Day: March 31, 2023

From ClimateRealism

By Linnea Lueken

A recent piece by CBS News details efforts being made in coastal communities across the United States to mitigate the impact of ongoing sea level rise. The article lays out three methods of dealing with it: constructing structures to keep water out, like sea walls and floodgates; restoring wetlands and dunes to dampen storm surges; and simply picking up and moving away from the encroaching waterline. Although CBS points the finger at climate change for rising sea levels, the fact of the matter is that the majority of sea level rise is entirely natural, and that it’s a good idea to be prepared for it regardless.

The article, “Sea levels are rising — and it’s going to get worse. Here’s how some communities are adapting,” begins by declaring that the recent United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report definitively states that sea level rise is unavoidable, and that sea levels will “remain elevated for thousands of years.”

This may well be true, as sea levels have risen and fallen dramatically over Earth’s history, and global sea level has risen about 400 feet since the end of the last major ice age.

Current NASA satellite measurements, going back to 1993, show a global average sea levels rising at about 1.2 inches per decade, as described in Climate at a Glance: Sea Level Rise.

The CBS article notes that a large number of Americans live near coasts, “while those people don’t have the power to unilaterally solve the underlying problem of climate change, some communities are now grappling with how to adapt to sea level rise by constructing new defenses, restoring natural defenses, or just moving out of the way.”

All three of these methods help mitigate the impact of rising sea levels, depending on the particular coastal conditions.

The first example, expanding on the idea of “constructing new defenses,” the story describes New York’s East Side Coastal Resiliency Project. This is a sea wall construction project that is 2.5 miles long, and just over 16 feet high.

On either side of the East River, sea level rise is different. To the Southwest, tide gauges at The Battery show a sea level rise of about 2.9 mm per year. About twenty miles away Northeast, gauges at Kings Point show a 2.6 mm per year rise. (See figures below)

This demonstrates that aside from rising seas, and whatever minimal amount climate change may be contributing to it, other factors are significant contributors to the rates of “sea level rise” measured at different, often nearby, locations. These factors may be land subsidence, sea floor changes, localized thermal expansion, land compaction, and increased impervious surfaces.

Hardening infrastructure and building sea walls is something coastal communities have done for hundreds, if not thousands, of years. In the East Side project, floodgates will remain open until a flooding event is anticipated, much like how the Dutch have historically handled flooding in their own low-lying country.

The next technique CBS describes is to improve or reconstruct natural features that help dampen the impact of storm surge and flooding. This is a method Climate Realism has previously mentioned in posts here and here, where the importance of natural salt marshes and estuaries is discussed in relation to erosion issues Louisiana faces. Wetlands and marshes are sometimes shortsightedly destroyed to make way for development, including the digging of canals, or dams, or the construction of concrete structures and beaches. This can result in increased flooding, because those natural features which previously slowed or absorbed storm surges and king tides are now compromised or even replaced entirely.

The final solution the CBS article discusses is relocation away from coastal areas threatened by rising seas. The article describes train lines that may be forced to move along the Pacific coast, as the cliffs they were built on erode over time. Cliffs, by the way, that were eroding long before any human habitation in the region occurred.

Climatologist Roy Spencer’s satellite data analysis suggests that human development and energy use may be contributing about three-tenths of an inch to sea level rise per decade. Meaning, anthropogenic climate change is contributing approximately 20 percent to rising seas, the other 80 percent being inexorable and entirely natural.

Regardless of climate change, placing roads and rails on cliffsides along extremely dynamic environments like coastal cliffs, especially those with famously violent wave action due to the steep drop-offs into the depths and prevailing winds that drive waves higher up the shore and increase erosion, is setting that infrastructure up to fail, despite how picturesque the drive is.

Absent any human contribution, seas will continue rising until the next ice age comes, and shores and coastlines will continues changing, sometimes eroding, sometimes adding land. This means that over time, many ill sited cliffside roads, rails, and homes will shift, often falling into the sea.

Human societies have adapted to rising seas throughout history. Such adaptation is still necessary, regardless of climate change. Ancient Rome built unique concrete sea walls whose segments can still be found today, 2,000 years later. The residents of Dunwich, England, continuously moved settlements inland as the sea encroached since at least 1066 AD, until it finally disappeared over the cliffs entirely in 1919. The Netherlands, more than a third of which is below sea level, has battled rising seas throughout its existence. All of this occurred long before anyone could attempt to attribute rising seas to human actions.

CBS’s attempt to attribute the threats posed by rising seas to coastal communities to human caused climate change was misguided. But CBS was right, aggressive infrastructure hardening and construction, reclaiming shorelines natural buffers, and/or relocating from areas where sea level rise is inevitable, makes sense. Only local communities can determine which option or combination of options is best for them in response to localized rates or sea level rise, subsidence, development, and other factors. This is true regardless of any role climate change may be playing in current rate of sea level rise.

Linnea Lueken

Linnea Lueken is a Research Fellow with the Arthur B. Robinson Center on Climate and Environmental Policy.

While she was an intern with The Heartland Institute in 2018, she co-authored a Heartland Institute Policy Brief “Debunking Four Persistent Myths About Hydraulic Fracturing.”

Linnea Lueken

From blackout-news.de

Expiry of tax breaks endangers expansion of wind power – wind power industry in the USA on the verge of bankruptcy.

The wind power industry in the USA is in a serious crisis. The capacity of wind farms has dropped dramatically in recent months. According to a report by Bloomberg, wind power capacity in the US has fallen by 56 percent due to greatly reduced tax breaks (Bloomberg: 27.03.23).

Wind power industry in the USA on the verge of bankruptcy: Carbon-free energy supply at risk

The impact on the wind energy industry is devastating. Many companies have reduced their workforce and stopped or postponed projects. Many companies are expected to go bankrupt in the coming months as they struggle to cover their running costs.

U.S. reliance on renewable energy has increased in recent years as more businesses and consumers switch to green energy sources. The government is committed to achieving a completely carbon-free energy supply by 2035. But this objective faces a setback if the wind energy industry is unable to recover from this crisis.

The phasing out of tax breaks threatens the development of renewable energy in the US

The tax breaks were introduced in recent years by the U.S. government to encourage the development of renewable energy. But now that the economy is growing again and the demand for renewables is declining, regulators have begun phasing out these perks.

This has led to a dramatic decline in investment in new wind turbines. In many cases, developers have abandoned their plans for new wind farms because the tax breaks are no longer sufficient to cover the investment costs. The uncertainty about the future promotion of renewable energy has led many investors and companies to invest their money in other industries and projects.

U.S. Wind Power Industry: Decline in Capacity Threatens Environment and Economy

The impact on the U.S. environment and economy is significant. The wind energy industry is one of the most important areas for the transition to a carbon-free energy supply. The decline in the capacity of wind farms means that less clean energy is produced, resulting in a higher demand for fossil fuels. This, in turn, increases CO₂ emissions and exacerbates climate change.

The crisis in the wind energy industry also has an impact on the economy. The wind energy industry employs thousands of workers and generates billions of dollars in revenue. The decline in investment and capacity has led to a decline in employment and a loss of income.

The U.S. federal government has already taken action to help the industry.

From NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT

By Paul Homewood

The bloc is backtracking on its plan to ban combustion engines. It’s time for Britain to follow suit

If anyone had any lingering doubts that the EU is run by German car-makers (in association with French farmers), they will surely have been dispelled by the news that the bloc is to backtrack on its plan to ban combustion engines from new vehicles by 2035. While petrol and diesel cars will still be banned, carbon neutral synthetic “e-fuels” will be permitted. While bringing the EU’s green juggernaut to a skidding halt may have required some very powerful lobbying, it is also the right decision.

Proposed bans on petrol and diesel cars in the EU and in Britain were put in place without any proper consideration as to whether electric cars were capable of replacing them. It was simply assumed that improvements in technology would solve the issues of range, ease of recharging, the cost of buying electric cars and their over-reliance on rare metals such as cobalt – which are extracted in troubled parts of the world. Yet prices of electric cars – not to mention the electricity to run them – have remained stubbornly high. Moreover, their manufacture can involve rather more emissions than a petrol or diesel equivalent.

Some are already trying to play down the significance of the EU’s decision, arguing that “e-fuels” will be so expensive that internal combustion engines will become a high-end, niche product. Yet two decades ago, long before we had a net zero target, drivers in Wales found to their pleasure (and to the annoyance of the then HM Customs and Excise) that an ordinary diesel engine could run quite happily on waste oil from chip shops. Since then, the government has made petrol with a 10 per cent renewable ethanol component the British standard, so most of us are already running our cars partly on non-fossil fuels.

As for synthetic fuels made from carbon dioxide and hydrogen produced by electrolysis of water, the German Aerospace Centre estimates such fuels could be made for aviation purposes using existing technology for around 2.26 Euros (£2 per litre). That is expensive – it currently costs around 50 pence to produce a litre of unleaded, the rest being tax and distribution costs – but it is not much higher than recent at-pump prices. The EU’s change of heart means that the car industry can now work developing what could be the ideal compromise: plug-in vehicles which could run 50 miles or so in pure electric mode, but which have a small engine – powered by synthetic fuel – to keep the battery charged on longer trips.

But what will Britain do? The government is showing no signs that its own ban on petrol and diesel cars will not go ahead as planned – which would mean no new pure petrol and diesels sold after 2030, and no hybrids from 2035. This is foolish, and the government will be forced to reconsider. No manufacturer is going to make cars exclusively with the UK market in mind, so if the internal combustion engine does remain a standard product in Europe and elsewhere in the world, UK motorists are going to find themselves restricted to a handful of pure – and expensive – electric models. What remains of our car industry will be put under even greater pressure.

If the electric car makers do improve and bring down the cost of their product, then that’s great – most of us will want to drive them. But in keeping options open for internal combustion engines the EU, for once, has done something sensible that Britain should emulate.

https://netzerowatch.us4.list-manage.com/track/click?u=c920274f2a364603849bbb505&id=78e9b5f35b&e=4961da7cb1

The point Ross Clark makes about manufacturers not wanting to make a car just for the UK market is a strong one. As he says, we will end up being restricted to a handful of expensive EVs, along with cheap Chinese ones. Quite where this leaves the UK car industry is debatable.

From NoTricksZone

By Kenneth Richard on 30. March 2023

Surface air CO2 concentrations vary by 100s to 1,000s of ppm within a span of hours to days or weeks across the natural world. The observational evidence suggests these variations are neither driving or even causing temperature changes.

According to recent field research (Mungai, 2021) conducted in Kenya, the observed CO2 concentrations in the atmospheric air above mofette springs (8) averages 3,400-4,800 ppm. Interestingly, the temperatures associated with these high CO2 levels are “relatively low” or “cold” (~21.5 to 29.5°C) compared to ambient temperatures at other nearby sites with ~400 ppm CO2.

The study also shows that when CO2 increases from 5,253 ppm in wet season to 12,138 ppm in dry season over a mofette springs site, there is only a 0.3°C temperature differential (23.4°C vs. 23.1°C) associated with this >7,000 ppm CO2 change. The sensitivity of the surface air temperature to these extremely high CO2 variations would appear to be vanishingly small – or non-existent.

Image Source: Mungai, 2021

Similarly, CO2 concentrations in the surface air over cities typically varies by 100s of ppm within a span of hours. CO2 also fluctuates by these magnitudes from season to season.

During the warmest part of the day (mid-afternoon) or the hottest summer month, the CO2 concentrations dip to their lowest values.

For example, as the mid-afternoon (summer) CO2 concentrations in urban environments dip to 285, 359, 402, or 388 ppm, whereas just before dawn (winter), when air temperatures are coldest, CO2 climbs to 588, 788, 743, or 754 ppm (McRae and Graedel, 1979, Gorka and Lewicka-Szczebak, 2013, Kumar and Nagendra, 2015, and Gonzalez de Castillo et al., 2022, respectively.)

Image Source: McRae and Graedel, 1979

Image Source: Gorka and Lewicka-Szczebak, 2013

Image Source: Kumar and Nagendra, 2015

Image Source: Gonzalez de Castillo et al., 2022

A rather similar profile occurs over non-urban areas such as above tree cover or over grassy meadows.

In areas where trees are prevalent, CO2 concentrations have been observed to flux from 328 ppm in the mid-afternoon to 632 ppm at 3 a.m., when it is 3-4°C colder than it was 12 hours earlier (Hamacher et al., 1994).

Over meadows, CO2 routinely varies from 280 ppm to 980 ppm within a span of hours (Szaran et al., 2005). Sometimes the variation differentials reach >1,000 ppm (266 to 1,430 ppm). Once again, the higher CO2 ppm values are associated with degrees colder temperatures than the lower CO2 concentrations.

None of these real-world observations of rapid and significant surface air CO2 flux support the contention that surface air CO2 concentrations are the driver or cause of surface air temperature changes.

Image Source: Hamacher et al., 1994

Image Source: Szaran et al., 2005

From Watts Up With That?

Essay by Eric Worrall

The Terminator. Fair Use, Low Resolution Image to Identify the Subject.

AI is terrifying – but the one thing which is worse than developing a dangerous superhuman AI, is for your enemies to develop it first.

Tech experts call for 6-month pause on AI development

As artificial intelligence makes rapid advances, a group of experts has called for a pause. They have warned of the negative effects runaway development could have on society and humanity.

Several leaders in the field of cutting-edge technology have signed a letter that was published on Wednesday, calling for artificial intelligence developers to pause their work for six months.

The letter warns of potential risks to society and humanity as tech giants such as Google and Microsoft race to build AI programs that can learn independently.

The warning comes after the release earlier this month of GPT-4 (Generative Pre-trained Transformer), an AI program developed by OpenAI with backing from Microsoft.

“Powerful AI systems should be developed only once we are confident that their effects will be positive and their risks will be manageable,” the letter said.

…Read more: https://www.dw.com/en/tech-experts-call-for-6-month-pause-on-ai-development/a-65174081

The open letter is available here.

I have high hopes for the AI scare. As I’ve predicted several times, I believe fear of malevolent AI will be the next great public fear to replace the climate scare. If I keep predicting it I’ll be right sooner or later, you’ll see.

Is AI actually a great threat? From what I’ve seen it is more of a great productivity boost.

A fellow software developer uses ChatGPT all the time to do simple software development tasks. For example, we had to migrate a configuration script to a different system which required a similar setup but used different commands to perform the same setup functions.

So we asked ChatGPT to do the translation, something we could have done in 15 minutes.

The outcome was perfect. ChatGPT not only did the translation, it correctly identified we needed an additional configuration step which we hadn’t noticed. Saved us at least 10 minutes work.

But I don’t fear ChatGPT will replace me anytime soon – most of my day was spent on problems ChatGPT can’t answer.

What about other professions?

A journalist using ChatGPT could use ChatGPT to suggest text, to provide inspiration – an enormous boost to productivity. But you would be taking a serious gamble to publish ChatGPT screed, without allowing an expert human editor to at least review the product. And given ChatGPT generates its work from the work of others, there would be a substantial risk of accidental plagiarism.

Will AI be a genuine threat in the future?

A decade or two from now, who knows. But fear of the unknown is what you need, to build a great public fear campaign. And there is always the rather disturbing but I believe ultimately necessary option of merging with our creation, augmenting our human brains with AI implants, if we start to fall behind.

Climate Scepticism

BY JOHN RIDGWAY

The effects of climate change are here.McKinsey & Company

Climate change has got the insurance industry worried. Or, more to the point, they are worried that they might fail to capitalise upon the panic created by the UN. It is for that reason that the United States Senate Committee on the Budget recently held a hearing titled ‘Risky Business: How Climate Change is Changing Insurance Markets’.

This proved to be the perfect opportunity for key sector representatives to impress upon the US government just how important restructuring the insurance markets will be to meet the challenge.

Or was it the government doing the pressing?

It’s difficult to tell sometimes, when so many like-minded people get into a room to debate an issue. Whatever the case, there was much talk of the ‘searchlight of science’ and how clever and switched-on the insurance boffins were.

The only fly in the ointment was the presence of Dr Judith Curry, who had turned up to offer some balance to the proceedings – only to provide the perfect foil for a showboating senator with an axe to grind.

More of this later, but first I want to say a few words regarding that scientific searchlight. And for such a purpose I will focus on Hurricane Sandy and the damage it wreaked on New York city. If there was ever a case in point to justify the insurance industry’s concerns, then surely that was it. Well, let us see.

So what’s going down in the Big Apple?

If there is anything guaranteed to give insurance companies a sleepless night it is the thought of setting the premiums too low for expensive real estate located on the climate hazard frontline. It is not surprising, therefore, that Senator Whitehouse opened the hearing (actually 34mins into the transmission) with the following remark:

As we have heard and will hear again, sea-level rise and wildfire risk can upset property markets so profoundly as to cause systemic economic damage across the whole economy.

A rising sea-level is of particular concern because coastal properties are at most risk from the damages resulting from storm surge, and it is part of the climate change orthodoxy that such dangers are destined to increase as the ice caps melt and the oceans thermally expand.

Eager to demonstrate how this is already a problem causing massive financial loss, the insurance companies have made repeated references to Hurricane Sandy, and the damage it inflicted on New York. 

It seems the perfect example by which to inform the restructuring of the insurance market in the light of climate change.

For example, take the following case study included in a Lloyd’s white paper on catastrophe modelling. Predictably, the authors were keen to highlight the extent of the damage and the role of sea-level rise (my emphasis):

Sandy caused an estimated $20-25 billion of insured losses mostly in New York and New Jersey largely arising from flooding due to the storm surge associated with what was a relatively low wind speed, albeit a large storm. Much has been made of the fact that Sandy made landfall near high tide and the anomalous, but by no means unexpected, path taken by the storm when it interacted with a second low pressure system – Hall and Sobel estimated a 700 year return period for Superstorm Sandy’s track. The contribution of sea-level change has however only recently been highlighted.

So what of that sea-level rise?

Superstorm Sandy broke 16 historical tide records along the east coast and Sweet et al. (2013) have estimated a one-to-two third decrease in the return period of a Sandy level event recurrence between 1950 and 2012 due to global sea-level rise (thermal expansion and ice melt), ocean circulation variation and subsidence.

It continues:

The approximately 20 centimetres of sea-level rise at the Battery since the 1950s, with all other factors remaining constant, increased Sandy’s ground-up surge losses by 30% in New York alone. Further increases in sea-level in this region would non-linearly increase the loss potential from similar storms.

Well that all seems very clear cut. The sea-level at the Battery has increased 20cm since 1950 and that massively increased the damages due to storm surge. The sea-level is rising due to climate change and it is only going to get worse.

Except for one little detail.

I seem to remember someone saying “…due to global sea-level rise (thermal expansion and ice melt), ocean circulation variation and subsidence”. Given the potential for contributing to the local sea-level rise, and hence damage caused, one might have expected Lloyd’s to have a lot more to say regarding the extent to which subsidence contributed.

But on that subject the white paper remained strangely silent. So I had to do my own sleuthing.

What I discovered was very easy to find and so I have to assume the same information is readily obtainable by the boffins at Lloyd’s using their scientific searchlight.

Two years after Sandy, according to the Journal of Ocean Engineering Science, the relevant numbers were as follows:

In the New York City area, the likely absolute SLR [since 1950] is about 0.7 to 1.0 mm/yr., the likely relative sea-level acceleration is about +0.008 mm/yr², the likely subsidence is about -2.151 to -3.076 mm/yr., and the likely relative SLR is about -2.851 to -4.076 mm/yr.

That means that of the relative rise in sea-level since 1950, about 75% had been due to subsidence and only 25% due to other factors. And just to cast further doubt on the narrative of New York drowning under melting ice caps, the journal adds the following:

Although the climate models predict that rising CO2 levels should cause an accelerated sea-level rise, the sea level measurements show that, thus far, there has been no detectable acceleration in the rate of sea-level rise.

The bottom line is that what is going down in the Big Apple is the ground, largely due to the sheer weight of the civil infrastructure built upon it, combined with the excessive extraction of water from its aquifer and the fact that much of New York was built upon landfill.

Yes it is only going to get worse, but the prospects of global sea level rise becoming the greatest contributor to Manhattan Island’s demise are still a long way off. And that’s the science that Lloyd’s et al seem to have downplayed when wringing their hands over Hurricane Sandy.

I appreciate that this is only one example of misdirection by the insurance industry, but it is a very significant one.

Hurricane Sandy is a poster boy for that industry and has been used repeatedly to help justify a massive restructuring of the insurance market.

The storm surge did indeed result in damage losses that were 30% greater than would have been the case without the last 70 years of rising sea-levels. But this rise was largely due to a subsidence that is destined to continue. If you are going to restructure your market, you need to focus upon that fact, alongside the increasing habit of building new developments in flood plains and along the coast.

Back to the hearing

An insurer’s profits lie in the gap falling between rhetoric and reality.

Consequently, although an understanding of the reality is essential, so is the support of any rhetoric that helps widen the gap.

For that reason alone, Dr Curry was always going to struggle to get her message across at a hearing designed to legitimise ‘changing insurance markets’. She happened to be the most qualified person in the room to advise on the science, but that was no good to anyone when her advice failed to align with business objectives.

Yes, she made it perfectly clear that the drive to restructure the market was premised upon the entirely implausible RCP8.5.

Yes, she made it perfectly clear that the data pointing to a dangerous acceleration of sea-level rise simply doesn’t exist (acceleration has been predicted but the rise so far remains relatively steady and slow with no unequivocal correlation with anthropogenic warming).

And yes, she made it clear that the science behind extreme weather event attribution provides a somewhat shaky foundation upon which to build a catastrophe model.

But none of that was going to go down well.

It is therefore no surprise whatsoever that the chair of the hearing dedicated the closing moments (starting at 1hr 57mins into the transmission) to the delivery of a well-rehearsed ambush designed to discredit Dr Curry as an expert witness. And I’m afraid to say it worked very well.

Dr Curry, seemingly unprepared for the onslaught, either lacked the oratory craft to counter the senator’s grandstanding, or was just too polite to join in.

Whatever the case, the internet now has plenty of out-of-context material to offer under headings along the lines of ‘Denier roasted/slammed/owned/destroyed by senator’. You can read Dr Curry’s own measured and reasoned response to the experience on her own website, but I am afraid the damage is already done. The real searchlight of science was put out by the catapult of politics.

Lloyd’s had offered up Hurricane Sandy as a case study in a whitepaper dedicated to climate change impact, when it would had been much more appropriate to include it in a whitepaper dedicated to subsidence. It is true that subsidence was mentioned, but only as an afterthought, suggesting it played only a minor role.

The reality was quite different.

This worries me because it calls into question the idea that the insurance industry is approaching the challenge of climate change objectively and with only its clients’ interests at heart.

But it doesn’t surprise me any more than Dr Curry’s treatment at the congressional hearing did.

When it comes to such hearings, science may be talking but money talks a whole lot louder.

As in all matters of risk and adventure, the question that should always be on everyone’s lips is, ‘cui bono?’

Footnote: The image used for this article is one of Dr Judith Curry providing testimony at a previous congressional hearing. Also, contrary to my article’s subtitle, the relevant hearing was attended by Dr Curry remotely. In contrast, everyone else travelled to Washington to register in person their concerns for the climate change caused by travel.

From Trust, yet verify

The title of this Newsweek fact check caught my attention:

Fact check: Did Greta Thunberg Delete Claim That Humanity Will End by 2023?

As most of you would probably already know, Thunberg posted a tweet in 2018 with a short-term prediction and deleted it when its end date approached. This resulted in quite some reactions, putting forward that this deletion again shows that her alarmist claims are weak and unsubstantiated, therefor not worth paying attention to.

The Newsweek fact check starts by listing three examples criticizing the deletion of the tweet, stating that they all refer to screenshots of this deleted tweet, but no such screenshot was provided in the fact check, only the text of the tweet was given:

A top climate scientist is warning that climate change will wipe out all of humanity unless we stop using fossil fuels over the next five years.

The author of the fact check, Tom Norton, didn’t seem to acknowledge that the tweet existed. He presented the tweet throughout the fact check as being “allegedly posted” or “allegedly deleted”. I found this odd and I became curious whether some proof of its existence could be found online. There is indeed an archived version of that tweet on archive.org (version of May 20, 2021):

That tweet links to an article with a url that begins with “gritpost.com/humans-extinct…”. Okay, now I can imagine why Norton wouldn’t want to show an image of the tweet in his fact check and just provided the text.

Luckily, the fact check provided a link to the archived version of that gritpost on archive.org (the original article also doesn’t exist anymore). That article was written by Scott Alden and the top climate scientist he referred to is Harvard professor James Anderson (from the discovery of the Ozone Hole fame).

Reading that gritpost article, it quickly became clear that Thunberg didn’t made up her claim. The message of her tweet is a verbatim copy of the first sentence of the gritpost article, in which Alden supposedly paraphrased what Anderson said in a speech at the University of Chicago on January 2018. So, that claim in the tweet is not a misinterpretation by Thunberg of the gritpost article, it comes directly from the article itself, hence the double quotes in her tweet.

Then the fact check took an unexpected turn. The fact checker declared that the gritpost article didn’t accurately summarize Anderson’s claims and that an Earth article and a Forbes article “quoted Anderson’s comments more closely to what he was quoted as saying”. That doesn’t make sense. The text of Anderson’s speech is not available (as Norton himself admitted) and he clearly wasn’t there during Anderson’s speech (otherwise we would be looking at a completely different fact check), yet he somehow knows that the Earth article and the Forbes article are closer to what Anderson was saying?!

Whether or not that turning point makes sense, the fact checker only referred to the Forbes article from that moment on until the end of the fact check, totally ignoring Thunberg’s tweet and the article that she linked to. Besides their brief introduction, the tweet and the gritpost article are not mentioned anywhere else in the fact check…

The final rating of the fact check is “False”:

This rating was based on three conclusions. This is the first one:

The tweet that Thunberg allegedly sent referenced an article that did not say the world would end by 2023.

That is puzzling. The text of Thunberg’s tweet is the very first sentence of the referenced article, so whatever claim is in that sentence is also the claim that Thunberg tweeted. It is also not relevant to the fact check. The subject of the fact check is whether Thunberg deleted the claim that humanity will end by 2023, not whether the gritpost article made the claim that the humanity would end by 2023.

Things didn’t improve in the second conclusion:

The article, which is no longer online, did inaccurately reference quotes from climate expert Professor James Anderson, who said in 2018 that unless the world stopped using fossil fuels by 2023, the effect on the polar ice caps would be irreversible.

That may or may not be true, but it is not relevant to this fact check. The subject of the fact check is whether Thunberg deleted the claim that humanity would end by 2023, not whether Anderson was accurately quoted in the gritpost article that Thunberg’s tweet linked to.

And finally the third conclusion:

While none of Anderson’s quotes (at least those online) state that humanity would be wiped out, it is also inaccurate to claim that Thunberg’s tweet or the article she referenced said the world was going to end this year.

It is entirely possible that Anderson never ever make the claim that humanity would be wiped out, but that is again not relevant to the claim that is being fact checked. The subject of the fact check is whether Thunberg deleted the claim that humanity would end by 2023, not whether Anderson ever made the claim that humanity would be wiped out.

These are pretty weird conclusions for a fact check with the subject “Did Thunberg deleted the claim that humanity will end in 2023?”. In what world would these conclusions justify “False” as the final rating?

In the end, do I think that Thunberg deleted the claim that humanity will end by 2023? There are two parts to this claim:

1. Did Thunberg delete the tweet? I surely think she did. There is an archived version of that tweet on archive.org and going to that tweet currently gives the message that the page doesn’t exist anymore, so yes, it looks like it was deleted.
2. Did Thunberg tweet the claim that “humanity would end by 2023”? Personally, I don’t think so. Just looking at the message of the tweet, those “next five years” are related to the period in which we would need to stop using fossil fuels in order to prevent reaching a tipping point, not to the period by when all of humanity would be wiped out.

Granted, she didn’t tweet that humanity would end by 2023, but that, unless we stopped using fossil fuels by now, climate change will wipe out all of humanity somewhere in the undefined future. That is still a pretty strong claim tough, so I can somehow understand why the fact checker tried to divert the attention away from it as much as possible in his fact check.

From Friends of Science Calgary

Contributed by Samuel Furfari © 2023
Professor of energy geopolitics

Silicon Valley Bank went bankrupt because it confused bits with molecules.

But the truth always comes out and this failure is an eye-opener for many operators… including BlackRock.

The bankruptcy of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) in March 2023, California’s regional bank, shook the entire international banking system. There are fears of a repeat of what happened between 2008 and 2011. In my graphs on energy consumption, I often show the notch in global primary energy consumption formed by this crisis. Yes, crises reduce energy consumption and therefore CO₂ emissions, because 81% of the energy consumed in the world emits this molecule, which has become a pariah, while it constantly leaves our mouths.

The SVB was the start-up bank that, since 1983, has allowed venture capitalists to launch their companies, which, if successful, are bought up by the largest companies. It is certainly a noble and very useful profession. But this “climate bank” was suddenly faced with a rapid decline in deposits as start-ups found it increasingly difficult to secure their cash flow.

The SVB has been proud to support entrepreneurs and high-growth companies that are disrupting traditional sectors, which is expected to accelerate the transition to a fairer and more sustainable world. It has funded entrepreneurs and companies in the technology, life sciences, healthcare and even wine sectors. They have made it clear that their loan portfolio does not match that of banks whose traditional clientele consists of sectors with high CO₂ emissions, such as fossil fuel exploration and production or electricity generation from fossil fuels. In January 2022, the SVB announced its commitment to provide $5 billion in sustainable financing by 2027 to help reduce the temperature increase by 1.5°C. They were convinced that the transition to a low-carbon economy represented an opportunity for the SVB and its clients, for example through loans to finance renewable energy projects and innovative climate technologies, which they finance within their Climate Tech and Sustainability Group.

After 40 years, the mechanism has stalled, for several reasons related to finance, but it seems that the green utopia is another reason. After the digital innovation, the whole of Silicon Valley got caught up in the frenzy of the fight against climate change, thinking that if we could manage immaterial bits, we could manage material molecules, because energy depends on molecules. They also thought they could manage people’s lives, because energy is life. The banks thought it was the same thing, but it is not. Moreover, digital creates, but the fight against climate change punishes and destroys value.

Green Big Brother

SVB was part of the Carbon Disclosure Project’s (CDP) standardized and globally recognized green activities and policies reporting system. They call it “disclosure.”

Founded in 2000, CDP was the first platform to use investor pressure to influence companies to disclose their environmental commitments. The information held by the CDP allows investors, companies, cities and national and regional governments – for a fee – to monitor companies’ commitment to ecological doctrine. This company, which likes to masquerade as a non-profit organisation, is doing exactly what climate scientist Richard Lindzen has been saying for years: “If you control carbon, you control life”.

The CDP company has a budget of €3.4 million for 2021, 42% of which is funded by public bodies. Without knowing it, we are financing organisations with our taxes that are sticking their noses into companies’ business. In the disclosure that the SVB submitted to the CDP in 2022, the word climate appears 275 times in 47 pages of detailed questions. So this Californian bank had all the credit it needed to pass the climate change test.

BlackRock is no longer a green rock

In January 2020, Larry Fink, CEO of BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager, warned in his traditional annual letter to business leaders that climate risk would change his investment policy. The financial giant wanted to use its power to push companies to fight climate change. The SVB has already done so.

In his 2023 annual letter to investors, the CEO makes a different statement. The word ‘climate’ appears five times, but the word ‘energy’ appears 22 times. BlackRock states that it works with energy companies around the world because they are critical to meeting the energy needs of businesses. To ensure energy price continuity during the transition, BlackRock recognises that fossil fuels, particularly natural gas, will remain important primary energy sources for many years to come. That is why it is also investing in gas pipelines, including in the Middle East, where massive investment in traditional energy is underway.

It is not too late for this financial giant, rationality has returned. The banking system would do well to concentrate on its business and not use its funding and EGS criteria to play politics. There will always be someone who invests in traditional energies because they are essential for the functioning of the economy, for job creation and therefore for social well-being. Whether globally or in the ‘green EU’, wind and solar together account for only 3% of primary energy demand. Assuming, unlikely as it is, that they will be multiplied by five in the foreseeable future, this will mean that 85% of energy will still come from conventional sources. Someone will have to invest in this sector, contrary to what the SVB thought.

Digital depends on bits, energy, climate, sustainable development and our quality of life depend on molecules. And they’re not the same thing at all. We urgently need to stop dreaming that the digital revolution will make the energy transition possible.

Let us hope that the failure of the SVB will not send a shock wave through the global economy like the collapse of Lehman Brothers. Otherwise, by triggering an economic crisis, the energy transition bank will have unwittingly succeeded in reducing global CO2 emissions. I hope there won’t be a second notch in my graph.

Samuel Furfari

See Samuel Furfari’s many books on energy and geopolitics in English and French on Amazon

From NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT

By Paul Homewood

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-11916587/Deep-ocean-deep-trouble-Antarctic-ice-melts.html

Will slow down?

Only in their computer models!

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-023-05762-w.epdf

From climatechangedispatch.com

BY DON RITTER, GUEST POST

President Joe Biden says climate change is the greatest threat faced by our country and the world. It’s a greater threat than nuclear war,  he insists.

Ironically, the proposed “solution” of eliminating essential fossil fuels to mitigate climate change actually increases greenhouse gas emissions and toxic air and water pollution – by requiring that we mine and process up to fourteen times more raw materials per megawatt for wind turbines and electric vehicles or backup batteries than would be required for natural gas-based electricity generation. [emphasis, links added]

Worse, most of that mining, processing, and manufacturing would be done overseas – almost all of it using fossil fuels – in countries that have few or no laws for pollution control, wildlife habitat, endangered species protection, land reclamation, child and slave labor, fair wages or other values we hold dear.

Eliminating fossil fuels also reduces our ability to protect our homeland, prevent nuclear war, and project Peace Through Strength worldwide.

Further, it profoundly weakens America by creating an imminent crisis for our economy and our military, the two main pillars of a nation’s power.

Fossil fuels are the lifeblood of American military power and serve numerous purposes.

Every iota of military equipment needs fossil fuels to manufacture and run it: from fossil fuel-derived petrochemicals to make thousands of plastic components for infinite uses; to mining and processing minerals into thousands of steel and aluminum alloys for trucks, tanks, guns, aircraft, and artillery; to copper and non-ferrous metals for wiring and shell casings; to processing minerals and chemicals into gunpowder and other explosives.

To creating and powering the semiconductor chips for increasingly energy-hungry electronic equipment that is part and parcel of all modern weaponry; to producing and shipping food for members of our Armed Services all over the world; to manufacturing pharmaceuticals and medical equipment to save lives and bring wounded warriors back to health.

Fossil fuels are essential for just about everything the military needs, from nuclear weapons to toilet paper!

This war on fossil fuels is happening at the same time the Biden Administration and Democrat supporters in Congress are spending hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars on deficit-increasing, investment-directing, market-skewing solar, wind, battery-storage, biofuel, and other Green Energy schemes.

Given the overwhelming dependence of our military on fossil fuels, this diversion of investments away from fossil fuels will wreak havoc on America’s readiness and defense industrial base.

Where does the lion’s share of raw materials for wind turbines, solar panels, batteries – and the high-tech equipment to produce these and military items – come from? China, and China-invested or China-run African, Asian, and Latin American mines are notorious for child labor, horrendous working conditions, and virtually no concern for the environment or human lives.

America has bounteous oil, gas and coal at home. It lacks the critical materials that go into wind turbines, solar panels, batteries and weapons only because we have made most American mineralized and mining areas off limits – and the administration has rejected almost every proposed mining project it’s seen.

While the push for renewables may be popular in politics, it is problematic in practice. Reliance on our adversaries is highly detrimental to our national security, economy, and very existence.

America will be forced to import vital materials from insecure, adversarial nations, such as China, making us dangerously and unnecessarily dependent on foreign sources.

China has the technologies (often stolen from the West) and the materials for dominating both “renewables” – solar, wind, and battery industries – and defense needs.

The harsh reality is that China is totally dominant in renewable energy industries right now. By “going green,” our dependence on China will only increase

Moreover, their electric grid is powered largely by fossil fuels and thus is set up to back up wind and solar when the sun doesn’t shine and the wind doesn’t blow. Meanwhile, our grid is becoming less reliable as we retire fossil fuel plants.

Just think of the freezing of windmills in Texas in the dead of winter, and California’s ultra-green government asking EV owners not to charge their vehicles because doing so could cause widespread blackouts!

Add Russia as China’s oil and gas station, plus raw materials supplier, and China makes a dramatic leap in both military and economic capabilities. Sino-Russian collaboration could well become the globally dominant force over a fossil fuel-disarming America and the West.

Indeed, Russia acting alone is able to invade a large, sovereign European nation – even though Russia’s economy is smaller than Italy’s, a mere 3% of the USA plus Europe. How is that possible?

Because Russia has, produces, uses, and sells oil, gas, and coal, giving it energy dominance now and into the future. Russia’s war on Ukraine is being paid for by its fossil fuel revenues.

And, while energy-weakened Europe reopens a headline-grabbing 27 mothballed coal plants to make up for the lost natural gas from Russia, it still bans fracking for oil and gas, and prays for warm winters.

In the meantime, China is building at least 27 new coal plants every year.

Common sense dictates that America reverse its climate-obsessed anti-fossil-fuel policies, and pursue a future that is “all-of-the-above” energy to ensure economic, technological, and national security reality – where all-of-the-above means energy that doesn’t require massive federal and state government subsidies; energy that isn’t weather dependent; energy that is abundant, reliable and affordable every hour of every day, year after year.

Anything less betrays not only our men and women defenders in our Armed Forces but all of us.

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Don Ritter holds a Science Doctorate from MIT and served fourteen years on the House of Representatives Energy and Commerce and Science and Technology Committees. After leaving Congress he created and led the National Environmental Policy Institute.

He was a National Academy of Sciences Fellow in the USSR, speaks fluent Russian, and was a Ranking Member of the Congressional Helsinki Commission and founding Co-Chair of the Baltic States-Ukraine Caucus. He is a Trustee of the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation and Museum and Co-chairs its Capital Campaign.