Guest essay by Eric Worrall
According to The Atlantic President Trump’s climate leadership will “devastate the Earth”.
The Global Rightward Shift on Climate Change
ROBINSON MEYER
President Trump may be leading the rich, English-speaking world to scale back environmental policies.
Last Thursday, Malcolm Turnbull was the prime minister of Australia. By the end of this week, he’ll be just another guy in Sydney.
…
It points to an emerging pattern: Moderate national leaders—on both the center-left and center-right—in some of the world’s richest and most advanced countries are finding it far easier to talk about climate change than to actually fight it.
At a basic level, this pattern holds up, well, everywhere. Every country except the United States supports the Paris Agreement on climate change. But no major developed country is on track to meet its Paris climate goals, according to the Climate Action Tracker, an independent analysis produced by three European research organizations. Even Germany, Japan, and the United Kingdom—where right-wing governments have made combatting climate change a national priority—seem likely to miss their goals.
Simply put: This kind of failure, writ large, would devastate Earth in the century to come. The world would blow its stated goal of limiting atmospheric temperature rise. Heatwaves might regularly last for six punishing weeks, sea levels could soar by feet in a few short decades, and certain fragile ecosystems—like the delicate Arctic permafrost or the kaleidoscopic plenty of coral reefs—would disappear from the planet entirely.
…
Read more: https://www.theatlantic.com/article/568684/
The part I don’t get, isn’t green energy supposed to be cheaper than coal? Aren’t green jobs supposed to be a net economic benefit?
Surely the solution to this backsliding is for countries which have embraced climate action for the last few decades to show the world how much that climate action has improved their economies, to inspire the USA and other rich nations to follow their lead regardless of what President Trump wants.
Do I need a /sarc tag?
Gee. And the USA sails along with declining CO2 emissions (assuming that’s “good”). As an American taxpayer watching this begging game, the rest of the world can just go pleasure themselves.
Haha. I didn’t realize until I’d written my own reply that we basically said the same things.
Don’t worry. The USA is simply exporting the CO2 emissions to China and India. Same with Canada and Australia.
Exporting as much coal as they can so cheap fabrication can take place away! Then claim to be “clean”
rd50
This is exactly he SJW mind set – no matter what the US does, somehow it’s bad.
India & especially China can focus on CO2 emission any time they want (has nothing to do with USA). Admittedly, they have other fish to fry (arsenic in the water, et al), but surely their leadership can walk & chew gum at the same time – there MUST be is SOMETHING they could do if they wanted to…
“Other fish to fry (arsenic in water, et al)”
You must be kidding. People in Beijing are walking the streets wearing face masks! You want pictures? Where do you think this pollution is coming from?
Its true, China needs to do a better job cleaning up smoke stack emissions but that technology already exists, they just have to implement it. In any case, they don’t wear face masks because of CO2 emissions.
Obviously they don’t wear a face mask because of CO2 emission, every person walking on the street in Beijing is exhaling CO2, the more they walk the more they exhale CO2. Simple.
For the most part it’s coming from coal being used to heat homes and cook food.
What is the most part coming from coal?
You think people are wearing a face mask because “the most part” is CO2? I know you don’t. The most part is from the older design of coal burning plants gases and particulates emissions. Not CO2. China needs to clean these emissions, not CO2.
Trust rd50 to pretend that he doesn’t understand.
They are wearing masks because of particle pollution. Nobody wears masks due to CO2.
What you know, and what is true rarely if ever correspond.
While it is true that one can see people in China wearing masks, they are far common on Japanese people when they visit other countries.
Smart people.
cars and motorbikes mostly
rd50, don’t you think much of that pollution is coming from the dunes in Taklamakan.
and why Mask Wearing in Japan is a fashion.
https://matcha-jp.com/en/2245?amp=true
https://www.google.at/search?client=ms-android-samsung&ei=3WGMW-f9O8uVsgGWmJTgAw&q=tokyo+streets+face+masks&oq=&gs_l=mobile-gws-wiz-serp.
If you bothered to pay attention, China is building supercritical coal plants. Run at very high temperatures, the CO2 output drops 35%.
Good. The reduced output of CO2 is nice but irrelevant.
CO2 is not a pollutant in China. People on the street are not using a face mask to filter CO2.
You mean they burn 35% less coal to get the same amount of useable energy out?If so, that is a good thing as it means that maybe you are producing energy even cheaper since it is 35% more efficient.
Wow, that’s great however the bulk of the improvement is replacing small very old plants with very poor efficiency. They are and will be the world’s greatest producer of CO2 and pollution by an even greater margin.
You didn’t mention that Obama, and greens forced coal to close up shop in the USA, which dropped coal stocks by around 1000% which at that time Soros bought up 20% of coal stocks.
Did not need to mention this. OK, if you insist, you thank the greens for less CO2 emission.
“OK, if you insist, you thank the greens for less CO2 emission.”
Why thank them for solving a non-problem?
Less CO2 emissions is a bad thing, not a good thing. Plants are starving.
The idea that plants are starving is nonsense. In fact we are “so green” now.
We are getting greener because plants are starving. CO2 levels are still way below what is optimal for plants. To do that we would need to get CO2 levels up to at least 1000ppm.
And yet CO2 emissions continue to climb. Maybe something else is contributing CO2 to the atmosphere? Hmmm……..
If this thing takes a happy turn Trump might flip Soros to the Red column.
Is there nothing he can’t do?
“The USA is simply exporting the CO2 emissions to China and India. ”
Well of course…and then the whole world gives them a pass to emit it…wise up junior you’ve been had
Developing countries emit a certain kind of fairy dust CO2…the good kind that makes plants grow faster
Sure and the people on the streets are wearing face masks! Good luck with your argument.
It makes the plants grow here much better from the increased amount of CO2 produced in China and India and we get very low cost products, they get the air pollution and obviously jobs.
Here’s my argument…
CO2 causes global warming….global warming is going to destroy the planet
…and the people pushing that gives the vast majority of countries a free pass the emit all the CO2 they want
The people pushing this crap don’t even believe their own crap………
Actually they do believe, very sincerely…
in socialism
But wait…China already has socialism…and…and.
Never mind; rd50’s figured out how particle masks save them from CO2.
Plus, we haven’t even factored in the dust & sand from water mis-management & encroaching desertification…
I don’t know what point you’re trying to make Javert. But the Chinese push the CAGW lie because they’re supposed to be on the receiving end of the wealth transfer when world socialism is implemented.
And apart from that, the Chinese state is more like robber baron capitalism than communism.
rd50
The Chinese choose to wear face masks in return for prosperity. There are more Rolls Royce’s sold in China than on anywhere on earth.
What’s you’re problem, or are you just another Social Justice Warrior who the Chinese would probably tell to take a hike.
None of your business pal. Stick your nose where it’s wanted, up your arse.
Interesting. The people walking on the street wearing a face mask to protect their nose and lungs, maybe I am wrong, but I do not think they have a Rolls Royce in their garage. I don’t even think they have a garage. I will take a survey.
rd50
Why not go there and ask?
I promise, you’ll be called an interfering Gweilo and be lucky to leave with your life.
That’ll be because you are an interfering Gweilo. No doubt your survey will be taken behind the safety of a keyboard, thousands of miles away.
You simply have no idea do you.
I was there. No need to take a survey.
A good pair of eyes and a brain. No problem.
rd50
“I was there.”
So was I, in the 1960’s where I witnessed first hand the results of Mau’s economic miracle.
The Chinese are in a far better place now than they were then, pollution or no pollution, which is a transient problem, they will clean up the air and water just as the west has, and continues to do.
rd50
You counted all the Chinese Rolls Royces?
Holy crap! Excellent job!
rd50 demonstrates the typical left wing 1st world concept of prosperity.
He views it as conspicuous consumption.
In the developing world, prosperity is having a roof over heads, a reliable source of heat when it’s cold out, and 3 meals a day.
Your suggestions are fine with me.
Roof, heat, meals.
I hope you have these.
It is August. Go to Beijing. There are 20m people living thereabouts. Find someone wearing a ‘face mask’.
Mendax.
rd50
“There are more Rolls Royce’s sold in China than on anywhere on earth”
Actually, Rolls does not break out sales figures by region, so the claim it difficult to verify. We can probably agree the China & US volumes are fairly close (China has 4X the population & a hell of a lot more socialism/corruption).
Do dudes driving Rolls Royces around Bejing wear masks?
Javert Chip
“Do dudes driving Rolls Royces around Bejing wear masks?”
Does it matter?
The fact is China has probably done more for it’s populations prosperity in the last 40 years than any other country on earth.
They suffer the consequences of rapid economic growth, so did the west. Now the west is so terrified of the minuscule downside of economic growth it has stagnated. Petrified to move forward.
Our socialist, green, SJW, minority group culture has terrified the west into a precautionary culture. And they infect every other country in the world with their poison.
Meanwhile 120,000,000 people in developing countries will die from smoke inhalation by 2050, by burning animal faeces and timber for heating and cooking. The west won’t let them build fossil fuel power stations for clean electricity so they hack down forests and collect cow shit for fuel.
What does the west do? We give Africa free condoms and birth control education, like they don’t know what makes babies. They make babies to have a big family to overcome the infant mortality rate and so they can take care of the elderly between them.
So if the west is going to give them anything, give them elderly care, not effing condoms! Take the elderly off their hands so the productive members of their society can concentrate on working rather than raising kids.
Let them build the power stations and a grid to electrify the country and take the place off everyone else’s hands. Let them compete and prosper on equal terms. And they were doing it until people like Ghandi and Mugabi played the race card and condemned everyone white as racist, then ate their own countries.
rd50,
And if the US had refused to sell the developing world that coal, then it would be called an Imperialist Thug that is trying to deny the rest of the world cheap energy and prosperity. I know how this stupid game works well enough to not bother playing it. So does Trump.
Not so. China is the one building coal plants in Africa.
USA refused! But we will supply the coal. Same for Canada and Australia.
Look here at the black stuff proposed by Canada
http://www.robertsbankterminal2.com/
They will not burn this in Canada, but will supply Africa.
rd50
Good deal. Big deal.
You’re siding with the wrong crowd. The Chinese don’t want, you, don’t like you and don’t care about you because you’re a SJW.
I know lots of Chinese, they think you types are lazy, good for nothing scroungers, and laugh at you. They largely agree you should be imprisoned. Some say shot.
Glad you know lots of Chinese.
rd50
It’s my country of birth.
So much for your smart arsed remark.
rd50
it is cogent insights like “…Glad you know lots of Chinese….” that continue to make your reputation
“rd50
Not so. China is the one building coal plants in Africa.”
They are building infrastructure in Africa so that they can be granted mining rights. I know this from personal experience in Ethiopia. The real issue there is none of the locals benefit from mineral extraction.
There is a Chinese interest OBVIOUSLY.
Otherwise the Chinese would NOT be there.
So, same old thing. No? African will not benefit according to you. OK. I was hoping they would benefit having energy coming in.
Aren’t they getting a coal plant in exchange? Is that not benefitting the locals?
You point out the hypocrisy of it so what would happen if they stopped exporting?…
The reality is that the whole thing is lunatic nonsense and the ‘Paris Targets’ can never be met for various reasons. Firstly so called ‘renewables’ are actually hideously expensive when you take full account of their intermittency, the huge devices needed to harvest such low density energy, their remoteness, in the case of wind the need to be engineered for storm conditions but only deliver in relatively mild weaher. Without massive inbuilt (battery or pumped hydro) storage they are disruptive to grid systems which annoys residential customers bt is even fatal to heavy industry and requires backup alternatives.
WHen all is said and done its largely a scam.
I agree it is a scam. I agree with everything you wrote.
What I do not agree with, is when it is said that USA decreased its CO2 emission. To me this is nonsense. USA simply exported CO2 emission to China and India. Simple.
The second thing is that USA, Canada and Australia are claiming the same, but they all want to export more coal.
I am told about “green coal” and better technology to reduce pollution from coal burning power plants. Great. However, CO2 is NOT a pollutant and will not be reduced by the new coal burning technology. Yes less pollutants such as SO2, Mercury, NOx etc. etc. etc. But not less CO2 or H20. These are not pollutants.
Carbon i.e. coal is not CO2 so we are not exporting CO2. The CO2 is anthropogenically produced overseas. (Since CO2 isn’t the control knob we can wipe our hands clean. Soros is getting rich on the backs of the green NGO’s sarc)
Many seem to believe that we are shipping all of our manufacturing overseas. I haven’t seen that in real numbers. There is a lot of manufacturing here in the states. Heck we even make third world quality parts, right here with refugees supplied cheaply from Catholic Services. The fact is, manufacturing is using less energy producing the same amount of product that use to require much more energy.
The US has reduced their CO2 emissions through fracking gas, more energy efficient gagets.
Wonderful. We are not exporting CO2. Indeed correct, we are only exporting coal. So, why not burning coal in USA, Australia or Canada? OK with you to burn it in China? Yes, CO2 is not the control knob. So what is the problem. Use natural gas instead. OK. Better technology, a little less CO2. OK.
However exportation of coal to China and India and then coming up to Africa for the coal burning power plants that China is financing in Africa is OK but not burning in USA, Canada or Australia because of CO2. I am all in favor of China financing coal power plants in Africa. Africans badly need electricity and I hope they get such.
rd50 said “So, why not burning coal in USA, Australia or Canada? OK with you to burn it in China?”
I take it that you are not from the bloody States of Capitalism. Right now gas is cheaper here than coal and less capital intensive. That is why we burn it instead of coal here in the States. We ship coal because we have if for sale and its easier to ship than gas so it ends up cheaper overseas than shipped gas. Simple economics not a conspiracy to shift a non problem to someone else. Follow the money.
Indeed, you ship coal because you have it for sale. If you have it for sale, why don’t you burn it in your country? Yes, you told me why. You told me. Gas is cheaper than coal and coal is cheaper to ship (at least for now I think) so you ship coal. Yes simple economics. You think burning gas is good. OK.
Well we used to be busy importing CO2 emissions from lots of nations. So turnabout is fair play.
Why not?
rd50
The massive regrowth of the great Eastern Forests in the USA is off-setting well over 50% of CO2 emissions. Some say 80%. If emissions are down 30% by “displacement” as it is called, then the USA is net negative for CO2.
Match that, Germany.
In 2000, the US used about 3,800 GW-hr of electricity. As of 2017, usage was about 4,000 GW-hr. It has been about 4,100 GW-hr ± over the last 10 years, excepting only the downturn in 2008 and its aftermath. CO2 has been going down steadily since 2007, total 14% to date. So, as far as electricity is concerned, we have NOT been exporting CO2 to other countries.
Komrade
I have been thinking about what happens when everyone gives up on the ‘Paris targets’. It seems to me the complaint from the alarmists will be that their grand and necessary plan was sabotaged by Big Oil and so on. All things said, done and stopped, it will have been an exercise producing nothing more than another excuse to hammer political opponents in the hope of gaining the ‘pity vote’.
The commitment to ‘winning the Paris Agreement’ goals was so thin that having only one dissenter prevents Uber-Commited Germany from reaching them? Macron’s emerging failure will be blamed on Pres. Trump?
This would, to me, indicate a group so incompetent they could not organise a conspiracy beyond accusing others of perpetrating one.
rd50
“Don’t worry. The USA is simply exporting the CO2 emissions to China and India. Same with Canada and Australia.”
You would rather China and India remain poverty stricken and destitute?
I thought you green lot were humanitarians.
Seems to me the right wingers on WUWT are far more interested in global wealth distribution that you socialists are, but we look to the free market economy to make people wealthy. You lot want to itemise who should be wealthy and who should be poor.
China is not a developing country. China has more skyscrapers than ALL other countries in the world. China has an unbelievable infrastructure. And yes China has poverty.
If you want to talk about poverty and destitute, come to India and Africa. Interestingly, China is the one building (financing) coal burning power plants in these countries. Not USA, not Canada, not Australia. They will supply the coal. Funny that they don’t want to burn the coal in their country, but they are willing to export it and more of it is better.
The UN devised this scheme to distribute wealth to developing countries…
…China is most definitely still considered a developing country by the UN
That means China can emit all the CO2 it wants to………
If China is no longer a developing nation (as it is #3 on GDP output), then they should assume the same responsibilities as the USA and EU for emission reductions.
@James Beaver
On a per-capita GDP basis, China is most definitely still a developing country. Per Wiki, the US is 11th, China is 79th.
rd50 Correction, China is financing the construction of coal fired power stations.
The world bank and U.N. financing institutions refused to fund such constructions.
With the Trump administration such policies with american lenders will change.
Also there is the possibility that the shut down aluminum smelting industry in the pacific northwest may restart. This would mean that the surplus power that is now sent to California would return to metal working industries which was what dams were constructed for in the first place.
michael
“The world bank and U.N. financing institutions refused to fund such constructions.”
I agree with your above statement. Known.
What you then stated is “the possibility”.
I hope you “possibilities” will come on.
rd50
“China has more skyscrapers than ALL other countries in the world.”
By that definition the UK then qualifies as a developing nation as we have relatively few skyscrapers.
From his previous posts, it’s pretty obvious that rd50 would much prefer that the developing world remain pure, and poor.
Nonsense. Africans are in need of energy.
You like women in India and Africa having to walk a few miles everyday to get water and carrying the containers on top of their head. You need pictures? You need a link?
Get energy to India and Africa. Particularly Africa. This is what China is doing. Financing, Building coal burning power plants in Africa. Something that the USA has refused to do.
Africa needs help building energy plants. The USA is not helping.
rd50
The last time someone attempted to help India they were kicked out accused of evil colonialism. India has a space program and the UK is still providing foreign aid to relieve poverty.
Zimbabwe has kicked out all the ‘colonialist’ white farmers and turned the bread basket of Africa into a basket case. South Africa is on the cusp of doing the same.
Sort your own countries out first before begging for help when you have consistently bitten the hands that feed you.
Everything you wrote is correct.
I agree.
rd50
“Everything you wrote is correct.
I agree.”
I’ll get a virtual frame and hang that on a virtual wall somewhere. 🙂
The “USA has refused” based on the idiotic Obama climate policies. It takes time to clean up the mess he had 8 years to create. And it’s not really the “US” that refuses-it’s the “World Bank,” which is fully “on board” with the Climate Nazis.
MarkW
It is obvious to me you are misreading rd50’s comments and intents. Stop with the projection already.
Crispin in Waterloo
“It is obvious to me you are misreading rd50’s comments…….”
I suspect most of us are. Having re read the whole thread I think rd50 has points to make but has a drum to bang.
I think he’s banging the right drum, for the wrong reasons. Most of us are examining the reasons rather than listening to the drum.
“You would rather China and India remain poverty stricken and destitute?” Looks like it.
“You lot want to itemise who should be wealthy and who should be poor.” Yep. And people who disagree with the Lefties should be poor – or dead.
“The USA is simply exporting the CO2 emissions to China and India.“. USA’s reduction in CO2 emissions comes from their use of natural gas. Their manufacturing is up not down, ie. no longer being exported to China or India. It is a delicious irony that Europe has gone full-bore into renewable energy to try to reduce CO2 emissions and has failed, while the USA is the only significant country to make any CO2 emission reductions at all, is the only country to meet its Paris target even though it no longer has it as a target, and has done it entirely by use of fossil fuels. Sometimes – and I do wish it was much more often – I just love the way the world works.
Agreed, and as the USA brings back manufacturing it will actually reduce global emissions because it will use Natural Gas to generate the energy used for manufacturing rather than coal and get richer at the same time. Oh the ironing 😉 Its too funny.
I wish the USA would build more nuclear power capacity. High density reliable and consistent base power production has huge advantages over wildly unreliable and expensive “green” power.
“The USA is simply exporting the CO2 emissions to China and India. Same with Canada and Australia.”
Wasn’t that the plan all along??……….
Invent some reason (global warming/CO2) to move all the manufacturing (money) to third world …..
…and then make up an excuse (developing) to give them a free pass to do all the CO2/global warming they want
..and then start measuring CO2 as GDP….like global warming gives a ratsass how much money you make
There was NO plan for CO2 Reduction from the USA, Canada, Australia, European Union, etc. etc.!
Simple, exporting manufacturing to China would reduced cost of all items.
So, China did not care about the unbelievable air pollution, water pollution this could create. It did indeed create the pollution. So much so that we only need pictures, no analytical chemistry to the part per million needed! A pair of eyes and a brain or a good camera are all what is needed!
rd50
“So, China did not care about the unbelievable air pollution, water pollution this could create.”
Free Market Economics pal, quid pro quo. China knew the risks of pollution, the west has set it plenty of examples. But I didn’t see China, Africa or India rushing to the aid of LA or London when they had air pollution problems.
No one forced the Chinese to manufacture utilising cheap labour, they volunteered and it has dragged the country from Mau’s disastrous communist starvation of 100M people, into the 21st Century where a great many Chinese are prosperous.
Leave well alone, it’s interfering people like you that’s caused the insolvable problem of the Middle East.
Isn’t one of Trump’s goals to bring back manufacturing to the USA? So clearly he’s trying to help China and India reduce their emissions and use Natural Gas for manufacturing instead of Coal… that will reduce global emissions even further. Seems like a smart move for the climate if your goal is to reduce Co2 emissions .. manufacture in the country that uses the least “polluting” energy source.. Win win win.
I like your idea that Trump wants to bring back manufacturing in the USA. The problem now is that CO2 has been declared a “pollutant”. Hard to think about photosynthesis without CO2, but this is what EPA does.
No, I want 800 to 1200 ppm CO2
How bout the folks that make these warming claims wager some money on their claims. Let’s agree to some measurable metrics and a reasonable timeframe and make some wagers. Put up or shut up!
Based upon what’s happened so far, I’d say it depends on who gets to keep score
You’re in luck. A just-up thread on this site discusses a new online climate bookie:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2018/08/28/you-can-now-bet-for-and-against-global-warming-with-an-online-climate-bookie/
will “devastate the Earth”….
OK, run with that…
…then why does the vast majority of countries get to do as they please and increase their emissions?
Does China, Russia, India, most of the middle and far east, all of Africa, South America, Central America and the Caribbean…..only emit fairy dust CO2?
The people saying this crap don’t even believe their own crap……….
‘The people saying this crap don’t even believe their own crap’
Kinda makes you think of one of the other posts today – that whole thing about wamists not agreeing to debate?
Only CAPITALISM and CAPITALIST countries can AFFORD to keep the planet CLEAN. Period. That is FACT.
we have a winner!
Kenji
I would refine that down to countries willing to engage in free trade. Capitalism is as much a political construct as socialism. It’s free trade that makes people prosperous.
Just to but in, I would add that free trade in this sense doesn’t just include foreign trade. It involves individuals trading with each other as well.
MarkW
Absolutely.
Let’s not forget: the US was the only major country to NOT sign the Paris Accord, and yet it is the ONLY major country to have reduced its CO2 footprint.
Not that I personally think that’s important. Except when it comes to showing how hypocritical the warmists are.
As best I can tell, they just want money. They don’t give a damn about the climate.
Bingo!
The USA did not reduce its CO2 footprint.
It simply exported more and more coal to China and India.
Same with Canada and Australia.
Export to China to get cheap fabrication! No more and no less.
Not true. The USA reduced its’ CO2 output primarily by converting coal plants to gas. Yes it exported manufacturing at the behest of the globalists under the guise of moving its’ workforce to less manual labor and increasing profits which not only did not materialize but caused economic problems for all but the countries providing the manufacturing. Globalization and AGW go hand in hand as artifices of UN meddling in world affairs to produce a Socialist state at the expense of successful Western industrialized countries.
I thought anti-globalization and anti-free trade were leftwing positions. But now its suddenly rightwing? How are free trade and free markets, which I thought were closely linked to globalization, also linked to socialism? I thought socialists wanted less freedom, not more. So confused.
I also thought US manufacturing was not in decline. https://www.cato.org/publications/commentary/myth-us-manufacturing-decline
I’m pretty sure Western industrialized countries didn’t get rich by bombing their own harbors, building walls, and limiting their people’s freedom. I thought those were what socialists did.
China, the grand master of cheap solar panel production, needs coal from the USA for their coal plants. Fine. At least their green-backs are green.
That’s far different from California going green but importing coal-generated, and other non-green electricity from other states. It’s really just a net export of CO2. Good Job CA Greenies!
https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=30192
https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=427&t=3
Yes. CA will claim the same. We reduced CO2 emission.
Sure, just import your electricity from another state. Bingo.
Well Donald Trump puts tarifs on China and the leftist/billionaires/anti power/pro US spying agencies/anti America/pro privacy/pro spying on citizens/pro consuming local goods/pro importing from China crowd hates that.
“The USA did not reduce its CO2 footprint.
It simply exported more and more coal to China and India.”
..and China and India did it with the blessings of the entire world…they can burn all they want
Now who set up that deal…….
The USA agreed with the deal. Simple. If the most wealthy nation agrees to pay, do you think the little nations who need money will go against it? Interesting what is happening now. The little nations who need money are bitching.
rd50
“Export to China to get cheap fabrication! No more and no less.”
Free Market Economics. China can export its fabrication to the US or any other country any time it wants.
Are you sure? According to you “China can export its fabrication to the US or any other country any time it wants”
You will let China drive the economy of your country?
You want everything from China? Go for it.
rd50
Assuming the terms were equitable then why not? In fact as we speak, if not the Chinese then the Japanese have highly successful factories in the UK including Nissan and Toyota.
Jaguar Land Rover are a subsidiary of Indian automotive company Tata Motors and are still made at Browns lane.
They bring enormous employment but carry the financial risk.
Quid pro quo.
France only reduced its carbon footprint for other reasons and before it was trendy. Inputs was the issue, not outputs.
Absolutely. What was wrong with what France did?
Good question, seems the French are a little miffed about our not honoring a agreement that we never signed on for. But their program of building nuclear power plants was a wise one. Though the french know all about non-compliance with international treaties despite the outrage of the rest of the world, but it never stopped them.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jul/03/french-nuclear-tests-polynesia-declassified
Yup the above ground nuclear test ban treaty.
https://www.ourdocuments.gov/doc.php?flash=false&doc=95
Now which is the real threat CO2 or strontium 90 ?
https://www.journalofdairyscience.org/article/S0022-0302(58)91149-4/abstract
Yes, yes France is such a blast of an example
michael
Yes, such a blast of an example.
They left out both majorities lost in the US. Senate and House of Representatives or was that Obama exclusive of his policies and positions.
Damn him!
This is why AI is a threat to the world with automation replacing humans, at least in a world that operates with auto-pilot thinking, agenda appeasement at every turn and every current event key-word combination, and no fact checking.
And Mars is warming because of the poor example set by Earth…
Ah, that explains it red color; its just like that “World On Fire” map put out by NASA!
Mars is warming because Matt Damon blew up his grow operation. The atmosphere released when the habitat blew caused the tipping point to be crossed. /sarc.
It sounds like more winning to me, and whining by the hypocritical Climate Losers. Every time I think I’m getting sick of winning, I’m not.
No sarc tag needed, Eric. Like you, I wish those particular countries would hasten their drive to combat climate change. Lead by example, Germany, Japan, et al.
I was worried, sometimes people think I’m being serious when I mock green claims…
The problem with trying to be sarcastic with statements from the greens, is that their real statements are so far out there it’s hard to be even more outlandish.
why do commentators like the one quoted, who ought to know better, keep referring to the “Paris Agreement’ on climate change? The whole point is that no one really wanted to commit to anything, and if it took the form of a treaty designed to be legally binding it would not have been ratified by the US (as that needs the Senate to be onside) and probably not other relatively well off (not just English speaking) countries which do not want legally binding commitments to pay huge sums to developing countries. Instead, it was an “Accord’, a fudge designed to oblige no one to do anything. And yet The Financial Times, in reporting the political issues is Australia, implied last week that it was a binding agreement which Australia had to legislate for. I just find this degree of ignorance frightening.
So the only world leader who is honest is Trump. And it’s Trump’s fault.
“I’m sorry baby, I’d never hurt you, you know that. It’s just this damn war and that lying son of a bitch Johnson!”
Come to think of it, when Trump was being criticized for “going astray” when the rest of the world was supposedly on board with the Paris garbage, it was conservatives who said that this would turn out to be an example of world leadership, and that other nations would soon follow the US lead. Of course, we meant it respectfully, not derisively.
[?? .mod]
[?? .mod]……..Forrest Gump
It is fake all the way down. Fake engineering and fake economics are worse than fake science which is used to push the green scams.
The idiots who produced the fake engineering studies are ignoring the German example as to what is the absolute limit of the green scams, ignoring the cost issue.
Germany has reached the engineering limit of green scam madness. Energy storage is required to reduce CO2 further using the green scams.
Germany has more than 100% green scam energy, maximum nameplate capacity Vs full Germany electric energy requirements.
The problem is actual average energy green scam energy, in Germany, is 20% average, of the maximum nameplate rating.
http://notrickszone.com/2015/02/04/germanys-energiewende-leading-to-suicide-by-cannibalism-huge-oversupply-risks-destabilization/#sthash.8tE9YRDj.PSllYaQF.dpbs
http://www.cfact.org/2014/12/16/germanys-energy-transformation-unsustainable-subsidies-and-an-unstable-system/
news flash: 500 billion euros id $585 billion US dollars…but close enough
I predict they won’t reach 50% before they start having interconnect overloads and crippling blackouts.
“Yet Germany has a unique peculiarity: its leaders sometimes exhibit a stunning inability to recognize when the time has come to abandon a lost cause.”
It’s not just German leadership that can’t recongnize reality, it’s the whole CAGW world.
Reality will dawn on them eventually, whether they want it to or not.
Now French environment minister resigns over the government’s failure to undertake serious green policies.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/world/blow-for-french-president-as-nicolashulot-quits-live-on-air-b5mv2rpvs
Great news. France needs to go green again. Nuclear.
rd50
Part of Trumps Swamp Clearance.
Another one bites the dust.
Actually France is very “green” already as long as one considers nuclear to be green – which I do. 72% of electrical generation is nuclear which combined with 10% hydro provides reliable base load generation to support ~6% intermittent renewables without destabilizing the grid. I like it.
wiki: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_in_France#cite_note-Prodfil-4
source data: https://opendata.rte-france.com/explore/dataset/prod_par_filiere/analyze/
I agree. Great for France. Will France be able to continue the combination nuclear/hydro. I like it also.
Robbie, Robbie, Robbie [ROBINSON MEYER], can you GET any more dramatic ?!
Since when did Germany and the UK have ‘right-wing governments’? What garbage.
I think they mean non-socialist or at least not like themselves.
To communists, socialists are right wing.
Well, on the “right” hand you have those who favor freedom. (Think those who favor the ideals set forth in the US Declaration of Indepence.)
On the “left” hand you have those know best how you should live your life and would use Government to force you to conform to what they think is best for you. (For the “Greater Good”, of course.)
In the middle, you have politics.
I should add that with politics comes “labels” designed to relieve the listener of the need for “thinking”. “Right” is wrong and so all that’s left is, well, “Left”.
All that’s left is, well… gone!
So, Left = Authoritarian
invariably
“Since when did Germany and the UK have ‘right-wing governments’? What garbage.”
Angela Merkel is a socialist. I don’t know how the author confused her with the Right.
If your looking for something to blame, don’t blame Trump, blame rational reasoning and clear heads.
Blame reality.
Blame the fact that none of the doom is occurring.
Blame the climate for not cooperating with the propaganda.
TRUTH and empirical evidence are difficult for the Warmists.
Seems about right to me, with Premier Ford of Ontario ousting loser Wynne and abolishing subsidies for electric cars and nixing a carbon tax, eco warrior Trudeau pushing for pipelines,etc. But have no fear, I hear that wind and solar are competive with fossil fuels and will come to the rescue.
We have the fiasco that is lignite in Germany.
We have the fiasco that is solar in Spain.
Not caused by Trump and not just in the English speaking world.
“President Trump may be leading the rich, English-speaking world to scale back environmental policies.”
Germany is part of the English speaking world?
56% of Germans speak English. Germany has a greater English speaking population than either Canada or Australia. link You could argue that Germany is an English speaking country.
I certainly agree with you. Dealing with Germans is very easy in English. I know a little German but ….forget it!
Normally I’d expect them to claim that President Trump was caused by global warming.
In a sense President Trump was caused by Obama’s policies, including the global warming ones. He’s the forgotten people’s answer to the left wing ideologues.
commieBob
Second term landslide. Yesssssssssssss.
As a Brit, I’m relishing the prospect. Thank you America.
I saw the possibility of a Trump victory. As the election approached, I was disheartened by the polls.
The mid-term elections are upon us. A few months is an eternity in politics. I would not bet on any outcome.
If the mid-terms are in any way sane, the Democrats will not have the numbers to impeach President Trump in the house and the senate. Crazy things can happen though.
Having said the above, if he survives to the next Presidential election, a landslide for Donald Trump is indeed one of the possibilities. I have no clue and I’m not betting more than a friendly coffee either way.
The way American politics works, The Donald could be elected by a landslide and then be impeached. I’d say crazier things have happened but not by much. 🙂
commieBob
Sane observations.
From what I can see from over the pond, Trump is taking a wrecking ball to American politics (not before time, I wish someone would do it here) and no one, not even Republicans, like their cosy status quo threatened.
Whilst the Democrats are on a crazed witch hunt to topple Trump, the real threat may well come from within his own party.
HotScot,
That’s one of the problems with a parliamentary system. If the executive upsets the establishment too much, he will be removed by the establishment.
The only way to clean house completely is for a party dedicated to cleaning house to get a sizable majority in parliament.
commieBob, While I certainly hope they don’t take the house, even if they do they still won’t have a 2/3rd supermajority in the Senate (which is what is needed to oust the President), so even if they capture the house and pass impeachment there, like Clinton before him, he won’t be removed by the Senate. Even if somehow they do, that just means we get President Pence something the lefties really don’t want.
“so even if they capture the house and pass impeachment there, like Clinton before him, he won’t be removed by the Senate.”
True, but it may not matter because if the Democrats win the house their plan is to start House investigations of as many things as they can think of to tie the White House up in knots and perhaps if they throw enough sh*t against the wall they may get lucky and some of it will stick.
I saw the possibility of a Trump victory. As the election approached, I was disheartened by the polls.
I wasn’t. I saw how close the polls were (one map, I think it might have been realclearpolitics (RCP), the day before the election had sHillary winning by a single point in the EC) and knowing how they tend to be a few points too high for the Dems, I was pretty positive Trump had a decent shot.
Election night I remember comparing that map to the returns as they came in. Trump kept beating the score on that map in state after state. It was great. Particularly watching the lefties bemoaning the results. I especially remember watching Penn. At the beginning of the night sHillary had a huge lead (because the Philly vote was reported first) that kept shrinking as the night went on. I said to myself that if Penn flips to red, there’s no doubt Trump wins. Even if Penn didn’t flip red, I could see several paths to a Trump victory (he only needed to flip one from the RCP map and there were several that were looking like good candidates), sHillary on the other hand, had far fewer paths based on the early returns (she basically had to hold on to every single one on the RCP as it didn’t look good for her to flip any of Trump’s poll predicted winners). Even though I ended up going to bed before the election was called I was certain Trump had won. and Sure enough, he had.
I remember when the Republicans won control of the House and Senate when Clinton was in office. Dan Rather proclaimed it an example of the American people throwing a temper tantrum.
If the Democrats capture the House, Trump will be impeached. However conviction needs a 2/3rds vote in the Senate and will never happen.
Clinton’s popularity went up after he survived impeachment. I suspect the same thing will happen with Trump.
“Normally I’d expect them to claim that President Trump was caused by global warming”
Hillary should add that to her long, continuously scrolling list of reasons for why she lost the 2016 election.
Already covered, that would be green claims that climate change is causing the rise of fascism.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2018/08/08/claim-failure-to-control-co2-emissions-will-lead-to-global-fascism/
“…that would be green claims that climate change is causing the rise of fascism.”
They may have something there as Green Fascism is getting to be a real problem.
So sad.
The US is setting an example by moving to free itself from the shackles of CAGW alarmism and its “solutions” and some are following our example.
So sad.
(I guess those backing the (political) solutions will need to find some other crap that will “stick to the wall” longer.)
Not meeting climate goals by Socialist countries of the EU is all due to the CIA, otherwise, by God, they would all be green by now. Oh right, big mouths, no follow through. I think the term “blowhards” covers it.
I think “hypocrite” is the best way to describe them. CO2 reductions for thee, but not for me.
Political climate discussion is about virtue signalling, not engineering.
I should hope so!
“Last Thursday, Malcolm Turnbull was the prime minister of Australia. By the end of this week, he’ll be just another guy in Sydney …”.
Yeah just another multimillionaire kicking around Sydney (Turnbull’s net worth A$133 million)– not our Malcolm.
My guess he’ll be off to take up some sinecure at the UN or World Bank or the like before long.
Next U.N. Secretary General? They deserve him…
Look on the bright side: China and India are probably going to increase CO2 emissions as fast as they promised in Paris.
Nice. I got a good chuckle out of that. Love your sense of humor.
It is still all the fault of the US according to the SJWs. If only Hillary had won, all these other countries would still be committed to Paris by means of the US setting a good example./sarc
What would a Hillary world look like?
Sorry, I just gave mySELF chills.
California on steroids?
Robert Kernodle
Perish the thought.
A larger version of Venezuela after her second term.
“What would a Hillary world look like?”
Like your worst nightmare.
If you like eight years of Obama and the corruption and criminality of his administration, then you would love having Hillary at the helm.
Hillary would have continued the United States down the road to ruin that Obama started us on.
Fortunately, sanity intervened on Nov. 8, 2016.
And as an aside: Is there any doubt that cutting taxes stimulates the economy? Socialists claim tax cuts do not stimulate the economy, but it works every time it is tried, and this time is a doozy!
Give people more of their own money to spend and they will spend it and stimulate the economy as a consequence. People are much better at spending their money than are politicians and bureaucrats.
Trump has taken U.S. GDP from about a 2 percent annual rate to an estimated 4.5 percent in the next quarter.
I heard Trump say the other day that each percentage point increase in U.S. GDP was equal to an additional one TRILLION dollars and about ten million new jobs.
Trump will probably add an additional $500 billion to U.S. GDP after he completes revamping all the unfair trade agreements the U.S. has.
China’s economy is sputtering. The U.S. economy is on fire.
“What would a Hillary world look like?”
Think about this: It was revealed yesterday that the Chinese hacked into Hillary’s illegal, unprotected server and were getting a copy of every email sent and received on Hillary’s server in real time.
No doubt there was much criminality discussed in Hillary’s emails and the Chinese have all her emails, so they could blackmail Hillary until the cows came home.
Also, Hillary engaged in criminal activity (imo) with the Russians to sell the Russians U.S. uranium, and the Russians, no doubt, have detailed information on everyone in the Clinton Crime Sydicate that they bribed to get this deal done, so the Russians would have excellent opportunities to blackmail Hillary, too.
Hillary would be doing the bidding of both Russia and China.
What a disaster it would have been had Hillary been elected. Our very freedom would be at risk from this authoritarian person and her authoritarian masters.
Regulations are just as much a drag on the economy as taxes.
What would a Hillary world look like?
Thankfully, I rarely have nightmares and that would have been the mother of all nightmares.
And their CO2 emissions would have *automatically* been less, just because Hillary cares so much. /sarc
Fault?? Maybe they meant Genius!
Stable Genius!
To answer the questions:
1. Yes but no it isn’t.
2. Yes but no they aint.
3. No but yes if addressing Climatics.
It’s all about money America isn’t paying/funding that marxist blob anymore.
The NGO’s think tanks and climate groups/none profits are all hitting ”the wall” now.
The UN Cancer is withering, as American funding dries up.
More power to the Don.
His actions have forced all the Marxistvroaches out into the light, we all see them now,……. and their naked lust for money and power.
“Even Germany, Japan, and the United Kingdom—where right-wing governments have made combatting climate change a national priority …”
Germany and the UK are right-wing? I know that these CAGW / CCC alarmist apologists don’t get atmospheric physics, but now they don’t even understand politics?
And if the US is causing other countires to flag in their efforts to appease the CO2 Gods, doesn’t that mean that the US has not lost its leadership position?
Those governments are well to the right of most GAGW/CCC alarmists.
Leftists refuse to associate with anyone who disagrees with them. Then they assume that since everyone they know agrees with them, that they must be the normal ones.
Yesterday I caught a cold. It’s because of Climate Change. So it’s Trumps fault.
“This kind of failure, writ large, would devastate Earth in the century to come.” That is a very good summing up of the effects of the Alarmists’ Crusade against CO2, the Third World and the Poor.
The Atlantic is historically illiterate, putting the cart before the horse. Australia has led the way on voting out the global warming doomsayers.
Abbott was putting the beat down on Gore’s manure, when Donald Trump was still building golf courses.
After coming second in the 2007 leadership election, Turnbull won the leadership of the Liberal Party in September 2008 and became Leader of the Opposition. However, his support of the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme proposed by the Rudd Government in December 2009 led to a leadership challenge by Tony Abbott, who defeated Turnbull by a single vote. Though initially planning to leave politics after this, Turnbull chose to stay and was later appointed Minister for Communications in the Abbott Government following the 2013 federal election.
“when Donald Trump was still building golf courses.”
Nat that there is anything wrong with that.
They are not conservationists, that’s a conservative trait.
Conservation being the route to conservative.
No they dont care about Trumps green spaces.
Environmentalism, has little to do with the environment, its all keyboard warriorism.
“Moderate leaders”????
Compared to what?
“Heatwaves might regularly last for six punishing weeks,…” Been there, done that, not sea level, but some a few miles from me saw that in Harvey. And I used to show students the “fragile ecosystem,” changed their minds.
Ah, Trump…the whole world hates him, except when they don’t. And no world leaders respect him, except when they follow him.
You are describing how the Leftwing MSM distorts reality.
I would say the Leftwing MSM is at least as much of a threat to Western civilization as are the Chinese or the Russians.
The Leftwing MSM distorts reality to the extent that people are almost unable to govern themselves. I say almost because the voters did manage to turn the situation around by electing Trump, but that’s only temporary, while the Leftwing MSM attempts to destroy Trump and make conservatism into the worst thing possible (for them:).
One bright note: More people seem to be getting wise to the fact that they are not hearing the truth from the Leftwing MSM, instead, they are hearing partisan political propaganda and lies.
I would say the Leftwing MSM is at least as much of a threat to Western civilization as are the Chinese or the Russians.
Indeed the Leftwing MSM is fake news, and as their favorite whipping boy says “Fake news is the enemy of the people”
Trump Derangement Syndrome coupled with CAGW derangement syndrome is a quick journey from somewhat sane to rubber room living.
Amazing, how they all freak out regarding voluntary non-binding estimates that globally aggregated would reduce IPCC formula calculated CO₂ warming by less the 2 tenths of a degree,
Dooooommm!
I’m glad the internet lives forever, or at least until a major Carrigan Solar Storm.
I would hazard that the real purpose of the Paris “Climate” Accord 2015 had nothing to do with “Climate” in any respect. Rather, the real purpose was to fund the World Meteorological Organization’s Green Climate Fund. Other than Obama transferring, by was of Department of Treasury 2 installments of $500,000 each, the Country “Pledges” are still just that, “Pledges”. Thus the fund is running out of operating capital other than what the U.N. shifts into it. And the political will of the signatory countries in particular Australia, France and Germany to turn the “Pledges” into cash is as quickly sinking as the Bismarck.
Agree.
“…the signatory countries in particular Australia, France and Germany to turn the “Pledges” into cash is as quickly sinking as the Bismarck.”
As I recall, the the Bismarck put up a very good fight before she was sunk. In fact, the only reason she was sunk was that a previous attack damaged her rudder and she was stuck going in circles which made it fairly easy for the British ships to gang up on her and sink her. Hmm, going in circles. I guess the Bismark is a good analogy for the signatory countries after all.
She was disabled by a Swordfish bi-plane torpedo. Then, according to images of the hull on the sea floor, she was likely scuttled by the crew.
“She was disabled by a Swordfish bi-plane torpedo.”
Yes, from HMS Arc Royal.
“…she was likely scuttled by the crew.”
True. She was also being torpedoed by British ships at that time so it was some combination of the gun fire, torpedoes and scuttling that actually sank her.
Australia gave”Malcolm the Magnificent”the boot directly because he has tried to snow us with the NEG(which is a crock of $hit)We wanted to get out of the”Paris Agreement”,but the”Cowardly,Lying,Do Nothing,Career Politicians”on both sides of the isle(the Uni-party)hood winked us and now we are stuck with Malcolm mark 2.So,we are back to square one.
The fact that the majority of Paris signatories are almost guaranteed to miss their targets is a reminder that if combating climate change were such a priority, those countries wouldn’t hesitate to fill the void supposedly left by American withdrawal from the agreement. But the reality is that to do so, they’d have to impose even more punishing carbon pricing on their constituents, and this would be a recipe for political suicide. So a further reality is that the Paris deal is dead and is just awaiting burial.
Google biased? Say it ain’t so…
https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/world/trump-wakes-up-complaining-about-negative-google-search-results-about-himself-illegal/ar-BBMypKw?li=AAgfYrC
Trump was also complaining about Twitter and Facebook and telling them they better change their ways.
I heard Facebook was hiring 10,000 more censors on top of all the thousands they already have. Think about that.
“Might” …. and “could” ….. a propagandist favorite words. … never occurs to them that it is just as probable that it “may be “ … might NOT, and Could NOT.
“would devastate Earth in the century to come”
Define “devastate”? Would he willing to bet money on that I wonder? Too bad he’s never going to see whether or not he was right. You should always mistrust people who make vague predictions hundred years in the future. Anyone can claim anything and there is not going to be any punishment if they are wrong.
Good grief, is there nothing the President cannot be blamed for. Oh by the way, the UK does not have a right wing government, it is soldily on the left.
Blame? I see it as credit. Not only us Trump making America great again, apparently he is making other countries great again as well!
One graphic says it all: Who actually paid in to the Paris Green Climate fund?
A picture is worth a …..
Nicely done.
That $1 billion was peanuts compared to all the other billions tossed from the podium in every speech by Obama.
Simply put: mr Meyer is talking through his backside.
The UK has a “right wing govt”?
I must have missed that then!
The Left hand knoweth what the Right doeth. So much for the fake narrative.
The Paris Agreement in 4.23 minutes
“It’s a fraud really, a fake. It’s just bullshit…” – Hansen
I read Merkle is also refusing to up the cuts to carbon and regretting the targets agreed to as well
funny that!
Here we go again with this ‘glacier sentimentality’. “Children won’t know what snow is.”, “The glaciers are disappearing.”, etc. Isn’t the diminishing of glaciers, permafrost, snow a GOOD thing? You can’t grow crops on a glacier or in permafrost. Yet these things are held up as delicate, precious artifacts of Nature. Jeez!
The other countries want the U.S. to pay their contribution.
The world isn’t doing what we want…… so blame Trump!
It’s not like they are constitutionally capable of blaming themselves.
There’s an fundamental misunderstanding regarding this excerpt which conflates the 2°C target with the Paris Agreement NDCs:
“But no major developed country is on track to meet its Paris climate goals, according to the Climate Action Tracker, an independent analysis produced by three European research organizations. Even Germany, Japan, and the United Kingdom—where right-wing governments have made combatting climate change a national priority—seem likely to miss their goals.”
/////
Germany, Japan and the UK along with many other countries are on track to reach their Paris Agreement commitments as laid out in their Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC’s). The NDC’s were submitted to the UNFCCC at the UN in New York on 22nd April 2016. These are the agreed emission cut promises actually agreed to at Paris in December 2015 and officially submitted four months later.
The NDC’s are strictly timed to run from 2020 to 2030. This time frame was agreed to at Paris as well. In other words, the purview of the Paris Agreement in terms of promising concrete commitments on emission reductions (the NDC’s) lasts until 2030. Many, probably most countries will fulfil those promises on time or before time.
The confusion arises when organisations such as Climate Action Tracker refer to the Paris Agreement’s 2°C commitment (or 1.5°C hoped-for target). These come in a vaguely worded paragraph in the Paris Agreement that’s separate from the paragraphs that specifically relate to how the NDC’s are to be formulated and presented.
The 2°C was a long-term target. To be specific, it was long term in the sense that everyone knew the Paris NDC’s wouldn’t be enough and so at future COP meetings they would have to thrash out more ambitious emission cuts in a “ratcheting up” of commitments (their preferred term).
Those new commitments would be new NDC’s superseding the old 2015 Paris ones. They wouldn’t be part of the Paris Agreement but part of a new future agreement made somewhere else, at another COP meeting and within the UNFCCC framework. They would only apply to Paris (as an add-on) if they were agreed as being implemented before 2030 i.e. during the Paris Agreement time frame of 2020 to 2030.
A framework for these NDC revision negotiations was agreed at Paris: every five years starting in 2023 (but with a preliminary reassessment at COP26 in Poland this year).
So we’re still at this early stage where the Paris NDC’s are known not to satisfy the 2°C target and the idea is that subsequent negotiations will (supposedly) bridge that gap with stronger NDC’s.
So the above shows why the Paris Agreement’s paragraph citing the commitment to 2°C was vague. It’s because everyone involved knew that their Paris-agreed NDC’s would go nowhere near achieving the 2°C target, let alone the 1.5°C. Everyone knew that the NDC promises alone would (according to models) limit the temperature to 3.6°C to 3.7°C.
This meant that when the delegates left Paris, no one had a clue as to how the world was going to reach the 2°C target. No one had promised anything more than the NDC’s which was equal to a collective 3.6°C promise. This is and always was totally clear in the minds of the delegates and the organisations such as CAT, Climate Interactive (CI), MIT and Shell, who supplied them with in-depth modelling scenarios. CAT etc would have us believe that it will be difficult but doable to reach 2°C by employing eye watering emission cuts that rely on CCS, high carbon taxes and high renewable subsidies.
So here’s a summary:
1- The Paris NDC’s were the only solid emission cut promises agreed to at Paris. Everyone involved knew at the time that these would limit warming to around a 3.6°C rise in 2100. These are largely on-track with policy commitments backing them up. They’re on-track because they’re reaping the low-hanging fruit (less painful policies).
2- To address the shortfall between the 2°C goal and the known 3.6°C achieved by the NDC’s, the “ratcheting up” system was agreed to with meetings every five years to thrash them out. These haven’t even started yet. But CAT, CI and MIT focus on the 2°C goal and say no country is fulfilling its Paris Agreement commitments. They say this while omitting to say that this is all in hand i.e. to be addressed in the five-yearly meetings. Yes, it’s highly unlikely that the “ratcheted” NDC’s will achieve the 2°C goal. Nevertheless, that is the Paris set-up and so it shouldn’t be misrepresented by these organisations.
3- Thus, we have two Paris Agreement commitments that are at odds with each other. The first is the solidly agreed NDC’s which were signed off at New York in 2016 and are largely backed up with policy commitments. The second is the vague 2°C/1.5°C collective global commitment that isn’t backed up by any emission cut promises, NDC’s or cogent ideas as to achieving it at all. It’s disingenuous to cite this second commitment in order to imply that targets agreed at Paris are being missed. Yes, CAT etc. can jump through semantic hoops by tacitly invoking the vague 2°C target when saying the Paris Agreement commitments aren’t being met but that is why it’s disingenuous because everyone thinks that they’re referring to the solid NDC’s. They therefore think that CAT are saying the Paris commitments are unravelling. They’re not.
And (in theory) they’re to be strengthened in due course in order to address the 2°C commitment.
“Do I need a /sarc tag?”
Naaaahhh. 🙂
….and the facts are the U.S. has been reducing its carbon emissions for more than a decade without government mandates while no other signatory is close to the US record. Citing the only country to come close to or meet the goals as the cause for the failure of the accord is a stupendous assumption that requires a denial of reality.
LOL – A few months ago they were labelling President Trump a pariah – and insisting that the reduction of CO2 levels would continue regardless. Now he is an inspirational leader, who is managing to persuade other countries to follow him
Which is worse, legally and openly getting out of an agreement because you don’t intend to keep it, or staying in an agreement while attacking others for getting out and then not doing what you promised to do? It’s like blaming your infidelity in marriage on the guy who got a divorce. You were free to get a divorce, too, but you chose to be a hypocrite by remaining in your marriage and cheating on your spouse.
Apparently, the U.S. was expected to provide most of the funding for the Paris Accord while the rest of the world took credit for it. Why else would it fall apart so soon after the U.S. left?