September 21, 2009 by admin.

From Papal Indulgences to Carbon Credits

Is Global Warming a Sin?

By ALEXANDER COCKBURN
http://www.counterpunch.org/cockburn04282007.html

Excerpt:

There is still zero empirical evidence that anthropogenic production of CO2 is making any measurable contribution to the world’s present warming trend. The greenhouse fearmongers rely entirely on unverified, crudely oversimplified computer models to finger mankind’s sinful contribution. Devoid of any sustaining scientific basis, carbon trafficking is powered by guilt, credulity, cynicism and greed, just like the old indulgences, though at least the latter produced beautiful monuments. By the sixteenth century, long after the world had sailed safely through the end of the first millennium, Pope Leo X financed the reconstruction of St. Peter’s Basilica by offering a “plenary” indulgence, guaranteed to release a soul from purgatory.

Now imagine two lines on a piece of graph paper. The first rises to a crest, then slopes sharply down, then levels off and rises slowly once more. The other has no undulations. It rises in a smooth, slowly increasing arc. The first, wavy line is the worldwide CO2 tonnage produced by humans burning coal, oil and natural gas. On this graph it starts in 1928, at 1.1 gigatons (i.e. 1.1 billion metric tons). It peaks in 1929 at 1.17 gigatons. The world, led by its mightiest power, the USA, plummets into the Great Depression, and by 1932 human CO2 production has fallen to 0.88 gigatons a year, a 30 per cent drop. Hard times drove a tougher bargain than all the counsels of Al Gore or the jeremiads of the IPCC (Inter-Governmental Panel on Climate Change). Then, in 1933 it began to climb slowly again, up to 0.9 gigatons.

And the other line, the one ascending so evenly? That’s the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere, parts per million (ppm) by volume, moving in 1928 from just under 306, hitting 306 in 1929, to 307 in 1932 and on up. Boom and bust, the line heads up steadily. These days it’s at 380.There are, to be sure, seasonal variations in CO2, as measured since 1958 by the instruments on Mauna Loa, Hawai’i. (Pre-1958 measurements are of air bubbles trapped in glacial ice.) Summer and winter vary steadily by about 5 ppm, reflecting photosynthesis cycles. The two lines on that graph proclaim that a whopping 30 per cent cut in man-made CO2 emissions didn’t even cause a 1 ppm drop in the atmosphere’s CO2. Thus it is impossible to assert that the increase in atmospheric CO2 stems from human burning of fossil fuels.

I met Dr. Martin Hertzberg, the man who drew that graph and those conclusions, on a Nation cruise back in 2001. He remarked that while he shared many of the Nation’s editorial positions, he approved of my reservations on the issue of supposed human contributions to global warming, as outlined in columns I wrote at that time. Hertzberg was a meteorologist for three years in the U.S. Navy, an occupation which gave him a lifelong mistrust of climate modeling. Trained in chemistry and physics, a combustion research scientist for most of his career, he’s retired now in Copper Mountain, Colorado, still consulting from time to time.

Not so long ago, Hertzberg sent me some of his recent papers on the global warming hypothesis, a construct now accepted by many progressives as infallible as Papal dogma on matters of faith or doctrine. Among them was the graph described above so devastating to the hypothesis. (Full Story)

The discussion paper by Dr. Martin Hertzberg that is mentioned in the preceding quote is titled “The Lynching of Carbon Dioxide - The Innocent Source of Life“.  That discussion paper (a 20-page PDF document) contains on page 13 the CO2 vs. Temperature graph mentioned in the article by Alexander Cockburn.

Alas, the commentary in Dr. Hertzberg’s discussion paper is based on logic and common sense.  It is not politically correct and has therefore been ignored by virtually all of the mainstream media.  Nevertheless, the discussion paper is an excellent refutation of the arguments that produce the man-made-global-warming fear and alarmism.

It is clear that the man-made-global-warming fear and alarmism are based on lies. It is no surprise that the former science adviser of Margret Thatcher, Sir Christopher Monckton of Brenchley stated in that regard, in letter to Representatives Ed Markey and Joe Barton, U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Energy and Commerce:

Rightly, one of the Administration’s own supporters on your Committee has stated that the principal purpose of “cap-and-trade” is not to “Save The Planet” – which it would not do even if it worked – but to raise revenue. If you wish to raise excessive revenue, be honest about it. Say that you intend to tax and tax and tax again. But desist from claiming that you are raising the revenue with the aim of preventing “climate crisis”. Already, every opinion poll demonstrates that, notwithstanding the most lavishly-funded propaganda campaign by the classe politique since Goebbels tried to make Nazism look good, the people are not buying the “global warming” scare any more. (Full Story)

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September 20, 2009 by admin.

Canada Free Press

The End Doesn’t Justify the Means When you Deliberately Deceive

By Dr. Tim Ball

Tuesday, September 8, 2009

….In modern times H.L.Mencken defined a demagogue as, “one who preaches doctrines he knows to be untrue to men he knows to be idiots.” Mencken also explains why he knows they are untrue. “The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.” Obama plays the game by finding a fault and inflating and conflating it to a catastrophe. It’s easy because, you can always find fault and elaboration is easy. Elaboration is always to the point where he can argue government intervention is the only solution. Here a third Mencken quote is relevant. “The urge to save humanity is almost always a false front for the urge to rule.” Thomas Sowell already identified Obama as a demagogue and has written about his urge to save humanity. “Barack Obama says that he wants to “heal America and repair the world.” One wonders what he will do for an encore and whether he will rest on the seventh day.” Obama the great savior rides to the rescue assuring people he does not want it this way but there is no choice; besides government intervention is only temporary. The giveaway is there is no substance and no proof. Sowell notes, “It is not too much to ask politicians to talk specifics, instead of trying to sweep us along, turning off our minds and turning on our emotions, with soaring rhetoric”….

(Full Story)

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September 20, 2009 by admin.

A must-see, a 40-minute video:

Why Global Warming Policies Are More Dangerous Than Global Warming Itself

Competitive Enterprise Institute Senior Fellow Marlo Lewis explains the truth about global warming in his film Policy Peril: Why Global Warming Policies Are More Dangerous Than Global Warming Itself. The movie includes cameos from Heritage’s Ben Lieberman and David Kreuzter and is full of talking points to debunk the common catastrophic global warming stories you always hear. The entire forty minutes is well worth watching.

(Watch the video)

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September 17, 2009 by admin.

Wind energy is a renewable alternative energy source whose alleged capability to serve as an acceptable and even desirable solution to the problem of ever-increasing fossil-fuel consumption is much touted by politicians who would like to demonstrate that with the help of billions of dollars in tax revenues they will save the world.

Regardless of their continual history of lack of success in implementing global policies, things like that are relatively easy to do for politicians.  Politicians make money for themselves whether the solutions they propose and try to push through are realistic or not, whether those solutions can be made to pay for themselves or lose trillions of dollars in gross domestic product.  Usually — the climate hysteria is a case in point — the greater the failures of politicians and the losses caused by them, the more the politicians stand to gain, and the more we — the ordinary people trying to make a living — stand to lose.

The political system is a growth industry that is being supported by a cancerously-growing, ravenous bureaucracy and ever increasing taxation.

It would be a great thing if Mother Nature’s bounty, as in the case of “free” wind energy, would help to offset the losses caused by the grand schemes rammed through by politicians, but wind energy is not free.  Wind energy is much more expensive than to generate energy by burning fossil fuels.  Wind energy generating capacity installed must be matched by corresponding generating capacity that is based on hydroelectric-, nuclear- or fossil-fuel-powered power generation.  In other words, as far as the utility of large-scale wind energy generation goes, it is as useful as tits on a boar and as precariously and potentially harmful as a second functioning steering wheel on a car.

A September 2009 study report by CEPOS (Center for Politiske Studier), “Wind Energy — The Case of Denmark” makes for fascinating reading. It addresses the illusions that anyone should hold regarding wind energy.  The study report should be of interest to a wide variety of people, such as tax payers, electrical systems operators, politicians and policy makers.

Here is the executive summary of the study report.

Executive summary

PART 1: The real state-of-play and its hidden costs

Denmark generates the equivalent of about 19% of its electricity demand with wind turbines, but wind power contributes far less than 19% of the Nation’s electricity demand.

The claim that Denmark derives about 20% of its electricity from wind overstates matters. Being highly intermittent, wind power has recently (2006) met as little as 5% of Denmark’s annual electricity consumption with an average over the last five years of 9.7%.

In the absence of large-scale electricity storage, any modern electricity system must continuously balance electricity supply and demand, because even small variations in system voltage and frequency can cause damage to modern electronic equipment and other electrical equipment.

Wind power is stochastic [that is, “random”, essentially difficult or impossible to predict], especially in the very short term (e.g., over any given hour, 30 minute, or 15 minute period). This has created a completely new challenge that transmission system operators (TSOs) all over the World are only now learning how to handle. Some draw from Denmark’s experience. But Denmark’s special circumstances make its experience of limited transferability elsewhere.

Denmark manages to keep the electricity systems balanced due to having the benefit of its particular neighbors and their electricity mix. Norway and Sweden provide Denmark, Germany and Netherlands access to significant amounts of fast, short term balancing reserve, via interconnectors. They effectively act as Denmark’s “electricity storage batteries”. Norwegian and Swedish hydropower can be rapidly turned up and down, and Norway’s lakes effectively “store” some portion of Danish wind power.

Over the last eight years West Denmark has exported (couldn’t use), on average, 57% of the wind power it generated and East Denmark an average of 45%.The correlation between high wind output and net outflows makes the case that there is a large component of wind energy in the outflow indisputable.

The exported wind power, paid for by Danish householders, brings material benefits in the form of cheap electricity and delayed investment in new generation equipment for consumers in Sweden and Norway but nothing for Danish consumers. Taxes and charges on electricity for Danish household consumers make their electricity by far the most expensive in the European Union (EU)[1]. The total probable value of exported subsidies between 2001 and 2008 was DKK 6.8 billion (€916 million) during this period. A similar amount was probably exported prior to 2012[2] and larger quantities will be exported following the commissioning of 800 MW of new offshore wind capacity in 2013.

The wind power that is exported from Denmark saves neither fossil fuel consumption nor CO2 emissions in Denmark, where it is all paid for. By necessity, wind power exported to Norway and Sweden supplants largely carbon neutral electricity in the Nordic countries. No coal is used nor are there power-related CO2 emissions in Sweden and Norway.

Wind energy has replaced some thermal generation in Denmark. It has saved an average emission of about 2.4 million t per year CO2 at a total subsidy cost of 12.3 billion DKK or an average cost of 647 DKK (€ 87 or $124) per ton CO2. Wind power has proven to be an expensive way to save CO2 emissions[3].

The cost of Denmark’s wind capacity to Danish consumers is exacerbated by its inability to use so much surplus electricity. The surplus will increase in 2013 when 800 MW of new offshore capacity is commissioned, increasing Denmark’s wind production by 2.7 TWh per year. Nearly all the additional wind power will be exported and this will further depress prices; nearly all the subsidies paid by Danish consumers will also be exported without achieving any significant fossil fuel use nor any CO2 reduction. Achieving own-consumption of all its wind power is technically impossible in the short term and will remain entirely hypothetical until electricity consumption rises and new technical and demand-side solutions have been developed and implemented. In most cases, these have yet even to be invented, let alone proven and costed.

Notwithstanding its many disadvantages, wind power’s one striking advantage is that, like nuclear, its marginal costs of operation are very small once the capital has been paid. However, unlike nuclear, many ten to fifteen year-old turbines are past their useful life. By contrast, most conventional rotating power plant can enjoy a working life of 40 to 60 years, as evidenced by most power plants in Europe today. This puts into question the strategic, economic and environmental benefits of a power plant that may have to be scrapped, replaced and resubsidized every ten to fifteen years.

The Danish Parliament reached a political consensus during 2008 that in 2025 50% of Denmark’s electricity demand must come from renewable resources, mostly wind power. The Ecogrid Study Group has concluded4 that if the extra wind power is to achieve this aim, drastic re-engineering of the whole energy system will need to take place, including the retirement of much expensive, high quality, existing capacity. Wisely, it has not tried to estimate the costs of doing this. In any case, Sweden and Norway will be unable balance the extra wind capacity planned that is also planned for Germany and Netherlands.

PART 2: Wind Energy’s effect on employment

Denmark has been a first-mover in the wind power industry for over ten years, and its leading wind turbine manufacturers have been able to maintain a very strong global position. This has been a consequence of a concerted policy to increase the share of wind power in Danish electricity generation. The policy has only been made possible through substantial subsidies supporting the wind turbine owners. This indirect subsidy has in turn generated the demand for wind turbines from the manufactures. Exactly how the subsidies have been shared between land, wind turbine owners, labor, capital and shareholders is opaque, but it is fair to assess that no Danish wind industry to speak of would exist if it had to compete on market terms. This paper documents the experiences gained in Denmark with regard to the employment effect of subsidizing the wind industry.

Substantial subsidies have been directed to the Danish wind mill industry over years. From 2001-2005 the yearly subsidy has been 1.7-2.6 billion DKK.

The Danish Wind industry counts 28,400 employees. This does not, however, constitute the net employment effect of the wind mill subsidy. In the long run, creating additional employment in one sector through subsidies will detract labor from other sectors, resulting in no increase in net employment but only in a shift from the non-subsidized sectors to the subsidized sector. Allowing for the theoretical possibility of wind employment alleviating possible regional pockets of high unemployment, a very optimistic ballpark estimate of net real job creation is 10% of total employment in the sector. In this case the subsidy per job created is 600,000-900,000 DKK per year ($90,000-140,000). This subsidy constitutes around 175-250% of the average pay per worker in the Danish manufacturing industry.

In terms of value added per employee, the energy technology sector over the period 1999-2006 underperformed by as much as 13% compared with the industrial average.

This implies that the effect of the government subsidy has been to shift employment from more productive employment in other sectors to less productive employment in the wind industry. As a consequence, Danish GDP is approximately 1.8 billion DKK ($270 million) lower than it would have been if the wind sector work force was employed elsewhere.

________________

1. 1. According to the OECD, Denmark has the World’s highest tax burden. This applies across a slew of tax sources, including personal income and value added tax.
   2. The wind power subsidy arrangements before 2001 were made directly by Government and are not available to the public.
   3. The “value” of European emission allowances since the European emission-trading scheme (ETS) started has varied between € 1 and €30 per ton of CO2.
   4. http://www.energinet.dk/en/menu/R+and+D/EcoGrid/EcoGrid.dk.htm

(See full study report; 2.8 MB, 39 pages,  PDF document)

The population of the Province of Alberta  (3.6 million) is comparable in size to that of Denmark (5.5 million), while its area (661,848 km²  or 255,541 sq mi) is 15.4 times larger than that of Denmark (43,098.31 km² or 16,640 sq mi).  It follows that the politicians’ push to create wind-energy generating capacity in Alberta will come at a considerably higher cost per capita than it does in Denmark, at considerably more than the Danish experience of $49 in GDP loss per annum per capita in Denmark.

The pursuit of the illusion of “free” wind power comes at a very real cost that we would be wise to avoid.

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