Guest essay by Eric Worrall
Japan, which hilariously defined investment in high efficiency coal plants as “climate finance“, now plans to meet Paris commitments, by building even more coal plants.
In the wake of the 2011 Fukushima disaster Japan mothballed its fleet of nuclear reactors, relying on fossil fuel imports to meet energy demand.
But last week prime minister Shinzo Abe said these would need to be switched back on to meet energy demand.
“Our resource-poor country cannot do without nuclear power to secure the stability of energy supply while considering what makes economic sense and the issue of climate change,” he said.
…
Around 40 new coal power plants are planned up to 2030, according to the Global Coal Plant Tracker.
“The main concern is measures on emissions from coal power plants,” Yukari Takamura, a climate policy expert who helped draft the climate plans told Carbon Pulse.
“Since construction of many new coal plants are planned, the government will put in place some regulatory measures but, I suppose, with quite weak enforcement.”
Read more: http://www.climatechangenews.com/2016/03/15/japan-fleshes-out-climate-change-plan/
Let us hope more governments follow the inspirational Japanese approach to reducing CO2 emissions.
Yes!!! Keep US and Aussie coal mines producing, miners employed with good paying jobs, and exporting their extractions.
15 Mar: Philippine Star: Alexis Romero: Former US VP Al Gore to Pinoys: Continue ‘moral crusade’ vs coal
Former United States vice president and environmental activist Al Gore on Monday urged sectors demanding government action on climate change to continue what he described as a “moral struggle” amid the Philippines’s continued support for coal-fired power plants.
Gore compared the climate movement to those who fought for the abolition of slavery, civil rights and the right of women to vote, saying such advocacies faced stiff resistance before they succeeded.
“Every great moral struggle in the history of humanity has met with no after no after no until finally when the question is ultimately resolved in a simple binary choice between what is right is what is wrong. The outcome became pre-ordained because of who we are as human beings,” Gore said during a two-hour lecture he delivered during the Climate Reality Leadership Corps Training in Pasay.
“That is where the climate movement is today. There have been no’s after no’s after nos. People have tried to confused the issue people have tried to cloud the issue,” he added.
“But now because of the impacts of climate-related extreme weather and because of our understanding of what is happening, it has become a simple choice between what is right and what is wrong.”
Gore, founder of the non-profit group Climate Reality Project, said people should pressure their leaders to act on climate change despite efforts by skeptics to muddle the issue…
“The need to act is indisputable,” Gore said.
“We can get rid of dirty fossil fuel. We need to put a price on carbon in the markers and put a price on denial in politics,” he added.
http://www.philstar.com/headlines/2016/03/15/1563178/former-us-vp-al-gore-pinoys-continue-moral-crusade-vs-coal
In the musings of what makes the man, I tend to think Gore’s environmental streak is a backlash to his uncomfortable connection to tobacco wealth. His sister also died of lung cancer. He speaks with the words of a believer in his cause. Ultimately his fervor is misplaced but I tend to think it is rooted in an uncomfortable past.
Quick! Give our coal hating mastermind at Pennsylvania Ave. some Pepto for
that upset tummy.
14 Mar: Inquirer Philippines: Kristine Angeli Sabillo: Al Gore to ‘climate warriors’: We only have years to make large change
“We’re in an unusual situation in our world. We have to make a very large change. And we have to do it in a ridiculously short period of time,” Gore said during the first day of the Climate Reality Leadership Corps training held in Sofitel, Manila. “I say ridiculously because we’re used to making changes these large over centuries.”
“We don’t have centuries. We have years. And each day matters,” he told more than 600 participants, some of whom flew into the country to attend the three-day workshop…
“It’s an extraordinary challenge. But we are winning. We are succeeding. The real question is how much longer will it take to complete this transition,” he explained.
Gore emphasized that the change should start from the grassroots…
There are now more than 9,000 climate leaders in 135 countries, according to Ken Berlin, president and CEO of The Climate Reality Project.
They are targeting 20,000 volunteers by 2020…
During his presentation, Gore showed how the Philippines is one of the most vulnerable countries to climate change
He also gave examples on how other countries like the United States are being affected by extreme weather and changes in water and air temperature.
http://globalnation.inquirer.net/137741/al-gore-to-climate-warriors-we-only-have-years-to-make-large-change
info on Ken Berlin:
Coalition for Green Capital: Kenneth Berlin, Climate Reality Project
Mr. Berlin has played an integral role in the establishment of the Coalition for Green Capital in 2012 and has dedicated years to promoting the green bank concept. He recently accepted a position as President and CEO of the Climate Reality Project.
Mr. Berlin is the former head of the Environmental and Climate Change Practices at Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom law firm and has an extensive background in environmental and climate change matters. The firm’s climate change practice includes 23 attorneys and represents clients in all aspects of climate change work, including emission trading, litigation and compliance advice. Mr. Berlin is the author of articles on clean coal and climate change and lectures widely on climate change issues. He is one of only two U.S. lawyers listed in the first tier of Climate Change Lawyers in Chambers Global. He is also listed in the first tier of Environmental Transactional Lawyers in Chambers USA and The Best Lawyers in America 2008. Mr. Berlin is former Chairman of the Board of the Environmental Law Institute and has been on the Board or National Counsel of many environmental groups. Mr. Berlin is a member of President Obama’s Environmental & Energy Policy Group and his Mid-Atlantic Finance Team.
http://www.coalitionforgreencapital.com/ken-berlin.html
Pat, why are you promoting the ranting of Gore ??
He’s just another snake-oil salesman trying (very successfully) to make a Dishonest $ by selling fear.
The ultimatums and dire last-chance dates of which prognosticator have come to pass? Answer: None.
which ones should we heed? Same answer.
“In the wake of the 2011 Fukushima disaster Japan mothballed its fleet of nuclear reactors, relying on fossil fuel imports to meet energy demand …”.
===========================================
“There was no association between the deaths of six workers at the plant during the accident and radiation exposure … the six people’s deaths were linked to either previous health problems or non-radiation accidents …
… one of the people who died had acute leukemia, while another fell off a ladder …” (medicalnewstoday):
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/245794.php
Chris
G’day mate. You seem to have missed some ‘small’ detail in your comments on the Fukushima accident. Such as the Great East Japan Earthquake of magnitude 9.0 which hit the fukushimal area and subsequent Tsunami (about 45 minutes after quake) resulting in around 20.000 deaths. The plants operating reactors all shutdown automatically when the quake hit, but the tsunami took out the emergency generators at the plant. Lousy engineering effort to have these in the basement. The operators then had no control over the cooling sytems for a couple of days, which resulted in the accident. No plant or local people were, or have been, killed in the nuclear accident, although 3 poor souls lost their lives in the Daiichi and Daini nuclear plants during the Earthquake and Tsunami.
See world-nuclear.org/information [follow Fukushima link]
Jim Stewart
100%- surprising for the Japanese to be shown to have so poorly located and engineered these reactors. It does, however make one wonder about other reactors around the world. I know after Fukushima there was an audit of U.S. plants that showed significant non-compliance and failure to meet previous repair and upgrade requirements from regulators.
I know after Fukushima there was an audit of U.S. plants that showed significant non-compliance and failure to meet previous repair and upgrade requirements from regulators.
Link?
The Japanese and Chinese are intelligent and practical people unlike the Leftists and Warmists that have infiltrated Western Countries’ political systems. The Japanese and Chinese move to define investment in high efficiency coal plants as “climate finance“, is magnificent and cost-saving too, and should be widely emulated. After all, things are only what you call them, aren’t they. I think that the Russians will be in agreement with their idea.
Japan is showing common sense. Compare to the bonfire of eco-socialist
insanity. It was never about the environment, never about replacing energy
-efficient-fossil-fuels with energy-efficient – low carbon -emission-nuclear-
power. Had to go with renewables, that need constant renewing and back-
up when the wind don’t blow and the sun don’t shine. Here DRAX madness ,
shipping wood-chips from Canadian forests to Britain…Green energy??
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2581887/The-bonfire-insanity-Woodland-shipped-3-800-miles-burned-Drax-power-station-It-belches-CO2-
In parliament today in oz a greenie questioned the prime minister about the impending climate doom as told by our chief scientist that NASA had recorded an extremely high Co2 reading at Hawaii. Which meant we are all going to perish because we are not acting quick enough to reduce carbon pollution .
Isn’t there active volcanoes in Hawaii ?why would NASA record Co2 levels in a place with elevated natural levels of Co2 ??? Oh that’s right it’s NASA !
I would like , at this point , to see some comments on the situation re: increased coal power dependency amongst leading economies , from our friends of the warmist persuasion.
Is it approved by them because it is a shift from nuclear , or disapproved because of increased CO2 emission ? The silence is a bit baffling , or have they thrown in the towel ?
OT but may be of interest to some.
Oxford professor wins £500,000 for solving 300-year-old mathematical mystery
Sir Andrew Wiles’ proof of Fermat’s Last Theorem has been described as ‘an epochal moment for mathematics’
http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/03595/Fermat_s-Last-Theo_3595243b.jpg
We can give Japan a head start by selling to them the coal fired power station at Longannet in Fife. It is going out of operation next month. We can moor barges at the power station jetty, dismantle it, put the pieces on the barges and send them to Japan like a giant jigsaw. Much quicker than building a new one from scratch.
We can buy candles from Japan so that we can have light during next winter.
And heat, Oldseadog.
No, no, the heat comes from the parliament buildings in Edinburgh and London.
And out of whisky bottles, of course. Even whiskey bottles.
Add to the proposed Japanese CFPS’s, their intention to import massive amounts of LNG from massive new sources in Northern Australia. The idiot Ministers and their civil service leaders and lackeys in the UK Government daren’t tell us the cost of the massive gas-tight greenhouse covering the whole of the UK that will be needed to make their imposed Green Energy Policies environmentally effective. We already know that these policies are commercially and economically grossly unaffordable and competitively suicidal.
Now would be a great time for Japan to snap up Peabody Energy, the largest coal mining company in the US. They just missed their March 15th. bond payment and have filed a “Going Concern” SEC document saying they are preparing for bankruptcy. It is expected that in bankruptcy Peabody will be able to jettison it’s burdensome obligations for worker retirement pensions, healthcare and EPA mandated mining restorations. It’s the deal of a lifetime – there is enough coal in the Peabody mines to last Japan 500 years!
I thought Anthony shut down the comments section??? Forget AGW and even CO2, the sulfur dioxides, nitrous oxides along with coal being the leading cause of smog, acid rain and toxic air pollution should be enough, elimination of the radionuclides is a problem too. Even the Chinese recognize this; ever see a news clip from a major urban center in China lately, such as Shanghai or Taiwan? They’re all walking around with masks on! No such thing as “Clean Coal”; its a marketing slogan.
What? What? Radionuclides? There are such things? You do realize that you are going up against the gospel of AGW. The things people can say in different situations has entirely different meanings. … no such thing I was told… when I was asking about the validity of measuring isotope ratios in co2. You must be a bona fide climate scientist.
Only a bona fide climate scientist can make such a statement and live to tell about it. (The rest of us face jail time, re-education, or possibly death). I’m getting the hang of this. It’s only true when talking about how unhealthy coal is and doesn’t exist when measuring isotope ratios.
You can’t possibly be that stupid, conflating modern, scrubber-equipped coal plants with the situation they have in China.
Or maybe you are.
I agree entirely. What I can’t understand is why the UK CFPS’s owners couldn’t do what their German counterparts and others have done, namely retrofit such scrubber/filter systems to remove/reduce the real pollutants in CFPS emissions – and stay in business. Why, also, have they not provided new CFPS’s with such scrubbers/filters as the Germans have done and now the Japanese and others intend? The designs would be basically the same and coal is now mostly bought on the global market and not locally sourced. Is it simply because of the UK’s typical gold plating of EU directives and Blair’s past unilateral legal commitment on CO2 emissions – something that Cameron’s government is now augmenting with their intended further CO2 commitments following the farce of the Paris Conference?
@T.Madigan:
“ever see a news clip from a major urban center in China lately, such as Shanghai or Taiwan? They’re all walking around with masks on……”
Among other things, you appear to be unable to get your East Asian geography right. While Shanghai is certainly an urban center in China, Taiwan is not. The last time I checked, Taiwan was (and I believe still is) an island nation off the coast of mainland China. The Chinese however still consider Taiwan a rebel province.
This is the first time I’ve ever heard radionuclides mentioned in association with coal plants, if indeed that is what you are doing. Everything I’ve read on the subject was always in association with nuclear power. In addition, I may be wrong here, but I do not believe that the Chinese install pollution control equipment on their coal plants like we do here in the West….which would explain their air quality problems now wouldn’t it? Using coal for power generation is just a matter of developing the technologies to do it cleanly and responsibly.
Coal waste contains some radioactive material, that’s a well-known fact. Probably not to worry about thoug.
The greens in California are saying that there are radionuclides in fossil fuel burnings. Most recently in the gas leak north of Los Angles that was picking up radon from the soil. Perhaps, but it may have to do with the sodium nuclear reactors that melted down nearby in 1949. Just for info not related, they were also saying that in sunlight the methane was/is being converted to fomidahyde.
When in doubt and there is a probability, I’d be wearing a radiation badge and carrying a gieger counter.
There are radionuclides just about everywhere, including coal and so like with any discussion of contaminants, it should be couched in some meaningful perspective.
NGOs know this but once again launch the half truth while it runs and the rest of the truth has to wade thru stirred up emotions to be heard.
Rinse, repeat the strategy.
I often wonder if the masses ever reach a point of hysteria saturation.
“T. Madigan
March 16, 2016 at 6:19 am
They’re all walking around with masks on! No such thing as “Clean Coal”; its a marketing slogan.”
I have seen Asian people walk around in London (Clean air act since the 1950’s), Wellington, New Zealand (Near Pencarrow Head, 2nd cleanest air on this rock apparently), Melbourne and Sydney Australia, fairly good air, wearing face masks on.
Clean coal is a marketing slogan, agreed. However, many plants scrub exhaust so much so that only water vapour and CO2 are emitted. So too is clean, renewable, energy is a marketing slogan. There is nothing we do, make and use, including the PC, telecoms networks that you are using to make your protest, that does not involve mining and energy use. If you can grow your internet connection, power and PC on a tree, get back to me. Otherwise I see you as a hypocrite!
What was said about the French is even more true for the islands of Japan: “No coal. No oil. No gas. No choice.” They need to import everything. Better to go with low cost uranium fuel. Turn the nukes back on, and build more. The tsunami was a great tragedy. Fukushima was more of an MSM blitz following that, to keep it all alive. It was expensive, but few people died from anything to do with Fukushima.
Perhaps they could ‘capture’ the CO2 emissions as a compressed gas to be used for carbonating their (notoriously flat) beer.
Note to all who respond to any comment of mine: I don’t have time to waste fighting with you. If your response is belligerent, offensive or uses insulting or demeaning language, don’t expect any further comments of responses from me.
The threat of jail time, fines, punishment, re-education, and possibly execution are very real to anybody that is a deiner. Myself, and others, the term deiner comes from denying the Holocaust happened and denying CAGW is in the same vain. By prominent individuals and organizations they have said people that deny CAGW are responsible for the potential deaths of millions of people and should be dealt with in the harshest of ways. Please note that not one of the predicted calamities has occurred since the Kyoto accord. Myself and others have been called mentally sick, stupid, on the payroll of big oil, and strawman, I have a problem with authority. .the list is quite long.
I think it is wrong that the same group of people who tell me that I’m sick and delusional, that I don’t know physics or chemistry, tell me that there are no radionuclides in fossil fuels, then 15 years later say there is in a different context. To me it is logical that there would be and even in naturally occurring events where co2 is released. Try selling your house without a radon test. But then the story line about how the IPCC can tell where the co2 came from, how long it exists in the atmosphere, and how much starts to unravel.
Of my many beliefs, CAGW is not one of them. T. Madigan if you believe you are right about something stand up for it. The arguments may be sharp, but certainly no one here is calling for you to be jailed or worse. Except of course, those who have committed fraud at taxpayer expense to push a political agenda. (You aren’t one of those, are you?) There are probably quite a few people that their research wouldn’t make the grade, however, they aren’t trying to effect wholesale changes in economics, government, or standard of living. The effect of elevating AGW while pushing back against anyone or anything that disagrees with the meme has had a chilling effect on science.
Nurses studied in an area of very high radon readings had fewer than normal cancers. Chronic exposure increases resistance in general by ramping up DNA-repair mechanisms (which robots, btw, lack).
Interesting. I’d love to see reliable statistical correlation for naturally occurring higher radiation and low rates of cancer ?
I can see that this is a new push towards nuclear. Scientific American makes similar claims in this month’s edition. No harm from a nuclear accident is what they are implying. Maybe the drinking water in Flint, MI is safe to drink after all. It’s the paint that’s causing your lead poisioning. If you push for that type of reasoning, then let me be the first to relocate you to one of those areas. How many 4/5 leaf clovers are growing in your yard? (Or park)…
How many firefighters at Chernoble died? None! How many people came down with lung problems from cleaning up the WTC. None! EPA chief Christy declared the air safe!
I didn’t kill that guy. He was still alive until the doctors removed the knife.
Cancer just runs in some communities and families. Who is to say?
You’re linking scientific evidence of hard nuclear facts with soft scientific evidence of global warming. Global warming is only supported by assumptions and maybe’s that so far have failed to appear in the time frame required by the math of AGW. Nuclear deaths from accidents have been underreported, because, well we can’t say for certain that the weird tumor going in his back is from the release of radiation from TMI.
Whew! We were so worried!
Looks like our coal miners will have someone to sell coal to and we’ll have this big supply we won’t be using because we’ll be deep into the expensive unreliable windmills and solar panels and quadrupled electric bills.
Businesses are cowards . They only go where the are welcome . Hillary Clinton trash talk and announcement about her plan to shut down USA coal companies and eliminate coal worker jobs
could present Japan and China with an excellent opportunity to buy cheap assets , generate coal power and export steel to the USA . Hillary apparently hasn’t quite figured out what steel is made from .
Imagine the excitement in the military knowing their President has made them completely reliant on countries for steel that the USA must consider defending itself against . Now there is a big thinker
who will not only throw the coal industry and it’s employees under the bus but the military too .
As soon as hedge fund billionaires pull political strings things just don’t work for the public interest it
seems . No wonder Trump is popular . He will never sell Americans out .
As they say don’t get emotionally attached to someone who isn’t emotionally attached to you .
Thanks for playing your cards though Hillary .
“Amber
March 16, 2016 at 10:25 pm
No wonder Trump is popular . He will never sell Americans out .”
You really believe that? If I was a voter in the US, I would not feel so “secure” Trump would not sell me out.
You mean Hillary, the Cloward-Piven supporter? UCLIU