Government monopsony distorts climate science, says SPPI
The climate industry is costing taxpayers $79 billion and counting
Washington, DC 7/22/2009 09:12 PM GMT from TransWorldNews
The Science and Public Policy Institute announces the publication of Climate Money, a study by Joanne Nova revealing that the federal Government has a near-monopsony on climate science funding. This distorts the science towards self-serving alarmism. Key findings:
Some Excerpts:
The US Government has spent more than $79 billion of taxpayers’ money since 1989 on policies related to climate change, including science and technology research, administration, propaganda campaigns, foreign aid, and tax breaks. Most of this spending was unnecessary.
Despite the billions wasted, audits of the science are left to unpaid volunteers. A dedicated but largely uncoordinated grassroots movement of scientists has sprung up around the globe to test the integrity of “global warming” theory and to compete with a lavishly-funded, highly-organized climate monopsony. Major errors have been exposed again and again.
Carbon trading worldwide reached $126 billion in 2008. Banks, which profit most, are calling for more. Experts are predicting the carbon market will reach $2 – $10 trillion in the near future. Hot air will soon be the largest single commodity traded on global exchanges.
Meanwhile in a distracting sideshow, Exxon‐Mobil Corp is repeatedly attacked for paying a grand total of $23 million to skeptics—less than a thousandth of what the US government has put in, and less than one five‐thousandth of the value of carbon trading in just the single year of 2008.
Read the entire report here (PDF)
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Anyone care to calculate a trend on that graph?
Monopsony indeed. Then again, there aren’t many jobs in the private sector involving this.
Maybe juxtapose a graph of the deficit and compare trends?
Carbon Trading. Making money out of thin air.
From the film “The Right Stuff”(one of my all time favorites)”No Bucks No Buck Rogers”
Or, no bucks, no grants,-unless they meet ah, certain ah, criteria…
This is one hell of a hockey-stick.
LOL/cry
Duh. Who didn’t already know this? But at least now it’s documented.
A similar time frame and $amount to Bernie Madoff…
Could almost be twins…
(of course there’s no comparison b/w AGW and Ponzi Schemes is there???)
In case anyone’s interested -“This Is Where EACH of Your 1.421 Trillion Dollars Is Going In 2010” –
http://gizmodo.com/5320681/this-is-where-each-of-your-1421-trillion-dollars-is-going-in-2010
Oh AGH! I HATE that phrase! Follow the ideas-funding is a real issue but “follow the money” (AGH!) is not what the issue is-the issue is bias (that is, ideas). Focusing on the fact that what is being exchanged is money makes the money itself sound bad. It’s from WHO it is coming and WHERE it is going and WHAT follows along with it that matters.
“Exxon‐Mobil Corp is repeatedly attacked for paying a grand total of $23 million to skeptics”
What this generally refers to are donations to think tanks which deal with issues of interest to the company. Often they give money because they like the ideas espoused-but the ideas espoused are not caused by the money, they “cause” the money. What’s more, Exxon donated to many think tanks which take many positions on many issues-including some which are “alarmed” about AGW. And rather ludicrously they have ceased giving any money at all to certain groups, from what I can tell because they were tired of being accused of funding “denial”-and yet the skepticism persists. What’s more, there are hardly any cases in which any more than tenuous “guilt by loose association” connections can be made directly between skeptical researchers and such coporations.
And of course, why is Exxon evil? Evidently because of AGW-but that’s the point to be proved! The “Exxon” screams are circular reasoning, or more likely, jealousy of “obscene” profits.
It takes money to effectively brainwash people. Serious money.
Yeah, I’m with Mick – Laugh/cry. I figure you’re either laughing or crying when you watch stuff like this, I choose laugh.
$79 billion over 9 years (89 to 08) is peanuts. Obama’s cap and trade bill alone is around $5.7 trillion of carbon tax revenues over 18 years (2012 to 2030) is around $316 billion/year, and that’s for federal carbon taxes alone. Excluded there are carbon taxes by various states, counties and cities.
So spend $79 billion, even $150 billion over 10 years, scare the American public, scare the world, for big carbon tax revenues in the future, plus taxes on carbon trading among private corporations.
This is not big scam. It is monster scam.
The year of 1992 was when Al Gore decided to run for Vice-President with Clinton… this correlates well with the rise of his climate tech investments. From then is stayed fairly flat until he lost his presidential bid and went full time on his climate related opportunities in 2002… this is when the curve starts again rising.
Does WUWT have a presence on Twitter or Facebook? Given that we can’t duplicate this level of funding, social networking can do the job of getting the word out about the bad science of AGW alarmism.
Dittos to Nonoy’s comment. Carbon trading is a humongous scam. It is also one doomed to bubble bursting and phenomenal capital losses that will be borne by the usual patsies, us, the common proles. It’s Enron deja vu on a grand and global scale.
The only scam bigger than energy derivative trading is real estate derivative trading. We all know what happened when a tiny down tick occurred in that financial house of cards: global financial crisis and the institutional thievery of more than $10 trillion (the actual numbers are so big and so convoluted that they cannot be accurately estimated).
It’s a global banking pile on, and the giant sucking sound you hear is the extraction of equity, yours and mine.
So who can blame the scientists bought and sold like cattle, their scientific integrity proffered on street corners to johns with bags of money stolen from quasi-governments? We are all in the same boat; most go with flow while far fewer try to paddle upstream. Yes, many of us here are paddlers, contrarians with a conscience, wiser but poorer, and miffed at the flood of gravy being lapped up by syncophants posing as scientists. But don’t blame the hookers for your own burden of integrity. Yes, the game is rigged, fixed by thuggish fixers, but you knew that going in.
David (22:21:15) :
Maybe juxtapose GISStemp global means onto it.
Never count your carbon credits before the political gas has risen.
They sure have invested a lot into this agenda.
I think it is fair to say that good science and good scientific technology has resulted from the expenditures documented in this report. Some not so much and plenty misdirected toward supporting AGW, especially all the “what will happen” studies. The amount truly wasted (still unknown) pales in comparison to that to be drawn from the economy in coming years and diverted to non-science and non-climate concerns. The U. S. House’s “American Clean Energy and Security Act” has zip to do with saving Earth from warming and much to do with “pork” related re-election strategies and wealth redistribution and, yes, even “global democratic government.” [Use this last phrase as a search term if you are not already aware.]
Right, let’s make a huge effort and take care that this 7.9 billion dollar is wasted money.
NO CAP & TRADE is a good start.
My interpretation of the rules for getting research money in my area (which has a carbon tax):
1. Prove global warming.
2. Project catastrophic consequences of (1).
Note how much legitimate (& important) climate research does NOT fit into this framework.
The monopsony is not in the best interest of civilization.
Suggested: Better balance, for starters.
I would have expected the funds for climate science (without the tech) to have risen far more sharply if it really were a scientific fraud on a large scale. It’s not so strange for climate technology to have risen so much, as satellites and their launching can be quite costly. I would think this technology helps to monitor various aspects of the climate.
Now, to put this article in perspective I would like to see a comparison to the funding for other sciences, such as let’s say genetic modification or weapon technology. And how long does 79 billion last in Iraq and Afghanistan? About 2 months?
These figures ‘Climate related Expenditure’ surely include the vast cost of putting satellites into orbit and maintaining them there? Exxon-Mobil simply don’t do that kind of thing.
It’s simple not valid to compare the $23M Exxon-Mobil spend with the $79B – well not unless we think observational satellites are a propaganda exercise.
The greenies accuse people of being deniers, but it looks like greenies are lacking a healthy dose of cynicism. They’ve yet to awaken to disenchantment with their utopian gaia visions.
Douglas DC (22:31:59) :
The Right Stuff is one of my all time favorites as well. It shows a picture of America motivated by hope and aspiration rather than the present values of venality and fear. As I have posted on previous threads, I feel the appropriate phrase for climate research is “No b……t, no bucks”.
The breakdown of the spending might be of interest. From reference [2] in the SPPI report:
Climate Change Science Program, FY2008 actual budget by budget authority in millions of USD
NSF: National Science Foundation
USAID: U.S. Agency for International Development
NIH: National Institutes of Health
So about 60% of all CCSP spending goes to NASA. I would expect that the large majority of this chunk goes into Earth and Sun observing satellite development, construction and operation.
The year of 1992 was when Al Gore decided to run for Vice-President with Clinton… this correlates well with the rise of his climate tech investments. From then is stayed fairly flat until he lost his presidential bid and went full time on his climate related opportunities in 2002… this is when the curve starts again rising.
OH! You’re my new favorite blogger fyi
Sorry, maybe I’ll look stupid. The graph shows me 7’900 Million $ is that not 7.9 Billion and not 79 Billion as stated??