Net Zero Debate is Running Out of Ideas
At the weekend I attended the Battle of Ideas Festival in London.
It is a fascinating event, with interesting debates taking place across a wide variety of topics like free speech, culture wars, the economy, education and women’s freedom.
I was there primarily for the energy discussions. Unfortunately, I missed the book launch on nuclear power on the Saturday, but I did attend the two energy debates that took place in the scientific dilemmas section on Sunday.
First up was a lunchtime debate entitled “Is nuclear the future of energy… again?” Unfortunately, the speaker who was supposed to speak for this position had some sort of transportation nightmare and could not attend.
I did not catch the name of the man who replaced her, but he did put up a valiant effort considering he was drafted in at the last minute. Speaking against the idea of a nuclear renaissance was Robert Reid, policy development officer for the Alba Party who was in mourning for the late Alec Salmond.
We can therefore forgive him somewhat for advancing the hoary old chestnut that offshore wind is cheap: he claimed £41/MWh without citing any sources. Of course, the existing CfD funded offshore wind farms have cost us over £150/MWh so far this financial year and the new projects awarded in AR6 will cost us over £82/MWh in today’s money, more than twice Robert’s claim.
Emma Bateman, who is an environmental campaigner and founding member of Together Against Sizewell C, unsurprisingly spoke against the idea of nuclear power and made some spurious claims about safety that if nuclear power were a person would have resulted in the libel lawyers being called on Monday morning.
The gist of her substantive argument was that nuclear is too expensive and takes too long so we should therefore spend more on wind and solar.
In the ensuing debate, I managed to correct Robert Reid’s ‘facts’ and make the point that if your primary concern is the environment, then you should be an advocate of nuclear power because it has the smallest overall environmental footprint of all energy sources because it doesn’t take up much land and has very low mineral intensity.
I also made the point about the chocolate teapot fallacy. Arguing for wind and solar in place of nuclear power is akin to arguing in favour of chocolate teapots because you cannot wait for a ceramic one.
No matter how many chocolate teapots you buy, you can never make tea; just like no matter how many wind turbines and solar panels you install you can never run a modern economy on intermittent electricity.
The physics of nuclear power are far superior to any other energy source because of its extremely high energy return on energy invested, meaning we get far more energy out than we expend building the power plants, and the output is reliable.
There are even designs on the drawing board and beginning to be built that will allow nuclear power plants to follow fluctuations in demand.
The barriers to nuclear power are all political: the West over-regulates nuclear power and it is unsurprising that it takes so long because of all the paperwork that must be produced before a new reactor can be built.
We can fix man-made political and regulatory problems, but mere mortals cannot change the faulty physics of intermittent renewables, just like you can never make tea in a chocolate teapot.
We would be far better off committing to a significant nuclear power programme so we can deliver reliable electricity. If we fix the regulations, invest in rebuilding the skills base and supply chains and choose the right reactor design, we can even have cheap, reliable energy with only a small impact on the environment.
This is what the French did in the 1970s and 1980s and now they produce around 70% of their electricity from nuclear.
The next debate was on the “Great British Energy Crisis”. It was encouraging to see that three of the five panellists are subscribers to this Substack (you know who you are and thank you).
Two of the speakers, James Woudhuysen and Lord David Frost both made eloquent attacks on Net Zero and its consequences. Professor Michaela Kendall who is the U.K.
Hydrogen Champion for Mission Innovation suggested we needed more facts to inform the debate on energy, but managed to skirt around the fact that the Government agreed contracts for green hydrogen at £241/MWh, which is about seven times the current cost of U.K. natural gas, which in turn costs more than five times U.S. gas.
Dr. Shahrar Ali is a former spokesperson for the Green Party who has recently won a discrimination court case against the Greens because they sacked him for his gender critical beliefs.
It is a shame Dr. Ali cannot apply his critical thinking skills to Net Zero. The gist of his argument was the world is warming, it is going to be a catastrophe, it is all our fault, so build more windmills.
I managed to take him to task in the ensuing debate by pointing out that even if you believe CO2 causes warming, then it is a big leap to conclude that building windmills will change the weather.
This is the so-called mitigation strategy that can only work if 1) CO2 is the only climate control knob (we know this to be untrue from paleo-climate records) and 2) everyone else follows the strategy (you only need to look at charts of global greenhouse gas emissions to see this is also untrue).
A far better strategy is one of adaptation which has the advantages of being cheaper and will work regardless of the actions of others and regardless of the causes of global warming.
The mitigation strategy we are pursuing is one of unilateral economic impoverishment and the Net Zero “cure” is far worse than the alleged climate change “disease”.
It is encouraging that my intervention drew an enthusiastic round of applause which is testament to the growing scepticism about Net Zero among the general public.
It appears to me that cracks are appearing in the cosy green consensus in Westminster and if we get our arguments right, we can win this debate.
All in all, the Battle of Ideas is a thoroughly enjoyable event and I highly recommend everyone to attend next year, whatever your beliefs. It is only through free and open debate that we can get to the truth.
https://principia-scientific.com/net-zero-debate-is-running-out-of-ideas/
*****************************************************Overnight Success: Biden’s Climate Splurge Gives Billions to Nonprofit Newbies
Although there isn’t much public information available about the Justice Climate Fund, it appears to have been an overnight success.
After gaining nonprofit status in August 2023, the organization was awarded $940 million by the Biden administration just eight months later in connection with the White House’s $27 billion Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund, which aims to provide financial assistance to reduce carbon emissions and reduce pollution.
The Justice Climate Fund is not the only nonprofit newcomer suddenly made rich by the GGRF. Within a month of gaining nonprofit status from the IRS, Power Forward Communities, which reported 2023 revenues of $100, was awarded $2 billion.
The awards were made by the Environmental Protection Agency, which is new to the world of major grantmaking. The agency acknowledges it has never handed out such gigantic sums of money, and its inspector general told Congress last month it marked a “fantastically complex” and “unusual” setup that his small staff would be hard-pressed to follow.
Critics note that many of the awardees are run by politically connected figures. The single biggest winner in the awards, which were announced in April, was the Climate United Fund, which is slated to receive $6.97 billion. The fund’s directors include prominent Democrats, such as Phil Angelides, a former California State Treasurer. After this article was published Climate United told RCI that Anthony Foxx, who served as Transportation Secretary in the Obama administration, was “listed as a board member for our [grant] application but did not commit to serving post award.” A press release on the group’s website names Foxx as a member of its “Inaugural Board of Directors.”
The unprecedented nature of the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund, which was created as part of 2022’s Inflation Reduction Act, is raising concerns about the Biden administration’s efforts to spend tens of billions of dollars in its final months, a gusher of taxpayer money that will flow into a poorly understood, untested, and difficult to audit format. The tremendous sums involved, the novelty of the program, and the EPA’s lack of experience in the field, as well as the unproven track record of some of the newly hatched recipients, have drawn the attention of lawmakers and others uncertain about how the taxpayers’ billions will ultimately be spent and who will keep track of it all.
“These groups are political front groups that are simply created to funnel billions of taxpayer dollars to Democrat campaigns under the guise of doing something good,” said Mandy Gunasekara, who served as EPA chief of staff in the Trump administration.
Daren Bakst, director of the conservative Competitive Enterprise Institute’s Center for Energy and Environment and a sharp critic of the Biden administration’s climate change spending splurge, said, “It’s worse than a slush fund – it’s a slush fund to create non-profit slush funds.”
The EPA describes the Greenhouse Fund as “an unprecedented opportunity to accelerate the adoption of greenhouse gas reducing technologies.” By investing in making residential homes and neighborhoods more “eco-friendly,” the money will pay dividends in both lower utility bills and higher employment, the agency says.
Neither the Justice Climate Fund nor Power Forward Communities responded to questions about their plans to spend the close to $3 billion in public funds they had received.
The $27 billion assigned to the Greenhouse Fund represents a fraction of the money the Biden-Harris administration has embedded in the Inflation Reduction Act for its green energy revolution. Biden acknowledged the bill’s true purpose this summer when he called the IRA a “climate” bill, thereby aligning the administration’s position with what leftist environmental groups such as the World Resource Institute hailed from the beginning as “the largest piece of climate legislation in U.S. history.” The IRA involved “hundreds of billions of dollars in clean energy, electric vehicles, environmental justice and more.” Billions more would be spent on the global warming front under the Biden-Harris Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act that passed in 2021.
The EPA has made it clear it views the bonanza as seed money. The agency expects that each dollar the nonprofit recipients spend in seeking to reduce America’s carbon footprint will attract seven times its value in private investment. This anticipated capitalist activity has led many media accounts to label the nonprofits “green banks,” and it has created an entirely new wrinkle in the EPA, according to its inspector general. The Fund’s requirements also carry mandates that at least 40% of the billions be spent in “low income or disadvantaged communities” or “tribal” lands, and in some cases, winners have pledged to spend up to 70% of the money in those same areas.
“I can’t say enough about how complex this system will be,” EPA Inspector General Sean O’Donnell testified to a House subcommittee in September. “It’s like they created an investment bank. It’s fantastically complex. I think it’s unusual.”
“I think it’s more than unusual,” responded Ohio Republican Rep. David Joyce.
EPA Special Advisor Zealan Hoover pushed back at the claim that unusual secrecy surrounded the process and criticism that there are flimsy guardrails to ensure the $27 billion is well spent.
Greenhouse Fund money has been divided into three programs. The biggest is in the National Clean Investment Fund (NCIF), which will divide $14 billion among three groups, followed by Solar For All, which has $7 billion, and then $6 billion divided among five groups under the Clean Communities Investment Accelerator (CCIA).
While the degree of competition involved was not immediately made public, the EPA did provide the numbers to RealClearInvestigations. Three National Clean Investment Fund winners were chosen from a dozen applicants, while Clean Communities Investment Accelerator winners came from a pool of 26 proposals. “Solar For All,” which has the smallest awards, had 60 winners and 150 applicants, according to the EPA. Some of the NCIF and CCIA winners are associated with one another and publicly speak of their collaboration.
“In some cases, the umbrella organizations are new, but it’s set up to help long established groups such as the United Way or Habitat for Humanity,” Hoover said. “These are partnerships and coalitions in which we are very confident, and they submitted remarkably comprehensive applications.”
Hoover also told RCI the EPA will retain spending and auditing oversight, though that responsibility was not spelled out in any of the press releases that have accompanied the Greenhouse Reduction Fund. None of the groups receiving the billions responded to questions or agreed to comment on their plans for spending and how the money will be tracked and audited.
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$24 billion is missing from spending on FAKE climate change! Was it stolen?
Climate science is a ruse. But the money spent on fake research and gifts to nations is real.
Between 24 and 41 billion dollars of that money is missing from the World Bank. No one knows where it went.
Oxfam, October 17: “Up to $41 billion in World Bank climate finance—nearly 40 percent of all climate funds disbursed by the Bank over the past seven years—is unaccounted for due to poor record-keeping practices, reveals a new Oxfam report published today ahead of the World Bank and IMF Annual Meetings in Washington D.C. [October 21—26, 2024]”
“An Oxfam audit of the World Bank’s 2017-2023 climate finance portfolio found that between $24 billion and $41 billion in climate finance went unaccounted for between the time projects were approved and when they closed.”
“There is no clear public record showing where this money went or how it was used, which makes any assessment of its impacts impossible. It also remains unclear whether these funds were even spent on climate-related initiatives intended to help low- and middle-income countries protect people from the impacts of the climate crisis and invest in clean energy.” (link in footnote)
A source at the World Bank told the NY Post that the actual amount of missing money “could be twice or ten times more…all the figures are routinely made up. Nobody has a clue about who spends what.” (link in footnote)
The World Bank gets its money from national governments’ donations, from its own issuance of bonds, and from repayment of loans it makes.
As mainstream reports on this scandal appear, they’ll be couched in terms of horribly deficient accounting practices, “mistakes,” lack of executive oversight at the Bank, etc.
I raise the distinct possibility that the money was stolen
https://jonrappoport.substack.com/p/real-24-billion-missing-from-spending-fake-climate-change
************************************************Indonesia Dumps Climate Politics in Favor of Energy Security
The archipelago nation of Indonesia represents just 1% of Earth’s land area, but it has set the stage for global geopolitics surrounding fossil fuels and climate policies.
As a part of climate negotiations between G-7 nations, Indonesia was expected to be the first among developing countries to announce early closures of coal plants.
In the spotlight is the 660-megawatt Cirebon-1 plant in West Java province, which had been scheduled to shut down by 2035. However, it is understood that Jakarta will not follow that timeline but rather continue to operate the plant to its originally projected end of life in 2042. A stumbling block to the early closure is a price tag of more than $1 billion to replace the coal plant with so-called renewable energy.
In reaffirming its commitment to the unrestricted use of coal, Indonesia makes a bold and sensible decision to put energy security and economic priorities ahead of international climate politics. The move sets up Indonesia as a model for other developing countries to defy the western agenda to reduce emissions in favor of their own self-interest.
Coal in Indonesia
For developing nations like Indonesia, the path to prosperity is paved with affordable energy. Coal, abundant and cheap, has long been the fuel of choice for powering economic growth. The country sits atop vast coal reserves, estimated at 37 billion metric tons, which are primarily located in Sumatra and Kalimantan.
Jakarta has approved a coal production quota of 922 million metric tons for 2024, a significant increase from previous years. This move has sparked international criticism, but it’s a calculated step to ensure energy affordability.
Coal remains the backbone of Indonesia’s energy sector, accounting for over 60% of its electricity generation. Also, Indonesia relies on coal-fueled smelters for most of its nickel production.
Producing about half of the world’s nickel, Indonesia is the top producer of the metal, which is needed to make batteries that run electric vehicles and energy storage devices.
Economic Case for Fossil Fuels
In the late 1990s, nearly 50% of Indonesia’s population lived in poverty. Today, that number is closer to 10%, thanks to unabated use of coal during the past two decades. At 70%, Indonesia manages to maintain one of the highest employment rates among the G20 countries.
“Despite challenges in 2023, Indonesia has demonstrated resilience to global shocks and an ever more diversified economic base is expected to mitigate adverse impacts,” says a spokesman for financial services company PwC.
Much of this success is due to a stable and reliable energy supply of coal, oil, and natural gas for electricity and industries. Coal and petroleum, along with nickel and ferroalloys, are among Indonesia’s top exports.
Poverty, though declining, remains a pressing issue, with over 26 million Indonesians classified as poor. Rapid industrialization and economic growth are essential for improving living standards and creating opportunities for millions.
Western Hypocrisy
Many western leaders lecturing Indonesia on the evils of coal had their own economies built with that very fuel and continue to rely on oil and gas.
The United States, for instance, underwent an energy revolution through fracking, which unlocked vast reserves of natural gas and oil. In 2023, U.S. was the number one oil producer in the world.
Similarly, Norway, often lauded for its commitment to “sustainability,” continues to issue oil drilling permits in the North Sea. If Norway, a country with a superior economy and high standard of living, can still prioritize its economic self-interest by extracting its oil, why should Indonesia be criticized for utilizing its coal reserves?
The $1.4 trillion Indonesian economy is in no mood to compromise its future or the continuing upward trend in economic growth. Count on Jakarta to exploit its natural resources well into the future.
https://climaterealism.com/2024/10/indonesia-dumps-climate-politics-in-favor-of-energy-security/
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https://westpsychol.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH -- new site)
https://john-ray.blogspot.com/ (FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC -- revived)
https://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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