Every once in awhile a window opens and shows us the dark, illogical souls of the bureaucrats in the climate cabal. This is one of those times.
Regardless of whether or not scientists are wrong on global warming, the European Union is pursuing the correct energy policies even if they lead to higher prices, Europe’s climate commissioner has said.
There’s more.
Let’s say that science, some decades from now, said ‘we were wrong, it was not about climate’, would it not in any case have been good to do many of things you have to do in order to combat climate change?.
These are the views of the EU climate commissioner, Connie Hedegaard.
Read it all here: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/environment/climatechange/10313261/EU-policy-on-climate-change-is-right-even-if-science-was-wrong-says-commissioner.html
h/t to Dennis Wingo, and many others.
http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/02673/CONNIE_2673422b.jpg
Looks like a new art form.
As a Danish politician Connie Hedegaard should declare a commercial interest and resign. Denmark more than any other country has a massive commercial interest in renewables as it is the home of the worlds biggest wind turbine company, Vestas.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/09/19/steven-schneiders-1992-argument-against-balance-in-science-reporting/#comment-1082960
Here are a few more quotations, excerpted from
http://www.green-agenda.com
Now seriously, do you really think this is all about global warming?
Is it not possible that CAGW alarmism is just a smokescreen?
It must be obvious by now, even to the most stupid of warmists, that the world is no longer warming, and has not been warming for 10-15 years.
And the warmists are not all stupid, so what are they up to?
In their own words:
______________
“Complex technology of any sort is an assault on
human dignity. It would be little short of disastrous for us to
discover a source of clean, cheap, abundant energy,
because of what we might do with it.”
– Amory Lovins, Rocky Mountain Institute
“The prospect of cheap fusion energy is the
worst thing that could happen to the planet.”
– Jeremy Rifkin,
Greenhouse Crisis Foundation
“Giving society cheap, abundant energy would be the
equivalent of giving an idiot child a machine gun.”
– Prof Paul Ehrlich, Stanford University
“The only hope for the world is to make sure there is not another
United States. We can’t let other countries have the same
number of cars, the amount of industrialization, we have in the US.
We have to stop these Third World countries right where they are.”
-Michael Oppenheimer,
Environmental Defense Fund
“Global Sustainability requires the deliberate quest of poverty,
reduced resource consumption and set levels of mortality control.”
-Professor Maurice King
“We’ve got to ride this global warming issue.
Even if the theory of global warming is wrong,
we will be doing the right thing in terms of
economic and environmental policy.”
– Timothy Wirth,
President of the UN Foundation
“No matter if the science of global warming is all phony…
climate change provides the greatest opportunity to
bring about justice and equality in the world.”
– Christine Stewart,
former Canadian Minister of the Environment
“The data doesn’t matter. We’re not basing our recommendations
on the data. We’re basing them on the climate models.”
– Prof. Chris Folland,
Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction and Research
“The models are convenient fictions
that provide something very useful.”
– Dr David Frame,
climate modeler, Oxford University
“I believe it is appropriate to have an ‘over-representation’ of the facts
on how dangerous it is, as a predicate for opening up the audience.”
-Al Gore,
Climate Change activist
“It doesn’t matter what is true,
it only matters what people believe is true.”
– Paul Watson,
co-founder of Greenpeace
“The only way to get our society to truly change is to
frighten people with the possibility of a catastrophe.”
– emeritus professor Daniel Botkin
“The climate crisis is not a political issue, it is a moral and
spiritual challenge to all of humanity. It is also our greatest
opportunity to lift Global Consciousness to a higher level.”
-Al Gore,
Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech
“We are on the verge of a global transformation.
All we need is the right major crisis…”
– David Rockefeller,
Club of Rome executive member
“We must make this an insecure and inhospitable place
for capitalists and their projects. We must reclaim the roads and
plowed land, halt dam construction, tear down existing dams,
free shackled rivers and return to wilderness
millions of acres of presently settled land.”
– David Foreman,
co-founder of Earth First!
Flydbee,you are missing the point!
Alexander Feht says:
September 17, 2013 at 12:11 am
You’re spot on! These are the neo-intellectual elites, the comprise no-feudalists, neo-socialists, neo-greenalists. They are frequently but not always, privately educated, wealthy, arrogant disguised as a passion for the environment & nature, but it is all a thin disguise, a veil! The last time people like them stalked the Earth, they were ordering their little helpers t heard millions into gas chambers, to control & solve the perceived threat of the day! They are all misguided lunatics! Long love the PDRofEU! The elieists have done it to us here, usurping science or policy! The EPA is your EU, unelected, undemocratic, unaccountable, unsackable, passing enforcement laws based upon the flimsies of scientific evidence! Grumpy old man rant over!
Clearly, the lunatics have taken over the asylum.
But we knew that already, didn’t we?
Chris
The irony is that EU policy is wrong even if the climate scientists are right.
The policy would not significantly delay global warming, but by seriously harming European economies they would make it more difficult to mitigate any damage caused by climate change.
‘Let’s say that science, some decades from now, said ‘we were wrong, it was not about climate’, would it not in any case have been good to do many of things you have to do in order to combat climate change?.’
Many of the things- such as diverting crops to fuel, thereby spreading hunger. Such as increasing fuel poverty, leading to thousands of premature deaths in the UK alone. Such as encouraging the spread of wind farms, leading to the despoiling of the countryside and the death of thousands of birds and bats. Such as clearing Indonesian rain forest to plant palm oil plantations, leading to the extinction of the orangutan. I could list many more of the things the EU has done in order to ‘combat climate change’ but I’m sure I’m preaching to the choir on this. The cartoon Aldous points to in comments would be funny if it wasn’t that the eco warriors aren’t creating a better world, they’re just taking from the poor and giving to the rich in much the same way as every power grabber before them.
Thus the expression: “One cannot cure stupid… merely sedate it.” Shall we raise a toast to Ms. Hedegaard?
Aldous – there is a great response to that cartoon here:
http://climatesanity.files.wordpress.com/2011/01/ani9.gif?w=450
There is a case to do only what we would have done even if CAGW is not true. This was one of Hansen’s original arguments. So, for example, tighter air standards on black soot, sulfuric acid from coal.
But if you go too far and you are wrong and people die in winter of cold and in summer from lack of cheap A/C – not good. People like her always want to go too far and do not think about the possibility of their mistakes killing people.
In reply to:
SideShowBob says:
September 17, 2013 at 1:25 am
Nothing wrong with Europeans moving away from Russian oil and gas, putting global warming and climate change aside, this is a clever long term German policy to insulate their country from future oil and gas price shortages… and if global warming turns out to be true well that’s just a bonus as the Germans will have already done the heavy lifting in eliminating CO2 emissions
William:
Green energy is a scam.
Fortunately we live in a democracy. The solution to the green scam is an election. Australia is an example of the process and result.
The long term energy solution is nuclear.
Comment:
Germany can spend money on green scams as the EU jobs have migrated to Germany and the common currency stops the normal rise in currency which would spread the jobs around the EU. Countries need GDP growth to create jobs and pay for entitlements.
Higher energy costs increase manufacturing job loss to Asia. High energy costs are a type of indirect taxation.
http://joannenova.com.au/2013/06/the-data-is-in-more-green-jobs-means-less-real-ones/#more-28909
Each green job in Britain costs £100,000 (and 3.7 other jobs):
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/christopherbooker/7969102/The-Clean-Development-Mechanism-delivers-the-greatest-green-scam-of-all.html
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2008-04-14/biofuel-production-a-crime-against-humanity/2403402
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1361316/250bn-wind-power-industry-greatest-scam-age.html
Why the £250bn wind power industry could be the greatest scam of our age – and here are the three ‘lies’ that prove it:
…The first is the pretence that turbines are anything other than ludicrously inefficient.
The most glaring dishonesty peddled by the wind industry — and echoed by gullible politicians — is vastly to exaggerate the output of turbines by deliberately talking about them only in terms of their ‘capacity’, as if this was what they actually produce. Rather, it is the total amount of power they have the capability of producing.
The point about wind, of course, is that it is constantly varying in speed, so that the output of turbines averages out at barely a quarter of their capacity. … …..This means that the 1,000 megawatts all those 3,500 turbines sited around the country feed on average into the grid is derisory: no more than the output of a single, medium-sized conventional power station. … …..Furthermore, as they increase in number (the Government wants to see 10,000 more in the next few years) it will, quite farcically, become necessary to build a dozen or more gas-fired power stations, running all the time and emitting CO2, simply to provide instant back-up for when the wind drops….
So we all shiver, catch influenza and other diseases from reduced immunity and cold, whilst millions around the world starve because of lack of food (if they haven’t froze to death) from land use diverted to biofuel, etc, etc.
And some crass EU commisioner says ”it’s still good’ ?? Let, alone the massive waste of funds that could have easily saved millions around the world via better water, sanitation and food! FFS, someone needs to do something……unfortunately, the only constructive thing for the loonies that have these ‘ideas’ involves physically eradicating these muppets.
From SideShowBob on September 17, 2013 at 1:34 am:
As expected, click some links, scratch through the gilt, find the truth.
http://www.snl.com/Interactivex/article.aspx?CdId=A-24988078-9516
This is a fake competitiveness to comply with legislation, and localized to Colorado. It is not reality.
Once again, the “hidden cost” of renewables. The first link supplied by the frequently-lying criminal who escaped from The Simpsons boldly proclaims:
Cheaper when adding in subsidies while leaving out the cost of the backup generation, so reliable it needs the fast-acting backup generation to even be allowed into their grid.
Standard Green lies and deception, pushed by a wannabe carnival barker. Feel free to ignore.
SideShowBob:
I see only kadaka (KD Knoebel) has replied to your ridiculous post at September 17, 2013 at 1:34 am. The paucity of replies to your post is possibly because many think your post is too silly to be worth the bother of disputing. However, there may be onlookers who could be duped by your tripe so I write to refute it.
Your post makes the daft assertion
and attempts to justify that with links to propagandist web sites which support rent seekers.
The truth is We’re fast moving to a situation where (sic) renewables are so highly subsidised that they can compete on price with burning coal, and the resulting high energy costs are killing people.
Costs are the sum of price and subsidies. And being “cheaper” is having lowest costs.
Renewables such as wind and solar cannot be cheaper than coal or other fossil fuel energy: it is physically impossible. I explain this as follows.
All energy is free. It was all created at the Big Bang. But it is costly to collect energy and to concentrate it for conduct of useful work.
Fortunately, nature has collected and concentrated energy for us.
For example, the little energy available in sunlight has been collected by photosynthesis over geological ages, and the collected energy exists in dry, compressed stores known as fossil fuels, notably coal.
The energy available in sunlight as it falls, or the solar energy collected as biomass is in such small amounts that collecting it costs much more than collecting the energy concentrated in fossil fuels.
Wind is also energy supplied by the sun but it is also too feeble in normal winds to make its collection affordable when the solar energy collected by fossil fuels is so much and is so concentrated.
However, hydropower is solar energy collected by evapouration over large areas which is concentrated when it falls as rain and is routed to rivers by geography. This large collection area makes hydropower affordable in competition with fossil fuels and nuclear power. (Nuclear power is energy concentrated by now long-dead stars).
The high concentration of energy in fossil fuels is why windpower and muscle power (from animals and slaves) were abandoned when the high energy intensity in fossil fuels became available for use as power by using of the steam engine.
But hydropower was not abandoned and is still used because the energy intensity in falling water is comparable to the energy intensity in fossil fuels.
In summation, collecting energy for use is cheap by using hydropower, fossil fuels and nuclear power because nature has done most of the collecting. But collecting energy is expensive from wind and solar because we have to do all the collection ourselves.
Richard
@harrywr2
The good ole’ “they will hold us hostage with their oil/gas/coal” argument. Always as baseless no matter how many times it trotted out by the naive and the manipulating.
As Saudi Arabia found out in the 1970s, using your commodity output as an economic weapon damages the supplier more than the consumer. Let them cut off the gas completely. Yes, there is a short term disruption, but the economics will prevail and within a decade, Russia would bbe sitting on a usless and unsellable stock of gas that isn’t even worth extracting.
Left alone, without the central planners like Hedegaard the rest of Europe will have moved on. Granted, without the best first choice enrgy techonology, but the next best one. Until of course Russia came back gto the market with its tail between its legs, having learnt a lesson in markets. Again, just like the Saudis.
Well at least Europe has come some way from hunting witches and fighting over who has the strongest imaginary friend.
@richardscourtenay
Brilliantly put! Definitely the best way I have ever heard it described. My quote of the year (so far).
Thanks.
SideShowBob says:
September 17, 2013 at 1:34 am
We’re fast moving to a situation were renewables are cheaper than burning coal, (not even including the death and lung disease from particulate pollution) …
________________________________________________________________________
The only way the utility can say that renewables are more economical is they are getting RECS. The average FOSSIL generating costs for the US in 2011 was $35.09/MWh, which is half to a third of ExCel estimated costs. What about capacity factors for solar and wind? It is 6:43 AM in Richmond, there is no wind and no sun. Just how much electricity do you suppose is being generated by renewables? PS: this is a peak demand time in the PJM.
What death and lung disease from particulate pollution? Show me the autopsy reports and assignments of “pollution” for lung diseases and deaths. Try the CDC mortality and morbidity tables to find it. Show me the data behind the EPA estimates. You know, the secret data the EPA won’t even share with Congress.
Quite a side show, Bob.
Making odd statements to justify right vs wrong is not unusual. Read the book The Righteous Mind by Jonathan Haidt. When one believes something to be right and is confronted about that belief, that person will find a reason to justify that ‘right’ belief. Morality leads reason, not the other way around. By the alarmists pushing their cause as ‘right’ the believers are in that awkward position as the latest science shows their belief to be unjustified.
OT: This has probably been asked and answered already, but can someone explain the bright streaks in the upper left quadrant of recent solar images on this page? Thanks.
Yes, wasting resources for the enrichment of a few, forced starvation, and of course eugenics is always good for the state. Newspeak has arrived.
Her name is Commie Hedergaad?
It could not be any more clear tht this is NOT about the science, it is about the policies that are designed to separate the people from their money.
Leftists ALWAYS fail to understand the concept of opportunity costs and unintended consequences.
After $trillions have been flushed down the toilet on this ludicrous and totally disconfirmed CAGW hypothesis, Leftists will point to their expensive, inefficient, intermittent, diffuse and wasteful wind/solar farms and proudly say, “look at the good we have done.”
What these naive and moronic political hacks fail to see are the: higher standards of living, the thriving factories, the manufacturing jobs, scientific research, lower fuel costs, higher disposable incomes, economic growth and prosperity that DIDN’T occur because all those limited funds were squandered on stupid “alternative energy” subsidies, carbon taxes, carbon emission compliance costs, etc.,
All politicians should learn and practice the lessons from Bastiat’s Broken Window Fallacy… But, alas, some leftist professor will show the political hacks some peer reviewed paper proving Bastiat got it all wrong and that the more money politicians flush down the toilet, the stronger economies become.
And so it goes…. Until sanity and freedom are restored…
eo September 17, 2013 at 12:33 am
There will just be a new issue. Anybody would try to predict forthcoming issue for the same political agenda ?
The same old Club or Rome claptrap – we must conserve resources, therefore ration everything for the plebs, as we need it all.