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A project of CFACT Left-wing Env. Scientist Bails Out Of Global Warming Movement: Declares it a 'corrupt social phenomenon...strictly an imaginary problem of the 1st World middleclass' http://www.climatedepot.com/a/7477/Leftwing-Env-Scientist-Bails-Out-Of-Global-Warming-Movement-Declares-it-a-corrupt-social-phenomenonstrictly-an-imaginary-problem-of-the-1st-World-middleclass Exclusive New Video: Calls cap-and-trade an 'horrendous scam' -- Joins other left of center scientific and activist dissenters Monday, July 26, 2010By Marc Morano – Climate Depot Physicist Dr. Denis Rancourt, a former professor and environmental science researcher at the University of Ottawa, has officially bailed out of the man-made global warming movement. In a hard-hitting and exclusive new exclusive video just released by Climate Depot, Dr. Rancourt declares that the entire man-made global warming movement is nothing more than a “corrupt social phenomenon.” “It is as much psychological and social phenomenon as anything else,” Rancourt, who has published peer-reviewed research, explained in a June 8, 2010 essay. (Rancourt's email: claude.cde@gmail.com) Watch Rancourt video here. “I argue that by far the most destructive force on the planet is power-driven financiers and profit-driven corporations and their cartels backed by military might; and that the global warming myth is a red herring that contributes to hiding this truth. In my opinion, activists who, using any justification, feed the global warming myth have effectively been co-opted, or at best neutralized,” Rancourt said. “Global warming is strictly an imaginary problem of the First World middleclass,” he stated. Environmental censorship Rancourt's dissent on man-made climate fears has not set well with many of his fellow green friends. “When I tell environmental activists that global warming is not something to be concerned about, they attack me -- they shun me, they do not allow me to have my materials published in their magazines,” Rancourt explained to Climate Depot. Rancourt bluntly examines why his fellow environmentalists are wrapped up in promoting climate alarm. (Note: Rancourt also ridicules environmental concern over acid rain and the ozone hole. See below) “They look for comfortable lies that they can settle into and alleviate the guilt they feel about being on privileged end of the planet -- a kind of survivors guilt. A lot of these environmentalists are guilt laden individuals who need to alleviate the guilt without taking risks,” he said. “They are weekend activists...looking for lies to hitch onto.” “The modern environmental move has hijacked itself by looking for an excuse to stay comfortable and stay away from actual battle. Ward Churchill has called this pacifism as pathology,” he explained. “If you are really concerned about saving world's forests or habitat destruction, then fight against habitat destruction, don't go off in tenuous thing about co2 concentration in the atmosphere. Actually address the question; otherwise you are weakening your effect as an activist.” Gore's film makes him 'ill' Rancourt openly expresses his hostility for former Vice President Al Gore's 2006 documentary “An Inconvenient Truth.” “I felt ill walking out of the theatre. It's terrible. It does not respect the intelligence of the viewer. The film does not acknowledge people can think for themselves at all,” Rancourt said. Rancourt lamented how “environmentalists could just gobble this up and agree with [Gore's film] in a non critical fashion.” Gore “strikes me as someone working for someone -- as someone who will financially benefit from this. He does not give me impression of someone who genuinely cares about environmental or social justice. Rancourt spared no mercy for the embattled UN IPCC. The scientists are “named by governments, they are scientists who accept to serve a political role. Their mission is to write a report” that “is meant to be used by government. Their goal is find a conclusion...it is a political process.” [Editor's Note: Climate Depot's Executive Editor Marc Morano appeared on Dr. Denis Rancourt's Radio Show for One Hour in May 2010: Morano: The global warming narrative...was total bunko, it was a con job...a scientific scandal of the highest order'] Carbon trading is 'an horrendous scam' Rancourt is also very critical of proposed global warming carbon trading or cap-and-trade. “Someone is going to make a lot of money from these schemes. I have great distrust for it. It is not motivated by true concern for social justice and the environment. It can only be about powerful financiers. I see it as an horrendous scam,” Rancourt said, adding he “I completely agree” with UK environmental guru James Lovelock who called carbon trading “verging on a gigantic scam.” But it is his fellow University professors that Rancourt has the least amount of patience with. “They are all virtually all service intellectuals. They will not truly critique, in a way that could threaten the power interests that keep them in their jobs. The tenure track is just a process to make docile and obedient intellectuals that will then train other intellectuals,” Rancourt said. “You have this army of university scientists and they have to pretend like they are doing important research without ever criticizing the powerful interests in a real way. So what do they look for, they look for elusive sanitized things like acid rain, global warming,” he added. This entire process “helps to neutralize any kind of dissent,” according to Rancourt. “When you do find something bad, you quickly learn and are told you better toe the line on this -- your career depends on it,” Rancourt said. Some Key Excerpts from Denis Rancourt: Left-wing Env. Scientist & Physicist Dr. Denis Rancourt: Some Big Lies of Science – June 2010 Rancourt Excerpt: Environmental scientists naively and knowingly work hand in hand with finance-corporate shysters, mainstream media, politicians, and state and international bureaucrats to mask real problems and to create profit opportunities for select power elites...I exposed the global warming cooptation scam in an essay that Alexander Cockburn writing in The Nation called 'one of the best essays on greenhouse myth-making from a left perspective.' [...] My essay prompted David F. Noble to research the question and write The Corporate Climate Coup to expose how the media embrace followed the finance sector's realization of the unprecedented potential for revenues that going green could represent. [...] I argue that by far the most destructive force on the planet is power-driven financiers and profit-driven corporations and their cartels backed by military might; and that the global warming myth is a red herring that contributes to hiding this truth. In my opinion, activists who, using any justification, feed the global warming myth have effectively been co-opted, or at best neutralized.” “Global warming is strictly an imaginary problem of the First World middleclass.” Rancourt Ridicules Ozone Hole Claims: 'Do you know of anyone who has been killed by the ozone hole?' Rancourt Mocks Acid Rain Claims: As a physicist and Earth scientist turned environmental scientist, I could not find an example of a demonstrated negative impact on lakes or forests from acid rain. In my opinion, contrary to the repeated claims of the scientist authors, the research on acid rain demonstrates that acid rain could not possibly have been the problem' – I concluded it had been a fake problem. [...] Acid rain very, very similar to global warming. A Sanitized problem. What I found, researched from the 1950's on and I concluded that is had been a fake problem. The effect on lake acidity from acid rain was so subtle so difficult to measure -- virtually impossible to measure [hype about acid rain was] at a period when forests being destroyed by real things. # Rancourt is not alone among left-of-center scientists and activists from dissenting on man-made global warming. (Excerpts from 2009 Environment & Public Works Committee Ranking Member Sen. James Inhofe speech) Sen. Inhofe: It is becoming increasingly clear that skepticism about man-made global warming fear is not a partisan left vs. right issue. In fact, many scientists and activists who are also progressive environmentalists believe climate fear promotion has "co-opted" or "hijacked" the green movement. In August 2009, the science of global warming was so tenuous that even activists at green festivals were expressing doubts over man-made climate fears. “One college professor, confided to me in private conversation that, 'I'm not sure climate change is real,'” according to a report from the New York Green Festival. The left-wing blog Huffington Post surprised many by featuring an article on January 3, 2009, by Harold Ambler, demanding an apology from Gore for promoting unfounded global warming fears. The Huffington Post article accused Gore of telling "the biggest whopper ever sold to the public in the history of humankind" because he claimed the science was settled on global warming. The Huffington Post article titled "Mr. Gore: Apology Accepted" adds, "It is Mr. Gore and his brethren who are flat-Earthers," not the skeptics. The Huffington Post article continues, "Let us neither cripple our own economy by mislabeling carbon dioxide a pollutant nor discourage development in the Third World, where suffering continues unabated, day after day." UK atmospheric scientist Richard Courtney, a left-of-political center socialist, is another dissenter of man-made climate fears. Courtney, a UN IPCC expert reviewer and a UK-based climate and atmospheric science consultant, is a self-described socialist who also happens to reject man-made climate fears. Courtney declared in 2008 that there is "no correlation between the anthropogenic emissions of GHG (greenhouse gases) and global temperature." Joining Courtney are many other progressive environmentalist scientists: Former Greenpeace member and Finnish scientist Dr. Jarl R. Ahlbeck, a lecturer of environmental technology and a chemical engineer at Abo Akademi University in Finland who has authored 200 scientific publications, is also skeptical of man-made climate doom. Ahlbeck wrote in 2008, "Contrary to common belief, there has been no or little global warming since 1995 and this is shown by two completely independent datasets. But so far, real measurements give no ground for concern about a catastrophic future warming." (LINK) Scientist and life-long liberal Democrat rejects climate fears Life-long liberal Democrat Dr. Martin Hertzberg, a retired Navy meteorologist with a PhD in physical chemistry, also declared his dissent of warming fears in 2008. "As a scientist and life-long liberal Democrat, I find the constant regurgitation of the anecdotal, fear mongering clap-trap about human-caused global warming to be a disservice to science," Hertzberg wrote. "The global warming alarmists don't even bother with data! All they have are half-baked computer models that are totally out of touch with reality and have already been proven to be false," Hertzberg added. (LINK) Ivy League Geologist Dr. Robert Giegengack, the former chair of Department of Earth and Environmental Science at the University of Pennsylvania, publicly announced he voted for Gore in 2000 and said he would do so again. But Giegengack does not agree with Gore's science views and states that global warming does not even qualify as one of the top ten ENVIRONMENTAL problems facing the world, let alone one of the top problems. "In terms of [global warming's] capacity to cause the human species harm, I don't think it makes it into the top 10," Giegengack said in an interview in the May/June 2007 issue of the Pennsylvania Gazette. (LINK) 'Intellectual blasphemy' Other liberal environmental scientists and activists are now joining Giegengack. Alexander Cockburn, a maverick journalist who leans left on most topics, lambasted the alleged global-warming consensus on the political Web site CounterPunch.org, arguing that there's no evidence yet that humans are causing the rise in global temperature. After publicly speaking to reject man-made warming fears, Cockburn wrote on February 22, 2008, "I have been treated as if I have committed intellectual blasphemy." Cockburn harshly critiqued the political left for embracing climate alarmism. "This turn to climate catastrophism is tied into the decline of the left, and the decline of the left's optimistic vision of altering the economic nature of things through a political program. The left has bought into environmental catastrophism because it thinks that if it can persuade the world that there is indeed a catastrophe, then somehow the emergency response will lead to positive developments in terms of social and environmental justice," Cockburn wrote. [See: A July 2007 and a March 2008 report detail how skeptical scientists have faced threats and intimidation - LINK & LINK ] CNN – not exactly a bastion of conservatism – had yet another of its meteorologists dissent from warming fears. Chad Myers, a meteorologist for 22 years and certified by the American Meteorological Society, spoke out against anthropogenic climate claims on CNN in December. "You know, to think that we could affect weather all that much is pretty arrogant," Myers said during "Lou Dobbs Tonight" on December 18, 2008. "Mother Nature is so big, the world is so big, the oceans are so big – I think we're going to die from a lack of fresh water or we're going to die from ocean acidification before we die from global warming, for sure," Myers explained. Myers joins fellow CNN meteorologist Rob Marciano, who compared Gore's film to 'fiction' in 2007, and CNN anchor Lou Dobbs who just said of global warming fear promotion on January 5, "It's almost a religion without any question." Perhaps the biggest shock to the global warming debate was the recent conversion of renowned French geophysicist Dr. Claude Allegre from being a believer in dangerous man-made warming fears to being a skeptic. Allegre, a former French Socialist Party leader and a member of both the French and U.S. Academies of Science, was one of the first scientists to sound global warming fears 20 years ago, but he now says the cause of climate change is "unknown." He ridiculed what he termed the "prophets of doom of global warming" in a September 2006 article. (LINK) Allegre has authored more than 100 scientific articles, written 11 books, and received numerous scientific awards including the Goldschmidt Medal from the Geochemical Society of the United States. He now believes the global warming hysteria is motivated by money. "The ecology of helpless protesting has become a very lucrative business for some people!" he explained. 'Hijacked' environmental left Left-wing Professor David Noble of Canada's York University has joined the growing chorus of disenchanted liberal activists. Noble now believes that the movement has "hyped the global climate issue into an obsession." Noble wrote a May 8, 2007, essay entitled "The Corporate Climate Coup" which details how global warming has "hijacked" the environmental left and created a "corporate climate campaign," "divert[ing] attention from the radical challenges of the global justice movement." (LINK) Botanist Dr. David Bellamy, a famed UK environmental campaigner, former lecturer at Durham University, and host of a popular UK TV series on wildlife, converted from believer to a skeptic about global warming. Bellamy, a committed environmentalist, now says that shift cost him his career at the BBC. Bellamy said in 2008, "My opinion is that there is absolutely no proof that carbon dioxide has anything to do with any impending catastrophe. The science has, quite simply, gone awry. In fact, it's not even science any more, it's anti-science. There's no proof, it's just projections and if you look at the models people such as Gore use, you can see they cherry pick the ones that support their beliefs." (LINK) Geologist Peter Sciaky echoes this growing backlash of left-wing activists about global warming. Sciaky, who describes himself as a "liberal and a leftist" wrote on June 9, 2007, "I do not know a single geologist who believes that [global warming] is a man-made phenomenon." Ecologist Dr. Patrick Moore, a Greenpeace founding member, has also joined the ranks of the dissenters. “It is clear the contention that human-induced CO2 emissions and rising CO2 levels in the global atmosphere are the cause of the present global warming trend is a hypothesis that has not yet been elevated to the level of a proven theory. Causation has not been demonstrated in any conclusive way," Moore, the chief scientist for Greenspirit, wrote in 2006. (End Inhofe Speech Excerpt) http://www.iceagenow.com/US_Navy_Physicist_warns_of_crushing_temperatures_and_global_famine.htm US Navy Physicist warns of possibly 'several decades of crushing cold temperatures and global famine' By Retired U.S. Navy Physicist and Engineer James A. Marusek __________________  1 2 Apr 09 – Excerpts: “The sun has gone very quiet as it transitions to Solar Cycle 24. “Since the current transition now exceeds 568 spotless days, it is becoming clear that sun has undergone a state change. It is now evident that the Grand Maxima state that has persisted during most of the 20th century has come to an abrupt end. “(The sun) might (1) revert to the old solar cycles or (2) the sun might go even quieter into a “Dalton Minimum” or a Grand Minima such as the “Maunder Minimum”. It is still a little early to predict which way it will swing. Each of these two possibilities holds a great threat to our nation. “We are now at a crossroad. Two paths lie before us. Both are marked with a signpost that reads “Danger”! Down one path lies monstrous solar storms. Down the other path lies several decades of crushing cold temperatures and global famine.” “Climate change is primarily driven by nature. It has been true in the days of my father and his father and all those that came before us. Because of science, not junk science, we have slowly uncovered some of the fundamental mysteries of nature. Our Milky Way galaxy is awash with cosmic rays. These are high speed charged particles that originate from exploding stars. “Because they are charged, their travel is strongly influenced by magnetic fields. Our sun produces a magnetic field wrapped in the solar winds that extends to the edges of our solar system. This field deflects many of the cosmic rays away from Earth. But when the sun goes quiet (minimal sunspots), this field collapses inward allowing high energy cosmic rays to penetrate deeper into our solar system. As I say in Magnetic Reversals and Evolutionary Leaps, these same cosmic rays can lead to mutations and evolutionary leaps. “As a result, far greater numbers collide with Earth and penetrate down into the lower atmosphere where they ionize small particles of moisture (humidity) forming them into water droplets that become clouds. Low level clouds reflect sunlight back into space. An increase in Earth's cloud cover produce a global drop in temperature. “If the sun becomes quieter than the old solar cycles, producing more than 1028 spotless days, then we might slip into a Dalton Minimum or maybe even a Grand Minima such as the Maunder Minimum. This solar state will last for decades. Several solar scientist have predicted this will begin in Solar Cycle 25, about a decade from now. But a few have predicted this will occur now in Solar Cycle 24. “A quiet sun will cause temperatures globally to take a nose-dive. We will experience temperatures that we have not seen in over 200 years, during the time of the early pioneers. “Temperatures are already falling. Satellites provide generally the most accurate atmospheric temperature measurements covering the entire globe. From the peak year 1998, the lower Troposphere temperatures globally have fallen around 1/2 degree Celsius due to the quiet sun. “This is despite the fact that during that same time period, atmospheric carbon dioxide (at Mauna Loa) has risen 5% from 367 ppm to 386 ppm. The main threat from a “Dalton Minimum” or “Maunder Minimum” event is famine and starvation (affecting millions or hundreds of millions worldwide) due to shortened growing seasons and harsher weather. In the past, in addition to great famines, this cold harsh weather has also lead to major epidemics. We need to talk about wind farms… > By James Delingpole Politics - July 28th, 2010 “Energy prices may rise by a third,” says our disastrous secretary of state of energy and climate change Chris Huhne. Rubbish. They’re going to rise by a hell of a lot more than that before he is finished. Alternative energy, let us never forget, is just that: an alternative to energy. Wind power and solar power are so risibly inefficient that the only way they can ever be economically viable is with lashings and lashings of taxpayer subsidy. Nuclear power would be much more effective but Huhne has effectively ruled it out. Why? Because in Huhne’s bizarre Weltanschauung, it’s OK for the taxpayer to subsidise low-carbon energy that doesn’t work (wind, solar) but not low-carbon energy that does work (nuclear). But it’s not Huhne’s breathtaking hypocrisy, ignorance and eco-fanaticism I want to talk about today. Rather I want to focus on just one aspect of it: his plan to carpet Britain in wind farms. What I should like to know is how many of you are with me on this one. It seems to me that at the moment we are sleepwalking towards the greatest environmental disaster of our lifetimes: in the name of alleviating something distant and imaginary ­ “Climate Change” ­ our government is now committed to the destruction of the British landscape. And what I’m not sensing, yet, is any kind of serious, concerted resistance. We need a figurehead. (Not me, unfortunately. I ain’t got the time or the fame or the diplomatic skills.) We need somebody who can galvanise ordinary British people into saving their countryside before it’s too late. Ideally that figurehead would have been the Prince of Wales. But as I explained in last week’s Spectator the Prince has rather ruled himself out of that one. Alan Titchmarsh? He’s the only name that immediately springs to mind, but perhaps you can suggest others. Next we need money to counter all the propaganda which is spewed out, much of it at taxpayer’s expense of course, by quangos like the Carbon Trust, by schools, by organisations like Renewable UK (formerly the British Wind Energy Association) ­ each of them repeating the same fundamental lies: that CO2 is a pollutant (not a plant food); that Man-Made Climate Change is a serious, pressing threat; that wind farms are the solution. Above all, though, we need to stop kidding ourselves that if only we concentrate on how thoroughly marvellous Michael Gove is or what a splendid idea elected police chiefs are, this nasty, scary energy policy our Coalition has decided to foist on us will somehow magically evaporate. At the moment, we seem to be allowing their spokesmen to get away with all manner of nonsense, such as: 1. Britain needs to set an example on CO2 reduction. No it doesn’t. At least not unless you believe in futile, suicidal gestures. China’s burgeoning CO2 output alone is more than enough to wipe out any paltry emissions Britain makes by going “low carbon”. 2. It will create green jobs. Only in places like China, where the wind turbines are manufactured. There will be no benefits to the British economy, just a disastrous replay of the Spanish experience where for every “green job” created by government subsidy, 2.2 jobs were lost in the real economy. 3. It will provide “energy security”. No it won’t. Because wind power is so unreliable, it has to be backed up by conventional power such as coal or gas. If energy security is really what we want we should go for more coal-fired power. We are, after all, sitting on an island of coal. 4. It doesn’t destroy property values, ruin views, chop birds to pieces, or create a low subsonic hum which drives anyone unfortunate to live by a wind farm mad. Yep. Sounds like you’ve been taking your daily dose of propaganda from the likes of Renewable UK and Polly Toynbee, who thinks wind farms are rather attractive. 5. The future is low carbon. Says who? What we need, now more than ever, is cheap power to generate the economic growth the world needs to lift itself out of the looming double-dip recession. Low carbon energy is, by definition, not cheap. 6. But what about “climate change”? What about it? If it’s “global warming” you’re worried about, it stopped in 1998. Global cooling is a much more imminent and serious problem. Recent changes in the Pacific Decadal Oscillation mean that we’re now set for a 30 year cooling period guaranteed to make a mockery of all our fears about “global warming.” Yet here we are, embarked on a policy guaranteed to raise our energy bills to unaffordable levels, as we enter a period of colder winters. This nonsense has got to stop. People, are you with me? http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100048905/we-need-to- talk-about-wind-farms/ Telegraph Climate change: Behold, the gospel according to the UN The Methodist Church is adopting the IPCC's report on global warming as holy writ, finds Christopher Booker By Christopher Booker Published: 6:04PM BST 07 Aug 2010 100 Comments Anyone who has observed the way the belief in man-made global warming has become for many a new religion might be intrigued by a lengthy document published by the Methodist Church, in the hope that next year it will become official Methodist policy. Entitled Our Hope in God’s Future, it kicks off by proclaiming that “the theological task is to reflect on modern scientific accounts of the threats posed by climate change in the context of affirming the triune God as creator and redeemer of the universe”. “What is required of God’s people,” it goes on, “is repentance.” The first step must be “confessing our complicity in the sinful structures which have caused the problem”. Related Articles RSPCA: End this cruelty to animal owners Virtual democracy in exchange for real power The document makes it clear that all good Methodists must take as their new Bible the latest report of the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, along with the famous report by Lord Stern. Inspired by this holy writ, like any Old Testament prophet it reels off all those familiar apocalyptic warnings of the catastrophes sinful mankind is bringing on the planet – floods, droughts, hurricanes, killer heatwaves, melting ice caps, sea levels rising by 20 feet (although they did get that one from the prophet Gore). One cannot imagine how they left out plagues and swarms of locusts, since they could have found biblical evidence for this in the IPCC report. But, of course, only the most devout disciple will still believe in all these apocalyptic predictions anyway, since in every case there is plenty of sound science to suggest they are no more than scare stories. Quite what the Methodist faithful are supposed to do to avert all these disasters, the document doesn’t make clear, apart from droning on, just like Chris Huhne, about the need to work for salvation by creating a “low-carbon economy”. But one thing that is clear is that the authors of this document have completely abandoned the core principle of Arminian theology that led John Wesley to set up the Methodist church in the first place — namely that “no works of human effort can cause or contribute to human salvation”. Perhaps if these Methodists want to start a new religion they should just join Greenpeace, which got there before them. Organised crime exploits wind industry | The Australian Organised crime exploits wind industry Robin Pagnamenta From: The Times August 09, 2010 8:37AM The blades of turbines on a wind farm catch the wind. Picture: AFP Source: AFP EUROPE'S booming wind energy industry is being exploited by criminals, according to Kroll, the corporate security group. Criminals see an opportunity to tap into billions of euros' worth of European Union subsidies. Organised groups linked to the Italian Mafia are among those to have infiltrated the industry, Jason Wright, senior director of Kroll's consulting group, told The Times. While emphasising that the overwhelming majority of European wind projects were "entirely legitimate", he said that criminals were increasingly investing in the industry, both to qualify for subsidies and to launder profits from drug-running and other illegal activities. Kroll, he added, was doing brisk business conducting due diligence on renewable energy projects on behalf of big banks and other potential investors. Start of sidebar. Skip to end of sidebar. End of sidebar. Return to start of sidebar. The American-owned Kroll has detected a sharp increase since 2007 in the number of cases involving fraud and corruption in the wind energy sector - chiefly in Italy and Spain but also in Bulgaria, Romania and other parts of Central and Eastern Europe. "Renewable energy is completely dependent on subsidies, so it is clearly an area for corruption," Mr Wright said. "Wind farms are a profitable way to make money because of the subsidies, and they are also a great way of laundering it." He added that the wind energy industry was vulnerable because projects frequently hinged on the political patronage of local officials who grant licences and access to public land. With more than €6 billion ($8.7bn) of EU subsidies having been earmarked for renewable energy projects over a 13-year period ending in 2013, Mr Wright said that the industry's growth in Italy had been much faster in Sicily and the south of the country than in the north - a reflection of the ease with which developers can secure licences. Eight people in the Trapani area of western Sicily, as well as in Salerno in the southwest of the mainland, were arrested last year after an investigation by anti-Mafia magistrates into a string of wind projects. Police in Trapani said that officials had been given bribes and luxury cars to encourage the town to invest in wind farms worth hundreds of millions of euros. In another case, in Spain's Canary Islands, five local officials, a mayor and two developers were accused of bribery and misappropriation of land. Another case in Corsica involved the skimming of more than €1.5 million worth of EU subsidies for wind energy projects. Mr Wright said that he was not aware of any similar cases in the UK, where wind farms face rigorous planning scrutiny and often are rejected. He said they were very unusual elsewhere in Northern Europe. "The vast majority of these projects are entirely legitimate but there is clearly a minority that are fraudulent ... We have seen a huge increase in the number of clients who have come to us with concerns." It was extremely hard, he added, to determine the degree to which criminal activity had penetrated Europe's wind industry. The president of the Italian National Wind Energy Association, Oreste Vigorito, was arrested last year and charged with fraud. He has not been convicted of an offence. In Italy, there have been at least three police operations targeting the country's wind industry, one of which was given the codename "Gone with the Wind". Christian Kjaer, chief executive of the European Wind Energy Association in Brussels, rejected the concerns. He said that reports of corruption in Italy were symptomatic of deep-rooted problems in the country's construction sector and not restricted to renewable energy projects. Mr Wright said that about 50 per cent of the renewable energy cases that the corporate investigations group undertook on behalf of clients in Madrid and Milan uncovered evidence of fraud or corruption. This compared with an average of 10-20 per cent for most Kroll projects.