Global warming, climate change, all these things are just a dream come true for politicians. I deal with evidence and not with frightening computer models because the seeker after truth does not put his faith in any consensus. The road to the truth is long and hard, but this is the road we must follow. People who describe the unprecedented comfort and ease of modern life as a climate disaster, in my opinion have no idea what a real problem is.
โโฆ Australia has a wealth of coal and gas resources as well as renewable energy, so why are energy costs so high โฆโ
Rich in resources, but Australiaโs energy costs have tripled and manufacturers are hurting
โฆ
โ[The US is] pro-manufacturing, theyโve got cheap energy, theyโve got good gas supply and reserves. Itโs one of the most attractive markets to invest today,โ he said.
Mr Gandhi said one solution to the problem in Australia is to increase the supply of gas.
But it is already too late for many Australian manufacturers.
โIf you start investing today it takes three to 10 years to bring on new gas resources โฆ [and] manufacturers wonโt survive [that long],โ he said.
โฆ
Plastics manufacturer Qenos went into administration last year blaming the lack of a reliable supply of gas and rising costs.
โฆ
The federal government did not respond to the ABCโs questions about a decision, but a statement from a spokesperson for Energy Minister Chris Bowen blamed the coalition for the gas shortfall.
โฆ
Bruce Robertson, a former stockbroker and fund manager who is now an independent energy consultant, said Australian manufacturers were โbleeding to deathโ due to high energy costs.
He blamed the gas export companies operating the export terminal in Gladstone in Queensland.
โฆ
Liam Wagner is an associate professor at Curtin Universityโs Institute for Energy Transition, researching new technology in electricity markets and how gas prices work in the eastern states.
He thinks manufacturers should focus on alternative fuels like hydrogen rather than hope for government intervention.
The fact that nobody in government or academia seems to understand the problem, let alone have viable ideas for solving it, is bad news for what is left of the productive sectors of Australiaโs economy.
Imposing a gas reserve or export quota on gas companies would at best buy a few years. Gas companies would respond to the increased risk of damaging government intervention by redirecting new gas field development elsewhere. Why should gas companies gamble on Australiaโs hostile energy regulation landscape, when they can participate in Trumpโs energy renaissance?
As for hydrogen, Iโm not going to bother answering that one. Feel free to ask other WUWT commenters why hydrogen is a bad idea, if you genuinely believe this is a possible solution.
Packing up and relocating to the USA or Asia might save some businesses. Though given the growing string of bankruptcies, it may already be too late for many of them.
Update (EW): One of Quenos Plastic Manufactererโs plants was in Melbourne, Victoria. Quenos relied on gas from Altona Refinery, an adjacent oil refinery. The oil refinery shut down in 2022. This is triggering a cascade of closures of adjacent businesses which piped gas or other petroleum products directly from the refinery, including Quenos.
The Victorian State Government could have acted to ensure a plentiful gas supply for businesses like Quenos, but instead of trying to help industry, in 2021 the Victorian Government added a permanent ban on fracking to the state constitution. This hostile regulatory act likely convinced Quenos and businesses like it there was no hope for a profitable future, which may have been a factor in their decision to close.
When I first read โAtlas Shruggedโ I thought the description of cascading industry failures in the book breathed real life into the plot. Now I am seeing it play out in real life.
Cinders are the black pieces that are left after something such as wood or coal has burned away. People can also burn.
There was a terrible bushfire in southeastern Australia on 6 February 1851. Quoting from the National Museum of Australia:
In the hills west of Geelong, a man helping fight a fire disappeared. His body was later found โburnt to a cinderโ. Another man who perished was with a group burning stubble to form a firebreak when they were caught out by a wind change. His companions scattered, but he went the wrong way.
Domesticated animals and wildlife suffered terribly. It was estimated that one million sheep and thousands of cattle were lost.
The Melbourne Argus callously noted that โpigs and dogs running loose were burned to death โ birds were dropping down off the trees before the fire in all directions โ oppossums, kangaroos, and all sorts of beasts can be had to-day ready roasted all over the bush.
Caught out by a wind change and subsequently reduced to cinders. I cannot image anyone ever expecting that to happen to them. The world can be so cruel.
There was a newspaper article in The Los Angeles Times, on page 4 on Thursday August 20, 1885, that described how cinders fell all over the city the day before โ on August 19, 1885 โ and how later, smoke filled the sky in a solid bank entirely shutting out the mountains.
The year 1895 was also a bad year for wildfires in California, apparently the worst on record. The 1930s were a bad decade, and in Australia my Aunty Enid was living in Melbourne in January 1939 and remembers that it was so hot the tar on the roads melted โ and the sky was grey from the bushfires.
The official temperature record, held by the Australian Bureau of Meteorology, now show temperatures some degrees cooler for that period. There is constant remodelling of these same temperatures, with the natural climate cycles stripped away until historical temperatures for everywhere show gradual warming consistent with how Hollywood has agreed the world should be.
There is a lesson in these fires still burning in southern California.
All that wealth, power and influence did not save Hollywood from this natural disaster. It could have, for sure. It is often, in the end, a question of knowledge, political will and priorities.
Bill Gammageโs book about firestick farming in Australia is entitled โThe Biggest Estate on Earthโ. It explains how Aboriginal Australians used fire to create clever mosaics of different habitat โ with extensive grassy patches and pathways, open woodlands and abundant wildlife, it evoked a country estate in England. These are his publicistsโ words, with reference to southern, now forest areas including East Gippsland that did not burn so badly in 1939 because the first settlers continued the Aboriginal practice of patchwork burning.
These same overgrown forests burnt to cinders in January 2020.
The forests of East Gippsland were described by the first European settlers to Australia in the early 1800s as โpark-likeโ and โclean-bottomedโ, which was attributed to burning by Aborigines. Of course, for traditional Australian Aborigines the concept of wilderness is not a cause for fond nostalgia but a land without custodians.
There was once a deep knowledge of wind and country, and a respect for history and elders. For cycles of life.
It is one thing to have an imagination and to dream and, as they do in Hollywood, making a fortune from films about how the world should be. But in the end, it is important to realize that after the rains, will sometimes come the floods, and after that the fires that can destroy you.
For sure they will destroy you, in real life, and also metaphorically, if you dream too big, take one too many chances after conditions have so obviously changed. If you didnโt have a plan for when the sparks would fly, as they surely will one day. It is virtuous. Just know where you are in your life cycle and the life cycle of nature and community.
As families and as nations we are more prone than ever to disaster, because of the excess hubris. It is everywhere nowadays in the West โ exported from Hollywood that is now part of a city with so many suburbs in cinders.
In part because of the hubris, including from so many deluded leaderswho were intent on changing the world, that they did not understand.
Hubris (/หhjuหbrษชs/; from Ancient Greek แฝฮฒฯฮนฯ โpride, insolence, outrageโ) describes a personality quality of extreme or excessive pride or dangerous overconfidence and complacency, often in combination with (or synonymous with) arrogance.
It is time that as individuals, communities and as nation states we stopped and took some time to reflect on our own limitations and the extraordinary power of nature โ and the cycles of life.
Where I am living, on the Tropic of Capricorn on the edge of South Pacific just across from the Keppel Islands at the Great Barrier Reef, we have had big rains and can expect even bigger sea tides โ it is that time of year when the dry rivers begin to flow to sea.
Life is good here, but it wonโt always be raining.
There are lessons in these fires still burning in southern California, lessons for all of us.
Just a couple of months ago, the creek ended without reaching Keppel Bay.Just yesterday I was wadding across the same stretch of Lammermoor Beach, then with the tides pushing in, while the freshwater was trying to run out.
Theย Nature Reviews Earth & Environmentย paper on hydroclimate volatility represents yet another example of speculative science dressed up as crisis-level evidence. Its central claim is that so-called โhydroclimate whiplashโโsharp transitions between wet and dry conditionsโwill become far more frequent and intense as the planet warms. The authors predict that subseasonal whiplash events (three-month shifts) will increase byย 113% under 3ยฐC warming, while interannual whiplash events (year-long shifts) will rise byย 52%.ย
Theย Nature Reviews Earth & Environmentย paper on hydroclimate volatility represents yet another example of speculative science dressed up as crisis-level evidence. Its central claim is that so-called โhydroclimate whiplashโโsharp transitions between wet and dry conditionsโwill become far more frequent and intense as the planet warms. The authors predict that subseasonal whiplash events (three-month shifts) will increase byย 113% under 3ยฐC warming, while interannual whiplash events (year-long shifts) will rise byย 52%.ย These figures, dramatic as they may sound, are derived from models riddled with uncertainties and based on poorly defined baselines, making their real-world implications highly suspect.
Hydroclimate volatility refers to sudden, large and/or frequent transitions between very dry and very wet conditions. In this Review, we examine how hydroclimate volatility is anticipated to evolve with anthropogenic warming. Using a metric of โhydroclimate whiplashโ based on the Standardized Precipitation Evapotranspiration Index, global-averaged subseasonal (3-month) and interannual (12-month) whiplash have increased by 31โ66% and 8โ31%, respectively, since the mid-twentieth century. Further increases are anticipated with ongoing warming, including subseasonal increases of 113% and interannual increases of 52% over land areas with 3โยฐC of warming; these changes are largest at high latitudes and from northern Africa eastward into South Asia. Extensive evidence links these increases primarily to thermodynamics, namely the rising water-vapour-holding capacity and potential evaporative demand of the atmosphere. Increases in hydroclimate volatility will amplify hazards associated with rapid swings between wet and dry states (including flash floods, wildfires, landslides and disease outbreaks), and could accelerate a water management shift towards co-management of drought and flood risks. A clearer understanding of plausible future trajectories of hydroclimate volatility requires expanded focus on the response of atmospheric circulation to regional and global forcings, as well as landโoceanโatmosphere feedbacks, using large ensemble climate model simulations, storm-resolving high-resolution models and emerging machine learning methods.
But the bigger story here isnโt the paperโs shaky scienceโitโs the timing of its publication.
Released on January 9, 2025, just two days after the Palisades and Eaton Fires broke out in Los Angeles and while they were still raging, the paper appears to have been rushed out to provide the media with a ready-made link between the fires and climate change. The fires, which have already caused 24 fatalities, destroyed thousands of homes, and inflicted $50 billion in economic losses, dominated global headlines.
For the marketing to work blaming climate change for the fires, the media needs some authoritative scientific experts and research papers, preferably with numbers that can easily fool busy readers or at least satisfy a bare minimum standard. pic.twitter.com/KUU5BPtBLc
As if on cue, the media pounced on the paper to frame the LA fires as evidence of escalating climate volatility. Itโs hard to imagine the journalโs editors werenโt aware of how perfectly their publication would align with the news cycle. Whether intentional or opportunistic, this timing seems far too convenient to be coincidental.
Letโs examine why this paperโs conclusions are deeply flawed and how its suspicious timing highlights the growing interplay between speculative climate science and media-driven alarmism.
The Los Angeles Fires: A Manufactured Narrative
The Palisades and Eaton Fires, which began on January 7, 2025, have caused destruction on an unprecedented scale. The Palisades Fire has destroyed over 420 homes, while the Eaton Fire has devastated more than 7,000 structures. The fires have claimed at least 24 lives combined, making them some of the deadliest in Californiaโs history. Predictably, the media seized the moment to blame climate change, framing these disasters as yet another example of a warming world spiraling out of control.
The Nature paper on hydroclimate whiplash provided the perfect scientific veneer to reinforce this narrative. Though the paper itself does not explicitly link whiplash events to wildfires, its release during the fires gave journalists just enough material to connect the dots. Headlines proclaimed that increasing โwhiplashโ was driving extreme weather patterns and fueling events like the LA fires.
However, the reality is far less dramatic. Wildfires in California, including the Palisades and Eaton Fires, are driven by far more immediate and well-understood factors, including:
Fuel Accumulation: Decades of poor forest management have allowed dangerous amounts of dry vegetation to build up. This is a far bigger driver of wildfire risk than climate change.
Ignition Sources: Investigators believe the Eaton Fire may have been started by electrical infrastructure failuresโan all-too-common ignition source in California. Human activity (including arson and accidental ignitions) remains the leading cause of wildfires globally.
Weather Variability: Californiaโs Santa Ana winds, with gusts reaching 70 mph during these fires, are a long-standing feature of its climate and have fueled fires for centuries, long before industrial emissions.
While climate change might influence background conditions, such as slightly lengthening fire seasons, it is far from the primary culprit in these disasters. Yet, thanks to the convenient timing of the Nature paper, the media has doubled down on the narrative that climate change is the driving force behind Californiaโs fires.
Hydroclimate Whiplash: A Crisis Built on Speculation
The term โhydroclimate whiplash,โ coined by the paperโs authors, refers to abrupt shifts between wet and dry periods. The authors claim that these events will increase dramatically under global warming scenarios, using projections from the CESM2-LE climate model. The numbers they cite are eye-catching:
Aย 113% increaseย in subseasonal whiplash events by 2100 under 3ยฐC warming.
Aย 52% increaseย in interannual whiplash events over the same period.
But these projections crumble under scrutiny. As Roger Pielke Jr. would say, this is a classic example of the โpercent of a percentage problem.โ By expressing changes as percentages without providing clear baseline context, the authors obscure the real-world significance of their findings.
If subseasonal whiplash events currently occur, say, once every five years, then doubling their frequency means they would still happen only every 2.5 years. Such increases, while statistically interesting, hardly warrant the apocalyptic tone of the paper.
More importantly, โhydroclimate whiplashโ itself is poorly defined and highly dependent on arbitrary thresholds. Californiaโs climate, for instance, has always experienced sharp shifts between wet and dry conditions. Atmospheric rivers bring heavy rains during wet seasons, followed by dry summers. This variability is a natural feature of Californiaโs Mediterranean climate, not a harbinger of climate catastrophe.
Shaky Science: Flaws in the Paperโs Approach
Even if we accept the concept of hydroclimate whiplash, the Nature paperโs conclusions are undermined by significant flaws in its methodology:
Unreliable Models: The CESM2-LE climate model, which the study relies on, struggles to accurately simulate extreme events in todayโs climate. If the model canโt capture current conditions, its projections of future trends are little more than guesswork. The authors even admit that the model underestimates extreme events, yet they proceed to base their conclusions on it.
Baseline Ambiguity: The paper provides no clear explanation of how frequently whiplash events occur today. Are they once-in-a-decade events? Once-a-year events? Without a baseline, the dramatic percentage increases cited in the paper are meaningless.
Natural Variability Ignored: The study attributes most of the projected increases in whiplash events to anthropogenic warming while downplaying the role of natural drivers like the El NiรฑoโSouthern Oscillation (ENSO). ENSO alone has a massive influence on precipitation variability in regions like California.
Rare Events Amplify Uncertainty: Modeling changes in rare phenomena is inherently difficult. Small errors in the modelโs input parameters can lead to massive variability in the results, making the projections highly unreliable.
Taken together, these flaws render the paperโs findings speculative at best. Yet its timing and dramatic conclusions have elevated it to a level of media prominence that far outweighs its actual scientific rigor.
Suspicious Timing: A Case Study in Opportunism
The timing of the Nature paperโs releaseโjust two days after the Palisades and Eaton Fires eruptedโraises serious questions about the journalโs motives. Peer-reviewed studies typically spend months, if not years, in review and revision. The decision to publish this paper while the fires were still raging appears calculated to maximize its media impact.
Journals like Nature are well aware of how their publications influence public discourse. By releasing this paper during an ongoing disaster, the editors ensured that it would dominate headlines and reinforce the narrative that climate change is the primary driver of extreme weather and disasters. This isnโt merely a coincidenceโitโs opportunism.
The media, predictably, ran with the story. Headlines conflated the fires with hydroclimate whiplash, portraying the LA disaster as an inevitable consequence of climate change. The result is a media-science feedback loop where speculative studies are treated as definitive evidence, fueling public fear and bolstering calls for sweeping, costly policies.
The Danger of Alarmism
The consequences of this kind of alarmism are profound. By framing hydroclimate whiplash as an urgent climate crisis, the Nature paper distracts from more immediate and solvable problems. Californiaโs wildfire risk could be significantly reduced through better forest management, infrastructure upgrades, and targeted fire prevention strategies.
Instead, resources are often diverted to climate mitigation policies that do little to address the root causes of wildfires. The public, meanwhile, is left fearful and misinformed, believing that climate change is solely responsible for disasters like the Palisades and Eaton Fires.
Conclusion: Alarmism Dressed as Science
The Nature Reviews Earth & Environment paper on hydroclimate whiplash is a textbook case of speculative science weaponized for alarmism. Its dramatic projections, built on flawed models and vague baselines, lack the rigor needed to justify its conclusions.
But the timing of its releaseโjust two days after the LA fires began and while they were still ragingโcasts an even darker shadow. Whether by design or opportunism, the paper was strategically published to align with the media narrative surrounding the fires. This is not science informing policy; it is science feeding fear.
The public deserves better. Policymakers need transparent, robust scienceโnot alarmist studies timed to exploit tragedy. Hydroclimate whiplash may make for a compelling headline, but itโs a poor foundation for sound policy or meaningful action. Letโs focus on solving real problems, not amplifying manufactured crises.
Roger Pielke Jr. and Ryan Maueโs X thread are well worth reading for more information.
Recent reports inย Politicoย andย The Guardianย make a now familiar but false claim: Californiaโs wildfires, particularly the devastating events around Los Angeles, are evidence of an accelerating โclimate crisis.โ The claims made in these stories are false. Data do not show wildfires are getting worse.
Recent reports inย Politicoย andย The Guardianย make a now familiar but false claim: Californiaโs wildfires, particularly the devastating events around Los Angeles, are evidence of an accelerating โclimate crisis.โ The claims made in these stories are false. Data do not show wildfires are getting worse. The stories rely on oversimplified, headline-grabbing narratives that blame climate change without examining other critical variables. In addition, they continue to make the most basic mistake ofย conflating weather events with long-term climate change.
Californiaโs landscapes have evolved alongside fire for millennia. Long before industrialization, periodic wildfires swept through these ecosystems, clearing out excess vegetation and promoting biodiversity. This is not conjecture, rather it is well-documented in history. Native American tribes understood this and used controlled burns to manage the land.
The problem today is not that California has firesโit always has. The problem is that modern fire suppression policies disrupted this natural cycle. For much of the 20th century, aggressive efforts to extinguish all fires, combined with the abandonment of Indigenous fire management techniques, allowed vegetation and underbrush to accumulate to dangerous levels. Other factors include a shift in forest management philosophy leading to decline in logging, resulting in overgrown forests with build-up of fuel, and increasing numbers of people moving to areas historically prone to wildfires. This surplus fuel creates the conditions for catastrophic fires and the increased population and all the buildings that come with them, leads to greater tragedy and cost when fires occur. Climate Realism has discussed these facts on multiple occasions, here, here, here, and here, for example.
The media conveniently ignores this, preferring to frame every wildfire as an apocalyptic omen of climate change. By failing to include this historical context, publications like The Guardian and Politico mislead their readers into believing wildfires are a โnew normalโ caused solely by greenhouse gas emissions.
The breathless media claims of increased drought, increased fire weather, and worse than normal winds such as the Santa Ana winds, just donโt hold up to scientific scrutiny.
Urban sprawl into fire-prone areas has also intensified the wildfire problem. The wildland-urban interfaceโwhere human development meets natural landscapesโis now home to millions of Californians. This expansion means more ignition sources, from power line failures, to campfires, to arson and more, and more structures vulnerable to fire.
For example, the Palisades Fire, referenced in recent media coverage, began in an area with a long history of human activity intersecting with high-risk landscapes. Investigations reveal that the fireโs ignition was likely human-caused, possibly by power line failureโa detail conveniently buried in the mediaโs climate-centric reporting. Cliff Mass, a respected atmospheric scientist, has written extensively on how human factorsโnot climateโare often the direct cause of such fires.
The mediaโs failure to acknowledge the role increased population has played in the recent wildfires is deeply irresponsible. Expanding urban development into high-risk areas, coupled with inadequate fireproofing measures, magnifies the destruction when fires occur. Yet, these factors rarely make the headlines. Why? Because they donโt fit narrative that climate change is to blame.
The policy failure that no one talks about is poor forest management.
Poor forest and land management is another critical factor contributing to Californiaโs wildfires that is often ignored by the mainstream coverage. Californiaโs forests are overgrown, with dangerously high levels of combustible material. Controlled burns and mechanical thinning are proven methods to reduce this risk, yet California has consistently fallen short of its forest management goals.
Governor Gavin Newsom has touted Californiaโs โclimate leadership,โ but his administration and the U.S. Forest Service have quietly backtracked on the forest thinning, logging, and prescribed burn targets. A report from Climate Realism details how inadequate the stateโs forest management efforts have been, leaving forests as ticking time bombs.
This policy failure is ignored by media outlets eager to blame a nebulous โclimate crisisโ rather than hold policymakers accountable for their neglect. How convenient.
There is no denying that naturally driven climate change may influence some environmental conditions, such as warmer temperatures or extended droughts. However, attributing wildfires solely to climate change ignores the larger picture. Consider this: the total area burned by wildfires in the U.S. has actually decreased since the early 20th century, according to data from the National Interagency Fire Center and summarized by Climate at a Glance.
Why hasnโt this fact been front-page news? Because it contradicts the mediaโs preferred narrative. Wildfires in the past were often larger and more frequent than they are today.
Climate alarmists also ignore the critical role of weather variability. For instance, Michael Shellenberger, a prominent environmentalist and author, has pointed out that many of Californiaโs recent fires were preceded by unusually high wind events, such as Diablo and Santa Ana winds. These natural phenomena, not climate change, drive the most destructive fires.
What is most galling about media coverage of California wildfires is its selective focus and refusal to acknowledge inconvenient facts. By attributing every blaze to climate change, journalists are not just misinforming the publicโthey are actively undermining efforts to address the real causes of these disasters and thereby putting people at risk by encouraging poor public policies.
Blaming climate change for wildfires is an easy way to avoid difficult conversations about land management, urban planning, and individual responsibility. It allows politicians to deflect blame and activists to push sweeping policies that often have little to do with wildfire prevention. In short, it is a cop-out.
The conclusion? Media irresponsibility is the real crisis.
By refusing to discuss the true causes of wildfires, outlets like Politico and The Guardian are complicit in hindering meaningful action. Itโs time for journalists to do their jobs: report facts, ask hard questions, and hold policymakers accountable. Until they do, they will remain part of the problem, not the solution.
Last year William Happer spoke on Radiation Transfer in Clouds at the EIKE conference, and the video is above. For those preferring to read, below is a transcript from the closed captions along with some key exhibits. I left out the most technical section in the latter part of the presentation. Text in italics with my bolds.
William Happer: Radiation Transfer in Clouds
People have been looking at Clouds for a very long time in in a quantitative way.ย This is one of the first quantitative studies done about 1800. And this is John Leslie, a Scottish physicist who builtย this gadget.ย He called it an Aethrioscope, but basically it was designedย to figure out how effective the sky was in causing Frost.ย If you live in Scotland, you worry about Frost. So, it consisted of two glass bulbs with a very thin capillary attachment between them. And there was a little column of alcohol here.
The bulbs were full of air, and so if one bulb got a little bit warmer it would force the alcohol up through the capillary. If this one got colder it would suck the alcohol up. So he set this device out under the clear sky. And he described that the sensibility of the instrument is very striking. For the liquor incessantly falls and rises in the stem with every passing cloud. in fine weather the aethrioscope will seldom indicate a frigorific impression of less than 30 or more than 80 millesimal degrees. Heโs talking about how high this column of alcohol would go up and down if the sky became overclouded. it may be reduced to as low as 15 refers to how much the sky cools or even five degrees when the congregated vapours hover over the hilly tracks. We donโt speak English that way anymore but I I love it.
The point was that even in 1800 Leslie and his colleagues knew very well that clouds have an enormous effect on the cooling of the earth. And of course, anyone who has a garden knows that if you have a clear calm night, youโre likely to get Frost and lose your crops. So, this was a quantitative study of that.
Now itโs important to remember that if you go out todayย the atmosphere is full of two types of radiation.ย Thereโsย sunlight which you can seeย and then there is the thermal radiation thatโs generated by greenhouse gases, by clouds and by the surface of the Earth.ย You canโt see thermal radiation but you you can feel it if itโs intense enough by its warming effect. And theseย curves practically donโt overlapย so weโre really dealing with two completely different types of radiation.
Thereโsย sunlight which scatters very nicely and off of not only clouds but molecules;ย itโs the blue sky the Rayleigh scattering. Then thereโs the thermal radiation which actually doesnโt scatter at all on molecules soย greenhouse gases are very good at absorbing thermal radiation but they donโt scatter it.ย Butย clouds scatter thermal radiationย and plotted here is the probability that you will find Photon of sunlight between you know log of its wavelength and the log of in this interval of the wavelength scale.
Since Leslieโs day two types of instruments have been developed to do what he did more precisely. One of them is called aย pyranometerย and this is designed to measure sunlight coming down onto the Earth on a day like this. So you put this instrument out there and it wouldย read the flux of sunlight coming down.ย Itโs designed to see sunlight comingย in every directionย so it doesnโt matter which angle the sun is shining; itโs uh calibrated to see them all.
Let me show you a measurement by a pyranometer. This is a actually a curve from a sales brochure of a company that will sell you one of these devices. Itโs comparing two types of detectors and as you can see theyโre very good you can hardly tell the difference. The point is that if you look on a clear day with no clouds you see sunlight beginning to increase at dawn it peaks at noon and it goes down to zero and thereโs no sunlight at night. So half of the day over most of the Earth thereโs no sunlight in the in the atmosphere.
Hereโsย a day with clouds,ย itโs justย a few days laterย shown by days of the year going across. You can see every timeย a cloud goes by the intensity hitting the ground goes down. With a little clear sky, it goes up, then down up and so on. On average at this particular day, you getย a lot less sunlight than you did on the clear day.
But you knowย nature is surprising.ย Einsteinย had this wonderfulย quote: God is subtle but heโs not malicious.ย He meant that nature does all of sorts ofย things you donโt expect, and so let me show you what happens on aย partly cloudy day.ย Here so this is data takenย near Munich.ย The blue curve is the measurement and theย red curve is is the intensity on the ground if there were no clouds.ย This is a partly cloudy day and you can see there are briefย periods when the sunlight is much brighter on the detector on a cloudy day than it is on the clear day.ย And thatโs because coming through cloudsย you get focusing from the edges of the cloud pointing down toward your detector.ย That means somewhere else thereโs less radiation reaching the ground. But this is rather surprising to most people. I was very surprised to learn about it, but it just shows thatย the actual details of climate are a lot more subtle than you might think.#
We know that visible light only happens during the daytime and stops at night. Thereโs a second type of important radiation which is the thermal radiation which is measured by a similar device. You have a silicon window that passes infrared, which is below the band gap of silicon, so it passes through it as though transparent. Then thereโs some interference filters here to give you further discrimination against sunlight. So sunlight practically doesnโt go through this at all, so they call it solar solar blind since it doesnโt see the Sun.
But itย sees thermal radiation very clearlyย with a big difference between this device and the sunlight sensing device I showed you. Because actuallyย most of the time this is radiating up not down.ย Out in the open air this detector normally gets colder than the body of the instrument. And so, itโs carefullyย calibrated for you to compare the balance of down coming radiation with the upcoming radiation.ย Upcoming is normally greater than down coming.
Iโll show you someย measurements of the downwelling fluxย here; these are actually in Greenland in Thule and these are areย watts per square meterย on the vertical axis here. The first thing to notice is that theย radiation continues day and nightย you can you if you look at the output of the pyrgeometer you canโt tell whether itโs day or night because theย atmosphere is just as bright at night as it is during the day.ย However, theย big difference is clouds: on a cloudy day you get a lotย more downwelling radiation than you do on a clear day. Hereโs a a near a full day of clear weather thereโs another several days of clear weather. Then suddenly it gets cloudy.ย Radiation rises because the bottoms of the clouds are relatively warm at least compared to the clear sky.ย I think if you put the numbers In, this cloud bottom is aroundย 5ยฐ Centigrade so it was fairly low Cloud.ย it was summertime in Greenland and this compares to aboutย minus 5ยฐ for the clear sky.
So, thereโs a lot of data out there and there really isย downwelling radiationย there no no question about that you measure it routinely. And now you canย do the same thing looking down from satellites,ย so this is a picture that Iย downloadedย a few weeks ago to get ready for this talk from Princeton and it wasย from Princeton at 6 PM so it was already dark in Europe.ย So this is a picture of the Earth from a geosynchronousย satellite thatโs parked over Ecuador. You are looking down on the Western Hemisphere and this is aย filtered image of the Earth in Blue Light at 47 micrometers.ย So, itโs a nice blue color not so different from the sky and itโs dark where the sun has set. Thereโs still a fair amount of sunlight over the United States and the further west.
Here is exactly the same time and from the same satellite the infrared radiation coming up at 10.3 which is right in the middle of the infrared window where thereโs not much Greenhouse gas absorption; thereโs a little bit from water vapor but very little, trivial from CO2.
As you can see, you canโt tell which side is night and which side is day. So even though the sun has set over here it is still glowing nice and bright. Thereโs sort of a pesky difference here because what youโre looking at here is reflected sunlight over the intertropical Convergence Zone. There are lots of high clouds that have been pushed up by the convection in the tropics and uh so this means more visible light here. Youโre looking at emission of the cloud top so this is less thermal light so white here means less light, white there means more light so you have to calibrate your thinking. to
Butย the Striking thingย about all of this: if you can see the Earth is covered with clouds,ย you have to look hard to find a a clear spot of the earth. Roughly half of the earth maybe is clear at any given time butย most of its covered with clouds. So, if anything governs the climate it is clouds and and so thatโs one of the reasons, I admire so much the work that Svensmark and Nir Shaviv have done. Because theyโre focusing onย the most important mechanism of the earth: itโs not Greenhouse Gases, itโs Clouds. You can see that here.
Now this is a single frequency let me show youย what happens if you look down from a satellite and do look at the Spectrum.ย This is the spectrum of light coming up over the Sahara Desert measured from a satellite. And so here isย the infrared window; thereโs the 10.3 micronsย I mentioned in the previous slide itโs itโs a clear region. So, radiation in this region can get up from the surface of the Sahara right up to outer space.
Notice that the units on these scales are very different; over the Sahara the top unit is 200, 150 over the Mediterranean and itโs only 60 over the South Pole. But at least the Mediterranean and the Sahara are roughly similar so the right side here these three curves on the right are observations from satellites and the three curves on the left are are calculations modeling that weโve done. The point here is that you can hardly tell the difference between a model calculation and observed radiation.
So, itโs reallyย straightforward to calculate radiation transfer.ย If someone quotes you a number in watts per square centimeter you should take it seriously; that probably a good number. If they tell you a temperature you donโt know what to make about it. Because thereโs aย big step between going from watts per square centimeter to a temperature change. All theย mischief in the whole climate business is going from watts per square centimeter to to Centigrade or Kelvin.
Now I will say just a few words aboutย clear skyย because that is the simplest. Then weโll get on to clouds, the topic of this talk. This is aย calculation with the same codesย that I showed you in the previous slide which as you saw work very well. Itโs worth spending a little time because this isย the famous Planck curve that was the birth of quantum mechanics.ย There is Max Planck who figured out what the formula for that curve is and why it is that way. This isย what the Earth would radiate at 15ยฐ Centigrade if there were no greenhouse gases.ย You would get this beautiful smooth curve the Planck curve. If you actually look at theย Earth from the satellites,ย you get aย raggedy jaggedy black curve. We like to call that the Schwarzchild curve becauseย Carl Schwarzchildย was the person whoย showed how to do that calculation.ย Tragically he died during World War I, a Big Big loss to science.
There are two colored curves that I want to draw your attention. Theย green curve is is what Earth would radiate to space if you took away all the CO2,ย so it only differs from the black curve you know in the CO2 band here this is theย bending band of CO2 which is the main greenhouse effect of CO2.ย Thereโs a little additional effect here which is the asymmetric stretch but it it doesnโt contribute very much. Then here is aย red curveย and thatโsย what happens if you double CO2.
So, notice the huge asymmetry.ย If taking all 400 parts per million of CO2ย away from the atmosphereย causes this enormous change 30 watts per square meter,ย the difference between this green 307 and and the black 277, thatโs 30 watts per square meter. Butย if you double CO2 you practically donโt make any change.ย This is the famous saturation of CO2. At the levels we have now doubling CO2,ย a 100% Increase of CO2 only changes the radiation to space by 3 watts per square meter.ย The difference between 274 for the red curve and 277 for the curve for today. Soย itโs a tiny amount: for 100% increase in CO2 a 1% decrease of radiation to space.
That allows you to estimate the feedback-free climate sensitivity in your head. Iโll talk you through the feedback-free climate free sensitivity. So doubling CO2 is a 1% decrease of radiation to space. If that happens then the Earth will start to warm up. But it will radiate as the fourth power of the temperature. So temperature starts to rise but if youโve got a fourth power, the temperature only has to rise by one-quarter of a percent absolute temperature. So a 1% forcing in watts per square centimeter is a one-quarter percent of temperature in Kelvin. Since the ambient Kelvin temperature is about 300 Kelvin (actually a little less) a quarter of that is 75 Kelvin. So the feedback free equilibrium climate sensitivity is less than 1 Degree. Itโs 0.75 Centigrade. Itโs a number you can do in your head.
So, when you hear about 3 centigrade instead of .75 C thatโs a factor of four, all of which is positive feedback.ย So how is there reallyย that much positive feedback?ย Because most feedback in nature are negative. The famousย Le Chatelier principleย which says that if you perturbย a system it reacts in a way to to dampen the perturbation does not increase it.ย There are a few positive feedback systems that weโre familiar with for example High explosives have positive feedback. So,ย if the earthโs climate were like other positive feedback systems, all of them are highly explosive,ย it would have exploded a long time ago.ย But the climate has never done that, so theย empirical observational evidence from geologyย is that the climate is like any other feedback system itโs probably negative Okay, so I leave that thought with you and and let me stress again:
This is clear skies no clouds; if you add clouds all this does is suppress the effects of changes of the greenhouse gas.
So now letโs talk about clouds and the theory of clouds, since weโve already seen clouds are very important. Here is the formidable equation of transfer which has been around since Schwarzchildโs day. So, some of the symbols here relate to the intensity, another represents scattering. If you have a thermal radiation on a greenhouse gas where it comes in and immediately is absorbed, thereโs no scattering at all. If you hit a cloud particle it will scatter this way or that way, or some maybe even backwards.
So, all of thatโsย described by this integralย so youโve gotย incoming light at One Direction, and youโve got outgoing light at a second Direction.ย And thenย at the same timeย youโve gotย thermal radiation,ย so theย warm particles of the cloud are are emitting radiationย creating photons which are coming out and and increasing the Earth glow and this is represented byย two parameters. Even a singleย cloud particle has an albedo, this is is theย fraction ofย radiationย that hits the cloudย that is scattered as opposed to absorbedย and being converted to heat. Itโs a very important parameterย for visible light and white clouds, typically 99% of the encounters are scattered.ย But for thermal radiation itโs much less.ย So, water scatters thermal radiation only half as efficiently as shorter wavelengths.
The big problem is that in spite of all theย billions of dollarsย that we haveย spent, theseย things which should be known and and would have been known if there hadnโt been this crazy fixation on carbon dioxideย and greenhouse gases. And so, weโve neglected working on these areas that are really important as opposed to the trivial effects of greenhouse gases.ย Attenuation in a cloud is both scattering and absorption. Of course, you have toย solve these equations for every different frequencyย of the light because especially for molecules, thereโs a strong frequency dependence.
In summary, let me show you thisย photoย which was taken by Harrison Schmitt who was a friend of mine on one of the first moonshots. It was taken in December and looking at this you can see that they were south of Madagascar when the photograph was taken. You can seeย it was Winterย because here theย Intertropical Convergence Zone is quite a bit south of the Equator; itโs moved Way South of India and Saudi Arabia. By good luck they had the sun behind them, so they had the whole earth Irradiated.
Thereโs a lot of information there and and again let me draw your attention to how much of the Earth is covered with clouds. So only very small parts of the Earth can actually be directly affected by greenhouse gases, of the order of half. The takeaway message is that clouds and water vapor are much more important than greenhouse gases for earthโs climate. The second point is the reason theyโre much more important: doubling CO2 as I indicated in the middle of the talk only causes a 1% difference of radiation to space. It is a very tiny effect because of saturation. You know people like to say thatโs not so, but you canโt really argue that one, even the IPCC gets the same numbers that we do.
And you also know that covering half of the sky with clouds will decrease solar heating by 50%. So for clouds itโs one to one, for greenhouse gases itโs a 100 to one. If you really want to affect the climate, you want to do something to the clouds. You will have a very hard time making any difference with Net Zero with CO2 if you are alarmed about the warmings that have happened.
So, one would hope that with all theย moneyย that weโveย spent trying to turn CO2 into a demonย thatย some good science has come out of it.ย From my point of view this is a small part of it, thisย scattering theoryย that I think will be here a long time after the craze over greenhouse gases has gone away. I hope there will be other things too. You can point to theย better instrumentationย that weโve got, satellite instrumentation as well as ground instrumentation. So thatโs been a good investment of money. Butย the money weโve spent on supercomputers and modeling has been completely wasted in my view.
Another important paper taking issue with the โsettledโ climate narrativeย has been cancelledย following a report in theย Daily Scepticย and subsequent reposts that went viral across social media. The paper discussed the atmospheric โsaturationโ of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide and argued that higher levels will not cause temperatures to rise. The work was led by theย widely-publishedย Polish scientist Dr. Jan Kubicki and appeared on Elsevierโsย ScienceDirectย website in December 2023.
Another important paper taking issue with the โsettledโ climate narrative has been cancelled following a report in the Daily Sceptic and subsequent reposts that went viral across social media. The paper discussed the atmospheric โsaturationโ of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide and argued that higher levels will not cause temperatures to rise. The work was led by the widely-published Polish scientist Dr. Jan Kubicki and appeared on Elsevierโs ScienceDirect website in December 2023. The paper has been widely discussed on social media since April 2024 when the Daily Sceptic reported on the findings. Interest is growing in the saturation hypothesis not least because it provides a coherent explanation for why life and the biosphere grew and often thrived for 600 million years despite much higher atmospheric levels of greenhouse gases. Alas for control freaks, it also destroys the science backing for the Net Zero fantasy.
Many scientists contend that above certain levels the ability of CO2 to warm within narrow bands of the infrared spectrum falls off a logarithmic cliff. Recently, eight Taiwanese scientists led by Professor Peng-Sheng Wei found that the sensitivity of the climate to a rise in CO2 atmospheric levels from 100 to 400 parts per million (ppm) was โnegligibly smallโ at 0.3ยฐC. Current levels of CO2 are around 420 ppm. Seven Austrian scientists recently concluded that a future doubling of CO2 showed โno increase in the IR [infrared] absorption for the 15 u-central peakโ. At most, it was stated, this could lead to warming of 0.5ยฐC. Yet in spite of this, Elsevier decided to retract Kubickiโs paper with only a few words of explanation, a decision that is likely to send shock waves through any group of scientists seeking to examine the role of saturation of gases in the atmosphere.
The retraction reads: โSubsequent to acceptance of this paper, the rigour and quality of the peer-review process for this paper was investigated and confirmed to fall beneath the high standards expected by Applications in Engineering Science. After review by additional expert referees, the Editor-in-Chief has lost confidence in the validity of the paper and has decided to retract.โ
Retraction in a scientific journal is a serious matter, relatively rare and potentially damaging to the reputation of authors. According to Elsevierโsย withdrawal policies, articles may be retracted โto correct errors that impact the findings reported by an article where they are too extensive in the view of the editors to publish a correction, or due to infringements of Elsevierโs journal policies, such as multiple submission, bogus claims of authorship, plagiarism, fraudulent use of data or the likeโ. None of these reasons for withdrawing the Kubicki paper have been given. Instead, there is the pompous reference to aโ fall beneath the high standards expectedโ, supposedly confirmed by additional unnamed โexpertsโ. Further details about the retraction may emerge given the important issues raised by Elsevierโs action.
Whatever the real reasons behind this retraction, it will not be the first science paper that has met this fate following publicity in the Daily Sceptic and subsequent widespread interest on social media.
In January 2022, a group of physics scientists led by Profession Gianluca Alimonti of Milan University published a paper in a Springer Nature journal that considered past weather trends. They concluded that the idea weโre in the throes of a โclimate emergencyโ was not supported by the facts. The paper attracted little attention outside academic circles until September 14th when the Daily Sceptic reported on it โ and our promotion of the story on X resulted in 9,000 retweets. The story was covered by the Australian and Sky News Australia, after which attacks were launched by activist scientists and journalists such as Michael โHockey Stickโ Mann and Graham Readfearn of the Guardian. After a year of lobbying, Springer Nature retracted the paper claiming it no longer had confidence in the results and conclusions. This surprised many, not least because much of the data came from the International Panel on Climate Change. Science writer Dr. Roger Pielke published a number of leaked emails surrounding the affair and concluded: โShenanigans continue in climate science, with influential scientists teaming up with journalists to corrupt peer review.โ
In September 2023, a departing academic, Dr. Patrick Brown, came clean about a paper heโd written in Nature saying that climate change was increasing the risk of wildfires in California. โI knew not to try to quantify key aspects other than climate change in my research because it would dilute the story that prestigious journals like Nature and its rival Science, want to tell,โ he explained. These key aspects, of course, include considering the role of arsonists and forest management. For its part, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change can find little or no evidence of human-caused climate change affecting โfire weatherโ to date and going forward to 2100. In Brownโs view, climate science has become less about understanding the complexities of the world โand more about serving as a kind of Cassandra, urgently warning the public about the dangers of climate changeโ.
The Editor-in-Chief of Nature Magdalena Skipper reacted furiously to Brownโs comments, accusing him of โpoor research practicesโ that are โhighly irresponsibleโ, according to the Daily Mail. Despite all the controversy, Brownโs paper has not been retracted.
Dr. Matthew Wielicki had a senior position in the Geological Sciences department of the University of Alabama. His parents were academics, and he grew up on a Californian university campus surrounded by freely exchanged competing ideas. He only ever wanted to be an academic, but he gave it up during Covid, seemingly disgusted at the turn against free speech in American universities and the effect it has had on climate science. If you speak out against the accepted narrative โyou are aย pariah in this communityโ, he said. Climate change is a โtabooโ subject in academia and there is a โdisconnect between what the science says and what the narrative in mainstream media isโ. It isnโt about finding the truth in open discussion โ Itโs about silencing those who disagree with you, he observed.
Chris Morrison is theEnvironment Editor of the Daily Sceptic.
Studies from Central China, Russia, and Central Europe indicate there was just as much (0r more) warming and drought prior to 1900, or when CO2 concentrations were under 300 ppm.
Studies from Central China, Russia, and Central Europe indicate there was just as much (0r more) warming and drought prior to 1900, or when CO2 concentrations were under 300 ppm.
A new 1606 to 2016 Central China winter (minimum) temperature reconstruction (Jiang et al., 2024) reveals cold periods only occurred in 9 years of the 1600s (1663-1672), but there were 71 years of cold periods during the 20th century (1900-1942, 1959-1979, 1985-1994).
Notably, CO2 hovered around 278 ppm during the 1600s and 1700s, but it rose from 290 ppm to 370 ppm during the 1900s.
From 1650-1750 the winter temperatures in Central China were 0.44ยฐC warmer than they were during the 20th century. The authors were surprised by this temperature result, as 1650-1750 falls within the timing of the Little Ice Age.
โSurprisingly, during 1650โ1750, the lowest winter temperature within the research area was about 0.44 ยฐC higher than that in the 20th century, which differs significantly from the concept of the โcoolerโ Little Ice Age during this period. This result is validated by the temperature results reconstructed from other tree-ring data from nearby areas, confirming the credibility of the reconstruction.โ
Finally, it should be noted that the year 1719 was 1.4ยฐC warmer (-3.17ยฐC) than the 1961-2016 average (-4.57ยฐC).
A new 1803-2020 Central Europe precipitation reconstruction (Nagavciuc et al., 2025) determines droughts were more prolonged and pronounced during the 1800s than in the 1900s, as the 1900s were relatively wet. Only one recent period (2007-2020) endured extreme drought, but it did not exceed the severity of the 1818โ1835, 1845โ1854, 1882โ1890 drought years.
โInterestingly, the most extreme wet periods occurred in the 20th century, while the most extreme dry periods were recorded in the 19th and 21st centuries.โ
Finally, another new precipitation and temperature reconstruction (Kirdyanov et al., 2024) from the Russian Altai Mountains suggests โstable summer temperature signalsโ since the 1500s, with no obvious trend changes falling outside the long-term average.
NOAA persists in claiming there is no evidence that offshore wind development is causing whale deaths. This is a false claim that is repeated endlessly in the press. There is lots of evidence some of which I have documented over the last two years.
NOAA persists in claiming there is no evidence that offshore wind development is causing whale deaths. This is a false claim that is repeated endlessly in the press. There is lots of evidence some of which I have documented over the last two years.
It is actually illegal for Federal agencies to make false claims like this. There is a 25-year-old law called the Information Quality Act (IQA) enforced by OMBโs Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs. IQA mandates that agencies provide accurate unbiased information.
Here are the two key definitions from NOAAโs IQA guidance:
1. โQuality is an encompassing term comprising utility, objectivity, and integrity.โ
2. โObjectivity consists of two distinct elements: presentation and substance. The presentation element includes whether disseminated information is presented in an accurate, clear, complete, and unbiased manner and in a proper context. The substance element involves a focus on ensuring accurate, reliable, and unbiased information.โ
Unfortunately NOAAโs repeated claim that there is no evidence of wind development causing whale deaths is neither accurate no unbiased. It is false and typical of NOAAโs actions biased in favor of development.
Moreover this wind-whale information falls under the special IQA category of influential scientific information which NOAA defines as โInfluential scientific information (ISI) means scientific information the agency reasonably can determine will have or does have a clear and substantial impact on important public policies or private sector decisions.โ
In fact it qualifies as highly influential scientific assessment: โThe term Highly Influential Scientific Assessment (HISA) refers to a subset of Influential Scientific Information and means an influential scientific assessment that: โฆ. (i) could have a potential impact of more than $500 million in any year, or (ii) is novel, controversial, or precedent setting or has significant interagency interest.โ
The viability of the multi-billion dollar a year offshore wind program crucially depends in part on this wind-whale information. This evidence assessment is a HISA and IQA guidance rightfully calls for extra care and caution in making such assessments.
This HISA care is clearly not being given. NOAA has conducted no systematic studies on the issue of evidence. They have simply shrugged off the issue in favor of wind development. This is a glaring violation of the Information Quality Act.
Of particular interest is the adverse impact of sonar site surveys as until recently that has been the primary activity. NOAAโs website says the following:
โAt this point, there is no scientific evidence that noise resulting from offshore wind site characterization surveys could potentially cause whale deaths.โ
In reality there is lots of evidence. Bear in mind that evidence comes in pieces. NOAA may be confusing evidence with certainty, that is thinking that because the specific impact on whales is uncertain that constitutes no evidence. Such reasoning is completely wrong.
Here are three simple examples of existing evidence that wind development is causing whale deaths.
First, the year site development got fully underway the Atlantic coast humpback whale death rate roughly tripled, and it has remained high. This is strong evidence of a development induced tipping point. Wind defenders talk about the impact of increasing ship traffic and climate change but neither jumped at this specific time.
Second, NOAA itself has predicted and authorized thousands of noise โharassmentsโ of whales where so-called harassment includes causing temporary deafness (which us actually an injury). That deafening a whale could lead to its death is obvious and NOAA even discusses this possibility. Thus these authorizations count as evidence supporting the hypothesis of development caused death.
Third, last year Professor Apostolos Gerasoulis found a high statistical correlation between the specific local activity of sonar survey boats and clusters of whale deaths. This is very strong, some would say compelling, evidence that wind development is causing whale deaths. Correlation is not causation but correlation in the context of a causal hypothesis is strong evidence. (This is the basis for clinical trials.)
NOAAโs response to this compelling study is simply preposterous. They consider it in an obscure single paragraph in a 160 page defense of their harassment authorization for the Vineyard Wind project. Here they say: โOverall, while NMFS considered this information, it did not provide new information that links whale strandings to offshore wind vessel movement or surveys.โ
NOAA falsely claims this groundbreaking study provides no new information linking wind development and whale deaths! That is precisely what it does. This ridiculous claim is clearly biased and far from objective. It is typical of NOAAโs handling of the wind-whale evidence issue.
NOAAโs blatant violation of the Information Quality Act by ignoring the evidence that wind development is killing whales needs to be investigated and corrected.
Just add โpolicyโ in two places in Rommโs quotation above, and substitute โinactionโ for โactionโ at the end, and his conclusion can be fixed. But who is Joe Romm? And what is his track record? I have tangled with Angry Joe for decades (I am a โsociopathโ to him) and can address these questions.
โIn a rational and moral world, the catastrophe of the Los Angeles fires, fueled in part by climate change, would be one of many climate โPearl Harborsโ that might help wake up the public to the urgent need for climate action.โ (- Joe Romm, last week)
โIs it just a coincidence that the worst of the worst happened in California, the Climate State? The Green State? The DEI State? Joe, the mainstream is not buying your โClimate Ate My Homeworkโ reasoning.โ (below)
Just add โpolicyโ in two places in Rommโs quotation above, and substitute โinactionโ for โactionโ at the end, and his conclusion can be fixed. But who is Joe Romm? And what is his track record? I have tangled with Angry Joe for decades (I am a โsociopathโ to him) and can address these questions.
Who Is Joe Romm?
Joe Romm has been a trenchant voice for climate alarm and forced energy transformation (wind, solar, batteries, efficiency) for many decades. [1] I have challenged him ever since the 1990s when his energy-efficiencies dreams led him to praise Enron (โa company I greatly respectโ) and its most fraudulent division, Enron Energy Services.
I continued to spar with him until the โindispensible blogโ Climate Progress (Center for American Progress) went defunct. (My suspicion is that his emotional, virulent styleโโstunningโ for the liked; โheads explodingโ for the dislikedโgrew tiresome.)
โฆ letโs start by examining the likelihood that an oil crisis will occur in the coming decade. Forecasting is always risky, especially where oil is concerned, but consider what a variety of experienced energy hands from every point on the political spectrum have said in the past year alone [many experts quotedโall errant].
That โenergy crisisโ never happened except for government energy/climate policy increases prices and reducing reliability. The first two oil crises came from price and allocation controlsโthe third never came from an absence of the same.
We have no room for errorโฆ. Barring a major reversal in U.S. policies in the very next decade, come the 2020s, most everyone will know the grim fate that awaits the next fifty generations. [The alternative to inaction] is a [later] massive, sustained government intervention into every aspect of our lives on a scale that far surpasses what this country did during World War II.
Joe Romm Today
Joe Romm is an expert! Currently a senior research fellow at the University of Pennsylvaniaโs Center for Science, Sustainability and the Media (PCSSM), Romm describes himself as
Former Acting Assistant Secretary of Efficiency and Renewables, Speaker, 2x TEDx, author, โThe Hype About Hydrogen.โ Economist Paul Krugman: โI have learned a lot of what I know about energy economics from Joe Romm.โ
And:
2024 Ban Ki-Moon Award for Environmental Leadership, 2009 TIME magazine โHero of the Environmentโ & Rolling Stone one of โ100 people reinventing America.โ Former Acting Assistant Secretary of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy. CNN host Van Jones called me โThe communicatorโs communicatorโ after reading my book โHow to Go Viral and Reach Millions.โ Bill McKibben said, โJoe Romm understands the secret of making things go viral.โ
And:
Author of 10 books, including โClimate Change: What Everyone Needs to Knowโ (Oxford University Press) which New York magazine called โThe best single source primer on the state of climate change.โ
Never shy, often wrong. Rommโs professional life is as an expert versus the ill-informed public. The premise of climate alarmism and wind/solar/energy/efficiency to save the planet from fossil fuels (really CO2, the nonpollutant) is Rommโs multi-decade theme.
The Latest?
โIn a rational and moral world,โ Romm states regarding the southern California fire box,
the catastrophe of the Los Angeles fires, fueled in part by climate change, would be one of many climate โPearl Harborsโ that might help wake up the public to the urgent need for climate action. But in our world, the initial flame of disinformation that the fossil fuel companies lit over half-century ago to delay action on climate change has spread like wildfire until itโs a firestorm of falsehoods.
What disinformation! Is it just a coincidence that the worst of the worst happened in California, the Climate State? The Green State? The DEI State? Joe, the mainstream is not buying your โClimate Ate My Homeworkโ reasoning.
Appendix: Romm in Action
โWhat Is the Difference Between a Psychic and a Climate Science Denierโ (March 25, 2014), (expunged, but reviewed here)
I know what the similarities are between psychics and deniers. They both use unscientific methods, generally make stuff up with no evidence to support their views, and have consistently been debunked when scrutinized. What is the difference between a psychic and a climate science denier? In fairness, psychics sometimes guess the right answer.
Earth Day post:
With 7 billion people going to 9 billion, much of the environment is unsavable โฆ the relatively stable environment and climate that made modern human civilization possible will be ruined, probably for hundreds of years โฆ with permanent Dust Bowls in Southwest and around the globe. And that means misery for many if not most of the next 10 to 20 billion people to walk the planet (expunged, but reviewed here).
Aย seasoned energy executiveย with deep experience in oil and gas, geothermal, nuclear, and solar is nominated to run the Department of Energy. One would think that heโd be met with overwhelming bipartisan support.
One would be wrong.
A seasoned energy executive with deep experience in oil and gas, geothermal, nuclear, and solar is nominated to run the Department of Energy. One would think that heโd be met with overwhelming bipartisan support.
One would be wrong.
Chris Wright, the CEO of Liberty Energy, was nominated in November by incoming President Donald Trump to be his Secretary of Energy. Since, he has faced undue opposition from green groups and Democrats alike. Pouncing on comments Mr. Wright made about the framing of climate change, these individuals have spared no smear tactic in their campaign to undercut Mr. Wrightโs undeniable qualifications.
Yet, in stark contrast to critical headlines, Mr. Wright has repeatedly stated that we are experiencing increased global temperatures and that carbon emissions contribute to that. In fact, at my organizationโs national conference in 2023, Mr. Wright discussed his lifelong environmentalism and how it informs the work he does to this day. The difference between his approach and that of his detractors, however, is that Mr. Wright is not willing to sacrifice human prosperity or quality of life for the sake of reducing emissions. As he sees it, energy poverty is one of the worldโs most urgent problems and, rather than sacrificing that for environmental protection, we should balance the two. Heโs right. We need more energy, not less.
Young people agree, demonstrated by a strong uptick in the popularity of reliable nuclear energy among younger generations, for example. In fact, it was primarily young people who campaigned to keep Diablo Canyon, Californiaโs last remaining nuclear reactor, operational last year. In 2024 polling from my organization, 68% of young conservatives said they would favor a climate plan that balances both environmental and economic concerns.
Donald Trump was elected on this pro-energy dominance platform and the American people expect his administration to deliver on it. While climate activists often clamor to shut down oil and gas, the reality is that we need secure and reliable energy to power our lives, protect our homeland, and compete on the global stage with the likes of China. Oil and gas demand is going up, not down, and rather than fist-bumping Saudi royalty or loosening sanctions on murderous regimes, we should be unleashing it right here at home with the highest environmental standards and lowest emissions in the world. As an avid outdoorsman, Chris Wright understands that better than anyone.
But it doesnโt just stop there. America should be dominant in oil and gas, yes, but it should also lead the world in up-and-coming energy technologies. Thatโs the role of the Department of Energy. From batteries to critical minerals to nuclear plants to solar panels, China currently beats the U.S. in almost every new energy supply chain. Rather than letting the Chinese Communist Party control these supply chains, and the nearly $4 trillion market they represent, the U.S. should be out-building, out-innovating, and out-competing the rest of the world. This is an energy abundance platform โ one of energy addition, not of energy subtraction.
Chris Wright also understands that. Through his work at Liberty Energy, and on the board of companies like Oklo, which is building next-generation nuclear reactors, Mr. Wright has embraced an all-of-the-above abundance approach, rather than picking winners and losers like Germany or California. As he puts it in his LinkedIn bio: โI donโt care where energy comes, as long as it is secure, reliable, affordable and betters human lives.โ He understands that bottom-up innovation and free enterprise are the means to unlock long-term sustainability and prosperity, not big-government mandates or ideological agendas. He also understands that artificial government barriers, like years of permitting delays caused by red tape, are the biggest obstacle to energy abundance and environmental progress.
We need an Energy Secretary who will unleash this American energy abundance while also ensuring environmental progress. In his role at the department, Mr. Wright will have the ability to re-establish a true all-of-the-above energy vision, and technologies like nuclear fusion, advanced geothermal, and carbon capture and storage will be unleashed alongside oil and gas. With the National Laboratories under his jurisdiction at DoE, the possibilities of American energy innovation are limitless.
With global energy demand increasing at unprecedented rates, we need more energy, period. Thereโs no doubt in my mind that under Mr. Wrightโs leadership, the Department of Energy will expand this commonsense approach across the country, paving the way for an affordable, abundant, and environmentally responsible energy future. Donโt cave to the naysayers and alarmists โ the Senate should move swiftly to confirm Chris Wrightโs nomination and unleash the power of American innovation for years to come.
Chris Barnard is the president of the American Conservation Coalition (ACC). Follow him on X @ChrisBarnardDL
This article was originally published by RealClearEnergy and made available via RealClearWire.
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