Day: October 28, 2024

Emotionally Unstable “Climate Scientists” Don’t Like Being Criticized, Run to Daddy (Nature)

The Guardian article titled ‘We have emotions too’: Climate scientists respond to attacks on objectivity is a remarkable exercise in self-pity, featuring climate scientists venting about the supposedly unjust criticism they face​. This is in reaction to the pushback received after publication of an idiotic survey by the Guardian last May

These self-appointed climate saviors insist that their projections should be accepted without question, and when they aren’t, they moan about how harsh and unfair the world has been to them. This isn’t science under attack—it’s fragile egos crying foul when the rest of us refuse to buy into their doomsday narrative.

From Watts Up With That?

From Charles Rotter

The Guardian article titled ‘We have emotions too’: Climate scientists respond to attacks on objectivity is a remarkable exercise in self-pity, featuring climate scientists venting about the supposedly unjust criticism they face​. This is in reaction to the pushback received after publication of an idiotic survey by the Guardian last May

These self-appointed climate saviors insist that their projections should be accepted without question, and when they aren’t, they moan about how harsh and unfair the world has been to them. This isn’t science under attack—it’s fragile egos crying foul when the rest of us refuse to buy into their doomsday narrative.

The researchers said they had been subject to ridicule by some scientists after taking part in a large Guardian survey of experts in May, during which they and many others expressed their feelings of extreme fear about future temperature rises and the world’s failure to take sufficient action. They said they had been told they were not qualified to take part in this broad discussion of the climate crisis, were spreading doom and were not impartial.

However, the researchers said that embracing their emotions was necessary to do good science and was a spur to working towards better ways of tackling the climate crisis and the rapidly increasing damage being done to the world. They also said that those dismissing their fears as doom-laden and alarmist were speaking frequently from a position of privilege in western countries, with little direct experience of the effects of the climate crisis.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/oct/25/we-have-emotions-too-climate-scientists-respond-to-attacks-on-objectivity

The Real “Crisis”: Hurt Feelings

The Guardian piece is full of climate scientists’ complaints about being criticized, a situation that apparently causes them great distress. They whimper about public skepticism as though it were some kind of assault on their personal well-being. In one particularly melodramatic section, a scientist whines about being called a “liar” on social media​. Well, welcome to the world of public debate, where people will scrutinize, question, and yes, sometimes rudely dismiss claims that seem dubious. But the Guardian seems determined to present these professionals not as robust researchers capable of handling criticism, but as delicate flowers wilting under the harsh glare of public doubt.

Instead of addressing substantive criticisms—like the failed climate models, inconsistent predictions, or the fact that climate policies often do more harm than good—these scientists turn to emotional appeals. They argue that the public’s harsh words are as much of a threat as climate change itself. They even suggest that “climate anxiety” is exacerbated by “online abuse” from skeptics​​. So, let’s get this straight: the models can handle the complex calculations of global warming trends, but the scientists can’t handle mean tweets?

The “Toxicity” of Skepticism

One theme that dominates The Guardian article is the scientists’ characterization of public scrutiny as “toxic”​. It’s a clever rhetorical strategy, designed to make criticism seem not only misguided but morally wrong. By framing dissenters as aggressors who “harm” scientists, the article tries to flip the script: suddenly, it’s not about whether the climate models hold up under scrutiny; it’s about whether the critics are hurting the scientists’ feelings.

If anything, this rhetoric exposes the scientists’ shaky confidence in their own predictions. People who are confident in their data don’t crumble under questioning. They engage, clarify, and persuade. But here, instead of rolling out hard evidence to silence their critics, climate scientists want sympathy. It’s a deeply unserious approach to a field that supposedly determines the fate of our planet.

Ben Pile’s critique in the Daily Sceptic nailed it when he observed that the current trend among climate scientists is to brand skeptics as not just wrong, but dangerous​. By shifting the focus to the alleged “toxicity” of criticism, the scientists evade the actual issues—like why their models frequently overshoot reality, or why predictions of imminent catastrophe keep getting delayed like a badly managed train schedule.

I believe that is the implication of Carrington’s series of Guardian articles and his survey. It shows that people with no scientific expertise to speak of are nonetheless routinely presented as ‘scientists’ and experts. It shows that even those with scientific expertise will happily and radically depart from both the consensus position and the objective data on both meteorological events and their societal impacts. And it shows they have no reluctance to use their own emotional distress as leverage to coerce others. Carrington thinks that showing us scientists’ emotional troubles will convince us to share their anxiety. But all it shows is that it would be deeply foolish to defer to the authority of climate science. It’s an unstable mess. Science must be cool, calm, rational, detached and disinterested, or it is just a silly soap opera.

https://dailysceptic.org/2024/05/13/many-of-the-climate-experts-surveyed-by-the-guardian-in-recent-propaganda-blitz-turn-out-to-be-emotionally-unstable-hysterics/

Victimhood as a Shield

A whole tantrum (see murder of crows, pod of whales), of climate whiners scurried off to their ideological shelter, Nature Climate Change, to cry for help. You see, when public skepticism became too much for their fragile nerves to handle, this tantrum ran straight to “daddy,” hoping for a pat on the back and a warm bottle of validation. And what better place than Nature, a publication that will bend over backwards to prop up their emotional narratives? These scientists clearly needed a safe space where their feelings could be stroked, rather than questioned. Forget rigorous defense of their models and theories—no, no, this time it was about defending their delicate psyches from the big, bad skeptics on Twitter.

The Nature article isn’t just a plea for public sympathy; it’s a full-on temper tantrum disguised as scholarly commentary. The authors aren’t interested in hard science or debate—they want therapy. With a straight face, they argue that public criticism is akin to abuse, reducing scientific discourse to a matter of emotional resilience. So rather than refining their models, this tantrum of whiners wants the rest of us to accept that hurt feelings are a legitimate basis for climate policy.

The Nature article doubles down on this victimhood narrative, describing scientists as burdened not only by the existential threat of climate change but by the hostility of the public​. The authors make a point of equating climate research with front-line war reporting, as if posting dire projections on X were the same as dodging bullets. This is a transparent attempt to invoke sympathy and sidestep criticism. If the scientists can present themselves as victims of a cruel public, then their arguments become untouchable.

The Guardian piece further amplifies this theme, portraying scientists as misunderstood martyrs who bear the emotional weight of foreseeing a bleak future​. It’s as if being skeptical of poorly substantiated projections makes one a tormentor of noble truth-seekers. The narrative is clear: “Don’t question us, or you’re part of the problem.” But when scientific discourse devolves into moral posturing, it loses its credibility and begins to resemble a political campaign—one driven by emotional manipulation rather than evidence.

Social Media Tears

Of course, no article about scientists’ suffering would be complete without a good dose of social media victimhood. The Guardian article features complaints about online “abuse,” as scientists recount harrowing experiences of being criticized on platforms like X​. According to these supposedly hard-nosed researchers, the online world is a mean place where people say unkind things about their predictions.

This is almost comical. After all, social media is a battleground for ideas, not a safe space for pampered experts. If scientists can’t handle criticism on X, how can they expect to withstand the scrutiny of peer review or public debate? Ben Pile rightly points out that climate scientists’ complaints about social media “abuse” often serve as an excuse to shut down dissent altogether​. Rather than engaging with criticism, these scientists prefer to play the victim, using their emotional wounds as a shield against legitimate questions.

“Science” as a Moral Crusade

The Guardian article’s melodramatic tone is matched by its moralistic language. It tries to turn science into a crusade, with climate scientists cast as righteous warriors battling the forces of ignorance and denial. This framing isn’t just patronizing; it’s manipulative. By presenting climate scientists as virtuous crusaders, the article implies that their opponents are not just mistaken, but immoral.

The scientists even manage to make their emotions seem like a badge of honor, arguing that their despair over climate change somehow legitimizes their work​​. But in reality, emotional outbursts and moral grandstanding are signs of weakness, not strength. Scientists are supposed to be objective and dispassionate—traits that make their conclusions reliable, not subject to personal bias or emotional manipulation.

The irony here is palpable: the same scientists who claim to be guided by evidence resort to emotional appeals when that evidence fails to convince. It’s a strategy designed to stifle debate rather than foster it. By making criticism a form of aggression, these scientists are effectively saying, “Agree with us, or you’re contributing to our emotional suffering.” This isn’t science; it’s emotional blackmail.

Public Scrutiny is a Good Thing

Contrary to the complaints in The Guardian, public scrutiny is not an attack on science; it’s a vital part of it. The scientific method thrives on skepticism, criticism, and revision. When climate models fail to predict reality accurately, the appropriate response is not to coddle the scientists’ feelings but to demand better models. If the scientists featured in The Guardian can’t handle that, they’re in the wrong field.

This thin-skinned response to criticism is particularly troubling given the sweeping policy changes that are based on climate projections. The rush to Net Zero, for example, has profound implications for energy costs, employment, and global inequality. Public skepticism is not only justified; it’s essential. If climate scientists expect to be taken seriously, they should welcome hard questions, not recoil from them.

Conclusion: Buck Up or Bow Out

The Guardian article offers a window into the current state of climate science—a field increasingly driven by emotional manipulation rather than empirical rigor. The scientists’ complaints about being criticized reveal more about their own insecurities than they do about the validity of their claims. If these researchers want to be seen as credible, they need to toughen up. Real science doesn’t hide behind emotions; it faces scrutiny head-on and welcomes challenges as a means to improve its findings.

So, to the climate scientists who complain about “abuse” on X: toughen up. If you can’t defend your models and predictions against public criticism, maybe you’re not as confident in your conclusions as you claim to be. And to The Guardian, which seems intent on shielding these delicate “warriors” from criticism: stop trying to turn skepticism into a sin. The future of the planet deserves better than a bunch of whining scientists seeking sympathy rather than solutions.

More Political Ignorance on Energy Realities

Professor Ian Plimer schools a politico climate change “authority” in the above interview aired by Sky News Australia. For those preferring to read, a transcript is below lightly edited from the closed captions.

From Science Matters

By Ron Clutz

Professor Ian Plimer schools a politico climate change “authority” in the above interview aired by Sky News Australia. For those preferring to read, a transcript is below lightly edited from the closed captions.

Climate Change authority Matt Kean, former Liberal treasurer of New South Wales, has lashed out at nuclear energy advocates, accusing them of being delay mongers trying to prevent renewables from succeeding. He labeled the push for nuclear and more gas as quote:

An illiberal drive to intervene in the market-led energy transition.”

Also he went on to say that the delay mongers have latched onto nuclear power despite the overwhelming evidence that it can only drive up energy bills, can only be more expensive and can only take too long to build this. In a cost of living crisis it seems to me that people calling for gas to be included in the capacity investment scheme are trying to stop renewables. Ian, I’m very very interested in your response to Matt K’s claims there.

Well this is just sheer stupidity. Mr Kean should know that when Finland put in its reactors, their latest reactors, the cost of electricity went down. And both the retailer and the wholesaler also had lower costs. So we have evidence very recently. The Page Research Center recently did a study on the cost of energy. This was done by Gerard Holland and he looked at solar and wind, he looked at nuclear, looked at gas and at coal.

By far the most expensive energy in Australia is solar and wind. This is considering the total costs, the land use changes, putting in the new power lines and so forth. Nuclear is quite cheap compared with that, gas is also cheap, as is coal. Coal’s the cheapest and that’s because we already have the infrastructure for coal.

Now what Mr. Kean doesn’t say is that solar and wind are not reliable, whereas nuclear, gas and coal are reliable. He also doesn’t say that solar and wind have a very short life less than 20 years. Whereas nuclear is at least 60 years for a nuclear power plant; more than 40 years for gas; more than 50 years for coal.

Moreover, he doesn’t say that our future demands for energy are going to increase enormously. We’re already using 10% of energy for data centers and with AI it’s going to be a lot higher. His real concern is that the practical economics of the nuclear lobby groups are starting to frighten renewables promoters; the practical economics of the gas groups are starting to frighten the wind and solar people.

These are the cheapest and most reliable and best forms of energy we can have in a country like Australia. And yet we’ve got all these foreign corporations who are running the solar and running the wind projects who are lining up for for their subsidies. And the subsidies make the renewable energy viable and profitable. The subsidies must keep getting renewed and he’s getting worried that that the whistle is going to be blown on this.

Worldwide, nuclear yields slightly more electricity than renewables.

We see around the world that we can have cheap reliable energy for very long periods of time from Nuclear. So I recommend that viewers look at Gerard Holland’s report from the Page Research Center. He aired these findings at the AIC conference on Tuesday, They show that we are going down the wrong path. We’ve got far too many vested interests whispering in Mr Kean’s ear. He doesn’t understand the fundamentals of energy generation and he doesn’t understand the fundamental weaknesses of solo and wind.

And I do love his comment about the illiberal drive to intervene in the market-led energy transition. When there has been so much market manipulation like the subsidies. It’s just wishful thinking to pretend that renewables are being led by the market, as though it were purely organic.

I’ve got an early Lefty losing it for you. It’s from the New Zealand greens:
Coal, don’t dig it, leave it on the ground, get with it.

What do you say to the New Zealand greens Professor Plimer. I think they’ve been taking some of Kamala Harris scripts and talking from them. I have no idea what they’re talking about. But we do know that the New Zealand coals on the west coast of South Island are exceptionally clean with very high calorific value, and very low Ash, They are prized coals.

New Zealand does have energy from other sources; from oil in and gas in the Taranaki Basin and some geothermal energy. But the New Zealand coals are some of the best in the world I have no idea what they’re trying to say except that perhaps they they want New Zealand to become even more backward.

‘Why did our parked electric car burst into flames?’

A mother said her family was “lucky to have got out safely” after their parked electric car exploded and engulfed their house in flames.

From NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT

By Paul Homewood

A mother said her family was “lucky to have got out safely” after their parked electric car exploded and engulfed their house in flames.

Georgina Bayliss from Spratton, Northamptonshire, said their Mercedes EQA had been parked outside their house for several hours before the explosion.

She said her younger son had seen flames around the front of the house and thought the rest of the family and their five dogs were still inside.

Mercedes-Benz UK said it was carrying out an investigation.

Mrs Bayliss’s husband Scott, 47, explained how his eldest son, James, 17, raised the alarm at 21:15 BST after he heard a loud bang and thought it was fireworks.

“The pace and ferocity at which the fire took hold and engulfed the entire car and pretty much the entire front of our house was scary beyond belief,” he said.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cy5l46l2vdxo

Dortmund Germany Delays Transition To Electric Buses Due To High Costs, Will Purchase Diesel Buses

The hype about green energies being the future is quickly becoming a thing of the past as all the Utopian promises made are not coming true as they clash against reality.

From NoTrickZone

By P Gosselin

The hype about green energies being the future is quickly becoming a thing of the past as all the Utopian promises made are not coming true as they clash against reality. 

The green movement is turning out to be nothing but a silly wet-dream LSD fantasy. 

The city of Dortmund, Germany is finding out that electric buses are significantly more expensive than diesel buses, even with government subsidies, reports Blackout News here.

Ordering more diesel buses

Due to the high costs, DSW21, a German transit company, is now delaying the full transition to an electric fleet and plans to continue purchasing some diesel buses alongside electric ones.

The plan was to replace the diesel buses with electric vehicles and to operate a largely emission-free fleet by 2035, but that’s looking extremely unlikely.

Diesel buses half the price of an electric bus

Blackout News reports that costs of switching to electric buses are almost impossible to manage without state funding. A diesel bus only costs around 400,000 euros, whereas an electric bus costs around 800,000 euros. This makes the switch to electric vehicles expensive even with government subsidies. “Without financial support from the German government, replacing the remaining 155 diesel buses with electric vehicles would cost around 140 million euros. That is almost three times as expensive as purchasing new diesel buses.”

Will never meet the 2035 climate target

Government subsidies for electric buses are decreasing, thus making the transition the transition over to an electric bus fleet even more challenging.

The EU directives are phasing out diesel powered buses and by 2035 only emission-free vehicles may then be used. That target is now in jeopardy as the government scales back subsidies.

Vehicle lifetime costs likely an even bigger obstacle

The other problem that gets ignored, and is not mentioned in the article, is the maintenance and service costs of the buses. Diesel buses are cheap, reliable and can run for many years. Electric buses, on the other hand, require massive batteries, which are exorbitantly expensive. And what value does a 7-year old electric bus have?

Potential folly

Blackout News sums up: “The long-term conversion to a zero-emission fleet will be significantly delayed if no further subsidies are made available. The decision to buy diesel buses again shows how much the industry is dependent on financial support in order to achieve the climate targets.”

Electric buses are increasingly appearing to be another costly green misadventure, and possibly a complete folly if policymakers refuse to wake up.

Blade-Runners Busted: State Sues Fake ‘Recycler’ For Dumping Wind Turbine Blades

Millions of toxic wind turbine blades have already been dumped in landfill, with millions more to follow. The wind industry is filled with shysters of all shapes and sizes, and has managed to spawn a peculiar a sub-species that spends their days telling everyone about their wonderful plans to recycle turbine blades, and their nights dumping them illegally, all over the countryside.

From STOP THESE THINGS

Millions of toxic wind turbine blades have already been dumped in landfill, with millions more to follow. The wind industry is filled with shysters of all shapes and sizes, and has managed to spawn a peculiar a sub-species that spends their days telling everyone about their wonderful plans to recycle turbine blades, and their nights dumping them illegally, all over the countryside.

One such operation, known as Global Fiberglass Solutions has been doing just that for more than 7 years. Now the State of Iowa has worked out that it’s been taken for a ride, suing the operator for dumping 1,300, 16 ton blades in various locations across the State.

State sues company accused of dumping wind-turbine blades
Iowa Capital Dispatch
Clark Kauffman
26 September 2024

The state of Iowa is suing a Washington-state company and its executives for allegedly dumping tons of old wind-turbine blades around Iowa, in violation of the state’s solid-waste laws.

The lawsuit alleges that over the past seven years, Global Fiberglass Solutions has failed to properly dispose of decommissioned wind-turbine blades and stockpiled them at multiple locations across Iowa.

These blades were allegedly dumped in the city of Newton

The lawsuit, filed in Iowa District Court for Jasper County, seeks payment of civil penalties and a court injunction to prevent any additional violations of the state’s solid-waste laws.

Global Fiberglass Solutions and its CEO, Donald Lilly, are named as defendants in the case, as is Ronald Albrecht, one of Global’s corporate officers. The defendants could not be reached for comment.

The lawsuit claims that General Electric, which provides parts and equipment for wind turbines, and MidAmerican Energy, which owns wind turbines in Iowa, each hired Global in 2017 to recycle their decommissioned wind-turbine blades.

MidAmerican and General Electric paid Global “millions of dollars,” the lawsuit alleges, to cut up, transport, and recycle the blades. Typically, such blades are about 170 feet long and weigh roughly 16 tons.

Rather than recycle the blades, the lawsuit claims Global instead dumped roughly 1,300 of them at four locations around the state: Newton, Atlantic, and a site in Ellsworth that was used to store blades that were originally dumped in Fort Dodge.

At one time, the lawsuit alleges, there were about 868 blades stored at the Newton site, which was a parking lot for the former Maytag factory. In Ellsworth, Global allegedly dumped 400 blades in a field, directly on the ground. In Atlantic, 22 blades were dumped in a field, directly on the ground, according to the lawsuit.

In 2018, according to the lawsuit, the Iowa Department of Natural Resources began fielding complaints about the Newton site. In 2020, the department sent Global a “notice of violation” related to the sites in Fort Dodge and Newton, indicating the blades were not being recycled as claimed and had simply been discarded. Later that year, a similar notice was issued regarding the Ellsworth site.

In December 2020, the lawsuit alleges, Global agreed to a consent order obligating the company to “take a number of concrete steps to purchase, install, and commence using recycling equipment” to process a certain percentage of the blades according to a series of deadlines.

The company was also required to post a $2 million surety bond to defray state expenses should the DNR be forced to remove and dispose of the blades because of Global’s lack of compliance with the consent order.

The DNR then agreed to extend the deadline for posting the bond until April 1, 2021.

Global never posted the bond, according to the lawsuit, and so the DNR ordered Global to stop accumulating wind-turbine blades in Iowa and to remove all of the blades scattered at the disposal sites. Global didn’t comply with that order and in July 2021 the matter was referred to the Iowa attorney general’s office for legal action.

The state’s lawsuit against Global was filed this week, three years after that referral. It seeks a civil penalty of up to $5,000 per day for each day the company was out of compliance with Iowa’s solid-waste laws.

State records indicate MidAmerican has removed and properly disposed of the blades once located at the Ellsworth site, while General Electric has removed the blades from Atlantic and Newton – a task that was completed in June of this year.

Global and its executives “dumped and abandoned 1,300 decommissioned wind-turbine blades in stockpiles across the state,” Iowa Attorney General Brenna Bird said in a press release. “We are taking action to hold them accountable.”
Iowa Capital Dispatch

EPA Proposes Yet Another Impossible Standard

Unsafe at any level!  If the current administration’s Environmental Protection Agency [ EPA ] has its way, if any ambient-air dust is found inside an apartment building then that would require property owners to perform exceptionally expensive remediation.

From Watts Up With That?

News Brief by Kip Hansen

News Brief by Kip Hansen — 25 October 2024 — 650 words/3 mins

Unsafe at any level!  If the current administration’s Environmental Protection Agency [ EPA ] has its way, if any ambient-air dust is found inside an apartment building then that would require property owners to perform exceptionally expensive remediation.

“Wait, that’s crazy!”, you might say.  But, hey, come on, it’s the EPA and they  are “still crazy after all these years.”  (h/t Paul Simon)

Don’t take my word for it, here it is in the NY Times:

“The Biden administration said Thursday that it was strengthening requirements for homes and child-care facilities to remove lead-based paint dust, a move that could better protect more than 300,000 children a year from the toxic metal.

Under the new rules, any detectable level of lead dust in the building would be considered a “lead hazard,” and property owners would be required to pay for cleanup. Property and business owners who could be affected expressed concern about potential cleanup costs.”

No, I haven’t cheated….the EPA says “any detectable level of lead dust in the building”.

So, how much lead – what level –  is found in the ambient atmosphere? 

Naturally, it varies a great deal, but as for air pollution,  the “National Trends in Lead Concentrations in 2010 – 2023” for the USA shows a level of just over 0.025 ug/m3.    That’s a detectable level.   The air measurement includes any particulate matter air.  In Europe, soil levels of lead are measured in nanograms/m3, and found at 25-35 ng/m3, which is the same.  The average hasn’t changed much in the last decade.

This means that both in the US and in Europe, the ambient air has a detectable level of lead of about 0.025 ug/m3.   The ambient air concentration measurements include any particulate matter (read “dust” – PM2.5/PM10) in that volume of air.   

According to a press release from MIT “testing for lead in water requires expensive, cumbersome equipment and typically requires days to get results. Or, it uses simple test strips that simply reveal a yes-or-no answer about the presence of lead but no information about its concentration. Current EPA regulations require drinking water to contain no more that 15 parts per billion of lead, a concentration so low it is difficult to detect.”

The new testing system being developed as discussed in that press release expects to be capable of detecting lead concentrations “as low as 1 part per billion”.

Now, no one wants to have their children, or themselves for that matter, exposed to lead in their drinking water, in the paint on baby’s cribs or toys or in the paint dust in their older homes.

But “no detectable level” is not a standard – it is an activist’s pipe dream.

The air around you probably has detectable levels of lead in it.  A recent document from the EPA shows that the dust in the air, averaged across all monitoring sites, ranges from 0.015 to 0.045 µg/m3.

If the water in your home is likely to have detectable lead levels, and the dust in the air outside your home has detectable lead levels, how is it possible to lower the lead levels inside your home to “no detectable level”?

It is not.

# # # # #

Author’s Comment:

A demonstrably impossible target is no target at all.  It is nonsensical.  No amount of cleaning, no amount of remediation can possibly reduce lead levels inside a home below the levels found in the tap water and ambient air around and thus in the home.  Homes are not, and cannot be turned into,  cleanrooms.  

It is possible that the current crop of EPA administrators, NIH and UN WHO apparatchiks have simply lost their minds.    Or maybe they have some secret knowledge from another planet that makes the impossible possible and they are hiding it out in Area 51?

Things are getting weirder.

Thanks for reading.

# # # # #

Cut Meat and Dairy Consumption By 50%, Orders CCC

Do they really think that people are so concerned about Net Zero that they will give up meat?
Of course, we all know that when they say “persuade”, they really mean “compel”.

From NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT

By Paul Homewood

h/t Paul Kolk

Britain must cut its meat and dairy consumption by up to 50pc to meet the latest net zero targets, the Government’s climate watchdog has said. 

The Climate Change Committee said in an ideal scenario, meat and dairy consumption should halve by 2050 and products be substituted with plant-based options.

The proposals are part of new net zero targets that have been recommended to Ed Miliband, the Energy Secretary.

In a letter to Mr Miliband, the committee said the Government must cut CO2 emissions by 81pc by 2035 when compared to the benchmark year of 1990. This would amount to a reduction of 200m tonnes from the current level of 384m tonnes.

Piers Forster, the CCC’s chairman, said persuading British consumers to change their diets would play a key role in achieving such massive cuts.

Mr Forster did not specify how the UK could reduce meat eating but options could include reducing subsidies for livestock, taxing meat products and a clampdown by regulators on advertising.

The committee has urged the Government to cut livestock numbers, especially sheep and cattle, because they argue the methane produced by these animals is a key cause of climate change..

The UK has just under 10m cattle and calves plus around 32m sheep and lambs.

David Handley of Farmers for Action, who keeps 500 sheep and 100 cattle on his Monmouthshire farm, said: “The amounts of methane produced by farming are tiny compared with the emissions from transport and other sectors.

“But these rules and regulations are devastating the sector along with the UK’s ability to produce its own food.” 

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2024/10/26/britons-urged-to-eat-less-meat-hit-latest-net-zero-target

Do they really think that people are so concerned about Net Zero that they will give up meat?

Of course, we all know that when they say “persuade”, they really mean “compel”.

In their zealotry, they don’t seem to care about the effect their policy will have on the rural economy. In England alone, livestock and dairy farms employ more than 120,000 people, and meat production is valued at £9bn a year, according to DEFRA.

Industry estimates suggest that you can triple the number of employees, when indirect jobs and jobs in the meat processing industry are added in.

Worse still, the rural economy in some parts of the country could be wiped out if livestock and dairy farming is ended. Shops, pubs , garages and other local businesses could not survive such a catastrophe.

To even contemplate such an outcome would be thoroughly reckless. And this is why Piers Forster, climate academic, is totally unfit to be in charge of climate decision making.

And as is ever the case, while we are trying to cut our meat consumption, the rest of the world eats more every year. Our consumption is barely 1% of the world’s.

https://www.fao.org/faostat/en/#compare

None of that matters to Piers Forster though. All he cares about is the UK’s Net Zero targets.

Climate Change Committee Tells UK Government that Pace of National Suicide Needs to Quicken – Part Deux

The UK needs to make huge cuts to its people’s wellbeing this decade to keep its national suicide plan on track, the government’s climate watchdog has said.

From Climate Scepticism

By Jit

The UK needs to make huge cuts to its people’s wellbeing this decade to keep its national suicide plan on track, the government’s climate watchdog has said.

The Climate Change Committee (CCC) says the UK has sufficient stupidity to do this, but that meeting the goal would require wasting much more of our money on renewable energy, electric cars and heat pumps.

While the UK has already cut its people’s wealth and freedom to less than 50% of its 2002 peak value, the CCC says it should reduce this to 19% by 2035, which would make a “vital contribution” to the target of international civilizational destruction by 2050.

A spokesperson said the government would carefully consider the CCC’s advice.

If the government commits to the suggested target, it would represent a significant advance on the UK’s current international pledge to cut lifestyles to 32% of their peak level by 2030.

It is, however, broadly in line with the UK’s self-imposed “legally-binding” wealth-cutting path towards national suicide by 2050.

Since these figures do not include products manufactured abroad and imported, the worst harms to ordinary people in the UK have so far been avoided. However, Greendeath, Enemies of the People, and Climate Action Network UK (CANKER) are demanding that this accounting loophole is rapidly closed.

The UK’s relatively successful path towards self-destruction so far has been largely down to installing large quantities of expensive electricity generators that only produce power when the UK’s notably fickle weather is cooperating. Progress in other areas, such as forcing old people to sit in cold houses in the evening, is proving more difficult.

For now, the UK’s people are thankfully apathetic to their worsening conditions.

“It’s like boiling a frog,” the CCC’s spokesperson said. “You don’t just throw it in hot water. You slowly, slowly, turn up the heat.”

And the CCC is confident that the UK’s targets are still possible.

“All the core money pits have got bigger, and they keep getting bigger, and that’s what gives us more and more confidence that we’ll be able to achieve this very ambitious date for national suicide, as long as the frogs, er people, remain apathetic,” a member of the CCC told the BBC.

‘Mutual suicide pact leadership’ ahead of COP29

As part of global agreements on self-impoverishment, countries have to decide whether to join the UK in a mutual suicide pact, or to continue to prioritise the health and prosperity of their citizens, by early next year.

But the government is expected to announce its new national target early, at the upcoming UN civilisational suicide conference (COP29) in Azerbaijan in November.

It hopes this will set the ball rolling and encourage other nations to follow the UK’s death cult leadership.

“Britain is back in the business of global suicide leadership,” a spokesperson for the Department for Energy Atrophy and Zero Fun (DENAZIFY) said. “But we want others to join ASAP, because if they see how well it goes for us, they might change their minds!”

The focus of COP29, though, will be on poor people’s money in richer countries.

There are hopes for a new deal on the funds that these richer countries should give away to corrupt third-world regimes. The guilt-wracked opinion formers of richer countries are easy to tap for their lower class’s money.

The CCC is calling for the UK to show international leadership by committing more of its poor peoples’ money to be squandered on foreign dictators’ palaces in line with its global suicide leadership ambitions.

It also says that the government should improve its preparations for the impacts of rising poverty and despair back home.

“The frogs might start squeaking,” a DENAZIFY spokesperson told the BBC. “And we have to be ready to shut them up quick.”

===

With apologies to Mark Poynting.

The original is here.

My report on the first call of the CCC to quicken national suicide is here.

‘Climate Extremism’: Biden-Harris Admin’s Own Data Undermines Its Fav Selling Point In Push To ‘Electrify Everything’

The Biden-Harris administration released data on Oct. 17 suggesting its push to electrify everything will ratchet up costs for American households, contradicting one of the White House’s favorite selling points for its green agenda, experts told the Daily Caller News Foundation.

From Watts Up With That?

The Daily Caller

Owen Klinsky
Contributor

The Biden-Harris administration released data on Oct. 17 suggesting its push to electrify everything will ratchet up costs for American households, contradicting one of the White House’s favorite selling points for its green agenda, experts told the Daily Caller News Foundation.

The Biden-Harris administration has made a crackdown on residential fossil fuel consumption a key aspect of its environmental strategy, justifying the push in part on the grounds electrification will lower energy costs. Now, Oct. 17 residential energy price data from the Department of Energy (DOE) shows electricity was roughly four times as expensive as natural gas in 2024, with experts telling the DCNF the White House’s electrification push is an example of extremist climate policy hurting everyday Americans. (RELATED: Forget Stoves! The Biden Admin Is Working Overtime To Phase Out All Your Gas Appliances)

“The Department of Energy has consistently shown that natural gas is a much cheaper energy source for households than electricity,” Daren Bakst, director of the Competitive Enterprise Institute’s Center for Energy and Environment, told the DCNF. “Government policies trying to block the use of natural gas in favor of electricity will significantly drive up prices, making home heating and appliance use needlessly expensive. The poor will get hurt the most because, compared to higher income households, they spend a greater share of their household income on meeting basic needs such as staying warm in the winter.”

AOC Attacks Republicans Over Gas Stoves

OCASIO-CORTEZ: “I do think it’s funny, the…absolute…Republican meltdown…’You can’t take my gas stove…How dare you…You have a gas stove.’
“First of all, I rent.” pic.twitter.com/F32HhSzEga

— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) January 13, 2023

The Biden-Harris DOE has issued a slew of rules restricting the use of gas appliances, including issuing revised standards on furnaces in September 2023 that could prohibit 40-60% of gas furnaces in homes, and increased efficiency requirements for water heaters that the agency claimed would save U.S. consumers $11.4 billion on their energy and water bills every year.

The Oct. 17 data showed electricity was significantly more expensive than fossil fuels, with a price of $47.36 per million British Thermal Units (BTU) compared to $13.38 and $33.59 per million BTU for natural gas and propane respectively. Thus, according to the Biden-Harris administration’s own data, switching from gas-powered appliances to electric appliances could increase utility costs by over 3.5 times, in addition to heightened installation costs.

“One of the most offensive bait-and-switch moves being played by officials in Washington D.C. and coastal enclaves is the push to force electric appliances on everyone, everywhere, even when natural gas can often be dramatically cheaper,” O.H. Skinner, executive director of the Alliance for Consumers and the former solicitor general of Arizona, told the DCNF. “The officials push the idea that bans on gas stoves, or gas furnaces, or other gas appliances will save on energy costs, but at the same time they have evidence that natural gas is cheaper…It’s time that officials in D.C. stopped trying to micromanage people’s lives and make everyone hew to a one size fits all approach to their homes.”

Energy sector expert Robert Bryce accused the Biden-Harris administration of purposely delaying the release of the price data on Oct. 3, citing the fact that, at least since 2011, the DOE has never published the information later than August. At the time — two weeks before the data was published — he predicted the agency was stonewalling because the cost figures would reflect the high costs of electricity relative to fossil fuels, which has proven to be accurate.

“This electrification push is a typical example of climate extremism,” Bakst told the DCNF. “There’s little to no consideration of how these policies will hurt Americans and the poor.”

An “electrification summit” held by the White House in December 2022 included non-governmental organization Rewiring America, which has previously stated its goal is to “electrify everything.”

The DOE did not respond to a request for comment.

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Will America save its aging water and sewer systems?

Systems often fail because of a lack of maintenance, and maintenance budgets are frequently robbed to finance pet projects. The electric grid is no longer being ignored, but another major segment of America’s infrastructure needs a closer look.

From CFACT

By Duggan Flanakin

Systems often fail because of a lack of maintenance, and maintenance budgets are frequently robbed to finance pet projects. The electric grid is no longer being ignored, but another major segment of America’s infrastructure needs a closer look.

According to a 2023 article in Nature, much of the U.S. water infrastructure was first installed in the late Victorian period when the influx of workers to cities fostered an enormous housing boom. These systems are now well over 100 years old, and some piping is closer to 150 years old. Even much of the infrastructure installed in the 20th century is also well past its design life.

The Bipartisan Policy Center reported in 2019 that the nation’s 15,000 publicly owned treatment works and 52,000 community water systems provide vital services, but their value was not reflected in the nation’s priorities. Major portions of the 1.2 million miles of water supply mains and an almost equal number of miles of sewer pipes needed repairs or even replacement.

The real problem is even greater. Nationwide, there are more than 148,000 independent public (and privately owned) water systems, most of which service communities of under 10,000 people. Many of these systems are old, and in many areas (including central Texas) customers are told not to flush even toilet paper down aging pipes. About 80% of Americans are serviced by about 13,000 larger systems, many of which are quite old.

A new report by the Council on Foreign Relations says that America’s water and sewer systems are under stress from growing populations, aging infrastructure, extreme weather patterns, and regulatory failures. While authorities focus on public health hazards, water utilities face budget squeezes, rising consumer costs, and unmet investment needs.

On top of those issues, a recent study by the National Institutes for Health found, while testing only 32 of the 12,000-plus types of per- and poly-fluorinated alkyl substances (PFAS), at least one of these chemicals was found in 45% of U.S. drinking water samples.

And a British study found that rivers in nearly every nation contain concentrations of medicinal drugs that exceed safe levels – and that the Trinity River in Dallas, Texas, which supplies some of the city’s drinking water, ranks in the top fifth with the highest concentrations of these drugs.

Columbia University hydro climatologist Upmanu Lall and his colleagues found, in a study of 17,900 water utilities and other community drinking water systems, that violations of the Safe Drinking Water Act more than doubled between 1980 and 2015 and that in 2015 drinking water systems serving nearly 21 million people were cited for water quality violations – a direct result of the failure to replace aging piping.

The American Society of Civil Engineers gave America’s drinking water infrastructure a “C minus“ grade. A U.S. water main breaks every 2 minutes, resulting in an estimated loss of 6 billion gallons of treated water every day. Pipe breaks and leaks also reduce water pressure, potentially causing back-siphoning of bacteria and other contaminants into water systems.

The report also said that unlined cast iron, typical in older systems, can be plagued by biofilms that can harbor pathogens if not carefully maintained, and there are still 9.2 million lead service lines nationally, according to the EPA. Without a major, and widespread, response to the challenge of aging water (and sewer) systems, vulnerable populations will continue to be at risk.

In 2020, a study by water utilities, engineers, and advocacy groups estimated that making all the needed investments in U.S. water infrastructure would add $4.5 trillion and 800,000 jobs to the U.S. economy by 2039.

A year later, President Joe Biden signed the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL), the nation’s largest federal investment in clean water, allocating $60 billion over five years for clean water and drinking water projects and other water protection programs. But the May 2024 CFR report suggests that the federal response has only scratched the surface of the growing problem.

Lall agrees, He says that, while the BIL enables replacement of some lead service lines and addresses the PFAS issue, the legislation is at best a band-aid. Congress instead needs to pay attention to the fact that the entire infrastructure system with water and wastewater is failing.

Apparently, that job is too big for lawmakers focused entirely on reelection and too difficult for pampered federal employees whose job security has little to do with quality of service. Lall says that water and wastewater issues can be divided into three components – storage (reservoirs and dams); conveyance (water and sewer pipes and associated pumps); and treatment systems.

Lall notes that the median age of U.S. dams is 60 years, yet most were designed to last only for 50 years. The state of dam maintenance is so bad that about two-thirds are unrated and their status unknown. As for conveyance, about 850 water mains fail every day in North America. Increasing pathogens in drinking water have led to more frequent boil water notices.

While larger cities have their own issues with aging water and sewer systems, many smaller communities no longer have the financial or technical resources to determine the condition of their systems, let alone come up with workable plans for system upgrades. In every year, many of these systems exhibit failure, creating local crises that may require help from neighbors.

One reason, says Lall, that nobody is addressing the big picture regarding our failing water and sewer systems is that there is no central planning (or advisory panel) for water and sewer investments in the U.S. By contrast, the U.S. Energy Information Administration and Department of Energy, and for that matter, multiple nonprofits and think tanks, focus on the nation’s energy needs and spark often raucous public debate that keeps the energy issue at the forefront.

Instead, we have seven or eight federal agencies with some sort of jurisdiction over water, plus state and local agencies, each of which has its own agenda. The BIL was the first major legislation to address water and wastewater infrastructure since 1980, and it was at best a piecemeal approach. The EPA’s regulatory framework addresses violations of standards but does little to address the infrastructure needs of local water and sewer systems.

All in all, says Lall, the challenge is not just throwing money at individual system failures. It is to create some group that is focused on what should be the 21st century architecture for the U.S. water system. In other words, it is well past time to create a national focus on water quality and to set national and local goals for system upgrades that will last for the next 50 to 60 years.

The U.S. Water Alliance believes that fully funding the needed upgrades to America’s water and wastewater infrastructure will bring benefits that far exceed the costs. Yet even that study, which predicted a $4.5 trillion upside and 800,000 jobs, does not include the associated public health benefits from cleaner drinking water and cleaner rivers and streams that can only result from vastly improved wastewater treatment systems.

But these benefits will only be possible if the U.S. put the same level of effort into fixing its water and wastewater systems that politicians have put into climate change.