How did Maine get left out of global warming?

I wanted to look up something about Maine in Wikipedia but wandered off reading all sorts of other stuff in the entry  -- as I often do.  And I came upon this:

The state's record high temperature is 105 °F (41 °C), set in July 1911, at North Bridgton.

In January 2009, a new record low temperature for the state was set at Big Black River of −50 °F (−46 °C), tying the New England record.

That's totally the wrong way around for the Warmists





Guy with thick German accent wants to gas people he believes are harming his country.

He even equates automobile exhausts with CO2. No point in trying to correct such a low-information Green/Leftist, I guess

Former Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, who enacted California's landmark climate change program and greatly expanded its leadership on renewable energy, joined Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley and former Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm, for the Clean Energy Solutions in States portion of the program.

Schwarzenegger got off some good gibes to win the crowd over.

Speaking of greenhouse gas deniers: "Strap some conservative-thinking people to a tailpipe for an hour and then they will agree it's a pollutant!"

And naturally, there was this quip: "Use your Hummer, but have an electric engine."

But Schwarzenegger mostly played it pretty straight, discussing what has been done in California and his pride in being part of a tradition of such action in California.

SOURCE  





Deja Cool: Zero People Attend Obama Climate Change Thing

Remember that Organizing For America event, aimed at promoting the President’s signature piece of Legislation? Remember how only one person showed up? Well, one of the constants in life is that things can always get worse. President Barack Obama’s shadowy campaign apparatus, Organizing For America (OFA) held a recent event to raise awareness about climate change. . . Well, they tried to hold an event. It turns out no-one showed up.

Originally the event was scheduled to be held at the Georgetown Waterfront. Just to show that they were serious, the group called the rally the “Climate Change Day of Action” on their event page. “Action” quickly turned to inaction as the gathering ended up as a non-meeting of clearly uncommitted leftists.

In all fairness, there was some rain at the time of the event. You would think environmentalists would be willing to brave the elements of nature to nurture their cause. . . But I guess you’d be wrong. Between the one person that attended the Obamacare event, and the zero people that poured out for climate change, it looks like the group is hitting a nice average of 0.5 people per rally. Surprisingly decent for this President’s radical interests.

The NRCC blog, which originally reported on the less-than-stellar turn out, made the very poignant observation that “climate change” is generally a low priority for most voters anyway. Therefore, maybe we shouldn’t be so surprised that the get-together went down the drain with the rain water.

It’s also worth noting that the group, OFA, wasn’t about to let a disappointing turnout (I’m understating things, I know) tarnish their reputation as the President’s official-unofficial campaign organization. So, they took the event off their page. Just like George Orwell’s Propaganda Ministry, the OFA wiped clean any evidence that a failure of activism (or community organizing) had taken place. . . Oh, except we got a screen shot of the event page. You can copy the picture and share with your Facebook friends for a free IRS Audit.

SOURCE  





The prophecies never stop

Since we actually seem to be having more coldwaves than heatwaves, this is just faith. The Potsdam Institute is Germany's great temple of the Warmist faith

Climate change will lock the world into more frequent and severe heatwaves in the next few decades, researchers have claimed.

They say there will be a 'several-fold' increase in heatwaves up to 2040, regardless of how much carbon dioxide goes into the atmosphere, but future efforts to slash pollution could stem the rise in extreme heat events later on in the century.

The last decade has seen an exceptional number of extreme heatwaves around the world, hitting the U.S. in 2012, Russia in 2010, Australia in 2009, and Europe in 2003 with damaging impacts on health, the economy, agriculture and wildlife.

The soaring monthly and seasonal temperatures associated with heat waves can now largely be attributed to global warming of around 0.5C over the past 50 years, according to a study published in the Institute of Physics' journal Environmental Letters.

Extreme summer heat waves in which monthly temperatures soar well above norms now cover around five per cent of the world's land, mostly in the Tropics, but also over western Europe and the Mediterranean, the researchers said.

But the percentage of land experiencing summer months of extreme heat is set to double by 2020, and quadruple by 2040 to cover a fifth of the global land surface, the projections using computer climate models found.

Even more severe summer heatwaves will increase from being virtually non-existent today to covering around three per cent of the world's land. The increase in heatwaves takes place regardless of efforts to cut emissions in the next few decades.

The study's lead author Dim Coumou, from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany, said: 'We find that up until 2040, the frequency of monthly heat extremes will increase several fold, independent of the emissions scenario we choose to take.

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Carbon trading via brokers plummets as banks retreat

Carbon trading via brokers including ICAP and GFI Group plunged to its lowest since at least January 2011 as banks scaled back buying and selling amid tighter regulation and a record glut of permits.

The volume of EU allowances handled by six members of the London Energy Brokers' Association dropped 61 per cent in July to 84.1 million metric tons from a year earlier, according to an Aug. 8 report by the lobby group. Trading in Certified Emission Reductions, the United Nations-regulated offsets, plunged 81 per cent. Activity on ICE Futures Europe in London, the biggest exchange for carbon contracts, slid 19 per cent in the month.

“A significant factor is that a few key players have exited,” Ilesh Patel, a partner in London at Baringa Partners LLP, said Aug. 9 by phone. “Banks need more money to trade carbon, power and other commodities because of new financial regulations that require them to set more risk capital aside.”

Banks are reducing trading in the 61 billion-euro ($88 billion) emissions market as the European Commission in Brussels struggles to deal with the oversupply. JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America have shut commodity trading units because of tighter regulation in Europe and the U.S. after the global recession.

Morgan Stanley will exit power and natural-gas trading in Bulgaria, the Czech Republic and Poland as it scales back involvement in commodities, a person with knowledge of the matter said in June. Louis Redshaw, Barclays Plc's head of carbon, coal and iron ore trading, resigned from the London- based bank in April.

Bank pressure

Pressures on banks to curtail commodities businesses include stiffening capital rules and a regulatory crackdown on trading practices. Commodities revenue at the 10 largest firms slid 24 per cent in 2012, according to analytics company Coalition Development Ltd. in London.

The European Parliament on July 3 approved a proposal to temporarily cut supply of carbon permits after they slumped to a record 2.46 euros a metric ton on April 17 on ICE. The EU built up a record surplus of allowances and credits of about 1.8 billion tons during the five years through 2012, or 18 per cent of total emissions in the region, according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance.

There's been little incentive for investors to speculate about the outcome of the plan after the vote amid the dearth of policy developments, Trevor Sikorski, a London-based analyst for Energy Aspects Ltd., said Aug. 12 by phone.

EU carbon for December has rebounded 78 per cent since reaching its record low in April. The contract rose 1.4 per cent today to close at 4.37 euros a metric ton on ICE.

Rebounding market

The market is indicating that EU nations will support the commission's market-rescue plan, said Sikorski, who was formerly head of carbon research at Barclays in London.

If nations approve the proposal, “there will be more interest in trading,” he said.

SOURCE





Australians are being far less green than they were

The closer you get to Green ideas, the more you see that they've got hairs on them

WE'RE being far less green.  Carbon offsetting among plane passengers is down by as much as half, as is use of renewable energy, although its popularity is predicted to surge if the carbon tax is axed.

Analysis of official figures shows the number of households using at least some green power is down by 150,000 from a high of 940,000 reached as the first Rudd government tried - but ultimately failed - to introduce a carbon pollution reduction scheme, or CPRS, in 2009.

Nationally, among those homes that still use some green power, sales are down by 51 percent, greenpower.gov.au data shows. Customer numbers are 16 per cent lower.

Victoria has recorded the biggest fall in use and customer numbers, down 61 percent and 39 percent respectively.

The fall in usage in South Australia has been greater than the national average, down 53 percent. Customer numbers are 11 percent lower.

This suggests South Australians have been more likely to downgrade the contracted proportion of green power than people in other states.

In NSW, falls have almost mirrored the Australia-wide trends, with use down 52 percent and customer numbers 19 percent lower.

Queenslanders have dramatically cut back the proportion of green power in their electricity supply, rather than ditching it altogether.

This is why usage is down 44 per cent, but customer numbers have bucked the national trend to rise 11 per cent.

The only area to record increases in customer numbers and usage has been Canberra.

Origin, which has eight times the number of green power customers as any other energy company, expects a turnaround in usage across the country should the Coalition win the election and be able to repeal the carbon tax.

"If carbon pricing goes away and people feel they'd like to do more again, I suspect those numbers would climb," said Origin's executive general manager of corporate affairs Phil Craig.

The Federal Government does not acknowledge the carbon tax had been a factor in the decline of green power's popularity, despite the biggest fall in customer numbers occurring in the quarter straight after then prime minister Julia Gillard announced details of a "price on pollution" in 2011.

A spokesman for new Climate Change Minister Mark Butler instead said the fall was due to the rapid increase in the number of houses with solar panels.

"Since 2007, over one million solar PV (photo voltaic systems) and 600,000 solar hot water heaters have been installed," Mr Butler's spokeswoman said. "And some of these households have decided not to continue purchasing green power because they are already generating their own renewable energy."

Mr Craig noted the base price of electricity had risen substantially, making it "a little bit more problematic" for people to pay a further premium for green power.

That premium has narrowed due to the imposition of the carbon tax because the levy does not apply to renewable energy.

The premium would likely expand if the tax is removed because the base price of electricity would fall.

Meanwhile, the number of plane passengers neutralising emissions has also plunged.

Qantas said the proportion of customers offsetting emissions had halved from 10 percent in 2009 to 5 percent now.

Virgin said offsetting among its passengers was down 30 percent from 2009 levels.

A Qantas spokesman said: "The proportion of passengers choosing to offset their emissions peaked in late 2009, when the world's attention was focused on the Copenhagen climate summit. So it's perhaps unsurprising that the percentage has dropped since then.

"While we'd love to see the number rise again, the program is voluntary and the choice is entirely up to the individual passenger."

SOURCE

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