The Week That Was: 2025-12-06 (December 6, 2025)
Brought to You by SEPP (www.SEPP.org
The Science and Environmental Policy Project
Quote of the Week: “Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn’t go away.”— Philip K. Dick, science fiction writer, [H/t National Center for Energy Analytics]
Number of the Week: — 0.75°C (1.35°F)
THIS WEEK:
By Ken Haapala, President, Science and Environmental Policy Project (SEPP)
Scope: This TWTW begins with a discussion by Roy Spencer of maximum and minimum temperature trends in southern Canada. TWTW then discusses some proxies for CO2 concentrations and a retraction of a much-used paper. TWTW discusses what is meant by the statement that a model is verified and validated. TWTW concludes with the two views that the push for green energy is over and that it is not.
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Temperature Trends in South Canada: Roy Spencer, who with John Christy developed the method of calculating atmospheric temperature trends using data gathered by satellites, has estimated the maximum air-surface temperatures trends and the minimum temperature trends in southern Canada from 1900 to 2023. In introducing the project, he writes:
“Given media reports, it is likely that most Canadians think they have been experiencing unprecedented summer warmth in the last couple of decades. But this isn’t true.”
In the presentation of the data, Spencer annotates the extreme heat wave in June 2021 in western Canada. Also, Spencer notes that 7 out of the 10 hottest summers occurred in the 1930s. These hot summers were also present in the US data until they were eliminated by deliberate manipulation by administrators at NOAA. The high temperatures still remain in many of the state records. In summarizing the project for the maximum temperature trends, Spencer writes:
“SUMMARY
- Over the period 1900-2023, the average summer (JJA) daily high temperatures across the six southernmost large provinces of Canada (British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario, and Quebec) show no trend.
- The average of the 3 hottest days in each month show a slight downward trend, while the 3 coolest days’ average temperature per month shows a slight upward trend.
- Recent years have generally averaged as warm as was experienced in the 1920s to 1940s, with 7 of the 10 hottest summers occurring in the 1930s.
- Results for the 6 provinces separately are also presented.”
In introducing the daily low temperature trends Spencer writes:
“Introduction
Below I present analyses of summertime daily low temperature (Tmin) trends from all available stations in the 6 southernmost large provinces, based upon the daily Global Historical Climate Network (GHCNd) dataset. These are the 6 provinces that border the Lower 48 and contain 86% of Canada’s population. (The results for daily high temperatures [Tmax] were posted yesterday.)
I simply averaged together the relevant statistics (monthly average Tmin, average of the warmest 3 days Tmin in each month, and average of the coolest 3 days’ Tmin in each month) from all available stations. Each station had to have at least 90% of the days in a month reporting data for that month to be included in the analysis.
Since stations come and go over the years, and since there are some large terrain elevation variations in western Canada, I performed an elevation correction to these Tmin metrics, in all provinces, using the departure of each year’s station-average elevation from the all-year (1900-2023) station average elevation, using a lapse rate of 6.5 deg. C per km. Corrections for average changes in station-average latitude were not done, which might be necessary in the winter since there are large North-South gradients in air temperature then. Such corrections in the summer would likely be small, but I can revisit that nuance at a later time.”
After presenting the general results, Spencer writes:
“I have also annotated 2021, which experienced the extreme heatwave in late June in western Canada. That event helped to push the warmest 3-day average Tmin metric (red curve) to the highest average temperature of any year since 1900. (Just to be clear, this is the warmest 3 days in each month in *minimum* daily temperature [Tmin]).
Notably, 8 of the 10 warmest summers in the all-days average Tmin have occurred since 2003. But, as I will show in the next few days, numbers matter: these warming trends are well below what the CMIP6 climate models produce for the same region of Canada.”
The summary of this part of the project states [Boldface added]:
- “Over the period 1900-2023, the average summer (JJA) daily low temperatures across the six southernmost large provinces of Canada (British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario, and Quebec) show warming trends, averaging +0.14 C/decade.
- The strongest warming (+0.18 C/decade) occurred for the coolest summer nights (coolest 3 days per summer month), while the warmest summer nights warmed at +0.10 C/decade.
- Whereas 7 of the 10 warmest summer daytime (high) temperatures occurred in the 1930s, 8 of 10 of the warmest nighttime (low) temperatures have occurred since 2003.
- Results for the 6 provinces separately are also presented.”
In a general note covering the project Spencer writes:
“NOTE: This is the Tmin (daily minimum temperature) version of the Canada temperature trend results I posted yesterday, which were for Tmax (daily maximum temperatures). These results are quite different: whereas the high temperatures have seen essentially no warming trends across southern Canada since 1900, the nighttime temperatures have warmed in each one of the 6 provinces. In the next few days, I will post just how much these observed Canadian temperature trends depart from the CMIP6 climate model simulations, which are the primary tool being used to change energy policy.”
TWTW notes that this interesting project demonstrates that adding carbon dioxide into the atmosphere does not necessarily result in high daily temperatures. The same applies to the US when using state data, not manipulated NOAA data. It will be interesting to see Spencer’s presentation of “how much these observed Canadian temperature trends depart from the CMIP6 climate model simulations, which are the primary tool being used to change energy policy.”
See links under Challenging the Orthodoxy.
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Proxies of CO2 Concentrations: Over the past several years some studies have claimed that the current high CO2 concentration in the Earth’s atmosphere is from the warming oceans outgassing CO2 and not from human CO2 emissions. The general response to this claim is that the Eemian (roughly 130,000 to 115,000 years ago) was the interglacial period with temperatures and sea levels significantly higher than today. There was a significant melting of the ice of Greenland. For example, the North Greenland Ice Core Project (GRIP) goes back only 120,000 years. Other projects in Greenland go back much further. Yet, the ice cores from the Eemian from Greenland and Antarctica show CO2 concentrations of around 280 ppmv (parts per million in volume), similar to pre-industrial levels around 1850.
To counter such arguments some researchers have suggested that ice cores do not record CO2 concentrations correctly. However, they forget that the CO2 estimates from ice cores are independently verified by CO2 estimates from Sea Sediment cores. The Thomas Westerhold, et al., paper in AAAS Science (Sep 11, 2020) verified these estimates, though the finding in the paper that CO2 is the primary driver of climate change was the result of cherry-picking and incorrect. The July 15, 2023, TWTW discussed the issues.
To address the issue that the current increasing levels of CO2 in the atmosphere come from ocean outgassing, critics must show that the estimates of CO2 both from ice cores and the sea sediment cores are not correct. This has not been done.
For one of the latest arguments of ocean outgassing causing current CO2 levels see links under Questioning the Orthodoxy. For a discussion of the Westerhold, et al. paper by geoscientist Tom Gallagher see https://www.sepp.org/twtwfiles/2023/TWTW%207-22-23.pdf.
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Retraction: After over a year of questioning, the journal Nature retracted a paper by Maximilian Kotz, Anders Levermann and Leonie Wenz, “The economic commitment of climate change.” The authors achieved a far higher reduction in global gross domestic product (GDP) from damages due to climate change from the use of fossil fuels by including highly questionable numbers for Uzbekistan. According to the New York Times, the authors claimed that global GDP would be 62% smaller with the damages caused by using fossil fuels than it would be without the use of fossil fuels. Further, the New York Times reported that global GDP would be 23% smaller with the continued use of fossil fuels than it would be without the use of fossil fuels.
Wind and solar have demonstrated that they cannot produce reliable electricity and there is NO demonstrated electricity storage system showing that wind and solar with storage can generate sufficient electricity to operate reliably year-round for any modern city, state, or country in the world. Thus, this entire exercise is a fantasy. Jo Nova commented: “The retraction might be just part of the escape plan. They’ve had their headlines of doom for 18 months already.”
See links under Lowering Standards.
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Verified and Validated: In engineering and scientific modeling the terms “verified and validated” are used. Frequently, the meanings are not clear. These are two distinct complementary process that give confidence that the model is built correctly and that it solves the right problem.
For example, the models used by William van Wijingaarden and William Happer on “The Role of Greenhouse Gases in Energy Transfer in the Earth’s Atmosphere” have been independently verified by others, including members of SEPP. The mathematics is correct. Further, the HITRAN data used in their model have been independently verified by reviewers of the HITRAN database and others.
Further, the model results have been validated by satellite observations over Guam (tropics), the Sahara (desert), the Mediterranean (temperate region) and Antarctica (polar region). Thus, the model has been verified and validated.
The same cannot be said for any of the global climate models or the collection (ensemble) of global climate models advanced by any of the modeling groups. None of the models and none of the ensembles produces results accurately depicting the warming of the atmosphere as reported by several groups using observations from satellites and as reported by groups using observations from weather balloons. The models have not been validated and their results should not be used for government policy decisions. For the validated model see link under Challenging the Orthodoxy – Radiation Transfer, for the database see https://hitran.org/
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Chinks in the Green: The New York Post carried an essay by Matt Ridley “Climate change doom-and-gloomers are finally bowing out— and showing that common sense prevails.” Ridley writes:
“It has been a long, lucrative ride. Predicting the eco-apocalypse has always been a profitable business, spawning subsidies, salaries, consulting fees, air miles, best-sellers and research grants. Different themes took turns as the scare du jour: overpopulation, oil spills, pollution, desertification, mass extinction, acid rain, the ozone layer, nuclear winter, falling sperm counts. Each faded as the evidence became more equivocal, the public grew bored or, in some cases, the problem was resolved by a change in the law or practice.
But no scare grew as big or lasted as long as global warming….”
Tyler Durden of Zero Hedge posted a 10-minute video by commentator Victor Davis Hanson who claimed that electricity required for Artificial Intelligence (AI) has changed the debate. Durden writes [Boldface in original]:
“Decades of ‘consensus’ around so-called climate catastrophe are now running into new economic, technological, and geopolitical realities.
Mix in AI and its unprecedented demand for large-scale electricity generation, and we have a global climate conversation that demands to be reckoned with.
Victor Davis Hanson breaks down how the foundations of decades of ‘green orthodoxy’ are shifting:
For decades, the narrative demanded radical economic shifts from fossil fuels to renewables like wind and solar, but recent skepticism is growing due to inconsistencies in temperature records and cyclical changes; Hanson notes, ‘I didn’t think in my lifetime that I would see an end to that dominance, even though there were inconsistencies.’
Artificial intelligence requires unprecedented electricity, far beyond what wind and solar can provide, necessitating 100 gigawatt plants annually equivalent to nuclear or fossil fuels; as Hanson cites Sam Altman, ‘we’re going to have to build 100 [one gigawatt plants] per year or the equivalent of clean coal or natural gas.’
Figures like Sweden’s King Gustaf XVI and Bill Gates have publicly questioned the crisis, …
Elite hypocrisy is everywhere as Hanson notes ‘the people who have been the avatars of climate change never suffer the consequences of their own ideology.’
‘Barack Obama said the planet would be inundated pretty soon, if we didn’t address global climate change. Why would he buy a seaside estate at Martha’s Vineyard or one on the beach of Hawaii if he really did believe that the oceans would rise and flood his multimillion-dollar investment?
‘The inconsistency of the global warming narrative, the self-interest in the people who promote it, and the logic that they have not presented, empirically, any evidence that would convince us that we have to radically transform our economies,’ leaves Hanson questioning whether AI’s demand shift has permanently crushed the ideology of so-called ‘climate change.’”
See links under Questioning the Orthodoxy.
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Shifting Words: The Progressive Policy Institute (PPI), calling itself “radically pragmatic” strongly supported green energy. For example, on Aug 20, 2023, its website posted an article beginning with:
“Over the past two years, the Biden administration has made large national investments aimed at putting America ahead in the global race to develop clean energy industries and jobs. Investment is flowing all across the country, for projects like solar panel factories in Louisiana, energy-efficient apartment buildings in New York and electric vehicle battery factories sprouting everywhere from Georgia to Michigan.
This emphasis on a green transition comes at an important time.”
Now, an article published by The Hill by PPI’s founder and president slightly changed the wording “The Green New Deal crashes to earth.” The article begins with:
“Less than a decade ago, young U.S. progressives started agitating for a Green New Deal to combat climate change and usher in a planned economy more planet-friendly than capitalism.
It was a bold, if implausible, demand for a crash program to rid America of fossil fuels. Animating it were decades of increasingly dire prophesies about how global warming is irreversibly impairing life on Earth.
Lecturing world leaders at a 2019 United Nations climate conference, Swedish teenager Greta Thunberg won rapturous applause when she informed her audience, ‘You have stolen my childhood.’
In the U.S., environmental groups pressured politicians to keep fossil fuels ‘in the ground’ even as advances in fracking technology were unlocking a bonanza of shale oil and gas.
In 2020, first-term Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) stoked a social media frenzy by joining Green New Deal activists in a ‘60s-style sit-in in House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s (D-Calif.) office.
President Joe Biden got with the program, portentously calling climate change ‘an existential crisis’ rising above such humdrum public concerns as spiking inflation and uncontrolled immigration.
Today, however, the Green New Deal seems to have fallen to earth, borne down by the inexorable gravity of economic and political reality. Therein lies a cautionary tale for Democrats about the gulf that separates elite and popular opinion on climate change.
Put simply, green activists have failed to convert America’s non-college majority to their cause. Working class voters recognize the problem but it takes a back seat to their everyday economic and social concerns.
Last year, they reelected the world’s most vociferous climate denier, President Trump. In a U.N. speech this fall, the president called climate change ‘the greatest con job ever perpetrated on the world.’”
The article concludes with:
“A pragmatic blueprint for slowing climate change also should include robust investments — financed by a carbon tax — in carbon capture, advanced batteries and green buildings, as well as new energy sources like geothermal, hydrogen and next-gen nuclear power. The latter is crucial to power the data centers America needs to lead the world in AI.
Trump’s one-dimensional energy policy is putting America behind China in the race to master clean energy technologies. That gives Democrats an opening to champion full-spectrum energy innovation and abundance. Unlike the Green New Deal, that’s a winning hand.”
The conflict for reliable, affordable energy has not changed, only some of the words have. Unreliable wind and solar power may be cheaper if and when it works. But a modern society requires affordable power 24-7. That is why China is building coal-fired power plants; some of the power from which is used to manufacture so-called clean energy technologies.
See link under Defending the Orthodoxy.
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SEPP Annual Meeting: Wednesday afternoon December 10 SEPP is holding its annual meeting. If a TWTW reader desires to suggest a topic to address, please contact Ken@Haapala.com.
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Number of the Week: — 0.75°C (1.35°F) As stated in last week’s TWTW in the section called Saturation Physics, AMO physicist William Happer has found that the warming from a doubling of CO2 increases the temperatures by 0.75°C (1.35°F). Starting from no CO2 at all in the atmosphere, CO2=0, only 0.42 ppm of CO2 would be needed to cause an initial warming of 0.75°C. These calculations are based on laboratory experiments without any feedbacks. Global climate modelers who claim much higher effects of CO2 claim positive feedbacks, amplifications, but have failed to produce any physical evidence of such positive feedbacks. See Saturation Physics in https://www.sepp.org/twtwfiles/2025/TWTW%2011-29-25.pdf
NEWS YOU CAN USE:
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/
Climate Change Reconsidered II: Fossil Fuels
By Multiple Authors, Bezdek, Idso, Legates, and Singer eds., Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change, April 2019
http://climatechangereconsidered.org/climate-change-reconsidered-ii-fossil-fuels/
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/why-scientists-disagree-about-global-warming/
Nature, Not Human Activity, Rules the Climate
S. Fred Singer, Editor, NIPCC, 2008
http://www.sepp.org/publications/nipcc_final.pdf
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
Dependence of Earth’s Thermal Radiation on Five Most Abundant Greenhouse Gases
By W.A. van Wijngaarden and W. Happer, Preprint, December 22, 2020
Net Zero Averted Temperature Increase
By Richard Lindzen, William Happer, and William A. van Wijngaarden, CO2 Coalition, June 2024
Radiation Transport in Clouds
By W.A. van Wijngaarden and W. Happer, Klimarealistene, Science of Climate Change, January 2025
Challenging the Orthodoxy
Former Czech President Václav Klaus appointed President of Clintel
The Climate Intelligence Group (Clintel) is honored to announce that Professor Václav Klaus, the former President of the Czech Republic, from today on will be the new president of Clintel, succeeding the current president, Professor Guus Berkhout, who co-founded the Clintel Foundation in 2019 with Dutch science writer Marcel Crok.
Press Release, Clintel Foundation, Dec 4, 2025
Canada Summer Daily High Temperature Trends, 1900-2023
By Roy Spencer, His Blog, Dec 4, 2025
Canada Summer Daily Low Temperature Trends, 1900-2023
By Roy Spencer, His Blog, Dec 5, 2025
Why It Is Good To Be Warm: Energy as a Common Good
By Maurice Glasman, The Global Warming Policy Foundation, 2025 Annual GWPF Lecture
Text: https://thegwpf.org/content/uploads/2025/12/Energy-as-a-Common-Good.pdf
Video: https://thegwpf.org/publications/why-it-is-good-to-be-warm-energy-as-a-common-good/
…Lord Glasman, founder of the Blue Labour movement.
The lecture highlights the centrality of affordable, dependable heat and power: “It is not only keeping the lights on, it is the defense of our borders, our sovereignty, our prosperity, our industry that is at stake.” He urged policymakers to prioritize secure domestic energy sources, including nuclear power and transitional fossil fuels, while giving control of Britain’s power grid to the Ministry of Defense.
Ecological Impacts Of Offshore WindParks Are Worse Than Expected, New Study Finds
By P Gosselin, No Tricks Zone, Nov 29, 2025
[SEPP Comment: See links immediately above.]
#DOEDeepDive: Chapter 3.1 on radiative forcing
By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, Dec 3, 2025
Study: 2010 Russian Heat Wave NOT caused by ‘climate change’
By Anthony Watts, WUWT, Nov 29, 2025
Link to press release: Scientists quantitatively identify main causes of Russian once-in-a-century heatwave
By Institute of Atmospheric Physics, Chinese Academy of Science, Nov 20, 2025
Link to paper: Quantitative attribution analysis of dynamical and radiative processes to the record-breaking western Russian heatwave
By Lianlian Xu, et al., Atmospheric and Oceanic Science Letters, Oct 16, 2025
Defending the Orthodoxy
The Green New Deal crashes to earth
By Will Marshall, The Hill, Dec 5, 2025
Trump’s one-dimensional energy policy is putting America behind China in the race to master clean energy technologies. That gives Democrats an opening to champion full-spectrum energy innovation and abundance. Unlike the Green New Deal, that’s a winning hand.
[SEPP Comment: Will Marshall is founder and president of Progressive Policy Institute.]
Defending the Orthodoxy – Bandwagon Science
Rebuttal: When “Coastal Climate Retreat” is just a Narrative – Why Nightlights Don’t Tell the Whole Coastal Story
By Anthony Watts, WUWT, Nov 29, 2025
Link to: Over half of global coastal settlements are retreating inland due to intensifying climate risks
Press Release University of Copenhagen, Nov 26, 2025
Link to paper: Global coastal human settlement retreat driven by vulnerability to coastal climate hazards
By Lilai Xu, et al., Nature Climate Change, Sep 22, 2025
Questioning the Orthodoxy
Climate change doom-and-gloomers are finally bowing out— and showing that common sense prevails
By Matt Ridley, New York Post, Dec 5, 2025 [H/t Bernie Kepshire]
Victor Davis Hanson Proclaims “The End Of Climate Change”
By Tyler Durden, Zero Hedge, Dec 4, 2025 [H/t Bernie Kepshire]
10-minute Video with some text
Net zero destruction’ happening all over Australia
10-minute video, Andrew Bolt, Sky News, Australia, Dec 1, 2025 [Bernie Kepshire]
Speaking of real problems…
By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, Dec 3, 2025
Remember when they told you climate change was causing a ‘mass extinction’? Never mind!
By Anthony Watts, WUWT, Dec 2, 2025
Link to paper: Unpacking the extinction crisis: rates, patterns and causes of recent extinctions in plants and animals
By Kristen E. Saban; John J. Wiens, Proceedings of the Royal Society B, Oct 15, 2025
From abstract: Extinction rates have increased over the last five centuries but generally declined in the last 100 years. Recent extinctions were predominantly on islands, whereas the majority of non-island extinctions were in freshwater. Island extinctions were most frequently related to invasive species, but habitat loss was the most important cause (and current threat) in continental regions.
More Evidence NE China Is Not Cooperating With The Alarmist Global Warming Narrative
By Kenneth Richard, No Tricks Zone, Dec 1, 2025
Link to latest paper: Summer hydroclimate variations in Northeast China during the period of 1568–2021
By Yucheng Liu, et al., Science China, Earth Sciences Aug 19, August 2025
From abstract: Recent drought events in Northeast Asia since the 1950s are not unprecedented compared with those during the LIA. Recent drought is likely influenced by the positive phase of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO), the negative phase of the Atlantic Multidecadal Variability (AMV), and anthropogenic aerosol emissions.
Tidbits
By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, Dec 3, 2025
New Study: Temperature-Driven CO2 Outgassing Explains 83 Percent Of CO2 Rise Since 1959
By Kenneth Richard, No Tricks Zone, Dec 5, 2025
Link to paper: Revisiting the Carbon Cycle
By Camille Veyres, et al., Science of Climate Change, November 2025
The Earth is getting better at dissipating heat
By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, Dec 3, 2025
Link to: Time-varying global energy budget since 1880 from a reconstruction of ocean warming
By Quran Wu, et al., PNAS, May12, 2025
[SEPP Comment from Nov 29 TWTW: How well the calculations estimate actual temperature change is unknown.]
After Paris!
COP30 Round-Up: Failure of a UN Climate Summit Is Great News for Humanity!
By Marc Morano, Real Clear Energy, Dec 2, 2025
Copsession
By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, Dec 3, 2025
The Economist spat out:
“‘This process is a nightmare. But it’s the best process we’ve got.’ That is what Ed Miliband, Britain’s energy secretary, told reporters late on Friday evening, as negotiations in Belém, Brazil, for the UN’s annual climate summit stretched well past their deadline. By the time a deal was finally gaveled through the next afternoon, it was difficult to imagine anyone disagreeing with the first half of Mr Miliband’s comment.”
Klimate Kops
By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, Dec 3, 2025
We don’t have the heart to tell her [The executive Director of the Just Transition Mechanism], amid raptures about “Afro-descendant people”, that the entire human race originated in Africa. It might spoil the mood. And we’re determined to accomplish that task in a more direct way, by saying that when you mistake windy intentions and hapless impracticality for a master plan, you’re very likely to keep holding conferences that talk and talk and all you end up with is an award you didn’t want.
Social Benefits of Carbon Dioxide
The effect of more CO2 on Knobby Club Rush
By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, Dec 3, 2025
From the CO2Science Archive.
Problems in the Orthodoxy
Climate groups falter, Bill Gates recalibrates, but Al Gore soldiers on
By Gary Abernathy, TEA Takes, Nov 25, 2025
Claim: Rejecting Emissions Targets Undermines the International Rules Based Order
By Eric Worrall, WUWT, Dec 5, 2025
Perhaps things have changed since 2023. New Zealand is currently suffering a catastrophic brain drain, as young and ambitious New Zealanders desert a homeland which is struggling to offer hope to its young people. Maybe a dose of green economic collapse is finally bringing New Zealand’s out of touch establishment to its senses.
Seeking a Common Ground
Peer-Reviewing Peer Review
By Willis Eschenbach, WUWT, Nov 29, 2025
In the climate world, “peer review” has too often morphed into “pal review.” It’s a cozy club where friends rubber-stamp friends’ papers and, more importantly, block the publication of a study from anyone like me who dares to question the “Consensus.”
The Zika Scare That Turned Out to Be a False Positive Debacle – and the ‘Congenital Zika Syndrome’ Backup Lie That’s Replaced It
By Randall Block, MD, The Daily Sceptic, Nov 29, 2025
It is time for high-impact journals to stop lending authority to a construct that has failed every predictive test. Congenital Zika Syndrome should be retired to the history of medical overreach – alongside the 1976 swine-flu scare and other cautionary tales where fear outran evidence.
Science, Policy, and Evidence
Carney Directs Canada Pipeline Charade
By Ron Clutz, His Blog, Nov 30, 2025
Further to that, the construction of a pipeline is entirely contingent on the simultaneous construction of a massive carbon capture project, presumably so Carney can claim the new pipeline is moving only “low emission” barrels of bitumen.
Memorandum of misunderstanding
By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, Dec 3, 2025
Meaning we not only have to entice back all the investors scared off by 10 years of activist and government obstacles, but also try to get consent through some undefined process from some undefined set of people who hate pipelines, jack up Alberta’s industrial carbon price and load on costly new carbon capture requirements, then somehow expand production while remaining committed we know not how to Net Zero. Before the energy sector had limped along even a single victory lap the green left had begun chortling that for them this deal is more lifeline than pipeline.
Measurement Issues — Surface
Hard Freeze This Morning
By Cliff Mass, Weather Blog, Nov 30, 2025
Keep in mind that the above temperatures are NOT at ground level, but at 2 meters (about 6 feet) above the surface, which is the standard height for surface air temperature.
On cold, nearly clear nights, like last night, the ground temperatures are considerably cooler than at 6 feet.
I checked that out this morning with a research-quality thermometer over a grassy area.
Frost was evident, and the ground temperature was 29.4°F.
At 6 feet, the temperature was 33°F. An inversion (temperature increasing with height) was evident.
Measurement Issues — Atmosphere
UAH v6.1 Global Temperature Update for November, 2025: +0.43 deg. C
By Roy Spencer, His Blog, Dec 2, 2025
The Version 6.1 global area-averaged linear temperature trend (January 1979 through November 2025) remains at +0.16 deg/ C/decade (+0.22 C/decade over land, +0.13 C/decade over oceans
Global Temperature Report
By Staff, Earth System Science Center, UAH, Dec 2, 2025
Map: https://www.nsstc.uah.edu/climate/2025/November2025/202511_Map.png
Graph: https://www.nsstc.uah.edu/climate/2025/November2025/202511_Bar.png
Text: https://www.nsstc.uah.edu/climate/2025/November2025/GTR_202511_v2.pdf
Changing Weather
Massive La Nina Precipitation Coming to the Northwest
By Cliff Mass, Weather Blog, Dec 2, 2025
Major Flooding Coming to Western Washington
By Cliff Mass, Weather Blog, Dec 4, 2025
Are you sitting down? Ready for a shock? Below is the ten-day accumulated precipitation forecast for the region. Some locations are expected to receive 15-20 inches in total.
That means flooding.
How Wet Has It Been in Wales?
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Dec 5, 2025
In reality, the rainfall totals for November were not unusually high and October had been drier than average.
Changing Seas
Does the Global Sea-Level Rise Have a Sinusoidal Variation–Part 2
An Investigation using Tidal Gauge Data, Part 2 – Curve Fitting
By Alan Welch FBIS FRAS, Via WUWT, Dec 3, 2025
Part 1: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2025/12/02/does-the-global-sea-level-rise-have-a-sinusoidal-variation/
[SEPP Comment: Does it have the form of a sine curve indicating it is cyclic?]
Expansion of Antarctic Bottom Water driven by Antarctic warming in the last deglaciation
By Huang Huang, et al., Nature Geoscience, Dec 1, 2025 [H/t Bernie Kepshire]
Changing Cryosphere – Land / Sea Ice
Two Hot Spots Slow Arctic Ice Recovery November 2025
By Ron Clutz, His Blog, Dec 1, 2025
Agriculture Issues & Fear of Famine
Trump admin backs Monsanto effort to limit Roundup lawsuits over glyphosate
By Rachel Frazin, The Hill, Dec 2, 2025
While the EPA has said that there’s insufficient evidence that glyphosate causes illnesses in humans, the World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer has classified the chemical as “probably carcinogenic to humans.”
[SEPP Comment: What physical evidence does the WHO have?]
Climate Crisis? The French are Uprooting Vines to Reduce Production
By Eric Worrall, WUWT, Dec 1, 2025
New Scientific Findings Expose the Hoax Behind Meat Eating Climate Alarm
By Chris Morrison, The Daily Sceptic, Dec 1, 2025 [H/t Bernie Kepshire]
Link to paper: CO2 removal to reach net zero warming of global methane and nitrous oxide emissions of livestock: Comparison of two metrics under different 2050 FAO scenarios
By Fabio Correddu, et al., PLOS.One, Aug 18, 2025
Lowering Standards
A religious spin on climate change
By Anthony J. Sadar, American Thinker, Dec 5, 2025
Climate Doomsday Prophecy Peddled By Academia Retracted In Disgrace
By Ireland Owens, Daily Caller, Dec 23, 2025
Link to: RETRACTED ARTICLE: The economic commitment of climate change
By Maximilian Kotz, Anders Levermann & Leonie Wenz, et al., Nature, Dec 3, 2025
Authors retract Nature paper projecting high costs of climate change
By Staff, Retraction Watch, Dec 3, 2025
Second most popular paper of Climate and Economic Doom has now been retracted
By Jo Nova, Her Blog, Dec 5, 2025
Communicating Better to the Public – Use Yellow (Green) Journalism?
NPR’s Climate ‘Tipping Points’ Advocacy – Three Claims, Zero Evidence
By Anthony Watts, WUWT, Nov 29, 2025
Link to: 3 massive changes you’ll see as the climate careens toward tipping points
By Rebecca Hersher, Lauren Sommer, NPR, Nov 19, 2025
From Watts: NPR’s “tipping point” claims are not new in either tenor or specifics; rather, they repeat a predictable pattern: dramatic scenarios derived from models are presented as near-term certainties, while actual measurements that undercut those scenarios are downplayed or omitted entirely. For Greenland, NPR omits that annual melt is microscopic relative to the ice sheet’s mass or that surface darkening, not temperature alone, drives melting.
Too Hot For Sport!
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Dec 2, 2025
The final will be held in New York, where peak temperatures used to be much higher in the past. In most years, you can expect to experience temperatures close to or over 100C. It is not “climate change”, Mr Rumsby, it is weather.
[SEPP Comment: Boldface added, rare error from Homewood. Should be 100F.]
From Storm to Scare Story: How The Guardian Wrongly Claimed Climate Change Caused a ‘Climate Breakdown’
By Anthony Watts, Climate Realism, Dec 3, 2025
Communicating Better to the Public – Make things up.
When Models Masquerade as Oceans: The Latest Adventure in Simulated Stirring
By Charles Rotter, WUWT, Nov 30, 2025
Link to paper: Future mesoscale horizontal stirring in polar oceans intensified by sea ice decline
By Gyuseok Yi, et al., Nature Climate Change, Nov 5, 2025
Claim: Household Bills are Causing Mental Distress – but Recycling More can Help
By Eric Worrall, WUWT, Dec 3, 2025
Communicating Better to the Public – Do a Poll?
Fear of AI Beats Climate Change in Aussie Poll
By Eric Worrall, WUWT, Nov 29, 2025
Communicating Better to the Public – Go Personal.
A Vindication of Bjorn Lomborg
Lomborg’s experience shows what happens when a researcher challenges a powerful narrative with inconvenient numbers.
By Marian L. Tupy, Quillette, Nov 20, 2025 [H/t Bernie Kepshire]
The substance of Lomborg’s crime was simple. He took the environmental litany of doom and gloom and checked it against long-run data from the UN, the World Bank, and other official sources. He concluded that on most indicators human welfare had improved, many environmental trends were not as catastrophic as advertised, and that resources devoted to some flagship green causes would save more lives if redirected to basic health, nutrition and economic development.
Communicating Better to the Public – Protest
Clueless Climate Hypocrites Block Major Coal Port
By Eric Worrall, WUWT, Nov 30, 2025
Climate Extremists Ordered By Hamburg Court To Pay €400,000 In Damages
By P Gosselin, No Tricks Zone, Dec 3, 2025
Questioning European Green
Trump versus The Blob: The US warns Europe it faces civilizational erasure
By Jo Nova, Her Blog, Dec 6, 2025
Link to: National Security Strategy of the United States of America
Signed by Donald J Trump, The White House, November 2025
Nationalism threatens the Blob, because it demands to know how The Blob serves the nation and The Blob serve only themselves.
Labour Peer: Net Zero is Fantastical and Incoherent and Must Be Abandoned
By Maurice Glasman, The Daily Sceptic, Dec 3, 2025
This is the text of Lord Glasman’s recent speech to the Global Warming Policy Foundation (watch here). To understand the first part, you need to know that the current Chair of the GWPF is Lord Mackinlay, formerly Craig Mackinlay MP, who had all his limbs amputated following a battle with sepsis, but who is nevertheless an active (and extremely mobile) member of the House of Lords.
Europe’s 20-year reckless Green experiment to control the weather has crippled the economy
By Jo Nova, Her Blog, Dec 3, 2025
Link to: Europe’s Green Energy Rush Slashed Emissions—and Crippled the Economy
Political consensus is cracking, industry is hobbled and high-profile projects are being postponed thanks to some of the highest electricity prices in the developed world
By Tom Fairless and Max Colchester, WSJ, Dec 1, 2025
Europe’s Energy Transition Destroyed its Economy
By Tyler Durden, Zero Hedge, Dec 3, 2025 [H’/t Bernie Kepshire]
Net zero destruction’ happening all over Australia
10-minute video, Andrew Bolt, Sky News, Australia, Dec 1, 2025 [Bernie Kepshire]
Litigation Issues
Oakland’s Reckless Climate Crusade against Coal Exports
By Eric Worrall, WUWT, Dec 1, 2025
In a two-page order, Judge Benjamin Beaton ruled that the bankruptcy court lacked authority to enter a final judgment on core disputes in the case. He also found that the judgment only dealt with liability, not damages, which means that it wasn’t really a “final” judgment.
[SEPP Comment: Oakland may face hundreds of millions of dollars in damages.]
Subsidies and Mandates Forever
Billions of Green Subsidies Missed by OBR
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Dec 4, 2025
From the Telegraph:
The Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) revealed in its latest economic assessment that £1bn a year will be added to household energy bills to fund Ed Miliband’s next auction for renewables projects, known as “allocation round 7” (AR7).
Green Subsidies Set To Rocket Under Miliband
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Dec 1, 2025
For years, the crippling cost of Net Zero has been hidden from the public. But it is now getting so big to hide much longer.
Energy Issues – Non-US
Google’s Wild Plan for “Sustainable” Orbital Data Centers
By Eric Worrall, WUWT, Dec 4, 2025
Why is My Energy Bill Even Higher? [UK]
By David Turver, The Daily Sceptic, Dec 1, 2025
A chill wind
By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, Dec 3, 2025
Being ourselves bourgeois sticks-in-the-mud, we note that “dominate Canada’s power growth” does not here mean dominate growth in power generation but merely absorb most of the investment. So, money is going to pipe dreams not proven systems.
£90bn Bill For Grid Upgrades
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Dec 4, 2025
[UK] OFGEM chief, Jonathan Brearley, inadvertently gave the game away when he revealed the real reason for these upgrades:
“This investment will support the transition to new forms of energy”.
It is nothing to do with saving people money; it is all about meeting Net Zero targets.
Energy Issues – Australia
The Blob says “Hands Up” — Electricity prices will rise unless the poor help the rich buy batteries and solar panels!
By Jo Nova, Her Blog, Dec 4, 2025
Watch the poison pea — see how the word “average” disguises the theft:
Despite the projected increase in per-unit electricity prices, household electricity bills themselves may not rise. The AEMC notes that “average household electricity costs are projected to remain stable”, as improved energy efficiency and rooftop solar uptake more than offsets increased demand from gas switching and EV charging.
So, the key question is who gets to pay the below average costs and who gets to pay the above average cost? It’s a stupid question — in Socialist-Paradise they both pay above average. There are no savings. Poor people pay more for rich people to put on economically inefficient solar panels, and the richer people pay more for solar panels no one needed when we ran a cheap coal fired grid. In a world of subsidies, we all lose!
Big Wind and Solar investors flee Australia, electricity prices rise 37% and Blackout warnings fill the news
By Jo Nova, Her Blog, Dec 2, 2025
Then we found out our grid Managers weren’t even planning for the worst wind droughts.
Claim: “lack of long-term revenue certainty” is Crashing Aussie Renewable Investment.
By Eric Worrall, WUWT, Dec 4, 2025
Aussie AEMO Pushes the Grid Stability Panic Button
By Eric Worrall, WUWT, Dec 1, 2025
“The energy grid is not ready for the closure of the Eraring coal plant, the energy operator has warned, raising the threat of widespread blackouts in eastern Australia.
The Hunter Valley coal plant’s life had already been extended from a planned closure of 2025 to 2027, at a cost to taxpayers of up to $225 million a year.
The Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO) has warned, however, that while there are enough renewables in the pipeline to cover its closure, supporting infrastructure to keep the grid stable is not expected to be ready.”
How to Cut the Electricity Price in Australia
By Mike Jonas, WUWT, Nov 30, 2025
AI is Killing Australia’s CO2 Emission Plans
By Eric Worrall, WUWT, Dec 2, 2025
Energy Issues — US
Energy Affordability Has Become the Kitchen-Table Issue of the 2020s
By William Murray, Real Clear Energy, Dec 1, 2025
Even “Progressives” Are Now Allowed To Notice That New York’s Climate Plans Are Crumbling
By Francis Menton, Manhattan Contrarian, Dec 3, 2025
Link to: New York’s Climate Crossroads, Assuring Affordable Energy
By Neel Brown and John Kemp, Progressive Policy Institute, November 2025
Menton: On the 2019 New York Climate Act by the Progressive Policy Institute:
“An assessment of New York’s progress against the 2019 Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act (Climate Act), using the state’s own metrics, reveals a clear and undeniable pattern of failure across its most critical mandates. . . . New York is not on track to meet its targets. Progress on offshore wind and energy storage, two cornerstones of the state’s grid transformation strategy, is severely behind schedule. This poor performance is not an anomaly but a symptom of deeper, systemic pressures that are converging on the state’s energy system.”
Objection Filed Against Con Edison Request For Rate Increase
By Francis Menton, Manhattan Contrarian, Nov 28, 2025
After a “deregulation” that took place in the 1990s, Con Edison almost entirely got out of the business of generating electricity, so this case is about the rates for delivery of the electricity, rather than generation. The basis for Con Edison’s request for a rate increase is substantially that it wants to build lots of new infrastructure, like additional cables, substations and transformers, to deliver incremental power to support widespread electrification of vehicles and buildings as part of New York State’s goal of “net zero” greenhouse gas emissions.
Some Other Parties Weigh In On The Con Edison Rate Case
By Francis Menton, Manhattan Contrarian, Nov 30, 2025
This of course is the City’s statement during the last days of an Eric Adams administration. I can’t wait to see what position the Zohran Mamdani administration might take on this JP [Joint Proposal], or the next one. You might say, we already have a City government completely unconstrained by the real world, so how can it get any worse?
Disney, Big Tech Take Up Energy Trading As Power Costs Soar
By Alex Kimani, Oilprice.com, Dec 2, 2025
Washington’s Control of Energy
Trump Admin, States Beef It Out Over Massive Offshore Drilling Unveiling
By Audrey Streb, Daily Caller, Nov 21, 2025
Nuclear Energy and Fears
Ridley: Are we finally about to crack fusion energy?
By Matt Ridley, via Rational Optimist Society, Dec 3, 2025
Fusion power could prove eternally out of reach or be only ten years away. It is unlikely to be providing electricity in a significant way before 2050. Whether it can be made cheap will depend on the physics but even more on the regulation. It was the rules and regulations, standards and certifications that caused nuclear to stall, despite its excellent safety record. Going back to the regulator for permission to change every weld and nut destroyed the nuclear industry’s ability to learn how to bring down costs. This stifled innovation and added nothing to safety. Please don’t let’s do that to fusion.
[SEPP Comment: Added to the problems of the expanding regulations on nuclear fission were the expanding egos of the developers eager to build bigger power plants and the politicians who supported them. For example, the Washington Public Power Supply System (WPPSS) or Woops.]
Sizewell C Levies
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Dec 3, 2025
With gas power now close to £50/MWh, when carbon taxes are excluded, nuclear does not look very good value.
However Sizewell and Hinkley will have enormous, long-term security value, given the potential 60-year lives. Moreover, Sizewell C will provide electricity at much lower prices than the offshore wind that Miliband wants.
The message is clear – cancel all new contracts for offshore wind, ramp up gas power and keep building nuclear.
A First for Military Nuclear Power: TRISO Fuel Arrives at Project Pele
By Sonal Patel, Power Mag, Dec 4, 2025
What does this mean for reactor design and deployment? [Joshua Parker, senior director of Advanced Nuclear Fuels at BWX] stresses, “It helps you reduce the cost of the deployment of advanced reactors. It helps reduce the safety barrier around those reactors, so that we can bring those to bear in the market. And it’s really enabled these ideas of microreactors or even nanoreactors.” The revolutionary containment of fission products means that TRISO offers both strong intrinsic safety and new flexibility for advanced nuclear systems, including applications requiring high process heat and small modular footprints.
INL Taps AWS, GE Vernova, Oil Majors for First MARVEL Microreactor Experiments
By Sonal Patel, Power Mag, Dec 4, 2025
Alternative, Green (“Clean”) Solar and Wind
Trump admin strips ‘renewable’ and ‘energy’ from National Renewable Energy Laboratory name
By Ashleigh Fields, The Hill, Dec 2, 2025
“The energy crisis we face today is unlike the crisis that gave rise to NREL,” Assistant Secretary of Energy Audrey Robertson said in reference to the 1973 oil crisis.
“We are no longer picking and choosing energy sources. Our highest priority is to invest in the scientific capabilities that will restore American manufacturing, drive down costs, and help this country meet its soaring energy demand. The National Laboratory of the Rockies will play a vital role in those efforts,” Robertson added.
“Solar, wind, and other clean energy technologies are the cheapest and most cost-effective resources in Colorado, and they have been for years. Changing NREL’s name will not change that fact,” Michael Hiatt, deputy managing attorney for Earthjustice in the Rocky Mountains told The Colorado Sun. [Boldface added.]
[SEPP Comment: How much does solar power cost at midnight? Comparing marginal cost of unreliable generation when it works with marginal cost of generation that is reliable is deceitful.]
Solar Bankruptcy: Pine Gate Renewables (boom to bust continues)
By Robert Bradley Jr., Master Resource, Dec 3, 2025
Founded nine years ago, Pine Gate has commercial and utility solar business in 32 states. With 500 MW of development in 2022, the company made the 2023 Top Solar Contractors List.
Cancel Net Zero: Wind Turbines Cause Ocean Heating
By Chris Morrison, The Daily Sceptic, Dec 4, 2025
Link to paper: Sea surface warming and ocean-to-atmosphere feedback driven by large-scale offshore wind farms under seasonally stratified conditions
By Hyodae Seo, et al.., AAAS Science Advances, Nov 5, 2025
Alternative, Green (“Clean”) Energy — Other
BP Abandon Teesside Hydrogen Plant
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Dec1, 2025
Producing hydrogen from gas and then burning it to generate electricity, instead of using that same gas, is insane in itself.
Alternative, Green (“Clean”) Energy — Storage
The Battery Storage Delusion: Utility-Scale Batteries Are No Silver Bullet
By Lars Schernikau, National Center for Energy Analytics, Dec 3, 2025
UK Battery Storage Capacity
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Dec 2, 2025
Given that on average batteries will have enough storage for about one hour’s use, that works out at 6.8 GWh, enough to run the grid for 8 minutes!
In reality, they might be called on to meet, say, 10 GW of demand at peak periods, which they could do for about 40 minutes.
Alternative, Green (“Clean”) Vehicles
Ignoring EV Pollution for Fake Climate Crisis
By Vijay Jayaraj, CO2 Coalition, Dec 1, 2025
Cities like Baotou in Inner Mongolia are infamous for dystopian toxic lakes, which are artificial ponds filled with black sludge contaminated by thorium, uranium and hazardous chemicals. Acidic wastewater, the byproduct of mineral extraction and processing, leaks into the environment, poisoning farmland and waterways.
Petrol cars cheaper than EVs after tax raid – unless you have a driveway
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Dec 5, 2025
And sure as eggs is eggs, the Telegraph has just woken up to what some of us have been reporting for ages:
Rachel Reeves’s new pay-per-mile tax will make petrol cars cheaper to run than electric vehicles (EVs) unless drivers can charge them at home.
Again, the Telegraph misses a crucial part of the story. The proposed pay-per-mile tax is set at 3p/mile. But to provide all of the revenue currently coming from fuel duties, that charge will need to at least treble.
EV Sales in November [UK]
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Dec 4, 2025
Carbon Schemes
Scotland’s key carbon capture project faces collapse in new blow to Miliband
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Dec 5, 2025
Scotland’s flagship carbon capture project is at risk of collapse after its main backer announced plans to exit the scheme.
The Acorn project, based in Peterhead, Aberdeenshire, is being built to capture CO2 from heavy industry and then bury it under the North Sea.
But the driving force behind the project, energy group Storegga, said on Thursday it planned to sell its stake in the scheme, delivering a major blow to the net zero push spearheaded by Ed Miliband, the Energy Secretary.
California Dreaming
Affordability Crisis: Gavin Newsom and the California Energy Disaster
By Steve Goreham, Newsblaze, via WUWT, Dec 3, 2025
But California’s transition to renewable electricity is an affordability disaster. From 2008 to 2024, California electricity prices rose 116% compared to a national average electricity increase of 33%. State residential electricity prices are now 32 cents per kilowatt-hour, second highest in the nation, rapidly approaching leader Hawaii, and roughly double the national average price. Air-conditioning a medium-sized California home can cost $1,000 per month.
Environmental Industry
Foreign Billionaires Pour €1.88 Billion into US Climate Extremism
Funds flow to radical activists and elite universities alike.
By Epp Tuul, Freedom Research, Dec 3, 2025 [H/t Bernie Kepshire]
Link to report: Foreign Charities Fueling Extreme Policies in the U.S.
By Staff, Americans for Public Trust, Oct 31, 2025
The phase-change continues: The Sierra Club loses 60% of members, 350.org is suspended
By JO Nova, Her Blog, Nov 29, 2025
BELOW THE BOTTOM LINE
Bill Gates Funds ‘Geoengineering’ to Dim the Sun – After Saying Climate Change Is Not a Threat to Humanity
By Lucas Nolan, Breitbart, Dec 1, 2025 [H/t Bernie Kepshire]
24,000 times more harmful to the climate than CO₂: Measurements reveal SF₆ gas emissions in Germany
Press Release by Goethe University Frankfurt am Main, Dec 3, 3035 [H/t Bernie Kepshire]
Link to paper: Characterization of German SF6 Emissions
By Katharina Meixner, et al., ACS ES&T Air, 2025
[SEPP Comment: Add more zeros after the decimal place in the denominator and make the number even bigger, for example the result of 1 divided by 0.000001 is far bigger than 1 divided by 0.1.]
ARTICLES
1. Europe’s Green Energy Rush Slashed Emissions—and Crippled the Economy
Political consensus is cracking, industry is hobbled and high-profile projects are being postponed thanks to some of the highest electricity prices in the developed world
By Tom Fairless and Max Colchester, WSJ, Dec 1, 2025
TWTW Summary: The article begins with (graph included)
“European politicians pitched the continent’s green transition to voters as a win-win: Citizens would benefit from green jobs and cheap, abundant solar and wind energy alongside a sharp reduction in carbon emissions.
Nearly two decades on, the promise has largely proved costly for consumers and damaging for the economy.
Europe has succeeded in slashing carbon emissions more than any other region—by 30% from 2005 levels, compared with a 17% drop for the U.S. But along the way, the rush to renewables has helped drive up electricity prices in much of the continent.
Germany now has the highest domestic electricity prices in the developed world, while the U.K. has the highest industrial electricity rates, according to a basket of 28 major economies analyzed by the International Energy Agency. Italy isn’t far behind. Average electricity prices for heavy industries in the European Union remain roughly twice those in the U.S. and 50% above China. Energy prices have also grown more volatile as the share of renewables increased.
Electricity prices in select countries in 2024”
The article concludes with:
“Some prominent economists and industry executives have recently cast doubt on whether renewables will ever be cheaper in places like Germany and the U.K. that aren’t blessed with abundant sunshine and have bet big on wind. Onshore wind turbines in Germany produce around one-fifth of their total theoretical output. Solar panels in Germany and the U.K. use only around 10% of their total theoretical output.
‘I have not seen any plan that facilitates green electricity in central Europe at competitive costs,’ said Miguel López, CEO of German industrial giant Thyssenkrupp.
Helm, the Oxford professor, argues renewable energy will remain more expensive than fossil fuels because the overall system is more cumbersome. The U.K. used to meet its electricity demand with 60-70 gigawatts of power capacity. Now, the country requires twice as much capacity, 120 gigawatts, to meet slightly lower demand—not to mention the additional storage facilities and interconnector supplies to and from continental Europe.
Twenty years ago, the U.K. was the most competitive location globally for Huntsman, a Texas-based chemicals manufacturer, thanks to cheap North Sea energy, said CEO Peter Huntsman. Over the past decade, the company sold off most of its U.K. assets, reducing its staff there from more than 2,000 to around 70.
‘The whole value chain has gone,’ Huntsman said.”
*************
2. Gratitude for the Trump EPA
Lee Zeldin wants to end Biden rules aimed at killing fossil fuels.
By The Editorial Board, WSJ, Nov. 28, 2025
TWTW Summary: After an opening paragraph, the editorial states:
“On Monday, the EPA told the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals that it is dropping its defense of the Biden-era fine particulate matter rule. These particulates can damage public health, but regulation has caused industries to limit their emissions to the point where they now pose little risk.
The EPA asked the court to vacate the rule because the agency had ‘exceeded its authority’ by lowering the standard without first completing a ‘thorough review’ of air quality standards, as required by the law.
The Biden EPA reduced the fine particulate matter (PM 2.5) standard to 9 micrograms per cubic meter of air from 12. This would have rendered some 584 U.S. counties out of compliance and effectively meant new factories and gas-fired power plants couldn’t be built there.
Manufacturers might also struggle to get permits for projects in another 2,204 counties that would have been at risk of falling out of compliance. Maine, New Hampshire, Wyoming and Montana would have been among the few places in the country where manufacturers could build new plants, and good luck finding enough workers there to operate them.
The rule was part of the Biden Administrator’s multifront war on fossil fuels. Yet the biggest sources of PM 2.5 are fires (2,491 thousands of tons a year), dust (902), agriculture (795) and residential fireplaces (337). Fuel combustion (289) and industrial processes (270) contribute far less. Rescinding the rule will ease some permitting pain for energy and other projects vital to U.S. prosperity.
The EPA on Wednesday also said that it would delay a Biden methane rule that requires expensive upgrades to oil and gas infrastructure to prevent leaks. Mr. Zeldin’s regulatory reprieve is one reason the U.S. economy has shown tremendous resilience amid President Trump’s tariff barrage.”
TWTW Comment: There is little or no physical evidence that the new rule was needed.
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Why is My Energy Bill Even Higher? [UK]
The flippant answer to that was Keir Starmer say’s we’re still all in. But there appears to be even more trouble ahead for this, the most economically illiterate government of all time…
EXCLUSIVE: UK Office of Budget Responsibility’s Latest Climate Fear Mongering Claims Based on Junk Findings From Retracted Nature Paper
The OBR [Office for Budget Responsibility] is not alone in having statistical egg all over its face since the work that arose from the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, a known nest of hard line climate activists, was widely used by other government organisations including the US Congressional Budget Office, the OECD and the World Bank. All seem to have relied on a so-called damage impacts model found in KLW24 that produced the headline claim that the world would be poorer over the next century
…
The OBR needs to amend its figures in the light of the Kotz retraction. – DS
It’s a dog’s dinner
In five years time, our electricity bills will have risen by 18%, even before general inflation takes effect.
This is not a guesstimate, it is based on what the OBR and NESO have officially said. – Not a lot…
Eyes On Miliband As Cabinet Enters Briefing Conflict With Starmer – Guido
Miliband isn’t going to give up his “mission” for anything or anyone. Which reminds me of the late, great Jimi
And so castles made of sand
Fall in the sea eventually…
“To address the issue that the current increasing levels of CO2 in the atmosphere come from ocean outgassing, critics must show that the estimates of CO2 both from ice cores and the sea sediment cores are not correct. This has not been done.”
Your assumption is flawed and thus you created a strawman argument.
It is easy to show >50% of the current CO2 rise is from outgassing, without using core data.
Stomata and early chemical analysis disagree with the core data. Atmospheric CO2 was rising faster than FF emissions until about 1960 so why would the cause of that growth end when FF emissions caught up?
“It is easy to show >50% of the current CO2 rise is from outgassing“
New study says about 83%
New Study: Temperature-Driven CO2 Outgassing Explains 83 Percent Of CO2 Rise Since 1959
“the Green New Deal seems to have fallen to earth, borne down by the inexorable gravity of economic and political reality.”
It’s too bad that “scientific reality” still can’t be included on that list.
Yes, too bad. A bigger problem, however, is that the current ‘political reality’ that opposes the GND nonsense could grind to a halt as early as next November’s election. Not to be ‘alarmist’, but the Left is still with us, and they can count on the rabid support of large segments of the population that either consider themselves to be ‘victims’ and/or are out to obtain free stuff.
Or who are genuinely concerned about the increasingly obvious impact of climate change.
There are no obvious impacts.. You have a warped imagination.
Apart from a couple of atmospheric temperature surges at El Nino events.. no evidence of any human CO2 caused warming at all…
.. and even the IPCC says nothing else untoward is happening
Meanwhile…. Petermann Glacier increases in length
Greenland Petermann Glacier Has Grown 30 Kilometers Since 2012!
The Left cares nothing about ‘climate change’ or useful idiots like you. It’s simply a weapon to destabilize society and the economy as a means of gaining power.
With respect, the paper “The Role of Greenhouse Gases in Energy Transfer in the Earth’s Atmosphere” is a fairytale similar to “Atmospheric CO2: Principal Control Knob Governing Earth’s Temperature.”
The authors say in the Summary
This is complete nonsense, obviously, as adding CO2 to air does not make thermometers hotter.
The authors are quite obviously ignorant and gullible if they have merely accepted a “consensus” that the physically impossible is fact. As Feynman said (having been caught out himself) “It doesn’t matter how beautiful your theory is, it doesn’t matter how smart you are. If it doesn’t agree with experiment, it’s wrong.”
Even the authors’ interpretation of Tyndall’s work is incorrect, and misleading at best. They say
No, they weren’t, and no he didn’t. CO2 and water vapour were well known to scientists of the day, and Tyndall merely pointed out that without an atmosphere, temperatures on Earth would drop further and faster, like the airless. He didn’t bother to point out the blindingly obverse – without an atmosphere, your blood would literally boil during the day. In the third edition of the Tyndall reference, he points out that surface temperatures in sunlight are reduced by increased “aqueous vapour” in the atmosphere. Tyndall also refers to Dr Livingstone’s travels in Africa, and finalises the chapter with “”. . .during the nights, the cooling by radiation is there much greater than in the plain.” The observations of the Messrs. Schlagentweit furnish, if I mistake not, many illustrations of the action of aqueous vapor ; ”
Is it too much to ask that authors actually read their references, and don’t just accept what other people say as fact? That is the mark of the ignorant and gullible.