Why Climate Change Chicken Littles Demand Action NOW!

by E. Calvin Beisner

Britain’s Prince Charles said it: “the next 18 months will decide our ability to keep climate change to survivable levels.”

There you go. 18 months.

And you thought AOC was shrill!

Why 18 months?

Supposedly because, as Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, founder and director emeritus of the Potsdam Climate Institute, and one Pope Francis’s chief advisors on his 2015 environmental encyclical, put it, “The climate math is brutally clear: While the world can’t be healed within the next few years, it may be fatally wounded by negligence until 2020.”

Ah. Yes. “The climate math.”

Is that kind of like the old “new math” that drove parents crazy back in the sixties and seventies? Or the “Common Core” math that prizes creativity more than getting the answers right? (Warning: Don’t fly on a jet engineered that way.)

“Climate math.” What a fascinating concept!

According to the average results of computer climate models, we should have seen about 0.27˚ C of global warming per decade since the late 1970s.

But the best data we have show about half that much—0.13˚ C per decade according to the University of Alabama at Huntsville’s satellite data.

Don’t get me wrong. There has been warming. But the models simulate about twice what we’ve observed.

And they simulate that as coming entirely from CO2 we’ve added to the atmosphere. But the world has warmed similarly many times in the past. That makes it pretty likely that at least some of the warming we’ve seen came from natural causes, not our CO2 emissions.

What’s more, the models estimate “climate sensitivity”—how much warmer the atmosphere will be after the whole climate system adjusts to a doubling of atmospheric CO2—at 1.5–4.5˚ C with a 3˚ “best estimate.” But more empirically driven estimates put “climate sensitivity” at about 0.5–1.5˚ C.

So the models are wrong. Almost unanimously wrong. Hopelessly wrong.

(Take a look at that first graph again. The closest to right is a Russian model. Collusion, anyone?)

And if the models are wrong, they provide no rational basis for predicting future temperature. Hence no rational basis for any policy.

But don’t sweat the small stuff. “Climate math,” you know? That solves everything.

So don’t even bother to ask about the math for global temperature if the countries signed onto the 2015 Paris climate treaty meet their targets for CO2 emission reductions—and what it’ll cost.

But let’s ask anyway.

Temperature? It’ll be at most 0.17˚ C cooler in 2100 than otherwise—statistically barely detectable, and utterly inconsequential to ecosystems and human welfare. (By the way, that number’s generously calculated from the Paris treaty’s own assumptions.)

Cost? A mere $70 to $140 Trillion. And that’s just from 2030 onward—doesn’t count 2016–2030. (Again, based on the treaty’s own assumptions.)

That figures to $23.3 to $46.6 Trillion per tenth of a degree Fahrenheit. But don’t worry. “Climate math” makes that a deal you can’t pass up!

And what do the climate warriors insist we commit to, within 18 months, to achieve this magnificent result?

Simple. By 2050, cut annual global CO2 emissions by 90 percent of what they were in 1990.

But there’s a catch. CO2 emissions are forecast to rise to nearly 50 Billion metric tons by 2050, compared with about 20 Billion in 1990. Hitting the target means reducing the 2050 emissions by 96 percent.

And there’s another catch. Most CO2 emissions come from fossil fuels. Fossil fuels provide over 80 percent of all the world’s energy—and they’ll continue to do so well past 2050.

Meanwhile, energy and economic production march together almost lockstep. More energy means more production. And that means less poverty and less of the troubles it brings, like disease and early death and—ironically—a dirtier environment.

So massive cuts in CO2 emissions will mean massive cuts in energy and thus massive cuts in poverty reduction—i.e., massive increases in poverty.

And poverty’s a greater threat to human welfare than anything related to climate or weather.

But, hey, what’s to worry about? President Trump is pulling the United States out of the Paris treaty. So we’re okay.

Except for AOC’s “Green New Deal.” And such a deal it is!

Economist Benjamin Zycher did the math—the real math, not “climate math”—on the GND’s costs. He shared the results at the 13th International Conference on Climate Change, in Washington, July 25. Take a deep breath.

Just to meet the GND’s renewable electricity mandate would cost, at a very conservative estimate, $491 Billion a year—or $3,845 per household.

And then there are the indirect costs. What are those? The costs of building the political coalition necessary to turn the GND (which AOC introduced as a resolution) into law:

  • $3.2 Trillion for a single-payer health care system;
  • $680 Billion to guarantee everyone employment;
  • $107 Billion for “free” college and family-and-medical leave;
  • $200 Billion for high-speed rail (because planes won’t fly on batteries!);
  • $4.5 Trillion for the marginal excess burden of the expanded tax system. (It costs a lot to collect all those taxes!)

That totals $9 Trillion a year. A paltry sum. Just slightly over two-fifths of our economy.

So the real math tells us the 18-month deadline, and the 12-year deadline, and all the other deadlines are fantasies.

What’s the real reason why Schellnhuber, Prince Charles, AOC, and others insist we have only a short time to get serious about fighting climate change?

Simple. Don’t by any means give people time to think carefully about what you’re demanding they do—time to do the math to carefully assess your case for rapid CO2-driven warming, your case for catastrophic results from it, your case for being able to prevent catastrophe by your policy, your case that the benefits of your policy will outweigh the harms.

No, no, no! Got to do it NOW!!!

E. Calvin Beisner, Ph.D., is Founder and National Spokesman of The Cornwall Alliance for the Stewardship of Creation.

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Dan Cody
July 27, 2019 10:17 pm

Chicken Littles ! Hey,watch your FOWL language! …OK,I know…that was for the birds.

Donald
Reply to  Dan Cody
July 28, 2019 3:42 am

3.2 trillion for a single payer health care system? In Canada health care costs half of what it does in the U.S. and the outcomes are better. Check your math.

Reply to  Donald
July 28, 2019 8:33 pm

Well, if we would just stop caring for all of the really sick people, like Canada, we’d have lower costs and better outcomes, too.

People that die before they even see a doctor don’t cost anything, and they don’t bring down the success rate.

Randy Wester
Reply to  Writing Observer
July 29, 2019 5:23 am

Employers in Canada typically pay $500 a month for su0plemental employee health & disability insurance. So it’s not all free, for all.

And there’s nothing stopping any Canadian with sufficient funds and no time, from going to the Mayo clinic. It seems better to me, than a system where insufficient funds might mean minimal treatment or none at all.

Perhaps it’s only a matter of degree and amount. No society has infinite resources. But outcomes are better, on average, in Canada, for everyone, using less resources, than in the U.S.

AGW is not Science
Reply to  Writing Observer
July 31, 2019 12:25 pm

“People that die before they even see a doctor don’t cost anything, and they don’t bring down the success rate.”

LMAO. “Socialized” healthcare, brilliantly summarized in a single sentence.

Darring
Reply to  Donald
July 29, 2019 8:16 am

Lets see, quick google search and…37 million Canadians vs. 328 million Americans. I doubt it can be done for 3.2 trillion. On top of that the per patient cost is higher because we have different laws in the US than Canada which in turn impacts per patient costs.

Couple quick examples:
-Doctors in Canada do not need to carry the insurance US doctors do. That right there saves every office money.
-This one might go away with single payer but currently doctor offices have to higher staff just to code insurance. One paper I read said that most businesses and doctor offices had to hire at least one additional person just to manage Ocare paper filing requirements.
-Canadian government tells drug companies how much they can charge for drugs, US government does not. That’s why Canadian drugs are so much cheaper than what we pay for the same drug in the US. Canada isn’t the only country doing this. FYI, some costs are due to pure profiteering but some cost are due to US laws/patent length/FDA testing driving how much a company like Pfizer has to charge to recover development costs. With other countries dictating prices they charge Americans more to recover their costs before patents run out. In other words, Americans are helping subsidize Canadians health care costs.

randy wester
Reply to  Darring
July 29, 2019 1:55 pm

It sounds like it’s more about price fixing and patent ‘evergreening’ with little actual progress.

https://www.t1international.com/blog/2019/01/20/why-insulin-so-expensive/

And maybe this is one reason there aren’t more generic drugs:

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/barry-and-honey-sherman-were-murdered-by-multiple-killers-private-investigators-believe-source-1.4496686

Eben
July 27, 2019 10:18 pm

you forgot the article

Greg
Reply to  Eben
July 27, 2019 11:30 pm

Yes, it does seem a little brief !

I thought there was a problem loading the page.

commieBob
July 27, 2019 10:19 pm

This has to be the all time shortest story on WUWT.

My secure version of Firefox shows no story. My unsecure version of Chromium shows no story. When I go ctrl-u to look at the source code, there’s no indication of a story.

As far as I can tell, there’s no story. 🙂

Greg
Reply to  commieBob
July 27, 2019 11:37 pm

I think it is a satirical comment on “global warming”. As you noted : “As far as I can tell, there’s no story. ”

Or maybe the sky really did fall in and squashed it. We are all living in flatland. The biosphere has been reduced to a spherical surface and it’s ALL OUR FAULT.

Greg
Reply to  commieBob
July 27, 2019 11:44 pm

Yes, it’s just click-bait, and you fell for it 😉

The only content is the advert at the top. LOL.

M Courtney
Reply to  Greg
July 28, 2019 1:29 am

It’s a joke.
Private Eye did the same gag om its front cover recently on Theresa May’s resignation.
It read “May’s Achievements” and the rest of the front cover was blank.

Goldrider
Reply to  Greg
July 28, 2019 7:25 am

Why are we still talking about AOC’s “Green New Deal” like it’s a possibility? It was garbage from the get-go, “A tale told by an idiot, sound and fury signifying nothing!” Let’s PLEASE start treating it that way.

H.R.
Reply to  Goldrider
July 28, 2019 10:39 am

Goldrider, we’re still talking about AOC’s “Green New Deal” to make sure that the destructive stupidity of it is known far and wide. It is important to tie AOC to the GND and heap on the ridicule because any further ideas from her will only be worse. It’s a vanishingly small probability that any of her proposals will be beneficial to America and Americans.

Reply to  H.R.
July 28, 2019 8:36 pm

You will find every one of AOC’s “ideas” in one part or another of the Democrat Party ideology. She just wrapped all of them up in one neat package.

Randy Wester
Reply to  Greg
July 28, 2019 10:18 am

Why? To get to the other side…?

Randy Wester
Reply to  commieBob
July 28, 2019 7:26 am

It’s often the case that there’s no story, but usually there are a lot more words and graphs.

Randy Wester
July 27, 2019 10:27 pm

To get to the other side?

July 27, 2019 10:34 pm

“The sky is falling!”
So, short sky.

Jimmy Haigh
July 27, 2019 10:46 pm

I call them climate bedwetters.

Dan Cody
Reply to  Jimmy Haigh
July 27, 2019 11:24 pm

when it rains,it pours.

LOL@Klimate Katastrophe Kooks
Reply to  Jimmy Haigh
July 28, 2019 1:21 pm

Similarly, I call them climate pants-wetters. ‘Bedwetters’ implies they only wet the bed, hence they only worry about the climate in their nightmares… whereas ‘pants-wetters’ implies they walk around pissing themselves from fright every minute of every day due to their gullibility and wide-eyed acceptance of every scary story of climate bogeymen they’re told.

How these people even function in society is beyond me. I work with a person such as this… he’s the most useless person I’ve ever met… it literally takes him 40 times longer to get any job done. He’s riding right on that ‘just about to get fired’ line at all times, but he plays his victim card frequently, and employers are so cowed by lawsuits that they don’t dare question it.

There’ll come a time when economics dictates that these dead-weight losers get the heave-ho, though… and that’ll be a glorious day indeed.

Michael S. Kelly LS, BSA Ret.
July 27, 2019 10:58 pm

My, that’s a short post.

birdynumnum
July 27, 2019 11:32 pm

The Chicken Littles decided to pullet.

I’ll get my coat

Warren
July 27, 2019 11:37 pm

I’m not mad after all!

Greg
July 27, 2019 11:41 pm

“Why Climate Change Chicken Littles Demand Action NOW!”

Well I guess this article neatly sums up all the good reasons why we need to ACT NOW.

Short and to the point.

Dennis Stayer
July 27, 2019 11:43 pm

Why? Because the Chicken Littles want radical political change now, and any delay will expose their lies about human induced catastrophic climate change. Its not about saving the planet, it’s about exterminating capitalism and individual freedom!

Goldrider
Reply to  Dennis Stayer
July 28, 2019 3:21 pm

And any minute now, it’s going to become apparent we’ve entered a Grand Solar Minimum and the screamers are going to have a hard time being heard over the howling blizzards. 😉 Because “Climate Change!”

Bill H
July 27, 2019 11:46 pm

Obviously the alarmists didn’t have seven thoughts to rub together… Of course that might have started a fire and warmed something.. Is it April 1st again?

Nicholas McGinley
July 27, 2019 11:50 pm

Mods,
Um, hey guys?
Guys?
Hey!

Joel O'Bryan
July 28, 2019 12:01 am

“Why Climate Change Chicken Littles Demand Action NOW!”

Me: Alex, I’ll take Climate Scams for $1,000.

Alex Trebek: “Worried that the Modern Warm Period may be over and the climate science grant Gravy Train will end soon…”
(My Buzzer)
Me: (see above)

Rod Evans
July 28, 2019 12:09 am

“Never, have so many, written so much, about so (chicken) little” 🙂

viejecita
July 28, 2019 12:11 am

Could it be because a new cold period is coming FAST , and if they do not act NOW, when the cold arrives, they shall bave no way to force people to die from it, instead of warming their homes with oil, with coal, with gas, with wood, or with whatever comes cheaper ?

yarpos
July 28, 2019 12:38 am

I guess its going to say they need action now because if there is any further delay nothing much will continue to happen apart from the weather, and the string of failed prediction of catastrophy, disaster, tipping point etc will continue to mount up and even Joe Public will start to notice.

Davidq
July 28, 2019 12:51 am

.

Flight Level
July 28, 2019 1:10 am

Aren’t the “Big Mobile Submarines” (link in the original post) the best possible carrier option for the “future wind powered aircraft” envisioned by other equally high as a kite designers ?

Sounds like a plan !

ggm
July 28, 2019 1:34 am

Why NOW ? Because another 1/2 dozen years of flat temperatures and we’ll be up to 25 years of no warming. At that point, the argument against AGW will be so simple that the MSM and left will not be able to cover it up any longer. They are trying to get the $billions spent now before the golden goose dies of old age.

Admin
July 28, 2019 1:49 am

Somehow the article didn’t publish, though it was visible in the editor. Fixed.

Reply to  Anthony Watts
July 28, 2019 7:02 am

Far more intriguing is that the “chicken little” stories seem to be saved up until a (totally natural and undulating jet stream driven) heat wave hits Europe and the US.

There’s some irony in the fact that jet stream undulations are a product of a weakening Sun near the bottom of its sunspot cycle.

DMacKenzie
Reply to  Anthony Watts
July 28, 2019 8:25 am

For Pete’s sake, update Spencer’s graph to 2019. I know the result isn’t quite in keeping with the rhetoric, but reverse cherry picking by leaving the last 4 years off only makes us sceptics look like intentional liars.

DMacKenzie
Reply to  DMacKenzie
July 28, 2019 11:41 am

Yes, 2018 rather than 2015 is better, thanks.

Steven Fraser
Reply to  DMacKenzie
July 28, 2019 12:05 pm

His graph has 1 data point per year. 2018 was the last complete year.

E J Zuiderwijk
July 28, 2019 2:18 am

The writer still assumes that the 0.13 degrees is due to CO2 and not caused by something completely different. That 0.13 is a hard upper limit and the CO2 contribution to it could be much smaller, may be even as low as nill. Until we have a good idea what the other mechanisms are that affect the planetary energy balance you can’t claim anything hard about CO2. Alas, no grants are provided for studies like that.

Crispin in Waterloo
Reply to  E J Zuiderwijk
July 28, 2019 7:32 am

EJ

Even if you assign some fraction to a CO2 increase, only a portion of that is “attributed” to human activities. Warming per se is not necessarily caused by CO2 and an increase is not per se caused by humans.

This claim for AG CO2 has wobbly legs.

Richard M
Reply to  E J Zuiderwijk
July 29, 2019 6:31 am

In fact, from the Christy/McNider paper we already know the trend drops below .1 C / decade when corrected for volcanoes and ENSO. It would drop to .06 C / decade if corrected for AMO effects.

Finally, the LIA recovery was estimated to be .05 C / decade by Akasofu which means there’s pretty much nothing left.

AGW is not Science
Reply to  Richard M
July 31, 2019 12:33 pm

Since there remains NO empirical evidence that atmospheric CO2 levels “drive” temperature, that conclusion (NO effect) actually matches “observation.”

ozspeaksup
July 28, 2019 2:19 am

I was seeing it fine so I was puzzled;-)
one of the bugs thats a feature things;-)))

ghalfrunt
July 28, 2019 2:28 am

(SNIPPED)

(The article is about science claims only, religious discussions not allowed by policy) SUNMOD

peter
July 28, 2019 3:40 am

If you were to spend two hundred billion a year building nuclear power plants for twenty years, I wonder how much that would reduce emissions?

Certainly a better use for the money than any of the renewable schemes.

MarkW
Reply to  peter
July 28, 2019 8:21 am

If you were to spend 200B a year building coal plants, how much happier would plants be?

Coach Springer
Reply to  MarkW
July 28, 2019 2:28 pm

Love it.

Coach Springer
Reply to  peter
July 28, 2019 2:37 pm

So that’s like 2 nuclear plants a year with regulatory costs.

Mike Bryant
July 28, 2019 3:42 am

If the world embraced this lunacy, all work would have to be taken up by the pitifully underperforming renewables, animal power and human slavery. You know that if the totalitarians win, nuclear is off the table. We’re barreling toward serfdom. Welcome to the dark ages.

Alasdair
July 28, 2019 4:02 am

No problem downloading this article so puzzled by some of the comments.
A good analysis but far too complicated for those of little brain and definitely not destined for publication on the MSM.

For me the bottom line is simple. :- Calculating the costs of GND is irrelevant; as without fossil fuel use there will be no money available to pay for its implementation.

Mike Bryant
Reply to  Alasdair
July 28, 2019 11:17 am

Perfectly reasoned…

Geoff Sherrington
July 28, 2019 4:05 am

Hans Joachim Schellnhuber is an extremely intelligent achiever. He has marketed his view of climate far more effectively than you or me. So, don’t set out to rubbish him, he is the better man by some important criteria.
There is a problem, because his expressed views of future climate and its consequences make most of us uncomfortable, because we do not wish for the dismal future he sells or for the responses to it. We think he is wrong. But, there is even a good chance that he is right overall and I am wrong.
If you wish to achieve something with him, you need to be able to start a discussion about the different views, to isolate the critical points of difference for further research. The path that proper science should take. This is where this narrative falls apart because of the widespread and strong unwillingness of he and his fellows to enter into meaningful debate. That is the sticking point. Until it can be overcome there can be no progress beyond several groups shouting different views to each other. I know my motivation for wanting to make progress (to utilise good scientific principles, including challenges to hypotheses) but I have no idea about his motivation.
Does anyone here have any inside knowledge of what makes Dr Schellnhuber tick? No wild assed guesses, most interested in accounts of personal meetings, performance delivering scientific papers and so on.
This matter of motivation has fascinated me for decades. In that time, I cannot recall ever meeting one of these “alarmists” let alone one of prominence. Yet they are supposed to be numerous enough to be controlling aspects of education, media, law making, social change. Does any blogger here actually know one of the species well enough to derive motivation?
Geoff S

Reply to  Geoff Sherrington
July 28, 2019 5:33 am

Geoff S wrote:
“This matter of motivation has fascinated me for decades. In that time, I cannot recall ever meeting one of these “alarmists” let alone one of prominence. Yet they are supposed to be numerous enough to be controlling aspects of education, media, law making, social change. Does any blogger here actually know one of the species well enough to derive motivation?”

Geoff – do you think this reality is an accident?

“All over the world, countries that once had a future have fallen into dictatorship, poverty and misery. It is notable that of the ~167 large countries in the world, most are totalitarian states, and all but “the chosen few” citizens of these countries suffer under brutal leftist dictatorships.”

Full article here:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2019/07/04/the-cost-to-society-of-radical-environmentalism/

paul courtney
Reply to  Geoff Sherrington
July 28, 2019 7:34 am

Geoff: I haven’t met one, either, but I can observe that (supposed?) they do in fact control education and media, two big drivers of culture(or social change). I observe they do not yet control law making.
I do not find it fascinating. They are plainly motivated by the notion that they are right about something SO important that they must tell others how to live. It’s not a new thing, been there many times in history where the “betters” think they can run things better. I think you are not “fascinated”, you’re over-thinking it and overlooking the obvious- they are selfish humans who think themselves selfless and virtuous.

James Clarke
Reply to  paul courtney
July 28, 2019 11:12 am

In Orwell’s 1984, no one in the book ever meets Big Brother. Similarly, no one in the real world has ever met the ‘climate consensus’! Schellnhuber is real and someone here could have possibly met him personally, but Schellnhuber is not driving the movement, he is just profiting from it. It is the fictitious ‘consensus’ that is driving the movement.

The ‘consensus’ and ‘Big Brother’ have a lot in common. They are both extremely benevolent and all knowing. Their motivation is clearly to protect the people from harm and is just as clearly unquestionable. Most importantly, they are completely fictional. People working for Big Brother or the ‘consensus’ claim the exact same motivation and demand the exact same fealty. But their real motivation is almost certainly money, power and prestige, for that is the motivation of the vast majority of humans who have risen above anonymity, as well as those who have not.

Altruism is an event in the life of a human, not a description of a human life.

Richard M
Reply to  Geoff Sherrington
July 29, 2019 6:43 am

Follow the money.

Start with Al Gore and all his political connections and big money donors. Folks like the Rockefellers, Steyer, Soros, etc. We now have literally dozens of political action groups with thousands of people whose income depends on the climate scam.

Add that to University climate departments and the number keeps growing. Within the governments of the world and media there are even more people whose jobs would disappear without climate funding. Finally, the wind, solar, ethanol, etc. industries add in even more money to fund this scam.

Sara
July 28, 2019 4:23 am

Eighteen months, huh? Thanks! I’ll make a note. Set up a reminder to pop up and tell me “The World Has Ended!” or something like that.

I keep saying they need to be sent to an island somewhere and supplies dropped to them. I’d substitute “another planet somewhere” but I would rather not inflict their stupidity and greed on some unsettled world.

On the other hand, they might have to defend themselves against stobor. It IS the season for stobor… and for meganeura, too. Almost forgot that. And giant mantis shrimp.

Bill Powers
Reply to  Sara
July 28, 2019 11:44 am

I love it! We can call it “Island that time Forgot” we can pick out one with an active volcano, or maybe we should call it the “Island of misfit scientists.”

Supply drops will of course exclude fossil fuel. We will supply the parts so they can build their own windmills and solar panels to kill the local wildlife and supply power to the pumping stations to utilize all that geothermal energy.

mikewaite
July 28, 2019 4:35 am

I personally have no objection to a carbon -reduced or carbon -free economy provided that it does not affect current standard of living or individual freedoms. So, with those reservations, and accepting a carbon free economy (UK or US) sometime in the future why don’t we change the approach to deadlines.
Instead of saying “carbon free ” by 2020, 2030, or whatever is latest action cry , ignore the end and concentrate on the means.
For example : electric cars- wonderful for some, ridiculous to others , but definitely suffering 3 major problems: too expensive compared to ICE cars , limited mileage, and uncertainty about the value in the used car market (due to worries about battery). So my suggestion is that the objective for a deadline is, say, 6 years(by 2025) to make an electric car totally equivalent to a conventional car of similar capacity in price, range and second hand retail value . Then I suspect that the electric cars will dominate much of the family car market , with significant reductions in CO2 without draconian taxes and legislation and general political hysteria. (Of course I am asuming that the required improvements are , in principle , achievable).
Basically I am saying let a market economy achieve your ends , with approriate Govt support for the design and engineering research costs involved.
If you want an example of how this has worked in the past , consider air travel . Once only rich people could afford intercontinental air travel. The rest of us had to go by ship, rail or mule. The UN did not say , in 1950 : for reasons of fairness we will make air transport available to the average working family by 1960 at the latest. No the market , assisted by reseach help to Roll Royce , Pratt andWhitney , etc produced fast , reliable long range mass carriers long befor 1960 and holidays abroad, visits to distant family , etc became available to many more people. It was concentrating on the means , better jet engines , wider bodies improved navigation aids , etc that produced the ends – mass transport and cheaper holidays for more people than just the rich.

Randy Wester
Reply to  mikewaite
July 28, 2019 10:05 am

Tesla started at the top of the market, producing cars for people willing and able to pay a lot, and used what they learned to reduce the cost and increase market share.

Nissan took almost the opposite tack from the start, a more conventional car-maker strategy to introduce a low end model and move it up market on trade-in.

Sure, there is some fear about battery range loss but it’s gradual, minimal, and doesn’t disable the car, as opposed to the more sudden $9,000.00 expense of repairing engine-disabling compression loss from piston skirt melting in a Ford Fusion Turbo.

PHEVs seem to make more sense than pure electrics in a northern climate, especially in rural areas.

mikewaite
Reply to  Randy Wester
July 28, 2019 12:34 pm

Randy , an example of how the market should work (and did 100 years ago) with Tesla and Nissan converging on the same objective : an affordable vehicle , attractive in range, price, resell value. Instead what we have in the UK is a Govt minister banging a puny fist on the table and saying :” no more ICE cars after 2025 , and if you cannot afford a Tesla 3 then tough – walk to work and get some fat off you (not that you will have any fat because by then we will have banned burgers , pizzas and fish and chip shops )”.

tom0mason
July 28, 2019 4:41 am

18 months because that is the UN timetable!

The UN elitist technocrats and bureaucrats know of no other subject that has caught most national governments attention so well as the catastrophic anthropogenic global warming (cAGW), aka Climate Change, Climate Emergency Climate Weirding, Carbon Pollution, Climate Disruption and Climate Catastrophe.
They know that in order to make the all new World Government they must take action while the AGW meme is still working on the majority of the world’s population and the majority of national governments. National governments are still saying they’ll abide by the Paris Accord, they are still enacting legislation to limit CO2 emissions, they are still making promises to lower CO2. It matters not that rarely anybody lifts a finger to actually do anything in reality, or that overall CO2 levels continue to rise, what is important is that national governments agree with the UN about CO2.
So watch out for expansion of UN requirements, or new moves to enable the UN to get closer to it’s big prize …
¯

Each small step takes the UN closer to it’s goal of becoming the World Government. They’re aim appears to achieve it by about 2070.

John Law
July 28, 2019 4:49 am

Mike, Charles being a king , would be at the top of that shit-heap, so no probs for him!

Chaswarnertoo
July 28, 2019 5:47 am

Can we go straight from Madge to Wills and Kate? Charley is a proper Charley.

Just Jenn
July 28, 2019 5:47 am

On the flip side….

in 18 months everyone is off the hook! Think about it. They’ve just killed off their own agenda by saying that in 18 months, game over. And it won’t matter anymore. We had 18 months to “fix the climate” and we failed. (Cue collective sigh of relief). We can all go home now, we failed as a planet to save it, so yea…..there was that…..well, it’s over now. well OK then…life goes on.

I love it when morons shoot themselves in the foot.

Sheri
Reply to  Just Jenn
July 28, 2019 8:26 am

Agreed. Everytime I see a deadline like this, I think “Okay, 18 months, nothing changes so we’re all toast now. No reason whatsoever to take action because it won’t help.” I also refuse to allow any changes in the deadline, which I know will be tried. If 18 months is the drop-dead date, then 18 months and one day from now, I see no reason to take any action recommended by the climate change people. Should the market and not the government bless us with some useful new energy solutions, great. If not, it matters not all.

John VC
Reply to  Just Jenn
July 28, 2019 10:54 am

I suspect that the “morons” know that if they don’t accomplish their goal soon, it will be all over for them. Seems as if the natural warming cycle is ending, only to be followed by another natural cooling cycle, this time possibly augmented by the predicted solar minimum. ( can anyone say “little ice age”??). Would love to last another 30 years so I can see the headlines of the late 70’s trotted out again, but since I am already well past my best used by date, I can only imagine, and grin at the foolishness of human hubris.

Russ R.
July 28, 2019 6:07 am

It is roughly 18 months until the US swears in a new leftist President, or re=elects the current one.The reason for this time table is simple. If we have another 5.5 years of the US refusing to cooperate with the wackos, their case will be increasingly difficult to maintain. They need the major powers to regurgitate the propaganda, and having one that does not, makes it difficult to maintain the illusion of the need to stomp out Liberty.

They want to be able to play both sides of whatever the climate does. If it warms, they can claim they were right. If it stays the same or cools, they can claim it is due to the actions taken, by the climate aristocracy.
This has nothing to do with managing any climate issues, and has everything to do with political posturing to reduce the risk, WHEN it is obvious they are wrong.

Gamecock
July 28, 2019 6:12 am

Can the monarchy survive 18 months? The potential king sounds like Harold Camping. His mother should tell him to STFU, while figuring out how to bump Prince William to the top of the line of succession over his daddy, without having to go to court to prove he’s a nutcase.

July 28, 2019 6:22 am

What’s up with counting a cost twice? The new taxes, and what they’ll be spent on?

michael hart
July 28, 2019 7:55 am

I too experienced teaching of “new maths in the UK for a couple of years, before reversion to “trad maths” at high school.

It was a lucky escape I am still grateful for.

Larry Hamlin
July 28, 2019 8:42 am

Great article!! Thanks.

Coeur de Lion
July 28, 2019 9:55 am

Charles as King is a disaster for the reputation of the Royal Family and for the operation of the constitution of Great Britain.

Andy
July 28, 2019 11:53 am

I’ve got some bad news. Climate change deniers are an endangered species and soon to be extinct.
http://inthesetimes.com/article/21980/i-went-to-a-climate-change-denial-conference-heartland-institute-trump

Reply to  Andy
July 28, 2019 12:15 pm

Yes Andy, and let’s not forget what Max Planck said, “science advances one funeral at a time”

Reply to  Andy
July 28, 2019 1:24 pm

Too fracking funny…

In 1976, author and historian James Weinstein founded In These Times with the mission to “identify and clarify the struggles against corporate power now multiplying in American society.”

http://inthesetimes.com/about/

I seriously doubt that any science conference would make sense to Christine MacDonald, 1998 BS in journalism. https://www.linkedin.com/in/christine-macdonald-45552430

Bruce Cobb
July 28, 2019 12:02 pm

“the next 18 months will determine our ability to keep {the} climate change {scam} to survivable levels.” There, fixed.

LOL@Klimate Katastrophe Kooks
July 28, 2019 1:13 pm

Funnily enough, I was reading a thread on a political debate forum last night. A couple years back in the thread, one of the CAGW true believers was defending the fatally flawed computer climate models by stating that the newest Boeing jet had been designed based wholly upon a computer model.

That was the Boeing 737 Max, grounded because the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS) was faulty, causing the planes to go into fatal nosedives, with the pilots pulling as hard as they could on the sticks to right the plane, and with the “computer modeled” control system diving the plane even steeper.

If engineers cannot even get the model of a comparatively small airplane to accurately mimic the processes of flight, the climate alarmist ‘scientists’ (propagandists in all but title) stand no chance of accurately modeling the atmosphere with their curve-fitted nonsense models. The engineers designing the plane understand the processes, the implementation of the computer model was flawed. The climate alarmist ‘scientists’ don’t even have the first faint clue about how the complex coupled non-linear multivariate and chaotic system which is the atmosphere works… if they did, they’d model it, not curve-fit it. Their curve-fits on in-series data invariably fail for out-of-series data, leading to ridiculous projections that likewise invariably fail.

In other words, it’s time to fire the so-called climate ‘scientists’ and get some actual scientists doing the job of modeling the atmosphere. Because the current crop are utterly incapable of doing the job. I recommend particle physicists and quantum mechanics. They have a deep understanding of the hard sciences.

Gamecock
Reply to  LOL@Klimate Katastrophe Kooks
July 28, 2019 2:39 pm

Crashes from Airbus software are legend.

Jireland1992
July 28, 2019 1:31 pm

The 18 months thing reeks of desperation.

Coach Springer
Reply to  Jireland1992
July 28, 2019 2:34 pm

Desperate is all they have. They’ll still have it in 18 months, so what’s there to be desperate about?

Gamecock
July 28, 2019 2:42 pm

GET SERIOUS, PEOPLE !!! WE’RE DOWN TO 17.5 MONTHS !!!

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

old construction worker
July 28, 2019 2:56 pm

The reason: They are running out of other people’s money. At least here in the States direct subsides for solar ans wind have a time limit. Then Congress has to renew them.

Linda Goodman
July 28, 2019 5:01 pm

Climate change is the eco-fascist foundation of the New World Order – everything else is bulls*it and subterfuge. It’s the stark-raving mad, butt-naked emperor and everyone”s yammering about fabrics.

Zeek
July 28, 2019 8:18 pm

Climate alarmist want to act now so that they can get their polocies started before the temperature starts to cool down. Then it makes it look like what they have put in place actually lowered temperature when actually it is just good old Mother Nature at work. If they don’t get their polocies in place before it cools down their all going to be looking like fools. (And fools they are!)

Judas Priest
July 28, 2019 9:38 pm

Written by a man who’s running a front for big oil through “The Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow”. Believe the oil industry or 99% of climate scientists

(Does this mean you have no argument to post? writing an useless fallacy doesn’t help you here, do better next time!) SUNMOD

HotScot
Reply to  Judas Priest
July 29, 2019 12:19 pm

Judas Priest

How many qualified ‘climate scientists’ are there on the planet.

Nor do I mean those that study climate from the perspective of physics, chemistry, mathematics, engineering, or any of the other innumerable other valuable sciences.

I mean how many people designated ‘Climate Scientists’ are there?

Don’t know?

Thought not.

July 29, 2019 3:19 am

As usual lots and lots of words. I understood that C2’s effects were
logerthmitic. So by now the effect of first absorbing heat energy, then
re-radiating it to other gases has decreased .

At what figure will it cease to have any effect on the temperature ?

CO2 an its so called effects are still the key to this nonsense.

MJE VK5ELL

Ulric Lyons
July 29, 2019 5:00 am

“And they simulate that as coming entirely from CO2 we’ve added to the atmosphere.”

While if they had disregarded rising CO2 forcing and just modeled the warming of the AMO and associated changes in cloud cover since 1995, they could of estimated how little warming that rising CO2 forcing is driving.

Geo
July 29, 2019 12:44 pm

Funny thing is, if you assume climate sensitivity = 0 all the models suddenly work.

But climate sensitivity = 0 means it is very unlikely there will ever be a climate crises, because the impacts of rising carbon dioxide concentrations decreases as concentrations become elevated. In fact we are likely through the worst impacts possible with increasing carbon dioxide concentrations – future impacts will be much less than what we have already experienced.

Which means we have all the time in the world to solve the problem – no sense in implementing costly solutions that will make little difference. we can take decades to solve the problem. Which is great because it will likely take many decades to solve the problem. Anyone promising a quick solution here is a liar. It is nota question of concern, or political will, it is how much clean energy capacity can we possibly build? Not enough to make a difference for several decades.

LOL@Klimate Katastrophe Kooks
Reply to  Geo
July 29, 2019 5:27 pm

That’s because particle physics shows climate sensitivity to CO2 varies by altitude and temperature. The net for the whole of the atmosphere is negative, becoming increasingly negative with increasing altitude and increasing temperature.

Now, if a ‘lowly’ nuclear physics trained individual who is autodidactically adept at quantum mechanics, particle physics, quantum electrodynamics, stochastic electrodynamics and quantum chromodynamics can figure this simple fact out, why can’t the so-called climate ‘scientists’?

“It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.” – Upton Sinclair

All radiative molecules play the part of atmospheric coolants at the temperature at which the combined translational mode energy of two colliding molecules exceeds the lowest vibrational mode quantum state energy of the radiative molecule. Below this temperature, they act to warm the atmosphere via the mechanism the climate alarmists claim happens all the time, but if that warming mechanism occurs below the tropopause, all it does is increase Convective Available Potential Energy, which increases convection, which is a net cooling process. So the alarmists, as usual, are wrong yet again, on every count.

CO2 is the most prevalent atmospheric coolant above the tropopause. Water vapor is the most prevalent below the tropopause, with CO2 playing a relatively smaller cooling role below the tropopause and above ~288 K. Below ~288 K and below the tropopause, CO2 does indeed cause warming… which increases convection, which is a net cooling process.

At all atmospheric temperatures, vibrationally-excited CO2 radiatively emits and thus some of that radiation is shed to space. This is a cooling process.

Below ~288 K and at low altitudes, vibrationally-excited CO2 undergoes collisional de-excitation, slightly (considering the Equipartition Theorem) warming the air and increasing Convective Available Potential Energy, which increases convective energy transfer to the upper troposphere, where that CO2 will be more likely to undergo radiative de-excitation rather than collisional de-excitation due to lower air density. The radiation from this process which exits to space constitutes a cooling process.

At temperatures above ~288 K, two CO2 molecules (or a single CO2 molecule and any other molecule in the atmosphere, due to the Equipartition Theorem) have sufficient translational mode energy to vibrationally excite a CO2 molecule to its {v21(1)} vibrational mode quantum state, whereupon some of those vibrationally excited CO2 molecules will undergo radiative de-excitation, some of that radiation goes out to space, which is a cooling process. This process is a direct conversion of translational energy (temperature) into radiation, and thus cools the atmosphere, which acts to damp temperature excursions above ~288K. With an increasing CO2 concentration, a greater number of CO2 molecules will undergo radiative de-excitation, thus the damping becomes more prevalent.
———-
All radiative emission to space is, by definition, a cooling process. The only way our planet can shed energy is via radiative emission to space.

N2 and O2, comprising ~99% of the atmosphere, are homonuclear diatomics and therefore have no net magnetic dipole, rendering them unable to effectively emit (or absorb) IR. Thus the only way they can cool is via conduction by contact with a cooler surface, or via transfer of their translational mode energy to the vibrational mode quantum state energy of radiative molecules.
———-
The radiative cooling of air via solely translational mode energy converting to radiation
CO2{v20(0)} (at 288K+) + CO2{v20(0)} (at 288K+) -> CO2{v20(0)} + C02{v21(1)} -> CO2{v20(0)} + CO2{v20(0)} + 667.4 cm-1

You’ll note the above interaction is a direct conversion of translational mode energy (which we perceive as temperature) to 14.98352 µm radiation. This directly cools the air, and the effect is significant, since nearly all the translational mode energy is converted to radiation, leaving the CO2 molecules at a very low temperature, whereupon they absorb energy by colliding with other atmospheric constituents. The effect begins taking place significantly at ~288 K, the temperature at which the majority of the molecules will have sufficient translational mode energy to convert to vibrational mode energy.

288 K also happens to be the stated average global temperature… that is not a coincidence, it is a mechanism long known, partly a result of CO2 radiative emission ramping up at ~288 K. As CO2 concentration increases, this effect will become more pronounced, increasingly damping any temperature excursions above ~288 K by increase of radiative emission via this interaction, and below ~288 K by reduction of radiative emission via this interaction.

It is not necessary for CO2{v20(0)} to collide with another CO2 molecule for this interaction to take place, any other molecule will do… the Equipartition Theorem dictates that all atmospheric constituents at the same temperature will have the same translational mode energy. So in reality, the above interaction could be represented thusly:
X (at 288K+) + CO2{v20(0)} (at 288K+) -> X + C02{v21(1)} -> X + CO2{v20(0)} + 667.4 cm-1
where X is any atmospheric molecule.

Further, you’ll note that if a CO2 molecule is already in the CO2{v21(1)} vibrational mode quantum state, a collision at just 0.1 K higher temperature (ie: ~288.1 K) can excite it to the CO2{v22(2)} state, whereupon it can emit a 14.97454 µm photon to de-excite to the CO2{v21(1)} state, and a 14.98352 µm photon to de-excite to the CO2{v20(0)} state.

Even further, you’ll note that if a CO2 molecule is already in the CO2{v22(2)} vibrational mode quantum state, a collision at just 0.1 K higher temperature (ie: ~288.2 K) can excite it to the CO2{v23(3)} state, whereupon it can emit a 14.96782 µm photon to de-excite to the CO2{v22(2)} state, a 14.97454 µm photon to de-excite to the CO2{v21(1)} state, and a 14.98352 µm photon to de-excite to the CO2{v20(0)} state.

This implies that for temperatures above ~288 K, more of the translational energy of atmospheric molecules will flow to CO2 vibrational mode quantum state energy, rather than vibrational mode quantum state energy of CO2 flowing to translational energy of other atmospheric molecules, simply for the fact that at and above that temperature, the combined translational energy of two colliding molecules is sufficient to excite the CO2 vibrational modes. This increases the time duration of CO2 vibrational mode quantum state excitation and therefore the probability that CO2 will radiatively emit, breaking LTE. Therefore the energy flow is to CO2, not from it.

In other words, at and above ~288 K, the combined translational mode energy of two molecules is higher than C02{v21(1)} vibrational mode energy, and therefore energy will flow to CO2 from other atmospheric molecules’ translational mode energy during molecular collision, simply because CO2 can radiatively emit that energy and break LTE, rather than that energy flowing back to other molecules.

You’ll note that’s diametrically opposite to the claimed mechanism by which CO2 purportedly causes global warming. Liberals tend to invert reality, and rely upon the low standard of education to sustain that inversion’s claims.
———-
Satellites see CO2 and (a bit of) water vapor radiating at the temperature of the lower stratosphere (at the ‘characteristic-emission surface’ altitude, or just less than one optical depth from TOA for any given wavelength) all over the planet. This is because ozone (O3, excited by incoming solar radiation) and collisional processes excite nitrogen (N2) to its {v1(1)} (symmetric stretch) vibrational mode, and N2 then transfers energy to the {v3(1)} (asymmetric stretch) mode of CO2 via collision as shown in the image, whereupon the vibrationally excited CO2 partially de-excites by dropping from the {v3(1)} (asymmetric stretch) mode to either the {v1(1)} (symmetric stretch) mode by emitting a 10.4 µm photon, or to the {v20(2)} (bending) mode by emitting a 9.4 µm photon.

This is the same method by which a CO2 laser works… the laser filling gas within the discharge tube consists of around 10–20% carbon dioxide (CO2), around 10–20% nitrogen (N2), and a few percent hydrogen (H2) and/or xenon (Xe), and the remainder helium (He). Electron impact vibrationally excites the N2 to its first vibrational mode quantum state {v1(1)}, the N2 collides with CO2, the CO2 becomes excited in the asymmetric stretch vibrational mode quantum state {v3(1)}, and de-excites to its {v1(1)} or {v20(2)} vibrational modes by emission of 9.4 µm or 10.4 µm radiation (wavelength dependent upon isotopic composition of the CO2 molecules) as described above. The helium is used to fully de-excite the CO2 to the {v20(0)} ground state after it’s radiatively de-excited to maintain population inversion (which is necessary for stimulated emission), but this is unimportant to the process of energy transfer from vibrationally excited N2 to CO2 in the atmosphere. The process by which the N2 becomes vibrationally excited (in the case of a CO2 laser via electron impact; in the atmosphere via translational-to-vibrational collisional processes and via vibrational-to-vibrational collisional processes with solar-excited O3) is similarly unimportant… the concept of energy flowing from N2 to CO2 is the same. Laser wavelength can be tuned by altering the isotopic ratio of the carbon and oxygen atoms comprising the CO2 molecules in the discharge tube, with heavier isotopes resulting in longer wavelength emission.

The Boltzmann Factor shows that ~10.26671% of N2 molecules are in the N2{v1(1)} excited state at 288 K due to collisional (t-v) processes. That’s 195 times more excited N2 molecules than all CO2 molecules (vibrationally excited or not).
———-

Alan in Kansas
July 29, 2019 7:49 pm

Seems obvious, 18 months is the time remaining until Trump begins his second term. End of the world as warmistas know it. Got to act NOW, before it is too late!!!

Amber
July 30, 2019 9:22 pm

Announce cancellation of all tax havens . $31 trillion windfall going to set the earths temperature . Scary global warming would end quickly .

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