John Kerry’s climate alarmism mission – distortion, deception and most of all dishonesty April 6, 2019 Guest essay by Larry Hamlin The Los Angeles Times and other so called “news papers” carried stories about John Kerry’s efforts to launch an international initiative to “hold politicians accountable for undermining the fight against climate change” for not supporting the phony Paris climate agreement which has now become an embarrassing global debacle with most of the world’s nations ignoring any actions to reduce energy growth, decreases CO2 emissions, mandate use of renewables and decrease use of coal fuel. Kerry singled out President Trump for criticism because of the President’s brilliant decision to dump the phony Paris agreement in June 2017 and back away from the Obama-era of politically contrived “pollution-cutting regulations” which Kerry characterized as being “criminal, basically.” The Times article noted the following climate alarmist propaganda puffery about Kerry’s schemes: “The primary solution to climate change, Kerry said, is clear: to transform the energy system so that it no longer relies on carbon-emitting fossil fuels. And that task is becoming easier as renewable technologies improve.” “Kerry said he found it “deeply frustrating” to watch Trump step away from the commitments made in Paris because it has emboldened other world leaders to do the same. “Without the United States, you have a lot of other countries starting to back off.” “Today, few nations are on track to meet the Paris targets and greenhouse gas emissions are rising. The United Nations says that to keep global warming within levels tolerable to humanity, governments will have to go far beyond their Paris pledges and reduce planet-warming pollution by nearly half in the next decade alone.” “That’s beyond catastrophe,” he said. “It’s unacceptable.” “The biggest single thing that is lacking today is political accountability,” Kerry said. “People can mock the concept of climate change with impunity and there is no cost to pay. That’s got to stop.” All of Kerry’s claims reek of the usual climate alarmist political propaganda distortion, deception and most off all dishonesty. With colossal dishonesty Kerry and the L. A. Times blatantly ignore the huge success and effectiveness of U.S. energy policy under President Trump which has vaulted America to become the world’s leading and largest contributor toward lowering global CO2 emissions by reducing emissions by over 870 million metric tons since the countries peak year 2007 levels with emissions forecast to be further reduced to just over 1 billion metric tons by 2050. No other global nation or group of nations has achieved anywhere near the U.S. success in CO2 emissions reductions with even the highly touted EU hyped climate initiatives falling far behind U.S. emission reduction achievements. The huge success in U.S. energy policy which has achieved lower energy costs, higher energy efficiency and lower CO2 emissions has been driven by the increased use of low cost natural gas which America’s fracking technology has created. In yet another act of dishonesty Kerry and the L. A. Times further conceal the global energy and emissions reality that has emerged with the world’s developing nations taking full control of global energy use and emissions levels and growth thus rendering the U.S. and EU energy and emissions growth as being irrelevant to existing and future global totals. Kerry and the L. A. Times also hide the huge failure of the EU’s efforts to meet its hyped climate alarmist goals which have resulted in the EU abandoning the establishment of specific climate targets and commitments for year 2050 with EU giant Germany leading this major retrenchment in climate goals. Worst of all Kerry and the L. A. Times try to cover-up the exploding growth in fossil fuel growth occurring in the developing nations and try to pretend that the phony Paris Agreement could have prevented these actions had the U.S. supported it when in fact the agreement allowed this very situation to occur because it failed completely to require or impose restrictions of any kind on such developments. Kerry and the L. A. Times also cloaked from view the overwhelming dominant role played by China as the leader of the world’s developing nations in driving increased energy use and emissions in their county and in many other countries that China is in partnership with in these endeavors. The failures of the Kerry and Obama-era climate alarmist propaganda Paris agreement schemes that have now clearly emerged resulted from the shear global energy and climate incompetence of these leaders who tried to impose initiatives that were unsupported by global energy and climate science reality but instead reflected nothing but propaganda hyped by UN elitists power grabbing political campaigns which recent events have now fully exposed. Kerry’s efforts on this “international initiative” represent nothing but a purely selfish and politically motivated scheme build upon a foundation of distortion, deception and most of all dishonesty
American Association for the Advancement of Science "The scientific evidence is clear: global climate change caused by human activities is occurring now, and it is a growing threat to society." (2006)3 American Chemical Society "Comprehensive scientific assessments of our current and potential future climates clearly indicate that climate change is real, largely attributable to emissions from human activities, and potentially a very serious problem." (2004)4 American Geophysical Union "Human‐induced climate change requires urgent action. Humanity is the major influence on the global climate change observed over the past 50 years. Rapid societal responses can significantly lessen negative outcomes." (Adopted 2003, revised and reaffirmed 2007, 2012, 2013)5 American Meteorological Society "It is clear from extensive scientific evidence that the dominant cause of the rapid change in climate of the past half century is human-induced increases in the amount of atmospheric greenhouse gases, including carbon dioxide (CO2), chlorofluorocarbons, methane, and nitrous oxide." (2012)7 American Physical Society "The evidence is incontrovertible: Global warming is occurring. If no mitigating actions are taken, significant disruptions in the Earth’s physical and ecological systems, social systems, security and human health are likely to occur. We must reduce emissions of greenhouse gases beginning now." (2007)8 The Geological Society of America "The Geological Society of America (GSA) concurs with assessments by the National Academies of Science (2005), the National Research Council (2006), and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC, 2007) that global climate has warmed and that human activities (mainly greenhouse‐gas emissions) account for most of the warming since the middle https://climate.nasa.gov/scientific-consensus/
The AustralianSaturday, September 21, 2019 A climate of burning moneyBJORN LOMBORGFollow @bjornlomborg Greta Thunberg testifies during a House Foreign Affairs Committee Europe, Eurasia, Energy and the Environment Subcommittee and House (Select) Climate Crisis Committee joint hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC. 25 MINUTES AGO SEPTEMBER 21, 2019 Facebook Twitter Whatsapp Email World leaders will soon arrive in New York for a climate summit likely to do little more than add to the hysteria drowning out any sober talk on climate policy. Amid warnings that we have days left to act, politicians will jostle to share the spotlight with celebrity activists such as 16-year-old Greta Thunberg, who came from Europe by wind-powered boat. Hurricane Dorian looms large over proceedings as a harbinger of doom. After 30 years of failed climate policy, more of the same is not the answer. Since the 1992 Rio de Janeiro Earth Summit, our use of renewable energy has increased by only 1.1 percentage points — from meeting 13.1 per cent of the world’s energy needs in 1992 to 14.2 per cent today. Most nations are failing to deliver on carbon cut undertakings already made — yet politicians will be feted in New York for making new, empty promises. Enough is enough. We must confront climate change, but hyperbole and bluster do the planet no favours. This is the time we should be having a sensible discussion on cost-effective ways to reduce the worst of climate change’s damages. Thunberg exposes the vacuous hypocrisy of the movement. She rightly points out that everybody talks big but does little. Since Bill Clinton was in the White House, a succession of global leaders has promised to cut emissions drastically. Their falling short is not because of a lack of interest, urgency or goodwill. While the US lack of climate policy is regrettable, global failure cannot simply be attributed to Donald Trump’s presence in the White House. The reason is that the main climate solution being pursued is costly and ineffective. Alternative energy has increased so little because green energy remains incapable of meeting all of our needs met by fossil fuels. Replacing cheap and reliable fossil fuel energy with more expensive and less reliable energy alternatives weighs down the economy, leading to slightly lower growth. This means the Paris treaty is likely to cost between $US1 trillion and $2 trillion ($1.5 trillion and $2.9 trillion) a year, making it the costliest treaty in history. Not surprisingly, research shows that it will increase poverty. Its effects are not evenly felt; increasing electricity prices hurts the poor the most. At great cost, the Paris Agreement will reduce emissions by just 1 per cent of what politicians have promised. The UN body organising the Paris Agreement finds that if all its promises were fulfilled (which they are not on track to achieve), it would cut about 60 billion tonnes of CO2 equivalents, whereas about 6000 billion tonnes are needed to get to the promised 2C target. Yet politicians are being celebrated for going even further than the Paris treaty’s current promises, vowing to make entire economies “carbon-neutral” within decades. It speaks volumes that few governments ever establish the costs of such promises. One of the few that has is New Zealand. A government-commissioned report found that aiming for net zero emissions by 2050 would cost more than the entire current annual national budget. There would be “yellow vest” riots worldwide if such policies were genuinely pursued. We need to challenge the ever-more rampant talk about “catastrophic” climate change. Rhetoric has become unpinned from science. According to the UN climate science panel’s last major report, if we do absolutely nothing to stop climate change, the impact will be the equivalent to a reduction in our incomes of between 0.2 per cent and 2 per cent five decades from now. Work by Nobel laureate climate economist William Nordhaus based on the UN findings shows the likeliest outcome is a cost to the planet of about 3 per cent of gross domestic product in coming centuries. That should be taken seriously — but it does not equal Armageddon. The havoc wreaked by Hurricane Dorian is tragic but it cannot be pinned on global warming, according to the UN’s climate scientists, who say “globally, there is low confidence in attribution of changes in tropical cyclone activity to human influence”. Indeed, a study shows hurricane damage currently costs 0.04 per cent of global GDP. As we expect a global increase in prosperity and hence resilience, unchanged hurricane costs will drop fourfold to 0.01 per cent by 2100. And even though global warming will make hurricanes fewer but stronger and double total damage, the net impact still will be a smaller 0.02 per cent of GDP. As a study from the Royal Society concluded, cutting CO2 has “extremely limited potential to reduce future losses”. Instead, adaptation can be up to 52 times more effective. As it has become obvious the political response to global warming is not working, more focus has been given to personal actions. But this doesn’t add up, either. Thunberg took a boat from Europe to New York. (The trip awkwardly will result in increased emissions because the crew is flying to New York to take the boat home; Thunberg is reportedly purchasing “carbon offsets”). But if all 4.5 billion flights this year were stopped from taking off, and the same happened every year until 2100, temperatures would be reduced by only 0.03C, using mainstream climate models — equivalent to delaying climate change by less than one year by 2100. Nor will we solve global warming by giving up meat. Going vegetarian is difficult; one US survey shows 84 per cent fail, most in less than a year. Those who succeed will reduce their personal emissions by only about 2 per cent. And electric cars are not the answer. Globally, there are only five million fully electric cars on the road. Even if this climbs to 130 million in 11 years, the International Energy Agency finds CO2 equivalent emissions would be reduced by a mere 0.4 per cent of global emissions. Put simply, the solution to climate change cannot be found in personal changes in the homes of the middle classes of rich countries. The Paris Agreement cannot do much — just as the Rio and Kyoto pacts before it mostly failed — because in essence this approach requires rich countries to promise future economic hardship to achieve very little. Indeed, the real problem is that most of the 21st-century emissions are not being emitted by the rich world: if every single rich country stopped all CO2 emissions today and for the rest of the century — no plane trips, no meat consumption, no petrol-powered cars, no heating or cooling with fossil fuels, no artificial fertiliser — the difference would be just 0.4C by the end of the century. Solving climate change requires getting China, India and all the other developing countries on board to cut emissions. But of course their goal is to lift their populations out of poverty with cheap and reliable energy. How do we square that? A carbon tax can play a limited but important role in factoring the costs of climate change into fossil fuel use. Nordhaus has shown that implementing a small but rising global carbon tax will realistically cut some of the most damaging climate impacts, at rather low costs. This, however, will not solve most of the climate challenge. We must look at how we solved past major challenges — through innovation. The starvation catastrophes in developing nations from the 1960s to the 80s weren’t fixed by asking people to consume less food but through the Green Revolution in which innovation developed higher-yielding varieties that produced more plentiful food. Similarly, the climate challenge will not be solved by asking people to use less of more expensive green energy. Instead, we should dramatically ramp up spending on R&D into green energy. The Copenhagen Consensus Centre asked 27 of the world’s top climate economists to examine policy options for responding to climate change. This analysis showed that the best investment is in green energy R&D. For every dollar spent, $11 of climate damages would be avoided. This would bring forward the day when green energy alternatives are cheaper and more attractive than fossil fuels, not just for the elite but for the entire world. Right now, despite all the rhetoric about the importance of global warming, we are not ramping up this spending. On the sidelines of the 2015 Paris climate summit, more than 20 world leaders made a promise to double green energy research and development by 2020. Spending has inched up from $US16bn in 2015 to only $US17bn last year. This is a broken promise that matters. We must also focus on adaptation — this can generate a broad range of benefits at low cost and help with challenges beyond global warming. And we should remember one of the most powerful development and climate policies is to accelerate economic growth for the world’s worst-off. The most powerful way to achieve this is through opening up trade opportunities. That is very far from the direction the world is heading in right now. Yet research shows that a successful Doha round could increase the annual income of the world’s poorest by about $US1000 a person in 2030. This is not only good in and of itself but it also would deliver much more resilience and reduce vulnerability to any climate impacts the future will bring. Sadly, growth policies, adaptation, green R&D and an optimal CO2 tax are not what we will be hearing from the climate summit in New York. But after 30 years of pursuing the wrong solution to climate change, we need to change the script. BJORN LOMBORG COLUMNIST Dr. Bjorn Lomborg is president of the Copenhagen Consensus Center and visiting professor at Copenhagen Business School. He has been named one of TIME magazine’s 100 most influential people in the world. His num... Read more Share