The Week That Was: 2026-01-10 (January 10, 2026)
Brought to You by SEPP (www.SEPP.org)
The Science and Environmental Policy Project
Quote of the Week: “I haye already placed before the Royal Society an account of some experiments which brought to light the remarkable fact that the body of our atmosphere, that is to say the mixture of oxygen and nitrogen of which it is composed, is a comparative vacuum to the calorific rays [Infrared Radiation], its main absorbent constituent being the aqueous vapor [Water Vapor] which it contains. It is very important that the minds of meteorologists should be set at rest on this subject—that they should be able to apply, without misgiving, this newly revealed physical property of aqueous vapor; for it is certain to have numerous and important applications.”— John Tyndall, Dec 31, 1863
Number of the Week: 28% v. 0.3%; 13% v 32%; down 6% v. up 455%
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THIS WEEK:
By Ken Haapala, President, Science and Environmental Policy Project (SEPP)
Scope: This TWTW opens a discussion that the US administration has announced it is withdrawing from 66 national and international organizations. Then TWTW discusses whether this announcement is bad for the US. TWTW discusses Roy Spencer’s presentation of surface-air temperature trends compared with model results and compares the surface-air temperature trends with satellite temperature trends. Then it discusses Matthew Wielicki’s explanation of the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO). TWTW discusses some electricity issues and concludes with a suggestion on redefining the Waters of the United States.
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IPCC & UNFCCC: On January 7, the Office of the President issued a Memorandum for the Heads of Executive Departments and Agencies “Withdrawing the United States from International Organizations, Conventions, and Treaties that Are Contrary to the Interests of the United States.” The initial part of the memorandum stated:
“By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, I hereby direct:
Section 1. Purpose. (a) On February 4, 2025, I issued Executive Order 14199 (Withdrawing the United States from and Ending Funding to Certain United Nations Organizations and Reviewing United States Support to All International Organizations). That Executive Order directed the Secretary of State, in consultation with the United States Representative to the United Nations, to conduct a review of all international intergovernmental organizations of which the United States is a member and provides any type of funding or other support, and all conventions and treaties to which the United States is a party, to determine which organizations, conventions, and treaties are contrary to the interests of the United States. The Secretary of State has reported his findings as required by Executive Order 14199.
(b) I have considered the Secretary of State’s report and, after deliberating with my Cabinet, have determined that it is contrary to the interests of the United States to remain a member of, participate in, or otherwise provide support to the organizations listed in section 2 of this memorandum.
(c) Consistent with Executive Order 14199 and pursuant to the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, I hereby direct all executive departments and agencies (agencies) to take immediate steps to effectuate the withdrawal of the United States from the organizations listed in section 2 of this memorandum as soon as possible. For United Nations entities, withdrawal means ceasing participation in or funding to those entities to the extent permitted by law. [Boldface added]
(d) My review of further findings of the Secretary of State remains ongoing.”
The memorandum contains a list of 66 non-UN organizations and UN organizations from which the US is withdrawing. The non-UN organizations include the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) which has produced six assessment reports on the human influence on climate change. The UN organizations include the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) the parent organization of the IPCC. This action produced a highly divided response, some praising, it others condemning it.
For example, in her praise of the action Australian sceptic of CO2-caused warming and blogger Jo Nova cited an article in the Guardian including a quote from Gina McCarthy, the Administrator of the EPA in President Obama’s second term and the first-ever White House National Climate Advisor leading the Climate Policy Office created by President Biden. The post by Nova stated, in part:
From The Guardian:
“Donald Trump has sparked outrage by announcing the US will exit the foundational international agreement to address the climate crisis, cementing the US’s utter isolation from the global effort to confront dangerously escalating temperatures.
‘This is a shortsighted, embarrassing and foolish decision,’ said Gina McCarthy, who was a top climate adviser to Joe Biden’s White House.
‘As the only country in the world not a part of the UNFCCC treaty, the Trump administration is throwing away decades of US climate change leadership and global collaboration. This administration is forfeiting our country’s ability to influence trillions of dollars in investments, policies and decisions that would have advanced our economy and protected us from costly disasters wreaking havoc on our country.’”
Since this is an executive order, it may only be in force while Trump is president. The order withdraws all funding from these “entities to the extent permitted by law.” Thus, the immediate impact on funding these entities is not clear. But it is doubtful that the funding will be in the Presidents proposed budget in the next fiscal year starting September 2026. See links under After Paris!
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Bad for the US? Roger Pielke, Jr. wrote a post in this blog “Leaving the IPCC and UNFCC is Bad for the United States.” In December, Pielke was already upset at the administration because it was considering dismantling the National Center Atmospheric Research (NCAR). Employees at NCAR had greatly assisted Pielke. The administration proposed sending the weather forecasting functions of NCAR elsewhere.
The global climate modeling section of NCAR uses one of the nation’s topflight computers. The modelers have ignored that their model results are contradicted by atmospheric temperature trends as measured by satellites and verified by measurements by instruments on weather balloons. Thus, the models have never been validated. The NCAR modelers ignore this and prefer to be part of the IPCC modeling process that consistently overestimates the warming of the atmosphere, spreading fear of a dangerous global warming from carbon dioxide.
In his objection to the US leaving the IPCC and UNFCCC, Pielke writes in part:
“Interestingly, despite the Senate’s ratification of the UNFCCC in 1992, it remains legally unresolved whether or not a president can withdraw from such an agreement unilaterally.
The U.S. Senate ratified the UNFCCC treaty on October 7, 1992, by a unanimous vote (92-0), giving President George H.W. Bush the advice and consent needed to formalize U.S. participation in the foundational international climate agreement.”
What Pielke does not mention is that following the 1992 Supplement to the first IPCC report (1990) distinguished physicist Federick Seitz wrote an editorial in the Wall Street Journal, calling it the worst abuse of the peer review process he has witnessed in 60 years in American physics. Further the Second Assessment report (IPCC-SAR 1996) was the first attempt to assert that the atmosphere has a mysterious “human fingerprint” no one has been able to find even today. These are only a few of the many deceits the UN IPCC and the UNFCCC have foisted on an unsuspecting public.
Following these, in in 1997 the US Senate unanimously passed (95-0) S.Res.98 known as the Byrd-Hagel Resolution concerning UN Climate Change which stated the Senate would not approve any treaty requiring emissions cuts from the U.S. or other developed nations without mandatory commitments from developing nations and warning of economic harm. The resolution states:
“Declares that the United States should not be a signatory to any protocol to, or other agreement regarding, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change of 1992, at negotiations in Kyoto in December 1997 or thereafter which would: (1) mandate new commitments to limit or reduce greenhouse gas emissions for the Annex 1 Parties, unless the protocol or other agreement also mandates new specific scheduled commitments to limit or reduce greenhouse gas emissions for Developing Country Parties within the same compliance period; or (2) result in serious harm to the U.S. economy.
Calls for any such protocol or other agreement which would require the advice and consent of the Senate to ratification to be accompanied by: (1) a detailed explanation of any legislation or regulatory actions that may be required to implement it; and (2) an analysis of the detailed financial costs which would be incurred by, and other impacts on, the U.S. economy.”
The Obama administration was well aware of this and forced a significant revision to the Paris Agreement after it was passed so that it would not appear to be a treaty requiring Senate approval. The UN IPCC and the UNFCCC continue to produce reports calling for measures that are destructive to the US economy. Whether this is sufficient reason to declare the UNFCCC treaty invalid for the US remains to be seen.
Further, a number of excellent scientists angrily quit the IPCC’s Working Group I, The Physical Science Basis, because of the terrible distortions inserted into the “Summary for Policymakers” and the “Synthesis Report.” These reports completely abandon the good science they wrote, substituting alarmist claims. By withdrawing from the IPCC, the US is declaring that the IPCC and the UNFCCC did NOT do what they promised. If the IPCC and the UNFCCC die, perhaps a new (genuinely scientific) organization will be formed to replace them. If not, for the good of humanity and modern civilization little is lost.
See links under Seeking a Common Ground, for the IPCC 1990 report and 1992 Supplement see https://wedocs.unep.org/items/e58f3806-61a3-4d01-9913-a78e3c549da6, and for S.Res.98 (1997) see https://www.congress.gov/bill/105th-congress/senate-resolution/98
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Atmospheric v. Surface Temperature Trends: The greenhouse effect occurs in the atmosphere where the two major greenhouse gases reside, water vapor and carbon dioxide (though there is a great deal of carbon dioxide in the oceans and on land). Yet global climate modelers insist on using surface-air data when they claim to be estimating the influence of carbon dioxide on temperatures. This is not to say that atmospheric temperatures are not influenced by the land and oceans below the atmosphere. Roy Spencer has a valuable post “Surface Air Temperature Trends, Climate Models vs Observations, 1979-2025.” He states:
“This is just a short update regarding how global surface air temperature (Tsfc) trends are tracking 34 CMIP6 climate models through 2025. The following plot shows the Tsfc trends, 1979-2025, ranked from the warmest to the coolest.
‘Observations’ is an average of 4 datasets: HadCRUT5, NOAAGlobalTemp Version 6 (now featuring AI, of course), ERA5 (a reanalysis dataset), and the Berkeley 1×1 deg. dataset, which produces a trend identical to HadCRUT5 (+0.205 C/decade).
I consider reanalyzes to be in the class of ‘observations’ since they are constrained to match, in some average sense, the measurements made from the surface, weather balloons, global commercial aircraft, satellites, and the kitchen sink.
The observations moved up one place in the rankings since the last time I made one of these plots, mainly due to an anomalously warm 2024.”
TWTW Comment: What is particularly interesting are the surface-air “observations” that produce a trend of +0.205°C (0.369°F) per decade. (The last digit in the numbers is not meaningful.) We see that most of the global climate models overestimate surface-air temperature trends.
In his post on “UAH v6.1 Global Temperature Update for December 2025” Spencer notes that:
“2025 was the 2nd warmest year (a distant 2nd behind 2024) in the 47-year satellite record.”
He also ranks the years in the record. This clearly indicates that “2024 really was an anomalously warm year, more than can be attributed to El Nino alone.” To TWTW, this indicates that the Hunga Tonga–Hunga Haʻapai eruption in 2022 that put about 150 million tons of sea water into the stratosphere may have had a significant impact on 2024 temperatures for both the surface and in the atmosphere. It is consistent with the assertions by Javier Vinos discussed in last week’s TWTW. But if correct, why the effect was not immediate and temperatures did not start increasing until 2023 is unexplained.
Also, in his post on atmospheric temperature trends as of December, Spencer notes that:
“The Version 6.1 global area-averaged linear temperature trend (January 1979 through December 2025) remains at +0.16 deg/ C/decade [+0.29°F per decade] (+0.22 C/decade [+0.40 °F per decade] over land, +0.13 C/decade [+0.23 °F per decade] over oceans).”
So, the decadal surface-air temperature trends of +0.21°C/decade closely match the decadal atmospheric temperature trend over land of +0.22°C/per decade. But the surface-air temperatures trends are far higher than the atmospheric temperature trend over the oceans of +0.13 C/decade. The oceans cover 71% of the globe. Do the global climate models omit 71% of the globe?
For Spencer’s analysis see link under Challenging the Orthodoxy, for atmospheric temperature trends see links under Measurement Issues – Atmosphere, and for sea surface temperature measurements see link under Changing Seas.
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ENSO: On his blog, Matthew Wielicki has a post titled
“ENSO: The Pacific’s Climate Powerhouse: The overlooked engine behind global temperature spikes and U.S. weather whiplash.”
Wielinski gives a solid description of the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) which is a powerful influence on global weather. He writes:
“What is ENSO? A Simple Breakdown
To understand ENSO, let’s start with the basics – no advanced physics required, just some ocean and atmosphere fundamentals. The El Niño-Southern Oscillation is a natural climate pattern in the tropical Pacific Ocean that flips between three phases: El Niño (warm), La Niña (cool), and neutral. It’s driven by interactions between the ocean and the atmosphere, specifically trade winds, sea surface temperatures (SSTs), and air pressure differences.
Here’s how it works: Normally, strong easterly trade winds blow from east to west across the equatorial Pacific, pushing warm surface water toward Asia and Australia. This causes cooler water to upwell (rise from deeper layers) along the South American coast, rich in nutrients that support marine life. But every 2-7 years, these winds weaken or reverse. During El Niño, the warm water sloshes back eastward, warming the central and eastern Pacific. This suppresses upwelling, leading to warmer global temperatures overall.
Conversely, during La Niña, the trade winds strengthen, piling even more warm water in the west and enhancing cool upwelling in the east, which tends to cool the planet slightly. The “Southern Oscillation” part refers to the seesaw in air pressure between the eastern Pacific (high pressure) and western Pacific/Indian Ocean (low pressure) that accompanies these shifts.
Why does it change? It’s a self-regulating cycle influenced by factors like wind bursts, ocean heat content, and even distant weather patterns. Think of it as the ocean “burping” excess heat – El Niño releases stored heat from the Pacific into the atmosphere, spiking global temps, while La Niña stores it away. Unlike the slow, debated changes in the AMOC, ENSO flips dramatically and unpredictably, making it a dominant short-term climate driver.”
Wielicki gives excellent graphs illustrating his assertions that there is “no long-term trend tied to human activity…it’s nature’s rhythm.”
“Look at the UAH satellite-based global lower atmosphere temperature graph below (Version 6.1), showing anomalies from 1979 to December 2025.
Notice the sharp spikes? The massive 1997-98 El Niño caused a huge temperature to jump in 1998, often cited as a “record” year. Similarly, the super El Niño of 2015-16 drove 2016’s heat, and the 2023-24 event correlated with 2023’s “hottest year ever” claims. These aren’t coincidences. El Niño releases vast amounts of ocean heat into the atmosphere, far outpacing the subtle warming from increasing greenhouse gases (GHGs).
The IPCC and mainstream narratives conveniently downplay this because, after all, how do you tax or regulate the oceans? Institutions like the IPCC focus on GHGs as the “sole driver” of climate change, but that’s a myopic view. GHGs contribute to a gradual background warming (about 0.01-0.02°C per year), but ENSO can swing global temps by 0.2-0.5°C in months. The Pacific’s sheer size means its oscillations have a larger, more immediate impact on climate variability than CO2 alone. If GHGs were the only factor, we’d see steady rises without these jagged spikes – but the data shows otherwise. This oversight exposes how the climate crisis narrative cherry-picks data to justify policies that expand power and wealth, ignoring natural drivers like ENSO that don’t fit the agenda.” [Boldface added]
Using excellent illustrations Wielicki describes how different phases of ENSO change weather. He concludes with:
“Final words…
In closing, ENSO reminds us that climate is complex, not a simple CO2 knob. By fixating on greenhouse gases as the sole driver, we’re missing the ocean’s massive influence – and that’s no accident in a narrative built on control.”
See links under Challenging the Orthodoxy and Changing Seas for additional comments.
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Airhead Electricity: Paul Homewood writes:
“The BBC’s Climate Editor, Justin Rowlatt, who likes to lecture us on renewable energy, does not even know the difference between power and energy!
Nor did he point out that much of the time wind output is much less than 29%. Analysis by my friend Simon Clanmorris has found that there were 2818 hours in 2025 when wind power supplied less than 20% of demand – this is equivalent to 117 days.
The longest such period lasted 195 hours and at times wind dropped to as low as 0.6% of demand.”
An ordinary car has the same energy as a race car of the same weight at the same speed, but the race car has more power and gets to speed faster. Unfortunately, this is one of the many key concepts politicians do not understand as they try to regulate energy.
Another problem with politicians regulating electricity is that they do not understand the concept of levelized costs and tend to follow promoters of wind and solar who claim these sources have lower cost but exclude the condition – when they work! Robert Bradley Jr. discusses a report from the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) which states:
“Total installed costs for renewable power decreased by more than 10% for all technologies between 2023 and 2024, except for offshore wind, where they remained relatively stable, and bioenergy, where they increased by 16%. Nevertheless, the combination of capacity factors, market share, and financing costs led to a slight increase in the levelized cost of electricity (LCOE) for some technologies: solar PV by 0.6%, onshore wind by 3%, offshore wind by 4%, and bioenergy by 13%. Meanwhile, costs declined for CSP (-46%), geothermal (-16%), and hydropower (-2%).
Renewables continue to prove themselves as the most cost-competitive source of new electricity generation. On an LCOE basis, 91% of newly commissioned utility-scale renewable capacity delivered power at a lower cost than the cheapest new fossil fuel-based alternative. In 2024, renewables helped avoid USD 467 billion in fossil fuel costs, reinforcing their role in enhancing energy security, economic resilience, and long-term affordability.”
As Bradley states: “Noncompetitive energies need studies; competitive energies need markets.” Comparing the costs of unreliable wind and solar with reliable coal, gas, and nuclear is for airheads. The issue is what is the cost of electricity when wind and solar do not work and what is the cost of putting an unneeded, unreliable system on top of a reliable one? See links under Questioning the Orthodoxy and Energy Issues – General.
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Waters of the United States: On Monday Ken Haapala submitted comments to the EPA and the US Army Corps of Engineers on the proposed revised definition of the Waters of the United States. Keeping the comment below 5000 characters (without attachments) Haapala emphasized some of the absurd results of the current definitions. In part, he stated:
“In physical science, the scientific method can be summed with one question: Is it consistent with the physical evidence?
Few sets of Federal regulations are more inconsistent with the physical evidence than the regulations that now apply to the navigable Waters of the United States. Since I am not an attorney, I will not make specific legal suggestions. But as a physical scientist I will suggest a few practical guidelines that should be considered when defining the Waters of the United States.
A clear definition of Waters of the United States is needed. Permanent or semi-permanent water is required. Semi-permanent water can be defined as water present at least 290 days of the year.
Further, if these waters cannot be navigated by commercial vessels, they must be connected to waters that can be navigated by commercial vessels.
Years ago, I prepared a photographic brochure featuring my daughter water skiing behind a life-raft powered by a retired Navy Captain using oars – all on high, dry land surrounded by trees. Yet the Corps of Engineers deemed this dry land to be Waters of the United States.
I have seen piles of wet leaves deemed to be Waters of the United States, with no connection to any permanent or semi-permanent surface water or flowing water.
I have seen land with a perched water table that becomes saturated with a heavy rainstorm, then dries out deemed to be Waters of the United States, with no connection to any permanent or semi-permanent surface water or flowing water.
These are a few of the many abuses of language and science that have come with Federal regulations under the guise of navigable Waters of the United States. I request that new definition be written in clear language with key terms clearly defined so this abuse of language and science may cease.
Further, I request that the definition includes clear exceptions for protecting human lives and welfare from future regulations. Such exceptions should include movable barriers to prevent storm surges, desalination plants, and the disposal of ancient water from oil and gas wells.”
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Number of the Week: 28% v. 0.3%; 13% v 32%; down 6% v. up 455%
According to the IPCC, “List of Member Governments and Organizations” that contributed in 2024 (31 December 2024), its income for the year was $5,207,437. Of that amount, the US contributed $1,445,000 or 27.75%; China contributed $17,940 or 0.34%.
According to Our World in Data, the “Total Emissions of Carbon Dioxide” in 2024 – Global emissions were 38.68 billion metric tons (BMT); from China 12.29 BMT 32% (31.77%); and from US 4.9 BMT (12.67%)
Emissions of CO2 in 1992 — US 5.2 BMT China 2.7 BMT; The increase from 1992 to 2024 was US down 6%; China up 455%.
Could the UN’s demand that the US reduce emissions be considered penalizing the citizens of the US, contradicting the 1997 Senate resolution S.Res.98?
NEWS YOU CAN USE:
Science: Is the Sun Rising?
Finding the 1859 Carrington Event in Tree Rings
By Anthony Watts, WUWT, Jan 3, 2026
Link to paper: Transient Offset in 14C After the Carrington Event Recorded by Polar Tree Rings
By Joonas Uusitalo, et al., Geophysical Research Letters, Mar 5, 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/
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
On the relation of radiant heat to aqueous vapour
By John Tyndall, F. R. S., The Royal Society, Philosophical Transactions, Dec 31, 1863
Surface Air Temperature Trends, Climate Models vs Observations, 1979-2025
By Roy Spencer, His Blog, Jan 9, 2026
ENSO: The Pacific’s Climate Powerhouse
The overlooked engine behind global temperature spikes and U.S. weather whiplash
By Matthew Wielincki, Irrational Fear, Jan 7, 2026 [H/t Bernie Kepshire]
Modeling Error In Estimating How Clouds Affect Climate Is 8700% Larger Than Alleged CO2 Forcing
By Kenneth Richard, No Tricks Zone, Jan 7, 2026
Link to paper: Development and comparison of empirical models for all-sky downward longwave radiation estimation at the ocean surface using long-term observations
By Jianghai Peng, et al., Atmospheric Measurement Techniques, July 4, 2025
Climate Attribution Model
By Tony Heller, His Blog, Jan 7, 2026
Link to: The secret weapon that could finally force climate action
An ambitious form of climate modelling aims to pin the blame for disasters – from floods to heatwaves – on specific companies. Is this the tool we need to effectively prosecute the world’s biggest carbon emitters?
By Thomas Lewton, New Scientist, Jan 6, 2026
[SEPP Comment: Heller exposes another ridiculous model linking CO2 to disastrous weather.]
CO2 and atmospheric temperatures: persistent trouble making them fit together
By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, Jan 7, 2026
Link to paper: CO2 Forcing of Changes in Lower Tropospheric Temperatures: A Time Series Analysis
By Peter R. Hartley, American Journal of Climate Change, December 2025
From Robson: Hartley notes that the simple IPCC control knob model implies that average atmospheric temperatures should track CO2 levels in the atmosphere and, crucially, should have the same level of persistence. But when he checked this assumption using data on CO2 levels and lower tropospheric temperatures as measured by the University of Alabama in Huntsville satellite record, he found that CO2 levels have a unit root but temperatures do not. Specifically, they have relatively little persistence. Which doesn’t make sense if CO2 is the control knob since in that case whatever CO2 does, including persist, should cause temperatures to do the same.
[SEPP Comment: Unit root means that the data’s current value depends heavily on its past values plus random noise, making long-term prediction difficult but its first difference (change from one period to the next) becomes stationary. These render long-term forecasts unreliable.]
#DOEDeepDive: Ch 4 Climate Sensitivity
By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, Jan 7, 2026
Link to report: A Critical Review of Impacts of Greenhouse Gas Emissions on the U.S. Climate
By the Climate Working Group, DOE, July 23, 2025
It gets even worse. Another move the IPCC made was to argue that ECS [Equilibrium Climate Sensitivity] will get larger in the future because warming will be concentrated in a part of the tropical Pacific where the climate system is relatively inefficient at expelling heat to space. But, the DOE team noted, while models say this pattern should already be happening, the data say the opposite, namely the warming is concentrated in another part of the Pacific that is especially efficient at expelling heat, so if that continues ECS may instead decline in the future.
Sensational New Findings: Higher Warming Trend at Start of 20th Century Casts Serious Doubt on Role of Human-Caused CO2
By Chris Morrison, The Daily Sceptic, Jan 5, 2026
Link to paper: Revisiting CO2 emissions and global warming: Implications for society
By B. Bhatta, Queens University Belfast, Aug 17, 2025
Dramatic Fall in Global Temperatures Ignored by Narrative-Captured Mainstream Media
By Chris Morrison, The Daily Sceptic, Jan 8, 2026
Exhibit 1: The accurate UAH satellite record shows the plunge clearly with the difference or anomaly from the 1991-2020 average falling during 2025 to end the year at just 0.3°C.
Defending the Orthodoxy
Al Gore sounds ‘climate crisis’ alarm as Trump yanks US from UN initiatives
Former Vice President Al Gore claimed that ‘the most significant challenge of our lifetimes’ is ‘the climate crisis’
By Alex Nitzberg, Fox News, Jan 8, 2026
Climate change shifts the North Pacific storm track polewards
By Rei Chemke & Janni Yuval, Nature, Jan 7, 2026 [H/t Bernie Kepshire]
From the abstract: Here we derive an observational constraint for mid-latitude storm tracks and show that the winter North Pacific storm track has shifted substantially polewards, emerging from natural variability. A polewards shift of storm track-induced heat and moisture flux is also evident over western North America, implying regional impacts on precipitation and temperature patterns. Our analysis further reveals that climate models underestimate the polewards shift of the storm track in recent decades, suggesting that the future human-induced impacts on both the North Pacific ecosystem and western North America might be larger than in current predictions.
Last Year’s Historic Reversals on Climate Protection
By Jay Hakes, Real Clear Energy, Jan 5, 2025
The year 2025 will be long remembered for the United States’ massive and relentless attack on efforts to increase our understanding of global warming and to reduce the pollution that contributes to it.
Questioning the Orthodoxy
Justin Rowlatt Does Not Understand Difference Between Energy and Power!
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Jan 4, 2026
The $20 Trillion Question: How to Spend It and How Not To
By William Murray, Real Clear Energy, Jan 5, 2026
This is the sum that was globally spent — largely by Europe and the United States — in a coordinated effort by the developed world to decarbonize the global economy.
They know
By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, Jan 7, 2026
One of the most notorious climate alarmist predictions is the 2000 one by David Viner of the Climatic Research Unit of the University of East Anglia (yes, the CRU of “Climategate” fame) that “Children just aren’t going to know what snow is”. And honestly we’re grateful to its author, not just for placing a large juicy fish in a small shallow barrel but because too much climate alarmism consists of predictions too vague or distant to be tested, thus making a mockery of the scientific method while claiming to follow it. This one was direct, concrete and verifiable.
The Snake Oil That Bites
Net zero’s fundamental flaw
By John Rigeway, Climate Skepticism, Jan 8, 2026 [H/t Bernie Kepshire]
There may be sound scientific reasons for controlling carbon dioxide emissions in order to control global temperatures, but as a means of controlling the well-being of societies and ecosystems, it is a poisoned chalice.
My Twenty Years of Watching the Thermometer—and the Narrative
By Anthony Watts, WUWT, Jan 4, 2026
As WUWT approaches its twentieth anniversary in 2026, it’s worth reflecting on how climate change went from being a hypothesis—one among many competing explanations for observed changes—to a full-fledged belief system, complete with sacred texts (IPCC reports), approved language, and the occasional excommunication.
The climate, meanwhile, has been far less dramatic.
Science Without Skepticism Is Just Politics in a Lab Coat
By Charles Rotter, WUWT, Jan 6, 2026
Link to paper: Scientists as policymakers: Greenlighting restoration and climate action
By Kathleen K. Treseder, Adam J. Cavecche, Earth Stewardship, Nov 18, 2025
Let’s Get Back to Building in America
By Chris Zeigler, Real Clear Energy, Jan 8, 2026
The rapid rise of technology and the race for America’s future brings new urgency to fixing a broken, inefficient permitting system where projects are often stuck in red tape and buried in endless reviews, thus blocking the critical infrastructure needed to keep pace with demand.
Infrastructure projects of all kinds – pipelines, power plants, transmission lines – even roads and bridges – face a myriad of federal approvals under a maze of outdated laws and regulations. Opponents regularly weaponize statutes like the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and the Clean Water Act (CWA) to block development at every stage of permitting.
Milloy talks energy with David Asman and Lydia Hu on FOX Business
By Charles Rotter, WUWT, Jan 4, 2026
4-minute video
AI models and their “knowledge” of climate change
By Joe Nalven, Climate Etc., Jan 5, 2026
Long Post
Energy & Environmental News: January 5, 2026
By John Droz, Jr., Master Resource, Jan 5, 2026
After Paris!
Trump orders US withdrawal from 66 ‘wasteful’ global organizations in sweeping ‘America First’ crackdown
Secretary of State Marco Rubio calls institutions ‘useless’ and ‘wasteful’
By Jasmine Baehr, Fox News, Jan 7, 2026
Link to: Withdrawing the United States from International Organizations, Conventions, and Treaties that Are Contrary to the Interests of the United States
Presidential Memoranda, The White House, Jan 7, 2026
Hallelujah! Trump announces withdrawal of US support and funds for Blob Headquarters — 66 UN and international agencies
By Jo Nova, Her Blog, Jan 8, 2026
Trump Pulls US Out Of IPCC
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Jan 8, 2026
Firing Globalism on Climate Alarm (EO 14199)
By Robert Bradley Jr., Master Resource, Jan 8, 2026
Day of Liberation from UN Climate Entities (among others)
By Ron Clutz, His Blog, Jan 8, 2026
Enron: From Rio to Kyoto to Paris
By Robert Bradley Jr., Master Resource, Jan 9, 2026
U.S. Withdraws from the IPCC—and Dismantles a Global Climate Bureaucracy
By Charles Rotter, WUWT, Jan 7, 2025
Climate Change Juror Ümit Şahin Promises Türkiye’s COP31 will Address the Failures of COP30
By Eric Worrall, WUWT, Jan 8, 2026
Social Benefits of Carbon Dioxide
The effect of CO2 on Elliott’s Milkpea
By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, Jan 7, 2026
From the CO2Science.org archive.
Problems in the Orthodoxy
Miliband energy quango in conflict-of-interest row over National Grid shares
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Jan 4, 2026
From the Telegraph:
“Staff at Ed Miliband’s energy quango own shares in the company responsible for rewiring Britain for net zero, raising concerns over a potential conflict of interest.”
Seeking a Common Ground
Leaving the IPCC and UNFCC is Bad for the United States
Multilateralism matters for normal Americans
By Roger Pielke Jr., His Blog, Jan 8, 2026
Trump orders attack
By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, Jan 7, 2026
Link to: Top Five Climate Science Scandals 2025
Bad science, Trump vengeance, USNCA [The U.S. National Climate Assessment], “climate risk,” and the top holds steady!
By Roger Pielke, Jr., His Blog, Dec 29, 2025
Top Five Climate Science Scandals 2025
From Robson: To repeat, we do not say that what Donald Trump is doing is wise. Nor, at the risk of alienating some readers, do we think Donald Trump could pass a basic quiz on climate any more than, frankly, we think Al Gore could. But we do say that if “science” finds itself under attack in the United States for being politicized, dogmatic and loony-left, the best response would be to prove that it’s not, rather than striving to confirm the critics’ claims.
[SEPP Comment: Discusses the possible defunding of NCAR.]
Models v. Observations
Why Don’t Global Lower Tropospheric Temperatures More Closely Track Atmospheric CO2 Levels?
By Francis Menton, Manhattan Contrarian, Jan 5, 2026
As our frequent and curmudgeonly commenter Richard Greene points out, you will be hard pressed to find any legitimate climate scientists to dispute the proposition that CO2 and some other human-produced gases (e.g., methane) are GHGs whose accumulation in the atmosphere is likely to lead to at least some warming. But, assuming that you accept that proposition, the question remains: Will the resulting warming be large, or moderate, or small? Indeed, could the GHG-induced warming be so small as to be even near or below the limit of detectability by available instruments? Could observed changes in temperatures be principally caused by other factors? And how could you assess those questions?
Measurement Issues — Atmosphere
UAH v6.1 Global Temperature Update for December 2025: +0.30 deg. C
By Roy Spencer, His Blog, Jan 5, 2026
Global Temperature Report, December 2025
By Staff, Earth System Science Center, UAH, Jan 6, 2026
Map: https://www.nsstc.uah.edu/climate/2025/December2025/202512_Map.png
Graph: https://www.nsstc.uah.edu/climate/2025/December2025/202512_Bar.png
Text: https://www.nsstc.uah.edu/climate/2025/December2025/GTR_202512_v2.pdf
Yearend 2025, Cooling Temperatures Reducing CO2 Rise
By Ron Clutz, His Blog, Jan 6, 2026
[SEPP Comment: The time period of the claimed lower CO2 rise is too short to be clear.]
UAH Cooling Everywhere December 2025
By Ron Clutz, His Blog, Jan 7, 2026
Changing Weather
Atlantic Hurricane Season 2025
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Jan 9, 2026
Repost: The Atlantic hurricane season, which officially ended on 30th November, was quieter than normal, with five hurricanes, compared to a long-term average of 7.2.
By far the most complete and robust data we have for hurricanes is for those which have hit the US coast. The US Hurricane Research Division, which is part of the Federal agency NOAA, have data going back as far as 1851. According to them, hurricane data is pretty reliable since the 1880s, when the coastline became settled.
No Atlantic hurricanes at all hit the US this year.
England Rainfall Trends 2025
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Jan 7, 2026
Annual rainfall in 1929 was almost exactly the same as 2025, and just as last year, it was extremely dry until autumn. Indeed, it was 10% drier cumulatively by the end of summer than 2025.
From October through to December, and January 1930 too, the heavens opened. Rainfall for that period in 1929 was 38% greater than last year.
It’s a good reminder that, whatever weather we get, it has always occurred before!
The Storm That Destroyed Sheffield – 1962
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Jan 4, 2026
11-minute video
Europe’s No Snow Global Warming Winter Just got Buried Under White Climate Change
By Eric Worrall, WUWT, Jan 5, 2026
Massive Mountain Snow and Flakes Down to Sea Level
By Cliff Mass, Weather Blog, Jan 5, 2026
Changing Climate – Cultures & Civilizations
Global Warming Sustained a Naval Power That Dwarfed Vikings
By Vijay Jayaraj, WUWT, Jan 8, 2026
[SEPP Comment: So much for claims that the Medieval Warm Period was confined to North Atlantic region.]
Changing Seas
December 2025 All Ocean SSTs Cool to Mean
By Ron Clutz, His Blog, Dec 9, 2026
The climatists have seized on this unusual warming as proof their Zero Carbon agenda is needed, without addressing how impossible it would be for CO2 warming the air to raise ocean temperatures. It is the ocean that warms the air, not the other way around. Recently Steven Koonin had this to say about the phenomenon confirmed in the graph above:
“El Nino is a phenomenon in the climate system that happens once every four or five years. Heat builds up in the equatorial Pacific to the west of Indonesia and so on. Then when enough of it builds up it surges across the Pacific and changes the currents and the winds. As it surges toward South America it was discovered and named in the 19th century It is well understood at this point that the phenomenon has nothing to do with CO2.
Now people talk about changes in that phenomena as a result of CO2 but it’s there in the climate system already and when it happens it influences weather all over the world. We feel it when it gets rainier in Southern California for example. So, for the last 3 years we have been in the opposite of an El Nino, a La Nina, part of the reason people think the West Coast has been in drought.
It has now shifted in the last months to an El Nino condition that warms the globe and is thought to contribute to this Spike we have seen. But there are other contributions as well. One of the most surprising ones is that back in January of 2022 an enormous underwater volcano went off in Tonga and it put up a lot of water vapor into the upper atmosphere. It increased the upper atmosphere of water vapor by about 10 percent, and that’s a warming effect, and it may be that is contributing to why the spike is so high.”
La Nina and Snow Expectations for this Winter
By Cliff Mass, Weather Blog, Jan 7, 2026
The only useful meteorological tool for predicting more than a few weeks ahead is the correlation of our weather with El Nino and La Niña.
La Niña occurs when the central tropical Pacific sea surface temperatures are cooler than normal. El Nino conditions occur when the water is warmer than normal…
Changing Cryosphere – Land / Sea Ice
Massive iceberg could be days away from ‘complete disintegration’: NASA
By Zach Kaplan, The Hill, Jan 9, 2026
When the “megaberg” first detached from Antarctica in 1968, it was almost twice the size of Rhode Island, or approximately 1,544 square miles.
[SEPP Comment: An iceberg twice the size of Rhode Island with no surge in sea level? Where’s the press?]
Lowering Standards
A Warm, Pleasant, Sunny Year
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Jan 5, 2026
Predictably, the Met Office has just announced last year was the hottest and sunniest on record. Laughably, the year was supposedly 0.06C warmer than 2022.
No serious scientific organization would claim accuracy to such a tiny margin, which says an awful lot about the Met Office’s credibility in these matters.
Communicating Better to the Public – Use Yellow (Green) Journalism?
Tidbits
By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, Jan 7, 2026
Plunge watch: during the summer we were keeping track of media outlets using “scorch” and “soar” to underline their devotion to the climate cult and their unoriginality. But then watching freezing rain somehow descending even though the thermometer read -9C, we got to thinking about how rarely stories mentioned temperatures plunging, or things being frostbitten, even though the winter has been, well, so wintery even Wenceslas would have put on an extra cloak before venturing out.
Guardian: Fossil Fuel Generators Powering the “Unbelievable” AI Boom are Still “Stranded Assets”
By Eric Worrall, WUWT, Jan 5, 2026
Attention, Energies Media, Sea Level Cannot be Submerging Tokelau if Tokelau is Growing
By Linnea Lueken, Climate Realism, Jan 8, 2026
Climate Policies Make California Unaffordable, LAist, Not Climate Change
By Linnea Lueken, Climate Realism, Dec 31, 2025
The Independent Refuses to Smell the Roses Regarding Winter Flowers and Climate Change
By Linnea Lueken, Climate Realism, Jan 7, 2026
Communicating Better to the Public – Make things up.
Richard Betts Fake Heatwave Deaths Claim
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Jan 4, 2026
Richard Betts, Head of Climate Impacts Research at the Met Office,…
Communicating Better to the Public – Use Propaganda
All Trump’s fault
By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, Jan 7, 2026
What makes it all especially weird is that the same people who apparently see no connection between facts and electoral outcomes are also completely mesmerized by the politics of climate policy not, again, the engineering, physics or economics of it.
Scots pine ‘could be wiped out by climate change’
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Jan 6, 2026
But more to the point is that the tree thrives in places where the climate is much drier and where summer are much hotter than in Scotland, including Siberia:
Questioning European Green
Berlin Blackout Shows Germany’s $5 Trillion Green Scheme Is “Left-Green Ideological Pipe Dream”
A Fundamental Lesson from the Terrorist Attack on Berlin’s Power Grid
By Prof. Fritz Vahrenholt, Vai P Gosselin, No Tricks Zone, Jan 8, 2026
“In the greed for energy, the earth is drained, sucked dry, burned, maltreated, scorched, raped, destroyed. Entire regions are rendered uninhabitable by the heat. They simply burn. Or habitats disappear under floods or due to rising sea levels. Shutting down fossil fuel power plants is manual labor.”
Except for the last sentence, one could read similar formulations in the party conference resolutions of the German Greens, the Left, and the SPD social democrats. The sentence “Entire regions are rendered uninhabitable by the heat” even comes from a UN report from 2022.
This is the worst possible time to double down on net zero
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Jan 5, 2026
From the Telegraph
“There are two big problems. To start with, under the weight of sky-high energy prices and green regulations, British industry is in full-scale collapse.
Over the last year, we learned that British car production had fallen back to levels last seen in the 1950s and the Mineral Products Association reported that cement production had fallen to levels from 70 years ago.
Scotland’s Grangemouth oil refinery, the oldest in the UK, stopped production and half the steel industry had to be rescued by the Government to stop it from closing down completely.
Overall, Britain has fallen out of the top 10 manufacturing nations in the world, overtaken by the likes of Mexico and Russia.
A rational government would be treating that as a national emergency and working out what it could do to rescue what little industry we still have left. Instead, we will start piling yet more costs and extra levies and targets on the few companies that have managed to keep operating.”
Think tank IREF: ‘Against All Rationality, the EU Persists in its Net-Zero Delusion’
The European Commission has approved a new step towards its 2050 ‘net-zero’ objective, targeting a 90% reduction in net greenhouse gas emissions relative to 1990 levels by 2040. But a recent report by the French think tank IREF (Institut de Recherches Économiques et Fiscales) delivers a sobering reality check.
By Staff, Clintel Foundation, Jan 2, 2026
[SEPP Comment: The article is in English; the report is in French.]
Questioning Green Elsewhere
Africa’s Pipeline Rejects Climate Dogma and Foreign Control
By Vijay Jayaraj, CO2 Coalition, Jan 8, 2026
The project will make Dangote’s refinery in Lagos one of the world’s largest single-site refining operations, growing from a current 650,000 barrels per day (bpd) to 1.4 million bpd by 2028.
This sends a terrifying signal to the climate czars that the developing world is waking up. Leaders like President Mnangagwa and industrialists like Dangote are realizing that the “Green Energy Transition” is a luxury good—likely a bogus one—they cannot afford. They are choosing the path of India and China—rapid industrialization fueled by whatever works. And what works, undeniably at this time, are fossil fuels.
New York Business Community Starting To Wake Up About The Coming Energy Train Wreck
By Francis Mention, Manhattan Contrarian, Jan 9, 2026
One product of their efforts was what we call the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act (CLCPA), enacted in July 2019. The point of the CLCPA was to have New York State rescue the climate and save the planet, which supposedly was going to be accomplished by imposing mandates for eliminating hydrocarbon fuels from the energy system of this one little state. It seems that nobody had pointed out to the very earnest legislators that New York represents only a small fraction of 1% of world CO2 emissions, the total elimination of which would barely be noticed in the overall world carbon balance.
Well, here we are in 2026 — 7 years down and only 4 to go toward the 70×30 mandate — and we have made almost no progress in “de-carbonizing” the electricity system. It is obvious to any thinking person that the 70×30 mandate has become a joke (to the extent that that was not obvious from the outset). But there is the mandate written in black and white in a statute. Is anything to be done?
Non-Green Jobs
Dismantlement of South Africa’s Ferrochrome Industry
By Lars Schernikau and Vijay Jayaraj, CO2 Coalition, Jan 8, 2026
South Africa’s once dominant ferrochrome industry is on the brink of collapse and requires a government bailout. That decline is not because the world no longer needs ferrochrome. It is because South Africa’s leaders tied their industrial policy to a “green” agenda that undermines reliable, affordable energy and sacrifices economic strength.
The Political Games Continue
Labour’s net zero ministers accused of hypocrisy after globe-trotting six times
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Jan 4, 2026
Litigation Issues
5 climate court battles to watch in 2026
By Lesley Clark, E&E News, Jan 6, 2026
The Sierra Club said in a recent report that repealing the Obama-era [Endangerment] finding would expose polluters to “significant common-law liability” because EPA would no longer be authorized to address interstate greenhouse gas emissions.
Cap-and-Trade and Carbon Taxes
EU Arms Its Next CO₂ Weapon
At what point will civil society pull the plug on a policy that systematically extracts its economic base?
By Thomas Kolbe, American Thinker, Jan 9, 2026
Following the increase of the tonnage price under the EU Emissions Trading System (EU-ETS) from €55 to €65, the European Commission under Ursula von der Leyen has struck again. Since the start of the year, importers in the EU are subject to the so-called Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM). This mechanism effectively extends the European emissions trading system to foreign trade.
Subsidies and Mandates Forever
40% Of Electricity Generation Is Now Subsidized
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Jan 6, 2026
It is no wonder that electricity prices are so high. But worse still is that these subsidies disrupt the whole operation of the market.
Energy Issues – General
“Should LCOE finally be retired from energy policy?”
By Robert Bradley Jr., Master Resource, Jan 7, 2026
Link to: 91% of New Renewable Projects Now Cheaper Than Fossil Fuels Alternatives
Press Release, International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA), July 22, 2025
Link to report: Renewable Power Generation Costs in 2024
The latest cost analysis from IRENA shows that renewables continued to represent the most cost-competitive source of new electricity generation in 2024.
By Staff, International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA), July 22, 2025
Why boosting production of Venezuela’s ‘very dense, very sloppy’ oil could harm the environment
By Steven Grattan, AP, Via The Hill, Jan 9, 2026
[SEPP Comment: Similar to oil sands of Canada. Venezuela’s vast oil reserves are in oil sands, a mix of sand, clay, water, and bitumen (a heavy, thick form of petroleum that doesn’t flow easily). Once a competent producer of oil, the country’s oil company became politicized and incompetent.]
Energy Issues – Europe
Electrical equipment shortage threatens net zero, Hitachi warns Ed Miliband
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Jan 4, 2026
From the Telegraph:
Transformer capacity is measured in megavolt-amperes (MVA), with the UK currently boasting a capacity of about 170,000MVA.
By 2035, that will have to reach up to 280,000MVA – a two thirds increase – with even more needed by 2050.
That’s an unprecedented increase – and Britain’s problem is that its plans to expand and update its transmission network have coincided with everyone else’s across Europe.
Britain’s Surging Reliance on Gas Deals Fresh Blow to Miliband Net Zero Hopes
By Will Jones, The Daily Sceptic, Jan 8, 2026
“This stemmed largely from reduced nuclear output across Britain, as the country’s nine remaining reactors were hit by technical faults and unplanned blackouts.”
Energy Issues – Australia
Next door’s wind farm can stop you building a home on your own land
By Jo Nova, Her Blog, Jan 8, 2026
Proposed regulation
Energy Issues — US
Chris Wright Talks Commonsense
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Jan 9, 2026
The US finally as an Energy Secretary, who has worked in the energy sector for years.
It’s a shame we are stuck with Miliband:
[SEPP Comment: Video – Massive growth in money invested in electricity but no growth in productivity of electricity. Government green programs are deindustrializing their countries.]
Energy Policy Must Answer to Reality, Not Rhetoric
By Terry L. Headley, Real Clear Energy, Jan 8, 2026
West Virginia deserves energy policy that respects the people who live here, the workers who power the system, and the realities that cannot be legislated away. It deserves analysis that will still make sense five, ten, and twenty years from now—after slogans fade and consequences arrive.
Natural Gas Is More Important and Cleaner Than Most Americans Realize
By Timothy Nash , Anthony Storer , Bob Thomas , Tom Rastin, Real Clear Energy, Jan 8, 2026
National gas[oline] price average to fall to around $3 per gallon
By Jordan Perkins, The Hill, Jan 6, 2025
Link to forecast: GasBuddy: Yearly Average Gas Prices to Fall Below $3 in 2026 — Lowest Since 2020
By GasBuddy, January 6, 2026
Washington’s Control of Energy
Why the U.S. Senate Must Soon Pass the SPEED Act and the MRCA of 2025
By The Editors, Real Clear Energy, Jan 7, 2026
SPEED slashes the red tape insanity that is blocking energy and climate progress: “To amend the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 to clarify ambiguous provisions and facilitate a more efficient, effective, and timely environmental review process.”
MRCA is critical to ensure that we can leverage our vast domestic natural resource base to build the mineral supply chains required for energy, economic, and national security.
The story behind Trump’s order halting Virginia offshore wind
By Collister Johnson, CFACT, Jan 3, 2026
However, the location of Virginia Wind off the coast of the Norfolk Naval Base violated the preexisting Navy reports. Accordingly, the Construction and Operations Plan (COP), approved by the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) for Virginia Wind, required Dominion Energy to enter into a series of “mitigation agreements” with the Navy to ameliorate its national security objections. But because BOEM knew that the Navy might not agree to these mitigation measures, it included in the COP a provision which stated that BOEM “reserved the right … in its sole discretion” to override these concerns.
Nuclear Energy and Fears
Meta strikes deals with three nuclear energy companies
By Julia Shapero, The Hill, Jan 9, 2026
Meta’s agreement with TerraPower will support the development of two of the company’s Natrium units, which can produce up to 690 megawatts of power, in addition to giving the Facebook parent access to another 2.1 gigawatts from six other units.
The Oklo deal aims to boost the development of its advanced nuclear energy campus, which is meant to add up to 1.2 gigawatts of power to the grid, while the Vistra deal secures 2.1 gigawatts from the firm’s existing plants in Ohio and Pennsylvania.
“There’s been a lot of words that these AI data centers, this growing demand for power, it’s going to drive up the price of electricity,” [Energy Secretary Chris] Wright said. “I will tell you the reality is the opposite.”
Alternative, Green (“Clean”) Solar and Wind
Miliband’s solar blitz to cover farmland as large as Bedfordshire
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Jan 9, 2026
“A push by the Energy Secretary to hit net zero targets means solar panels will cover up to 100,800 hectares of countryside by 2030, a similar landmass to the ceremonial county in eastern England.”
Significantly, solar power has barely produced anything so far today, maybe because so many solar farms are covered in snow!
[SEPP Comment: About 250,000 acres, 390 square miles, or 1008 square km of solar panels at a latitude about the same as the southern Hudson Bay, where the sun shines bright?]
Gloomy Outlook For Solar Power!
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Jan 5, 2026
Offshore wind turbines steal each other’s wind: yields greatly overestimated
The energy yields of offshore wind turbines are overestimated by up to 50% in national policy documents. This conclusion is based on an analysis of operational data from 72 wind farms.
By Bert Weteringe, CLINTEL, Dec 30, 2025
Link to paper: A theoretical upper limit for offshore wind energy extraction
By Carlos Simão Ferreira. Cell Reports Sustainability, Nov 24, 2025
From paper highlights:
- Defines the aerodynamic upper limit of offshore wind energy production
- Validated with 72 offshore wind farms over 420 cumulative operational years
- National policy targets overestimate energy production output by up to 50%
- Provides a simple tool usable across disciplines to set realistic targets
Scotland’s Biggest Offshore Wind Farm Wasting Three Quarters of Energy
By Will Jones, The Daily Sceptic, Jan 7, 2026 [H/t Bernie Kepshire]
Claire Coutinho, the Shadow Energy Secretary, blamed Ed Miliband, the Energy Secretary, for overseeing a system that is becoming unaffordable.
“What other sector do we pay people not to produce anything? We’re spending £1 billion switching wind farms off today, but thanks to Ed Miliband’s mad dash for renewables, we’ll be spending £8 billion by 2030,” she said.
“We simply cannot afford an approach that makes our energy system higher cost and less productive. Cheap, reliable energy must come first.”
Save LBI Says Offshore Wind Projects Grossly Underestimate Harm to Marine Mammals, Challenges NOAA to “Prove Us Wrong” with a Focused Monitoring Program
By Bob Stern, WUWT, Jan 6, 2026
Save LBI has also asked NOAA in a formal 11-page technical critique of its proposed monitoring standards to define and require a specific monitoring program that will either verify the assumptions and calculations in its Take estimation methods or, if not, revise those methods. Existing regulations require the agency to verify
Alternative, Green (“Clean”) Energy — Other
Bring no pine logs hither?
By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, Jan 7, 2026
A Bloomberg feature begins “In the dark, chilly winter months, it’s not uncommon to walk down one of London’s more affluent residential streets without noticing the smell of wood smoke. Bittersweet and pungent, the odor typically comes from an appliance that has become the epitome of British middle-class aspiration: the wood-burning stove.”
Alternative, Green (“Clean”) Energy — Storage
Battery Storage Fire in Warwick, NY: A Repeat Incident
By StacheD [sic] Training, WUWT, Jan 4, 2026
[SEPP Comment: 6-minute video gives important details to the battery storage. High winds and rain were involved in both fires.]
Can’t anybody here play this game… again?
By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, Jan 7, 2026
Oh dear, right? It matters? Apparently not, because Moss Landing had a history of such fires. Moreover:
“Back here in New York, my March 2024 post reported on no fewer than three major fires at grid battery storage facilities in this state that had taken place during 2023…”
And these are serious fires, that do massive damage and burn for days. If you get one, your storage facility can’t store anything but toxic waste. So why are such things being hailed as a solution not raised as a major problem? After all, it’s not getting better:
Alternative, Green (“Clean”) Vehicles
EV Sales End Year Way Below Target
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Jan 9, 2026
The two biggest EV sellers are Tesla and BYD, with EV sales of 45000 and 51000 respectively. Their combined “surplus” equates to 69000, worth £10 billion at £15000 a pop.
UK Van Production Down 10%, As ZEV Targets Bite
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Jan 9, 2026
It seems likely that manufacturers are cutting back diesel production in order to avoid ZEV fines.
Chinese EV Buyer Beware!!
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Jan 6, 2026
6-minute video
London’s congestion charge: End of free ride for electric vehicles
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Jan 8, 2026
Carbon Schemes
CLAIM: Efficient method to capture carbon dioxide from the atmosphere developed
By Anthony Watts, WUWT, Jan 3, 2026
Link to paper: Direct Air Capture: Recyclability and Exceptional CO2 Uptake Using a Superbase
By Zahra Eshaghi Gorji, et al., Environmental Science & Technology, Dec 4, 2025
California Dreaming
Reversing California’s Policies of Scarcity
By Edward Ring, What’s Current/ Accessed Jan 9, 2026
This means that during a month that included an impressive deluge of harvestable runoff, of the 2,018,924-acre feet that flowed into the delta, 311,819 was harvested into our two major southbound aqueducts, and 1,707,105 flowed through to the ocean. That is, while torrential rain pummeled the entire state, causing high water and flooding from headwaters to estuaries, the powers that manage the delta pumps only managed to retain 15.4 percent of that water for farmers and urban users. [Boldface added]
Politically contrived scarcity is not sustainable. It violates every goal that progressives along with conservatives tend to agree on, even if they disagree on the means to achieve them: sustainability, opportunity, resilience, affordability, and abundance. Until we have viable, competitive alternatives, we need to pump more water, and we need to pump more gasoline. To deny these facts is to deny reality.
A Very Moist California
By Cliff Mass, Weather Blog, Jan 4, 2026
Currently, ALL the California reservoirs are at above-normal levels, some at much above normal levels.
You would think the media and climate pundits would be happy with this water bounty.
But no, many outlets can not give up on the climate change impacts angle and are now pushing the “weather whiplash” and “hygrometeorological whiplash” angles.
BELOW THE BOTTOM LINE
Berlin’s Terror-Blackout Enters 4th Day As Tens Of Thousands Suffer In Cold Without Heat!
By P Gosselin, No Tricks Zone, Jan 6, 2026
A far-left extremist group known as the “Vulkangruppe” (Volcano Group) has claimed responsibility — again — stating they targeted the infrastructure to protest “the fossil fuel economy” and the rising energy demands of AI data centers.
Climate Terrorism: Militant left activists use grid arson to blackout 45,000 Berlin homes in midwinter
By Jo Nova, Her Blog, Jan 5, 2026
Psychologists do mass survey of climate messages only to find nothing “opened wallets”
By Jo Nova, Her Blog, Jan 7, 2026
Link to: Climate messaging sways minds, not wallets, regardless of political party
By Tom Fleischman, Phys.org, Jan 5, 2026
Link to paper: A registered report megastudy on the persuasiveness of the most-cited climate messages
By Jan G. Voelkel, et al., Nature Climate Change, Jan 5, 2026
From Phys.org: Questions included: “Do you think that the world’s temperature probably has been going up over the past 100 years, or do you think this probably has not been happening?” and “How serious a problem is climate change?”
[SEPP Comment: A biased study]
Church of England orders parish to rip out brand new gas boilers
By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, Jan 4, 2026
From the Telegraph
“Christ Church Chineham, in Basingstoke, Hants, spent £18,200 last year replacing two failing gas boilers, with the new ones expected to last for at least two decades.
But the parish will now be forced to remove the system and pay for an eco-friendly replacement after a church court ruled it had not “adequately explored more sustainable options” before installing them.”
ARTICLES
No Articles This Week
In these round-ups one notices a particular name again and again. The gift that keeps taking.
Miliband energy quango in conflict-of-interest row over National Grid shares
Electrical equipment shortage threatens net zero, Hitachi warns Ed Miliband
Britain’s Surging Reliance on Gas Deals Fresh Blow to Miliband Net Zero Hopes
Miliband’s solar blitz to cover farmland as large as Bedfordshire
Understatement of the year? “It’s a shame we are stuck with Miliband”.
Miliband ‘to miss net zero targets by 15 years’
Ed Miliband is at risk of missing his clean power target by more than a decade amid delays to building wind farms and the closure of Britain’s ageing nuclear power stations… – DT
Your Country Needs £4.5Trillion
“… sparked outrage … the US[A]’s utter isolation from the global effort [sic] …”
Fog in the Atlantic, ‘global effort’ cut off
Oh dear. I wonder how many heads that will whooosh over. Nice one, though.
Trying that once again: Fog in the ‘Global Effort’, America et al. cut off
Are having a spring special for scarecrow repairs?
RRrrrr you a pirate, matey?
Story Tip:
Massacring the boreal forest to address nonexistent climate change:
Sinking trees in Arctic Ocean could remove 1 billion tonnes of CO2
I love to play with big numbers, too. Big numbers must mean big effects, right?
“…the Hunga Tonga–Hunga Haʻapai eruption in 2022 that put about 150 million tons of sea water into the stratosphere …”
But then you run into really BIG numbers, like: The average daily precipitation on the Earth’s surface is about 1.3 Trillion tons! (Mostly from, and into, the oceans.)
So, HT-HH really added 0.001% to one day’s rainfall! Measure that with a thermometer a couple years later!
My scientific understanding is that rainfall and snowfall (aka precipitation) occur in a downward direction . . . that is from higher in the troposphere to lower in the troposphere, and never upward from the troposphere into the stratosphere.
Perhaps I have it all wrong?
Back to basics.
GHE theory says that without it Earth becomes 33 C cooler, an average 255 K, -18 C, ball of ice.
Wrong.
Without the GHE Earth would have no water vapor, clouds, snow, ice, oceans or 30% albedo becoming much like the Moon, a barren rock ball 400 K lit side, 100 K dark.
TFK_bams09 heat balance graphic uses the same 63 twice violating GAAP & calculates out of thin air a 396 BB/333 “back”/63 net GHE radiative forcing loop violating LoT 1 & 2.
Wrong.
Likewise, the ubiquitous plethora of clones.
GHE theory requires Earth to radiate “extra” GHE energy as a thermodynamic black body.
Wrong.
A BB requires all the energy leaving the system to do so by radiation. TFK_bams09 shows 60% of the surface energy upwelling by kinetic modes, i.e. conduction, convection, advection and latent there by rendering BB impossible.
Thank you for that. I am sure there are other differences (gravity, mainly, retaining the atmosphere) but it never occurred to me that the moon provides a nice simple proxy for what the Earth would be like without an atmosphere to retain heat.
While generally true, the proxy of the Moon in comparison to an airless Earth is not so simple: a single day on the Moon, from sunrise to sunrise (a solar day), lasts about 29.5 Earth days, meaning approximately 14 Earth days of sunlight followed by 14 Earth days of darkness, due to the Moon being tidal-locked with Earth.
No shit Sherlock. I never would have known if you hadn’t pointed it out. But I see you left out Earthshine and its warming effect on the moon. You’ll have to do better next time to enter the Pedantic Hall of Fame.
You are welcome.
I am confused by this sentence under the first sub-topic, IPCC & UNFCCC, in the above article in the first paragraph that follows the quoted excerpts from Trump’s memorandum:
“The non-UN organizations include the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) which . . .”
A Web search yields this response from Google’s AI overview when asked if the IPCC is part of the UN:
“Yes, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is a body of the United Nations (UN), established by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) to provide governments with scientific assessments on climate change. It serves as the UN’s primary scientific authority on climate change, producing reports that inform international climate policy and negotiations.”
The real purpose if the IPCC is to provide the UN a scientific justification for the distribution of doner funds, via the UNFCC and the UN COP, from the rich counties to the poor countries to help them cope with the alleged harmful effects of global warming and climate change. At COP30, the poor countries came clamoring not for billings but trillions of funds. Unfortunately for the poor countries, they left the conference empty handed with no pledges of large amounts of funds from the really rich countries.
Utter bilge.
For a start, ENSO just moves heat the ocean and the atmosphere, back and forth, it is not a cause of long-term warming any more than it is a cause of long-term cooling. That’s why it’s called an “oscillation”. The long-term trend in the ENSO Index is zero; in UAH it’s +0.16C per decade warming.
Secondly, not only does the IPCC not “downplay” the role of ENSO, it explicitly acknowledges it!
This explains a lot about the current state of academia
https://x.com/skepticaliblog/status/2010611103492145493
More assumption presented as fact.