Forty-two was the mystical number that explained “life, the universe, and everything” in Douglas Adams’ comic novel, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Today, another mystical number, the so-called social cost of carbon (SSC), is providing the excuse for the Environmental Protection Agency and green-energy-enamored state regulators to enact crippling energy policies.
The SCC is the thumb on the scale that can justify virtually any policy aimed at eliminating fossil fuels. When the EPA first proposed its rule to reduce mercury emissions from coal-fired power plants, the agency’s cost-benefit analysis determined the benefits would be minuscule. Any putative benefits, it turns out, would come instead from reductions in carbon emissions and, here’s the key, based on a calculated value for the SCC. The same was true for the EPA’s earlier attempt at carbon regulation via a “Clean Power Plan,” which was shut down by the Supreme Court. But here we are again with the agency’s newest rules trying to force coal plants to further reduce mercury emissions and to force both coal and natural gas-fired power plants to capture 90% of their carbon emissions. The technology to accomplish this doesn’t exist and EPA Administrator Michael Regan admitted the rule will force the closure of fossil-fuel power plants.
The SCC values used by the EPA are derived from calculations in integrated planning models (IPMs). Those models assume a simplistic linear relationship between carbon emissions and world temperature (never mind that the validity of that linear assumptions is a subject of deep debate in scientific circles). The models then assume that the resulting temperature increases cause all forms of environmental doom – rising sea levels, more disease, and declining agricultural production – for which yet more estimates are made to assign future cost consequences. Here’s the key: the IPMs project these costs out for the next 300 years (not a typo). Then, those far future costs are “discounted” to estimate a value in today’s dollars by using truly absurd assumptions about such things as inflation and economic growth.
A tongue-in-cheek forecaster’s creed is “Give them a number or give them a date. Don’t give them both.” Attempting to predict the future three centuries hence may be standard fare for science fiction writers, but basing energy policies on such predictions is insane.
Imagine someone in the year 1724 predicting life – and technology – today. Benjamin Franklin was 18 years old and working in his father’s print shop. George Washington would not be born for another eight years. The French scientist Antoine Lavoisier, who first identified carbon as an element in 1789, would not be born until 1743. The first patent on a flush toilet would not happen for another half-century. Thomas Edison would not invent the light bulb and the telephone for another 150 years. Could anyone in 1724 have imagined automobiles, mobile phones, and MRI machines? How about integrated circuits, nuclear power, and B-2 bombers?
To presume we can accurately predict, or even imagine, what the world will look like 300 years from now is just as preposterous. Yet, simplistic models and arbitrary assumptions are being used to drive energy policy decisions today. Using the SCC estimates, and assuming that new technologies will magically appear, the EPA can justify virtually any pollution control regulation, including those that effectively mandate electric vehicles. Similarly, even though offshore wind generation costs five times more than natural gas and coal, the SCC can “prove” the benefits of offshore wind exceed its costs. New York State, for example, assumes that, by 2040, thousands of megawatts of “dispatchable emissions-free generators” (the equivalent of a natural gas generator burning pure hydrogen) will provide the necessary backup for unreliable offshore wind, even though no such generators exist.
Contrary to the economic fantasies peddled by green energy advocates, policies to eliminate fossil fuels based on the supposed benefits captured by the SCC will cripple the U.S. economy. Electricity prices, coupled with ill-considered plans to electrify virtually everything, will soar. Supplies will dwindle, requiring rationing, either explicitly or through rolling blackouts, such as those experienced every day in South Africa. Rather than creating some green energy nirvana, the lack of adequate and affordable electricity will cause societal decay.
All of this based on a made-up number.
Jonathan Lesser is a senior fellow with the National Center for Energy Analytics and president of Continental Economics.
This article was originally published by RealClearEnergy and made available via RealClearWire.
It is physically impossible for CO2 to cause warming.
I totally agree. The concentration of CO2 in air is only 424 ppm at the MLO. This is 0.833 grams of CO2 per cubic meter. The mass of 1 cubic meter of air is 1.2929 kg. This amount of CO2 can only can only cause a small amount of global warming. Water is the main greenhouse gas.
Sorry
On May 11, a strong solar wind from the eruptions of a spot that is close to the solar equator will hit the Earth’s magnetosphere.
What should a climate watcher expect to see in thermometer, ice or wind data as a result of the strong solar wind.
Expect low latitude auroras.
Expect ice in your bourbon to melt unless you drink fast.
The solar wind impact on May 11 will be strong and sudden. It may cause a sudden increase in seismic and volcanic activity.
To be a pedant, Benjamin Franklin was apprenticed to his older brother’s print shop, not his father’s.
The Social Cost of Carbon calculations are bad science fantasy, not even fiction, as they have demonstrably false premises.
The social BENEFITS of carbon, are several magnitudes higher than any imaginary social cost.
Exactly. This is so obvious that one has to question the motives of anyone who chooses to examine the “social cost of carbon”. Are they malevolent or merely just fabulously ignorant to the point of idiocy?
…and will likely remain so.
And Edison didn’t invent the telephone. Bell did.
“Give them a number or give them a date. Not both.” Alarmists are often not so wise given their ardent desire to create climate alarm.
Wadhams said Arctic summer sea ice would be gone (0, a number) by 2014 (date). Oops.
USNPS said all the glaciers in Glacier National Park would be gone (0) by 2020 (date). Oops.
Viner said in 2000 that UK children would soon (datish) not know snow (0).
Well, it’s been 24 years—NOT soon—and they still do. Oops.
The gov of NY says that black kids don’t know what computers are. She screwed up. She should have made it a prediction.
“Give us money, or 25 years from now black kids will not know what computers are”.
No apology would have been needed.
One of the late night shows made fun of that statement by the gov. (Colbert?)
Good post. The ‘social cost of carbon’ was a warmunist absurdity from the gitgo.
First, they don’t mean carbon, they mean CO2.
Second, any such analysis should properly be net cost/benefit, not just cost. The benefits of burning fossil fuels have been enormous for 200 years now, and they will continue. We would not have airplanes, heavy trucks, or a reliable electricity grid without future ‘carbon’ benefits.
Third, ‘cost’ is based on climate models that provably do not reproduce reality. They produce a tropical troposphere hotspot that does not exist, and an ECS twice observational EBM estimates. Not real cost, only falsely modeled cost.
Fourth, they project their ‘costs’ into a very uncertain far distant future in order to gross them up. Nobody in the serious real world ever does that. For example, the social costs of increased sea level rise when sea level rise has NOT accelerated. For example, the social costs of increased extreme weather when extreme weather has not increased. Imaginary costs versus real benefits.
When EPA succeeded in cleaning up air and water pollution, they just switched to the false ‘linear no threshold’ model of harm to keep on doing their EPA thing despite increasingly more cost than benefit. When reality is, for most things there are thresholds below which no harm occurs. Else we would not have medical X-rays, or life saving maximum drug doses.
Good points Rud. Of course if they were to include an estimate the benefits of CO2 emissions (increased crop yields etc) with less fanciful estimates of future costs, then the SCC would likely be negative. In other words fossil fuel producers and users would by EPA logic be receiving tax credits for the net benefits of “carbon”.
One thing to note, Rud, is the previous version of the MATS rule that governs mercury and particulate, used reductions in particulate, not mercury, to do the economic justification. Mercury reductions could not do that.
They have done this several times because they use the LNT theory to justify the “benefits” of particulate reduction even though other rules apply to particulate. A little double counting of benefits, anyone?
SCC is a hoot. They go out 300 years to get big damages mostly from loss of land due to SLR which loss they count anew every year for the same land since it is still gone. The discount rate should quickly zero all this but they invoke economic growth that more than offsets it.
…and they ignore the very real near-term (therefore less discounted) benefits of mild warming and increased levels of CO2 (increased crop yields etc) that would quickly make the social “cost” of carbon a benefit. In other words the SCC is likely a negative number that should result if fossil fuel producers and users receiving tax credits. It’s time to hoist the EPA with their own petard.
One of the three models used to guess SCC is Tol’s which shows net benefits up to at least 2 degrees C of warming. He says the others are “constrained” not to do that.
Wind and solar power plus battery of any current technology are carbon intensive. They consume more fossil fuels than they can save. They would need to last more than 200 years to save more fossil fuels than what went into their manufacture.
The illusion is kept alive by all the developed nations burdening China with the task of burning ever more coal to make the stuff needed for the transition. The whole effort is building huge dependence on Chinese coal mining and acquisition.
Anyone who cannot see this is not looking.
It would seem to me that the bogey man is the tiny amount of gas that that allows air-breathing plants and animals, but might undergo a reaction upon being stuck by sunlight and then re-raiating energy and so forth.
So until many abandon this concept/theory/hypothesis that the reaction is is armegeddon, the masses must tolerate loss of freedom, loss of progress, loss of affordible heating and cooling and transportation and the beat goes on.
We need a charismatic leader to lead us outta the woods.
Gotta grill my meat using propane, and hell with the cricket that dies due to a 2 degree change in his nest.
Gums sends…
The cricket would probably love it to be warmer.
Well, cricket is a summer game (:-))
“We need a charismatic leader to lead us outta the woods”
NO, WE DON’T !!
Charismatic leaders & their (now even richer ) pals have put us in this mess.
We need someone honest with a basic understanding of maths & physics who won’t let the wool be pulled over their eyes !!
One could hardly describe Trump as “charismatic” ! 😉
We need someone who is more interested in doing what is right, benefitting everyone, than someone who is just trying to get attention and reelected. Oh, and money, too.
I guess that there are a few simple questions that settled/consensus science must be able to answer
What amount of CO2 in the atmosphere do we need to achieve to save the planet?
What global temperature will this CO2 level guarantee?
They must have very clear numbers that will become apparent as soon as we hit the magical net zero goals otherwise, we’ll never know when the net zero dreams have come true!
Without clear goals and results why else should we continue to pursue the current net zero dogma /lunacy?
It is obvious there is no achieving “net-zero” for the trough feeders. Currently, in order to expand room at the trough for some late comers, there is a UK demand to spend what will no doubt get to be billions of pounds/year, if it ever gets started, in order to remove CO2 from the atmosphere — beyond the goal of adding no more CO2.
Story tip – Warren Michigan roads flaking due to greener cement –
Why are some new roads in Warren showing signs of deterioration? (wxyz.com)
“I don’t know what is going on, I don’t know if the concrete is defective or if it was a bad batch, but as tax payer, I want good quality product,” he said.
“Why did you reach out to 7 News Detroit?” I asked.
“I wanted to get some answers, you guys are the investigators and I am sure you will dig into it,” he said.
After doing some digging, I learned this is not an issue just isolated to Warren roads.
“Where else are you seeing this is Southeast Michigan?” I asked Steve Waalkes, the executive director and CEO of the Michigan Concrete Association.
“We have seen this in a few other locations that come to mind, such as Garden City, Woodhaven,” Waalkes said.
He tells me the concrete issue has been popping up primarily in metro Detroit.
But what is it? He said it’s called “scaling.”
“It’s where the surface mortar of the concrete is not durable, comes off, and exposes kind of the surrogate aggregate you know surface below,” he said.
“Is this at all dangerous?” I asked.
“It’s not dangerous, it’s primarily an ascetic concern, it can leave the slab rough in spots if it gets a little deeper than just on the very surface.”
How did it happen? Waalkes said it can be a number of reasons, from weather, to how the cement is mixed.
Warren City Engineer Tina Gapshes has her own theory.
“It’s due to 2022 regulations placed by EGLE on the cement manufacturing industry in order to reduce CO2 admissions,” Gapshes said. “They added more limestone to it, so it does cure faster.”
Gapshes tells me all of Warren’s road projects have a three-year warranty on them. She said they are waiting to see if Cosgrove and a few other roads where this has happened in Warren gets any worse.
“Why not use that three warranty now? Because at least one person that I’m talking to is saying well this looks bad,” I asked.
“An ascetic concern?” I guess the ascetics walk barefoot across the scaled concrete to make themselves uncomfortable and prove their devotion.
more tire wear and noise??
Once the surface seal goes moisture gets in and it keeps crumbling just like a cement pad driveway.
Co2 is a benefit so the cost is negative. We are living in the best of times and so I will keep cheering on China and India keeping it going where we are letting down the side.
more co2 the better
The EPA is a corrupt organization. It has been lying to us and cheating us since its inception. It is time for it to be dismantled.
The EPA has taken their corruption to a new level. The 2023 Plan of action will ensure zero CCGT electricity in 2038 not just for new construction
Clean Air Act Section 111 Regulation of Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Electric Generating Units (epa.gov)
Highlights – copy/paste
NSPS – STATIONARY COMBUSTION TURBINES
Three general subcategories of stationary combustion turbines • Low load “peaking” turbines • Intermediate load turbines • Base load turbines (CCGT)
For each subcategory, EPA is proposing a distinct “best system of emission reduction” (BSER) and standard of performance….
..
for sources on the CCS pathway: 90% carbon capture and storage (CCS) by 2035
• 2nd and 3rd components of BSER for sources on the low-GHG hydrogen pathway: co-firing 30% (by volume) low GHG hydrogen by 2032 and 96% by 2038 Phases:
1st phase standards: 770 – 900 lb CO2 /MWh-gross, depending on the base load rating – based on the performance of a highly efficient natural gas-fired combined cycle combustion turbine.
We know this. The real question is, how do we stop it from going forward?
[QUOTE FROM ARTICLE]”The SCC values used by the EPA are derived from calculations in integrated planning models (IPMs). Those models assume a simplistic linear relationship between carbon emissions and world temperature (never mind that the validity of that linear assumptions is a subject of deep debate in scientific circles). The models then assume that the resulting temperature increases cause all forms of environmental doom – rising sea levels, more disease, and declining agricultural production – for which yet more estimates are made to assign future cost consequences.”[END QUOTE]
A linear relationship between carbon [dioxide] emissions and world temperature? Even the IPCC assumes only a logarithmic relationship between CO2 concentrations and temperature rise from a baseline, meaning that each additional ppm contributes less temperature rise than the previous ppm.
Also, as CO2 concentrations rise, the removal rate of CO2 by natural sinks increases. A mass balance over the atmosphere, plus an analysis of anthropogenic CO2 emissions and concentrations at Mauna Loa from 1959-2022 shows that:
CO2 emissions from natural sources are about 39.9 Gt (gigatonnes)/yr
CO2 natural removal rate by natural sinks = 0.14 Gt/yr/ppm
Accumulation of 8.00 Gt of CO2 raises concentration by 1 ppm.
If anthropogenic CO2 emissions were held constant at their current value (about 37 Gt/yr) into the indefinite future, the CO2 removal rate by natural sinks would catch up to the total (natural + human) emission rate, and the CO2 concentration would level off at about 550 ppm circa AD 2200.
Since 1900, we have seen an estimated 1.1 C rise in global average temperature (per GISS) with CO2 concentrations rising from about 300 ppm to about 425 ppm today. If the temperature rise was linear with concentration, we would see another 1.1 C by AD 2200.
If the temperature rise depended on the logarithm of concentration (as proposed by the IPCC):
1.1 = K ln(425/300) from which K = 2.87 C.
From now until 550 ppm, dT = 2.87 * ln(550/425) = 0.74 C.
Can humanity handle the effects of an extra 0.74 C warmer in 176 years? After the progress made since 1850, it shouldn’t be too hard.
“Those models assume a simplistic linear relationship between carbon emissions and world temperature”
Stop right there. All of the climate models, IPCC or otherwise, produce a function called the Equilibrium Climate Sensitivity, which is always stated as the temperature anomaly caused by a doubling of CO2 in the atmosphere. A little high school algebra gives you:
T2 = T1 + (ECS × (log2 (C2/C1)))
Friends that is a logarithmic function. It is by definition not linear. it increases more slowly than slowly than a linear function. It arcs over as it increases and flattens out. The day I understood that is the day I understood that global warming is a non problem.