The Real Cost Of The Push Toward Unproven Green Energy

On Sunday, The Epoch Times posted an article what happened in America Christmas weekend because of the extreme weather. It should be noted that extreme weather in the winter (particularly in the northern parts of the country) is not all that unusual.

The article reports:

A number of U.S. utility companies called on customers to conserve electricity due to frigid weather on Saturday and Sunday.

Con Edison, which serves the New York City metropolitan area, asked its 1.1 million natural gas, 3.5 million electric, and other customers in New York City to conserve power. Temperatures in the Big Apple plunged to about 15 degrees F overnight on Saturday and Sunday morning.

“Conserving energy as much as possible now will help ensure adequate natural gas supplies for the rest of the weekend,” Con Edison said late on Saturday. “Owners of natural gas pipelines have reported that equipment problems caused by the cold weather and the heavy demand for natural gas are challenging their ability to provide adequate amounts of gas throughout the Northeast,” the utility company added.

Another, ISO New England, warned Saturday that it has “insufficient reserve supplies” and called on its members to “voluntarily curtail power” due to strain on the power grid, reported Bloomberg.

“We have declared a power caution for the region, and [are] calling upon reserve resources due to the unexpected loss of generation and imports,” ISO New England spokesman Matthew Kakley told Bloomberg News.

Duke Energy, which operates across several states, made a similar demand to customers earlier on Saturday, according to a news release. It cited tight supplies due to heavy energy use and exceptionally cold temperatures.

America has vast resources of natural gas (an environmentally clean-burning fuel) and is capable of building adequate pipelines and refineries to get that natural gas to where it needs to go to keep everyone warm and snug in the winter and cool and comfortable in the summer. What is the motivation of our political class in keeping Americans from using their natural resources to stay safe and warm?

There is no excuse for not being able to deal with extreme winter weather in one of the supposedly most civilized countries in the world.

The Problems With The Climate-Change Report

The Daily Signal posted an article today about the new Climate Report presented to President Trump.

These are the four areas of the report that are questionable at best:

1. It wildly exaggerates economic costs.

2. It assumes the most extreme (and least likely)climate scenario.

3. It cherry-picks science on extreme weather and misrepresents timelines and causality.

4. Energy taxes are a costly non-solution.

The article notes that the study was partially funded in part by climate warrior Tom Steyer’s organization. How is this supposed to be an objective study?

The article further notes how the study came up with the economic costs:

The study…calculates these costs on the assumption that the world will be 15 degrees Fahrenheit warmer. That temperature projection is even higher than the worst-case scenario predicted by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. In other words, it is completely unrealistic.

The article notes that the climate trajectory used in the study is not realistic. The article states:

Despite what the National Climate Assessment says, Representative Concentration Pathway 8.5 is not a likely scenario. It estimates nearly impossible levels of coal consumption, fails to take into account the massive increase in natural gas production from the shale revolution, and ignores technological innovations that continue to occur in nuclear and renewable technologies.

When taking a more realistic view of the future of conventional fuel use and increased greenhouse gas emissions, the doomsday scenarios vanish. Climatologist Judith Curry recently wrote, “Many ‘catastrophic’ impacts of climate change don’t really kick at the lower CO2 concentrations, and [Representative Concentration Pathway] then becomes useful as a ‘scare’ tactic.”

The article explains how some of the data in the study is being manipulated:

Another sleight of hand in the National Climate Assessment is where certain graph timelines begin and end. For example, the framing of heat wave data from the 1960s to today makes it appear that there have been more heat waves in recent years. Framing wildfire data from 1985 until today makes it appear as though wildfires have been increasing in number.

But going back further tells a different story on both counts, as Pielke Jr. has explained in testimony.

Moreover, correlation is not causality. Western wildfires have been particularly bad over the past decade, but it’s hard to say to what extent these are directly owing to hotter and drier temperatures. It’s even more difficult to pin down how much man-made warming is to blame.

Yet the narrative of the National Climate Assessment is that climate change is directly responsible for the increase in economic and environmental destruction of western wildfires. Dismissing the complexity of factors that contribute to a changing climate and how they affect certain areas of the country is irresponsible.

The article explains why carbon taxes are not the answer:

Just last month, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change proposed a carbon tax of between $135 and $5,500 by the year 2030. An energy tax of that magnitude would bankrupt families and businesses, and undoubtedly catapult the world into economic despair.

These policies would simply divert resources away from more valuable use, such as investing in more robust infrastructure to protect against natural disasters or investing in new technologies that make Representative Concentration Pathway 8.5 even more of an afterthought than it already should be.

Climate change has been with us as long as the earth has existed–they found plant fossils under the ice in Greenland. The question is, “How much impact does man have on climate, and do we have the ability to impact climate in a positive way?” Considering some of the mistakes we have made in the past when tampering with nature, I truly believe we need to attempt to keep our air and water as clean as possible and leave the rest to nature.

An Editorial Written By People Who Choose To Ignore Basic Facts

On September 11, The Washington Post posted an editorial about Hurricane Florence. The editorial noted that President Trump was complicit in the damage the hurricane was going to do. Wow. Was he also complicit in Hurricane Andrew in 1992, Hurricane Katrina in 2005, Hurricane Hazel 1954, Hurricane Bob 1991, Hurricane Camille in 1969, and Hurricane Hugo in 1989, etc.? Many of those hurricanes were larger and stronger than Florence. Those of us who live on the east coast or the Gulf coast understand that hurricanes happen. Blaming the current President for those hurricanes or their severity is ridiculous.

The editorial states:

Yet when it comes to extreme weather, Mr. Trump is complicit. He plays down humans’ role in increasing the risks, and he continues to dismantle efforts to address those risks. It is hard to attribute any single weather event to climate change. But there is no reasonable doubt that humans are priming the Earth’s systems to produce disasters.

Actually, there is a reasonable doubt that humans are causing climate change. It is also unfair to say that President Trump is aiding and abetting climate change.

On August 21, I reported:

Yet the latest world climate report from the BP Statistical Review of World Energy finds that in 2017, America reduced its carbon emissions by 0.5 percent, the most of all major countries. That’s especially impressive given that our economy grew by nearly 3 percent — so we had more growth and less pollution — the best of all worlds. The major reason for the reduced pollution levels is the shale oil and gas revolution that is transitioning the world to cheap and clean natural gas for electric power generation.

Meanwhile, as our emissions fell, the pollution levels rose internationally and by a larger amount than in previous years. So much for the rest of the world going green.

Yes, President Trump has reduced the regulations, but he has not done anything to increase pollution. He has encouraged energy independence, which includes natural gas, which burns cleaner than most other fuels.

A website called wattsupwiththat reminds us of the following:

Back in the late 1600s, the Salem Witch Trials accused defendants of using black magic to cause bad weather, during a prolonged period of bad weather.

Have we reached the point where we are returning to the Salem Witch Trials in order to make political points?

 

Using The Government To Punish Those Who Don’t Agree With You

One of the side effects of having a petulant person in the White House is that anytime someone contradicts the wishes of the White House there is retribution of some sort. This has now extended to the matter of Climate Change.

On Thursday, The Weather Channel posted an article entitled, “FEMA Won’t Help States That Don’t Plan For Climate Change.” Thank about that for a moment. The federal government should be willing to help all states in case of emergency. Climate Change is not settled science, and no natural catastrophe has ever been linked to climate change. In fact, as climate change believers howl about increased damage from hurricanes, the amount of hurricanes since 2005 have gone down significantly. Also, the true numbers (rightwinggranny.com) show that the earth has not warmed for more than a decade.

The article at The Weather Channel reports:

States publish reports every five years or so detailing their vulnerability to natural disasters, such as floods, storms and wildfires, and how they plan to protect themselves and recover after them. Such plans are needed in order to qualify for a share of nearly $1 billion in Hazard Mitigation Assistance grants provided every year by the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

But those plans rarely consider climate change impacts in detail — an omission that could see states become ineligible for the grants after new guidelines take effect early next year. Under FEMA’s updated guidelines, published last week, state disaster plans will only be approved if they adequately describe how the likelihood and intensity of natural hazards could be affected by growing levels of greenhouse gas pollution.

“The risk assessment must provide a summary of the probability of future hazard events,” the new guidelines state. “Probability must include considerations of changing future conditions, including the effects of long-term changes in weather patterns and climate.”

This is more of the government attempting to control the debate. Why does the government support global warming? If the earth is warming at a catastrophic rate, the government will have to take action (thus gaining more control over its citizens). It is interesting that study grants are more like to be given to groups that support global warming than groups that do not.

From a comment left at wattsupwiththat:

Sir Harry Flashman says;

If you can tell me where to line up for my AGW money I’d really appreciate cause I could use a few extra bucks right now.

Well you could try applying for a grant from The Rockefeller Brothers Fund:

From 2003 to present;

Bill McKibben’s;
Step it Up ($200,000)
1Sky.org ($2,100,000)
350.org ($875,000)

Total RBF grants to Mckibben = $3,175,000

Al Gore’s – Alliance for Climate Protection = $250,000
David Suzuki Foundation = $185,000

The Sierra Club = $1,665,000
Friends of the Earth = $777,500
Friends of the Earth International = $290,000
The Pacific Institute (President; Peter Gleick) = $670,000
Greenpeace Fund = $550,000
Center for Climate Strategies = $5,171,600
The Union of Concerned Scientists = $75,000
Media Matters for America = $375,000
Environmental Defense Fund = $550,000
Natural Resources Defense Council = $1,660,000
National Wildlife Federation = $1,025,000

Sceptic ‘think tanks’;
The Heartland Institute
The Cato Institute
The Global Warming Policy Foundation (GWPF)
Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT)

= $0.00

That pretty much tells the story.