Current climate policy promises will do little to stabilize the climate and their impact will be undetectable for many decades. Paris COP21 commitments [by the EU] will reduce temperatures by just 0.05°C in 2100
Bjorn Lomborg wrote to tell me yesterday about a new paper he has published in the Global Policy journal, titled: Impact of Current Climate Proposals. It shows the futility of the COP21 meeting which is essentially going to be “sound and fury, signifying nothing”.
Abstract:
This article investigates the temperature reduction impact of major climate policy proposals implemented by 2030, using the standard MAGICC climate model. Even optimistically assuming that promised emission cuts are maintained throughout the century, the impacts are generally small. The impact of the US Clean Power Plan (USCPP) is a reduction in temperature rise by 0.013°C by 2100. The full US promise for the COP21 climate conference in Paris, its so-called Intended Nationally Determined Contribution (INDC) will reduce temperature rise by 0.031°C. The EU 20-20 policy has an impact of 0.026°C, the EU INDC 0.053°C, and China INDC 0.048°C. All climate policies by the US, China, the EU and the rest of the world, implemented from the early 2000s to 2030 and sustained through the century will likely reduce global temperature rise about 0.17°C in 2100. These impact estimates are robust to different calibrations of climate sensitivity, carbon cycling and different climate scenarios. Current climate policy promises will do little to stabilize the climate and their impact will be undetectable for many decades.
From his press release:
A new peer-reviewed paper by Dr. Bjorn Lomborg published in the Global Policy journal measures the actual impact of all significant climate promises made ahead of the Paris climate summit.
Governments have publicly outlined their post-2020 climate commitments in the build-up to the December’s meeting. These promises are known as “Intended Nationally Determined Contributions” (INDCs).
Dr. Lomborg’s research reveals:
- The climate impact of all Paris INDC promises is minuscule: if we measure the impact of every nation fulfilling every promise by 2030, the total temperature reduction will be 0.048°C (0.086°F) by 2100.
- Even if we assume that these promises would be extended for another 70 years, there is still little impact: if every nation fulfills every promise by 2030, and continues to fulfill these promises faithfully until the end of the century, and there is no ‘CO₂ leakage’ to non-committed nations, the entirety of the Paris promises will reduce temperature rises by just 0.17°C (0.306°F) by 2100.
- US climate policies, in the most optimistic circumstances, fully achieved and adhered to throughout the century, will reduce global temperatures by 0.031°C (0.057°F) by 2100.
- EU climate policies, in the most optimistic circumstances, fully achieved and adhered to throughout the century, will reduce global temperatures by 0.053°C (0.096°F) by 2100.
- China climate policies, in the most optimistic circumstances, fully achieved and adhered to throughout the century, will reduce global temperatures by 0.048°C (0.086°F) by 2100.
- The rest of the world’s climate policies, in the most optimistic circumstances, fully achieved and adhered to throughout the century, will reduce global temperatures by 0.036°C (0.064°F) by 2100.
Overview in Celsius and Fahrenheit by the year 2100
The global temperature change from pre-industrial, for the Do Nothing (RCP8.5) scenario, for the global promises for Paris and for Paris extended for 70 more years, as run on MAGICC.
Comments from Dr. Bjorn Lomborg
What does this mean for the Paris Summit?
Dr. Lomborg said: “Paris is being sold as the summit where we can help ‘heal the planet’ and ‘save the world’. It is no such thing. If all nations keep all their promises, temperatures will be cut by just 0.05°C (0.09°F). Even if every government on the planet not only keeps every Paris promise, reduces all emissions by 2030, and shifts no emissions to other countries, but also keeps these emission reductions throughout the rest of the century, temperatures will be reduced by just 0.17°C (0.3°F) by the year 2100.
And let’s be clear, that is very optimistic. Consider the Kyoto Protocol, signed in 1997, never ratified by the US, and eventually abandoned by Canada and Russia and Japan. After several renegotiations, the Kyoto Protocol had been weakened to the point that the hot air left from the collapse of the Soviet Union exceeded the entire promised reductions, leaving the treaty essentially toothless.
The only reason Kyoto goals were almost achieved was the global 2008 recession. Moreover, emissions were shifted from one country to another. The EU, the most climate-engaged bloc, saw an increase in its emission imports from China alone equaling its entire domestic CO₂ reductions. In total, 40% of all emissions were likely shifted away from the areas that made promises.
Negotiators in Paris are trying to tackle global warming in the same way that has failed for 30 years: by making promises that are individually expensive, will have little impact even in a hundred years and that many governments will try to shirk from.
This didn’t work in Kyoto, it didn’t work in Copenhagen, it hasn’t worked in the 18 other climate conferences or countless more international gatherings. The suggestion that it will make a large difference in Paris is wishful thinking.”
What should countries do instead?
Dr. Lomborg said: “Instead of trying to make fossil fuels so expensive that no one wants them – which will never work – we should make green energy so cheap everybody will shift to it.
The Copenhagen Consensus on Climate project gathered 27 of the world’s top climate economists and three Nobel Laureates, who found that the smartest, long-term climate policy is to invest in green R&D, to push down the price of green energy.
Subsidizing inefficient renewables is expensive and doesn’t work. The IEA estimates that we get 0.4% of our energy from wind and solar PV right now, and even in optimistic scenarios the fraction will only rise to 2.2% by 2040. Over the next 25 years, we’ll spend about $2.5 trillion in subsidies and reduce global warming temperatures by less than 0.02°C.
Copenhagen Consensus has consistently argued for a R&D-driven approach. Fortunately, more people are recognizing that this approach is cheaper and much more likely to succeed –including the Global Apollo Program which includes Sir David King, Lord Nicholas Stern, Lord Adair Turner and Lord John Browne.
You describe a 0.05°C reduction, but the UN Climate Chief, Christina Figueres, said Paris could lead to a 2.7°C rise instead of 4°C or 5°C. Why?
Christiana Figueres quote: “The INDCs have the capability of limiting the forecast temperature rise to around 2.7 degrees Celsius by 2100, by no means enough but a lot lower than the estimated four, five, or more degrees of warming projected by many prior to the INDCs.”
Dr. Lomborg said: “That entirely misrepresents the world’s options. The 2.7°C comes from the International Energy Agency and essentially assumes that if governments do little in Paris and then right after 2030 embark on incredibly ambitious climate reductions, we could get to 2.7°C.
That way of thinking is similar to telling the deeply indebted Greeks that just making the first repayment on their most pressing loans will put them on an easy pathway to becoming debt-free. It completely misses the point.
Figueres’ own organization estimates the Paris promises will reduce emissions by 33Gt CO₂ in total. To limit rises to 2.7°C, about 3,000Gt CO₂ would need to be reduced – or about 100 times more than the Paris commitments (see figure below). That is not optimism; it is wishful thinking.
Source: press release
Lomborg’s analysis essentially finds that if we look at the climate impact of all the [EU] Paris promises, they will in total reduce the temperature increase by the end of the century by a whopping 0.05°C (0.086°F)
Lomborg notes this to me:
Even if we extend the Paris promises for another 70 years, essentially cutting emissions all the way through the century, we will see temperature rise just 0.17°C less by the end of the century (0.306°F).
You might find it interesting to see, that the EU promises for Paris, which will cost $300-600 billion annually, will by themselves reduce temperature by just 0.017°C (0.031°F). And the much-touted Clean Power Plan will reduce temperatures by just 0.007°F.
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Isn’t that within the margin of error ????
The whole thing is one big error to begin with!
yes, 0.05 C over that many decades is undetectable with current technology.
“0.05 C over that many decades is undetectable with current technology”
No way, NCDC’s homogenization software could easily detect, and correct, changes that small.
Just out of curiosity:How much does it cost to hire someone to drop a large bomb on a given location-assuming ,of course there would be no animals harmed in any way?
Explain yourself.
The most irritating issue here is how all these studies and plans talk about returning to ‘pre-industrial climate’ which was also called the Little Ice Age!!!
This plan is insane. It was very cold during that period compared to the Medieval Warm Period which was a time of plenty for many peasants due to longer growing seasons. We have to call these climate vandals out on their plans to return us to the Little Ice Age conditions!
This is why every warming ‘study’ assumes this will be evil whereas returning to Little Ice Age conditions is fantastic.
And all predicated on man made CO2 having any discernible and measurable effect on temperature or weather events!
Interestingly, there was recently a “study” which purported to show that temperatures over 13.5 degrees was bad for civilisation. Think how much better a temperature of 0 degrees would be for it. We would enter a new golden age. Or was that hoarfrost white?
And the costs of the Paris proposals? Probably trillions of dollars.
To kill capitalism they will need to implement communism. I hope they will not succeed. The world is in for a lot of suffering if they do.
Missing quote mark.
But the point is well made.
Switching from the cheapest form of energy is harmful. So if you want people to switch from fossil fuels you need to make something else the cheapest form of energy.
That means a new, plentiful form of energy. Which rules out Geothermal in most places.
That means a new, readily available on demand form of energy. Which rules out Wind and Solar.
That means a new, low impact form of energy. Which rules out large-scale Hydro.
So invest in nuclear, tidal and wave power research.
And stick with the fossil fuels until the alternatives are economic.
MCoutney, agree, but would also add “reliable”, Our economies depend upon computers and if they cannot function our economies will crash.
To use some common sense here the costs for this farce are way out of proportion to the achievable results
So invest in nuclear, tidal and wave power research.
==============
both wave and tidal power are intermittent. Waves depend on wind. The tides are cyclical. They wax and wane with the moon.
The only solution that is currently available is nuclear, but the present technology is far from adequate, because it can be easily be weaponized as a dirty bomb.
the problem is that people have no real comprehension of how much more power is compressed into fossil fuels as compared to green power of a comparable size.
For example, from my experience a standard 10kg tank of propane was the energy equivalent of 1 solar panel for 1 year in the tropics. But the propane is much more convenient, and avoids the large capital outlay.
And you can move around that bottle of gas and use when needed.
On June 26, 1954, at Obninsk, Russia, the nuclear power plant APS-1 with a net electrical output of 5 MW was connected to the power grid, the world’s first nuclear power plant that generated electricity for commercial use. On August 27, 1956 the first commercial nuclear power plant, Calder Hall 1, Eng-land, with a net electrical output of 50 MW was connected to the national grid.
https://www.euronuclear.org/info/encyclopedia/n/nuclear-power-plant-world-wide.htm
Nuclear Power – 60 years – Dirty Bombs – 0 – Scary thoughts – unlimited.
Ferd writes: “The only solution that is currently available is nuclear, but the present technology is far from adequate, because it can be easily be weaponized as a dirty bomb.”
Ferd, I don’t think nuclear reactors are really needed to build “dirty” bombs. Sure, if you want to use something really exotic you need a breeder reactor but you can get some pretty lethal stuff right out of the ground and refine it with some bicycle parts and a few well trained squirrels.
There are relatively safe nuclear reactor designs. There is no political will to build them.
The IEA says windpower is now well cheaper than coal.
So opposing windpower is harmful, in your words. Please stop it.
Eh!?
Windpower is ‘only’ cheaper than fossil fuel when:
A) – The turbines are run 24 hr/day at ‘predicted peak’ power. Doesn’t happen ever.
B) – Wind power cost claims are based on fully subsidized wind power by taxes.
C) – Wind power costs always seem to forget maintenance costs, construction costs, end of life costs, transportation costs, land usage costs, dead birds, dead bats, impacts to power lines.
D) – Wind power costs always assume that someone else is dealing with intermittency and load costs to the grid.
E) – Wind Costs never mention that fossil fueled or nuclear generating stations must be online to cover wind power gaps.
F) – Wind power is not observed to be lasting their predicted lifetimes.
We don’t have to oppose wind power, though we do object to wind power due to turbine direct damage to wildlife.
We do ask that wind power take ownership of their total responsibilities and operate without taxpayer subsidies.
[Note: “Kent Pitman” is a sockpuppet name. ~mod.]
“Lomborg: Paris climate pact will reduce temperature increase by the end of the century by a whopping 0.05°C”
That sounds like it contains a high degree of certainty – “will reduce”.
Wouldn’t a more “could, at most, reduce” be better?
The primary bone of contention is the exact amount of warming caused by anthropogenic CO2 emissions and Lomborg is professing a certainty, is he not?
Actually, the “exact” amount of warming isn’t much of a bone of contention, it is accepted that the true number falls within a range of values that have been established by over two dozen research groups over the years.
The true bone of contention is convincing governments to stand up to the fossil fuel industry and require them to pay for the damage they are profiting from, which is the only way to fund the necessary cuts.
What damage are you referring to ?
Vince, activate your brain cells, and try to imagine what the world would be like had it not been for the fossil fuel industry.
WhirlyVince:
There is not any ‘exact’ amount of warming. There is a lot of ‘noise’ claiming one or another warming points in that range; yet only the minimal rates are confirmed as ‘possible’ by actual observations.
Possible, yet there is zero proof that any of the observed warming is due to CO2. It is also possible that all of the observed warming is due to ‘natural’ causes.
There is no bone of contention convincing governments to oppose fossil fuel use. The bone of contention is again a complete lack of observed proof.
A global 0.05 deg. C. detection is lost in the noise of natural variation.
JohnWho writes: “Wouldn’t a more “could, at most, reduce” be better? ”
Good catch John! That happens to me all the time and I hate it when it does. I fall into the trap of accepting the nonsensical, unfounded claims made by the alarmist “scientists”, then present my own rebuttals and arguments on a playing field of their construction.
Yes. Uncertainty in the claims must be expressed. No one has demonstrated there is any measurable effect of CO₂ on warming (or any measurable warming as a result for that matter) so it would be a concession, in the footsteps of the Stockholm Syndrome, to suggest any changes in CO₂ emissions would have a measurable effect.
Very good point.
I am impressed that he speaks the truth on the upcoming Paris charade, however his solution is to make green energy cheaper. This fails to address the absolute inability for green energy to meet our needs. Making it cheaper is as useful as adding more deckchairs to the titanic. Unfortunately he is still a believer and thus irrational.
Well, I’ll agree with Lomborg on this one. At the moment, it’s not viable. It won’t be viable until we have a capacity multiple times our needs. However, there’s nothing wrong with looking into it. We might even be able to wheedle some nuclear research into the mix.
Research and development seems to be the best approach. If we pour in a few billion dollars and get nothing, then we at least we have discovered a number of things not to do, and we will hopefully get at least a few incremental improvements useful in niche applications.
It’s a darn sight better than what we’ve been doing.
The great thing about capitalism is that these sorts of things will naturally transition when needed. I think you are suggesting by “we pour in a few billion dollars” you meen taxpayers. Why not let private industry. They were working on solar etc. before big green, and they probably would have been at about the same place we are now even without big green. Those ‘few billion dollars’ you mention have gone up in smoke.
“The great thing about capitalism is that these sorts of things will naturally transition when needed.”
Um, no. Nuclear energy is a perfect example. It never would have taken off without major government research money in the late 1940s and 50s. Nuclear energy has received 48% of total DOE energy research funding since 1948. Fossil fuels has received 25%, renewable 12%.
Jeff, businesses tend to only research things that are safe, or at least give foreseeable benefits, and wealthy patrons can no longer contribute enough to fund significant “big science” projects. Business research will give incremental benefits and applications in spades, but full-out new avenues just aren’t going to spring up completely organically. Interestingly, our current funding of solar and wind are probably hindering their development, as there aren’t enough incentives to make them good enough or cheap enough to be viable on their own.
Besides, as a practical solution, saying “do nothing” is not going to be an acceptable solution to people who have been told for years that they have to stop global warming. Even if we win the argument, people want to do something productive, even if it’s meaningless. We have to first convince them that it’s not all that bad a situation and the solutions they propose are horrible, and then we have to produce something for them to back that will work better and be cheaper.
The largest blockade to nuclear energy research is public policy on the deployment of nuclear power stations. Technology aside, no one wants Three Mile Island, Chernobyl or Fukushima Daiichi in the back yard and that is the problem.
Private industry is not going to invest billions in research on technology they won’t be able to use. Nuclear technology is trapped in irrelevance by public policy and regulatory capture; it cannot succeed. Until that situation changes there will be no nuclear solution and no end to the world’s dependence on fossil fuels.
I’d give the good doctor the benefit of the doubt and assume that by “cheaper” he means “viable economic alternative” which would encompass uptime and reliability, however achieved, not just a simple naked $/watt comparison.
Marlowe From what I can deduce he seems to have a very broad definition of ‘green’ energy that includes oil derived from fracking.
Thank God they will fail. Don’t any of these morons bother to ponder what hapens when they reduce CO2 to preindustrial levels? Massive starvation, for one. And how do they plan to counter that by producing CO2 after they have eliminated all sources of CO2? Light all the forests afire?
Wha…?
Maybe you can step me through this:
– who is planning on reducing CO2 to pre-industrial levels?
– considering CO2 level is now higher than it ever was during our species’ entire history, *how* is anybody going to reduce it?
– who is going to “eliminate all sources of CO2”?
– are you imagining that the entire world was a barren CO2-free desert until Mankind came along and started emitting CO2?
– if so, it may surprise you to learn that our natural environment has a thing called the carbon cycle….
Check it out:
“– are you imagining that the entire world was a barren CO2-free desert until Mankind came along and started emitting CO2?”
Well, almost. During the last Interglacial it appears that “natural” atmospheric CO2 got down to levels around 180-220 ppm., just above “carbon starvation” where C3 plant life may die or fail to reproduce. These are among the lowest levels of CO2 in Earth’s geologic history, as Mother Nature seems to naturally remove carbon from the atmosphere and bury it. I may be wrong but I think it was Dr. Moore (ex-Greenpeace) who made the observation that mankind has fortuitously begun to put back into the atmosphere some of that long buried carbon, to the benefit of both humans and plant life. The “normal” level of atmospheric CO2 would seem to be several times what it is today.
The fallacy is to believe that any of this has anything to do with changing the temperature of the planet. This is a new form of foreign aid. As the economist Peter Bauer put it foreign aid is “poor people in rich countries having money taken away from them to be given to rich people in poor countries.
This is why the Climate Change establishment hates Bjorn Lomberg and will try to sabotage him, even though he starts off making the same assumptions of a true believer. His analysis shows that what is being done is futile.
Lord Monckton is the same – using their own data and methodology, he blows a hole in their analysis.
But…hang on….the coal companies and Lomborg are telling us all the poor people in the world need cheap coal.
The coal industry receives government subsidies amounting to hundreds of billions every year.
Is that foreign aid?
WhirlyVince:
Name any actual subsidy received by coal! Taxes and reduced taxes are never subsidies.
You’re full of hundreds of billions of bogus information.
And you’re beginning to sound like one of the pet sock puppet vermin that love to come here and argue nonsense.
Wrinkly loathsome social pariahs who detest honest science frequenting discussion sites as repulsive sock puppets.
“Name any actual subsidy received by coal!”
Of course coal has gotten subsidies as expressed in federally funded research. Here is a history:
http://energy.gov/fe/early-days-coal-research
Nice link Chris. It’s a shame there are no subsidies to coal in the link or the referenced research.
No subsidies for coal identified!! Only informative and comical links.
Chris … I don’t think researching creating synthetic fuels from coal during the 1940s and 1950s qualifies as ‘subsidies’ to the coal industry … and it certainly doesn’t qualify as current subsidies.
Did you even bother to read your article that is clearly labeled “Early Days of Coal Research?”
I really hate it when people offer links to totally irrelevant material. It’s a waste of time and effort.
“THE SCIENCE IS SETTLED” – one more time around… Right-o!
http://globalnews.ca/news/2327598/climate-science-indisputable-says-canadas-environment-minister-catherine-mckenna/
“PARIS – Canada’s environment minister says the new Liberal government agrees the science is indisputable – that global warming is real and that urgent action is needed to tackle the problem.
Catherine McKenna is in Paris meeting with fellow ministers from around the world…”
https://catherinemckenna.liberal.ca/biography/
“She completed her Bachelor’s degree in French and international relations at the University of Toronto, earned a graduate degree in international relations at the London School of Economics, and a law degree from McGill. She is called to the Bars of Ontario and New York.”
I can’t believe that you guys (not you personally, the general ‘you’ of Ontario, Quebec and BC) elected these loons! Now they will bleed Alberta and Saskatchewan dry trying to hide the destruction they bring to Canada.
Not me Jeff. I voted Conservative and I live in Alberta.
The latest elections in Alberta and Canada were national IQ tests, and we the people utterly failed.
I have publicly opposed global warming alarmist nonsense for three decades.
I was the one who proved that CO2 lagged temperature at all measured time scales.
Now I say natural global cooling will resume by about 2020.
Bundle up!
Regards, Allan
But hey, it’s a great place to party with other people’s money.
Thank goodness all of their climate models are accurate to 0.0001 deg C. Otherwise we wouldn’t know how important this conference is.
Now it’s settled?
So you’ve got better ones?
If so, get them added to this:
http://www.ig.utexas.edu/people/staff/charles/images/uncert1.gif
Wow, Vince. You found a pretty colored graph of someone’s wild-a$$ed prediction of runaway global warming! Hysterical climate alarmism at its finest. Too bad that real world observations don’t support your hysteria.
Temps haven’t risen for almost 20 years, according to satellite readings. Sea ice in the Arctic is increasing. The Antarctic is not melting down. The seas haven’t shown any increase in sea level rise. The pH of the oceans haven’t changed beyond the usual daily/seasonal/location variations. Polar bear numbers are healthy. There have been no widespread extinctions. Extreme weather events haven’t increased.
But your graph has such pretty colors … maybe we should believe that instead of all those pesky real world observations and measurements.
What doesn’t make sense to me is that the impact of China fulfilling every promise to their cuts (0.048C) is the same as the entire world fulfilling every promise to all their cuts (0.048C).Can someone explain this?
There are two different scenarios calculated, and they are confusingly presented. One calculation is everyone meeting their commits by 2030 and the other calculation is keeping those commits through to 2100. China warps both numbers since their commit is to grow emissions aggressively until 2030 and only start cutting then.
Davidmhoffer- Don’t forget that China has now abandoned its 1 child policy. By 2030 there could be be a steep increase in its population and consequent demand for energy. China will do what China wants to do and it won’t be about to reduce its energy consumption – especially it Obama want it to.
The climate impact of all Paris INDC promises is minuscule: if we measure the impact of every nation fulfilling every promise by 2030, the total temperature reduction will be 0.048°C (0.086°F) by 2100.
Should this read (0.086 F) by 2030?
And the diurnal swing is about how much on the average Parisian street at this time of year?
http://s16.postimg.org/5titepgx1/Street_Name.png
Thanks, Bjorn Lomborg, for pointing out how even if we accept the IPCC’s conclusions, the net result from CO2 emissions reductions, the bottom line, is very negative.
Here I am counting “not warming” as a desirable status, when in real terms the desirable status it is “not cooling”. This because colder weather kills more people than warmer weather.
“we should make green energy so cheap everybody will shift to it.”
The idea of “green” energy is a sham. We need cheap, reliable energy. End of story. The only alternative to fossil fuels for electricity will probably be some type of nuclear. As for alternatives for heat and transport, that’s a whole ‘nother ball of wax. Probably not going to happen for a long time.
Lomborg seems to be assuming the completely meaningless metric called “global temperature” is actually rising.
Yes, because that is an established fact. Don’t be so lonely out there on the fringe…
WhirlyVince:
Another falsehood!
It must be lonely deep in those slimy dark voids you inhabit.
You’re right, Vince. It is an established fact that “global temperature” is physically meaningless. Thanks for the validation.
Molten Salt Reactors are the low cost to build, as cheap as a coal fired plant to build; as they are low pressure and don’t require the expensive pressure domes, 170 atmosphere plumbing and triple water cooling systems. Lomborg overlooks energy density of wind which is 1/5 millionth of that of nuclear. Questions to environmentalists do you want to add 15 million wind turbines or only 30 thousand small inherently safe MSRs to create the forecast need to add 5 cubic miles of oil energy equivalent by 2050. http://www.egeneration.org
The problem with Molten Salt is that no one knows how to build them. The limited research done was back in the 50’s or 60’s, and limited to one or two research facilities. There are also some serious drawbacks to the technology. After reading the wikipedia article, it became clear that molten salt is not the home run a lot of people are preaching.
The story of Monju is pretty interesting:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monju_Nuclear_Power_Plant
$10billion spent over 29 years, total of one hour of power delivered so far.
…all paid for by the taxpayer, of course…
$10,000 would pay for enough wind turbines to deliver 2 reactors’-worth of power to the grid. And the on-going costs for turbines are a tiny fraction of the on-going costs per MW for a reactor.
Nuclear is a tired, expensive, and dated technology and a ridiculously risky method to boil water to generate power. Waste of time.
WhirlyVince:
You mean like the 1 Trillion plus dollars spent on ‘climate change’, solar, wind that vanished without anything substantive? Those green cheap energy companies have mostly failed.
Existing nuclear power stations and hydro are the cheapest forms of power per MW.
Wind isn’t cheap, it is definitely not cheaper than any of the fossil fuels. Knock off all of the freebies and subsidies and wind is darn expensive.
The “Engineering Disasters” TV series had a program about problems with MSR’s.
Can’t recall the program number.
Jeff, just starting a 5.5 GW project using MSRs…its worked out how to build safe, cheap and very safe and very fast. Cheaper than coal.
Lomborg is almost right up until the point at which he says we should make green energy so cheap everyone will want to use it. Greens continue to preach about investing more in green energy without ever saying what green energy we should be investing in, just more bland generalisation. We know that oil gas uranium and coal are finite but no one appears to consider the huge volume of raw commodities needed to facilitate the green dream. We consume 160,000 TWh’s of energy and if you wanted to replace that with wind – for example purposes only – it would take 2,766,611 voyages to carry 1,051,312,500,000 tons of iron ore in a 380,000 ton iron ore carrier would burn 13,418,063,350 tons of bunker fuel so of course its green. Then exactly where would you put them just the niggling 13 billion hectares of land.
Lomborg is the most acceptable of his chosen tribe but even he flounders as soon as the discussion turns to what actually can replace fossil and nuclear and right now there isn’t anything. Oil at 95 million barrels a day is unique with 600 different produces in daily use across the planet, whatever anyone would want to believe there is a hope in hell that this bounty can ever be replaced, the manufacturing system would be gigantic and the – again – precious finite resources to enable the process do not exist.
Thank goodness therefore that it looks as though oil will be around for some considerable time at least it will see me out.
According to Figueres we cannot burn oil coal and gas to live but we can burn huge volumes of what she hates in order to enable her Alice in Wonderland fantasy parallel universe.
This malignant bunch of illegitimate mentally deranged halfwits have used invalid models to create and support their fantasy world and now they are using IAM’s – integrated assessment models – to provide a socialised solution to a problem that only exists within their parallel universe, you really could not make it up.
Agree totally! But would also like to add that Thorium reactors are not on the Green lefties wish list, the reason being that we would still have cheap reliable energy. Their thinking is negative, it is not about saving the Earth if it was they wouldn’t want ugly bird and bat slicers/fryers that deface the landscape. It is purely about control and the implementation of a world wide socialist “utopia”which they cannot get via the ballot box, because the 1st world are not stupid enough to vote in extreme left wing parties (although France did come pretty close).
This is their last chance because they have the EU and Obama on their side, this will change (hopefully), when Obama leaves office and if Cameron doesn’t take us out of the EU inspiring other countries to do the same, then the migrant issue and inevitable internal terrorist attacks will be the downfall of the EU. The fact that we do not have Australia and Canada making rational decisions is also bad news.
Maybe whether the greens liked Thorium reactors or not might be a little bit more relevant if those reactors were actually real?
David Wells wrote:
“This malignant bunch of illegitimate mentally deranged halfwits have used invalid models to create and support their fantasy world and now they are using IAM’s – integrated assessment models – to provide a socialised solution to a problem that only exists within their parallel universe, you really could not make it up.”
David, tell us how your really feel about the global warming alarmists (“warmists”) – don’t hold back to spare anyone’s feelings. 🙂
I try to keep my tone much more moderate, respectfully referring to purveyors of global warming alarmist fantasies as “scoundrels and imbeciles”. Keep in mind the two terms are not mutually exclusive.
Regards, Allan
So, what Lomborg has shown is, that reducing GHG’s by 33 GT, as is the Paris best outcome, will cost $300-600 billion annually. But to achieve anything useful actual emission cuts would have to be 100 times that amount.
sac re bleu
Actually, Lomborg has shown nothing of the sort, which is no real surprise based on his past form and his lack of science or economics expertise or qualifications.
A bit more scepticism for what Lomborg writes is probably in order, I think…
Vince …
Your science or economics expertise or qualifications are . . . . . . ????
I presume the 0.05C figure was calculated using a climate sensitivity within the IPCC-approved range?
If so, 0.05C will be the maximum reduction, since Nature appears to believe the actual sensitivity is less than the IPCC’s calculated value.
Someone on Climate Etc. said the assumption was 3.0.
Dr. Lomborg said: “Instead of trying to make fossil fuels so expensive that no one wants them – which will never work – we should make green energy so cheap everybody will shift to it.
Earth to Dr. Lomborg….
Yeah, he forgot to add ” … that cures cancer”.
That is what we need. Cheap green energy that cures cancer… and reduces the entropy of the Universe.
http://www.sciencealert.com/austria-s-largest-state-now-gets-100-percent-of-its-electricity-from-renewables
Ooops, looks like reality is getting ahead of you…..
WhirlyVince:
Reality is something you do have trouble with.
From “World Nuclear Association’s” ‘Electricity Transmission Systems (Updated October 2015)’
About that 100% fantasy…
From Renewables International, ‘Is Austria now practically “nuclear-free”?’
Odd that none of those eco-buffoonery news articles bothered to check. It’s darn hard to find in the decent news sources too; e.g. WSJ, FT.
There is also an article about how these same places are producing electricity and selling it at 1/4 the actual cost and then hitting subscribers with ‘surcharges’. Surcharges end up on a total bill, not on the MW cost indexes. Tricky buggers.
The impact of all of the emission decreases will be undetectable, particularly as no gas at any concentration in the atmosphere can warm Earth’s surface. It’s simple thermodynamics. The “greenhouse” gases in the upper troposphere are supposed to re-radiate absorbed upwelling IR radiation back to the surface, thus warming the surface. The problem is that the upper troposphere is -17 deg C and Earth’s surface is 15 deg C, 32 deg C warmer. A cold object cannot warm a hot object. The energy levels of material on the surface that are equivalent to the downwelling IR are already full and the IR will be reflected (rejected) and sent back upward again, to be lost to space. They are giving CO2 and even water vapor much too much weight here, particularly when they ignore the global heat engine, the water cycle, which carries 85% of the solar energy input budget to altitude to be lost to space (this is Trenberth’s “missing heat”).
Admittedly, there is a small rate of IR being absorbed by greenhouse gases and converted directly to heat energy in the atmosphere, but this is a small effect as it works in both directions, such that this effect is a wash during daylight. However, at night, these gases serve to cool the air, converting heat energy to IR that is radiated in all directions. The surface is still warmer, so the IR is reflected and the IR goes out to space. This si why the air cools so very rapidly after sunset and little breezes kick up quickly in the shadows of clouds on a day with scudding clouds.
In other words, all of the policies proposed by anyone to decrease emissions of any kind have nothing to do with climate and all to do with wealth redistribution, crippling the industrialized countries, and forever stunting development of developing countries. They have no intention of letting any nation or peoples have a nice life. The UN wants to be the world government, which would have to be socialist and totalitarian, with saving the planet as the excuse for taking over.
If you have to lie to get what you want, then it is something you do not deserve in the first place. The ends DO NOT justify the means. They want the world to live in a huge lie.
“The energy levels of material on the surface that are equivalent to the downwelling IR are already full and the IR will be reflected (rejected) and sent back upward again, to be lost to space.”
So you admit a bunch of heat has been trapped by the CO2 and is spending more time down here with us than it would otherwise have done so, had there been no CO2?
Your story is a mish-mash of the completely non-sensical, the demonstrably untrue, the factoidal, the irrelevant and the embarrassingly illogical.
CO2’s absorption spectrum is a well-known, measurable fact.
The atmospheric greenhouse effect is a well-known, measurable fact.
@ur momisugly whirly vince – Yea, you are a leftist troll, alright. As usual for your type you resort to loaded words that are empty of substance and, in the end, think we are going to be amazed by your lack of real data to support anything you have to say. Practically everybody who posts here knows there is a greenhouse effect. We all know there has been warming. We also know that, according to satellite data, the earth has not warmed significantly for the last 18 years 9 months. Many of the people posting on this site are scientists and researchers who readily display their real knowledge of the subject. To attack them using distortion and dis-information just makes you look like a leftist moron. Oh! That’s right! You are one.
Aren’t the calculations based on IPCC scenario 8.5? An how far off the real temperature is the 8.5 scenario at the moment?
WOW – just noticed the ENSO Meter – took a big jump. What happened?
ENSO meter? Just El Niño.
https://bobtisdale.wordpress.com/2015/11/10/october-2015-sea-surface-temperature-sst-anomaly-update/
Imagine that 1.3bn people in the world without electricity actually achieve the dream of development and miraculously manage it with just 6kw each per day.
The result? More than 10 United Kingdom size economies firing up.
I have a sneaking suspicion that cheap ‘green’ energy will struggle to meet this demand.
According to the IEA, windpower is now cheaper than coal.
I have a sneaking suspicion that you don’t really care enough about poor people in the 3rd world to support their quest for getting access to the cheapest form of electricity though…
vincewhirlwind says:
According to the IEA, windpower is now cheaper than coal.
Preposterous nonsense.
Coal costs around 6¢ – 8¢ a kwh. Windmill power — when it’s even available — costs in excesas of 25¢/kwh.
Coal power is always available. Windmills work when there’s wind.
WhirlyVince:
What an odd argument? Demean the poor and the poster at the same time.
Why is it so hard to recognize that everyone suffers under eco-lunacy with the poor getting the worst of it? So to bolster your lack of humanity you attack those who seek to aid the poor?!
I said loathsome earlier, I need to add totally repugnant moral values to your description too.
Do you also attend cock and dog fights too?
Show the EIA link. This kind of nonsense, often a made up statistics by green media, is common. Here are the facts: In my state, wholesale electricity cost is 2 c/kWh. That’s the price to compete with. The price on my residential monthly bill is 8 c/kWh. The Cape Cod Wind project was canceled because there were no investors (aside from the governments) that would agree to BUY the wind electricity at the projected 25 c/kWh (and sell it at 2 c/kWh while paying dividends, insurance, debt, and make profit).