Democrats in California seem to be finally waking up to the fact that green energy disproportionately hurts poor people.
According to the Wall Street Journal;
The environmental lobby has tried to turn climate change into a social justice issue even though its anticarbon policies disproportionately harm the poor. Honest Democrats are starting to admit this, as we saw in this week’s stunning revolt in the California legislature.
Jerry Brown doesn’t have much to show for his second turn in Sacramento, and of late he has focused his legacy attention on reducing carbon emissions. The Governor hailed California as a model of green virtue at the Vatican this summer and had hoped to flaunt sweeping new anticarbon regulations at the U.N’s climate-change summit in Paris this year.
But now his party has mutinied. Democrats hold near supermajorities in both legislative chambers with 52 of 80 seats in the Assembly. Yet this week 21 Democratic Assembly members representing middle- and low-income communities—including 11 blacks and Latinos—joined Republicans to kill a bill mandating a cut in state greenhouse gas emissions to 80% below 1990 levels by 2050.
Read more: http://www.wsj.com/articles/californias-climate-change-revolt-1442014369
All I can say is its about time. The evidence that green energy is hideously expensive and hurts poor people is irrefutable. Claims of alleged benefits are all based on broken climate models, which have no demonstrable predictive skill.
Anyone who supports absurd green energy policies is the enemy of the world’s poor people.
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VV The big DubbaYa! The big DubbaYa!
benofhouston September 12, 2015 at 8:51 pm
“Oh come off it. They think they are doing the right thing. Their priorities are different than yours, and their understanding is also different….
They aren’t evil, just wrong.”
Ben, I’m sure the Khmer Rouge thought they were doing the right thing when they drove people out of Cambodian cities and slaughtered one-third the population. And the jihadists certainly think they are right to torture and kill the infidels and sexually enslave girls as young as 7. Different priorities and understanding, don’cha know.
Are they evil, or just wrong?
jihadists ……Evil – definitely!!
Ken Stewart has a new UAH V 6 pause update.
No global warming for 18ys 5 mths, no n. polar warming for 13 yrs 7 mths, no s polar warming for entire record 36 yrs 9 mths, USA no warming for 18 yrs 3 mths and OZ now no warming for 17 yrs 11 mths.
https://kenskingdom.wordpress.com/2015/09/11/pause-update-september-2015/
A good post containing a useful comparison.
There’s been no warming in OZ because the Wizard banned all CO2 emissions. Dorothy and Toto are still freezing in those Kansas winters, and the Munchkins are starving because they are so poor they they have nothing to munch on. And the wicked witch still flies (in fact, she is running for US president).
More sanity.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/earth/environment/climatechange/11759619/Climate-change-debate-dictated-by-left-wing-anti-capitalists-says-Amber-Rudd.html
“Anyone who supports absurd green energy policies is the enemy of the world’s poor people.”
Not a good position for the Pope to be in; a quick re-read of the New Testament required, I think!
Not a lot of people know this – but even George Monbiot could clearly see that the absurdly structured “feed-in-tariff” (a.k.a. 10x the wholesale market leccy rate as a 25 year return for solar investors) was a stealth tax and a clear case of robbing the poor to give to the rich.
Of course we can now see that the roof-top solar free cash giveaway was only really a sweetener to gain public acceptance for the far more costly off-shore wind cash giveaway.
In the case of the latter scheme the beneficiaries are super-rich individuals some of whom sit in the House of Lords, and obviously the corps. who get the work – i.e. Vestas, G.E. Siemens, Halliburton et al.
The people who will be paying most for this are those who through limited investment capital and limited roof-space or land ownership – have no access to the great cash giveaway. i.e. mostly poor people.
Here is Monbiot on the topic. How strange that this slipped through the Grauniads pro-renewable editorial control. And when a supposedly “green” policy is too daft for Monbiot – then that means very daft indeed.
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2010/mar/01/solar-panel-feed-in-tariff
Unhappily it was published over 5 years ago and had absolutely no effect during the subsequent 5 years of the “greenest ever in the history of the human race ” Coalition.
Sadly, you are correct, Mike.
The scheme and those like it, all across the developed world have been deemed to be a “success”.
Inasmuch as so many people in the upper strata of society stood to gain from the scheme that criticism of it amongst the political classes and amongst journalists became unacceptable and unwelcome behaviour.
And – that is why the scheme met with no further resistance.
Even though, in reality, it represented possibly the very most ineffective and expensive option for cutting the UK’s total CO2 output. Even if we assume that such a cut was a priority at the time.
But I suppose that there could conceivably have been a CO2 reduction scheme that was less effective and more expensive.
However, since I am not a professional politician, I am not naturally adept in developing and promoting the very stupidest idea that can be conceived of by the human mind.
And yes, the Pope who supposedly wants poor people to be better off also wants them to be treated like the Khmer Rouge treated Cambodians. This schizophrenic policy of the Pope has to be attacked frontally by anyone who has any mercy for the very poor.
Just like with the refugee issue: all over Europe for the last five years, services, hospitals, food etc has all been cut back hurting poor citizens and suddenly the same leaders who did this are opening the public purse and importing a million Muslims mostly males, giving them for free everything they are taking away from the poor who are already citizens.
This has been covered up by media praising this but I read comments and such and the fury at the bottom of society is broiling hot mad.
Couple this with the meeting in Europe in November as the snow begins to fly to order huge taxes on energy and cuts on social services in the name of global warming and revolts, race riots and terror attacks are going to multiply rapidly in Europe while Putin laughs his head off and the Chinese will snicker.
Yes, this anti-science, anti-humanist, anti-Christian encyclical will go down as one of the worst mistakes a Pope has ever made. Sadly, I think his heart was in the right place but that advisers he has trusted far too much have pushed through terrible counsel.
It was revealed in the recent US TV presentation of Catholics humiliating themselves in front of him that Francis has never operated a computer, has no modern (or probably even ancient) technological savvy. The only real question is whether the choice of this particular figurehead by the cardinals was intentional, or simply serendipitous.
“The only real question is whether the choice of this particular figurehead by the cardinals was intentional, or simply serendipitous.”
That $100 billion per year handout to the third world would look good to the third-world cardinals who are now a majority. Some of that money would pass thru their hands. It’s possible that those cardinals selected Francis after determining that he was a hard-core greenie–or, if not, that he would act like one if handed the papacy. It’s likely that their lobbying had an effect on Benedict’s greenie proclamations and other actions. The Vatican realizes that the center of gravity of Catholicism is shifting to the tropics. So there’s an unstoppable tendency at work. Only a prolonged cold snap will counter it effectively.
Today in an interview on a Portugese radio station, he all but declared that capitalism is the reason for the refugee crisis in Europe, and that capitalism is at the root of most of the world’s problems.
But he means well, which some here tell is the all purpose excuse for actually doing evil.
Speaking as a person at the bottom of society here in the UK, I too am aware that my country is being simultaneously gifted to the rich, and invaded by a foreign population and religion. On top of these burdens, I find every day that increasing regulation and bureaucracy are further limiting the range of available legal activities that might aid me in escaping from poverty. At least it is still legal for me to (for example) repair my own car or fix a leak in my own roof, but who can say if such liberties will survive the next decade.
As a poor person, I have access to “freeview” television, which with only minor exceptions is a churning mass of drivel. The four available so-called “news” channels are BBC, Sky, Al Jazeera and Russia Today.
The last two of these are heavily engaged in psy. ops. i.e. the brainwashing of the target population in order to inspire social collapse and dependency on the fossil fuel exports of the lands in which these channels originate.
Al Jazeera, “is a Doha-based state-funded broadcaster owned by the Al Jazeera Media Network, which is partly funded by the House of Thani, the ruling family of Qatar” source wikipedia.
Russia Today “is a brand of “TV-Novosti”, an “autonomous non-profit organization”, founded by the Russian news agency RIA Novosti on April 6, 2005. During the economic crisis in December 2008, the Russian Government included ANO “TV-Novosti” in the list of core organisations of strategic importance of Russia”
In that sense, at least, they represent a rational exercise on the part of the instigators of this exercise.
Both channels heavily promote the views of “useful idiots” who wish to destroy UK energy independence and access to cheap energy.
Both channels also promote tolerance of immigration and also promote the causes of immigration – i.e. popular revolt against standing governments.
It is remarkable that we as a nation allow our enemies to employ subversive “active measures” by granting them direct access to the minds of the population.
What is more remarkable – is that the purportedly “non-biased” (haha) BBC, takes a similar stand on most issues to Al Jazeera and RT. Especially with regard to the green issues and immigration.
It is hardly surprising that our enemies would like to see us kick ourselves squarely in the nuts.
But, far more fascination that the imbecilic urban elite and academia represented by the BBC have joined with our enemies and are aiding them in their mission to destroy our industrial capacity, financial power, security and happiness.
There is a large wooden horse, that has now been carried in through the gates of the citadel.
For some reason we are being told that we must be “tolerant” of the lovely new wooden horse.
And yes, we all agree that horses are very nice, in general.
But, I have a very nasty feeling about this particular wooden horse.
+1
+100
Note Putin’s move into Syria. There are wheels within wheels and a big game afoot.
If oil prices stay down, Russia won’t have the money to maintain his occupation force for long.
Plus this puts Russia in the bulls-eye as far as Isis is concerned.
So we end up with the governors climate change for social justice being challenged by the legislatures social justice for the poor. Unfortunately like “climate change”, “social justice” is becoming a meaningless term.
When a politician claims their motive is social justice, run away. Kind of like when a used car salesman prefaces a statement with “To tell you the truth”.
The bottom line is representatives from poorer communities are properly protecting the interests of the people who elected them. The governor is following a fanatical eco ideology with an eye toward a sweet pay-off down the line from all in the CA solar industry that up to this point have been doing very well.
Nothing like the spectre of a peasant’s revolt to change the direction of a liberal (and about the only thing). Liberals live by the tenets of two emotions: fear and avarice. When there is no fear the avarice is righteous and vicious, when there is fear, self preservation goes into overtime: gun control, nanny-statism, righteous indignation, oppression. It’s all a clearly definable sociopathy.
Proof that the Dems have really woke up will be killing the stupid train.
I seem to remember that CA had a past governor with a very similar name, but he was a Jesuit-trained, pot-smoking rock star-boinker. This guy looks more like my accountant. No relation, I’m sure.
Democrats do not care about anything anymore but getting re-elected. They have no real principles left and that allows them to blow in the wind. While it is good to see the wind beginning to change on this CAGW hoax/scam/nonsense, democrats will remain unprincipled democrats.
These lines, near the end of the WSJ article, are interesting:
After this week’s defeat, Mr. Brown vowed to use regulation to end-run the legislature. “We don’t have a declaration in statute, but we have absolutely the same authority,” he declared.
. . .
“We’re going forward. The only thing different is my zeal has been intensified to a maximum degree.”
I don’t need no stinkin law.
Sounds like another prominent Democrat.
Taking his cue from Obama, he plans to do an end-run around the legislature via regulation. Good to see some Dems are starting to wake up to the damaging effects of “green” energy policies, although they have a long way to go. Ultimately, anti-carbon so-called “green” energy policies are economy-killing and anti-democratic. They make us less able to deal with real issues, such as actual pollution, and poverty, and actually exacerbating them. It will also increase cognitive dissonance, since they will still be left with the knee-jerk, un-thinking belief that we have to “do something” about climate before it’s “too late”.
When the climate STOPS changing , THEN we can start worrying !!!!
Time to throw out the alarmist’s green agenda and look at a different agenda
So what should we really do to prepare for the future climate?
• FIGHT POLLUTION AND NOT CLIMATE CHANGE. CUTTING CO2 LEVELS WILL HAVE VERY NEGLIGIBLE EFFECT ON CLIMATE
• LEARN TO PREPARE AND ADAPT TO CLIMATE CHANGE. MOST CLIMATE CHANGE CANNOT BE AVOIDED AND IS NATURAL ANYWAY
• RECOGNIZE THAT POPULATION GROWTH CANNOT BE SUSTAINED INDEFINITELY OR THE GLOBAL SUPPORT SYSTEMS LIKE O2 SUPPLY, CLEAN WATER, FOOD SUPPLY MAY FAIL FOR ALL
• RECOGNIZE THAT CARBON DIOXIDE IS NOT A POLLUTANT AND IS ESSENTIAL COMPONENT OF LIFE ON THIS PLANET
• RECOGNIZE THAT THE REAL POLLUTANTS ARE OTHER EMISSION’S COMPONENTS LIKE VOC, CARBON MONOXIDE, NITROUS OXIDE, PARTICULATE MATTER, ETC., ( NOT CO2)
• DRASTICALLY REDUCE OR ELIMINATE SUBSIDIES AND TAX BENEFITS TO UNSUSTAINABLE ENERGIES.USE THE FUNDS TO HELP THE NEEDY AND HOMELESS DUE TO NATURAL DISASTERS
• ELIMINATE ALL FORMS OF CARBON TAX, CARBON PRICING , CAP AND TRADE TAXES
• HELP POOR COUNTRIES AND STATES TO INSTALL LESS EXPENSIVE FOSSIL ENERGIES WITH LESS RESTRICTIVE REGULATIONS
• HELP THE POOR OF ANY NATION TO COPE WITH HIGH ENERGY COSTS AND REDUCE ENERGY POVERTY BY LOWERING PRICES , NOT INCREASING THEM
• HAVE BETTER AND PROPER SAFETY MEASURES TO TRANSPORT ALL ENERGY INCLUDING FOSSIL FUELS
• STOP PRODUCING ETHANOL AND FEED THE POOR INSTEAD WITH THE CORN
• PUT AN ANNUAL PRICE AND TRACK ALL THE DOLLARS BEING SPENT TO FIGHT CLIMATE CHANGE. WHAT GAIN ARE WE GETTING FOR THE COST?
• STOP CONTINUALLY MANIPULATING RAW CLIMATE DATA
• RECOGNIZE THAT CLIMATE CHANGE MEANS PERIODIC COOLING AS WELL
• MANY NORTHERN REGIONS NEED TO PREPARE FOR THE COMING 30 YEAR COOLER PHASE OF THE CLIMATE CYCLE
• RECOGNIZE THAT GLOBAL TEMPERATURES ARE DERIVED FIGURES WHICH MAY INCLUDE SIGNIFICANT REGIONS THAT ARE ACTUALLY COOLING AT THE MOMENT (NORTH AMERICA)
• PRESENT ALL CLIMATE RISKS NOT JUST THE WARMING SIDE
• STOP SHUTTING DOWN GOOD WORKING FOSSIL POWER PLANTS PREMATURELY. THE PUBLIC PURSE CANNOT AFFORD THIS KIND OF WASTE.
• PROMOTE THE RESTORATION OF GLOBAL FORESTS. LOSS OF TREES POSES A SIGNIFICANTLY BIGGER THREAT THAN CURRENT INCREASES IN CO2 LEVELS
• PUBLICIZE THE TRUE COST OF RENEWABLES. TRUE COST OF WIND ENERGY IS 1.7 TO 2.2 TIMES MORE THAN USED IN LEVELIZED COST STUDIES AND 3 TIMES MORE EXPENSIVE THAN FROM EXISTING COAL
• STORING CARBON DIOXIDE IS A TOTAL WASTE OF EVERYONE’S MONEY AND SHOULD BE HALTED
You might rephrase the last point as Cardox International has made millions from beneficial uses of stored CO2 http://cardox.net/
The dry ice industry is also healthy, with a current US price around 1.50/lb.
Oh yeah, and don’t build on a flood plain.
Maybe if you yell at everyone by using all caps, your message will be more palatable?
Seriously…few things are more annoying dude. There is a reason why things are written using a standard form…it is easier on the eyes and hence easier to read.
To be clear…I agree with much of what you say, but could not stand to read it all because of your choice to hit cap lock.
Agreed. Emphasis works only by virtue of contrast. All caps is all emphasis, so it defeats its own purpose.
Standard usage calls for either bold or italic for emphasis, but never all caps. Acronyms are capitalized. (I would have underlined ‘never all caps’, for yet another kind of emphasis, but only Ric Werme knows how to do that here, so you’ll have to use your imagination.)
Paragraph breaks introduce needed w h i t e s p a c e by giving a break to the eyes, boosting contrast, and increasing legibility.
To get bold and italics, you’ll have to master some simple HTML. You’ll also need to proof your work thoroughly, ‘lest you cause a – R u n a w a y B o l d E f f e c t – so be very careful.
Population growth isn’t a problem and won’t be until the population is at least 10 times what we have.
With future technological improvements, this number could increase.
Your worried about running out of O2 if there are too many people????????????
You know you are in a discussion with Brainiac 5 when he brings up oxygen depletion as a cause for concern.
‘Green’ energy hurts poor people…..(Doesn’t solve anything either)….Think outside of the box…
https://fenbeagleblog.wordpress.com/2015/09/12/box-clever-a-cubist-revival/
The Wall Street Journal is the propaganda arm for unbridled capitalism and Climate Change deniers. I hope that the populace will just say no when Wall Street asked to be bailed out again – this time when water floods Wall Street entirely.
jhindson2015,
Are you trying to make a point? Or are you just venting?
There is no such thing as unbridled capitalism here, and even if there were, it has nothing to do with “Climate Change deniers”, whatever that means.
I doubt if you even understand what you’re trying to say.
What is a climate change denier? Where do you get your fuzzy thinking from? You sound like a trained parrot.
This is a science site, not one of the idiot magnet blogs you usually read. Do you really believe that Wall Street is going to be flooded because of man-made global warming? Do you have a single fact to support that ridiculous notion? If so, post it here. We can use the amusement.
dbstealey Well said, thanks.
yep, even the chinese went for unbridled capitalism.
Said the robot.
Interesting use of terminology. Could just as easily rewritten: “The New York Times is the propaganda arm for unbridled Socialism and Climate Change. I hope that the populace will just say no when the NYT asks to be bailed out – this time when NYT’s revenues dry up entirely.”
Socialists never seem to get that for there to be OPiuM* to get high on, some capitalist has to have generated some. Otherwise, you only get more by printing more. You can only steal what exists in the first place. The Greeks have an excellent post-graduate course in real-time on how this works.
*(Other People’s invested, uncommitted Money)
Somebody doesn’t read the WSJ. The idea that they support unbridled capitalism is utterly laughable.
Regardless, WSJ didn’t make this story up, they just reported it. Are you claiming that the WSJ somehow forced the Democrats to go against Gov Moonbeam? I wish they had that kind of power.
As to your nonsense about Deniers and flood waters, you got nothing else right, why should I be surprised.
ROFL
IMO unbridled capitalism (that is truly a free market) is something we should try. I don’t think it has existed for 500 years or more.
There seems a belief in some quarters that government manipulation of the markets is somehow more benevolent than letting business sort it out for themselves. At least they have some interest in keeping the customers happy and coming back to them. The state has no such interest.
And that includes not pumping public money into failing enterprises.
Reblogged this on Climate Collections and commented:
Executive Summary: All I can say is its about time. The evidence that green energy is hideously expensive and hurts poor people is irrefutable. Claims of alleged benefits are all based on broken climate models, which have no demonstrable predictive skill.
I think the climate models do have a demonstrable predictive value…everything they predict is guaranteed not to happen. At least based on past performance.
They are the perfect reverse barometer of what is to come.
On the topic of California, any way we could get the contents of the USB drive dumped on a WUWT page and allow the community too dig into the data?
On the above, I meant contents of the USB drive Governor Brown sent Dr. Carson.
Saying green energy disproportionately hurts poor people is pure BS. First of all, green energy would create jobs for lots of trades, and second it would make the energy supply industry much more decentralized (which is exactly what the giant petro CEOs fear, as it would cut into their excessive profit margins, shareholder dividends, fat paychecks, and enormous bonuses).
http://www.ibtimes.com/fossil-fuel-execs-have-little-financial-incentive-fight-climate-change-report-says-2079765
And even if energy prices rise significantly, policies can be put in place so that they do not disproportionately affect the poor (e.g. increasing block pricing, green energy dividends”). California just doesn’t have the political will right now because so many elected officials are bought and paid by Big Industry.
Barry, who do you suppose is standing to gain the most from the ginormous subsidies the government is larding out for the so-called “green” energy schemes?
Hint: It is not the people struggling to pay their utility bills, or scrounging under couch cushions for gas money.
Barry,I doubt that you would admit that the article you present has more than a bit of a progressive slant to it. Perhaps you should move to Venezuela for a couple of years so you can get a first hand look at how the revolution is going.
Moving to one of their utopias would require work. It’s so much easier to demand that someone else create their own little utopia here.
The naivete of this kind of thinkfail is what is so demoralizing. You frankly have no clue – none – what it takes to deliver ANY kind of energy to modern society, or how energy is delivered, even today. Decentralized? Jobs for lots of trades? Even IF energy prices rise significantly? HAH! It’s centralization that provides efficiency of generation and stability of supply. The trades are already at demand capacity – there are no new trades in the “green revolution”, because there really is no new applied technology – just different feed sources.
The only demand for more trades can come from increased population and more industry. Energy prices have already risen significantly – (come to Canada sometime in the winter – find out how much energy you really need to survive a typical winter). Last year’s electricity costs for me were twice what I’ve paid in the recent past. In August, I’m still trying to get to economic parity on my energy costs from last year, let alone set up for this winter. All, BTW due to the applied “policy” cost of decentralization due to subsidized installation of so-called “green energy”. Jobs? Thousands of acres have been taken out of production for the installation of green cash sinks like windmill farms and solar arrays. At best, the job base of that land (compared to agriculture, because there is no industrial capacity to greenified land) is neutral, at worst, its below the agricultural need.
At the current price of oil, my energy costs would be a 1/3 of previous decades. Instead, I’m looking at energy costs this winter 3x what I paid as little as 3 years ago, with projections to go higher, by “policy” mandate. I have no idea where the money is going to come from to pay it. Your policy mavens continue to extract more of what I make with NO ROE, and those increasing costs have driven additional income opportunities out of my world. I wouldn’t mind trying to capitalize a few ideas I have and see what comes of it, but I can’t, because capitalism is evil.. Odd though that those policy mavens say no when I ask them for the money, or to forget about collecting on my hydro bill. Odd too, that in spite of all of those bonuses, dividends, and perks to fat cats and (good God, shareholders!) my energy costs only went up when the green fantasy started. Maybe, just maybe, its due to the outrageous subsidized, contracted costs with no guaranteed ROE that pushed those costs up. The ironic part? Those costs have succeeded in driving out those fat cats and their industry, so energy demand is down some. That’s great news – leaves only the unemployed now to have to pay for those green fantasies, but apparently, that’s all BS. So is the “green job” nirvana those unemployed keep being told they’ll be able to bank on.
Somebody ELSE always has to pay for your reversion to subsistence living. Problem is – most developed regions, especially more northern ones, no longer have the local carrying capacity to support high density populations on decentralized, erratic energy feeds.
Paul Coppin –
Well said. This week I am splitting another couple of cords of wood in order to keep my 52-40 degrees north heating bill in check. I get several rounds of heat out of each piece of wood – 1 Cutting down the trees, 2 Bucking, 3 Splitting, 4 Stacking, 5 Hauling in to the wood box in the house, 6 Burning, 7 Carrying out the ashes. That plus a sweater and comforter keeps the energy bills in check – a little. Plus I keep the upstairs thermostats at 18 C and the downstairs walkout at 14 C unless I have company. Now, a good fire heats the upstairs to the mid 20’s and only drops to the thermostat settings if I am away.
I love the way idiots actually believe that when you steal money from one group of people and give it to someone else, you can create jobs.
As to your belief that decentralization is good for people, why do you morons always insist on centralizing power in Washington?
Barry, get a clue. “Bought and paid for” applies much more to California politicians owned by the enviro-lobby that it does to “Big Industry”.
And it doesn’t bother you even a little bit being so hypocritical, criticizing the system that provides just about everything you have?
Finally, you obviously know nothing of economics if you believe that ‘green’ energy is a net creator of jobs. Learn about Bastiat’s ‘Broken Window’ fallacy. You will be smarter for it.
Barry, please submit an article to WUWT. One of the reasons WUWT is popular, is we welcome input from people who disagree with us. Read the articles here and you will see plenty of material, from people with very different views.
The key to being accepted is to provide evidence to back your position – so for example, if you wanted to convince us that green energy helps poor people, we would expect you to provide facts, figures and calculations, to back your argument.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/submit-a-story/
Have you noticed all the billionaires and multi-millionaires who made their money “shuffling paper”/Wall Street that are backing climate change and renewable energy?
Money made by not producing/making anything.
Pushing up prices for essentials (and the price of electricity feeds into just about everything we manufacture) does not hurt the poor first? Sorry Barry, not sure where you learned your economics, but it doesn’t work.
Question: Creating jobs to make expensive energy that would be unsellable in an unrestricted market…who pays the wage bill?
Clue: It is not the people selling the energy.
Question: How do renewables decentralise energy exactly?
Clue: They are reliant on a reliable grid to backfill when they can’t meet demand.
Supplementary Question: In the UK renewables often fall below 1% of demand. What do you think the ‘green’ electricity companies sell?
Clue: Their customers are on the grid. They are buying the same electricity as everyone else. They are just foolish enough to create some millionaires by paying over the top for their power and who could live quite nicely by competing on price and subsidy farming.
Question: Renewable firms Big Industry or mom and pop companies who only have the customers interest at heart?
Clue: Try building a 2 acre solar array or a 300ft wind turbine from scratch in your garage.
Question: The government money that is propping up a failed enterprise…where does that come from?
Clue: They don’t have a magic money tree or unicorn that poos gold. It comes straight of the wage packets of the people who are out there 8 hours a day trying to earn a crust.
Renewables are a failed experiment that delayed the adoption of MSR and CANDU by 30 years.
Now disconnect from the grid and install your solar and windmill if you truly believe it is workable, it should be the most amenable generation method to scaling down. You can sit in the dark and wait for the sun to shine or the wind to blow. I don’t intend to.
“And even if energy prices rise significantly, policies can be put in place so that they do not disproportionately affect the poor (e.g. increasing block pricing, green energy dividends”).”
But, if the poor are going to be made whole, what incentive would there be for them to cut their energy use? There would need to be a smart meter on every apartment in every apartment building, and on every car.
Well, this didn’t work out for Gov. Moonbeam.
So it’s back to the office for some brainstorming…
http://americandigest.org/sidelines/aclimatedoor.jpg
Jerry Brown intends to go around everyone to impose his will and thanks to the regulatory state he could even do it. This reminds me of what James Madison said:
“The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, self-appointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny.”
In Alberta we have a similar problem to California, but our problem is not resolved. It appears probable that our energy systems will be californicated by costly, inefficient green energy foolishness.
Our new left-wing Alberta government drank the Kyoto Kool-Aid and wants to aggressively “fight global warming”, which (ironically) has not happened for more than 18 years, despite increasing atmospheric CO2.
This six-minute video is worth watching.
Dr. Sallie Baliunas (Harvard), Dr. Tim Patterson (Carleton) and I co-authored the anti-Kyoto position in the 2002 APEGA debate referred to in the video.
A Summary of my presentation to the Alberta Climate Change Advisory Panel is included below. The two papers will be cited when posted on the net.
Regards, Allan
SUBMISSION TO ALBERTA’S CLIMATE CHANGE ADVISORY PANEL (ACCAP)
I request that you post this email AND the two attached papers, written for submission to ACCAP:
1. The UN’s IPCC Has No Credibility On Global Warming September 6, 2015
by Allan MacRae
2. Cold Weather Kills 20 Times as Many People as Hot Weather September 4, 2015
by Joseph D’Aleo and Allan MacRae
SUMMARY:
The members of the Alberta Climate Change Advisory Panel may find these two papers controversial and want to dismiss them.
The mandate of the Alberta Climate Change Advisory Panel relies primarily on the scientific position of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). However, the IPCC’s position is being disproved by two decades of credible climate data. NONE of the IPCC’s dire climate change predictions have materialized.
One’s predictive track record is an objective measure of one’s technical competence, and based on its negative predictive track record, the IPCC has NO credibility.
In contrast, the predictive track records of Joseph D’Aleo, a veteran Meteorologist and Allan MacRae, a Professional Engineer, are highly credible. A debate with the Pembina Institute published in 2002 co-authored by Mr. MacRae provides evidence of his predictive competence. Mr. D’Aleo and his colleagues have demonstrated remarkable accuracy in their meteorological forecasts.
Since its first report (FAR, 1990) the IPCC has predicted catastrophic global warming due to increased atmospheric CO2. However, global temperatures in the Lower Troposphere (LT) have NOT warmed in more than 18 years despite significant increases in CO2, according to the most accurate temperature data measured by satellites. The Surface Temperature (ST) data claims some warming, but it is increasingly obvious that the ST data is inaccurate, due to its increasingly large divergence from the satellite data.
Despite claims of more extreme weather due to global warming, the incidence and severity of extreme weather has not increased. The climate has been remarkably stable despite substantial increases in atmospheric CO2.
Over-hyped fears of global warming are utterly wrong. In fact, cold weather kills. Throughout history and in modern times, many more people succumb to cold exposure than to hot weather, as evidenced in a wide range of cold and warm climates. Evidence is provided from a study of 74 million deaths in thirteen cold and warm countries including Thailand and Brazil, and studies of the United Kingdom, Europe, the USA, Australia and Canada.
Contrary to popular belief, Earth is colder-than-optimum for human survival. A warmer world, such as was experienced during the Roman Warm Period and the Medieval Warm Period, is expected to lower winter deaths and a colder world like the Little Ice Age will increase winter mortality, absent adaptive measures. These conclusions have been known for many decades, based on national Excess Winter Mortality statistics.
Excess Winter Mortality in the USA typically totals about 100,000 per year – that is, 100,000 Excess Winter Deaths every year during the cold months of December through March. In Canada, Excess Winter Deaths range from about 5000 to 10,000 every year.
Despite our colder climate, Canada typically has slightly lower Excess Winter Mortality Rates than the USA and much lower than the UK. This is attributed to our better adaptation to cold weather, including better home insulation and home heating systems, and much lower energy costs than the UK, as a result of low-cost natural gas due to shale fracking and our lower implementation of inefficient and costly green energy schemes.
The Alberta Climate Change initiative seeks to reduce the use of fossil fuels and increase the use of green energy. In Europe, where green energy schemes have been widely implemented, the result is higher energy costs that are unaffordable for the elderly and the poor, and increased winter deaths. European politicians are retreating from highly-subsidized green energy schemes and returning to fossil fuels.
The problem with green energy schemes is they are not green and they produce little useful energy, primarily because they are too intermittent and require almost 100% fossil-fueled (or other) backup.
The lessons for Alberta are clear: When misinformed politicians fool with energy systems, the costs are enormous – globally, trillions of dollars of scarce resources have been squandered, economies have been severely damaged, and innocent people have needlessly suffered and died.
Yours truly, Allan MacRae
Well done! I attended the meeting in Edmonton and had quite a long chat with one of the representatives. In my discussion with her, I commented on the fact that the NDP seemed to change their mind about CCS from before the election to afterwards. In the comments that I submitted, I also mentioned that Alberta’s plan to still spend (due to previous commitments) about 1.24 billion dollars on CCS and the gain from this would be a forestalling of about 1/10000 degree C over the next 100 years.
Hi Werner.
In about 2008 Syncrude studied the cost of CO2 capture from their huge hydrogen plants, which produce hydrogen and CO2 by-product through steam-methane reforming of natural gas.
As I recall, the cost to simply capture this relatively pure CO2 by-product stream and pipe it just one mile to the plant boundary was about $150 per tonne CO2, including capital amortization and operating cost.
Then there would be the added costs of piping the CO2 to distant oilfields and injecting it into producing formations to increase oil recovery.
The economics of this scheme sound rather dismal, although CO2 injection has been used for many years at Weyburn-Midale, Saskatchewan.
Very true! And what good would it do? Did you see:
http://joannenova.com.au/2011/10/canada-6b-to-cut-global-temps-by-0-0007%C2%B0c-just-84trillion-per-degree/
Many people moved to Alberta for work and they brought their politics with them. Didn’t learn from having lost their jobs in other provinces.
Thanks Allan.
I have sent comments to the CCP (Climate Change Panel) and to the Premier.
I note we have seen the first protests against the new Alberta NDP govenment this weekend for putting their Climate Change Agenda ahead of jobs and the economy. Hopefully they will listen. I actually think they are pandering to the US and our other provinces in order to get pipelines approved, but I may be reading too much into comments made by the Premier and her Ministers that don’t get to the media.
In my note to the Premier, acknowledged by an underling, I sent the results of the UN and Gallup polls showing how the public puts Climate Change at the bottom of their list of concerns.
Only politicians, bureaucrats, and university ivory tower gazers along with a few blinded ecoloons believe in CAGW. The politicians like it as a diversion to allow them to carry out activities under the radar while rewarding their friends. Bureaucrats like it because they get nice rewards. The ivory tower group likes it for the same reason and the ecoloons like it because they get the attention they undoubtedly missed when they were children. (I can’t say environmentalists because they aren’t, I think I am because I have worked and played with knowledge in the enviromental/climate area all my life.) There are still lots of good environmental groups and ecologists out there, but sadly, they don’t attract much attention.
Although we see no warming in the satellite record in the last 18 years, personally, living in the country and burning wood off my property as my main winter heat source, I wouldn’t mind a degree or two of warming.
However I have looked at a lot of temperature records north of 49 and the most common thing I see is LESS cold, not warming. Frankly, living in a place that gets down to 30 below regularly, a degree or two of less cold really doesn’t seem like a problem to me.
Glad I had a chance to talk to you about the CPP meetings and thanks to all who attended and who have commented.
Any Albertans reading this might want to go to:
https://climateleadershipsurvey.alberta.ca/
Now there are issues with the “survey” as it appears designed to get predetermined results … but there are comment sections that allow responders to provide “real” input. Take the opportunity.
Wayne Delbeke,
Thank you Werner, Barbara and Wayne for your comments.
My submission to the Alberta Climate Change Advisory Panel was made six days ago on Tuesday 8Sept2015 but is still not posted on their website – I will advise when it is posted. The Panel have now posted submissions up to 31Aug2015 at
https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0B1whOKweyfKHfndDdUpxYXlQdUF0MGhSM25jR3RuLXppLU01NXlMcDFqR2pJZHpkSmo2T2M&usp=drive_web
Regards, Allan
Post Script:
An earlier version of our Excess Winter Mortality Paper is here:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/05/24/winters-not-summers-increase-mortality-and-stress-the-economy/
[excerpt]
“USA: In 2008, there were 108,500 ‘excess’ deaths during the 122 days in the cold months (December to March).”
To put that number of USA Excess Winter Deaths into perspective, it is two 9-11’s per week for 17 weeks EVERY YEAR.
And the President and the media tell us to be very frightened because we’ll all burn up from global warming… … I am not at all concerned abut global warming, but I am concerned about global cooling, whether moderate or severe, and I suggest cooling is imminent.
Our letter and papers submitted to the Alberta Climate Change Advisory Panel are published at:
https://friendsofsciencecalgary.wordpress.com/2015/09/15/what-is-the-ipccs-credibility-on-global-warming-a-2002-kyoto-debate-retrospective/
Regards, Allan
Our submissions to the Alberta Climate Change Advisory Panela are now posted on the Panel’s website – see 108, 108.1 and 108.2 at
https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0B1whOKweyfKHfndDdUpxYXlQdUF0MGhSM25jR3RuLXppLU01NXlMcDFqR2pJZHpkSmo2T2M&usp=drive_web
Regards, Allan
“Anyone who supports absurd green energy policies is the enemy of the world’s poor people.” It would be nice if Pope Francis would learn and admit this…