Posts Tagged ‘climate policy’

European Commission HQ, Brussels [image credit: Em_Dee @ Wikipedia]


The motor industry gets sandwiched between climate obsession and clean air fanaticism.
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The CEO of Italian truck and bus maker Iveco has condemned as “plain stupid” the Euro 7 standards which tighten vehicle emission limits for pollutants including nitrogen oxides and carbon monoxide in the European Union from 2025, reports Euractiv.

Iveco Group’s Gerrit Marx said the regulation as currently drafted by the EU required cuts in emissions of nitrogen oxides and particulates which are “technically unfeasible”.

“The effort to get there is huge. And there is no real payback,” he said.

EU countries and lawmakers are due to negotiate the proposed legislation, which is designed to apply to cars and vans from July 1, 2025 and to buses and trucks two years later, this year.

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This article (extracts below) is littered with climate propaganda and evidence-free claims about weather and warming. But then a Stanford University professor is quoted saying carbon capture is “not going to help the climate”. The story of the Satartia CO2 pipeline rupture is disturbing.
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The opportunity to compete for billions of dollars in federal funding is on the line as Illinois considers the future of carbon capture, according to the Prairie Research Institute report, as well as the chance to create jobs and boost local economies, says Phys.org.

And at a time when the state and federal government and nations worldwide are trying to drastically reduce greenhouse gas emissions and stave off the worst effects of global warming—including catastrophic floods and droughts—carbon capture also holds out the promise of making the job easier.

Carbon capture and storage “could play an important role in achieving the state’s decarbonization goals,” according to the report, which was commissioned by the state legislature.

According to Navigator CO2, the Heartland Greenway pipeline would have the ability to reduce annual carbon dioxide emissions by 15 million metric tons, the equivalent of taking 3.2 million cars off the road.

But as the fight over Navigator CO2’s pipeline illustrates, battle lines are being drawn, with opponents questioning carbon capture’s very reason for being—its real-world effectiveness in reducing greenhouse gases.

There are also safety concerns. Landowners fear a pipeline could rupture, releasing a potentially suffocating gas not far from bedroom windows.

“Right now, to move forward with a carbon dioxide pipeline is unconscionable,” said Pam Richart, lead organizer of the Coalition to Stop CO2 Pipelines, which includes citizens and environmental groups. “It just brings too much risk.”
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‘A boondoggle’

Carbon dioxide, which traps heat close to the earth, plays a vital role in maintaining the planet’s temperature [Talkshop comment – a mere assertion].

But now, scientists say, we have too much of a good thing. Due largely to carbon emissions [Talkshop comment – another assertion] from fossil fuels such as oil, gas and coal, global temperatures have risen in the last century.

As a result, there’s been an increase in extreme weather events [Talkshop comment – another one] such as droughts, heat waves and floods; trees and corals have died off in large numbers; and millions of people have been exposed to acute food and water insecurity, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Scientists say urgent action is needed and effective solutions are available, including replacing fossil fuels with wind and solar energy, switching homes and businesses from gas to electricity, and turning to electric cars.

Carbon capture is more controversial, especially when it comes to keeping coal or gas-burning power plants open for business.

Among the critics is climate scientist Mark Jacobson, a professor of civil and environmental engineering at Stanford University.

“If you don’t care about climate or air pollution or energy security, go for it,” he said when asked whether Illinois should pursue leadership in carbon capture. “You can pump a lot of money into carbon capture and create some jobs, but it’s not going to help the climate.”

Jacobson, author of a 2019 study in the journal Energy & Environmental Science that raised doubts about the real-world effectiveness of carbon capture, said that the widely quoted figure that the technology can capture 90% of carbon dioxide emissions is actually an assumption based on idealized measurements.

When Jacobson looked at the real-world performance of the $1 billion Petra Nova project in Texas, at the time the biggest coal-plant carbon capture project in the United States, only about 55% of carbon dioxide emissions were being captured.

And that figure didn’t take into account emissions from the natural gas turbine that had to be built to power carbon capture. Also excluded: emissions from mining and processing the coal and natural gas used at the Petra Nova.

When those factors were taken into account, Jacobson found that carbon capture only reduced average annual emissions by 11% to 20%.

“There’s just no evidence this stuff is useful,” Jacobson said of carbon capture. “And all the evidence suggests it’s just a boondoggle and we could have spent all that money on actual emissions reduction.”

Asked for studies that show carbon capture’s effectiveness in reducing emissions, the authors of the Prairie Research Institute study responded via a spokesperson, who offered a written list of studies, none of which appeared to look at real-world emissions before and after carbon capture.
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Unanswered questions

Among the questions that Illinois still hasn’t answered clearly: Who will bear the long-term responsibility for underground carbon storage sites? Who owns the potentially valuable underground space where carbon dioxide can be stored?

And what will happen if some landowners want to offer up their property for carbon dioxide storage, and other, adjacent, owners do not?

The Prairie Research Institute report includes a range of recommendations addressing such issues, including that the state should create legal and regulatory frameworks for the long-term stewardship and oversight of carbon dioxide storage sites.

The report also recommends the establishment of an interagency planning and oversight committee to consider carbon capture and storage activities in Illinois.

Carbon capture, utilization and storage “should be both enabled and appropriately regulated to ensure long-term storage of CO2 in full consultation with impacted communities,” the report says.

In the wake of a 2020 carbon dioxide pipeline rupture near Satartia, Mississippi, the federal government is also considering more regulation.

At the Satartia pipeline rupture, which followed heavy rains and a landslide, the escaping carbon dioxide roared like a jet engine and carved a crater an estimated 40 feet deep in the ground. A potentially suffocating green fog rose from the pipeline and started moving downhill toward Satartia, according to rescue workers who testified before the Illinois Commerce Commission.

Gas-powered vehicles stalled out on the road due to lack of oxygen, according to testimony. People passed out. In one car, rescue workers found three people unconscious, two with froth coming out of their mouths.

“It looked like the Zombie apocalypse,” testified Yazoo County Emergency Management Agency Director Jack Willingham, who arrived in Satartia about five hours after the rupture. “It was hazy. … There were abandoned vehicles everywhere, many with doors ajar, many with their windows smashed from the rescue efforts.”

No deaths were reported, but 45 people sought medical attention at local hospitals, according to a government report, and federal regulators took notice.

In May, the U.S. Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration announced that it would start a new rule-making process to update standards for carbon dioxide pipelines, including new requirements related to emergency preparedness and response.

Meanwhile, some counties in Illinois have taken matters into their own hands, declaring moratoriums on permits for pipeline construction.

Full article here.
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Huffpost: The Gassing Of Satartia (2021)

A CO2 pipeline in Mississippi ruptured last year, sickening dozens of people. What does it forecast for the massive proposed buildout of pipelines across the U.S.?
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This story is the result of a 19-month HuffPost/Climate Investigations Center investigation into the Satartia pipeline rupture, and the safety of CO2 pipelines.


The government talks about ‘investment’ in renewables. So-called cheap wind energy holds out the begging bowl again.
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Rising supply chain costs and other financial pressures are threatening the development of what could be the world’s largest offshore wind farm off the coast of Britain, says Energy Live News.

The Hornsea Three Offshore Wind Farm is expected to have a capacity of almost 3GW and generate [Talkshop comment – on a good day] enough energy to power three million homes.

Energy giant Orsted, which is behind the construction of the massive wind farm, has said it needs more government support to achieve project progress.

In a statement, Duncan Clark, Head of Orsted UK & Ireland, said: “Since the auction, there has been an extraordinary combination of increased interest rates and supply chain prices.

“Industry is doing everything it can to manage costs on these projects but there is a real and growing risk of them being put on hold or even handing back their CfDs.”

Mr Clark has called on the government to offer targeted support on investments such as tax breaks.

A government spokesperson told ELN: “The government is encouraging investment in renewable generation including through £30 billion to support the green industrial revolution…”

Full article here.

Image credit: autocarbrands.com


Needless to say, high energy prices and job insecurity isn’t what workers wanted in exchange for obscure future benefits. But the country’s Green Party says in effect ‘like it or lump it’. Welcome to the effects of manic climate obsessions.
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A survey done by the German Trade Union Confederation has reportedly found that one in five employees now fear for the future of their jobs as a result of the country’s push for green agenda measures aimed at curbing climate change, says Breitbart.

It is the latest piece of evidence showing how the European Union’s leading economy is struggling with its own carbon emission goals, with the price of energy soaring over last year as renewable energy sources are unable to fill the hole left by missing Russian gas and deliberately scrapped nuclear energy.

The surging price of electricity and home heating is not all that Germans are worrying about, though, with a report by Die Welt claiming that around 20 per cent of the German workforce now feel the country’s green push could endanger their employment.

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London’s Heathrow airport


The four leading alternatives, from biomass to hydrogen, are expensive and/or would require huge imports or swathes of farmland, we’re told. Another fail for climate obsessives it seems. Is Plan B – choking off demand – on the fanatics’ drawing board yet?
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The quest for guilt-free flying may have been knocked off course by a broad study that has concluded there is “no clear or single net zero alternative to jet fuel”, reports Sky News.

The four most viable alternatives “offer some carbon savings but are not ideal”, according to the review by the Royal Society academy of scientists.

Replacing jet fuel with biomass, for example, would require half the UK’s farmland just to sustain current passenger levels.

But the government is planning for levels to soar by 70% by 2050, representing an additional 200 million passengers.

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Irish transmission line [image credit: thejournal.ie]


No surprise to find that ‘Surging demand and insecure supply has left the country vulnerable indefinitely’, after years of climate-driven policies on electricity supply. The self-induced emergency has led to desperate measures like these ‘effectively jet engines’. Another case of replacing what worked with what sounded good.
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Back-up power generators have started to arrive in Ireland to help it keep the lights on during the next few winters, reports The Telegraph.

The mobile turbines, described as “effectively jet engines”, are set to be installed in areas including Dublin and nearby County Meath.

The €350m (£308m) temporary capacity was ordered by environment minister Eamon Ryan last year as a “last resort”, after regulators flagged a looming shortfall in generation.

“This is an electricity emergency,” minister of state Ossian Smyth told its parliament in October.

“It is a national scandal,” retorted Darren O’Rourke, the Teachta Dála for Meath East.

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Image credit: energy-storage.news


The old idea of machinery that produces electricity providing security is on the way out, due to climate obsessions. Now it’s expensive devices such as this which merely store power that are supposed to guarantee the lights stay on, with the obvious problem that the power still has to be generated somewhere, sometime.
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Work is starting and completion is expected by mid 2025 to install the biggest energy storage battery in the southern hemisphere –– the 850 megawatt Waratah Super Battery at the former Munmorah coal-fired power station site, says Coast Community News.

NSW Treasurer and Energy Minister, Matt Kean, announced approval of the project when he visited the site last Thursday, along with Transgrid Executive General Manager of Network, Marie Jordan.

“Transgrid is on track to ensure the super battery, the System Integrity Protection Scheme and network upgrades are completed by mid 2025 in advance of Eraring power station’s earliest closure date,” Jordan said.

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The cost per molecule of atmospheric CO2 ‘saved’ must be phenomenal i.e. ridiculous.

PA Pundits International

By Steve Goreham~

We are in the midst of history’s greatest wealth transfer. Government subsidized support for wind systems, solar arrays, and electric vehicles overwhelmingly benefits the wealthy members of society and rich nations. The poor and middle class pay for green energy programs with higher taxes and higher electricity and energy costs. Developing nations suffer environmental damage to deliver mined materials needed for renewables in rich nations.

Since 2000, the world has spent more than $5 trillion on green energy. More than 300,000 wind turbines have been erected, millions of solar arrays were installed, more than 25 million electric vehicles (EVs) have been sold, hundreds of thousands of acres of forest were cut down to produce biomass fuel, and about three percent of agricultural land is now used to produce biofuel for vehicles. The world spends about $1 trillion per year on green energy. Government subsidies run about…

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Domestic Air Source Heat Pump [image credit: UK Alternative Energy]


Not before time. Climate obsession is now being used as a pretext for almost anything the government fancies spending, or not spending, money on. Don’t ask questions, just pay up and look big – seems to be the current policy on the costs.
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The new department for energy security and net zero is facing one of its first challenges as the information watchdog launches an investigation into the government’s refusal to release the figures underpinning its flagship net zero strategy.

Opposition MPs said Grant Shapps, the new net zero secretary, must “show us the numbers”.

The strategy, published in 2021 on the eve of Cop26, was hailed by then prime minister Boris Johnson as “leading the world in ending our contribution to climate change”.

But officials at the department for business, energy and industrial strategy, from which the new department is hived off from, repeatedly refused freedom of information requests to reveal the bottom-up accounting of how measures from electric cars to heat pumps will eliminate emissions.

Full article (paywalled) here.
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Costing £trillions – NetZeroWatch clip from Talk TV here.
Quote: “The government didn’t have that big conversation with the country about what it would mean for them in practice… [despite being] the main plank of government policy making at the current time.”

Risky business [image credit: safetysource.co.nz]


York is a notoriously flood-prone place and these wagons under-performed in a big way, restricting themselves to cricketing weather. The costly attempt to help save the planet by adopting net-zero climate dogma thus faltered. The ‘wrong type of weather’ excuse used to refer to UK trains, but now it’s moved on.
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Two electric bin lorries bought by City of York Council in a bid to cut carbon emissions were unable to operate when it rained, it has emerged.

Rain caused the wagons to be taken off the city’s roads for up to 26 days a month several times last year, reports BBC News.

The vehicles stopped working for a combined total of 481 days between January 2021 and November 2022.

The council bought the vehicles in 2020 as part of its drive to achieve net zero emissions by 2030.

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Where’s The Electricity?

Posted: January 21, 2023 by oldbrew in Batteries, Energy
Tags: ,

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Electricity: before you can use it you have to generate it, and the worldwide demand only ever goes up.
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PA Pundits International

By Ronald Stein ~

One of the best-known quotes was where’s the beef?from Clara Peller who was a manicurist and American character actress who, at the age of 81, starred in the 1984  advertising campaign for the Wendy’s fast food restaurant chain.

Today, the huge dark cloud over EV projected sales, is the availability of electricity to charge batteries which leads us to the quote for the foreseeable future, Where’s the electricity?

The Elephant in the EV sales room that no one wants to talk about is the limited amount of electricity available to charge the EV batteries.

The global fleet of road vehicles in 2022 numbered about 1.446 billion, that’s with a “B”.

Of this huge global fleet, only 12 million were electric vehicles (EV) in 2021. Thus, less than one percent of the worldwide road vehicle fleet were EVs, and more than 99-percent…

View original post 548 more words

[image credit: beforeitsnews.com]


Looks a tad optimistic. Nobody forced wind farm developers to bump up their prices to match the massive increases in gas and electricity charges. Invoking ‘net zero’ seems a bit of a cheek when they’re blatantly chasing maximum profits.
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A Cheshire wind farm developer has threatened to sue the UK government over its plans to impose a ‘windfall tax’ on renewables companies, reports OilPrice.com.

Community Windpower – which owns 1.5 GW of UK wind generation capacity – has said it will take legal action to block the UK’s Electricity Generator Levy.

The temporary tax imposes a 45 percent levy on “exceptional receipts” of more than £10m generated by selling wholesale electricity at average prices exceeding £75 per MWh.

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It’s a dream if they think it makes any difference to anything other than the company balance sheet, except the ‘upto 10,000 jobs’ they claim it will create and support. Do we hear the sound of yet more subsidies going down the climate plughole?
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Bosses at Drax Power Station says they are waiting to hear whether the government will greenlight plans for a £2billion hi-tech scheme to capture carbon emitted from its biomass burners and pump it under the North Sea to be stored, reports yahoo!.

They say the scheme could potentially capture 95 per cent of the carbon emitted from the power station’s two biomass burners at Selby – removing eight million tonnes of carbon a year, and supporting up to 10,000 jobs.

Drax plant director Bruce Heppenstall said the power station had already run two pilot projects to test out the ‘Bioenergy with carbon capture and storage’ (BECCS) technology.

It was, he said, a ‘game changing technology’ that leading climate scientists at the UN’s IPCC said could play a critical role in addressing the climate crisis.

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Domestic Air Source Heat Pump [image credit: UK Alternative Energy]


Who wants a lack-of-heat pump now?
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A man claims he is facing a £7,000 energy bill after replacing his heating system with a £25,000 Government-backed ‘green’ heat pump, says The Independent (via Yahoo News).

Officials are currently providing grants for up to £5,000 to home owners who remove a gas central heating and hot water system and replace it with a heat pump.

But the new system, backed by many in the green lobby, has apparently left many UK homeowners in the cold.

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Credit: klimatetochskogen.nu


This underlines the reality, whatever the numbers are. Carbon capture is nature’s job.
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UK forests could store almost double the amount of carbon than previous calculations suggest, with consequences for our understanding of carbon stocks and humanity’s response to climate change, according to a new study involving UCL researchers.

For the study, published today in the journal Ecological Solutions and Evidence, the international team of scientists used a novel 3D scanning technique and analysis to assess the amount of aboveground biomass (AGB)—used to derive carbon storage—of 815 trees in a UK woodland, says Phys.org.

The team found that their results were 77% higher than previous estimates (410 t ha-1 of biomass vs. 232 t ha-1).

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Policies based on pseudo-official UN climate theories are now so politically significant, the public want a say, according to this poll. Voters never agreed to the draconian contents of the Climate Change Act (2008). Open debate has been marginalised for years now.
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More people than ever want a referendum on the Government’s net zero policy, a survey has found.

A poll by YouGov found that 44 per cent of adults in Britain supported “holding a national referendum to decide whether or not the UK pursues a net zero carbon policy”, with 27 per cent opposed, while 29 per cent said they did not know, reports The Telegraph.

When the “don’t knows” were excluded, 62 per cent wanted a referendum. A poll on the same question a year ago found that 58 per cent wanted a ballot on the issue.

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CO2 is not pollution


In the end nature determines how much of the trace gas carbon dioxide is in the atmosphere, via the carbon cycle. Certain human activities may alter the numbers up or down temporarily. There’s vast expense, including lots of pipelines nobody wants, with no known finishing line in so-called ‘carbon capture’.
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Up to a fifth of emissions cuts from the Inflation Reduction Act are expected to come from carbon capture technologies, but there are major technical and political hurdles, says Climate Home News.

US president Joe Biden is expected to sign off a sweeping climate, energy and health care bill on Tuesday (16 August). It contains about $370 billion to foster clean energy development and combat climate change, constituting the largest federal climate investment in history.

Several studies project that its climate and energy provisions could enable the United States to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by around 40% below 2005 levels by 2030.

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China isn’t expecting the world’s weather to change as a result of its Taiwan policy. If push comes to shove, it puts its perceived national interests ahead of UN or US climate obsessions.
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Tackling climate change has been a key area of co-operation between the two superpowers, says Yahoo News.

But China has suspended talks as part of its escalating retaliation over U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan.

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Money down the drain?
[image credit: thisismoney.co.uk]


The government-backed buy-a-climate fantasy steamrollers on. No expense spared in the war on one of Earth’s most vital trace gases.
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A company based in Cornwall has been given the job of overseeing a £70 billion contract to help deliver the country’s transition to Net Zero – the target of completely negating the amount of greenhouse gases by reducing emissions, says Cornwall Live.

The Place Group – which is based at The Regent, Chapel Street, Penzance – has won the huge framework contract to “control, manage and deliver” the public sector transition to Net Zero.

It will oversee the framework for services, products, solutions and support for Everything Net Zero. The small company is a “specialist consulting, project management and research company with 18 years’ experience in the field of education”.

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No emergency in temperature trends, so where is it?

Science Matters

The editors of IBD explain at Issues and Insights Climate Emergency?  What a Crock.  Excerpts in italics with my bolds and added images.

Joe Biden did not declare a climate emergency last week, as many in his party urged him to do. One Democratic senator claimed that the changing climate required “bold, intense executive action” from the president. Another said Biden needed to move because “the climate crisis is a threat to national security.” But there’s no emergency. It’s a wholly manufactured charade.

Though he put off an executive action, Biden said last Wednesday that he has “a responsibility to act with urgency and resolve when our nation faces clear and present danger. And that’s what climate change is about. It is literally, not figuratively, a clear and present danger. The health of our citizens and our communities is literally at stake.”

His non-COVID fever continued:

“Climate change is…

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