RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://issuesinsights.com/2021/06/28/putting-climate-models-on-trial/

It’s hot. A number of North American cities have set record-high temperatures. But this is summer and that’s not indisputable evidence that man’s use of fossil fuels is overheating the planet. No matter what the Democrats say, how much the media nag, and how loudly zealots screech, the issue is not settled. There’s still enough doubt about the entire enterprise to fill the yawning gap between Earth and some far-away galaxy.

If climate models were on trial – and they should be – that doubt would be magnified by a new post from the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES) at the University of Colorado Boulder, which confirms “models may overestimate warming.”

“Today’s climate models are showing more warmth than their predecessors, forecasting an even hotter future for the same rise in atmospheric carbon dioxide. But a paper published this week highlights how models may err on the side of too much warming: Earth’s warming clouds cool the surface more than anticipated, the German-led team reported in Nature Climate Change,” says CIRES.

Jennifer Kay, a CIRES fellow and an associate professor of atmospheric and oceanic sciences at Colorado University, says “the increase in climate sensitivity from the last generation of climate models should be taken with a huge grain of salt.”

https://thefederalist.com/2021/06/25/censuring-china-would-help-the-earth-far-more-than-banning-steak-gasoline-and-cow-flatulence/

Every hindrance on industry made in the name of the Earth is a lie if it does not include similar restrictions on imports from countries without laws like ours.

Bashing America is popular on the radical left, but it betrays just how much they really don’t know about the rest of the world. For leftists concerned about the environment, incessantly focusing on the United States is an especially big mental failure. While American stewardship of our land, water, and air have gradually improved over the last 50 years, real degradation of the natural environment has been increasing overseas.

Politicians on the left preach piously about the need to protect the Earth while decrying any sort of restriction on trade with the world’s greatest polluter, China. Anyone who cares about good stewardship of the Earth should consider that trade with China is the United States’ most anti-environmental activity. If you want to be green, you must call for tariffs on China.

Communism’s Anti-Environmental Legacy

China is by far the world’s biggest user of coal, and unlike the west, they make little attempt to clean up the byproducts. They burned more coal than ever in 2020 and so far in 2021, they are on pace to use even more. Pollution in their major cities, where mask-wearing was a thing long before anyone heard of COVID-19, is telling.

Their uncaring attitude even extends to space, like earlier this year when bits of a Chinese rocket were left to fall wherever they might. Even when China pretends to be green, the efforts are an obvious sham. The Chinese Communist Party cares as little for the Earth as they do its inhabitants.

The exact statistics from Beijing cannot be fully trusted, but their environmental record is in line with other Marxist regimes. As China does, the Soviet Union put a premium on rapid industrialization. While an advanced economy offers a better standard of living, the Soviets allowed a possibly worthy end to justify a host of atrocious means. In addition to executions, gulags, and famines, they also wrecked the environment, leaving behind a legacy of pollution Russia is still battling today.

China’s actions are similar. In their drive to rival the United States in economic output and industrial strength, they have committed atrocities against their own people and against the world. Mao Tse-Tung’s Great Leap Forward and its “backyard furnace” program are well-known examples. Instructing every communal farm to build a furnace to increase steel production, the CCP mainly succeeded in forcing farmers with no knowledge of steelmaking to melt down their iron and fuel forges by cutting down trees, only to result in inferior steel of no use to anyone.

China, Not the U.S., Needs Environmental Reform

https://www.realclearenergy.org/articles/2021/06/24/happy_birthday_global_warming

This month, climate change celebrates its 33rd birthday. On June 23, 1988, NASA scientist James Hansen testified that the greenhouse effect had been detected. “Global Warming Has Begun,” The New York Times declared the next day. Indeed, it had. A year older than Alexander the Great when he died, climate change took less than one-third of a century to conquer the West.

Four days earlier, the Toronto G7 had agreed that global climate change required “priority attention.” Before the month was out, the Toronto climate conference declared that humanity was conducting an uncontrolled experiment “whose ultimate consequences could be second only to a global nuclear war.” In September, Margaret Thatcher gave her famous speech to the Royal Society, warning of a global heat trap. “We are told,” although she didn’t say by whom, “that a warming of one degree centigrade per decade would greatly exceed the capacity of our natural habitat to cope,” an estimate that turned out to be a wild exaggeration. Observed warming since then has been closer to one-tenth of one degree centigrade per decade. Two months later, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) held its inaugural meeting in Geneva.

The tendency to catastrophism was present at the outset of global warming. The previous year, at a secretive meeting of scientists that included the IPCC’s first chair, it had been recognized that traditional cost-benefit analysis was inappropriate, on account of the “risk of major transformations of the world of future generations.” The logic of this argument requires that climate change be presented as potentially catastrophic—otherwise, the cure would appear worse than the putative disease.

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2021/06/fake_science_covid_and_global_warming.html

The scientists guiding our COVID response have been exposed as driven by politics, not science. Dr. Fauci says that attacks on him are attacks on science. We are supposed to believe that persons that cloak themselves with science are infallible and honest. Really?

If one of their fellow scientists departs from orthodoxy, scientists sign petitions denouncing him.  That happened to Dr. Harvey Risch of Yale because he dared to suggest that hydroxychloroquine might be useful for treating COVID.  

Given the COVID example, it is now not so incredible to think that the scientists promoting global warming have ulterior motives. The Texas A&M University atmospheric sciences faculty sign a loyalty oath to global warming. The editor of the academic journal Remote Sensing was forced to resign because he published a perfectly legitimate paper critical of climate models. Cancel culture is strong among the global warming scientists. Every effort is made to cancel dissenters. There is no such thing as an early career scientist skeptical concerning global warming. He could never get a job, even if somehow he could get his Ph.D.  This is not because the science is solid. It’s because orthodoxy is ruthlessly enforced to protect the career interests of the global warming establishment.

In case you are wondering, the name “global warming” was changed to “climate change” because the globe wasn’t warming. The climate is always changing, so the advocates can claim that normal variation is proof of climate change.

Global warming has been thoroughly exposed as a fraud by many authors including highly qualified atmospheric scientists. Yet global warming is still a canonic belief in influential circles. The president wants to greatly expand the development of wind and solar energy in order to prevent global warming. Even if one accepts the junk science of global warming, according to the tenets of global warming theory, wind and solar are completely ineffective for preventing the imaginary crisis,. Straight forward computation shows that wind and solar, exclusive of subsidies, cost 5-10 times more than the natural gas energy they displace. Only gas usage is displaced. The gas generating plants must remain, fully staffed, ready to spring into operation when sun or wind is deficient.

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2021/06/the_utter_uselessness_of_climate_change_science_.html

As I have learned the hard way, the science behind climate change has no more predictive real-world value than the science behind COVID.  When put to the test, scientists cannot tell you what will happen next year, let alone next century, but that does not stop them from pretending they can.

Three years ago, my new neighbor here on Lake Erie asked if I wanted to go in with him on a seawall.  Having spent thirty summers on the Rust Belt Riviera, I politely declined.  As I explained, on only one occasion during those years had waves lapped against even the base of my heavily vegetated ten-foot bank.  Besides, walls cost a lot of money.

Although I have never trusted it, the science of climate change was on my side.  In 2002, National Geographic published a scary, much cited article titled “Down the Drain: The Incredible Shrinking Great Lakes.”  Someone seems to have pulled the plug on this article, as I learned about it only from reading a 2012 National Geographic article by Lisa Borre that identified the culprit for this shrinkage as climate change, “Warming Lakes: Climate Change and Variability Drive Low Water Levels on the Great Lakes.”

According to Ms. Barre, “Down the Drain” documented “declining lake levels and the potential economic and ecological consequences for the region.”  Ten years later, Barre tells us, “[t]he story continues to unfold, as water levels remain lower than normal.”  Barre’s article features several alarming images of stranded boats and sandy stretches where water once flowed.  On a dozen occasions in the article, Barre cites “climate change” as the likely explanation for the shrinking lakes.

A lengthy 2013 article by Dan Egan of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel on the shrinking Great Lakes affirmed that the debate was over.  “This is not a story about climate change,” Egan wrote.  “It is a story about climate changed.”

Citing various climate scientists, Egan described the reason for the shrinking trend this way: “[w]ith little to no protective ice cap, chilled air whooshing over relatively warm water leads to more cold-weather evaporation.  The result of this thermal avalanche triggered by just a tiny bump in air temperatures: the surface of the lake is literally going poof into the sky.”

https://issuesinsights.com/2021/06/16/it-pays-to-be-green-if-youre-a-wall-street-fat-cat-that-is/

America’s business community has always liked the color “green.” Traditionally, it was about earning U.S. dollars.  Today, it’s about brandishing a woke environmental image.

Perhaps nothing showcases this better than the trend toward “Environmental, Social and Governance” (ESG) investments by those on Wall Street.  Particularly attractive to millennials, the pitch for investing in ESG’s is to not just “make money,” but “make the world a better place” while doing it.

A noble-sounding idea?  Perhaps.  But as Rupert Darwall points out in a newly released study “Capitalism, Socialism and ESG,” there’s more to this racket than meets the eye.

That notion of a “better” world from ESG investments applies only if you agree with progressive climate and social agendas. For those who identify as anything other than “liberal,” backing investment strategies to kill fracking jobs, attack red meat, and help promote a Green New Deal economy may prove a bit hard to swallow.

What about all that money to be made? Turns out it is less for your portfolio and more for the bottom line of Wall Street companies.

For example, BlackRock charges 46 cents annually for every $100 invested in its iShares Global Clean Energy ETF, while it charges just 4 cents for iShares linked to the S&P 500 in comparison.

It pays to be woke – if you’re a Wall Street fat cat, that is.

As for average Joe investors buying into these ESG stocks, their bottom lines aren’t as lucky.

https://issuesinsights.com/2021/06/08/the-more-alarmists-talk-the-more-we-know-global-warming-is-a-scam/

It’s said that conspiracies can’t remain secret forever because someone eventually talks. This is certainly true of the global warming swindle. The climate fanatics have a habit of regularly revealing that they’re running a racket.

The most recent example occurred last month during a “Critical Climate Moment?” segment on CBS that featured its global warming “expert.” When asked why an increase of 1.5 degrees Celsius in global temperature has been determined to be a tipping point, the network’s “climate specialist” admitted it’s a “symbolic” figure. 

“Because, I mean, humans chose it, we chose 1.5, we chose 2 degrees,” said meteorologist Jeff Berardelli, whose entire on-camera spiel was an exercise in fearmongering based on speculation.

So there it is. A number pulled out of the ether. No (real) science behind it. A benchmark used to do nothing more than frighten the public – a Menckenian hobgoblin.

It’s almost routine for the alarmists to give up the game. We’ve seen them inadvertently admit that the objective of the global warming scare is an opportunity to:

Abolish capitalism, “change the economic development model that has been reigning for at least 150 years, since the Industrial Revolution,” and install a command-and-control economy. 
Change our political system.
Redistribute wealth.
“Build a better world” that will surely be based on economic and social central planning.
“Bring about major structural changes in economic growth and development.”
Pursue personal and religious ambitions – at the expense of others.

https://www.manhattancontrarian.com/blog/2021-6-3-california-may-be-crazy-in-its-climate-initiatives-but-new-york-wants-to-be-even-crazier

In the competition among the states to establish progressive and “woke” bona fides, California and New York run neck and neck for the lead positions. In no field is this more true than in the area of “climate change,” which as progressive public policy turns into a program to drive up the cost of energy, suppress fossil fuels and anything else that works (nuclear), and demand creation of a new fantasy energy system based on the wind and the sun.

In recent years, California has seemed to pull well ahead of New York in the accumulation of climate virtue. California has had a so-called “renewable portfolio standard” for its generation of electricity since way back in 2002, and has been aggressively building wind and solar generation facilities ever since. In 2018, thinking that the way to achieving lower carbon emissions is to cover the countryside with wind turbines and solar panels, California upped its game with a bill known as SB 100, having the official title “The 100 Percent Clean Energy Act of 2018.” Among other things, SB 100 called for a 100% carbon-emissions-free electricity sector by 2045. As reported here a few weeks ago, in March the California energy regulatory agencies jointly came out with plans to reach the 100% by 2045 goal. Meanwhile, the California Energy Commission reports that in 2020 California achieved a level of 36% of its electricity generation from renewables.

So are we here in New York just going to stand around and let our butts get kicked by these upstarts? No! But we have some serious catching up to do. New York wasn’t nearly so ambitious as California in building wind and solar facilities in the first two decades of the 21st century. By 2019 New York got some 29% of its electricity from “renewable” sources. But the large majority of that came from the gigantic hydroelectric power plant at Niagara Falls, which somehow is seen by environmental moralists as lacking in climate virtue; and in any event there isn’t another Niagara Falls waiting to have a big hydro plant attached. Time to get serious! So in July 2019 New York enacted something called the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act (CLCPA), our own version of California’s SB 100.

https://thehill.com/opinion/energy-environment/556003-us-energy-policy-and-the-pursuit-of-failureagain

We’ve been here before.  

The development of the Biden administration’s energy and climate policies is following a path set by the energy policies of the 1970s. That is not a good model to follow. Failure followed failure. Essentially U.S. energy policy has been created by a four-step process: 

First, an energy crisis is declared. Presidents and legislators feel the pressure to “do something.” 

Second, policy proposals that supposedly will provide a solution are announced. 

Third, assuming the sense of crisis lingers, extreme measures are passed in Congress or initiated by executive action, or both. 

Fourth, the measures prove ineffective and, although billions are spent, the measures are either repealed or just forgotten. In the meantime, market forces end the “crisis.” 

Presidents Nixon and Ford went through steps one and two. The Arab oil embargo and the subsequent gasoline shortages made it necessary for officials to offer radical ideas. But the end of the lines at gas stations and the fall in oil prices meant the end of the sense of crisis. That made officials reluctant to pursue the radical measures that had been proposed.  

It took the energy crisis of 1979-80 to follow the path to its conclusion. The return of gasoline shortages and sky-high energy prices induced President Carter to devise a comprehensive energy plan.  

Carter and his energy secretary believed that the U.S. and most of rest of the world were rapidly running out of oil and natural gas. All remaining oil and the wealth it entailed would go to the oil exporters (especially the hated Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, OPEC), while we shivered in the dark.  

So drastic measures were needed. Carter’s policies, if enacted, were supposed to make the U.S. energy independent, but would have other virtues including protecting the American way of life. 

The major component of this plan was to replace two million barrels a day of oil imports with a substitute derived from processing American coal. These “synfuels” would cost $88 billion (inflation-adjusted $320 billion), a number then-Secretary of Energy James Schlesinger later admitted “came from nowhere.” Moreover, five different agencies of the government said that the synfuels goal wasn’t feasible.   

As distress at the pump (especially rising prices) continued, Congress passed most of Carter’s plan, including the creation of the Synfuels Corporation.