Net zero is the reason we have empty supermarket shelves

Green blob [credit: storybird.com]

If officials think empty food shelves are a price worth paying for vain attempts to change the climate, they’re way out of touch with reality.
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It wasn’t meant to be like this: rationing is back, now being introduced in some supermarkets for fruits and vegetables, says farmer Jamie Blackett @ The Telegraph.

Typically, the public debate remains stuck on Brexit – or “Vegxit”. But this is much more to do with cold weather in farming regions, poor harvests in North Africa and Spain, and continued high energy costs.

If public expectations are that they should be able to eat tomatoes, peppers and cucumbers in February, something previous generations could barely imagine, it is perhaps understandable that logistics along an attenuated supply chain will play a major part.

Friends of Science: Germany Teeters on the Brink of Energy Disaster – Global Food Crisis Looms

CALGARY, ALBERTA (PRWEB) JULY 14, 2022

The Financial Post of July 09, 2022, reported that Canada will release a sanctioned, overhauled gas turbine to Germany, for use in Russia’s Nord Stream 1 gas pipeline, hopefully preventing a further collapse of Germany’s economy, says Friends of Science. Critics denounced the move as conflicting with Canada’s “Stand with Ukraine” policy. According to Canada’s international trade website: “Germany, with the largest economy in the EU and the fourth largest in the world … Germany is Canada’s largest export market in the EU…with two-way merchandise trade totaling $25.8 billion in 2021.”

Germany is heavily reliant on natural gas from Russia. DW reported on July 11, 2022, that Germany was preparing for possible total Russian gas cut-off which would mean economic collapse and social strife due to rationing of low gas reserves and a cold winter ahead.

EChemi reported in April 2022, Germany chemical giant BASF warned that it may have to shut down production: “there is no substitute for natural gas as a raw material or energy source (in Germany), and a shortage of natural gas will result in it not having enough energy for chemical production and lack of key raw materials for manufacturing products.” Many BASF products are familiar and important to the daily life of millions of people worldwide. About 39,000 people work at BASF’s Ludwigschafen chemical processing complex in Germany.

EU energy geopolitics expert Samuel Furfari explains in his July 12, 2022, Atlantico article, “Towards a gas cut: the moment of truth on our dependence on hydrocarbons has come,” oil and gas provide the ‘horse-power’ to make large scale food production possible, but they are also the source of fertilizer. Skyrocketing fertilizer costs and blocked wheat exports from Ukraine will create food shortages and famine.

Freedom of speech: Stuart Kirk resigns as head of HSBC sustainable investing.

Back in May we reported on the suspension of Stuart Kirk, who dropped some truth bombs about climate finance at a Times newspaper conference. Stuart has now resigned his post, and issued this statement:

Today I wish to announce that I have resigned as global head of responsible investing at HSBC Asset Management.

Ironically given my job title, I have concluded that the bank’s behaviour towards me since my speech at a Financial Times conference in May has made my position, well, unsustainable.

Funny old world.

Over a 27-year unblemished record in finance, journalism and consulting I have only ever tried to do the best for my clients and readers, knowing that doing so helps my employer too.

Investing is hard. So is saving our planet. Opinions on both differ. But humanity’s best chance of success is open and honest debate. If companies believe in diversity and speaking up, they need to walk the talk. A cancel culture destroys wealth and progress.

There is no place for virtue signalling in finance. Likewise as a writer, researcher and investor, I know that words or trading shares can only achieve so much. True impact comes from the combination of real-world action and innovative solutions.

Which is why I’ve been gathering a crack group of like-minded individuals together to deliver what is arguably the greatest sustainable investment idea ever conceived. A whole new asset class. Sounds fanciful – but I am not one for hyperbole, as viewers of my presentation know well.

To be announced later this year, the first project will underline the central argument in my speech: that human ingenuity can and will overcome the challenges ahead, while at the same time offering huge investment opportunities.

Meanwhile, I will continue to prod with a sharp stick the nonsense, hypocrisy, sloppy logic and group-think inside the mainstream bubble of sustainable finance. Follow me on LinkedIn if you want to learn the right way to think about ESG – and let me tell you, most of what’s out there is bonkers.

Finally, can I take this opportunity to thank the tens of thousands of people – from chief executives and congressmen to scientists and mom and pop investors – who contacted me from around the world offering their support and solidarity over the past two months.

You have given me strength during what has been a tumultuous time for me and my family. It is for you that the next chapter in my career will be devoted. Please forward this to anyone you know who cares about money and planet earth.

Stuart

Update on the world’s progress eliminating fossil fuels

Coal-hungry China [image credit: democraticunderground.com]

Progress? There isn’t any worth mentioning, and that will continue. Meanwhile ‘net zero’ fantasies are served up daily to obscure the reality and make believe that politicians can be managers of the climate.
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The bureaucrats of the world, particularly in the UN and developed countries, have the idea that they are going to eliminate all use of fossil fuels by somewhere around 2040-50, says Francis Menton at the Manhattan Contrarian (via Climate Change Dispatch).

They have no conception how to accomplish that, other than to order from on high that it shall occur and assume that somebody else will figure out the details.

This gives the rest of us the opportunity to sit on the sidelines and observe how bureaucratic fantasy gradually runs into the brick wall of physical reality.

Can the world stop investing in oil & gas?

By the Ageing Tiger

The International Energy Agency was set up in 1974 to ensure the security of oil supplies, if you are old enough, like me, you might remember the Arab oil embargo, queues at petrol stations and rocketing oil prices. So, if the IEA come out and say “that no new oil and natural gas fields are needed in the net zero pathway”, then that must be true and all of us oil and gas professionals can hang up our boots and head to the scrapheap.

When the IEA was formed, it was in response to the emergence of OPEC. When OPEC flexed its muscles in the early 1970’s the cartel supplied over 50% of the world’s oil, they had massive market power.

By the time I was moving to Aberdeen to work offshore on Forties, you see for a brief period I was a genuine North Sea Tiger, OPEC supplied less than 30% of the world’s oil. Oil prices which had been over $100/bbl in 2021 money, duly collapsed and it wasn’t until US shale oil started to chip away at OPEC’s market share that anyone really paid attention to OPEC again.

How the UK Climate Assembly manufactured consent

No coincidence that Ireland and France also held similar climate charades around the same time. All part of the promotion of useless ‘net zero’ ideology.
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This stage-managed Assembly is a sham, says Spiked-online.

There is no democratic mandate for extreme climate policies.

As I have been pointing out for over a decade here on spiked, the political consensus on climate change is not shared by the public – or, at best, the public’s appetite for climate policy has not been tested democratically.

And governments are well aware of this, too.

UK Climate Assembly was undemocratic–Ben Pile

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Just as undemocratic as the Irish version, the French version etc. Funny how they all came up with the same idea at the same time…

NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT

By Paul Homewood

London, 29 January: The UK Climate Assembly, which claimed to have delivered a mandate for a green revolution, could not have delivered a mandate of any kind, according to a new analysis published by the Global Warming Policy Forum.

According to the report’s author, Ben Pile, the Assembly was set up to deliver a preordained result:

Pile says that the Assembly was actually set up because the public were unpersuaded of the case for radical action.

The UK Climate Assembly: Manufacturing Mandates can be downloaded here

https://www.thegwpf.com/climate-assembly-was-undemocratic/

Ben’s conclusion sums it up nicely:

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Carbon capture is vital to meeting climate goals, say scientists – but industrial-scale wood burning is OK?

Drax power station, generating 7% of Britain’s needs, is partly converted to burning imported woodchips.

More climate doublethink here. While supporting the burning of wood pellets to generate electricity, thereby creating massive carbon dioxide emissions that may reside in the atmosphere for a number of years, some climate obsessives insist that removing such emissions from the atmosphere is ‘desperately needed’. The illogicality of this has been largely ignored, but now Friends of the Earth Scotland and others have complained that CCS has a “history of over-promising and under-delivering”. Will CCS ever be viable either in terms of cost or practicality? If anything, current evidence points in the other direction.
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Supporters insist that storage technology is not a costly mistake but the best way for UK to cut emissions from heavy industry, says The Guardian.

Engineers and geologists have strongly criticised green groups who last week claimed that carbon capture and storage schemes – for reducing fossil fuel emissions – are costly mistakes.

UK urged to save Cop26 UN climate change summit in Glasgow

The greenblob is right to think ‘COP-speak’ is a big turn-off for the public, but that’s about all they get right. Trying to manipulate the Earth’s climate by demonising the minor trace gas carbon dioxide is a vastly expensive exercise in futility. Seeing hundreds of planes full of delegates arriving in Glasgow (if it happens) will undermine any little public credibility the COP exercise, supposedly about ’emissions’, might have. People may be even less impressed if/when delegates start arguing for semi-permanent forms of lockdown, in pursuit of their long-term agendas.
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UK ministers are under pressure to rescue the 26th UN Climate Change Conference of the Parties (Cop26) in Glasgow this year amid concerns not enough energy is being poured into preparations for the crucial talks, reports The National News (N World).

Environmental experts warned the government must step up preparations after a report claimed at the weekend Business Secretary Alok Sharma offered to quit his government post to focus on his second responsibility as Cop26 president.

The November talks are seen as critical for accelerating global action towards meeting the goals of the Paris Agreement.

Participating countries are expected to hammer out new emission reduction targets to limit global warming to well below 2°C.

Ben Pile: How the CCC turns 10 opinions in 66 million.

Watch this excellent seven minute video and read the twitter thread here by Ben Pile. The climate change committee is using soviet style ‘citizen’s assemblies’ to justify their highly questionable ideas about how we should live to government.

Ben Pile on the cosy compact of Govt, Business and Civil Society

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Hands up if you remember voting in favour of the UK’s ‘net zero’ energy policies. Or even being offered the chance to vote on them at all. Oh…

NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT

By Paul Homewood

Ben Pile has a new video out, which needs to be widely spread:

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Solar Desert Deep-Sixed In Rural Virginia

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So the greenblob can’t always steamroller local opposition to its land-grabbing subsidy farms. The actual solar panels are not renewable or even recyclable.

PA Pundits International

By Bonner Cohen, Ph.D. ~

For the second time in 15 months, residents of rural Culpeper County, Virginia have risen up against a proposed massive solar array project, forcing the would-be developers to withdraw their application to put the renewable energy facility in the county’s picturesque rolling farmlands.

North Carolina-based Strata Solar had planned to build the $200 million, 1,700-acre, 149 megawatts project on cleared timberland in southern Culpepper. The land on which the industrial-sized solar array was to be built was zoned agricultural in keeping with the rural character of the area.

Maroon Solar, the name the developer gave to the project, was supposed to be another step on the way to a “carbon-free” energy future, but local officials and nearby residents raised strong objections. The Culpepper County Board of Supervisors (BOS) evaluated the project and, on Nov. 12, held a well-attended, four-hour public hearing on a request by…

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Andy Shaw: A Guide to the Green Industrial Revolution

Guest post from our good friend Andy Shaw; taking a light hearted look at some pretty serious issues around Boris Johnson’s version of the Green New Deal. Andy is also the powerhouse behind London based Comedy Unleashed who are still running, despite the batflu restrictions. Book early and get along there to enjoy a pint, pizza and pisstake if you’re in the area. Give Andy a follow on twitter to keep up with the latest.

A Guide to the Green Industrial Revolution

The government has announced their Plan for a Green Industrial Revolution. It will bring electricity to light homes, gas for cooking and cars to drive! You may think that we already have these things, but this is a Green revolution, everything that we have got used to will be re-invented. Boris Johnson’s 10 point plan includes heat pumps, hydrogen gas and batteries, but what is really going on? This is your 6 point guide.

1. Green is popular!

Boris Johnson’s dad and his current girlfriend have a favourite colour and it is .. green! This shows that green policies are popular across generations and that the government is right to revolutionise our entire economy.

PM’s “green industrial revolution” plan hits the road — subsidies all round

Image credit: BBC

Of course the assumption behind most of this is that the climate needs ‘saving’ from the demonic trace gas CO2, according to failing climate models anyway. We’ll skip most of the BBC commentary and show the main points of the plan. The expressed aim is ‘to put the UK on track to meet its goal of net zero emissions by 2050’. No sign of the eye-watering costs, in this report at least.
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New cars and vans powered wholly by petrol and diesel will not be sold in the UK from 2030, Boris Johnson has said.

But some hybrids would still be allowed, he confirmed.

It is part of what the prime minister calls a “green industrial revolution” to tackle climate change and create jobs in industries such as nuclear.

Boris Johnson seeks advice on how to create 2 million green jobs

Green blob [credit: storybird.com]

Tree planters required – no experience in climate saving necessary? Government announcement here.
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Investors are keen to create ‘green jobs’ in technologies such as nuclear, hydrogen and carbon capture but they are too expensive to work without subsidy, says The Global Warming Policy Forum (GWPF).

Prime Minister Boris Johnson is seeking advice from industry on how to create green jobs in the U.K. as unemployment rose at the quickest pace in a decade.

The government is gathering a green jobs taskforce that seeks to create employment for 2 million by 2030.

Johnson is planning a major speech on how he will spur an industrial revolution in clean-energy technologies, part of a series of initiative leading up to global talks on climate change the U.K. will host next year.

Ross McKitrick: Save the economy, ditch the ‘green recovery’ plans

Any ‘green’ ideas were never about economic sanity anyway, but that problem is now even more acute.

H/T The GWPF
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Green technologies that were known money-losers before the pandemic are still money-losers today.

There’s a curious idea floating around that the COVID crisis undid the principles of economics, says Ross McKitrick.

Nobody puts it exactly like that, but it’s implied in the various proposals for restructuring the post-pandemic economy so that it will look very different from the one we experienced up to the end of January.

Amid the buzzwords about “Resilient Recovery” and “Building Back Better” are proposals for an investment push into green technologies and new environmental policies, including initiatives that failed to pass standard economic tests before the pandemic.

So how, exactly, did the pandemic change the criteria for evaluating policies, investments and major public projects?

The short answer is: it didn’t, and any claim otherwise is untrue.

Davos: the birthplace of a New World Government? But who are the parents?

Charlie Chaplin: The Great Dictator

June 25, 2020

By Robin Horsley

DAVOS, is the small town, nestled high in the Swiss Alps, widely known for hosting the annual conference of global business-people, world leaders, activists, and journalists that takes place every January. The organisation that arranges the event, the World Economic Forum (WEF), and its enigmatic founder Klaus Schwab, are less well-known.

The WEF’s exclusive shindig used to be thought of simply as a grandiose talking-shop. The ultimate annual ‘networking’ event where the wealthy and powerful could grand-stand in front of the world’s media. But in recent years, as the ambitions and agenda of the WEF have become clearer, many people have gradually realised there is far more to Davos and the World Economic Forum than they previously thought. 

Energy minister declares UK fracking dead.

Utterly misguided and spineless UK Govt. decision.

Pushback on EU ‘Green New Deal’ leads to alternative proposals.

Green blob [credit: storybird.com]

From GreenTech media

The EU is currently working through the details of a €1.85 trillion ($2.08 trillion) recovery package. Before the stimulus was signed, a leaked document by the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Energy (DG Energy) ran through a serious of policy plans to marry the European Green Deal and the COVID-19 recovery effort.

Those plans included a possible 15-gigawatt EU-wide renewable tender designed to help make up for a shortfall in national tenders. Support for green hydrogen was also advanced as a potential item for inclusion.

But the plans have not survived a barrage of lobbying by vested interests and pushback from member states still married to a more traditional energy mix, according to multiple sources following the green recovery’s development.

Still waiting for greenhouse: No response to my last email to Roy Spencer

Before the last time I had to dive deeply into politics to defend the EU referendum result, I had an email conversation with Roy Spencer in an attempt to resolve the conflict between physicists like himself, who believe the radiative greenhouse theory is correct, but it’s effect small, and physicists like Ned Nikolov, who contend that the theory is fundamentally incorrect.

After a couple of to and fro emails I sent this response in Feb 2019, to which I never received a reply. It’s time we got this discussion back out in the open, because Boris’ green reset #netzero plan for the UK post Brexit and post pandemic is set to ruin our economy and cause untold suffering, deprivation, and death.

the lukewarmers have utterly failed to convince the fanatics that although they think their theory is correct (it isn’t, but that’s their misguided opinion), they’ve overestimated the magnitude of the effect.

It’s time they stopped supporting the fanatics by deploying false arguments against better theory which will exonerate CO2 and move the debate away from ridiculous and expensive ‘mitigation’, and forward to adaption to the effects of natural climatic change.