| Alan Moran 1 September 2021 |
| A review and commentary on topical matters concerning the science, economics, and governance associated with climate change developments. |
| Developments in the science of climate The latest IPCC report is mainly political rhetoric and conjecture about human derived carbon dioxide bringing more storms, fires and heat. The chart below from the report’s Summary radically and implausibly revises previously accepted temperature history, resurrecting Michael Mann’s 1999 hockey stick fabrications. I covered the issue in the Spectator and here is an informed analysis from Jo Nova. |
| Richard Lindzen estimated human actions in doubling CO2 emissions will increase global temperatures by 1°C, with only neglible further increases. Lindzen gives this assessment of climate alarmism. The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) uses Greenland ice data to provide an alternative temperature picture to that of the IPCC. |
| Connolly, Soon and 21 other distinguished authors conclude that the IPCC has grossly underestimated the role of the sun in climate trends. They place the human contribution at one quarter that of the IPCC. The difference stems from the IPCC using all data, whereas the alternative study seeks to eliminate the “urban heat island” effect by using only rural sites. Similarly, Mitchell et al find the IPCC models seriously overshoot the actual warming. Professors William van Wijngaarden and Will Happer use a major breakthrough in radiation physics to demonstrate that CO2 and H2O are “extremely saturated” at present atmospheric concentrations and that dangerous multi-degree warming (IPCC has 2.5°C to 4°C) assumed by the climate emergency cannot occur. Global warming bringing more heat-related deaths? Sterling Burnett shows the opposite: |
| Climate is cyclical: humans always prosper in warm times and suffer during cold times. Nor is it getting hotter in the US, where the per cent of hot days has fallen. |
| Agitprop is mounting ahead of the Glasgow climate change meeting as alarmists discover “a weakening” of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC). This transports warm, salty water from the tropics to northern Europe, sending colder water back south along the ocean floor and its weakening can bring abrupt change in climate. |
| Alarmist headlines also accompanied a decline in Arctic ice. LiveScience thundered “Massive melting event strikes Greenland after record heat wave,” on August 2 but this followed record growth in the ice sheet. Here is the picture for the whole year |
| Developments in politics of climate Following the IPCC release, there was an uptick (from 40 to 45 per cent) in the share of Americans who say they are “very concerned” about climate change. Even though US hot days have not increased, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services is establishing the Office of Climate Change and Health Equity (OCCHE) in response to President Biden’s Executive Order “Tackling the Climate Crisis at Home and Abroad”. Under its climate change policy, the Biden Administration is attempting to pause new oil and gas leases and has made similar moves with coal. The Interior Department’s regulatory impediments and cost impositions on US coal mining is however confronting court action forcing it to move forward with oil and gas leases. But the Public Service Enterprise Group, New Jersey’s largest utility owner, is selling natural gas-fired power plants for $1.92 billion as part of its effort to curb its carbon emissions and New York’s pension fund is examining a sell off of its $640 million shale oil and gas investments. Bill Gates said his Breakthrough Energy will spend $1.5 billion green energy over three years if the $100 billion energy aspects of the government infrastructure package becomes law. The US Treasury has required the World Bank and other multilateral lending agencies it supports to cease lending for fossil fuels. The UK’s Climate Change Commission headed by green subsidy-seeker, Lord Deben, put the UK’s cost of net zero at £49.5 billion (1.3 per cent of GDP). Andrew Montford sought CCC’s data, but was told they had, “overwritten and erased the spreadsheet”. Clearly, UK politicians and public servants negligently waived through the decarbonisation policy on the basis of concocted figures. Net zero’s true costs, if feasible, would be over £2.3 trillion (70 per cent of GDP). Benny Peiser writes “Currently, UK consumers are funding renewable energy investors to the tune of £12 billion per year, taken from consumer bills as stealth taxes.” That is comparable with the $7 billion a year cost of Australian taxes and regulations. Australia denies itself wealth as yet another coal mine is rejected by “judicial” planning authorities – there’s always some variation of a “rare upland swamp” to conscript to the cause! Woke BHP, under pressure from global investors, has sold its oil and coal assets. The Government cites falling coal use and increased rollout of subsidised renewables as putting Australia on track to meeting its Paris 26-28 per cent emission reduction target. Reality bites in Spain, where the Socialist government has temporarily cut taxes on energy to limit the impact of price rises induced by green policies. But in Germany, as part of a future government, the Greens want a climate ministry to oversight other ministries’ plans to ensure their compatibility with the Paris Climate Agreement. Fueling this claim, Ms. Merkel, in response to recent floods said, “We must get faster in the battle against climate change.” This is despite Bjorn Lomborg showing that controls over rivers mean much reduced flooding and that the European Flood Awareness System predicted the recent floods and formally warned the German government. |
| Developments in the economics of climate Globally, annualised new coal plant capacity in the first half of 2021 was less than half that of the previous ten year average. China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), one of the world’s few sources of investment for coal developments, has markedly reduced this funding, prompting anti-coal sources to speculate it “is likely to end quietly” |
| Yet, China announced 35m tonnes of coal-dependent ironmaking capacity in the first half of 2021, more than in all of 2020, according to the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air advocacy group. Lauri Myllyvirta, the Centre’s lead analyst, said “I don’t see the maths for getting to carbon peak by 2030 without a 30 per cent reduction from steel”. Graham Lloyd points out “emissions continue to grow as increases from developing economies swamp cuts from the developed world. The developed world is proposing deep cuts to emissions but at the same time outsourcing industrial production of the things needed to make the transition to China, including the greenhouse gas emissions involved.” China offers a mirage of future reductions, while India will not even do this. The first comprehensive analysis of (blue) hydrogen from gas with carbon-capture-and-storage finds its greenhouse gas footprint is 20% greater than burning natural gas or coal for heat and 60% greater than burning diesel oil. Many countries, including the UK and Australia, have promoted the technology as a contribution to low emission energy. In the BHP Woodside merger, blue hydrogen is lauded as a “bridge” to water-based green hydrogen. |
| Whimsy James Taylor points to the absurd lies of woke CBS News in claiming climate change caused the Afghanistan loss because it ‘destroyed crops and left people hungry’. Here is the Food and Agriculture Organisation’s data. |
| The Taliban is quoted as seeking international cooperation to resolve issues including world security and climate change. Amping-up Australian agitation: •an Australian Conservation Foundation survey claims overwhelming support for additional emission reductions; •290 athletes petitioning for net zero, “To safeguard the games we love for generations to come”; •and there’s “outrage” from “School Strike 4 Climate Australia”. Iron ore billionaire Andrew Forrest also wants net neutral, though probably not for processing the iron ore on which his fortune depends. |
| Articles relating to Climate Change published in August: Kabul: the harbinger of western decline or the catalyst for Trump’s returnThe Spectator, 20 August 2021 The IPCC buries two millennia of fluctuating temperaturesThe Spectator, 13 August 2021 Will big financial institutions destroy our resources sector before the Greens? The Spectator, 2 August 2021 |