be possible with limited, unreliable, weather-dependent, expensive “renewable” energy.

It’s no wonder 200 prominent Golden State civil rights leaders have sued the California Air Resources Board, claiming its greenhouse gas policies are “racist” and disproportionately raise electricity, housing, transportation, food and hiring costs for Latino and African-Americans, for no environmental benefits. Poor countries should consider bringing similar human rights lawsuits in US, EU and international courts.

* We are still IN denial – of the negative impacts that our eco-imperialist, carbon-colonialist policies have on rural, poor, minority and working class families in the United States, and on billions of people in Africa, Asia, Latin America and former Soviet/Eastern Bloc nations. We are also IN denial of the failed predictions of climate models – and IN denial of scientific evidence that contradicts our assertions that Earth is warming rapidly, bringing unprecedented chaos and cataclysms.

As I have pointed out in numerous articles – and as websites like WattsUpWithThat, ClimateDepot and DrRoySpencer discuss in readily understandable language – there is no valid, replicable, scientific evidence that humans or fossil fuel emissions have replaced the powerful natural forces that have always governed Earth’s complex, frequently changing climate and weather systems.

There is no evidence that humans can control those systems by tweaking the concentration of molecules that together represent roughly 0.042% of Earth’s atmosphere. There is no evidence that expensive, unpredictable, pseudo-renewable energy can replace the 80% fossil fuel energy that currently powers the US and world economies – certainly not without severe consequences for people and planet. Computer models, hype, hysteria, headlines and zealotry are no substitute for honest, fact-based, replicable science.

* We are IN cahoots with the IPCC, far-left politicians, Climate-Industrial Complex companies, the “mainstream” media, and social media behemoths like Google, You Tube, Face Book and Twitter. Together, we control what people are able to find, see, hear, think, say and do about these issues.

Climate realists are fighting back, and true free speech alternatives to Twitter & Comrades are arising.

* We are INtolerant of any views that contradict our own. We not only refuse to debate. We refuse to allow debate. We are contemptuous of “civil society” norms for civil discourse. We will always resort to totalitarian power, mob rule and the sheer weight of equally closed-minded, ill-informed intellectuals, students, urban voters and ruling elites … to impose our climate, energy and economic ideologies.

In one of the most egregious cases ever, the UN and IPCC gave their explicit permission, encouragement and blessing to radical protesters at the Katowice COP-24 conference. They let the INtolerants disrupt and shut down the official US “innovative fossil fuel technologies” and “economic dynamism” presentation. The UN pre-authorized and pre-planned the loud interruptions, officially gave rabid protesters over seven minutes to rant and chant “Keep them in the ground” (fossil fuels, that is), and let them harass CFACT and other climate realists attending the event.

When UK author and policy analyst Rupert Darwall challenged the obnoxious hecklers, UN security guards immediately restrained Darwall and told him to shut up or be thrown out of the conference!

Why the United States should tolerate any of this – much less pay for it – is hard to fathom.

* The climate-obsessed IN-crowd is INsatiable in its hunger for global power – but INcapable of dealing with reality and INsane for endlessly repeating the same tired tropes, ignoring evidence that contradicts its claims, vilifying scientists who disagree with them, and ignoring the enormous benefits of fossil fuels.

Amid virtually all their politicized campaigns, these groups appear to be engaged in climate science and energy fraud. Whether it’s global temperatures, changing weather patterns, Arctic, Antarctic or Greenland ice, hurricanes and tornados, wildfires, floods or droughts – or the need for and viability of renewable energy – deception, misrepresentation, disinformation and even fabrication are their stock in trade.

Those tactics would bring small armies of regulators (perhaps accompanied by armed SWAT teams) swarming into the offices of almost any other companies or organizations.

It’s depressing that politicians and tax-exempt pressure groups are generally exempt from such “inquiries.” But the dishonest, profiteering companies that ally with climate alarmists may not be. Perhaps a few enterprising AGs, FBI offices, public interest law firms, or SEC and FTC investigators will be inspired to examine some of these ethics, securities and truth-in-advertising issues.

Via email





Australia: Anti-coal protestors interrupt Labor Party leader's keynote address

Bill Shorten’s keynote speech at Labor’s National Conference this morning got off to an awkward start as he was ambushed by protesters.

The audience of 400 delegates and 1000 observers at the Adelaide Convention Centre had been thoroughly warmed up by Labor’s deputy leader Tanya Plibersek, national president Wayne Swan and South Australian opposition leader Peter Malinauskas when Mr Shorten finally strolled onto the stage.

A protester, 25-year-old Isaac Astill, quickly appeared next to him. As Mr Shorten took his position behind the lecturn, Mr Astill stood beside him and unfurled a banner bearing the words “Stop Adani”.

“Will you please stop the Adani coal mine? There are bushfires across Queensland, heat records are tumbling, the Great Barrier Reef is heading for a third bleaching event, we have to stop the Adani coal mine,” he said.

“Oh mate. Alright,” Mr Shorten said, before letting Mr Astill make his point.

“Thanks for making that statement. Do I get to keep the flag?” he asked. “You can keep the flag if you like, absolutely, of course,” the protester replied.

“Good on you mate, cheers. See ya,” Mr Shorten said.

“Really appreciate it Mr Shorten. It’s going to be so important you do that. Thank you, catch you later. I really hope you come out with a commitment to stop the mine.”

“No it’s all good. Thank you very much, I appreciate you making your point.”

At that point, Mr Swan intervened, and a security guard removed Mr Astill from the stage.

“I think our visitor should leave the stage now,” Mr Swan said. “Show him the way out, thank you.”

But the fiasco continued, as more protesters appeared at Mr Shorten’s other shoulder.

“OK. Which one’s this?” he quipped.

“We’ll call for the escorts,” Mr Swan interjected.

“We’re Australia’s oldest political party. We have a proud history of democracy, we all understand the right to protest. But that doesn’t include the right to drown out the leader of the opposition. So could you please leave the stage?”

When he finally got some clear air, Mr Shorten addressed the crowd. “I know these people are well-intentioned, but the only people they’re helping is the current government of Australia,” he said.

“I’ve waited for the next election for five years and if I’ve got to wait a couple more minutes, I just will. “People have got a right to protest, but you’ve got to ask yourself when you see these protests — who’s the winner? It’s the Coalition. “We’ve already had two protests and goodness knows what the current Prime Minister will do to try to upstage them.”

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For more postings from me, see  DISSECTING LEFTISM, TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC and AUSTRALIAN POLITICS. Home Pages are   here or   here or   here.  Email me (John Ray) here.  

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A climate passport?

A prominent researcher is proposing establishing a "climate passport" for people driven from their homes by the impact of global warming.

Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, founder of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, said Thursday the passport could be modeled on a similar certificate given to refugees of Russia's civil war in the 1920s.

The so-called Nansen passport was later extended to other people who were made stateless after their citizenships were revoked. It helped hundreds of thousands of people to find refuge elsewhere in the world.

Schellnhuber's proposal, made on the sidelines of the U.N. climate talks in Poland, is likely to face resistance from rich countries concerned about the possibility of millions of refugees heading their way in the coming decades.

SOURCE   

Climate Depot's Morano Responds: "On the contrary, it is time for 'climate passports' to be issued to French citizens and others who wish to flee climate change driven policies that skyrocket energy prices. It is the victims of 'climate change' policies, taxes, and regulations that need passports to escape their leaders who are trying to control the weather through higher fuel costs. Climate passports should be issued to all the French citizens who wish to escape from Pres. Macron's climate policies!"





Ocasio-Cortez backs green policies that would hurt the poor and cripple our economy

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez promises that going green – removing all fossil fuels from our energy mix – will “establish economic, social and racial justice in the United States.”

In fact, her proposal would cripple our economy and hurt our poorest citizens.

Ms. Ocasio-Cortez has admirable passion, but needs some schooling in energy economics. The cost of renewable energy is dropping fast, but is still more expensive in many applications than traditional fossil fuels like coal or oil. That’s one reason that adoption of wind and solar power has been slow, and that many countries, including the United States, underwrite renewables with subsidies and tax credits. The International Energy Agency predicts in its 2018 report that “the share of renewables in meeting global energy demand is expected to grow by one-fifth in the next five years to reach 12.4% in 2023.”

The share of renewables remains low because wind and sun power are effective in producing electricity but not, for instance, in powering automobiles or airplanes. Renewables will generate nearly 30 percent of global electricity in 2023, a big jump from 24 percent in 2017, but will still account for only 3.8 percent of transportation fuel, compared to 3.4 percent in 2018.

More important, Ms. Ocasio-Cortez should know that lower-income and minority communities in the U.S. are disproportionately disadvantaged by higher energy costs. A 2016 study by the National Research Defense Council found that low income households “spend, on average, 7.2 percent of their income on utility bills…That is more than triple the 2.3 percent spent by higher-income households for electricity, heating and cooling.”  Were we to ditch coal, natural gas and oil in favor of higher-cost renewables, electricity prices would soar, especially harming just those folks whom the young progressive says she wants to help.

Evidence of the staggering costs imposed by green policies is provided by other IEA data, which compares electricity costs in different countries. In the United States, the cost of electricity for households earlier this year was $129 per megawatt. In Germany, a country that leapt into renewables with enthusiasm, and imposed hefty taxes to squelch demand for fossil fuels, the cost is $343.59. Does Ms. Ocasio-Cortez really want to impose a near-tripling of electricity costs on Americans?

Ms. Ocasio-Cortez might want to visit France, a sympathetic left-leaning country, which is currently convulsed by people who are really, really angry over recently-enacted green policies of the kind that she might embrace.  President Emmanuel Macron raised taxes on diesel fuel and gasoline, hoping to make driving more expensive and thereby discourage fossil fuel use, setting off the worst rioting that country has seen in a generation.

The lesson for Macron, for Ms. Ocasio-Cortez and other policy makers is that people may be concerned about global warming and increasing emissions, but they are considerably more worried about making ends meet.

It is not the high-income elites who are taking to the streets, breaking store windows and burning cars – it is middle class and blue collar people who think Macron has no sympathy for their travails, for their ever-higher cost of living and, in particular, for the cost of their commute.

Note that 70 percent of the French people support the protests, while at the same time 79 percent of the country, according to a poll conducted last year, fret about climate change.

The lesson for Macron, for Ms. Ocasio-Cortez and other policy makers is that people may be concerned about global warming and increasing emissions, but they are considerably more worried about making ends meet.

Polling on the subject bears this out. While a global Pew study found that 54 percent of people in 40 countries thought that climate change was a “very serious problem,” a survey conducted by the UN at about the same time, which elicited almost 7 million responses, showed people ranking climate change the least of their concerns. Global warming came in dead last behind better education, better health care, better job opportunities and thirteen other issues.

Even in the U.S., where 6 of 10 respondents to the Pew poll say their community is already being impacted by climate change, the issue ranks 17th in a list of policy priorities.

Why this disconnect? One reason is that the extreme alarmism from environmentalists has numbed us to the perils of rising emissions. If you are endlessly lectured about how eating meat or driving your Chevy will cause entire populations to be swept away by rising sea levels, it becomes overwhelming. People tune out.

It is also true that some of the wilder predictions of disaster have failed to materialize, leading to profound skepticism. Al Gore’s doomed polar bears, for instance, seem to actually be thriving. According to one source, their numbers are increasing except in one location, where in fact they are challenged by too much sea ice, as opposed to too little.

Because of abundant natural gas displacing coal, the United States is the only major country in which emissions have been dropping over the past decade. We are not the problem. It is China, whose carbon output is already nearly twice that of the U.S. A recent report from the Global Carbon Project blames a predicted rise in worldwide emissions this year on “a rise in coal consumption in China, which accounts for more than 46% of the projected increase in industrial CO2 emissions in 2018.”

The U.S. is blessed with abundant energy, an important competitive advantage. The Trump White House pulled out of the Paris Climate Accord because the demands of that agreement would have destroyed that advantage and hobbled our growth, while demanding virtually no commitments from China.

Americans are sensible people. We want clean air and water, and we want to curtail the carbon emissions that appear a danger to our world. But, we do not want to sacrifice our economic wellbeing on the altar of climate dogma. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez should be careful before promoting policies that would build a cleaner planet on the backs of American workers.

SOURCE   





The Green New Deal: eco pastiche

Despite the often unhinged and naked fearmongering of environmentalists, climate change has remained the preoccupation of very narrow sections of society: certain political activists, remote bureaucrats, disoriented journalists and disconnected politicians – groups that many people might rightly identify as a bigger problem for society, and the future, than global warming. Thus, the movements that urge us to flush the toilet less frequently and not to take unnecessary journeys has had to recycle moments from history in order to try to stir political passions.

Climate activists have dressed themselves up as Suffragettes and rushed parliament to demand ‘deeds not words’ from MPs. Politicians have compared their own projects with the civil-rights movement. Senior technocrats and scientists have compared the task ahead of them with the Moon landing and the Manhattan Project, and demanded budgets accordingly. Environmentalism is like an astronomically expensive, but dire, costume drama.

The latest example of such historical plagiarism is in the United States. Representative-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the youngest woman ever elected to Congress, has backed a so-called Green New Deal, aimed at creating a new green industry that she says will guarantee every American a job. Her pitch is full of the usual naff pastiche: ‘This is going to be the New Deal, the Great Society, the Moon shot, the civil-rights movement of our generation.’

The US green left is making some huge promises. Ocasio-Cortez says this proposal, to make 100 per cent of US electricity renewable and phase out fossil fuels, will also eliminate structural inequalities, racism and social injustices of all kinds. Her vision of the Green New Deal leaves virtually no part of American society unmodified.

But the idea that one can simply summon up the ghost of Roosevelt to solve contemporary political crises is misplaced. To do so misses the complexity of the present. It assumes that everything wrong with the world is merely the consequence of fossil fuels, and that everything can be righted by building enough wind turbines. Going by Ocasio-Cortez’s statements, you’d think all we have to do is make every victim of social injustice a unionised wind-power engineer in a green-energy cooperative, and voila! What’s more, the idea of a Green New Deal is not new, and its history may shed some light on its future.

In 2007, Thomas Friedman wrote in the New York Times about his desire for ‘a new unifying political movement for the 21st century’. Green ideology, he said, ‘has the power to mobilise liberals and conservatives, evangelicals and atheists, big business and environmentalists around an agenda that can both pull us together and propel us forward’. In his vision for a ‘Green New Deal’, government would be ‘seeding basic research, providing loan guarantees where needed and setting standards, taxes and incentives’. That people did not immediately leap to the streets to demand it must have been a great surprise to Friedman.

The following year, in the UK, a group of prominent environmentalists from the Green Party, Friends of the Earth and the Guardian, based out of the New Economics Foundation, drafted their own proposals for a ‘Green New Deal’ to tackle what they called the ‘Triple Crunch’: ‘A combination of a credit-fuelled financial crisis, accelerating climate change and soaring energy prices underpinned by encroaching peak oil.’ It was a time of much green policy innovation; the UK’s Climate Change Bill was being debated in parliament.

In 2009, the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) launched its own ‘Global Green New Deal’ under its Green Economy initiative. According to a UNEP policy brief, a fiscal stimulus of a mere $750 billion – one per cent of global GDP – could begin to transform the ailing and ‘unsustainable’ ‘brown’ economy into a vibrant green one. Arriving in the wake of the financial crisis, it argued for stimulus into sanitation, housing and energy, rather than bank bailouts. Which might have connected with people at the time. But the UN’s proposals were still downbeat, with the people at the bottom offered ‘sustainable development’ rather than a meaningfully better life.

Indeed, to compare these green schemes to something like the New Deal is more than a little disingenuous. Economic prosperity and jobs are not the primary concerns of climate activism – ‘saving the planet’ is. And the UK experience would suggest that ordinary people do not feel the benefit of these grand plans.

In April 2009, the Labour government announced that the crisis-ridden British economy would be saved by creating 400,000 new ‘green jobs’. ‘The huge industrial revolution that is unfolding, in converting our economy to low carbon, is going to present huge business and employment opportunities’, said then business secretary Peter Mandelson. But it didn’t. Domestic energy prices doubled, and much of the profit went to wealthy landowners on whose estates the ‘revolution’ was installed, in the form of wind turbines, solar panels and biofuel crops. The revolution soon began to look a lot like feudalism.

Greens like to talk about making the world a better place, but their indifference to ordinary working people has been plain for decades. Hence climate change has not been a vote-winner. Anywhere. Ever. Despite Friedman’s optimism for a new ecological political consensus, environmentalism has only ever united political elites. What’s more, climate change has become synonymous with the tendency towards ‘globalism’, at the expense of national political agendas. Brexit, Trump and now the gilets jaunes have shown that the era of international, consensus-driven politics is over. The retreat to Roosevelt’s mega-Keynesianism is thus an attempt to give climate activism a new political context, off the back of absurd promises.

Historians are divided on whether it was Roosevelt’s programme or the Second World War that ultimately saved Americans from the economic torpor of the 1930s. Either way, searching 1930s America for answers to America’s problems today is facile. Climate-change activists seem compelled to re-enact the past because they are so unpopular in the present.

SOURCE   





Document Details the Eye-Popping Amount Attorneys Stand To Make from Climate Crusades

One of the law firms involved in a trove of California lawsuits targeting ExxonMobil and other energy companies is poised to rake in hundreds of millions of dollars from their climate crusades.

Sher Edling LLP could capitalize on a big payday if San Francisco’s lawsuit against the oil company, according to documents obtained Wednesday by Climate Litigation Watch. The contract between the firm, San Francisco and the county is complex and lays out a multi-tiered payment method for Sher Edling.

The California-based firm pay is dependent on the amount of the settlement. If the city secures a $100 million settlement, then Sher Edling takes roughly $25 million; if the settlement is over $100 million, then it gets $32.5 million; and the firm receives roughly $36.5 for anything above $150 million. These payments are per city, meaning the firm is looking for a big payout.

Oakland is also working with Sher Edling on a lawsuit against the Texas-based company, but refused to provide copies of its settlement, CLW noted in a press statement Wednesday. San Francisco and Oakland had previously employed Hagens Berman to represent them in their legal pursuits.

Hagens Berman’s fee was pegged at 23.5 percent of any winnings from its cases with San Francisco and Oakland before the two cities switched firms. Hagens Berman represents King County and New York City in their separate lawsuits demanding Exxon pay for its supposed role contributing to global warming.

Manufacturers’ groups have consistently criticized the lawsuits. Linda Kelly, senior vice president and general counsel for National Association of Manufacturers, blasted the settlement in a statement to The Daily Caller News Foundation.

“In case anyone thought this litigation was motivated by a desire to actually address climate change, this agreement between San Francisco and its new outside counsel should put that notion to rest,” Kelly said. “It is astounding that Sher Edling managed to undercut Hagens Berman and still anticipates receiving a cut worth tens or hundreds of millions of dollars.”

The contracts come shortly after TheDCNF reported in November that attorneys Vic Sher and Matt Pawa got into a multi-million-dollar legal dispute in 2014 stemming from a lawsuit they both worked on against ExxonMobil. Sher, who founded Sher Edling, alleged Pawa’s group, Pawa Law Group, failed to distribute money from a settlement in the case. Pawa, who is now with Hagens Berman, argued in a lawsuit that Sher was the one cheating him out of millions of dollars.

Sher eventually paid Pawa about $6 million for the retributions, court documents show. The disagreement stems from a lawsuit New Hampshire filed in 2013 alleging Exxon negligently contaminated the state’s waterways with 2 billion gallons of MTBE, a gas additive experts believe poisons drinking water. The intrigue comes amid growing bad blood between the two sides.

SOURCE   





Good show! Australia’s carbon emissions highest on record

Good for crops

Australia’s carbon emissions are again the highest on record, according to new data from the emissions-tracking organisation Ndevr Environmental.

Ndevr replicates the federal government’s national greenhouse gas inventory (NGGI) quarterly reports but releases them months ahead of the official data.

Data it has produced for the year up to September 2018 shows Australia is still on track to miss its Paris target of a 26%-28% cut to emissions on 2005 levels by 2030.

Matt Drum, the managing director of Ndevr, said if emissions continued at their current rate, Australia would miss the target by a cumulative 1.1bn tonnes.

Electricity sector emissions were stable, but fugitive emissions, and emissions from stationary energy and transport are all still trending sharply upwards.

Both the Coalition government and Labor have not ruled out using controversial carryover credits from the Kyoto protocol to help meet Australia’s obligations under the Paris agreement.

Labor has promised that if it wins the election it will increase Australia’s target to 45% on 2005 levels, in line with recommendations from the independent Climate Change Authority.

Ndevr’s analysis said this would require a reduction of 197.1m tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent based on current emissions levels, which would be equal to taking 75m cars off the road for a year.

In comparison, the Coalition’s emission reduction target would require an 80.8m tonne reduction.

Breaking up Labor’s target across sectors, Ndever suggests a range of reductions will be necessary in several industries, including 61.2m tonnes from the electricity sector, 33.4m tonnes from the stationary energy sector, 23.7m tonnes from agriculture and 34.2m tonnes from transport.

“If Labor come into government we can’t afford a policy vacuum,” Drum said. “It’s looking grim. We need policy levers and we need them quickly.” Drum said the need for action was so urgent there would be no time for a full redesign of policy if there was a change of government. Instead, he said existing policies, such as the safeguard mechanism, should be amended.

“They need to utilise existing policy like the safeguard mechanism and tweak it so it achieves what it is intended to achieve, which is reduce emissions,” he said.

On Thursday, the Greens environment spokesperson, Sarah Hanson-Young, said Australia was using “creative emissions accounting” to try to meet its Paris targets. “Counting Kyoto credit towards Paris cheats our environment and the rest of the world,” she said.

“Our emissions are going up, yet our environment minister is telling the world we are doing our bit to meet our Paris targets.”

SOURCE 

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For more postings from me, see  DISSECTING LEFTISM, TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC and AUSTRALIAN POLITICS. Home Pages are   here or   here or   here.  Email me (John Ray) here.  

Preserving the graphics:  Most graphics on this site are hotlinked from elsewhere.  But hotlinked graphics sometimes have only a short life -- as little as a week in some cases.  After that they no longer come up.  From January 2011 on, therefore, I have posted a monthly copy of everything on this blog to a separate site where I can host text and graphics together -- which should make the graphics available even if they are no longer coming up on this site.  See  here or here

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Hack journalism at the NYT

The NYT article below is standard Warmist talking points. The author accepts as gospel, claims and findings that are very much under challenge.  It is a very "free" version of the original academic article.  That article is "Increased Occurrence of Record‐wet and Record‐dry Months Reflect Changes in Mean Rainfall"

Despite working at the fanatically Warmist Potsdam Institute  lead-author Jascha Lehmann puts out a lot of careful research and the present article is pretty good, though not beyond criticism.  I think I should reproduce the abstract here:

Climate change alters the hydrological cycle which is *expected* to increase the risk of heavy rainfall events and prolonged droughts. Sparse rainfall data, however, have made it difficult to answer the question of whether robust changes can already be seen in the short observational time period. Here, we use a comprehensive statistical tool to quantify changes in record‐breaking wet and dry months. The global‐mean number of record‐wet months has significantly increased over the recent decades and is now nearly 20% higher than would be expected in a stationary climate with no long‐term trends. This signal primarily comes from pronounced changes in the northern mid to high latitudes where the occurrence of record‐wet months has increased by up to 37% regionally. The tropics have seen opposing trends: More record‐wet months in Southeast Asia in contrast to more record‐dry months in Africa. These changes are broadly consistent with observed trends in mean rainfall.

So where the NYT reproduces the standard absurd Warmist claim that global warming produces both  floods and drought, Lehmann finds differently.  He finds what basic physics would tell you: That a warmer world is a WETTER world. I have highlighted the key sentence.

He finds an unusual incidence of drought in Africa only, which is well established.  But WHY much of Africa has been suffering a lot of drought in recent years is quite unknown.  Some weather system peculiar to Africa would have to be the explanation but nobody can figure out what it is.  Since global warming causes MORE rain, attributing it to global warming is absurd

So there is nothing that need disturb anybody in the Lehmann findings.  All that he found is that we have been getting more rain in the period from 1980 to 2013, which is well in accord with what we would expect given the roughly one degree C of gradual warming that we have had over the last century or so


More records for both wet and dry weather are being set around the globe, often with disastrous consequences for the people facing such extremes, according to *a study published Wednesday* that offered new evidence of climate change’s impacts in the here and now.

Extreme rainfall, and the extreme lack of it, affects untold numbers of people, taxing economies, disrupting food production, creating unrest and prompting migrations. So, factors that push regions of the world to exceptional levels of flooding and drought can shape the fate of nations.

“Climate change will likely continue to alter the occurrence of record-breaking wet and dry months in the future,” the study predicts, “with severe consequences for agricultural production and food security.”

Heavy rainfall events, with severe flooding, are occurring more often in the central and Eastern United States, Northern Europe and northern Asia. The number of months with record-high rainfall increased in the central and Eastern United States by more than 25 percent between 1980 and 2013.

In those regions, intense rainfall from hurricanes can be ruinously costly. Munich Re, the reinsurance giant, said that the 2018 hurricane season caused $51 billion in losses in the United States, well over the long-term annual average of $34 billion. In 2017, Hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Maria contributed to a total of $306 billion in damage from extreme weather events in the United States.

Parts of Africa, on the other hand, are experiencing more months with a pronounced lack of rain. The number of record-setting dry months increased by nearly 50 percent in sub-Saharan Africa during the study period.

Jascha Lehmann, a scientist at the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany and the lead author of the study, compared extreme weather events to a high roll of a die. “On average, one out of six times you get a six,” he said. “But by injecting huge amounts of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, humankind has loaded the dice. In many regions, we throw sixes much more often with severe impacts for society and the environment.”

While much climate research relies on complex models to make projections, this new work interprets already-observed monthly rainfall data from 50,000 weather stations around the world. “That’s not to say models are not good,” Dr. Lehmann said in an interview, but his observational data “fits what we expect from physics and what models also show.”

Climate models have long predicted that because of the greenhouse gases human activity has pumped into the atmosphere and the warming that results, the world’s wet regions are likely to grow wetter. Warmer air causes greater evaporation from oceans and waterways, and warmer air can hold more moisture.

There is also evidence that changes in atmospheric circulation in summer have caused some weather systems to stall. The combination of such factors can lead to torrential rains like those that inundated the Houston area during Hurricane Harvey last year, and Baton Rouge during the floods of 2016.

Regions that tend to be dry, by contrast, are expected to grow even more parched as higher temperatures dry the soil and air. “Climate change drives both wet and dry extremes,” Dr. Lehmann said.

To conduct the study, which appears in the journal Geophysical Research Letters, Dr. Lehmann’s team searched the databases of an authoritative repository of rainfall measurement, the Global Precipitation Climatology Center in Germany. Given natural weather variability, some extreme weather events were to be expected, so the researchers tried to determine how many events would have occurred without the influence of global warming.

The researchers determined that one-third of the record-dry months recorded in the African regions under study would not have occurred without the influence of climate change.

SOURCE






More holes in the National Climate Assessment

The most predictable thing about the climate these days is the sensationalism we see in the headlines.

“The weather of Washington’s future: Hellish heat and high water,” The Washington Post wrote after the National Climate Assessment was released. “New U.S. climate assessment forecasts dire effects on economy, health,” said NPR. And not to be outdone, CBS News claimed, “Mass deaths and mayhem: National Climate Assessment’s most shocking warnings.”

It’s not a new trend, but it’s worth pointing out again. Headlines often overstate the actual content of the report, and the report itself often overstates the data.

Let’s take those “mass deaths” (leaving aside the mayhem for the moment). What does the report actually say?

“The health and well-being of Americans are already affected by climate change, with the adverse health consequences projected to worsen with additional climate change,” the National Climate Assessment reads.

More specifically, “In 49 large cities in the United States, changes in extreme hot and extreme cold temperatures are projected to result in more than 9,000 additional premature deaths per year under a higher scenario by the end of the century, although this number would be lower if considering acclimatization or other adaptations (for example, increased use of air conditioning).”

That estimate is based on a 2016 study that applies mortality data to climate models that predict more and more intense heatwaves. But dig a little deeper, and you’ll find there’s some real uncertainty about those numbers.

That study references a research letter published in 2016 by the American Geophysical Union.

“These probabilities are typically computed using ensembles of climate simulations whose simulated probabilities are known to be imperfect,” the letter reads. “ … Climate model ensembles tend to be overconfident in their representation of the climate variability which leads to systematic increase in the attributable risk to an extreme event.”

As for heatwaves, the reality is that far more people die from extreme cold than extreme heat.

Even those deaths are difficult to pin on extreme temperatures. Rather, scientists say pre-existing conditions can often be exacerbated by extremes. Making projections 50 years out is difficult, and far from “settled science.”

Still, we know what prevents many of those deaths—from both extreme cold and extreme heat. It’s affordable, reliable energy. People cool and heat their homes when they can afford to. Misguided policies like the carbon tax, designed to curb energy usage, would send electricity bills soaring and would achieve the opposite of the National Climate Assessment’s goals.

Energy poverty is deadly, as the European Union is learning. Just last year it established a commission to address the problem.

“More than 50 million households in the European Union are struggling to attain adequate warmth, pay their utility bills on time, and live in homes free of damp and mold,” the EU says. “Awareness of energy poverty is rising in Europe and has been identified as a policy priority by a number of EU institutions, most notably in the European Commission’s ‘Clean Energy for All Europeans’ legislative package.”

But back to the U.S.’ National Climate Assessment.

The report also presents some scary predictions for the economy. A highly quoted headline cites that the economic damages from climate change could amount to 10 percent of annual U.S. gross domestic product in 2090. The obvious criticism is that this headline uses the highest estimate of a model where the average cost estimate is around 3 percent.

But digging deeper, there are other questions to be posed about how these economic impacts are calculated.

Premature deaths from extreme temperature (9,300 per year) are said to amount to $140 billion in annual losses. How is it that each premature death is given an economic cost of more than $15 million? Is it reasonable to place an economic value on a theoretical loss of life due to climate change, similar to the way we estimate property damage?

These questions must be asked before we take these “projected costs” at face value.

There’s a real danger here, and that’s in responding to the National Climate Assessment in a way that will make things worse, not better. Already, a carbon tax bill has been introduced in the House of Representatives that would make energy more expensive for American families.

The other danger is in responding to the headlines, not the data. We know the National Climate Assessment is good for frightening news stories. But public policy must be based on solid information, not scary interpretations.

SOURCE 





The Truth Behind the Plastic ‘Crisis’

There is evidence that some climate activists are seeking to elevate the plastic ‘crisis’ above the climate ‘crisis.’ Former Vice President Al Gore’s producer of his 2006 film “An Inconvenient Truth,”  — Hollywood eco-activist Laurie David — has been test-marketing the plastic eco-scare.

David has touted the plastic crisis over man-made climate fears. “Plastic waste is in some ways more alarming for us humans than global warming,” David wrote in 2009.

“The rapid rise in global plastic production is leading to a rise in plastic pollution and its devastating effects on our oceans and our lives.,” Laurie David wrote.

“This insidious invasion of the biosphere by our plastic waste is in some ways more alarming for us humans than global warming. Our bodies have evolved to handle carbon dioxide, the nemesis of global warming, indeed, we exhale it with every breath. Plastic, though present in the biosphere from the nano scale on up, is too stable a molecule for any organism to fully assimilate or biodegrade. So we have a situation in which a vector for a suite of devastating chemicals, chemicals implicated in many modern diseases, is now invading the ocean, our bodies and indeed, the entire biosphere. The prognosis for improvement in this situation is grim.”

But Greenpeace founding member and Ecologist Dr. Patrick Moore — who has turned against the organization —  responds to the plastics scare:

“What I don’t get is why it is assumed that a bit of plastic in your digestive tract is probably ‘harmful.’ This is the same plastic nearly all our food is packaged, transported, stored, and often served in. It is essentially inert and with the main exception of PVC, which contains chlorine, is made of 100% carbon and hydrogen. And because it is so inert it goes right through us like a small pebble or the cellulose in a kernel of corn.

Now the ‘sea of plastic garbage’ is the ‘size of Alaska.’  Last month it was ‘the size of Texas’ yet no satellite photo has been presented because the sea of plastic is a fiction. The ultimate in Fake News.”

The new report finds that “Greenpeace is deliberately misleading the public by fabricating a fictional ‘crisis.’ and “the infamous ‘oceanic garbage patches’ are not nearly as dramatic as people think.”

“It is making people feel guilty and worried about a ‘crisis’ which isn’t actually real,” the new report notes.

The report finds: “The Greenpeace narrative is largely fabricated, and is based on cherry-picked distortions of the scientific literature.”

“Some scientists are genuinely concerned about the fact that concentrations of ‘microplastics’ in some parts of the oceans are relatively high. However, the concentrations that they are talking about are relatively modest, e.g., a few hundred fragments per square mile in the worst regions,” the report concludes. “Also, the average sizes of these plastic fragments are very small, e.g., less than 1/16 inches in diameter…

Despite this, Greenpeace has been actively misleading the public to create the perception that there are massive floating ‘islands’ filled with plastic bottles, plastic bags and other plastic debris,” the report notes. “They are deliberately misleading the public by fabricating a fictional ‘crisis’ and trying to turn it into an excuse to abandon ‘single use plastics.”

Greenpeace has been hyping the alleged plastic “crisis” and are using it as “an excellent excuse to blame the western world for their ‘overconsumption,’” according to the new report. “They decided to start campaigning for ‘Zero Waste’ and insisting that we needed to completely stop using ‘single use plastics’ to protect the oceans.”

“Where exactly the plastic is coming from. Greenpeace and others are implying that the developed world is to blame (particularly Europe and North America), but several studies have now confirmed that the problem lies almost entirely with certain developing nations – chiefly in Asia.”

Greenpeace, some media channels, and other environmental activist groups (and to be fair, some scientists too) have used these alarming-sounding names to ridiculously exaggerate the phenomenon, and create the completely false impression that there are these horrendous floating “islands” of our plastic waste somewhere “out there”…

Greenpeace’s latest campaign on “the plastics crisis” is having the following effects:

* It is making people feel guilty and worried about a “crisis” which isn’t actually real.

* It is prompting people, governments and businesses to implement radical reforms without thinking through the consequences.

* It is hampering efforts to evaluate and deal with the genuine “ocean plastic pollution” concern.

In addition, “despite Greenpeace’s repeated claims, we now know that the ingestion of plastic particles by seabirds doesn’t seem to be having any ill effects on the birds,” the report notes.

This new report examines whether or not the Earth is experiencing a plastic “crisis” and the scientific finding is a resounding ‘No’.

SOURCE 





Climatologist Rebuts Rising Sea Level Narrative

Not that you'll hear about it from the press, which is preoccupied with alarm.

It’s often observed that those with the shrillest voices garner the most attention. Unsurprisingly therefore, the climate debate is overwhelmed by alarmist drivel. Just this week NBC News pilloried the Trump administration under the intentionally perturbing headline, “Trump team advocates burning fossil fuels, even as U.S. scientists sound alarm on melting Arctic.”

Such antics are unfortunate. They are routine only because other distinguished scientists, whose work supplies necessary context and counterarguments, are being drowned out, overlooked, or even ignored. Climatologist Judith Curry is one of those scientists whose work is often snubbed. Why? Here’s one reason: By her estimation, the ramifications of rising ocean levels are greatly exaggerated. She says, “Projections of extreme, alarming impacts are very weakly justified to borderline impossible.”

In February 2017, The Patriot Post documented the meager rise in sea levels in part by including this citation from NOAA: “Sea level continues to rise at a rate of about one-eighth of an inch (3.2 mm) per year, due to a combination of melting glaciers and ice sheets, and thermal expansion of seawater as it warms.”

If that sounds just as underwhelming to you as it does to us, you’re not alone. In a recent report, Curry addresses the alarm over the supposed cataclysmic consequences of rising sea levels. She points out, “For reference, 3 mm is the height of two stacked pennies.” She provides several additional points, including:

“Rates of global mean sea level rise between 1920 and 1950 were comparable to recent rates. It is concluded that recent change is within the range of natural sea level variability over the past several thousand years.”

“Identifying a potential human fingerprint on recent sea level rise is confounded by the large magnitude of natural internal variability associated with ocean circulation patterns. There is not yet any convincing evidence of such a fingerprint on sea level rise associated with human-caused global warming.”

“In many of the most vulnerable coastal locations, the dominant causes of local sea level rise problems are natural oceanic and geologic processes and land use practices. Land use and coastal engineering in the major coastal cities have brought on many of the worst local problems, notably landfilling in coastal wetland areas and groundwater extraction.”

“Local sea level in many regions will continue to rise in the 21st century — independent of global climate change. There are numerous reasons to think that projections of 21st century sea level rise from human-caused global warming are too high, and some of the worst-case scenarios strain credulity.”

Curry provided supplementary commentary to The Daily Caller, noting: “With regards to 21st century climate projections, we are dealing with deep uncertainty, and we should not be basing our policies based on the assumption that the climate will actually evolve as per predicted. Climate variability and change is a lot more complex than ‘CO2 as control knob.’ No one wants to hear this, or actually spend time understanding things.”

The only proof you need is demonstrated by the fact her report won’t appear in any mainstream media outlets.

SOURCE 






Carols turn green as some Australian Christians sing out to save the planet

Hundreds of Christians in church choirs across the country will be singing Christmas carols with ­lyrics altered to protest about the burning of coal in a bid to change federal government policy on renewable energy.

The community organisation Australian Religious Response to Climate Change has facilitated the rewriting of 16 traditional Christmas carols — including We Wish You A Steady Climate and ­Silent Night, Smoky Night — and is encouraging community groups and choirs to sing them.

Darebin Council in Melbourne’s north, which has four Greens councillors among its nine members, hosted an event last week featuring many of the Carols Against Coal, and the Pitt Street Uniting Church Choir in Sydney has recently sung the altered Joy To The World — “Cool down the world, the time has come, for targets tight and fair”.

The ARRCC intends to upload a video of groups singing the carols to social media today ahead of tomorrow’s opening of the ALP’s national conference.

“We believe the Liberal Party has been in a long-term relationship with coal but we have slightly more hope that the Labor Party will be encouraged to take a bolder stance,” said ARRCC community organiser Tejopala Rawls.

“We want them to step down off the fence and gain the moral courage to do something about climate change.”

A dozen carollers from St John’s Cathedral in Brisbane will take to Brisbane Square today to sing the carols, led by Dean Peter Catt. “It shows that there’s a broad cross-section of the community that have concern for the environment,” Dean Catt said.

He said it was not anti-­Christian to politicise Christmas, nor would this detract from the spirit of the season. “Life is political and the gospel itself is political,” he said.

SOURCE

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For more postings from me, see  DISSECTING LEFTISM, TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC and AUSTRALIAN POLITICS. Home Pages are   here or   here or   here.  Email me (John Ray) here.  

Preserving the graphics:  Most graphics on this site are hotlinked from elsewhere.  But hotlinked graphics sometimes have only a short life -- as little as a week in some cases.  After that they no longer come up.  From January 2011 on, therefore, I have posted a monthly copy of everything on this blog to a separate site where I can host text and graphics together -- which should make the graphics available even if they are no longer coming up on this site.  See  here or here

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