Most WUWT readers know Joltin Joe Romm by his trademark over the top rhetoric and his outright hatred of skeptics on parade every day at his Center for American Progress blog. Most of us have learned to ignore it, because he’s simply pushing a company brand.
That said, Master Resource has this interesting story today; it seems Joe was endorsing the nastiest energy company in history, as told by someone who was an employee, Robert Bradley Jr..
From Master Resource:
It is a common refrain in headlines at Joe Romm’s Climate Progress:
- “Koch-Fueled Americans for Prosperity Takes Credit for Bullying GOP Lawmakers Into Climate Denial” (Emilee Piece: December 8, 2011);
- “Koch-Fueled Denial Backfires: Independents, Other Republicans Split With Tea-Party Extremists on Global Warming” (Romm: December 2, 2012); and
- “Koch-Fueled Americans for Prosperity Spends $2.4 Million on Solyndra Attack Ad (VIDEO)” (Stephen Lacey: November 28, 2011).
Smearing and innuendo is hardly fair play. But in this case, Joe Romm has something embarrassing to hide. Just as Koch Industries might be his least favorite company, Enron was his darling company.
Specifically, Romm was not only a cheerleader of Enron (Enron is “a company I greatly respect,” Romm would say). He was also an unpaid consultant and collaborator with the infamously fraudulent division, Enron Energy Services (EES), purveyor of energy efficiency service in (gamed) long-term contracts.
It is timely to reestablish the linkage between Joe Romm and once-mighty Enron Corporation, a company which went bankrupt ten years ago this month. Perhaps this history will help the combustible Romm to deal with the arguments more and funding links less. (Besides, would he like for his critics to bring in the funding link between George Soros and Center for American Progress?)
Some Romm Enron Quotations
Read the rest here at Master Resource
You know, I want to know where to get me some of that Koch denial moolah folks are yammering about. I do my best to indoctrinate the boys and girls about climate issues, yes I do, but not a penny of that big Koch money have I seen in all these years of teaching. Surely someone here can hook a girl up?
It is also said, IIRC, that Enron was (one of ) the force(s) behind the push for carbon legislation and renewables. As usual, it all ends up making sense.
Wow, talk about being a hypocrite, this must take the cake. Does this man have any decency or any morality at all? Scratch that, the last was of course rhetorical.
In any regard, looks like big enron funds the hypocrite.
REPLY: I don’t know that Bradley has established any funding of Romm by Enron -Anthony
Oh how fondly I remember Enron.
They bought the utility company I worked for, primarily to acquire the Oregon – California intertie. Just about every Enron employee I dealt with – fortunately they were few – came across as either arrogant, slimy or both. They took over the communications affiliate and went into fiber construction big time. Guess who became one of our biggest sources of problems? Apparently following the rules was beneath them. To this day I’m convinced they installed fiber along transmission corridors without notifying either the utility or underlying property owners.
I would mention $125,000 in 401k accounts that went up in smoke, but that falls under the category of personal problem. Yeah, I have this nice warm spot for Enron.
It is kinda funny to read Romm’s Wikipedia page. No mention of Enron…
But,…” In March 2009, Rolling Stone magazine named Romm to its list of “100 People Who Are Changing America”
…and “In 2009, U.S. News & World Report featured Romm as one of eight “key players” in its article “Driving Public Policy in Washington”, In 2009, Time magazine named Romm one of its “Heroes of the Environment (2009)”. It wrote, “He combines … intellect with a strong sense of moral outrage. He also possesses a Jon Stewart-like quality for pointing out the absurdity of his opponents.”…. Romm’s blog, in addition to being named one of the “Top 15 Green Websites” by Time magazine, was ranked as the leading “Green site”, in 2009, by Technorati. In 2009, Thomas L. Friedman, in his column in The New York Times, called Climate Progress “the indispensable blog”.
ok…I feel a bout of rapid onset retro-peristalsis approaching…
Andrew
“Enron Romm” sounds nice. Like “Bagdad Bob”. 🙂
Romm is a living testament to the adage “the ends justify the means” for those who care nothing for the facts – just the end goal.
It seems that Enron was nothing more than a trial run for future top warmalistas.
Discernment, rationality and good business acumen, all hardwired into this guy, way to go Joe.
So big oil is associated with a Warmist. What a surprise. Sort of like GE buying The Weather Channel in order to propagandize.
Google Games…
“Joseph Romm” Enron = About 9,600 results (0.14 seconds)
“Joe Romm” Enron = About 17,600 results (0.15 seconds)
“President Bush” Enron= About 5,570,000 results (0.13 seconds) gee…way more results and faster too!
“Joe Romm” enron “President Bush” = About 5,280 results (0.22 seconds)
Since WUWT get so much traffic, if we all start bitchin’ about Romm and Enron online…the message will get out there via ‘the google’…we can work around Google’s AGW bias, lol!
I usually don’t even think about Joe Romm. This piece reminded me of this little debate from a couple years ago:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9tUO4WqAg2Q
Want to know who WAS paid by Enron to write favorable pieces about them? (yes, it’s documented)
Noted NYT columnist and Global Warming true believer, Paul Krugman.
In a former life I was in Omaha NE as an engineer. This during the ’80’s. There was a FINE, established, 70+ year old company, “Northern Natural Gas”, with 5000 employess, servicing about 30 million people across the midwest. Then a group of upstart financial manipulators came in, Houston Nat. Gas, about 1200 employees..and “leverage bought out” NNG. End result: 900 employees left in Omaha. About 2000 employees offered jobs in TX. (About 1/2 of them took it…no other choices.) Families ripped apart. Long term stability destroyed. All because of a bunch of young ’30 year olds, who were great manipulators, but dripping with SLIME. Oh, Houton Nat. Gas was too provincial, so they changed the name to ENRON. (Because it sounds like END RUN, which is what they did around most ethical business practices.) One of the chief of the miscreants was Kenneth Lay. I must say, he took the “easy way out”.. He DIED before he could be tried and sent for a stay at a Federal Hotel. DANG!
Bradley blew the whistle on Enron and Romm has hated him for it ever since .
“December 2, 2012”?
There was nothing substantive in those quotations.
Basically, Romm said “Enron looks like a cool company” and “Enron senior staff believes what I say” and “Enron has made big deals.”
At worst, they show Romm was wrong about Enron – along with a whole lot of other people.
EnRomm, the oil supported bubble head of the CO2 ponzi scheme. He’s probably just pissed he missed out on the future fortune of Enron. :-()
“In 2009, Thomas L. Friedman, in his column in The New York Times, called Climate Progress “the indispensable blog”.”
Friedman — who longs to replace the US Constitution with Chinese-style single-party dictatorial rule?
But, then, CAGW *IS* just another justification for doing just that, so…
ah- that would explain romm’s unnatural fascination with energy co. funding- the ‘secret shame syndrome’
like the ‘white collar drug addicts’ rush limbaugh was curiously on about…
like the ‘no sex outside marriage’ that doctor laura obsessed over…
like congressman Foley, one of the foremost opponents of child pornography…
“REPLY: I don’t know that Bradley has established any funding of Romm by Enron -Anthony”
I stand corrected Anthony. I read “unpaid” as paid. It was my mistake, and I appologize for my post which alluded to something that was a mistake. Thanks for correcting me. It is better to be called out for a wrong then to go on believing a falsehood….at least that is my two cents on the issue. Again, thanks!
-Ben
Kevin Butler says:
December 19, 2011 at 11:09 am
There was nothing substantive in those quotations.
ummm…you didn’t read Bradley’s piece did you…
“Your [Enron Energy Services’] folk believe what I say is possible, and, more to the point, is a reasonable ‘goal’–I have that from Tom White himself, though ‘Kyoto’ probably has more meaning as a benchmark goal so that is more my focus now. I have had many discussions with EES’s senior staff.”
– Email communication from Romm to Enron, July 23, 1999.
Kevin Butler says:
December 19, 2011 at 11:09 am
Basically, Romm said “Enron looks like a cool company” and “Enron senior staff believes what I say” and “Enron has made big deals.”
At worst, they show Romm was wrong about Enron – along with a whole lot of other people.
ummm…try doing some research as well…
Coolcompanies.org is a project of the non-profit
Center for Energy & Climate Solutions
The Center was founded in 1999 by Dr. Joe Romm
http://www.cool-companies.org/targets/
from that specific page…on Romm’s own website…
The Business Council for Sustainable Energy
The Business Council for Sustainable Energy, a group of senior executives in the natural gas, energy efficiency, electric utility and renewable energy industries in the United States has also provided active support for climate protection measures. Members include Enron, Honeywell, Trane, Lockheed, York International, Sempra, Keyspan and others.
Romm says in the clip that “it’s clear that we’re going to warm this country by 10 to 15 degrees by the end of the current century if we continue with our current emissions.” Pretty spectacular claim. It makes me that much prouder to have been attacked by him on his blog and to have the attack be included in his book of 2010.
Speaking of books, the second excerpt from my own is here: http://bit.ly/umfr5Q
You’re right – Google games is fun…
“President Obama” Enron:
About 4,390,000 results (0.18 seconds)
“Al Gore” Enron
About 3,550,000 results (0.18 seconds)
“Andrew” Enron
About 2,470,000 results (0.08 seconds)
“EnRomm” has a nice, accurate ring to it.
Ken Lay, leader of enron, was heavily involved in getting kyoto protocol advanced, circa 1997.
Why? At least because he saw a boost to natural gas market from kyoto.
he wanted U.S. to sign on.
But otherwise, he knew a cap-n-trade carbon market would be awesome.
ken lay was one of the ppl credited with dreaming up the carbon exchange cap and trade idea, while at the department of energy in the early 1970s.
the dept of energy funded michael mann’s dissertation, in 1996:
1996 Alexander Hollaender Distinguished Postdoctoral Fellowship.
that was funded by the dept of energy.
Joe EnRomm
EnRomm
Great
My company delivered some of the technology to get Enron into the wind business. Enron wind is now GEWind. Northern Natural is owned by Buffett/berkshire.
Koch,
ElPaso, Dynegy and a couple others were big in counter trades with Enron. Enron scams took many folks down. Koch was too large to get damage. Many Koch workers were lured to Enron with huge increases.
SOX, COX, NoX and Ch4 control trade schemes were conjured up at Enron. alGore, Clinton, Jim Hansen were participants.
There is so much fiasco bred at Enron that people still don’t connect the dots.
Sorry to hear about Enron using it’s own stock for 401K plans. I made a lot of money trading Enron stock. I wrote a market trading model in the early 70’s in fortran. i used what I remembered about fortran to see where the Mann manipulated his data.
The only good out of enron was EOG and they spun off if i recall a couple years before the implosion.
As you probably already know, Enron invented Cap-and-Trade, attempting to make their subsidiary Enron Wind profitable. Apparently, they tried hard to get the US to sign the Kyoto protocol.
Greenhouse gas quotas will be an off-book asset, so some companies are going to get a windfall financial gain…. And when you’re allocating a $100 billion pie, or in fact, a potentially larger pie than that, even a small slice of that pie is pretty valuable.
http://climateerinvest.blogspot.com/2011/12/enron-on-cap-and-trade-ene.html
T Boone picked up the wind power mantle in Texas after Ken Lay died. GE bought Enron Wind. Remember “ecomagination”?
http://www.masterresource.org/2009/03/governor-rick-perry-r-tx-t-boone-pickens-and-the-enron-legacy-of-windpower/
When corporations and individuals successfully use the power of govenment coercion to make money, it isn’t in our best interest. Regulations distort the free market and limit competition. We lose jobs and pay higher prices for poorer quality products. Innovation is stifled.
http://biggovernment.com/chorner/2011/05/18/media-gift-republicans-pickens-new-subsidy-and-the-circular-firing-squad/
Of course, government doesn’t give anything away for free. They get something out of the deal. Smart grid is one example. The following link barely scratches the surface.
http://www.networkworld.com/community/blog/are-smart-meters-real-time-surveillance-spies
Although T Boone promoted wind power and natural gas fuel, his unstated goal was to acquire land under which the Ogallala aquifer sits. Texas law does not restrict landowners from pumping groundwater from their property. The plan was to sell approximately 1 million acre-feet per year to the larger cities in Texas. However, Dallas, for example, isn’t buying into the plan.
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/08_25/b4089040017753.htm
The potential impact of the Pickens water plan argues for legitimate regulation. However, what will stop the government from taking ever more control? An informed population has a chance to control a limited government. An uninformed population can’t. An unlimited government can’t be controlled. Economic reality eventually will restrain government. The starving bureaucracy will try to save itself by borrowing, or by finding an internal or external enemy to fight. It would be better if we could stop the spending early and shrink government.
Unfortunately, too many people have become dependent on public services – by design they become hostages. When the collapse comes, there may be no safety net except their families, friends, and neighbors.
Some half-baked ideas I’m tossing around:
Perhaps some form of economic collapse is an inevitable part of a longer term cycle of nations. Progressive corruption in government, unchecked bureaucratic growth, and abuse of power may be impossible to prevent. If so, it may be better to avoid creating synchronized and deeply tied multi-national economies that rise and fall together. The damage may be limited if individual countries collapse and re-organize, instead of letting neighboring nations “save” them. Preserving the corruption only allows it to spread, possibly making the delayed collapse wider and deeper. People should be able to move out of a failing nation to acquire new skills and new ideas about how a successful country should be run. After the re-org, investors from wealthier nations should be able to make some money in the rebuilding process. As conditions improve, people will want to move back.
Another socialist goal, at least in the US, is to discredit capitalism, crush the economy, and replace it with one the socialists prefer (e.g. centralized command and control). They have to corrupt the system to make it fail. Our economies are not failing because they are free – there is no free market anymore; governments have too much control over markets, improperly picking winners and losers.
Enron has left quite a legacy. However, it is only a symptom of a more deadly disease.
oh wow, someone who has outdone the Australian Tim Flannery, the Flim Flam man!! Way to go Joe!! / sarc off
Maybe somebody like Minnesotans for Global Warming can put that to this:
Chris says:
December 19, 2011 at 12:01 pm
You’re right – Google games is fun…
“President Obama” Enron:
About 4,390,000 results (0.18 seconds)
“Andrew” Enron
About 2,470,000 results (0.08 seconds)
Great catch! I had forgotten about Andrew Fastow, Enron’s CFO, he got a reduced sentence for testifying against Ken Lay and Jeff Skilling. Since Lay is dead, and Skilling is continuing his appeal of his 24 year sentence, Andrew Fastow is the guy people should be talk with! He got a 6 year sentence…so he should be free soon.
Andrew (not Fastow)
=))
Enron Romm
Posted on December 19, 2011 by Anthony Watts
[i]Most WUWT readers know Joltin Joe Romm by his trademark over the top rhetoric and his outright hatred of skeptics on parade every day at his Center for American Progress blog. Most of us have learned to ignore it, because he’s simply pushing a company brand.[/i]
I used to check in regularly at CP to see what his hate target [i]du jour[/i]was. Since he vainly added his visage to the site’s banner, I quit looking. One can take only so much.
January 2002: National Center for Public Policy Research: Enron and the Environmental Movement:
Global Warming Politics Makes for Strange Bedfellows
by Amy Ridenour
Enron hoped to cash in on the Kyoto treaty by masterminding a worldwide trading network in which major industries could buy and sell credits to emit carbon dioxide – the inert gas that some scientists and most environmentalists believe contributes to global warming.
The Houston firm’s lobbying push appeared to be on the verge of success when Vice President Al Gore signed the Kyoto Protocol in November of 1998…
The Clinton Administration’s interest in obtaining an international agreement to fight global warming meshed with Enron’s dream of huge profits from new investments in natural gas utilities and pipelines. Ratification of the Kyoto treaty would have played into Enron’s greed by forcing the U.S. to switch from coal-fired power plants to ones fueled by cleaner-burning natural gas. The trading surge in emission credits thus would have funneled an ever-increasing flow of cash into its coffers…
As part of the strategy, CEO Kenneth Lay signed Enron onto the Business Environmental Leadership Council of the Pew Center for Global Climate Change, a left-leaning think-tank headed by Eileen Claussen, a former Environmental Protection Agency and State Department official in the Clinton Administration.
The Pew Center has waged an expensive propaganda campaign over the past few years aimed at convincing journalists that global warming is a dire threat.
Other companies joining Pew’s Business Environmental Leadership Council also stood to gain vast sums if federal regulators imposed strict new limits on carbon dioxide emissions, including such powerhouses as Boeing, British Petroleum, International Paper, Lockheed-Martin, Maytag, 3M, Toyota, Weyerhaeuser and Whirlpool.
Lay, a close personal friend of leading Republicans and Democrats, also joined two far-left environmental groups – the Union of Concerned Scientists and the Natural Resources Defense Council – in calling for new curbs on emitting CO2 into the atmosphere…
How duplicitous were the environmental groups that joined Enron in its crusade for Kyoto? Did these organizations financially benefit from their strange bedfellow alliance with giant energy company?…
http://www.nationalcenter.org/NPA384.html
Hansen mention here:
6 Feb 2002: Cato Institute: Why Enron Wants Global Warming
by Patrick J. Michaels
By now, much to the chagrin of my greener friends, it is common knowledge that Enron Corporation was lobbying the Bush administration for highly profitable policies relating to the Kyoto Protocol on global warming. In fact, the tatters of Enron still want the administration to place a cap on carbon dioxide emissions so the company can broker the trading of “permits” to emit carbon dioxide under that cap…
But what’s not run-of -the-sty is a 1998 letter, signed by Enron’s then-CEO Ken Lay (and a few other bigwigs), asking President Clinton, in essence, to harm the reputations and credibility of scientists who argued that global warming was an overblown issue. Apparently they were standing in Enron’s way.
The letter, dated Sept. 1, asked the president to shut off the public scientific debate on global warming, which continues to this date. In particular, it requested Clinton to “moderate the political aspects” of this discussion by appointing a bipartisan “Blue Ribbon Commission.”
The purpose of this commission was clear: high-level trashing of dissident scientists…
But what about Kyoto itself, which Enron knew would never be ratified by the required 67 senators? In 1998, Kyoto enjoyed the support of about 12 senators. “We urge the Kyoto Protocol not be submitted to the Senate in the near future, where pre-emptive rejection would remove the U.S. from a political leadership role,” said Lay’s letter. In other words, Lay wanted to derail the normal democratic process of having our elected officials vote on a treaty, so that Enron could prosper.
While that was happening, Enron commissioned its own internal study of global warming science. It turned out to be largely in agreement with the same scientists Enron was trying to shut up. After considering all of the inconsistencies in climate science, the report concluded: “[T]he very real possibility that the great climate alarm could be a false alarm. The anthropogenic warming could well be less than thought and favorably distributed.”
One of Enron’s major consultants in that study was NASA scientists James Hansen, who started the whole global warming mess in 1988 with his bombastic congressional testimony…
True to its plan, Enron never made its own findings public, self-censoring them while it pleaded with the new Bush administration for a cap on carbon dioxide emissions that it could broker. That pleading continues today — the remnant-Enron still views global warming regulation as the straw that will raise it from its corporate oblivion.
http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=3388
——————————————————————————–
Carbon Trade Exchange: Our People
Lloyd Fleming, Managing Director, European Operations
Lloyd’s commercial experience began over 20 years ago with a small commercial law firm. In 1993 he moved to Standard Chartered to help establish a market risk management function. Progressing through a number of credit and operational risk roles, he moved to Enron Corporation in early 2000 and gained a breadth of experience across electricity, gas, broadband and metals trading.
Returning to Australia in September 2002, Lloyd worked for PwC in financial risk management before to moving to ANZ into a strategic risk role. Lloyd’s growing interest in sustainability and climate change ultimately led to his becoming a director in ANZ’s Institutional Sustainability team for two years. In this role he worked on developing revenue opportunities for financing based on climate change impacts, carbon markets and energy efficiency…
Peter Fusaro, Non-Executive Director
Peter is Chairman of Global Change Associates a financial services advisory in New York and is the best selling author of What Went Wrong at Enron as well as 15 other books on energy and the environmental financial markets..
http://www.carbontradexchange.com/our-people.php
this appeared the moment Durban ended:
12 December 2011: PR Wire: Sydney Australia: Carbon Trading Goes Mobile in World First Deployment
Carbon Trade Exchange (CTX), an Australian-based carbon credits (offsets) trading marketplace, today expanded its service for brokers and corporate clients with the launch of a new, mobile service for accessing the CTX trading platform…
***(Wayne Sharpe, CEO of CTX “It’s incredible to think that a broker, CEO, CFO or head of sustainability could be on the beach in Australia or in the South of France buying carbon credits, real time, from South America or Africa, in an end-to-end electronic transaction. That really is cool. We believe that the mobility we’ve announced today is the future of carbon trading.”
The new technology is live for Carbon Trade exchange members today.
About Carbon Trade Exchange
Carbon Trade Exchange is a global carbon credit trading exchange…
http://www.prwire.com.au/pr/26462/carbon-trading-goes-mobile-in-world-first-deployment
@ Hoser,
If you have been keeping tabs on the MF Global issue (and others) regarding sophisticated financial instruments and how the UK handles them, we need to revisit this.
Risk management
Main article: Risk management
Before its fall, Enron was lauded for its sophisticated financial risk management tools.[47] Risk management was crucial to Enron not only because of its regulatory environment, but also because of its business plan. Enron established long-term fixed commitments which needed to be hedged to prepare for the inevitable fluctuation of future energy prices.[48] Enron’s bankruptcy downfall was attributed to its reckless use of derivatives and special purpose entities. By hedging its risks with special purpose entities which it owned, Enron retained the risks associated with the transactions. This setup had Enron implementing hedges with itself.[49]
Enron’s aggressive accounting practices were not hidden from the board of directors, as later learned by a Senate subcommittee. The board was informed on the rationale for using the Whitewing, LJM, and Raptor transactions, and after approving them, received status updates on the entities’ operations. Although not all of Enron’s widespread improper accounting practices were revealed to the board, the practices were dependent on board decisions.[50] Even though Enron extensively relied on derivatives for its business, the company’s Finance Committee and board did not have comprehensive backgrounds in derivatives to grasp what they were being told. The Senate subcommittee argued that had there been a detailed understanding of how the derivatives were organized, the board would have prevented their use.[51]
Special purpose entities
Main article: Special purpose entity
Enron used special purpose entities—limited partnerships or companies created to fulfill a temporary or specific purpose—to fund or manage risks associated with specific assets. The company elected to disclose minimal details on its use of special purpose entities.[25] These shell firms were created by a sponsor, but funded by independent equity investors and debt financing. For financial reporting purposes, a series of rules dictates whether a special purpose entity is a separate entity from the sponsor. In total, by 2001, Enron had used hundreds of special purpose entities to hide its debt.[22]
The special purpose entities were used for more than just circumventing accounting conventions. As a result of one violation, Enron’s balance sheet understated its liabilities and overstated its equity, and its earnings were overstated.[25] Enron disclosed to its shareholders that it had hedged downside risk in its own illiquid investments using special purpose entities. However, the investors were oblivious to the fact that the special purpose entities were actually using the company’s own stock and financial guarantees to finance these hedges. This setup prevented Enron from being protected from the downside risk.[25] Notable examples of special purpose entities that Enron employed were JEDI, Chewco, Whitewing, and LJM…
source: Wikipedia: Enron Scandal.
Ok, so how does this tie into current events? There is a wind company (companies) formed and headed by former Enron/GE guys from the Enron operation that was located in London.
http://seekingalpha.com/user/473076/comments/symbol/ge
The companies are First Wind/UPC/IVPV and numerous shell and shelf LLC’s.
http://bjdurk.newsvine.com/_news/2010/02/23/3941671-who-are-these-guys-cape-wind-emi-upc-first-wind-paul-gaynor-oreste-vigorito-ivpc
They just blew in out of nowhere and are getting hundred of millions in loan guarantees and even bailout money, have connections to Chicago hedge funds, connections to Larry Summers, the white house, GE and on and on. In light of the MF Global issues one has to wonder where did all that enron money disappear too? The UK? That’s my bet.
Just today they got another 210mm in financing.
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/first-wind-secures-210-million-financing-for-palouse-wind-project-2011-12-19
excerpt:
As part of the financing, Palouse Wind, LLC closed an approximate $170 million construction and term facility loan, and letters of credit of up to $40 million. KeyBank National Association KEY +0.39% served as the joint lead arranger and administrative agent, and Nordduetsche Landesbank Girozentrale, CoBank ACB, and Banco Santander served as joint lead arrangers.
Now Goolge this: Banco Santander GE
Joe is our generation’s version of Lord Haw Haw or Tokyo Rose.
And his legacy will be as odious.
Our friends at the UEA were also open to engagement from Enron:
date: Mon Sep 17 10:17:17 2001
from: Keith Briffa
subject: RE: Climate Research at The University of East Anglia
to: “Jean Palutikof”
I am interested but happy for you and Phil to meet with him/them . If a visit to CRU is requested , I would be happy to take part in a general discussion.
Thanks
Keith
At 10:11 AM 9/17/01 +010 ???, you wrote:
Does anyone have a strong desire to meet him? Otherwise, I guess Phil and I can handle it.
Phil – do you want me to reply?
Jean
—–Original Message—–
From: Hamilton, Tony [[1]mailto:???@enron.com]
Sent: 14 September 2001 19:31
To: ???@uea.ac.uk; ???@uea.ac.uk; ???@uea.ac.uk;
???@uea.ac.uk; ???@uea.ac.uk
Subject: Climate Research at The University of East Anglia
Dear Sirs/Madam,
I am a senior specialist in statistical forecasting and meteorology with the research group at Enron Europe Ltd., based at Grosvenor Place, London. As you will know energy demand and supply is heavily dependant on climate, weather and weather forecasts. Also, increasingly, global energy demand and supply depends on climate and weather around the whole northern hemisphere.
Our devoted weather research and synoptic forecasting team based in our Houston office, and myself here in London, are extremely interested in the potential for collaborative University-University and University-Industry applied research projects, particularly between joint US/European research institutes and ourselves. We are interested in all aspects of Meteorology from new ideas in theoretical atmospheric physics through more practical aspects such as short-range deterministic forecasting, medium-range ensemble forecasting and long-range seasonal/climatic forecasting and analysis. My colleagues from Houston (who are currently planning visits to research institutes on the US side in the near future) will be in London in early November and I would very much like to set up an introductory meeting with the heads of the research groups at The Climatic Research Unit to introduce ourselves to you and discuss possible areas of mutual research interest.
If this is something that you would be interesting in setting up, or if you can direct me to a more suitable group or individuals at The University of East Anglia, please let me know and we can hopefully arrange a date for sometime in early November. I am currently in Houston, but hope to be able to return to London early next week depending on the current tragic situation here in the US. I can be contacted by email in the meantime.
Look forward to the opportunity of meeting with you in the near future.
In confidence,
Tony Hamilton
_______________________________________
Dr. Tony Hamilton
Senior Specialist, Meteorology and Forecasting
Weather Research
Enron Europe Ltd.
Enron House
–
Professor Keith Briffa,
Climatic Research Unit
University of East Anglia
Norwich, NR4 7TJ, U.K.
Phone: +4 ???-1603-593909
Fax: +4 ???-1603-507784
[2]http://www.cru.uea.ac.uk/cru/people/briffa[3]/
http://www.ecowho.com/foia.php?file=2241.txt&search=enron
john says:
December 19, 2011 at 3:21 pm
“Ok, so how does this tie into current events? There is a wind company (companies) formed and headed by former Enron/GE guys from the Enron operation that was located in London.”
I believe the London location is so that they can be close to Al Gore’s Hedge fund:
http://www.generationim.com/
Why would former VP of the USA and former CEO of Goldman Sachs form their investment company in London?
Could it be that if they established the investment company in the United States, Al Gore would be breaking Federal Securities Laws regarding conflict’s of interest? Since Al Gore is based in London, and subject to British Securities Regulations, Algore can say whatever he wants in the USA, with full protection of the First Amendment. Anybody that is a stockbroker/financial planner in the USA knows the rules on conflict of interest and insider trading, or at least they should.
Does that tie into current events enough for you?
Andrew
Looks like yet another case of “Do what I say not what I do” from a warmist. They should eventually enter the lexicon under hypocrite as an example or maybe a synonym.
And you can’t quote him on that can you?
Can’t – can’t – can’t.
I just want to underscore that point.
Can’t.
.
Good comparison.
.
I sometimes wish that I had taken the blue pill…………….
@ Andrew,
Enron used Arthur Anderson there (UK)…. It seems that the exact same thing is happening in the case of MF Global. Al Gore (Generation Investment) certainly has ‘advantages’ there in the (UK) as you say and remember that Ken Lay helped Al get his carbon business going.
Ironically, Cantor Fitzgerald was the first to really get things going until that Sept. day in 2001. No tin foil hats here, but I was involved in wind at the time and knew about Cantor’s Renewable Energy Credits efforts.
“In a time of deceit telling the truth is a revolutionary act.”
― George Orwell
Maybe we should all reread Animal Farm, then go eat a bunch of bacon and pork sausage!
Andrew
“over the top rhetoric and his outright hatred” – quite different to what one can find here, yes.
Mighty hoax from little Enrons grow…
When politicians say “too many regulations” they actually mean “too much corporate oversight”. Most of these scandals where the direct result of reduced “regulation”.
http://www.forbes.com/2002/07/25/accountingtracker.html
Of course congress can add supposed oversight and then the president/staff reduce the manpower or just “prosecute” with the SEC who can only levy fines (unlike the Dept. of Justice). The post ENRON/WorldCom/Tyco blowouts resulted in the 2002 Sarbanes-Oxley Act which was supposed to have real teeth but turned out to have only gumming power after the 2008 meltdown. One of the arguments against FDR’s Glass-Steagall Act was that the banks in the 1930’s where too small, making them susceptible to failure. Well, the banks in 2008 were plenty large and “too big too fail” but legal/deregulated corruption took care of that. Oversight may have some inhibitory effect on competition, but me thinks I would prefer that relative to the pain of the effects of a 2008 near catastrophe.
Unfortunately when empowering “Free Enterprise” it is assumed that most are honest and that may be. But is too easy to forget that it only takes a small number of large companies run by greedy corrupt groups to make large dents in or overwhelm the economic systems and as a result expensive oversight must be be kept on all.
Nice to see the repost (thanks Anthony!), and thanks to readers for adding to the historical record. EnRomm is a name that might just stick.
I do not know for a fact that Romm’s nonprofit received money from Enron. But given all the work he did which gave an environmental ‘A’ grade to at least some of EES’s (fraudulent) agreements, had he asked for a contribution, he would have gotten it (that’s how the company operated)!
I will investigate for the last book in my Enron inspired trilogy on political capitalism, which will cover Enron and the post-Enron years. It could get worse for Romm, particularly if the company walked him through how they booked their contracts–think ‘mark-to-model’.
I recently posted verbatim the Kyoto memo from Enron’s climate lobbyist, John Palmisano, that readers might be interested in reading: http://www.masterresource.org/2011/12/palmisano-kyoto-memo-10/. Palmisano was sort of our Romm-in-residence.
Keep the comments coming!
– Rob Bradley
@ John,
” Ken Lay helped Al get his carbon business going.”
Was it quid pro quo? Was Al Gore not the primary negotiator on behalf of the United States for Kyoto?
Oh yeah and who pulled the US out of Kyoto…hmmm…oh yeah that’s right Kenny Boy’s good friend G.W.
I wonder if Time will re-do this piece from 2002
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,192920,00.html
Oh, and since Animal Farm was an allegory about the evils of Socialism…is it ironic that Al Gore and Allegory sound alike…or is that a simile…I am so confused…and don’t even get me started on the Al Gore Love Story connections!
Andrew, nobody ‘pulled us out of Kyoto’. We were never in it. Al Gore signed the accord but it had zero, zilch meaning since Reid, the Democrat Senate Leader, had already indicated that Kyoto would get zero votes for ratification. Clinton let Gore sign it so Gore could use it for campaign purposes.
@ Rhoda Ramirez
Oops my bad. Sorry about that.
http://www.eoearth.org/article/Kyoto_Protocol_and_the_United_States
COP-6 Negotiations, The Hague
The November 2000 COP-6 meeting in The Hague was the last negotiation session on the Kyoto Protocol in which the United States participated. After President George W. Bush became President in January 2001, he rejected the Kyoto Protocol and opted out of participation in Kyoto-related negotiations.
http://www.eoearth.org/profile/Petersaundry/
Andrew says:
December 19, 2011 at 5:29 pm. We should re-read Animal Farm…..
You said it…..
I did two days ago….It is scary how much of it applies to this issue….
Remember when Squealer gets caught repainting one of the Seven Laws of Animalism…. You could imagine Joe Romm up there on the ladder rewriting a few bits of history….. “Carbon Dioxide creates Global Warming” gets changed to “Carbon Dioxide creates Global Warming and Cooling and Climate Change and Climate Disruption”…. Finally it just becomes “Carbon Dioxide is Evil”….
Or when Napoleon get Squealer to tell the Animals that Snowball wasn’t actually a hero but he was an agent of farmer Jones…. Watch the Squealers over at Joe’s site… they’ll be re-writing this little piece of Enron history…. Seems Joe just can’t pick the honest side…
@ Harpo
That’s a reference to Marx, not Oprah right?
Isn’t this whole article effectively an ad-hominem?
I have no sympathy or shared views with the guy, and find his rhetoric utterly objectionable, but I don’t see this post advancing the scientific debate any.
just for the record, Goldman Sachs seems to be sort of relocating to the centre of carbon trading and are being courted it would seem:
23 Nov: UK Telegraph: Graham Ruddick: ‘Rare murals’ hinder Goldman Sachs expansion in London
Goldman Sachs’ plans to create a major new headquarters in the City have been hindered by a bizarre debate about the quality of murals on the front of the building the bank wants to develop.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/constructionandproperty/8909231/Rare-murals-hinder-Goldman-Sachs-expansion-in-London.html
20 Dec: UK Mirror: Jason Beattie: MPs blast tax chief for ‘cosy deals with big firms’
BRITAIN’s top taxman was today attacked for failing to collect £25billion of revenue and letting big companies off paying their bills in full.
The Public Accounts Committee said Dave Hartnett bent rules for the likes of Goldman Sachs, which had an £8million bill waived…
Banking giant Goldman Sachs was allowed to skip a multi-million pound interest bill on unpaid tax on bonuses after Mr Hartnett was wrongly advised there was a “legal impediment” to collecting it.
The potential cost to the taxpayer is officially put at £8 million but the committee was given evidence from a whistleblower that the sum could be as high as £20 million.
In its report the MPs expressed astonishment that HMRC “chose to depart from normal governance procedures” by allowing the same senior officials to both negotiate and approve such deals.
Worse, it said, the Goldman deal was done “without legal advice” or an official note being taken of the meeting, with officials relying on the firm’s records….
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/2011/12/20/mps-blast-tax-chief-for-cosy-deals-with-big-firms-115875-23648120/
9 Dec: CNBC: Lawyer Who Revealed Goldman’s UK Tax Deal Could Be Fired: Report
A solicitor employed at UK internal revenue service, HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) is facing disciplinary action, which could include being fired from his position, and possible legal action for blowing the whistle on a deal which saw Goldman Sachs being let off from paying 10 million pounds ($15.6 million) in tax, according to British newspaper The Guardian…
http://www.cnbc.com/id/45609195?__source=google%7Ceditorspicks%7C&par=google
Kevin Butler says:
December 19, 2011 at 11:09 am
So why does anyone listen to them now?
I can make my own mistakes; I don’t need ‘experts’ to make them for me.
I saved Enron’s Statement on Climate Change from its post-bankruptcy website – reposted at CA here http://climateaudit.files.wordpress.com/2006/05/enronclimatechange.pdf .
@ Pat, I recall Goldman’s UK operation threatened got move to Spain if they didn’t get a tax break a couple of years ago….
That said, London seems to be running a PR campaign regarding renewables (see the dateline of this story)…
http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/12/20/us-power-acdc-idUSTRE7BJ0PW20111220
IMHO, Osama Bin Leverage is still hiding in a cubicle somewhere in London!
Speaking of Goldman, here is the latest…
Goldman Takes Client Abuse To Next Level: Closes, And Reopens, Copper And Zinc Recommendations At Massive Losses
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/goldman-takes-client-abuse-next-level-closes-and-reopens-copper-and-zinc-recommendations-massiv
Note: Transmissipn towers and substation components are usually zinc plated (dipped). Copper is used for the grounding grids, transformer windings and generator windings. Now to keep an eye on aluminum plays (transmission and distribution conductors).
This ‘bears’ (pardon the pun) watching.
@Steve McIntyre says: on December 20, 2011 at 6:16 am
I love the statement “lack of scientific certainty does not justify inaction”. No one is certain the world is going to end, but we got to stop it now!
http://thehill.com/blogs/e2-wire/e2-wire/200485-google-invests-in-california-solar-project
The company is partnering with investment firm KKR, which launched a new venture Tuesday to provide additional equity investment in the project. KKR said it was the firm’s first investment in renewable energy in the United States.
Cleantech Funds Listing
http://www.colleripmanagement.com/news/CleantechFundslisting.html
Carbon Connections
“Carbon Connections is based at the University of East Anglia, recognised as a world leading research centre for environmental sciences. It already has a well established Carbon Reduction programme (CRed), which was set up as a direct result of the UEA’s focus on outreach activity: enabling research to achieve results. Carbon Connections is an investment body, set up by the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) to seek out, encourage and invest in carbon-saving innovation either through technological advance or behavioural change.”
Web: http://www.carbon-connections.org
Go to page 50, item 9…
http://www2.goldmansachs.com/s/proxy-2011/images/Goldman_Sachs-Proxy2011.pdf
@ john
That is good stuff and will most likely come back to bite Goldman. Kinda funny, they are ‘hiding’ behind their 2005 Environmental Policy Framework as one of their justification for not supporting Shareholder proposal #9. In 2005 the Goldman Sachs CEO was Henry Paulson who left Goldman in 2006 to become the Sec of the Treasury. Paulson had replaced former Goldman CEO Jon Corzine…
We can go back to another former Goldman CEO, Robert Rubin, who as Sec of the Treasury was instrumental in pushing through the repeal of the Glass-Steagall act…which eventually contributed to the Freddie Mac/Fannie Mae issues.
People need to connect some of these dots: Goldman Sachs executives, their various roles in politics…what they do after they leave Goldman Sachs…and some of their other colleagues including:
David Blood, former CEO of Goldman Sachs Asset Management
Rajat Gupta
Anil Kumar
Raj Rajaratnam
Robert Rubin…and his Enron connection
Also, those SEC Guidelines referred to in the Goldman Sachs proxy…somebody explain how those guidelines might negatively impact Al Gore and David Blood’s company…had they chosen to domicile in the USA…
But then again, what do I know…
“The more I know, the less I understand” – Don Henley from ‘The Heart of the Matter’
Andrew
@ andrew,
Did you notice that the date of the proxy statement was April, 2011? Wait till the next one comes out…
Also, If there was any communication between Goldman and East Anglia things will get interesting as East Anglia denied any contact or funding.
http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/goldman_sachs_correspondence_and
Dermot O’Logical says:
December 20, 2011 at 1:47 am
“Isn’t this whole article effectively an ad-hominem?
I have no sympathy or shared views with the guy, and find his rhetoric utterly objectionable, but I don’t see this post advancing the scientific debate any.”
Regarding this post ‘advancing the scientific debate’…
http://www.aaas.org/news/releases/2011/0211eisenhower.shtml
While continuing to respect discovery and scientific research, he said, “We must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite.”
Read up on the dangers Eisenhower warned us about.
Regarding ad-hominem attacks:
Has there been any attempts in this ‘article’ to negate the Truth? Has sarcasm been directed at a particular person? Was it done to discredit their arguments? If so, then you would be correct…right?
Pointing out that somebody is wrong and they are acting unprofessional is not considered an ad-hominem attack, or is it?
I don’t believe laughing at someone’s expense qualifies either.
Here’s the thing… I visit Joe’s Progressive site often…. His team does a great job of pointing out alot of the BS in Washington and from the shady candidates the Republican party is throwing out.
(Btw, Ron Paul is the only one of these people that I would even consider voting for. And I’m not voting for Obama just like I didn’t the first time)
That said, about this argument…. I’ve viewed this site for many months now. The truth is that regardless of what is said, we’re not getting off fossil fuels anytime soon. Which really makes alot of the bickering pointless. There has been some valuable information shared here just as there is on some of the progressive blogs. Both sides have some fair arguments just as both sides have a lot of lobbying and dishonesty. The thing is that I think I was better off when I accepted that everything now is about politics and there is so much BS thrown around that it’s better to take any argument with a grain of salt and just go about my day.
“Read up on the dangers Eisenhower warned us about.”
Eisenhower also warned us about the dangers of the military-industrial complex.
Andrew says:
December 20, 2011 at 12:45 pm
[[…]] Was it done to discredit their arguments? [[…]]
That was what I took from the post – something along the lines of “he was wrong about that, so how could he be right about this?”. Not that he had any credibility in my eyes anyway, but that is discrediting the person, not the argument that person is presenting.
@Brian,
Here is an outstanding must read piece done yesterday that involves de-bunking Associated Press ‘fact checkers’…
http://dailybail.com/home/corporate-media-fails-again-ap-fact-check-repeats-zombie-lie.html
Some of the comments are priceless too, especially Cheyenne’s. And yes, the good folks there are wise to what is happening regarding climate fraud (among others) especially the financial issues involved.
@ Brian
All valid points, and personally I like a lot of Ron Paul’s message, I am just not sold on the messenger. He kinda reminds me of the eccentric uncle…he makes some good points, is fun to have around, but you really don’t want to introduce him to the ‘in-laws’…which to me is not a quality I would like in my President.
@ Dermot O’Logical
Pretty much everyone that has ever opened their mouth was wrong, at least a few times. So clearly Romm qualifies, just because he is human. Pointing out that ‘a given’ person is wrong… repeatedly… doesn’t qualify as an ad hominem attack. I think…but I have not been ‘peer reviewed’…