The Week That Was: 2024-03-09 (March 9, 2024)
Brought to You by SEPP (www.SEPP.org)
The Science and Environmental Policy Project
Quote of the Week: “The cavemen had the same natural resources at their disposal as we have today, and the difference between their standard of living and ours is a difference between the knowledge they could bring to bear on those resources and the knowledge used today.”—Thomas Sowell
Number of the Week: 64% Capacity Factor
THIS WEEK:
By Ken Haapala, President, Science and Environmental Policy Project (SEPP)
Scope: This TWTW addresses the lack of mature, critical thinking shown in the UK and the EU policies on Net Zero carbon dioxide emissions which are being followed in Washington and certain states. It questions what is meant by the green slogan Beyond Carbon. Apparently, a reporter for the Washington Post has become aware that “clean tech” and “high-tech” means a high need for reliable, affordable electricity. Also discussed are a new solar facility with storage at Edwards Air Force Base and the pursuit of bats.
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Green Dreams: Washington’s commitment to wind and solar lacks mature thinking. These sources present major issues regarding reliability and affordability. Thanks to the Climate Change Act of 2008, the UK is further along in the failure to address these issues than the US. UK Economist Professor Gordon Hughes, formerly with the World Bank, addresses the financial feasibility of the UK going to Net Zero from an economic standpoint, leaving it to others to address the problems of physical practicality and reliability. (We’ll have the ideas; you carry them out.)
The forward was written by Lord David Frost who has been a UK Minister, special adviser, professional diplomat, and civil servant. He was responsible for EU relations during Brexit until he left the government over disagreements about COVID policies. The forward states:
“The message in this briefing from Professor Gordon Hughes could hardly be more urgent. It is that the energy transition, as currently structured as part of the broader net zero policy, will lead to another ‘policy fiasco’. He rightly says that we are ‘posturing about targets that are patently not achievable and might be economically ruinous’ and urges a rethink of the strategy before it is too late.
The view of Western governments and of the expert class that supports their Net Zero policies is that the necessary transition can be accomplished at limited cost. The UK’s Climate Change Committee argues that the fiscal cost of transforming our energy system will be an average of around 1–2% of GDP per year between now and 2050, and that this investment in new energy technology will actually improve the country’s growth performance. Believe that if you will.
Professor Hughes is more honest. He points out that independent experts assess the real cost to be at least 5% of GDP for the next couple of decades, and potentially even higher. He notes that we can’t find this money by redeploying it from other investment areas, because we already invest, net, almost nothing in assets other than housing. It’s clear that we can’t borrow such sums without risk of a fiscal crisis. So, the only way of doing it is to reduce consumption by 8–10% over two decades – and, even then, only if the necessary funds can be extracted by taxation. This is doubtful when the tax burden is already at its highest point since the war. [WW II]
Put these propositions to the Net Zero proponents, and you will be told there is no need to worry. Costs will magically come down, new technology will somehow be invented, and we will find ourselves in the new promised land of clean, green, growth that will pay for everything. But they never give any evidence for believing this – and, where we can check what they say, for example, in the real costs of wind power, we can see that these cost reductions are simply not happening.
The real world cannot be avoided. As Professor Hughes says, either we must be honest with the people and be clear that they are going to have to pay at a currently unanticipated level, or we must extend the time period for the transition – that is, delay the Net Zero 2050 target, perhaps out till 2070 or 2075. Failure to do either – sadly, perhaps the most likely outcome – will mean that we simply muddle on, pretending we are making progress, spending at high levels, but achieving little. Meanwhile the rest of the world outside the West will look on, incredulous at this unprecedented act of economic self-harm.
This whole debate badly needs more honesty and openness. Professor Hughes’ paper is an important contribution to it. I hope policymakers are listening.”
Honesty and Openness about the green transition advocated by some are sorely lacking in Washington, California, and New York as well. Advocates of zero carbon dioxide emissions fail to address how wind and solar affect the affordability and reliability of the electrical grid. Hughes states:
“If the UK and countries in Europe want to provide an example that might be followed, the first step is to offer a strategy that (a) takes full account of macroeconomic and fiscal realities, and (b) focuses initially on those parts of the energy transition with the lowest investment costs and best return on the resources used. It is obvious to any analyst that neither of these conditions are met by current policies.”
Hughes brings out what he calls the macroeconomic trap and stories on how to escape it:
“Currently the UK is in a macroeconomic trap, with low investment and low productivity, alongside significant population growth. All of the proposed solutions envisage more investment, whether on housing or infrastructure or industrial capital, without providing any indication of where the extra resources will come from. Population growth due to immigration and the energy transition simply tighten the screws of the mismatch between available investment resources and the demands on the overall investment budget.”
“There are, in essence, three stories about how to escape the macroeconomic trap.
1. Redeploy existing investment and, most importantly, allocate a much higher share of future economic growth to fund the energy transition.
2. Relax the investment budget constraint by squeezing domestic consumption via higher taxes and other levies on disfavored forms of consumption.
3. Relax the investment budget constraint by a combination of borrowing and foreign investment.
None of these stories is very plausible, but some are sillier than others.”
Hughes goes on to explain why none of these stories is plausible then concludes:
“The prospects of financing the energy transition by either redeploying existing capital spending or borrowing are effectively zero. As a result, the costs will fall directly or indirectly on household consumption unless government consumption is squeezed too. Since household consumption is only 60% of GDP, the impact will be to reduce it by more than 8% over the whole period of the transition. That is not a recipe for political tranquility over the next two decades, and especially if the burden is distributed unevenly, as is all too likely.
Applying Stein’s Rule, that anything that can’t continue won’t continue, any observer with an iota of common sense will realize that the energy transition won’t happen over the period and on the scale currently promised. The sad aspect of this is that such failures invariably lead to vast amounts of muddle and wasted resources. The outcome will be certainly worse than adopting a timeframe and a strategy for the transition that is consistent with a plan for financing the investments required that is feasible and has broad public consent.
Many will dispute or play down the facts and logic I present. So be it. Before dismissing the case that I have made, readers should ask cui bono – who benefits? There are very strong private and commercial interests that will benefit from the huge program of spending and taxes required to finance the energy transition. They may adopt the clothing of environmental concerns, but a crucial question is ‘Where does the money go? ‘
I have studied, taught, written about, and advised on issues of environmental policy and environmental economics for nearly four decades. It is not necessary to believe in the overriding primacy and urgency of the energy transition or Net Zero to have a sincere and sound commitment to environmental issues and human welfare. The obsessive focus of public debate on one issue, to the exclusion of rational argument about costs and other consequences of such policies, is a disgrace for politicians, advisers and the media.
All politics and policymaking are about choices, often complex and contentious. Net Zero and the energy transition are presented as being a necessity that does not involve large costs. The ‘necessity’ part of the argument is patently untrue – we can choose to set a target date for the energy transition of 2040, 2050, 2060 or beyond. That is exactly what China, India and many other countries are doing.
The issue of costs is a little more complicated because the argument relies upon a deliberate confusion between initial or transitional expenditures and average costs in the long run. For the avoidance of doubt, the average cost of using renewable energy is generally higher than reliance on fossil fuels. But even if the average cost of using renewable energy were low, the argument entirely neglects the very large initial capital investments required for the transition. This money must be found somewhere. The belief that a country can simply incur debt of 100% of GDP to finance the transition ignores economic and financial reality.
This is why the term ‘energy transition’ is so important. We have inherited a capital stock and an economy, built over more than a century, that relies upon fossil fuels. To replace that capital stock to use renewable energy instead is a project that involves huge expenditures as well as social and economic dislocation, plus the sacrifice of a portion of our national income.
The shorter the transition, the greater will be the cost in terms of other economic and social objectives. We will forego investments in housing, infrastructure, and business capital. We will spend less on education, caring for the disabled and the elderly, improving security, treating illness, reducing mortality, and many other things that we value collectively or individually.
The fiscal and macroeconomic trap in which the UK and European countries find themselves is inexorable, and such choices cannot be avoided. Rhetorical commitment to Net Zero does not change facts and financial constraints. The sooner this is recognized and addressed, the better the outcome is likely to be for both general welfare and the environment.” [Boldface added]
Many in the US will argue that this trap will not occur in the US. However, Washington is spending hundreds of billions from the misnamed Inflation Reduction Act on unneeded wind and solar without regard to its reliability and costs. As James Freeman wrote in the Wall Street Journal:
“It took Uncle Sam 232 years to accumulate its first $10 trillion in debt, nine years to accumulate its second, and five years to reach its third. The trip from $33 trillion to $34 trillion in debt was a short one, requiring only three months, from September to December of 2023.
If having $34 trillion in debt wasn’t enough, the Treasury department funded itself with short-term debt at a time of secularly low interest rates. More than one-third of America’s debt matures in the next year, resetting at higher rates and increasing the debt load by higher interest expenses alone.”
See links under Challenging the Orthodoxy and Article #1.
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Beyond Photosynthesis? In his essay “These 10 Charts Caused a Hissy Fit at NARUC” (National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners) Robert Bryce states:
“As I noted in these pages in October, in “Michael Bloomberg’s $1 Billion Assault On The Grid,” three big climate NGOs, League of Conservation Voters, Sierra Club, and Earthjustice, will likely get tens of millions of dollars from Bloomberg Philanthropies. In September, the Bloomberg group announced it was donating an additional $500 million to the Beyond Carbon campaign. The campaign aims to shutter all of America’s remaining coal plants and half of our gas-fired power plants, and that effort will be spearheaded by Sierra Club and Earthjustice. I explained:
A more radical agenda is difficult to conjure. The coal and gas plants that Bloomberg and his allies in the anti-industry industry want to shutter produced about 40% of all the electricity used in the U.S. last year. Here are the numbers: In 2022, according to the Statistical Review of World Energy, U.S. electricity generation totaled about 4,550 terawatt-hours (TWh). About 904 TWh came from coal-fired power plants, and 1,817 TWh was generated by burning natural gas…Put another way, the 1,813 TWh/year of electricity that Bloomberg wants to eliminate equals the combined annual electricity use of nine states: Texas, Florida, California, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, Georgia, North Carolina, and Illinois.”
The 2017 IRS 990 for the private Bloomberg Foundation shows revenues of $808,206,044 and the 990 for 2023 is not yet available. The website of Beyond Carbon states:
“Together with the Sierra Club, Bloomberg Philanthropies built Beyond Coal – a groundbreaking national campaign that involved the first comprehensive effort to map and gather data on every coal plant across the country, along with critical information on their economic performance and pollution levels, allowing us to develop a powerful plant-by-plant strategy. Together, we set a concrete goal: closing one-third of the country’s existing coal plants by 2020.
In the years that followed, we won fight after fight, quickly beating our original goal. We started to run into new challenges: the construction of new gas-fired power plants began to undercut our progress on emissions reductions, and the development of clean energy lagged far behind our targets.
With a new focus, we continued our work, launching the first iteration of Beyond Carbon in 2019 with the goal of finishing the job on coal and beginning to tackle methane gas plants. Since then, we’ve now helped retire more than 71% of all U.S. coal plants, and we’re aiming to close the remaining 30% by the end of the decade.
That success led us to expand our work globally, first to Europe in 2017 and now across 32 additional countries, including 25 developing countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Meanwhile, Beyond Carbon has helped block nearly one-third of all planned U.S. gas plants and ensured that 20 states and territories now have 100% clean energy laws in place.”
This brings up the question: what is meant by Beyond Carbon. All complex life on Earth is carbon based. Does it mean that the Sierra Club and Bloomberg Philanthropies are opposed to life on Earth? Let us assume that they are not and what the slogan really means is Beyond Carbon Dioxide.
Carbon Dioxide is critical for photosynthesis. The entry in Britannica on photosynthesis begins (subscription required):
“Photosynthesis, the process by which green plants and certain other organisms transform light energy into chemical energy. During photosynthesis in green plants, light energy is captured and used to convert water, carbon dioxide, and minerals into oxygen and energy-rich organic compounds.
It would be impossible to overestimate the importance of photosynthesis in the maintenance of life on Earth. If photosynthesis ceased, there would soon be little food or other organic matter on Earth. Most organisms would disappear, and in time Earth’s atmosphere would become nearly devoid of gaseous oxygen. The only organisms able to exist under such conditions would be the chemosynthetic bacteria, which can utilize the chemical energy of certain inorganic compounds and thus are not dependent on the conversion of light energy.”
Water vapor is the dominant greenhouse gas, carbon dioxide is secondary. Based on the work of W. A. van Wijngaarden and W. Happer “The Role of Greenhouse Gases in Energy Transfer in the Earth’s Atmosphere” using the detailed HITRAN database on actual atmospheric gases (not gases stripped of water vapor as in laboratory experiments), AMO physicist Howard Hayden estimates that water vapor accounts for about 80% of the greenhouse effect in the lower atmosphere and carbon dioxide about 20%. The other gases are insignificant except ozone which is primarily formed by sunlight high in the atmosphere and peaks at a concentration of about 7.8 parts per million at an altitude of about 35 km (115,000 feet), where the atmosphere is thin.
Based on their actions and slogans one can say that the League of Conservation Voters, Sierra Club, Earthjustice, and Bloomberg Philanthropies are extremely misanthropic organizations, have a rooted distrust and dislike of human beings and their society. To be charitable, let us just assume that they have not thought out the consequences of their actions and their slogans.
See links under Challenging the Orthodoxy – Radiation Transfer, Challenging the Orthodoxy, and Defending the Orthodoxy.
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Artificial Intelligence: As discussed in the September 23, 2023, TWTW, the testimony by Dominion Electricity before the Virginia State Corporation Commission on Virginia Power’s 2023 Integrated Resources Plan revealed that data centers in northern Virginia are large users of electrical power. They usually have a 100-megawatt substation, and Dominion Energy provides electricity to over 12 million square feet of commissioned data center space. Further, Artificial Intelligence (AI) software may increase this demand for electrical power by five to eight times.
Now the Washington Post seems to be aware of the importance of reliable affordable electricity to the local economy. It had an article titled “Amid explosive demand, America is running out of power: AI and the boom in clean-tech manufacturing are pushing America’s power grid to the brink. Utilities can’t keep up.” Will other major players in Washington’s economy become aware that “clean tech” industries need great amounts of reliable and affordable electricity? See link under Energy Issues – US.
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More Solar and Storage: According to a report, a massive solar farm with a large battery storage facility has opened in the Mohave Desert on Edwards Air Force Base.
“Presently, the facility features more than 360 miles of DC wire and boasts at least 120,720 batteries, according to current installation figures.
The site’s impressive solar array also currently features nearly two million solar panels covering its 4,660 acres focused on the generation of sustainable energy.
At 875 megawatts of total solar capacity, Edwards Sanborn features the highest of any facility in the country, with its battery storage system capable of harnessing 3,300 megawatt hours of capacity.”
The previous largest storage facility in California is “The Moss Landing Energy Storage Facility, the world’s largest lithium-ion battery energy storage system, has been expanded to 750 MW/3,000 MWh.” There was no statement of final costs of the new facility at Edwards Air Force Base only some estimates of the first two rounds of financing: “In total, the two financing rounds for the project totaled more than $1.7 billion.”
For March 8, the demand reported by the California Independent System Operator (CAISO) was 22,000 MW at 5 pm and remained above that number until 11 pm. The storage on the Sanborn can support its output for less than 4 hours. What is the source of the electricity needed when the batteries are depleted, what is its cost, and how will the storage batteries be replenished? See link under Alternative, Green (“Clean”) Solar and Wind, https://www.pv-magazine.com/2024/01/22/largest-us-solar-storage-project-goes-online/#:~:text=Financing%20for%20the%20the%20first,revolving%20letter%20of%20credit%20facility and http://www.caiso.com/todaysoutlook/pages/index.html, and http://www.caiso.com/todaysoutlook/pages/index.html
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Money Bats: Matt Ridley has an article in the Wall Street Journal with a reference to a paper. Ridley’s article is titled: “Why Scientists Love Chasing Bats: The threat to humans from animal viruses is small. The financial incentive to pretend otherwise is large.” The key part is:
“The common claim in all the reports that climate change and deforestation increase the risk of virus spillover is poorly supported by the evidence.
The prospect of spending $31 billion a year on pandemic prevention, a third of which would be new money and a third diverted from other programs, provides an incentive for international bureaucrats to ignore or misrepresent evidence that the problem is small.
But a dollar spent on spillover can’t be spent on something else, and the evidence is clear that sanitation, nutrition, and vitamins are more cost-effective ways to save lives in poor countries—from infectious diseases as well as other causes. In an illustration of the opportunity cost, Vanuatu was on the brink of eradicating malaria before its public-health staff were diverted toward Covid. Malaria has erupted again in the 80-island archipelago.”
See Article # 4.
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Number of the Week: 64% Capacity Factor. An article on UK natural gas generation of electricity by Capell Aris stated:
“There was one noteworthy addition to the CCGT [combined cycle gas turbine] fleet in 2023: Keadby 2. Its performance is remarkable, boasting an efficiency of 63% – compared to the 46% of the retiring CCGTs. It was cheap and quick to build.”
The US EIA reports:
“The average utilization rate (or capacity factor) for the entire U.S. fleet of combined-cycle natural gas turbine (CCGT) electric power plants has risen as the operating efficiency of new CCGT units has improved. The CCGT capacity factor rose from 40% in 2008 to 57% in 2022. Increased efficiency improved the competitiveness of newer CCGT units against other fuel sources and older CCGT units.
Two factors affect the utilization of a CCGT unit: the efficiency of the generator and the delivered cost of natural gas. More advanced H- and J-class natural gas turbine technology entered the market in the mid-2010s, increasing the efficiency of newer natural gas-fired power plants. Lower natural gas prices typically increase capacity factors at natural gas-fired power plants because the electricity generated is cheaper than from other sources, such as coal-fired plants. In 2012 and 2015, annual average capacity factors of CCGT units increased by more than seven percentage points when the annual Henry Hub natural gas price declined.
Grid operators generally dispatch generators sequentially from lowest to highest cost. Because CCGT units built between 2010 and 2022 typically have the lowest operating costs, they are dispatched more frequently compared with older CCGT power plants. In 2022, the capacity factor of CCGT units that began operations between 2010 and 2022 averaged 64%, compared with 55% for those that began operations between 2000 and 2009 and 35% for units that began operations between 1990 and 1999.
About one-half of today’s CCGT capacity was built between 2000 and 2006. This sudden increase in the number of CCGT plants was in response to power shortages that occurred in the late 1990s, coinciding with new and more efficient F-class natural gas turbines entering the market. Now, many of these CCGT plants are about 20 years old, which could lead to lower capacity factors as the units age.
Lower heat rates, the ratio of the amount of fuel required to generate a unit of electricity, are the result of increased efficiency of newer CCGT power plants. CCGT power plants built between 2010 and 2022 have the lowest average heat rate among all CCGT plants, at 6,960 British thermal units per kilowatt-hour (Btu/kWh) in 2022, which is 7% lower than units built between 2000 and 2009.”
EIA reports that the capacity factor for photovoltaic solar in 2023 was 23.3%, for wind it was 33.5%, and for nuclear it was 93.1%.
Of course, CCGT power plants have steam turbines, which stabilize the grid and require about 24 hours to get to operating temperature from a cold start. Thus, they are unsuitable for backing up unreliable, destabilizing wind and solar.
Environmental groups such as League of Conservation Voters, Sierra Club, Earthjustice, and Bloomberg Philanthropies are out to replace reliable, affordable, grid setting power plants with unreliable and expensive wind and solar in the name of the environment because CCGT power plants emit CO2 which is essential for photosynthesis and most life on Earth?
See link under Alternative, Green (“Clean”) Solar and Wind and https://www.eia.gov/electricity/monthly/epm_table_grapher.php?t=epmt_6_07_b
NEWS YOU CAN USE:
Climate Newspeak
If you think energy policy is on the wrong track, get ready to be accused of a hate crime.
By Doomberg, Its Blog, Mar 4, 2024
“A censor is a man who knows more than he thinks you ought to.” – Laurence J. Peter
X Users Didn’t Like a Paper’s Tone and Findings, So They Got It Rejected
By Ross Pomeroy, WUWT, Mar 3, 2024
Challenging the Orthodoxy — NIPCC
Climate Change Reconsidered II: Physical Science
Idso, Carter, and Singer, Lead Authors/Editors, Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC), 2013
Summary: https://www.heartland.org/_template-assets/documents/CCR/CCR-II/Summary-for-Policymakers.pdf
Climate Change Reconsidered II: Biological Impacts
Idso, Idso, Carter, and Singer, Lead Authors/Editors, Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC), 2014
http://climatechangereconsidered.org/climate-change-reconsidered-ii-biological-impacts/
Summary: https://www.heartland.org/media-library/pdfs/CCR-IIb/Summary-for-Policymakers.pdf
Climate Change Reconsidered II: Fossil Fuels
By Multiple Authors, Bezdek, Idso, Legates, and Singer eds., Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change, April 2019
http://store.heartland.org/shop/ccr-ii-fossil-fuels/
Download with no charge:
Why Scientists Disagree About Global Warming
The NIPCC Report on the Scientific Consensus
By Craig D. Idso, Robert M. Carter, and S. Fred Singer, Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC), Nov 23, 2015
http://climatechangereconsidered.org/
Download with no charge:
Nature, Not Human Activity, Rules the Climate
S. Fred Singer, Editor, NIPCC, 2008
http://www.sepp.org/publications/nipcc_final.pdf
Global Sea-Level Rise: An Evaluation of the Data
By Craig D. Idso, David Legates, and S. Fred Singer, Heartland Policy Brief, May 20, 2019
Challenging the Orthodoxy – Radiation Transfer
The Role of Greenhouse Gases in Energy Transfer in the Earth’s Atmosphere
By W. A. van Wijngaarden and W. Happer, Preprint, Mar 3, 2023
Former World Bank economist warns of energy transition’s fiscal risks
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Mar 5, 2024
Link to report: Financing the Energy Transition: Do the Numbers Add Up?
By Gordon Hughes, Global Warming Policy Foundation, 2024
Population is Not Being Told the True Cost of Net Zero, Warns Former World Bank Economist
By Chris Morrison, The Daily Sceptic, Mar 6, 2024
[SEPP Comment: Refers to the above report,]
Problems With Climate Change Data
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Mar 5, 2024
[SEPP Comment: From Zero Hedge and The Epoch Times]
The Ozone Hole and Lower Stratospheric Temperature
By Mike Jonas, WUWT, Mary 6, 2024
The Continuing Albedo Change Warms the Earth More Than Twice as Much as CO2
By Gabriel Oxenstierna, WUWT, Mar 5, 2024
Six Warning Signs Climate Scientists Are Lying About Wildfires
By Jim Steele, WUWT, Mar 4, 2024
These 10 Charts Caused An NGO Hissy Fit At NARUC
Yes, Michael Bloomberg’s goal of shuttering 40% of the electric generation in the U.S. by 2030 is a threat to national security.
By Robert Bryce, His Blog, Mar 7, 2024
Website, Bloomberg Philanthropies, Accessed Mar 8, 2024
2017 990 PF https://apps.irs.gov/pub/epostcard/cor/205602483_201712_990PF_2019020416059851.pdf
Defending the Orthodoxy – Bandwagon Science
Arctic sea could be ‘ice-free’ by the 2030s, new study warns
By Lauren Irwin, The Hill, Mar 5, 2024
Link to paper: Projections of an ice-free Arctic Ocean
By Alexandra Jahn, et al., Nature Reviews Earth & Environment, Mar 5, 2024
[SEPP Comment: 20 to 30 years later than previous projections? The constantly receding 30-year horizon, just like fusion energy.]
Experts urge governance of planetary commons to manage climate change
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Mar 5, 2024
“Both the ‘planetary boundaries’ and the ‘planetary commons’ are informed by Earth system science, a discipline that regards the planet as a system made up of multiple biophysical subsystems, interacting with one another and together self-regulating the overall stable state of the Earth. These biophysical systems connect the five general ‘spheres’ of the Earth: the atmosphere, hydrosphere, biosphere, lithosphere, and cryosphere. There are many biophysical systems, including atmospheric circulation, ice sheet reflectivity, ocean carbon capture, and other categories of planetary commons shown across five spheres and divided as tipping elements and other subsystems. Source: Figure 2 in Rockström, et al. 2024. ‘The Planetary Commons: A New Paradigm for Safeguarding Earth-Regulating Systems in the Anthropocene.’”
[SEPP Comment: From the organization named Democracy Without Borders. Will another 100,000-year glaciation period disrupt these “spheres”?]
New Alarmist Definition Of A Region’s ‘Rapid Climate Change’ Is A Slight Cooling Trend Since 1960
By Kenneth Richard, No Tricks Zone, Mar 7, 2024
Link to paper: Multi-century (635-year) spring season precipitation reconstruction from northern Pakistan revealed increasing extremes
By Nasrullah Khan, et al., Nature Scientific Reports, Jan 2, 2024
Questioning the Orthodoxy
A New 1787-2005 Temperature Reconstruction Determines The Coldest 50-Year Period Was 1940-1993
By Kenneth Richard, No Tricks Zone, Mar 4, 2024
The warmest 50-year period in northeastern China occurred from 1844-1893.
Link to paper: Two Centuries of Winter Temperature Variability Inferred from Betula ermanii Ring Widths near the Forests/Tundra Ecotone in the Changbai Mountain, China
By Siwen Li, et al., Forests, Jan 22, 2024
From abstract: This chronology was established utilizing 55 cores obtained from 30 trees.
[SEPP Comment: No hockey-stick?]
Minding the Sciences—Wicked Science and Understanding Climate Change: Uncertainty, Risk, and Pragmatics
By Joe Nalven, Minding the Campus, Via WUWT, Mar 8, 2024
“Wicked problems need wicked science to, minimally, frame what is puzzling. Wickedness is not a moral judgment. Instead, it is tied to the limits of knowing—when rationality is encumbered by ambiguity and uncertainty and when control over the variables is limited or currently impossible. Predictions that emerge from modeling, especially those that reach decades into the future, cannot be adequately evaluated in the present, thus affecting whether such predictions have low, middling, or high confidence.”
[SEPP Comment: Upper and lower bounds can be established using observations. Global Climate Models all exceed the upper bounds from observations.]
Should We Change the Climate … On Purpose?
By Staff, Kite Key, March 2024
Video with some text
Unlike Warmists, Numbers Don’t Lie
By Gabriel Moens, Quadrant, Mar 4, 2024
Study was not found
Energy & Environmental Review: March 4, 2024
By John Droz, Jr., Master Resource, Mar 4, 2024
Seeking a Common Ground
#Gettingworse: the cost of European weather disasters edition
By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, Mar 6, 2024
Warming Earth Has Changed U.S. Hardiness Zones
By Kip Hansen, WUWT, Mar 3, 2024
“USDA Hardiness Zones are based on ‘30-year averages of the lowest annual winter temperatures’ – periodically, those values are re-examined, and hardiness zones adjusted.”
Science, Policy, and Evidence
Tidbits
By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, Mar 6, 2024
“Even though, again from Blacklock’s [Reporter], ‘Small business has yet to see billions in promised carbon tax rebates, the Canadian Federation of Independent Business said yesterday. The finance department in 2019 said it was ‘developing the specifics’ for payouts.’ Designing a tax handout? Indescribably hard and slow. Fixing the planet’s weather? Dead simple.”
Model Issues
Climate Model Bias 3: Solar Input
By Andy May, Mar 3, 2024
Climate Model Bias 4: Convection and atmospheric circulation
By Andy May, WUWT, Mar 6, 2024
Ordinary Average Guy – EIA’s Latest Approach To Weather Modeling Promises Forecast Improvements
By Albert Marc Passy, RBN Energy, Mar 6, 2024
Measurement Issues — Surface
How to Falsify Weather Station Data
By Kip Hansen, WUWT, Mar 5, 2024
Even Radcliffe Observatory Is Only Class 4!
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Mar 3, 2024
“To my surprise, even the weather station at Radcliffe Observatory in Oxford University appears on the Met Office’s station lists as a next to junk Class 4.”
Measurement Issues — Atmosphere
Roy Spencer on models v observations
By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, Mar 6, 2024
UAH Global Temperature Update for February 2024: Delayed
By Roy Spencer, His Blog, Feb 27, 2024
Changing Weather
Modelling Northern Hemisphere atmospheric blocking systems
By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, Mar 6, 2024
“From the CO2Science Archive:”
El Nino’s Collapse Has Begun
The entire character of this winter has been characterized by a strong El Nino.
By Cliff Mass, Weather Blog, Mar 8, 2024
Coldest Early March in a Generation, Large Improvement in Regional Snowpack
If it feels a bit chilly to you, you are not imagining it.
By Cliff Mass, Weather Blog, Mar 6, 2024
California sees nearly 11 feet of snow, with another foot or so expected
By Sarah Fortinsky, The Hill, Mar 4, 2024
Warm Atlantic Pattern: Germany Sees Warmest February; 3rd Warmest Winter On Record
By P Gosselin, No Tricks Zone, Mar 3, 2024
“At 156 hours, the duration of sunshine this winter in Germany saw a deviation of around 10 percent below the mean (170 hours). December was particularly gloomy.”
Labor Day Hurricane 1935
By Tony Heller, His Blog, Mar 7, 2024
From Monthly Weather Review:” It seems safe to estimate that winds of 150 to 200 miles per hour occurred near and over the Keys, with gusts probably exceeding 200 miles per hour.”
[SEPP Comment: According to the National Hurricane Center the three category 5 hurricanes that made landfall from 1851-2004 are, in order: Unnamed (FL Keys) 1935; Camille (MS) 1969; and Andrew (SE FL) 1992. They are ranked by minimum pressure.]
February 1779–Exceptionally Warm [In central England]
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Mar 4, 2024
Heatwaves Of 1895
By Tony Heller, His Blog, Mar 5, 2024
“man-induced drought”
By Tony Heller, His Blog, Mar 5, 2024
“global cooling process that is causing erratic weather”
“Shifts In World Climate Since 1945 Help Explain Severe Food Crisis”
By Tony Heller, His Blog, Mar 8, 2024
Louisiana governor issues a disaster declaration for the crawfish industry
By Tara Suter, The Hill, Mar 7, 2024
Changing Seas
Coastal US cities are sinking as sea levels continue to rise, new research shows
By Julia Jacobo, Yahoo News, Mar 5, 2024 [H/t Bernie Kepshire]
Link to paper: Disappearing cities on US coasts
By Leonard O. Ohenhen, et al., Nature, Mar 6, 2024
From abstract of paper: “The sea level along the US coastlines is projected to rise by 0.25–0.3 m [10 to 12 inches] by 2050, increasing the probability of more destructive flooding and inundation in major cities,”
[SEPP Comment: Deliberately confusing land subsidence with sea level rise. Based on geologically stable tide gages, the rate of sea level rise is 7 to 8 inches per century, not 10 to 12 inches in the next 30 years. Coastal land subsidence can be addressed with low-cost sea water desalination.]
Changing Cryosphere – Land / Sea Ice
Alarming loss of Antarctic ice
By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, Mar 6, 2024
“But it’s not ‘direct evidence’. It’s a reconstruction. They didn’t get in a time machine, go back and watch. They sliced up ice cores and looked at water isotopes and air bubble pressure. So, while it could be correct, it’s not yet carved in stone. Indeed, the settled science is as usual highly unsettled:”
This just in: Arctic cold in winter
By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, Mar 6, 2024
“It is one more example of the way in which the climate cult can’t be bothered with mere facts, since Arctic ice has been rebounding of late and is higher than it’s been at this time of year for about 20 years.”
Acidic Waters
The “Great Barrier Reef Is Dying” Scam
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Mar 8, 2024
“Australia’s emissions of CO2 are just 1% of the world’s; so calling on the Federal Government to reduce emissions will make no difference whatsoever to the reef. Instead, they [The Australian Marine Conservation Society] are using the reef as an excuse to force through their left-wing political agenda.”
[SEPP Comment: For the past 60 million years, corals grew during long periods with CO2 many times that of today’s atmosphere.]
Agriculture Issues & Fear of Famine
Pink problems
Evidence fingers manmade ecological chaos
By Craig Medred, His Blog, Mar 1, 2024 [H/t Ken Snider]
Link to paper: Biennial patterns in Alaskan sockeye salmon ocean growth are associated with pink salmon abundance in the Gulf of Alaska and the Bering Sea
By Peter S Rand, Gregory T Ruggerone, ICES Journal of Marine Science, Feb 29, 2024
From abstract: “In response to ocean heating and hatchery production, pink salmon (Oncorhynchus gorbuscha) returning from the North Pacific Ocean steadily increased after 1975, leading to concerns about their influence on food webs and competition with other species. Using measurements of distance between scale annuli of 24 584 individual sockeye salmon (O. nerka), we examined growth during their 2 or 3 years at sea from 1977 to 2015 for eight populations in Alaska.”
Lowering Standards
When Science Journals Become Activists
Spinning climate data to fit a policy agenda undermines public faith in science.
By Patrick Brown, The Liberal Patriot, Mar 4, 2024 [H/t Paul Homewood]
“It also seems as though Nature and the underlying report from the Lancet are attempting to use their authority as trusted scientific institutions to foster more action on CO2 emissions reductions. The irony, however, is that when an institution becomes activist, it is much more prone to spinning the data, which then undermines the very authority it is attempting to leverage. Society needs neutral scientific institutions that it can trust to give a foundational view of reality as free of spin as possible.”
Class 5 Weather Stations
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Mar 2, 2024
“Long established stations such as Durham, Bradford and Sheffield are also all Class 5, as well as Eskdalemuir, which is normally regarded as a reliable, rural station.
Amongst the Class 4s are Hawarden Airport, which holds the record temperature in Wales, and Charterhall, the record in Scotland.
Only Class 1 and 2 stations should be used for climatological purposes, including analysis of trends, national datasets and reporting of temperature extremes.”
[SEPP Comment: According to the reported UK Met Office rankings almost 50% are class 4 and almost 30% are class 5.]
Met Office Must Account for the ‘Junk’ Temperature Data Propping up Net Zero Insanity
By Chris Morrison, The Daily Sceptic, Mar 4, 2024
Network Rail Blame Landslips On Climate Change (Again)
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Mar 2, 2024
Communicating Better to the Public – Use Yellow (Green) Journalism?
Oxford Researcher: Frequent Intense Cold Spells are Caused by Global Warming
By Eric Worrall, WUWT, Mar 6, 2024
Check Your Facts, CNN, Human Emissions Aren’t Driving ‘Doomsday Glacier’ Decline
By H. Sterling Burnett, Climate Realism, Mar 5, 2024
No, BBC–It Was Not The Warmest February On Record
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Mar 2, 2024
EV Drivers Moan That They Don’t Pay As Much Tax As Petrol Car Drivers
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Mar 8, 2024
“Where on earth do they get these dopey environmental reporters from? Nursery School?”
Meet The Express Senior Political Correspondent
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Mar 5, 2024
“Her writings make it clear that she knows very little about the topics, and that most of what she thinks she knows is just propaganda that has been fed to her at school and university.
Where have all the real journalists gone?”
Jim Dale Gets It Wrong Again!
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Mar 2, 2024
Communicating Better to the Public – Exaggerate, or be Vague?
How Climate Alarmists Profit From The Scare
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Mar 5, 2024
“Johan Rockström, a prominent Swedish scientist and director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, has been awarded the Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement, commonly known as the environmental Nobel Prize. This recognition, initially reported by the Wall Street Journal, includes a $250,000 award and celebrates profound contributions to environmental science, policy and awareness. Graphic representation of the Planetary Boundaries concept.”
[SEPP Comment: Given the dramatic change from Hothouse Earth to today’s Icehouse Earth over the past 60 million years, what are the planetary boundaries?]
Meet SpongeBob, the climate scientist
By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, Mar 6, 2024
Link to story with no link to study: ‘Cathedrals of history’: How ancient sea sponges give worrying clues about global warming
By Seth Borenstein, Teresa de Miguel, msn.com, no date
Link to paper: 300 years of sclerosponge thermometry shows global warming has exceeded 1.5 °C
By Malcom McCulloch, et al., Nature Climate Chage, Feb 5, 2024
From article: “They analyzed six of the long-lived sponges.” [Boldface added]
From the paper: “Live specimens were collected from the Caribbean at depths between 33 and 91 m.”
Would limiting US fossil fuel production actually help climate change?
By Rachel Frazin, The Hill, Mar 3, 2024
[SEPP Comment: Typical muddled thinking that ignores the real questions: How much warming will be caused by increasing CO2, will increasing CO2 be beneficial or harmful, and (if necessary) how can the West stop China and other countries from increasing emissions?]
Communicating Better to the Public – Make things up.
Claims Of Wettest Winter Are Fake [for England and Wales]
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Mar 8, 2024
Communicating Better to the Public – Use Propaganda
Burn, Hollywood, Burn
By Roger Caiazza, WUWT, Mar 8, 2024
Drowning In Propaganda
By Tony Heller, His Blog, Mar 2024
Video: https://realclimatescience.com/2024/03/drowning-in-propaganda-2/#gsc.tab=0
Text: https://realclimatescience.com/2024/03/drowning-in-propaganda/#gsc.tab=0
[SEPP Comment: Showing NASA-GISS propaganda.]
Hot cuisine
By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, Mar 6, 2024
“Moreover, the family Rubiaceae, to which coffee belongs, appears to have evolved roughly 50 million years ago during the Eocene Epoch, which as any good democracy reporter focused on misinformation will not know was a lot warmer than the current Holocene. Coffea arabica, aka “the good stuff”, seems to have appeared between half a million and a million years ago, but as a hybrid of two other existing coffees due to ‘changing environmental conditions in East Africa’ way before humans caused weather to become unstable.”
[SEPP Comment: Using food for propaganda to “follow the science.”]
“passed an ominous tipping point”
By Tony Heller, His Blog, Mar 7, 2024
“Arctic Sea Ice Gone in Summer Within Five Years? (2007)
Arctic Sea Icecapades
By Willis Eschenbach, WUWT, Mar 8, 2024
“Here’s the dean of failed serial doomcasting, James Hansen, pontificating on the subject back in 2008.”
Communicating Better to the Public – Protest
Eco-Terrorism…Over Half A Billion Euros Damage
Tesla’s Berlin Plant Remains Shut Down After Eco-Terrorism…Over Half A Billion Euros Damage
By P Gosselin, No Tricks Zone, Mar 6, 2024
“Yesterday’s eco-terrorism attack will cause Tesla to shut down its Berlin plant until the end of the week… 12,000 employees idle…damage could reach over half a billion euros!”
Has the Melbourne Extinction Rebellion Protest Driven Up CO2 Emissions?
By Eric Worrall, WUWT, Mar 5, 2024
Expanding the Orthodoxy
Health Effects of Fossil Fuel–Derived Endocrine Disruptors
By Tracey J. Woodruff, et al., The New England Journal of Medicine, Mar 7, 2024
First two recommendations under food preparation and storage
“Consume less meat and more fruits, vegetables, and whole grains, because certain chemicals can concentrate in animal fat.
Eat fresh (and if accessible and feasible, organic) produce whenever possible; always wash raw produce to decrease exposure to pesticides.”
[SEPP Comment: If modern life is so unhealtful, why is life expectancy increased for all ages particularly in countries modernizing?]
In the US the life expectancy was 68 in 1950; 79 in 2015
For China, 43, in 1950; 76 in 2015
For India 35 in 1950; 68 in 2015
Plastic food packaging contains thousands of hormone-mimicking chemicals: Study
By Saul Elbein, The Hill, Mar 5, 20234
No link, likely paper: Plastic Food Packaging from Five Countries Contains Endocrine- and Metabolism-Disrupting Chemicals
By Sarah Stevens, Environmental Science & Technology, Mar 5, 2024
SEC finalizes weakened rule to make companies disclose climate information
By Rachel Frazin and Saul Elbein, The Hill, Mar 6, 2024
“In their comments to the SEC on the draft rule, investors large and small ‘have indicated that they are making decisions in reliance on [climate risk] information,’ Gensler said.
‘It’s in this context that we have a role to play with regard to climate-related disclosures,’ he added.”
[SEPP Comment: With Washington’s regulatory entrepreneurship, who cares if the companies are fiscally responsible, as long as they are environmentally conforming?]
The Anthropocene? Not or Maybe Not
By Kip Hansen, WUWT, Mar 5, 2024
We Must Think More Broadly to Reduce U.S. Carbon Emissions
By Michael McAdams, Real Clear Energy, March 05, 2024
Questioning Green Elsewhere
Canada’s Green Policies Jeopardize Economic and Societal Needs
The green ‘road work’ in Canada might just be the signpost American policymakers need: Beware of economic potholes on the path to sustainability.
By Lucy Gay, Real Clear Energy, March 05, 2024
Market Environmentalists vs. Wind/Solar/Battery Industrialization, Sprawl
By Robert Bradley Jr., Master Resource, Mar 7, 2024
“The greenest fuels are the ones that contain the most energy per pound of material that must be mined, trucked, pumped, piped, and burnt. [In contrast], extracting comparable amounts of energy from the surface would entail truly monstrous environmental disruption….” Peter Huber
Non-Green Jobs
Does the Alleged Climate Crisis Justify Ignoring Accusations of Chinese Slave Labor?
By Eric Worrall, WUWT, Mar 3, 2024
Litigation Issues
24 states sue EPA over air pollution limit
By Rachel Frazin, The Hill, Mar 6, 2024
Red States Slap Biden SEC’s Latest Climate Rule With Legal Challenge Within Hours Of It Going Live
By Nick Pope, Daily Caller, Mar 6, 2024
Texas sues Biden administration over finalized methane rule
By Zack Budryk, The Hill, Mar 8, 2024
New York’s Attorney General Makes A Fool Of The Governor
By Francis Menton, Manhattan Contrarian, Mar 2, 2024
If the AG can use a broad statute to target a politically disfavored individual like Trump in this way, how could any person doing business in New York think they are safe from similar legal abuse?”
“The crazed and delusional ambition evidenced in this case is even wilder than what was just seen in the Trump case. This time we’re not just going to keep a hated politician out of office; we’re going to save the planet!”
“Meanwhile, it is high time for the business and legal communities of New York to start calling out our Attorney General for completely politicizing and degrading her office. You corporate CEOs and law firm leaders — do you think that if you just lie low the crocodile will eat you last? Your tolerance of this politicized AG is completely shameful.”
[SEPP Comment: Has Trump done any more harm than climate modelers and government officials who exaggerate the temperature effects of atmospheric CO2, ignore the positive effect that Earth is greening, and ignore the high costs of their proposed energy transition?]
Cap-and-Trade and Carbon Taxes
Boiler Tax Set To Be Scrapped
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Mar 3, 2024
Net Zero Watch welcomes boiler tax retreat
Press Release, Net Zero Watch, Mar 4, 2024
California man is first in the US to be charged with smuggling greenhouse gases, prosecutors say
By Charles Rotter, WUWT, Mar 6, 2024
“’This is the first time the Department of Justice is prosecuting someone for illegally importing greenhouse gases, and it will not be the last,’ U.S. Attorney Tara McGrath said in a statement. ‘We are using every means possible to protect our planet from the harm caused by toxic pollutants, including bringing criminal charges.’”
[SEPP Comment: Hydrofluorocarbons are accused of causing the “ozone hole” over Antarctica, an annual austral winter event discovered by Dobson in 1956. There is no corresponding “ozone hole” over the North Pole. There has been continuous monitoring of the ozone hole over Antarctica since the 80s.]
Subsidies and Mandates Forever
Renewable Subsidies To Rise By £1.6 Billion This Year [in England]
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Mar 8, 2024
“Either way, energy consumers will end up being much worse off.”
Energy Issues – Non-US
Net Zero budget ‘a hammer blow’ aimed at public
Green blob is still running the Tory show.
By Andrew Montford, Net Zero Watch, Mar 7, 2024
Should we abandon electricity generation using gas?
By Capell Aris, Net Zero Watch, Mar 6, 2024
Energy Issues – Australia
Electric or Bust: Aussie Climate Minister’s Plan to Boost China and Hurt US Automakers
By Eric Worrall, WUWT, Mar 8, 2024
“Aussie federal climate minister Chris Bowen plan is to force mainly US ICE manufacturers to buy carbon credits from mainly Chinese EV manufacturers.”
Energy Issues — US
Amid explosive demand, America is running out of power
AI and the boom in clean-tech manufacturing are pushing America’s power grid to the brink. Utilities can’t keep up.
By Evan Halper, The Washington Post, Mar 7, 2024 [H/t Bernie Kepshire]
New Data Points In New York’s Unfolding Energy Implosion
By Francis Menton, Manhattan Contrarian, Mar 5, 2024
“Meanwhile, the Energy Information Administration reports here in 2023 (page 6) that the “levelized cost” of electricity from a new combined cycle natural gas plant is under $50/MWh — for dispatchable power with no transmission upgrades, backup or storage needed. That translates into electricity to the consumer of well under $0.20/kWh.”
“There is no effort whatsoever here or anywhere else in New York’s propaganda to figure out how much it will cost the consumer for electricity when the grid has been converted to all renewables plus massive amounts of some kind of backup or storage that hasn’t even been invented yet.
Memo to Attorney General James: If you have any real interest in prosecuting people who lie about plans to supposedly achieve ‘net zero’ carbon emissions, here is the worst offender of all right under your nose.”
Natural gas combined-cycle power plants increased utilization with improved technology
By Lindsay Aramayo, Mark Morey, et al., EIA, Nov 20, 2023
U.S. Manufacturing Is Among the Cleanest in the World – Let’s Prove It
By Heather Reams, Real Clear Energy, March 04, 2024
Public Choice and Electricity: [Lynne] Kiesling Ducks Again (Plano, Tx. meeting next week)
By Robert Bradley Jr., Master Resource, Mar 8, 2024
“The Electricity Reliability Council of Texas got off the hook for tens of billions of dollars’ worth of planning error in regard to The Great Blackout of February 2021, the most deadly and costly economic failure in U.S. history. What a case study–and Lynne (and disciple Michael Giberson) know where the bodies are buried in the ‘governance failures’ (her term) of ISO/RTOs.”
Oil and Natural Gas – the Future or the Past?
Exxon CEO: “The people who are generating those [CO2] emissions need to … pay the price”
By Eric Worrall, WUWT, Mar 5, 2024
Nuclear Energy and Fears
French built a reactor in 7 years in 1976, but modern Australia needs “decades”
By Jo Nova, Her Blog, Mar 6, 2024
“The nuclear debate in Australia is 100 years behind the rest of Western Civilization. Like children, we banned nuclear power before we even built one. We could afford to strut in our anti-nuke super-cape because we were swimming in 300 years’ worth of coal. (Now we want to ban that too.)”
Microreactor Designs Fit for a Green Future
By Duggan Flanakin, Real Clear Energy, March 06, 2024
“Innovation Zero 2024, set for April 30-May 1, is the largest net zero conference in the United Kingdom, a nation that has opted to keep nuclear energy in its ‘green’ portfolio. The government-sponsored event ‘provides a meeting place for announcements, partnerships, deal-making, and collaborations for those who develop, produce, deploy, and fund low-carbon solutions.”
[SEPP Comment: Environmentalists opposed nuclear in the past; will they change?]
Alternative, Green (“Clean”) Solar and Wind
This Massive Solar Farm, One of the Largest Projects in DOD History, Is Changing How We Look at Solar Energy
By Micah Hanks, The Debrief, Feb 27, 2024
Italy is putting a big hybrid floating solar–floating wind farm in the sea
By Michelle Lewis, Electrek, Mar 1, 2024
CFACT Says Offshore Wind Violates Clean Air and Clean Water Acts
By David Wojick, WUWT, Mar 6, 2024
Alternative, Green (“Clean”) Energy — Other
David Turver On Drax
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Mar 3, 2024
“This is an excellent summary of Drax biomass operations on David Turver’s Substack:”
“’ Electricity generation from standalone biomass is already extremely expensive and inefficient. Adding CCS [Carbon Capture and Storage] to make BECCS [Biomass with Carbon Capture and Storage] makes the technology a net energy sink which of course is even more expensive. The Government should drop any plans it may have for BECCS.’”
Europe is Struggling to Meet Green Hydrogen Goals, Send Money
By Eric Worrall, WUWT, Mar 6, 2024
“WINNING: €22 Billion EU Government money spent to produce 20,000 tons of green hydrogen, at a price of €1.1 million per ton, or €1100 / kg.”
Alternative, Green (“Clean”) Energy — Storage
The Ideology and Reality of Carbon Capture Utilization and Storage
By Philip Rosetti & Robert G. Eccles, Real Clear Energy, March 07, 2024
Alternative, Green (“Clean”) Vehicles
Britain’s e-bus ticking timebomb: How nearly TWO THOUSAND electric buses worth £800m face urgent recall over fears they could see burst into flames
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Mar 3, 2024
VW faces lawsuits over claim Porsche EV battery sparked ship fire
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Mar 8, 2024
“Whatever the verdict, it is bad news for the EV industry, and ultimately buyers. If Volkswagen ends up paying the bill, it will put up costs for the whole industry, which will need to specifically insure against such risks.
And if Allianz [the company that insured the ship] has to pay, the insurance industry will insist that shipowners either stop carrying EVs, or have to pay much higher premiums, which will be passed on to the car manufacturers.”
Climate Change Weekly #499: Is the Bell Tolling for EV Mania?
By H. Sterling Burnett, Environment & Climate News, Mar 8, 2024
California Dreaming
Harvesting Urban Storm Runoff
California’s Water & Energy Future with Edward Ring
By Edward Ring, His Blog, Mar 6, 2024
“The people designing the water future for California’s South Coast cities are doing an impressive job, but they might wish to consider the positive externalities of surplus water. What if Los Angeles County planned to increase their planned water supply capacity by 17 percent, instead of planning to reduce it by another 17 percent? Both outcomes are well within the scope of feasibility, even if the more generous choice might cost more. But what is it worth, for example, to continue to use recycled wastewater to guarantee perennial flow in the Glendale Narrows?”
BELOW THE BOTTOM LINE
Britain’s America’s Cup Challenge Hit By Lithium Battery Fire
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Mar 2, 2024
“It is ironic given that the team has made such a big deal about being zero carbon:”
“The America’s Cup is a sailing competition and the oldest international competition still operating in any sport. America’s Cup match races are held between two sailing yachts: one from the yacht club that currently holds the trophy and the other from the yacht club that is challenging for the cup.” – Wikipedia
Climate fortune tellers say global warming causes cold spells too
By Jo Nova, Her Blog, Mar 7, 2024
“100 years from now university students will write exam essays on the mass psychosis that overcame climate scientists in the early part of the century.”
“Dam across the Bering Straits?”
By Tony Heller, His Blog, Mar 5, 2024
[SEPP Comment: To warm the earth’s climate? The Bering Strait is the world’s “thermostat”?]
Leafhoppers ate my climate
By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, Mar 6, 2024
“One rule of climate change journalactiviscience is that anything, no matter how small or tentative, can be reported as proof that we are wrecking the planet. But nothing can be cited as potential evidence that we are helping it. Every single impact of warming has to be bad. QED.”
ARTICLES
1. How Are We Going to Clean Up the Biden Mess?
Look to a much older president for the answers.
By James Freeman, WSJ, Mar 8, 2024
TWTW Summary: The key part was covered in the This Week section above under Green Dreams.
************************
2. GM Doesn’t Tell the Truth About EVs
If the U.S. and allies become failed states, blame their energy and climate delusions.
By Holman W. Jenkins, Jr., WSJ, March 8, 2024
Link to report: The Norwegian Illusion
By Staff Goehring & Rozencwajg, Natural Resource Investors, Feb 28, 2024
TWTW Summary: The columnist writes:
“I didn’t read last weekend’s Barron’s interview with GM’s Mary Barra before starting this column because I knew the question most crucial for shareholders wasn’t going to be asked:
‘Ms. Barra, you say GM won’t be selling gas-powered cars by the year 2035. When you say these words, is it part of an unspoken political bargain to protect the trade and fuel-mileage concessions that allow large markups on big SUVs and pickup trucks?’
Normal market logic goes out the window when company leaders are indulged and even required to say fantastical, unrealistic things about the future. I’ve long borrowed the term ‘sophisticated state failure’ for the Western world’s energy policies. Because government must always be seen doing something, nonsense ideologies, even when spoken purely for effect, end up ‘gamified’ (made a game of) in government programs. Thus, the Obama auto bailouts: They left Detroit permanently dependent on artificially inflated pickup profits to subsidize loss-making electric vehicles served up as a gesture by the political class.
The resulting program, the Biden Transportation Department was legally obliged last year to admit, fails any cost-benefit test. Climatewise, the truth is even sadder.
Dollar for dollar, subsidizing EVs for Americans is a subsidy to the rest of the world to use more fossil energy and cause more emissions, a reality that can’t escape political notice forever.
Take Norway, portrayed in GM ads as EV heaven. As a Morgan Stanley research note first observed two years ago, Norway has seen no decline in oil consumption related to EVs, though users receive thousands of dollars in annually recurring subsidies and EVs accounted at the time for 64% of new-car sales.
The reason is increased use and ownership of gas-powered cars, especially for trips that EVs aren’t suited for.
Now comes an update from the natural-resource consultants Goehring & Rozencwajg that only darkens the picture. Despite some of the greenest electricity on Earth, a Norwegian still needs to get 45 years of use out of his imported EV battery (expected life 15 years) to offset the global CO2 cost of producing it.
As I’ve noted before, secretly even the Biden administration knows the truth about all this. Get ready for a colossal irony. Europe’s emissions peaked in 1979, America’s peaked in 2005, and China’s are expected to peak as soon as next year. The reason wasn’t energy policy. Peak emissions happen because of slowing population and economic growth plus the normal, uninterrupted, market-driven hunt for energy efficiency (which can certainly include cost-effective investment in renewables).
Unfortunately, global energy efficiency, which was improving by 1.9% annually for more than a decade, has been growing at only half that rate since 2021.”
The columnist goes into further detail including that the GM stock has been in doldrums for 15 years then concludes with:
“Ms. Barra and other CEOs have reasons for a strategic silence on the EV folly. But it comes at a cost. I doubt any president of Eisenhower’s era or earlier could have pictured the misallocation of perhaps ultimately $1 trillion on so deluded an enterprise as our government pretending to convert the nation’s vehicle fleet to electricity to change the planet’s weather.”
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3. EV Madness and the Chinese Menace
How green-energy policy upholds an evolutionary theory about why stupid ideas win support.
By Holman W. Jenkins, Jr. WSJ, Mar 1, 2024
TWTW Summary: After citing phrases for a new EV made in China, the columnist writes:
“In all likelihood, companies like Ford, GM, and Chrysler-parent Stellantis, whose specialty is conventional vehicles, would otherwise continue to focus on conventional vehicles, because demand for them remains strong. For reasons I’ll get to, it’s not clear a supercheap EV would even matter that much to Tesla, given America’s taste in cars.
But the moment is interesting for another reason. What logic predicts, the data have been starting to show. Green energy use is rising, and fossil-fuel use is rising even faster. Energy intensity, or the amount of energy consumed per unit of global gross domestic product, was falling at a rate of almost 2% a year for two decades. Now it’s falling at barely 1%.
Though it’s early days, this is exactly what you would expect if green-energy subsidies mainly subsidize more energy consumption overall rather than emissions reductions. It turns out, despite the intuitions used to sell climate pork to the public, energy demand is not capped. Fossil fuels don’t stop being useful just because green energy is subsidized. If you want to curb emissions, you have to impose a carbon tax.”
The columnist discusses certain politicians and political analysts who ignore talking about a carbon tax then gets to the key part:
“It’s a good time to remember what the late evolutionist John Tooby, who died in November, taught us about ‘coalitional instincts.’
His most important insight was that ‘stupid’ or ‘weird’ ideas are actually more powerful in rallying coalitional solidarity than truthful ones, because truthful ones can be recognized by any rational person.
‘The more biased away from neutral truth,’ he wrote, ‘the better the communication functions to affirm coalitional identity.’
‘Coalition-mindedness,’ he added, ‘makes everyone, including scientists, far stupider in coalitional collectivities than as individuals.’
I submit you can’t understand elite beliefs and behavior in our increasingly conformity-enforcing society without the concept of coalitional instincts. You might also start to see the utility of a Donald Trump-like figure to act as wrecking ball when elite beliefs become dysfunctional and self-defeating.”
The columnist concludes with further comments on EVs, Washington, and the uncertainty of climate change forecasts.
************************
4. Why Scientists Love Chasing Bats
The threat to humans from animal viruses is small. The financial incentive to pretend otherwise is large.
By Matt Ridley, WSJ, March 6, 2024
Link to report: Rational Policy Over Panic: Re-evaluating the Pandemic Risk withing the Global Pandemic Prevention, Preparedness and Response Agenda,
By David Bell, et al., University of Leeds, 2024
**********************
I just caught a part of Evan Davies’ business programme – The Bottom Line – on BBC Radio 4 (11:30 GMT)
It was fascinating.
“”Evan makes up crisis management scenarios to see how three CEOs handle a business emergency. To make it more realistic none of the guests know what the predicaments are in advance””
The scenario in question that I heard? Domestic e-scooter and e-bike fires.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001wypt
Apparently – according to said CEOs – we need to be able to go into peoples’ houses and check all their electrical systems, because…. these often lethal fires are all down to a dodgy socket or fuse box.
It isn’t the product.
A condo complex I own a unit in is in the process of prohibiting all e-bikes etc.
All residents being exposed to too much risk uncontrollable risk of sudden fire outbreak.
Local fire dept gave us a big thumbs up.
Whilst sometimes that might be true I’m not sure the Fire Brigade Services would agree!
I just caught a part of Evan Davies’ business programme – The Bottom Line – on BBC Radio 4 (11:30 GMT)
It was fascinating.
“”Evan makes up crisis management scenarios to see how three CEOs handle a business emergency. To make it more realistic none of the guests know what the predicaments are in advance””
The scenario in question that I heard? Domestic e-scooter and e-bike fires.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001wypt
Apparently – according to said CEOs – we need to be able to go into peoples’ houses and check all their electrical systems, because…. these often lethal fires are all down to a dodgy socket or fuse box.
It isn’t the product.
“Number of the Week”
This phrase reminds me of John Brignell’s Number Watch. Unfortunately, he isn’t maintaining his old website, and it’s gone into the ether. It’s a major loss to us all!
Nit picked: Seems to me, at least, that a short definition of combined cycle would have been helpful in understanding the number of the week.
With due regard for Sowell, maybe this is more simply put as
“Knowledge is what makes something a resource.”
Too true.