Green waste - by Richard... Saturday, March 27, 2010

Green waste - by Richard... Saturday, March 27, 2010

American Thinker tells a tale of woe about the costs of "green" energy ... but then look at the advert:

Wind energy is an especially good choice when investing in green power because it is one of the cheapest and cleanest renewable energy sources available and it does not produce air pollution. The world continues to watch to see how successful these "wind farms" are going to be when put to the test of powering larger grids. If early indications are any hint, wind will literally take the world by storm and be one of the premier energy sources for the entire world.

For a minimum of $10,000, you too can have a slice of the action (results not guaranteed).

COMMENT THREAD - CLIMATE CHANGE

Print ready

A co-ordinated counter-offensive - by Richard...

"One regrettable mistake about glaciers doesn't alter the vast evidence there is of climate change," says Rajendra Pachauri in an authored piece in The Guardian, in what is obviously part of a concerted charm offensive, with The Times and The Independent carrying long, self-serving interviews. 

In The Guardian though, Pachauri tells us that, "To dismiss the implications of climate change based on an error about the rate at which Himalayan glaciers are melting is an act of astonishing intellectual legerdemain." 

If true, that would be the case. But it isn't. The errors are multiple and grievous, which collectively completely undermine the authority of the IPCC and thus the case made for climate change. But it is part of the damage limitation strategy adopted by Pachauri and the warmists in general to admit to "Galciergate" but then to contain it, sticking firmly to the "one small mistake" fiction.

The other parts of the strategy are to attack the more dangerous criticism, launch a series of stitched-up inquiries on "climategate", which will find that there was nothing wrong at all, to smear the "deniers" by characterising them as Big Oil shills and to set the lawyers to work. 

A certain newspaper, which shall have to remain nameless, got a very long letter from a firm that is known in the trade as "Carter-Fuck", from a certain Rajendra Pachauri, complaining about a campaign against him that is "damaging his reputation" (which, of course, was the intention).

As a spoiler, it will prevent any interventions in the ongoing charm offensive, while the likes ofThe Times ("Quality journalism has never mattered as much as it does today") can be relied upon to swallow the spin.

And, in a bid for victimhood, Rajendra tells his Guardian audience that he "sincerely" hopes "the world is not witnessing a new form of persecution of those who defy conventional ignorance and pay a terrible price for their scientifically valid beliefs."

"The IPCC will continue to learn from experience, including criticism of its work," he then says. And indeed it has. Having discovered that the sceptics are far more dangerous than they realised, and that its work can be so easily taken apart, they have devised a co-ordinated counter-offensive, part of which we are seeing today.

COMMENT THREAD - CLIMATE CHANGE

Print ready

The US goes down the European road - by Richard...

The celebration at the apparent demise of US plans to introduce cap and trade, as heralded by The New York Times, looks to be a tad premature.

In that context, the NYT headline, "'Cap and Trade' Loses Its Standing as Energy Policy of Choice", is more than a little misleading. 

Although it certainly seems to be the case that the "big bang" scheme, covering all major economic enterprises, has been put on hold, the concept most certainly has not been abandoned by the Obama administration. Rather, it seems – and perhaps learning from the European experience – that the current plan is to phase in the system, starting with the utilities.

The huge political reaction to the original plans, in fact, mirrors the European experience, where it was intended that the European Trading Scheme (ETS) would apply to utilities and to the major energy-using manufacturing sector. 

The response of industrial leaders, however, was to threaten to offshore their plants. The EU commission backed off from forcing them to buy "credits" (or EUAs), instead giving them free allowances. Since this coincided with the recession, the carbon dioxide quotas more than covered the emissions. Many enterprises were able to sell surplus credits, giving them an unintended financial boost, and thereby neutralising political opposition.

The European scheme, therefore, has ended up appling only to the utilities – the electricity generators. This is one sector which cannot move offshore and is less concerned about cost impositions. It has a large consumer base and can spread the costs thinly, so that no one really notices.

But, where the Europeans have arrived by accident, the US seems to be aiming as a matter of deliberate policy. That plan, still being written – we are told by the NYT - "will include a cap on greenhouse gas emissions only for utilities, at least at first, with other industries phased in perhaps years later." 

The paper follows this with the rhetorical, "Why did cap and trade die?" But the fact is that cap and trade is not dead. European-style, it is just being phased in more slowly than originally intended. In due course, the EU will also bring the other industries fully into the ETS.

Furthermore, if UK experience is any guide, it will not stop there. This April, a heavily-disguised "phase two" of cap and trade is to start. Misleadingly labelled the "CRC Energy Efficiency Scheme", this – as we pointed out in an earlier post - moves cap and trade downstream, into the light manufacturing, retail and service sectors, still by-passing the major manufacturers.

This UK scheme is ahead of the core ETS scheme, but borrows from its structures. It could very well turn out to be a test-best for the next stage of the ETS, to be introduced by the EU commission in all member states when the glitches have been ironed out.

There are also further developments in the wind. The Conservative Party recently floated the idea of a floor price for "carbon" with a levy imposed on credits when the market price dropped below a pre-set level. This is another ratchet, which brings cap and trade closer to its original intentions – and we could see more of this idea.

If then Obama and his advisors are shadowing European experience – as seems to be the case – US cap and trade is very far from dead. The president instead is adopting European strategies, namely policy by stealth and engrenage, loosely translated as "salami slicing".

The really big, immediate danger is the current low prices of gas in the US, and an intention by the utilities to increase the use of gas for electricity generation. In this environment, the imposition of a cap and trade scheme on them, with the current low price of carbon, might encounter little opposition. The end costs to individual consumers would be slight and hidden by the drop in gas prices.

However, it will have enabled Obama to set a precedent. Using the engrenage strategy, cap and trade can then be rolled out to cover other sectors, going deeper and wider until the original objective is achieved. The plan, therefore, survives. All that has changed is a recognition that it will take a little longer.

And that this is the case should not come as a surprise. US cap and trade is a glittering, trillion-dollar prize on which all the warmists' long-term plans rely. They are not going to give it up without a struggle.

COMMENT THREAD - CLIMATE CHANGE

Print ready

A new blog on the block - by Richard... Friday, March 26, 2010

Rarely does one use the words "an exciting new venture" – they don't come easy from a jaundiced old cynic such as this writer. But to have Norman "Polecat" Tebitt front a new venture which aims to be a right-wing UK version of Huffington Post does have a certain attraction, and it could be quite fun.

Called Critical Reaction, it launched quietly last Wednesday, and will build up over term as it recruits a galaxy of writers and commentators, including this jaundiced old cynic.

The plan is also to have a group blog, which could be very interesting, especially if it does the sort of job that Conservative Home set out to do, but does no longer – offer a commentary on conservative (rather than the not-the-Conservative-Party) affairs.

Anyhow, a publication that lets yours truly loose on its pages has to be all good – or bad, depending on your point of view - so we'll keep an eye on it and report what it has to say from time to time.

COMMENT THREAD

Print ready

Slowly deflating - by Richard...

"European Union leaders are cooling on their ambition to fight global warming, leaving a key greenhouse-gas emissions reduction target out of a draft statement prepared for a summit on Friday, internal documents show." 

So said Earth Times - typically referring to this weekend's European Council as a "summit", unable like so many to come to grips with the basic institutional structure of the EU.

That aside, it noted that the EU had already pledged to cut emissions to 20 percent below 1990 levels by 2020, and to deepen the cut to 30 percent if other rich nations made "comparable" efforts. 

But, we were told, a draft "summit" declaration on long-term economic planning seen by the German Press Agency dpa set as the EU's goal for 2020 "reducing greenhouse-gas emissions by 20 percent compared to 1990 levels," but had no reference to the 30 percent goal.

Then we learned that, "at the eleventh hour", our brave leaders have agreed to reinstate this "key goal". The blockage had come from the Italians and Cypriots, who somehow had residual objections to committing economic suicide.

However, all this is a far cry from the heady days of 2007 when Rajendra Pachauri was sweeping all before him, and the green agenda was conquering the world. Slowly, almost imperceptibly, it is dawning on the political élites that their global warming scam is no longer a runner. 

It is struggling to get on the agenda and, if past experience is any guide, the tactic will be to talk about it less and less, until the issue is parked and forgotten.

And what is happening on the international stage is being replicated at local level. In an important but much neglected survey highlighted by the left-wing blog Left Foot Forward, it is clear that UK political parties are failing to convince the electorate that any of them have a distinctive voice on the environment.

Lib-Dims apart, who still have ambitions of making climate change an electoral issue, the Tories and Labour will be doing their best to avoid green issues during the election campaign – paying lip-service to the theme while avoiding anything that will upset the voters.

For, while the science is no longer "settled" – not that it ever was – in the popular mind the issue certainly is. The overwhelming sentiment is that it is a tax-raising "scam", part of the continuum of dishonesty perpetrated by self-serving politicians who are concerned only to line their own pockets. Interest is evaporating - it is just another political scam to add to the rest.

No wonder the greenies are beginning to panic, pouring out reports about how to deal with the "sceptics". They have lost it. They don't know how or why, and have yet to come to terms with the fact that they are not going to get back to the good old days. The bubble has not burst - it's not going to be like that. It is slowly deflating.

COMMENT THREAD - CLIMATE CHANGE

Print ready

A masterpiece - by Richard...

Gerald Warner on his blog ...

Three former Labour cabinet ministers are caught touting for lobbying jobs, Samantha Cameron is expecting a baby – and still the polls get worse for the Tories. Why? Because the electorate doesn't give a damn, that's why. Cameron gave a good reply to the Budget, whine the baffled ones, but it doesn't seem to have helped. Of course it hasn't helped because only a few pathetic anoraks know or care about it.

Do they think the public watches the Parliament Channel? What Joe Public sees is a 30-second clip on the evening news. He sees the interior of the Commons chamber – and that is, literally, a turn-off. He sees two men he detests as the leaders of rival gangs of corruption-mongers shouting at each other – and he is suffused with loathing.

When are they going to get it? No normal person in Britain has the slightest identification with what happens in Parliament. Journalists lunch and dine with MPs and ministers; they are on Christian name terms; they rely on them for "stories"; they take on, like chameleons, their interests, their views, their priorities, which are utterly alien to the rest of the nation. 

The demented notion that news that a party leader's wife is expecting a baby is supposed to have the loyal tenants dancing in the streets, suddenly oblivious to the threats to their jobs and houses, raises a pertinent question: are these commentators completely sane?

Savour every word ... treasure them. There will not be a better piece written on the state of contemporary politics. "Most Tories hate David Cameron and cannot wait to see him crash and burn," says Warner. Too right. Vote for change, I say ... vote ABC: Anyone But Cameron.

COMMENT THREAD

Print ready

The long goodbye - by Richard...

The Times and The Sunday Times will start charging for their websites from June. Readers will be offered a day's use for £1, or £2 for a week's subscription. Readers who have a seven-day subscription to the print editions will not be charged extra for access to the websites. 

The two titles will launch new websites in early May, separating their digital presence for the first time and replacing the existing site. There will be a free trial period and payment will allow access to both websites.

Rebekah Brooks, chief executive of News International, said: "At a defining moment for journalism, this is a crucial step towards making the business of news an economically exciting proposition. We are proud of our journalism and unashamed to say that we believe it has value."

Byeeeeeee ...

COMMENT THREAD