Weekly Climate and Energy News Roundup #604 (2024)

The Week That Was: 2024 06-29 (June 29, 2024)
Brought to You by SEPP (www.SEPP.org)
The Science and Environmental Policy Project

Quote of the Week: “This was the object of the Declaration of Independence. Not to find out new principles, or new arguments, never before thought of, not merely to say things which had never been said before; but to place before mankind the common sense of the subject, in terms so plain and firm as to command their assent, and to justify ourselves in the independent stand we are compelled to take.” —Thomas Jefferson (1825)

Number of the Week: 4,000; 40 floating

THIS WEEK:

By Ken Haapala, President, Science and Environmental Policy Project (SEPP)

Scope: Discussed below is part of presentations by geoscientist Tom Gallager discussing the relationship between CO2 and temperature trends. Will Happer has comments that help clarify a controversy regarding the increasing CO2 concentration in the atmosphere. Jennifer Marohasy addresses the destructive storms that hit the Great Barrier Reef. Robert Bryce presents evidence that the so-called Energy Transition is failing. The Supreme Court decision on the Chevron Deference is discussed from different points of view.

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CO2 and Temperature Trends: TWTW was impressed by a video by Tom Gallager which convincingly showed the relationship between temperature and carbon dioxide as calculated from 67 million years of deep-sea benthic foraminifera. It turns out that the video was part 1 of a three-part series. TWTW just came across parts 2 and 3. Part 2 deals with the Holocene, the last 11,000 years. It discusses Global Ocean Currents; the Atmosphere; Energy Errors and resolution limits; and Radiation: Water Vapor Vs CO2 especially the ocean currents today and the atmosphere. Part 3 distinguishes between dominant variables that control climate and the uncertainty of today. It discusses Cloud uncertainty; the Ozone polar vortex; and CO2 Biosystems

Part 2 opens with a good summary of Part 1, which this TWTW will review to refresh readers. Future TWTWs will review the rest of Part 2 and Part 3. As stated in the July 15, 2023, TWTW:

On September 11, 2020, the journal, Science, by the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) published an article written by Thomas Westerhold and over 20 European scientists titled, “An astronomically dated record of Earth’s climate and its predictability over the last 66 million years,” A summary states:

“Deep-sea benthic foraminifera preserve an essential record of Earth’s past climate in their oxygen- and carbon-isotope compositions. However, this record lacks sufficient temporal resolution and/or age control in some places to determine which climate forcing and feedback mechanisms were most important. Westerhold et al. present a highly resolved and well-dated record of benthic carbon and oxygen isotopes for the past 66 million years. Their reconstruction and analysis show that Earth’s climate can be grouped into discrete states separated by transitions related to changing greenhouse gas levels and the growth of polar ice sheets. Each climate state is paced by orbital cycles but responds to variations in radiative forcing in a state dependent manner.”

Deep-sea benthic foraminifera are small marine creatures living on the bottom of the oceans at all depths including The Abyss, the deep ocean. Most are smaller than 1 to 2 millimeters, but some can grow to over 5 centimeters (2 inches). The larger ones were observed in the limestone that once covered the Egyptian pyramids. They were from the Eocene Epoch (about 33.9 to 56 million years ago. Britannica states:

“Foraminiferans inhabit virtually all marine waters and are found at almost all depths, wherever there is protection and suitable food (microscopic organisms).

“An important constituent of the present-day planktonic (floating) and benthic (bottom dwelling) microfaunas, foraminiferans have an extensive fossil record that makes them useful as index fossils in geological dating and in petroleum exploration. The word foraminiferan does not refer to the external pores found in some species but to the foramina (openings or apertures) between adjacent chambers after a new chamber envelops a previous one. When the foraminiferans die, their empty calcareous tests [a technical term for internal shells] sink and form the so-called foraminiferal ooze that covers about 30 percent of the ocean floor. Limestone and chalk are products of the foraminiferan bottom deposits.” [Boldface added]

The Abstract of the Westerhold paper states:

“Much of our understanding of Earth’s past climate comes from the measurement of oxygen and carbon isotope variations in deep-sea benthic foraminifera. Yet, long intervals in existing records lack the temporal resolution and age control needed to thoroughly categorize climate states of the Cenozoic era and to study their dynamics. Here, we present a new, highly resolved, astronomically dated, continuous composite of benthic foraminifer isotope records developed in our laboratories. Four climate states—Hothouse, Warmhouse, Coolhouse, Icehouse—are identified on the basis of their distinctive response to astronomical forcing depending on greenhouse gas concentrations and polar ice sheet volume. Statistical analysis of the nonlinear behavior encoded in our record reveals the key role that polar ice volume plays in the predictability of Cenozoic climate dynamics.

Willis Eschenbach unraveled clumps of data in the Westerhold paper to reveal a wide variety in CO2 concentrations at different, stable plateaus in temperature. Using these data, Gallagher discussed in the summary of Part 1:

• The Solar, Earth/Sun CYCLES of the Milankovitch Control the Timing
• The SUN controls the Energy of the system.
• The oceans Control the energy storage and amplify the solar signal.
• Water in all phases, drives the energy cycle of Climate.
• Continental Drift, shaped the Timing of major climate change/Temperature Steps
• CO2 and Temperature proxies do not correlate in geologic Climate Data
• CO2 is controlled by Volcanic and Oceanic sourcing.

Gallagher states:

• Temperature is controlled by the Sun, Oceans, and Continents drifting which change the ocean currents.
• Catalysts like clouds/Albedo, vegetation modify Cycles.
• The Default Condition of the current world is Dry, Dusty, Cold and Glacial
• Vegetation and Civilization both thrive in warm, Non-glacial times.

He states that the circum-equatorial ocean current dominated during the Eocene Epoch about 56 to 33.9 million years ago. With the east-west equatorial current open, Earth was warm and wet and with the closure of the Equatorial Current, we got into a colder, dryer world.

About three-and one-half minutes into the lecture Gallagher shows a complex graph the title of which cannot be fully seen but includes “CENOGRID Temperature vs. Log of Atmospheric CO2, 67 million years ago to Present. The vertical axis is labeled Temperature Anomaly which is in degrees Celsius with Zero the average temperature over the past 10,000 years. The horizontal axis is Atmospheric CO2 (ppmv, log scale). PPMV is parts per million volume.

The graph shows six phases of Earth’s history over the past 67 million years. Along with varying temperatures and CO2 concentrations:

• Warmhouse #1 67 million years ago (mya) to 55 mya, (CO2 from 280 to 600 ppmv (parts per million volume) Temperature anomaly around 10°C

• Hothouse 55-47 mya (CO2 from 600 to about 1000 ppmv) Temperature anomaly around 12 to 14°C

• Warmhouse #2 from 47 to 34 mya (CO2 about 700 to over 1000 ppm) [Antarctic opening, circum-polar current being established, polar ice cap] Temperature anomaly falling from around 10°C to 6°C

• Coolhouse #1 from about 34 to 13.9 mya (CO2 290 to 800, with no significant change in temperature. Temperature anomaly around 5°C

• Coolhouse #2 from about 13 mya to 3.3.mya (CO2 280 to 320 ppm [Indonesia closes (contracts)] Temperature anomaly falling from around 5°C to Zero °C

• Icehouse Earth, 3.3 mya to Present (CO2 down from 320 to 200 ppmv [Panama (Caribbean Seaway) Closed, Second polar ice cap.] Temperature anomaly falling from around Zero °C to minus 5°C

From the above list, one can see how deceptive it is to take temperature and CO2 concentration estimates from about 50 million years ago during Hothouse Earth, with the high CO2 concentration of about 1000 ppmv, and temperature anomaly of about 14°C and compare them to Present Icehouse Earth with low CO2 concentration about 200 ppmv and temperature anomaly of minus 5°C—an example of two-point statistics— then declare that CO2 is the control knob of Earth’s temperatures. Yet, this is what the leadership of NASA-GISS did, a false claim that haunts climate science today.

In a separate post, Ron Clutz compares the change in World Fossil Fuel Consumption (WFFC) and atmospheric temperature trends from University of Alabama, Huntsville, (UAH) and the Hadley Center Seas Surface Temperature trends (HadSST) from 1980 to 2023, a period of 44 years. Although the increases in temperature trends are similar, they depart significantly from the increase in world fossil fuel consumption. He also compares the World Fossil Fuel Consumption (WFFC) with Global Surface Air Temperature Anomaly from the Hadley Center Climate Research Unit (HadCRUT). Clutz writes:

“It is enough for simple minds to see that two time-series are both rising and to think that one must be causing the other. But both scientific and legal methods assert causation only when the two variables are both strongly and consistently aligned. The above shows a weak and inconsistent linkage between WFFC and GMT.

Going further back in history shows even weaker correlation between fossil fuels consumption and global temperature estimates:”

There is an old saying in statistics: Correlation does not prove causation, which is correct. Also, if there is no close correlation, there is no causation. Nature shows temperatures and carbon dioxide concentrations are not closely correlated. Also, it is important to note that the deep-sea sediments cannot be compared with recent changes in the atmosphere. The sediments build slowly, thus are not useful for short term trends, only for long term trends stretching thousands of years. See links under Challenging the Orthodoxy and http://www.sepp.org/twtwfiles/2023/TWTW%207-15-23.pdf for the July 15, 2023, TWTW.

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Clearing a Controversy: For some time, individuals who realize that CO2 is not a major player in climate change have disagreed as to the extent that recent increases in CO2 have been caused by humans. There is no question that a warming of the oceans, whatever the cause, will result in an increase in CO2 because cold water can absorb more gas than warm water, and CO2 is the atmospheric gas most easily absorbed. TWTW has stayed out of the disagreement because there appeared to be no suitable criteria for assessing any of the arguments used.

In group correspondence, Will Happer has provided suitable standards. He wrote:

“The important question is what causes the observed increase of atmospheric CO2, about 2.5 ppm/year at present. If all of the human emissions remained in the atmosphere the increase would be about 5.0 ppm/year. So human emissions are twice what is needed to account for the observed year by year increase of atmospheric CO2. Both emissions and atmospheric increase rates are observed quantities, not computer calculations.

Of course, there are much larger natural fluxes of CO2 out of the atmosphere at summer land locations, where photosynthesizing plants convert atmospheric carbon to carbohydrates and other organic compounds. Carbon dioxide is emitted from the same locations during the winter when respiration is faster than photosynthesis, again at a much faster rate than human emissions. But the ice core records of CO2 show that these natural flows in and out of the atmosphere have been nearly equal for about 10,000 years and have maintained a nearly steady atmospheric concentration of close to 280 ppm. Only during the past century or two have atmospheric CO2 concentrations begun to grow significantly above the 280-ppm baseline.”

There is no link.

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Changing Corals: Jennifer Marohasy who debunks claims about the Great Barrier Reef going extinct by scuba diving at the sites and taking photographs, then writing about what she saw has a three-part series on natural changes to the reef, particularly when hit hard by a cyclone. In “Denying the Most Precious – Natural Cycles (Part 1)” she writes:

“Is it possible to ever celebrate regrowth, without first acknowledging injury?

I am growing to despise the premeditated ignorance that is everywhere in Western Civilization with opinion leaders and scientists often giving-up on accurate reporting of the real state of the natural environment and instead regurgitating their political narrative. In the case of the Great Barrier Reef, it can be ‘record coral cover’ or ‘all the coral is dying’.”

In part 2 she includes a video of a reef before and after it was hit by a cyclone. In “Monitoring to Avoid Cyclone Damage – Denial. Part 3” she writes:

“It is purportedly the intension of The Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS), specifically their Long-Term Monitoring program, to detect changes in reef communities at a number of different scales including at the scale of the individual reef, sub-region and between the northern, central and southern Great Barrier Reef.

But. If this monitoring is not even able to detect the extraordinary damage inflicted by Tropical Cyclone Kirrily on John Brewer Reef, it cannot be considered fit for purpose.”

Nature is destructive, it always has been and will be. If government entities are oblivious to Nature’s destructive storms, many of them have lost their usefulness to humanity and civilization. See links under Changing Seas.

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The Myth of the Energy Transition: The so-called green energy transition is not happening, despite the hyperbole surrounding it. It is an enormously expensive government sponsored exercise. Further, there is no need for it. As discussed above, there is no significant causal relationship between carbon dioxide emissions and temperatures in 67 million years of history from high quality proxy sediments that can be used to measure CO2 and temperature. The proxy evidence shows CO2 concentrations varying from about 200 ppmv to over 1000 ppmv, more than twice that of today.

Using charts from the June 20 report by The Energy Institute, which replaced the annual BP Statistical Review of World Energy, Robert Bryce exposes the myth of the energy transition & shows hydrocarbons are growing faster than alternative energy, notably wind and solar. Very simply, wind and solar plus storage cannot deliver reliable, affordable electricity much less provide energy for transportation and industry, no matter how many trillion US dollars governments spend. We live in an energy hungry world, which politicians fail to recognize. See links under Challenging the Orthodoxy and Article #1.

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Missing the Elephant in the Room: TWTW greatly respects the views of Roger Pielke Jr., who has been severely, personally, and professionally criticized because he is honest. On Thursday, the US Supreme Court released its findings in a case involving the Chevron Deference. The beginning of Pielke’s comments on the case sums it well. He writes:

“In 1981, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), under Administrator Anne Gorsuch (the mother of Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch), decide to change how it defined a ‘source’ of pollution under the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1977. An environmental group, the National Resources Defense Council (NRDC) petitioned the EPA in federal court arguing that there was a right way to define ‘source’ and EPA’s new definition was incorrect.

In a decision written by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg (the future Supreme Court justice), the federal appeals court sided with NRDC and against President Reagan’s EPA. Chevron, the oil company, was affected by the regulations, giving the company standing to sue, and appealed the decision to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The resulting Supreme Court judgment — Chevron U.S.A. Inc. vs Natural Resources Defense Council — overturned the earlier NRDC victory. The Supreme Court judgement established what came to be known as Chevron Deference — the principle that when Congressional legislation is ambiguous or silent on how to interpret a statue, the courts should defer to agency interpretations of those statutes. For instance, EPA’s definition of a ‘source’ of pollution.

Yesterday, in a 6-3 ruling along ideological lines the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Chevron. I would have joined the dissent (Justice Kagan’s dissent is outstanding) but at the same time, I would argue that the Chevron doctrine was problematic to the extent that it created opportunities for the executive branch to take action not enacted by Congress via statutory deference.

My views are influenced by the excellent analysis of legal scholar Cass Sunstein, who observes that Chevron was once favored by the right and opposed by the left, and those positions have now switched:

Once celebrated by the right and sharply criticized by the left, Chevron is now under assault from the right and (for the most part) accepted on the left. More particularly: The decision was originally embraced by the right as an effort to cabin [confine?] the illegitimate exercise of policymaking authority of unelected judges, who were often requiring greater regulatory activity, and to insist instead on the primacy of officials within the Executive Branch, who have the advantage of democratic accountability. On this view, Chevron shifted authority from unaccountable judges, who had policy goals of their own, to policymaking officials.

The principal objections came from the left, which saw Chevron as an effort to weaken judicial review and as a capitulation to the (insufficiently zealous) administrative state, which was often captured by powerful private interests, and which often failed to regulate as Congress directed. Relatively aggressive judicial review, certainly on questions of law, was necessary to counteract the risk of ‘capture’ and violations of congressional directions.

Ambiguities in legislation are unavoidable for practical reasons and often even necessary to create space for political compromise. For instance, in my PhD dissertation of 30 years ago I evaluated the law which established the U.S. Global Change Research Program. I argued that the program was headed towards failure because Congress directed it to provide ‘usable information for policymakers’ related to climate change, but the federal science agencies interpreted that phrase to mean the development of predictive climate models — and not information more directly related to mitigation and adaptation policies.

I quoted James Madison from Federalist 37 on this point:

‘All new laws, though penned with the greatest technical skill and passed on the fullest and most mature deliberation, are considered more or less obscure and equivocal, until their meaning be liquidated and ascertained by a series of particular discussions and adjudications.’

In practice, in regulatory policy making, even with Chevron overturned, agencies will continue to have discretion in how to interpret ambiguity in statutes. Chevron applied to situations where agency regulation were challenged.”

Pielke then goes into a minor ambiguity used by Justice Kagan who dissented pertaining to the Endangered Species Act. But the real elephant in the room is the EPA setting energy policy using false claims, particularly that carbon dioxide is a pollutant, while carbon dioxide is essential for photosynthesis. As Britannica states:

“Photosynthesis, the process by which green plants and certain other organisms transform light energy into chemical energy. During photosynthesis in green plants, light energy is captured and used to convert water, carbon dioxide, and minerals into oxygen and energy-rich organic compounds.

It would be impossible to overestimate the importance of photosynthesis in the maintenance of life on Earth. If photosynthesis ceased, there would soon be little food or other organic matter on Earth. Most organisms would disappear, and in time Earth’s atmosphere would become nearly devoid of gaseous oxygen. The only organisms able to exist under such conditions would be the chemosynthetic bacteria, which can utilize the chemical energy of certain inorganic compounds and thus are not dependent on the conversion of light energy.”

Since carbon dioxide, in water vapor (carbonic acid), is essential for most life as we know it, declaring it a pollutant requires extraordinary physical evidence. The EPA offers none. It relies on global climate models that have been falsified by physical evidence. Removal of the Chevron Deference may be an important step in restoring physical science in government agencies.

Further, other criticism asserted that the Supreme Court is engaged in expanding its powers. It is not. It placed the obligations for clear laws and definitions precisely where the Constitution placed them – the US Congress. To avoid such difficult issues the late Senator Teddy Kennedy frequently said let the courts decide. The Supreme Court did and told Congress that the Constitution states it is Congress’s decision. See links under Litigation Issues.

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DDP 2024: The 42nd Annual Meeting of Doctors for Disaster Preparedness is scheduled for July 5-7, 2024, in El Paso, Texas. The speakers include a number of outstanding scientists such as John Clauser, the 2022 Nobel Laureate in Physics for contribution to the foundations of quantum mechanics; Stephen McIntyre and Ross McKitrick, recipients of the 2023 Fredrick Seitz award by SEPP for upholding integrity in using the scientific method; Willie Soon, Michael Connolly, and Ronan Connolly of the Center for Environmental Research & Earth Science (CERES); and Patrick Moore, former Greenpeace co-founder. See link under Challenging the Orthodoxy.

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April Fools Award: TWTW intends to announce the winner of the 2024 April Fools award at the July 5 meeting of the DDP. Please submit your nominee by July 2.

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NO TWTW NEXT WEEK – DDP – Will Resume Weekend of July 13

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Number of the Week: 4,000; 40 floating. The fossils used by Tom Gallagher in estimating 67 million years of temperature and carbon dioxide trends are Foraminifera (forams for short) are single-celled organisms (protists) with shells or tests (a technical term for internal shells).

According to a description posted on the University of California – Berkley website:

“They are abundant as fossils for the last 540 million years. The shells are commonly divided into chambers that are added during growth, though the simplest forms are open tubes or hollow spheres. Depending on the species, the shell may be made of organic compounds, sand grains or other particles cemented together, or crystalline CaCO3 (calcite or aragonite).

There are an estimated 4,000 species living in the world’s oceans today. Of these, 40 species are planktonic, that is they float in the water. The remainder live on or in the sand, mud, rocks and plants at the bottom of the ocean. Foraminifera are found in all marine environments, from the intertidal to the deepest ocean trenches, and from the tropics to the poles, but species of foraminifera can be very particular about the environment in which they live. Some are abundant only in the deep ocean, others are found only on coral reefs, and still other species live only in brackish estuaries or intertidal salt marshes.

Foraminifera are among the most abundant shelled organisms in many marine environments. A cubic centimeter of sediment may hold hundreds of living individuals, and many more dead shells. In some environments their shells are an important component of the sediment.”

See https://ucmp.berkeley.edu/fosrec/Wetmore.html#:~:text=WHAT%20ARE%20FORAMINIFERA%3F,the%20last%20540%20million%20years

Censorship

Facebook Censor My Post

By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, June 25, 2024

Facebook have just removed my post on wildfires, seconds after I posted it:

So, the only conclusion is that they now censor posts that don’t agree with the establishment’s climate narrative.

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

Challenging the Orthodoxy

Paleoclimatology- Tom Gallagher (2021)

Climate change is definitely not a hoax: the climate has always been changing, and it will continue to change in the future.

By Roger Palmer, Citizens Oversight & Accountability Project (COAP), Accessed, June 25, 2024

Part 2, Paleoclimatology the Holocene, last 11,000 years

Ocean currents today and Atmosphere,

Numbers Don’t Lie

These 9 charts from the Statistical Review Of World Energy expose the myth of the energy transition & show hydrocarbons are growing faster than alt-energy

By Robert Bryce, His Blog, June 23, 2024

Link to: Media releases

The Energy Institute, June 20, 2024

This Energy Transition Thing Really Is Not Happening

By Francis Menton, Manhattan Contrarian, June 25, 2024

That means that the 4,748 TWh of “almost entirely” solar and wind power generated in 2023 came to all of 17.1 EJ, which is just 2.7% of the 620 EJ of world primary energy consumption. Could you have imagined that it could be so little, after decades of over-the-top promotion and trillions of dollars of subsidies?

Over that period [1965 to 2023], North America and Europe have cut their consumption almost by half, from almost 40 EJ [Exajoules] per year to around 20. But over the same period the consumption in the rest of the world has gone from about 20 EJ to around 140, multiplying by a factor of 7.

2024 Update: Fossil Fuels ≠ Global Warming

By Ron Clutz, Science Matters, June 25, 2024

DDP 2024 Annual Meeting

42nd Annual Meeting of Doctors for Disaster Preparedness, July 5-7, 2024

Defending the Orthodoxy – Bandwagon Science

Half the water flowing from US rivers is at risk of pollution due to lax federal regulation: Study

By Sharon Udasin, The Hill, June 27, 2024

Link to paper: Ephemeral stream water contributions to United States drainage networks

By Craig Brinkerhoff, et al. AAAS Science, June 27, 2024

[SEPP Comment: Streams that last for a brief time periods pollute major rivers? Time to ban rain which is loaded with carbonic acid?]

Questioning the Orthodoxy

Corporations that Concede the Science are Doomed

By Christopher Monckton of Brenchley, WUWT, June 25, 2024

Here, as elsewhere, the judgment fails to ask the question that any genuinely independent and impartial tribunal would ask: namely, by how much does the anthropogenic increase in CO2 concentration increase global temperature? The [UK] Supreme Court did not even bother to ask that question: perhaps the chief evidence that its judgment is rooted in a prejudice as ill-informed as it is profound. The West cannot long survive negligent stupidity on this scale.

Five Questions Congress Should’ve Asked the Climate Cartel

By Matt Cole, Real Clear Energy, June 24, 2024

The heat wave from climate

By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, June 26, 2024

Global Excuses: Ship pollution was saving us from global warming, but now we’ve fixed the ships, we’re all going to die

By Jo Nova, Her Blog, Juen 27, 2024

All of which begs the question, if shipping smoke solves global warming, shouldn’t we just go with it then?

So, about those bears

By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, June 26, 2024

Got that? Another half-degree and out they go. One wonders if the author is aware that polar bears are so closely related to the dreaded grizzlies (known revealingly as Ursus arctos horribilis) that they can interbreed or thinks grizzlies can’t survive if it’s warmer where they live than in, say, the Arctic. For instance, in Montana.

Energy & Environmental Review: June 24, 2024

By John Droz, Jr., Master Resource, June 24, 2024

After Paris!

Ambition Impossible

By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, June 26, 2024

All of that left UN climate chief Simon Stiell with little option but to give countries a stiff talking-to as he beseeched them not to ‘leave the hardest work to the eleventh hour’ before COP29. ‘Business-as-usual is a recipe for failure, on climate finance, and on many other fronts, in humanity’s climate fight,’ he warned them.”

Social Benefits of Carbon Dioxide

Increased CO2 caused big gains in US crop yields

By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, June 26, 2024

Link to paper: Environmental Drivers of Agricultural Productivity Growth: CO2 Fertilization of US Field Crops

By Charles A. Taylor and Wolfram Schlenker, Working Paper, National Bureau of Economic Research, October 2021, Revised January 2023

The “Green Revolution” brought about a massive increase in crop yields across the world. In the US, for example, corn yields increased six-fold since 1940, while soybeans and wheat increased by a factor of three. Prior to this point, however, yields were flat,

Before 1950, US farm sector productivity growth was half that of the non-farm sector, but afterwards the relationship reversed with farm productivity growth exceeding the non-farm sector by 62% (Pardey and Alston 2021).

Percent dry weight (biomass) increases for durum wheat following 300 and 600 ppm increases in the air’s CO2 concentration

By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, June 26, 2024

From the CO2 Science Archive

Science, Policy, and Evidence

Joe Biden’s Energy Policies Are Based on Fantasies and Fairy Tales

By Emily Arthun, Real Clear Energy, June 26, 2024

Protecting 1.2 percent of land as nature preserves could prevent majority of extinctions: Research

By Lauren Sforza, The Hill, June 25, 2024

Link to paper: Conservation Imperatives: securing the last unprotected terrestrial sites harboring irreplaceable biodiversity

By Eric Dinerstein, et al., Frontiers in Science, June 24, 2024

[SEPP Comment; Why does the US government need 28%, and state and local governments 9%?] – Wikipedia

Models v. Observations

Scientists Admit Cloud Radiative Properties Are 3D But Studies ‘Ignore’ This And Use 1D Simulation Data

By Kenneth Richard, No Tricks Zone, June 24, 2024

The #CRE Challenge Part 3: Surface temperature correlations

By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, June 26, 2024

Measurement Issues — Surface

UK High Temperature At Chertsey–Amid A Field Of Solar Panels!

By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, June 26, 2024

Chertsey is officially a Class 3 site, accurate to 1C. But as Ray reveals the weather station is slap bang in the middle of a field of solar panels.

Changing Weather

Expert’s Prediction Of “Summer of Hell” For Central Europe Hasn’t Materialized Yet

By P Gosselin, No Tricks Zone, June 26, 2024

A Benign Wildfire Year and Upcoming Rain

By Cliff Mass, Weather Blog, June 25, 2024

We are now in the fire ramp-up period, with the highest frequency of the year on July 4th, when many folks start fires with fireworks.

Today, there are only four fires going in WA and northern Oregon, and they are all predominantly grass fires ignited by humans. Keep in mind that only a few days of dry weather are more than enough to dry grass enough to burn.

Changing Seas

Denying the Most Precious – Natural Cycles (Part 1)

By Jennifer, Marohasy, Her Blog, June 24, 2024

Denying the Reef Crest – Before and After the Cyclone

By Jennifer Marohasy, Her Blog, June 26, 2024

Includes video.

Monitoring to Avoid Cyclone Damage – Denial. Part 3.

By Jennifer Marohasy, Her Blog, June 27, 2024

What about sea level?

By Andy May, WUWT, Juen 24, 2024

Changing Cryosphere – Land / Sea Ice

Arctic sea ice at the summer solstice: more polar bear habitat than 2022 after hottest year on record

By Susan Crockford, Polar Bear Science, June 25, 2024

Extreme heat no one wants to mention: Greenland warmed 10 degrees in a few decades (many times)

By Jo Nova, Her Blog, June 22, 2024

[SEPP Comment: Brings up Dansgaard–Oeschger events, sudden warming with slow cooling shown in Greenland ice cores.]

Lowering Standards

Met Office’s “Record Temperatures” All Come From Junk Sites

By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, June 24, 2024

[SEPP Comment: Making good data poor: Such erroneous measurements are combined with good measurements, then summed and averaged to the second decimal point, one-hundredth of a degree. They remain poor data.]

BBC Verify, A Kenyan Farmer & The Green Blob

By Ben Pile, The Daily Sceptic, June 23, 2024 [H/t Paul Homewood]

That is why BBC Verify and the blob it serves are absolutely terrified of a subsistence farmer and his mobile telephone. More power to Jusper Machogu’s arms and his digits. BBC Verify is nothing more than a nasty smear machine.

Link to: Explaining the ‘how’ – the launch of BBC Verify

By Deborah Turness, CEO, BBC News, May 21, 2023

We’ve brought together forensic journalists and expert talent from across the BBC, including our analysis editor Ros Atkins and disinformation correspondent Marianna Spring and their teams. In all, BBC Verify comprises about 60 journalists who will form a highly specialized operation with a range of forensic investigative skills and open source intelligence (Osint) capabilities at their fingertips.

[SEPP Comment: The organization, BBC Verify, should stick with facts and avoid politics.]

Scarcely a Day Passes Without the Met Office Announcing Another ‘Record’ Temperature. But How Many of its Weather Stations are Next to Airports and Solar Farms?

By Chris Morrison, The Daily Sceptic, June 24, 2024

Hull East Park

By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, June 28, 2024

It is hard to think of a worse place to place a thermometer, unless you count the tarmac at Heathrow!

The weather station only opened in 2011, so the average temperature for that part of the country has been artificially inflated since then by this frankly awful site.

Multiply this by the dozens of other utterly unacceptable sites recently opened, and the same can be said of the temperatures of the country as a whole.

Communicating Better to the Public – Use Yellow (Green) Journalism?

Historic Heatwave

By Tony Heller, His Blog, June 24, 2024

Text: https://realclimatescience.com/2024/06/historic-heatwave/#gsc.tab=0

Video: https://realclimatescience.com/2024/06/historic-heatwave-2/#gsc.tab=0

From Heller: “we live in an unscientific age in which almost all the buffeting of communications and television-words, books, and so on-are unscientific. As a result, there is a considerable amount of intellectual tyranny in the name of science.” – Richard Feynman

Game Over For The Climate

By Tony Heller, His Blog, June 27, 2024

[SEPP Comment; Video showing that contrary to press nonsense, heat waves are not supercharged.]

No, Bloomberg, Neither Extreme Weather Nor Climate is Worsening in Swelling Cities

By Anthony Watts, Climate Realism, June 21, 2024

No, Mainstream Media, “Extreme” Wildfires Are Not on The Rise Due to Climate Change

By Anthony Watts, Climate Realism, June 25, 2024

Of course, the mainstream media does not have reporters with the science education needed to even question this. But, as illustrated in this article, you don’t have to be a forest scientist to be able to find this contrary data. It simply appears that the mainstream media didn’t bother to look because they prefer to push a scary narrative about climate change rather than do the job they have been charged with. So much for “journalistic integrity.”

Supreme Court temporarily halts EPA rule that limits interstate pollution

By Zack Budryk, The Hill, June 27, 2024

[SEPP Comment: Without carbon dioxide humanity would not exist, therefore carbon dioxide it is a pollutant?]

Wrong, Mainstream Media, Hajj Deaths Not Unusual or Due to Climate Change

By H. Sterling Burnett, Climate Realism, June 27, 2024

Six years later, New York Times mentions that the Maldives is not sinking

By Jo Nova, Her Blog, June 28, 2024

Communicating Better to the Public – Make things up.

Climate “Communicators” Discover the Best Way to Persuade Voters is to Lie to Them

By Charles Rotter, WUWT, June 25, 2024

Wildfires Getting Worse, Even When They’re Not!

By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, June 25, 2024

When the facts do not support the theory, ignore the facts!

Why Do They Lie About Extreme Temperature Deaths?

By Kip Hansen, WUWT, June 25, 2024

I know I didn’t answer the question asked in the title: “Why Do They Lie about Extreme Temperature Deaths?” I don’t answer because I don’t know. There is overwhelming publicly available data and published in-depth peer-reviewed studies, published even in journals known for their pro-climate-alarmist bias, that establish that cold, low temperature, even moderate cold, kills far many more people than high temperature.

This is true in the United States, in the United Kingdom, Europe and the world in general.

But rank propaganda is based on the simple process of repeating the same lie over and over and over until it is accepted as truth.

Communicating Better to the Public – Use Children for Propaganda

Tidbits

By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, June 26, 2024

We have more to say on the bears below… but she certainly identifies one reason the mainstream media really are in danger of extinction. They’re serving the public badly and aren’t sorry.

Communicating Better to the Public – Protest

Extinction Rebellion Dweebs Get Shutdown Quickly on The PGA Tour

By Charles Rotter, WUWT, June 23, 2024

Questioning European Green

Teams Bring Their Own AC Units to Paris: Exposing the Absurdity of “Sustainability” at the Olympics

By Charles Rotter, June 23, 0224

Tom Slater Who can blame the Greens’ co-leader for not getting a heat pump? 24 June 2024,12:32pm

By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, June 24, 2024

This is the fundamental flaw of greenism – the reason it only appeals to a privileged few. It wants to rip up the unwritten contract between government and the governed. Where politicians once pledged to make life that bit easier, cheaper and more convenient for ordinary folk, now they are offering us higher bills, colder homes, fewer foreign holidays and expecting us to be happy about it. Deep down, no one – not even the co-leader of the Greens, it seems – wants to live like that.

Questioning Green Elsewhere

Worse than a lie

By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, June 26, 2024

Canada’s Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault got into quite a spat with the Parliamentary Budget Officer at the beginning of June over information they had provided to him that showed they were lying about the economic impact of their carbon tax and that they had forbidden him to reveal. They deployed all the usual nasty tools of denial, evasion and partisanship, only to be forced by an impending motion to release the data and it was even worse than we thought.

Again, you might think Guilbeault was hiding the numbers because he knew he was busted. But he put them out with the usual swaggering assurance that they proved him right, so he has not grasped any of the above. He isn’t aware of the truth and lying, he’s a zealot who sees what he expects to see and hides it because he doesn’t trust us to see as deeply as he does.

[SEPP Comment: New York has secret juice to keep the lights on as the State abandons reliable electricity, Canada has secret benefits of going to Net Zero?]

Queensland Petition Against Wind Farms in Protected Wilderness Regions

By Eric Worrall, WUWT, June 24, 2024

Non-Green Jobs

Vauxhall owner threatens to close UK car factories

By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, June 25, 2024

This was inevitable, and certainly won’t be limited to Vauxhall. As I have repeatedly pointed out, the UK motor industry as a whole cannot afford to pay the hundreds of millions in fines coming their way at the end of the year. The only option open to them is to cut back on production of ICE cars, in order to get back to the 22% target.

Based on current trends, this could mean that factories shut down production for the last three months of the year, or alternatively simply stockpile 3 months of production.

Funding Issues

Prof Paul Williams Has Trouble Reading

By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, June 23, 2024

Homewood: Professor Paul “Air Turbulence” Williams seems to be getting very tetchy these days!

It has been pointed out that the TCW article wrongly states £1.3bn – it should of course be £1.3 million!

It was my typo unfortunately.

The Political Games Continue

The true cost of Labour’s net zero plans is slowly being revealed – and the sums are staggering

By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, June 28, 2024

“Instead, the prospect is for a very large increase in energy levies and bills to pay for the very high costs of pursuing the vision of rapid decarbonisation.” Gordon Hughes

Labour’s net zero grid will require ‘huge sacrifice’, warns energy chief

By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, June 23, 2024

British Labour Considers “Office for Net Zero”

By Eric Worrall, WUWT, June 27, 2024

Never has a proposed Whitehall taskforce been so aptly named.

“I’ll Take On the Wind Farm Nimbys From Day One” Says Ed Milliband

By Richard Eldred, The Daily Scepptic, June 23, 2024

The Shadow Energy Secretary pledged a Labour Government will overturn planning rules that currently require local community support to approve proposed turbines.

Litigation Issues

The End of Chevron Deference

Implications for expertise in regulatory policy making

By Roger Pielke Jr. The Honest Broker, June 29, 2024\

REP. HARRIET HAGEMAN: The Supreme Court’s Latest Chevron Ruling Is A Big Win For America — What’s Next?

By Rep Harriet Hageman (R. WY), Daily Caller, June 28, 2024

Kagan, liberal Supreme Court justices issue scathing dissent in Chevron ruling

By Rachel Frazin, The Hill, July 28, 2024

Looming Supreme Court decision could curtail federal agency powers

By Rachel Frazin, The Hill, June 25, 2024

More SEC “Climate Risk” Machinations

By Staff, Government Accountability & Oversight, June 22, 2024

The Supreme Court’s curious source [UK]

By Bruno Prior, Net Zero Watch, June 25, 2024

In UK law, Parliament is sovereign. although until Brexit, that statement was somewhat caveated. Nor is that sovereignty subject to constitutional constraints, as it is in the USA (see Bingham’s The Rule of Law).

Subsidies and Mandates Forever

EV Mandates: A Disproportionate Burden on Minority Communities

By Shay Hawkins, Real Clear Energy, June 26, 2024

[SEPP Comment: The wealthy get the tax credits, more subsidies to the wealthy.]

‘Renewable Energy Still Dominates Energy Subsidies in FY 2022’

By Robert Bradley Jr., Master Resource, June 27, 2024

“Federal subsidies to support renewable energy formed nearly half of all federal energy-related support between fiscal years 2016 and 2022. Traditional fuels (coal, natural gas, oil and nuclear) received just 15 percent of all subsidies between FY 2016 and FY 2022, while renewables, conservation and end use received a whopping 85 percent.”

The Politicized Texas Grid: Sheridan Calls for Transparency (and Mea Culpas)

By Robert Bradley Jr., Master Resource, June 26, 2024

Texas is turning to government-aided natural gas to fix its broken political grid. Yes, wind and solar did that in one of the natural gas meccas of the world.

[SEPP Comment: Politicians subsidizing solutions they created with mandates and subsidies! When will it ever end?]

Energy Issues – Non-US

Balkans Blackout: Start of the 2024 European Green Energy Outage Season?

By Eric Worrall, WUWT, June 22, 2024

Ukraine attacks Russia’s oil sector, Canada attacks Canada’s… you sure you want us in NATO?

By Terry Etam, BOE Report, June 25, 2024

The West is caught in its weird dance whereby it implements policy after policy against hydrocarbons, attacking their own native supplies, while at the same time consuming the same amount as they always have, more or less. The west wants to cancel its own production, or strangle it, and at the same time wants to keep Russian oil off the market, and yet ironically, above all, wants low oil prices, because consumers freak out when they aren’t low.

Energy Issues – Australia

Cold, windless Victoria may run out of gas before the end of winter

By Jo Nova, Her Blog, June 24, 2024

It takes some skill to run out of gas when we are also one of the Big Three LNG exporters in the world, but the Australian government has achieved this. Incompetence knows no bounds:

Renewable energy subsidies undermine our economy

By Alan Moran, from Spectator Australia, June 11, 2024

“Seasonal” Renewable Output Fail Bites Australia

By Eric Worrall, WUWT, June 23, 2024

Energy Issues — US

Five Energy Failures Joe Biden Needs You to Forget Before the Debate

By Larry Behrens, Real Clear Energy, June 25, 2024

Natural Gas Saves New England From the Weather… Again

By David Middleton, WUWT, June 26, 2024

Feds advance contentious gas export terminal CP2

By Rachel Frazin, The Hill, June 27, 2024

[SEPP Comment: Suppling natural gas to NATO allies to keep them from freezing is contentious?]

New York’s Energy Transition Guru Responds To Basic Questions

By Francis Menton, Manhattan Contrarian, June 23, 2024

In New York, the most important academic guru behind the Climate Act and energy transition is a Cornell professor named Robert Howarth. Howarth is a professor of Ecology and Environmental Biology. Based on that background, he would seem to have nothing to offer on the subject of the engineering of an electrical grid. But Howarth has a burning desire to save the planet, and he has read some work by trendy Stanford professor Mark Jacobson, and has become convinced that putting together a zero-carbon electricity grid is no problem. Despite his total lack of relevant expertise in grid engineering, he has somehow gotten the ear of the New York State legislature and bureaucracies on that subject.

New York State June 2024 Heat Wave Summary

By Roger Caiazza, WUWT, update June 23, 2024

The owners of the Danskammer power plant north of New York City have had an application to repower and replace the existing Danskammer generating station with the Danskammer Energy Center, a new state-of-the art, efficient natural gas-fired combined cycle generating unit. Unfortunately, like a couple of other proposals to replace old fossil generating units with much cleaner and modern units, the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation has denied the permits to construct basically because there are Climate Leadership & Community Protection Act mandates coming. The fact that there is no feasibility analysis that proves that those mandates can be achieved was ignored. After years of court battles the developers gave up and withdrew their application this week. As a result, the electric system will continue to rely on aging and dirtier fossil generation for however long it takes for the State to figure out that existing technology is incapable of replacing fossil fired peaking power plants needed to keep the lights on.

Washington’s Control of Energy

Mission Creeps

The latest assault on US shale.

By Doomberg, June 24, 2024

Is the Biden LNG-export “‘Pause’ to Study” a Cheap Fake?

By Staff, Government Accountability & Oversight, June 25, 2024

Sources say January 2024 “pause” to study the impacts of LNG exports is based on a fib; that the macroeconomic study was in fact already produced, in 2023, but gave ‘wrong’ answer and was buried

[SEPP Comment: The 2023 study did not produce the desired results?]

Biden administration blocks controversial mining road in Alaska

By Rachel Frazin, The Hill, June 28, 2024

In 2020, the Trump administration said that approving the road, a project of Ambler Metals, would provide mining access to an area with significant copper and cobalt deposits.

[SEPP Comment: Can’t let the US produce the metals needed for EV’s?]

Oil and Natural Gas – the Future or the Past?

2024 World LNG Report

Press Release, International Gas Union, June 26, 2024

Return of King Coal?

Coal power is dying in Western Europe

By Hannah Ritchie, Our World in Data, June 18, 2024

[SEPP Comment: And booming in Asia.]

Alternative, Green (“Clean”) Solar and Wind

BP freezes offshore wind projects to focus on fossil fuels

By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, June 27, 2024

The message is clear – wind power is only profitable when subsidies are thrown at it.

People Living Near Wind Turbines Vacate Their Homes Due To Harm To Pets, Livestock, Water Supply

By Kenneth Richard, No Tricks Zone, June 27, 2024

Link to: Wind turbines: Vacated/abandoned homes study – Exploring research participants’ descriptions of observed effects on their pets, animals, and well water

By Krogh, Carmen Marie, et al., Environmental Disease, Jan-Mar 2024

“264% higher cortisol (stress) levels in forest animals”??

[SEPP Comment: The study interviewed 67 persons who live or previously lived within 10 km of wind turbines. Such methods produce doubtful results. How do you measure stress in forest animals?]

Alternative, Green (“Clean”) Energy — Storage

Claims Of Revolutionary Batteries Turn Out To Be Unfounded Hype By “Uncritical Media”

By P Gosselin from KlimaNachrichten, June 21, 2024

‘Remain indoors and avoid area’: Explosions and smoke amid fire at battery recycling plant

By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, June 24, 2024

Scotland

Alternative, Green (“Clean”) Vehicles

This is your warning – City of Toronto launches lithium-ion battery safety campaign

Press Release, City of Toronto, June 25, 2024 [H/t WUWT]

Toronto Fire Services, in partnership with the Office of the Ontario Fire Marshal and the Ontario Association of Fire Chiefs, launched a lithium-ion battery public safety and education campaign called “This is Your Warning” that highlights the fire risks associated with lithium-ion batteries in micromobility devices such as e-bikes.

In 2023, the number of lithium-ion battery-related fires in Toronto increased by 90 per cent compared to 2022. Already this year, there have been 15 fires involving lithium-ion batteries; seven of those fires were related to micromobility devices.

Whoever controls electrolytes will pave the way for electric vehicles

by Riko Seibo Tokyo, Japan (SPX) Jun 25, 2024

Link to paper: Mitigating Gas Evolution in Electron Beam-Induced Gel Polymer Electrolytes Through Bi-Functional Cross–Linkable Additives

By Seoha Nam, et al., Nano-Micro Small, Apr 30, 2024

Infrastructure Requirements for the Mass Adoption of Electric Vehicles

By Jonathan A. Lesser, National Center for Energy Analytics, June 2024

Yet Another E-Scooter Fire Disaster–When Will The Govt Act?

By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, June 21, 2024

A spokesman for Hampshire and Isle of Wight Fire and Rescue Service said: “The initial reports and the preliminary fire investigation has found that an e-scooter is the most likely cause of the fire.

“The main danger occurs when e-bikes and e-scooters are left on charge and unattended in homes or in communal areas such as hallways and stairwells.

“Charging lithium batteries indoors increases the fire risk, especially if charged overnight when occupants are sleeping.”

The Enduring American Car

What’s driving the new economy? The old economy’s gas-powered vehicles.

By Mark Mills, City Journal, June 24, 2024

Electric regret: Almost half of Australian and US EV owners want to go back to a combustion engine (and many in the UK already have)

By Jo Nova, Her Blog, June 26, 2024

Huge Percentage Of EV Owners Want To Go Back To Normal Cars, Study Finds

By Nick Pope, Daily Caller, June 20, 2024

DAVID BLACKMON: US EV Industry Shifts Back Into Reality Gear

By David Blackmon, Daily Caller, June 22, 2024

Exploding batteries spark deadly S Korea factory fire

By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, June 24, 2024

Other Scientific News

NASA Asteroid Planetary Defense Exercise Reveals Big Gaps in Readiness

By Eric Worrall, WUWT, June 24, 2024

Link to: NASA, Partners Conduct Fifth Asteroid Impact Exercise, Release Summary

Press Release by Tiernan Doyle, NASA, June 20, 2024

The Chemtrails Conspiracy Theory

By Cliff Mass, Weather Blog, June 23, 2024

Other News that May Be of Interest

Great Women of Science: Lisë Meitner – The Physicist Who Should Have Won the Nobel Prize

By Barbara Pfeffer Billauer, ACSH, June 20, 2024

Britain is being tricked into becoming vegetarian

By Paul Homewood, Not a Lot of People Know That, June 27, 2024

BELOW THE BOTTOM LINE

Another Ice Age?

By Tony Heller, His Blog, June 26, 2024

[SEPP Comment: Another climate scare 50 years ago!]

All charged up

By John Robson, Climate Discussion Nexus, June 26, 2024

Yes, the Arctic Territories of Yukon, Northwest Territories and Nunavut, aka the far north, now boast fully 34 charging stations between them for their… um… uh… seven electric vehicles. We have seen the future, and it is risible.

[SEPP Comment: The Canadian north cannot claim it is underserved!]

Maldives Refuse To Drown

By Tony Heller, His Blog, June 27, 2024

[SEPP Comment According to a 1988 UN study, the Indian Ocean nation of 1196 small islands should be long gone by now.]

Scientists Working on Desperate Plan to Refreeze Arctic

By Sharon Adarlo, Yahoo News, June 8, 2024 [H/t Bernie Kepshire]

A Day in the LIFE of a Climate Journalist

By Charles Rotter, WUWT, June 24, 2024

Cartoon by Josh

ARTICLES

1. The ‘Green Energy Transition’ That Wasn’t

Governments push heavily subsidized renewables, but fossil-fuel use continues to increase even faster.

By Bjorn Lomborg, WSJ, June 24, 2024

The president of the Copenhagen Consensus begins:

“Despite extravagant hype, the green-energy transition from fossil fuels isn’t happening. Achieving a meaningful shift with current policies is too costly. We need to change policy direction entirely.

Globally, we spent almost $2 trillion in 2023 to try to force an energy transition. Over the past decade, solar and wind energy use has soared to record levels. But that hasn’t reduced fossil-fuel use, which increased even more over the same period.

Studies show that when countries add more renewable energy, it does little to replace coal, gas or oil. It simply adds to energy consumption. Recent research shows that for every six units of green energy, less than one unit displaces fossil-fuel energy. The Biden administration finds that while renewable energy sources worldwide will dramatically increase up to 2050, that won’t be enough even to begin replacing fossil fuels—oil, gas and coal will all keep increasing, too.

This shouldn’t come as a surprise to any student of history. During the 19th-century transition to coal from wood, overall wood use increased even as coal assumed a greater percentage of energy needs. The same thing happened during the shift to oil from coal: By 1970, oil, coal, gas and wood all delivered more energy than ever before.

Humans have an unquenchable thirst for affordable energy. In the past 50 years, oil and coal energy use has doubled, hydro power has tripled, and gas has quadrupled. The use of nuclear, solar and wind power has surged.”

After discussing adding the cost of storage to wind and solar, the total costs become far greater the fossil fuels. Mr. Lomborg concludes.

The way to achieve an eventual transition is to improve green-energy alternatives. That means investing much more in research and development. Innovation is needed in wind and solar, as well as storage, nuclear energy, and other possible solutions. Bringing the costs of low-CO2 energy sources below those of fossil fuels is the only way that green solutions can be implemented globally, and not merely by a few wealthy countries.

When politicians say the green transition is here, they are really asking voters to support throwing more good money after bad. We need to be smarter.

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