How scientists got their global warming sums wrong — and created a £1TRILLION-a-year green industry that bullied experts who dared to question the figures
Thanks to their bad advice on climate change our gas and electricity bills have rocketed.
So too have our taxes, our car bills and the cost of flying abroad, our kids have been brainwashed into becoming tofu-munching eco-zealots, our old folk have frozen to death in fuel poverty, our countryside has been blighted with ranks of space-age solar panels and bat-chomping, bird-slicing eco-crucifixes, our rubbish collection service hijacked by hectoring bullies, our cities poisoned with diesel fumes . . .
And all because a tiny bunch of scientists got their sums wrong and scared the world silly with a story about catastrophic man-made global warming.
This scare story, we now know, was at best an exaggeration, at worst a disgraceful fabrication. But while a handful of reviled and derided sceptics have been saying this for years, it’s only this week that those scientists have fessed up to their mistake.
In a new paper in the prestigious journal Nature Geoscience, the scientists who produce those doomsday reports for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change have finally come clean — the computer models they’ve been using to predict runaway global warming are wrong, the planet has stubbornly refused to heat up anywhere near as much as they’d warned.
The report’s authors say it is now much more likely that the world will meet its CO2 reduction targets agreed at the UN’s Paris summit in 2015. Back then, Professor Michael Grubb of University College London said that the goal — keeping the rise in global temperatures below 1.5C — was so hard that achieving it would be “incompatible with democracy”.
Now he says: “When the facts change, I change.” Because it is now clear the impact of CO2 has been overstated, it means less needs to be done to stop “global warming”.
According to research by Dr Bjorn Lomborg, former director of the Danish government’s Environmental Assessment Institute (EAI) in Copenhagen, using the UN’s own figures, even if every country in the world sticks to its Paris carbon reduction targets, the result will be, at best, a drop in global temperatures by the end of the century of about one fifth of a degree. All that money, all that effort to — maybe — reduce “global warming” by less than the temperature difference between getting up and having breakfast.
One scientist has described the implications of the new Nature Geoscience report as “breathtaking”. He’s right. What it effectively does is scotch probably the most damaging scientific myth of our age — the notion that man-made carbon dioxide (CO2) is causing the planet to warm at such dangerous and unprecedented speeds that only massive government intervention can save us.
For a quarter of a century now — it all really got going in 1992 when 172 nations signed up to the Rio Earth Summit — our politicians have believed in and acted on this discredited theory.
In the name of saving the planet, war was declared on carbon dioxide, the benign trace gas which we exhale and which is so good for plant growth it has caused the planet to “green” by an extraordinary 14 per cent in the last 30 years.
This war on CO2 has resulted in a massive global decarbonisation industry worth around $1.5trillion (£1.11trillion) a year. Though it has made a handful of green crony capitalists very rich, it has made most of us much poorer, by forcing us to use expensive “renewables” instead of cheap, abundant fossil fuels.
So if the science behind all this nonsense was so dodgy, why did no one complain all these years?
Well, a few of us did. Some — such as Johnny Ball and David Bellamy — were brave TV celebrities, some — Graham Stringer, Peter Lilley, Owen Paterson, Nigel (now Lord) Lawson — were outspoken MPs, some were bona fide scientists. But whenever we spoke out, the response was the same — we were bullied, vilified, derided and dismissed as scientifically illiterate loons by a powerful climate alarmist establishment which brooked no dissent.
Unfortunately this alarmist establishment has many powerful media allies. The BBC has a huge roster of eco-activist reporters and science “experts” who believe in man-made global warming, and almost never gives sceptics air time.
Typical of this bias was the way one of its scientist presenters — a Guardian writer called Adam Rutherford — campaigned on Twitter to have Labour MP Graham Stringer “blocked” from the House of Commons Science and Technology Committee just because Stringer is a climate change sceptic and a trustee of Lord Lawson’s Global Warming Policy Foundation (GWPF).
One irony here is that Stringer, with his chemistry degree, is probably better equipped than Rutherford to understand the ins and outs of climate science.
Another is that the GWPF produced a report three years ago saying pretty much exactly what the supposed climate change experts are only finally admitting now — that the computer models are running “too hot”.
It comes as little consolation to those of us who’ve been right all along to say: “I told you so.”
In the name of promoting the global warming myth, free speech has been curtailed, honest science corrupted and vast economic and social damage done. That apology is long overdue.
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Sir Iain Duncan Smith calls for honest and open debate on Net Zero
London, 6 March - Former Conservative Party leader Sir Iain Duncan Smith has called for an “honest and open debate” on Net Zero, warning that politicians have not sufficiently scrutinised the requirements, and saying that they must level with the public about the sacrifices required.
He also highlights the UK’s lack of energy security and Western Europe’s reliance on Russian gas.
Sir Iain’s comments, in the foreword to a new report published by the Global Warming Policy Foundation, reflect growing alarm among Conservative backbenchers about a possible electoral backlash in the wake of the cost of living crisis, and a new awareness of the threat the Net Zero project represents to national security.
The report, by Professor Michael Kelly FRS, examines the scope of the Net Zero project and considers the financial, resource and manpower requirements, concluding that the political and economic upheaval it would necessitate make success a practical impossibility.
Sir Iain Duncan Smith said:
“We owe it to the citizens of the UK to take a long hard look at the path to be taken. Policymakers must be honest and open with the British public about how much all this will cost them and how much change to our everyday lives may be required.”
Professor Kelly said:
“The scale of this project is, in terms of resource and time, so great that a war footing and a command economy will be essential for its delivery”
Contact: Prof Michael Kelly. e: mjk1@cam.ac.uk
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Biden and Europe Should Respond to Russian Aggression by Scrapping Extremist Climate Policies
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine was facilitated by alarmist policies enacted by the United States and Europe, meant to combat alleged runaway global warming.
Germany, for example, decided to abandon coal and nuclear energy in favor of supposed climate-friendly “renewable” energy sources. And in the United Kingdom, after briefly considering allowing fracking a few years back, the government has basically doubled down on wind and solar, erecting bans or nearly insurmountable hurdles to natural gas development on the U.K. mainland.
Those costly sources simply are not reliable enough to sustain the German, U.K., or the wider EU economies. Partly as a result of these policies, even before Russia invaded Ukraine, many Europeans were suffering under cripplingly high energy prices and periodic energy shortages.
Germany’s response has been to become even more reliant on Russian natural gas than it already was. Indeed, major Western European companies have investments in pipelines being built from Russia. Western Europe, having given Russia power over it, emboldened Putin to invade Ukraine.
Under President Donald Trump’s initiative to make American energy dominant, the United States not only became energy independent but also became a net energy exporter. Expansion of natural gas production and the rapid opening of new Liquefied Natural Gas export terminals allowed America to help Europe out of its mess by providing an alternative, geopolitically friendly, source of reliable energy. Had this initiative and other policies the Trump administration instituted continued under President Joe Biden, it could have meant European countries purchasing more energy from America, putting money in our pockets, rather than funding Putin’s war machine.
Instead, Biden reversed course. The Biden administration’s “whole of government approach” to fighting climate change requires rapidly weaning the United States from fossil fuels.
Accordingly, Biden canceled the Keystone XL pipeline partnership with Canada on his first day in office; he imposed a moratorium on new oil and gas leases on federal lands and on the U.S. outer-continental shelf. Since then, Biden has canceled oil and gas leases in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge; proposed methane emission restrictions that would make it harder and more expensive to develop, store, and transport oil and natural gas in the United States; proposed increasing the fees and royalty rate oil and gas producers must pay the federal government; and recently announced plans to foreclose drilling on more than half of the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska.
The result has been to dramatically drive up prices for fossil fuel energy. During Biden’s first year in office, Biden’s climate policies have resulted in overall electricity prices rising by more than 8 percent, home heating oil prices increasing by 43 percent, West Texas Intermediate crude oil prices rising by more than 80 percent, natural gas prices surging by 61 percent, and the price of gasoline jumping by 98 cents per gallon, about 42 percent. To be clear, higher energy prices are the explicit goal of administration policy because the administration believes it is necessary to fight climate change. These policies are not only seriously harming Americans with sharply higher energy prices contributing to higher prices throughout the economy and thus the current upward inflation spiral, but they are also enriching Putin and his oligarchs, who reap the benefits of high-priced Russian oil.
The United States and Europe have crippled their own economies and harmed their own citizens with anti-fossil fuel policies in the name of fighting so-called global warming, simultaneously endangering world peace and security. Russian troops are on the ground creating orphans in Ukraine, while John Kerry, President Biden’s climate czar, bizarrely prattles on about greenhouse gas emissions from Russia’s military action there.
There is never a good time to enact bad policies, and making America and the world more beholden to Russian influence via its stranglehold on European energy markets was about as bad a policy as one can imagine.
For economic, humanitarian, and geopolitical reasons, President Biden should reverse course immediately. He should use his executive authority to remove all restrictions on energy exploration and production in the United States. He should call on all states that still restrict fracking to allow the extraction of clean, low-cost natural gas. He should scrap ongoing efforts to impose carbon dioxide restrictions on every sector of the economy. And, he should pull out of the Paris Agreement, with its climate alarmist restrictions that simply empower the likes of Vladimir Putin.
Bold actions such as these might force Putin and other potential bad actors, I’m thinking China here, to reconsider aggressive, expansionistic policies.
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What Are ESG Scores?
Sustainable investing has become one of the hottest new trends in the financial industry, corresponding to the increasing clamor for corporations and businesses to espouse more socially responsible principles. Environmental, social, and governance (ESG) scores are the primary mechanism by which these sustainability objectives have been institutionalized within our global economic infrastructure.
Their utilization has exponentially increased in recent years, with 98 percent of U.S. companies now disclosing ESG scores, and more than 15,000 companies worldwide signing on the United Nations Global Compact – an initiative to use ESG for tracking the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDG). The United Nations, alongside other international organizations such as the World Economic Forum and mega-financiers like Larry Fink, have been the primary sponsors of this system.
If you have found yourself at a loss in terms of what ESG scores actually entail, you are not alone. It is a confusing system. Yet, the implications associated with this system’s implementation are important to understand.
ESG scores are, essentially, a social credit framework for sustainability reporting. They are supposed to measure both financial and non-financial aspects of a company’s overall risk profile. Companies with favorable credit ratings are therefore attractive targets for investment, whereas companies with unfavorable credit ratings are “screened out.” Ultimately, their utilization alters how businesses are evaluated, grading them on the basis of their commitment to social justice and environmental causes rather than traditional financial metrics.
Despite the implication that there is a set of defined standards by which companies can be objectively evaluated, there is far from a uniform approach. Instead, there are multiple overlapping systems, sponsored by governments, international organizations, and financial institutions alike. Additionally, there are numerous ratings agencies such as Moody’s and S&P, each of which applies its own unique methodology to assigning scores. Studies have even shown that a rating agency’s subjective view of the firm under observation has influenced their rating to a significant degree.
Another area of potential confusion lies within the data itself. Allow me to present you with an example of just one system, promoted by the International Business Council (IBC). This ESG system incorporates 55 metrics, which range from quantitatively determined “Total R&D Expenses” and “Total Social Investment” to qualitatively determined “Purpose-Led Management.”
These metrics are then subjectively weighted according to the preferences of corporate stakeholders, and finally aggregated together into one overall score. It is difficult to countenance a scenario in which that score is an accurate representation of a company’s risk profile.
The power that these stakeholders enjoy over the determination of these metrics leads us to the direst aspect of the ESG system: Banks, corporations, ratings companies, and other financial elites are in total control, and can adjust their predetermined metrics at will. As metrics are not determined by a government agency, instead being a product of the “free market,” no oversight mechanism exists to constrain their influence.
For one, this has allowed those capitalizing upon and driving ESG scores to become exceedingly wealthy, often at the expense of others.
In 2020, investment into sustainable funds surpassed $50 billion, 10 times that of 2018. The novelty associated with ESG has allowed financial institutions to justify higher portfolio management fees while reaping the rewards. The system also allows banks and investment firms to drive large flows of capital to wherever they choose, enriching themselves and their friends in the process.
Moreover, the ESG system has been used to consolidate wealth amongst the individuals responsible for the movement’s genesis. Blackrock – the world’s largest private asset manager – recently hit $10 trillion in assets under management, powered in large part by ETFs. Its iShares Global Clean Energy ETF is one of the largest ESG funds in the world.
Who runs Blackrock? Larry Fink. The same Larry Fink who, along with Charles Schwab, could be seen as the founder of the entire ESG system, and the shift to an overall model of stakeholder governance.
Beyond the issue with wealth consolidation, however, lies the concerning precedent being set. The wealthiest Wall Street investors, such as Blackrock, have become increasingly capable of dictating the affairs of small businesses and companies by virtue of their influence over ratings, and the voting blocs they hold in corporate boardrooms.
Society, too, is at their mercy. The power that ESG affords to its creators could potentially be wielded to censor free speech by coercing social media companies to ban content. The system could be used to alter consumer behavior, pressuring individuals to purchase electric vehicles when their natural preference is for a gasoline-powered car. ESG frameworks could be used to mandate certain food and beverage choices, under the guise of championing sustainable options.
https://redstate.com/heartlandinstitute/2022/03/02/what-are-esg-scores-n530449
***************************************My other blogs. Main ones below
http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM )
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)
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Jim Hansen and his twin
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