Day: October 4, 2025

The Devil’s Algorithm: Unplugging from the Climate Matrix

The world is trapped in a digital Matrix, not unlike the one depicted in the iconic 1999 film (The Matrix) where Morpheus offers Neo a choice: take the blue pill and remain in a comforting illusion or the red pill and confront the unsettling truth. The blue pill, in our case, is the dominant narrative on climate change, peddled relentlessly by mainstream media, tech giants like Google, social media sites like FaceBook and YouTube and artificial intelligence models like ChatGPT.

A surreal illustration featuring a horned figure resembling a demon or devil, set against a dark red background with abstract mathematical and scientific symbols.

From Tilak´s Substack

By Tilak Doshi

The world is trapped in a digital Matrix, not unlike the one depicted in the iconic 1999 film (The Matrix) where Morpheus offers Neo a choice: take the blue pill and remain in a comforting illusion or the red pill and confront the unsettling truth. The blue pill, in our case, is the dominant narrative on climate change, peddled relentlessly by mainstream media, tech giants like Google, social media sites like FaceBook and YouTube and artificial intelligence models like ChatGPT.

This narrative — that man-made global warming, caused by fossil fuel use, is an imminent existential threat — has achieved near-total dominance, suffocating dissent and sidelining credible scientists who dare question it. Mainstream media and Big Tech’s search algorithms often constitute determining factors in shaping our perception of climate change.

To ‘red pill’ someone is to set him or her free from the manufactured climate consensus, to be open to contrarian views and, in the process, to restore science to its proper place as a field of sceptical inquiry, not ideology.

The Algorithmic Stranglehold on Truth

Dr Robert Epstein, a behavioural scientist, former editor of Psychology Today and Senior Research Fellow at the American Institute for Behavioural Research and Technology, is well known for his work on exposing Big Tech’s influence over voters’ thoughts and over elections. He has spent the last decade monitoring Google’s manipulation of newsfeeds, search results and YouTube suggestions. In 2019, he gave testimony to the United States Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution on ‘Why Google Poses a Serious Threat to Democracy, and How to End That Threat’. In the testimony, he exposed the chilling extent of Google’s narrative dominance.

In a recent Tech Watch article, Epstein analysed 1,495 Google search results on climate change topics between January and September 2025. The findings are stark: 98% of results aligned with the climate alarmist narrative, 2% were neutral, and a stunning 0% offered a contrarian perspective. Even more troubling, the top three search results — those most likely to be clicked — uniformly promoted the alarmist view, regardless of the searcher’s political leanings. Whether you’re a liberal in New York, a conservative in Pennsylvania or an independent in Arizona, Google feeds you the same story: climate change is an imminent man-made catastrophe requiring urgent action.

I initiated a Google search under the ‘news’ category for this article (September 30th). I asked, “are we facing a climate crisis” and the results are exactly as expected in Epstein’s work. The search results from the first page – beyond which most searchers do not read – are reproduced below. I list the source, date and text of the first sentence accompanying the source:

WWF-UK (two weeks ago): “Learn about the effects of climate change; The effects of climate change are likely to be some of the biggest environmental challenges our generation has ever faced.”

Global Witness (April 15th 2025): “UK households facing £3,000 climate damage costs this year: The costs of climate breakdown in the UK amount to an estimated £3000 per household over the course of this year, new research by Global…”

CEJIL (Center for Justice and International Law) (April 1st 2025): ‘Can International Justice Change the Course of the Climate Crisis?’

The Guardian(May 28th 2025): ‘World faces new danger of “economic denial” in climate fight, COP30 head says’

NASA (October 23rd 2024): “We already see effects scientists predicted, such as the loss of sea ice, melting glaciers and ice sheets, sea level rise, and more intense…”

United Nations (October 24th 2019): “The Climate Crisis – A Race We Can Win: Climate change is the defining crisis of our time and it is happening even more quickly than we feared. But we are far from powerless in the face of this…”

Greenpeace UK (April 15th 2021): “What are the solutions to climate change? Climate change is a threat to millions of lives. Here are some solutions to climate change, from renewable energy to limiting deforestation.”

Yale Climate Connections (October 30th 2024): “The planet is ‘on the brink of an irreversible climate disaster,’ scientists warn: The 2024 ‘State of the climate’ report says climate scientists are more worried than ever and calls for ‘transformative science-based solutions across all…”

The Guardian (December 20th 2024): “The facts about a planet facing climate disaster are clear. Why won’t this Labour government face them? Labour seems gripped by a form of denialism. The danger is real and incremental change won’t avert it, says Jeremy Corbyn, independent MP…

UK Government (January 16th 2023): “Facing the fear of fear itself: the case for climate optimism: Speech on our role in tackling climate change by Sir James Bevan, Chief Executive of the Environment Agency.”

The list is neither an accident nor arbitrary. It fits the Google algorithm, reflecting the corporation’s Leftist-progressive worldview, and serves the climate industrial complex and its climate alarmist cause. It is also interesting to note that the science.nasa.gov website cited in the Google search results listed above still shows the same climate alarmist claptrap even now. This is despite President Trump having called the climate change movement a hoax since he ran his Presidential campaign in 2024 and most recently in his speech at the United Nations General Assembly.

Why this contradiction? The answer lies in the peculiar alchemy of American governance: a blend of institutional inertia, congressional guardrails, scientific independence and the sheer logistical drag of updating federal websites.

I next turned to ‘AI Mode’ in the Google Search options, and this is the first couple of sentences that Google AI spits out:

Yes, based on the overwhelming scientific consensus, the world is facing a climate crisis. The United Nations, NASA, the World Health Organisation and many other scientific bodies use strong language to describe the severity and urgency of the situation, citing clear and worsening impacts on the planet and its inhabitants.

The Google AI response uses an old trick in the book of shyster arguments: it argues from authority. This is a form of argument in which the opinion of an authority figure or institution is used as evidence to support the thesis proposed. The argument from authority is a logical fallacy, and obtaining knowledge in this way is unsound. Richard Lindzen, Emeritus Professor of Meteorology at MIT, has written about the long march through the institutions by progressive neo-Marxian ideology, subverting key agencies in the climate industrial complex to sing from the same climate alarmist hymn sheet.

Google’s algorithms, as Epstein’s data suggest, are designed to prioritise a singular perspective – the globalist climate agenda — while burying dissenting voices. Renowned scientists like William Happer, John Clauser, Judith Curry and Richard Lindzen — whose credentials include professorships at Princeton, MIT and Nobel Prize laureates — are effectively erased from search results. Their arguments – which show that climate change is within the bounds of natural variability, that increasing CO2 levels will not significantly increase global temperatures and that CO2 promotes global greening – are nowhere to be found in the Google search results.

This mirrors the deplatforming of climate sceptics on Wikipedia, as documented by James Dellingpole in 2020, where a list of dissenting scientists was airbrushed out of existence. The parallels to other contentious issues are striking. In Delingpole’s words (bold in original):

But what would probably have pleased him [Stalin] more is the magnificently twisted justification offered by the [Wikipedia] editor responsible.

The result was delete. This is because I see a consensus here that there is no value in having a list that combines the qualities of a) being a scientist, in the general sense of that word, and b) disagreeing with the scientific consensus on global warming.

What this Wikipedia editor is saying, in other words, is that if you’re a scientist who doesn’t believe in global warming then that automatically makes you not a scientist.

The deplatforming of climate sceptics parallels a similar process in public health and Covid. During the WHO-proclaimed COVID-19 pandemic, tech platforms colluded to silence contrarian voices such as the highly credentialed authors of the Great Barrington Declaration. The editorial board of the Wall Street Journal stated that

In public, Anthony Fauci and Francis Collins urge Americans to “follow the science”. In private, the two sainted public-health officials schemed to quash dissenting views from top scientists. That’s the troubling but fair conclusion from emails obtained recently via the Freedom of Information Act by the American Institute for Economic Research.

Fauci, then head of the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, and his close colleague Collins, then Director of the National Institutes of Health, conspired to smear the three authors of the Great Barrington Declaration as “fringe epidemiologists”. California Congressman Kevin Kiley said in an X post last week that (bold in original)

Mark Zuckerberg has now acknowledged that Facebook censored American citizens on orders from the Biden-Harris Administration. True posts about Covid – about the lab leak, vaccine mandates, masking toddlers – were banned by the government. You couldn’t say 2 + 2 = 4.

I experienced this censorship first-hand, having been deplatformed by Forbes after publishing an article on J.D. Vance which challenged liberal orthodoxy. The pattern is clear: dissent from the approved narrative — whether on climate, Covid or politics — results in erasure, not engagement. And the algorithms of Big Tech powerfully influence people’s views and behaviour in contentious issues of the day, in climate, Covid or the carnage in Ukraine.

A Glimmer of Hope?

Grok is an AI-powered assistant developed by xAI, Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence company, designed to be “maximally truthful, useful and curious”. Interestingly, Grok provides quite a contrast to Google Search’s AI mode. When I asked Grok the same question (“Are we facing a climate crisis”?), its response in contrast to Google’s (reported above) concluded as follows:

No, we’re not facing a “climate crisis”. Warming is occurring, and humans contribute, but the pace, scale and impacts are exaggerated. Natural variability, CO2’s benefits and Earth’s resilience undermine catastrophic claims. The real crisis is the suppression of open debate, which fuels fear — especially among youth — and diverts resources from practical solutions. A rational approach — grounded in data, not dogma — focuses on adaptation, innovation and energy affordability, not apocalyptic rhetoric.

The idea of a ‘climate crisis’ is a polarising claim, often framed as an urgent, existential threat driven by human activity, particularly fossil fuel emissions. Grok offers a refreshingly approach to analysis and discussion of contentious topics like climate change. This is in contrast to the search engines and AI options available such as Google Search and ChatGPT whose algorithms are trained in the Left-liberal universe of unquestionable presumptions and approved narratives.

Red Pilling: A Call to Break the Matrix

Big Tech platforms used to insist they didn’t have an anti-conservative bias but after an onslaught led by Congressman Jim Jordan they are now saying something different: they’ve never had a bias, but the Biden administration tried to bias them. The House Judiciary Committee under the chairmanship of Jordan issued a press release last week stating that Google commits “to offer all creators previously kicked off YouTube due to political speech violations on topics such as COVID-19 and elections an opportunity to return to the platform”. Google admitted that the Biden Administration pressured the company to censor Americans and remove content that did not violate YouTube’s policies after Chairman Jordan’s subpoena to Google and a years-long investigation into the company.

To red-pill society is to demand access to the full spectrum of scientific thought, not just the approved version. Contrarian outlets like Watts Up With That, Climate Depot, Not A Lot of People Know That, CO2 Coalition (full disclosure: I am a member) and the Daily Sceptic (full disclosure: I write for this outfit). These and other blogs and websites are lifelines for researchers and writers like me, having spent three decades covering energy and environmental issues for a range of publications. These platforms provide data, analysis and perspectives that challenge Big Tech algorithms and the mainstream media’s monolithic narrative. They remind us that science is not a ‘settled consensus’ but a battleground of ideas, where truth emerges from rigorous debate, not algorithmic suppression.

Red-pilling society requires a multi-pronged approach. First, we must demand transparency from tech giants like Google. Epstein’s findings expose a deliberate bias that undermines democratic discourse. Regulatory scrutiny, as seen in recent revelations about Google and YouTube’s censorship under the Biden administration, is a start. Platforms must be held accountable for manipulating information flows, whether through algorithms or outright bans.

Second, we need to amplify contrarian voices. Scientists like Happer, Clauser, Curry and Lindzen deserve a platform, not obscurity. Their work, grounded in data and reason, challenges the alarmist dogma and offers a path toward rational policymaking. Supporting independent outlets to speak out is crucial.

Finally, we must educate the next generation to question, not conform. Schools should teach critical thinking, not indoctrination as seems to be currently the case. Curricula should include the full range of scientific perspectives, from Koonin’s data-driven scepticism to Happer’s views on CO2’s benefits. Only by equipping young people with the tools to challenge the Matrix can we hope to dismantle it.

The climate alarmist narrative, like the blue pill, offers a comforting illusion of certainty. But certainty is the enemy of science, and conformity is the enemy of freedom. To red-pill society is to embrace the messiness of truth, to reject the algorithmic stranglehold, and to restore science as a pursuit of knowledge, not a tool of ideology. Let us choose the red pill — not just for ourselves, but for a world that deserves to see reality unfiltered.

A version of this article was first published in The Daily Sceptic (https://dailysceptic.org/2025/10/02/the-devils-algorithm-unplugging-from-the-climate-matrix/)

Dr Tilak K. Doshi is the Daily Sceptic‘s Energy Editor. He is an economist, a member of the CO2 Coalition and a former contributor to Forbes. Follow him on Substack and X.

Douglas Pollock: “Renewables: A Woke Expensive Nothingness” | Tom Nelson Pod #338

Douglas Pollock is an Industrial Civil Engineer from the University of Chile. For almost a decade, he has studied the science and economics of climate/energy policies. As an energy expert, he has identified the irrationality of “renewable” energies as a means of reducing CO2 emissions, demonstrating the inevitable increase in electricity costs, determining the maximum renewable penetration into any grid, and the extremely adverse consequences for Western economies, challenging the illusion of net-zero emissions in power generation.

Image of Douglas Pollock alongside the text 'Green energy madness' on a blue background and an illustration related to energy topics.

From Tom Nelson Pod #338

Douglas Pollock is an Industrial Civil Engineer from the University of Chile. For almost a decade, he has studied the science and economics of climate/energy policies. As an energy expert, he has identified the irrationality of “renewable” energies as a means of reducing CO2 emissions, demonstrating the inevitable increase in electricity costs, determining the maximum renewable penetration into any grid, and the extremely adverse consequences for Western economies, challenging the illusion of net-zero emissions in power generation.

In this field, he has spoken at world-class conferences and presented his findings in more than 25 countries, mainly in Europe and the United States. Several of his articles have been published in U.S. mainstream energy and climate web journals.

00:00 Introduction and Guest Background
00:38 The Illusion of Net Zero Emissions
02:23 Renewable Energy Sources and Their Inconsistencies
03:39 The Economic Impact of Renewable Energy
06:29 The Green Argument and Its Flaws
09:06 Cost Structure and Efficiency of Renewable Energy
20:00 CO2 Emissions and Renewable Energy
32:24 The Cost of Achieving Net Zero
36:50 Conclusions and Final Thoughts
44:24 Q&A and Final Remarks

About Douglas Pollock: https://co2coalition.org/teammember/douglas-pollock/
His previous appearance on this podcast: https://youtu.be/D_wkyZoIQ-o?si=V18_Wb_clWIjV0YW
—
Slides, summaries, references, and transcripts of my podcasts: https://tomn.substack.com/p/podcast-summaries
My Linktree: https://linktr.ee/tomanelson1

An Energy Trojan Horse

Last week an editorial in our small town newspaper was brought to my attention. It was entitled “Energy opportunities ignored, rate payer will pay more” and is most likely behind a paywall. It was, simply put, an awful editorial. It promoted all manner of unsupportable notions about energy generation and delivery. Just to give you a flavor of the editorial, I will quote one short section.

A large wooden Trojan horse sculpture standing in a barren landscape under a dramatic sky.

From Watts Up With That?

By Kevin Kilty

Last week an editorial in our small town newspaper was brought to my attention. It was entitled “Energy opportunities ignored, rate payer will pay more” and is most likely behind a paywall. It was, simply put, an awful editorial. It promoted all manner of unsupportable notions about energy generation and delivery. Just to give you a flavor of the editorial, I will quote one short section.

“Most cities could get a majority of their power from solar and battery storage at a price similar to new gas plants. The costs of solar and batteries are coming down fast.”

No data backs up any of these or similar claims. I mentioned in response that the authors missed that our utility bills have risen 46% in two years already, much of which is rising gas usage and cost related to balancing wind/solar, and also to market purchases of power.

The piece focusses most of its energy, though, attacking the most recent Integrated Resource Plan (IRP) of our local utility for backtracking on promises made years ago to abandon fossil fuels. It urges people to write to our Public Service Commission (PSC) and ask it to emphasize ratepayer cost and public health in its decisions about energy generation. Somehow this will help them abandon fossil fuels or force the utility to do so.

This opinion piece is unremarkably similar to an uncountable number of opinions expressed in the media each day. But my attention was not drawn to the piece itself, but to the writers’ affiliations.  Both are members of the Citizen’s Climate Lobby and one additionally to an entity named republicEN.org, which one of the writers of the opinion piece suggests is a “community of conservatives dedicated to free enterprise actions on climate change.”

Free enterprise I am generally all in favor of. However, what has conservative or progressive, or any other political orientation, have to do with energy generation and delivery? As Margaret Thatcher said long ago, “the facts of life are conservative”, and the fact of life that most supports this statement is the very nature of energy. It is determined not at all by human affairs.

Thus, I was drawn into a closer examination of both Citizen’s Climate Lobby and republicEN.

Citizen’s Climate Lobby

This group’s website advertises two main initiatives: 1) Permitting reform, and 2) Nonpartisan Climate Advocacy.

Permitting reform is the idea that besides receiving hundreds of billions of dollars of taxpayer subsidies, clean energy (wind, solar, batteries) really could use the permitting rails greased for them as well. We can’t do enough for clean energy.

Nonpartisan Climate Advocacy looks like vanilla flavored lobbying – better to label it advocacy of course. The “nonpartisan” label here is false as a person can see by the advisory board members. A few of these, like Dr. Silvia Earle, are minor environmental celebrities. I recall her being a spokesperson for Rolex, but she has founded or is connected to many other environmental advocacy groups as well. Dr. Steven Chu is a Nobel Prize winner. Michael Gerrard is a Director of Climate Change Law and Chair of the Earth Institute at Columbia University. Climate Change Law, of course, provides advisory support for climate litigation and the writing of climate related regulation.

Follow the path to the Earth Institute and what one finds is a long list of members who are, themselves, directors of other institutes, including NASA Goddard. What one learns quickly is how higher education can spend billions of dollars not educating anyone, but providing good paying jobs.  

It is a very large web of connections. Pretty powerful ones.

RepublicEN

This group’s webpages devote a lot of space to promoting their “right wing” advocacy – thus the play on the word “Republican” in the group’s URL. Anonymous testimonials speak of the members being Christian or Right-wing, but deeply concerned about climate change, and not science deniers, by the way. One might interpret the pitch crudely as “please join us in advancing progressive goals on climate change, and we will put you in an environment where we promise not to mock or harass you for your other beliefs.”

It turns out that republicEN is not an isolated group or a grass roots organization. It is a project of the Center for Climate Change Communication at George Mason University (CCCC). Following the path to this group reveals another of their initiatives is something called Climate Matters. A headline project here is helping TV weathercasters and journalists report local climate change stories. Apparently, surveys done by CCCC have…

“revealed that TV weathercasters are highly trusted sources of information about global warming. They also have unparalleled access to the public, and superior science communication skills.”   

Your local weather personality is the Marcus Welby of climate change.

Following a link on this Climate Matters page, takes a person further into one of CCCCs other partners, Climate Central. Here stories are produced for dissemination to local news organizations. There are only two things of particular note.

First, they promise

“…We defer to our partners on most final editorial decisions, but insist upon scientific accuracy and context. If we can’t reach agreement on the science in a story, we agree in advance that we will halt the project.”

If the opinion piece that started this effort is any indication, then accuracy falls short of this stated goal. The opinion piece was full of the usual flapdoodle about clean energy, prices, energy rates, and fossil fuels being horribly out of date as energy sources. OK; the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) says otherwise, though.

Second, in terms of identifying for the public the origin of these stories they say…

“We share bylines with print partners and ask broadcast partners to mention our partnership in their coverage.”

This surely undermines trust between a media resource (print or TV) and its consuming public who have been conditioned to believe that news sources are independent. The general population are rapidly learning not to trust anything coming from the media. Climate Central’s effort in this case is probably hurrying this erosion along.

Conclusion

Two organizations, one espousing its nonpartisanship, and the other promoting itself a “right-wing” or Republican, are revealed as increasingly progressive leftist as one peels away layers of other affiliations and partnerships. We may be the world’s most viewed site about climate change, but we aren’t nearly so organized.

The bigger lesson learned, though? Nullius in Verba.

No, Reuters, Climate Change is Not Threatening Europe’s Resources

In the article, “Climate change and pollution threaten Europe’s resources, EU warns,” Reuters asserts that climate change poses a “direct threat” to Europe’s natural resources, citing an EU environment agency report, and warns of worsening droughts and extreme weather. These claims are patently false. History shows far worse droughts in the past with no appreciable trend of other types of extreme weather events becoming more common or severe. Europe’s resource problems are caused by humans, stemming from overuse and poor management, just not from human-caused climate change.

A landscape depicting a drought-affected agricultural field with cracked earth, farmers working, and a warm orange sky at sunset.
MEGADROUGHT of year 1540: Europe’s Forgotten Weather Catastrophe.

From ClimateRealism

By Anthony Watts

A cracked and dry corn field in Les-Rues-des-Vignes, France, with small green plants emerging from the ground, overlaid with the word 'FALSE' in bold red letters.

In the article, “Climate change and pollution threaten Europe’s resources, EU warns,” Reuters asserts that climate change poses a “direct threat” to Europe’s natural resources, citing an EU environment agency report, and warns of worsening droughts and extreme weather. These claims are patently false. History shows far worse droughts in the past with no appreciable trend of other types of extreme weather events becoming more common or severe. Europe’s resource problems are caused by humans, stemming from overuse and poor management, just not from human-caused climate change.

The article declares that “Europe is the world’s fastest-warming continent and is experiencing worsening droughts and other extreme weather events.” It further states that more than 80 percent of protected habitats are in poor condition, blaming climate change and pollution.

“The window for meaningful action is narrowing, and the consequences of delay are becoming more tangible,” European Environment Agency executive director Leena Yla-Mononen told Reuters. “We are approaching tipping points – not only in ecosystems, but also in the social and economic systems that underpin our societies.”

The is political rhetoric couched in weak science.

The reality is far more mundane. The European Environment Agency’s own data show that water stress is primarily linked to intensive agriculture, industrial demand, and population growth. As the “Review of National Water Allocation Policies in Six European Countries” documents, many European countries continue to over-allocate water rights, creating artificial scarcity even in years with average rainfall. This is a governance problem, not a climate one. Similarly, biodiversity decline across Europe is overwhelmingly the result of land use change, habitat fragmentation, and invasive species—not a few tenths of a degree of warming over the last few decades.

When it comes to extreme weather, Reuters’ claims are directly contradicted by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) AR6 report which notes there is little to no attribution of many types of severe weather to climate change. As Climate at a Glance: Extreme Weather summarizes, data do not support claims that extreme weather events are becoming more frequent or severe worldwide.

Further, Europe’s worst droughts occurred long before today’s modest warming. The megadrought of 1540 lasted an entire year, with contemporaneous records describing riverbeds across central Europe running dry, widespread crop failure, and thousands of deaths. More recent severe droughts struck in the 1920s and 1940s, periods that cannot be blamed on modern greenhouse gas emissions. The paper “The 1921 European drought: impacts, reconstruction and drivers” describes the 1921 European drought as “the most severe and most widespread drought in Europe since the start of the 20th century.

In “A drought climatology for Europe,” decadal trends show “greater pan-European drought incidence in the 1940s, early 1950s … and lesser drought incidence in the 1910s, 1930s” over the 20th century.

And there are many more worse droughts even further back in the past, before climate change even had a name, as this graph from the 2021 paper Recent European drought extremes beyond Common Era background variability shows:

Graph showing the historical trend of droughts in Europe over the calendar years, with marked periods of wet and dry conditions and significant drought events labeled.

Compared to these historical drought episodes, recent intermittent summer dry spells are far from extraordinary.

Also, as detailed in multiple Climate Realism posts on the topics neither floods, here and here, for example, nor wildfires, here and here, are more frequent or severe now than they have been in the past.

Even heatwaves are neither more frequent nor deadly now than they have been historically, with deaths from temperatures declining.

Europe’s actual environmental challenges—such as nutrient pollution in rivers, overfishing, and urban sprawl—require pragmatic policy solutions, not grandiose climate pledges. By conflating resource depletion with climate change and exaggerating extreme weather risks, Reuters has misled its audience. The problems it describes are not new, not worsening because of climate change, and not solvable by CO₂ reductions. They are solvable by better governance, better planning, and better science. Once again, journalism has been sacrificed to climate alarmism.

The Net Zero Consensus Is Breaking Down in Britain

Once upon a time the promise of Net Zero enjoyed such universal support that a Tory government signed the UK’s Net Zero pledge into law. Today, the Tories say they’d scrap it – while alarm bells are ringing as the costs of the policy become clearer.

A digital illustration of a superhero resembling Iron Man, standing confidently in a post-apocalyptic landscape with ruins and dramatic clouds in the background.

From OilPrice.com

By City A.M

  • The UK’s 2019 Net Zero law, once universally praised, is now blamed for high energy costs, industrial closures, and grid inefficiencies.
  • Conservatives have vowed to scrap the 2050 target, while even Labour faces union pressure to roll back on ambitious climate commitments.
  • Britain’s energy crisis highlights a paradox: subsidising idle wind farms, losing industry to the U.S., and underusing North Sea resources while energy demand surges.

Once upon a time the promise of Net Zero enjoyed such universal support that a Tory government signed the UK’s Net Zero pledge into law. Today, the Tories say they’d scrap it – while alarm bells are ringing as the costs of the policy become clearer.

In June 2019, Prime Minister Theresa May passed a law – with near unanimous parliamentary backing and pretty much no debate – committing the UK to achieve Net Zero by 2050. 

She hailed the move as a “historic step” that would make the UK the first major economy in the world to set such a legally binding target. 

“Now is the time to go further and faster,” she said – “for our children” – and it was framed as a moral issue, a moment to be on the right side of history. 

And while everyone was patting themselves on the back, and as the lofty ambition was turned into legal text, the UK accelerated down a path that is only now being fully understood. 

If Theresa May hadn’t signed the 2050 into law someone else would have, such was the consensus and such was the sense of inevitability whipped up in those heady pre-Covid, pre-War days. 

And where has it taken us?

The UK has the highest cost of energy in the developed world – for households and businesses – and we’ve been putting wind farms faster than our energy infrastructure can handle them – leading to a situation where we – taxpayers, bill payers – will pay £1bn this year to wind farm operators to turn off those wind farms when it’s too windy. 

We’ve put the cart before the horse

Vast sums are then spent on replacement gas power to keep the lights on. And that’s almost certainly imported gas, by the way, as we’ve rather gone off producing our own. 

It’s a problem known as ‘curtailment’ – too much wind produces too much power and it would overwhelm the congested network and so they’re simply switched off.

The National Energy System Operator, which runs the grid, says the cost of this – the constraint cost – could surge to £8bn a year by 2030. 

We’ve put the cart before the horse. Windfarms were the great visible manifestation of our Net Zero drive – but we haven’t built the pylons and cables to make them worthwhile – something that will take years and cost billions. 

Related: New Quantum Breakthrough Could Lead to Super-Efficient Electronics

There’s no problem with ultimately attaining a state of Net Zero emissions; the problems lie in the law, the target date and the consequences of an ill-thought through rush. 

High energy costs are forcing chemical, cement and manufacturing plants to close. Energy investment and associated manufacturing are heading for the US. The North Sea is viewed as an awkward relic rather than a natural asset and the combination of green levies, subsidies and taxes are making a mess of the entire system. 

Conservatives repent

Today the Conservatives, the moral and political architects of the 2050 target, say they’d scrap their law. They’ve seen the light. The Institute of Economic Affairs says the Tories’ announcement is “the first step back to sanity” – pointing out that the Climate Change Act was “the biggest central planning mistake since the Soviet Union’s Five Year Economic Plans.”

Kemi Badenoch says “Climate change is real. But Labour’s laws tied us in red tape, loaded us with costs, and did nothing to cut global emissions. Previous Conservative governments tried to make Labour’s climate laws work – they don’t.” 

She said that the Conservatives would make the North Sea the “cornerstone” of UK energy policy by ending a ban on new oil and gas exploration, and that as Prime Minister her priorities would be “growth, cheaper energy” and a renewed commitment to protecting the environment.

Even Labour, whose climate change secretary Ed Miliband is a full-blown High Priest of Net Zero zealotry, is considering rowing back from some of its bolder commitments. That would certainly please the unions, who have been shouting at the deindustrialisation unleashed by the Net Zero sprint.

Miliband policies “a disaster”

Sharon Graham, boss of the Unite union, has called for Miliband to be sacked, labelling his Net Zero plan “a disaster” and accusing him of being “completely irresponsible” with the UK’s energy security and jobs in the oil and gas sector. And she’s right. Oil refineries are closing. Chemicals plants are closing. And the promised green jobs boom is felt more in consultancy and the civil service than in any factory.

Ahead of the Budget, the British Chambers of Commerce have called on the government to remove the windfall taxes imposed on oil and gas producers in the North Sea, saying the policy puts the UK at a “competitive disadvantage.”

Meanwhile, our energy demands are going to skyrocket – not least given all the hungry new data centres unveiled in recent weeks. 

It seems when it comes to energy the best approach is to do everything, everywhere, but not all at once. 

We need nuclear, and we’re getting more of it. We need the North Sea, but we’re ashamed of it. We need renewables – but only when the network can actually take the power and we shouldn’t be spending vast sums to subsidise biomass energy that burns wood from South America shipped to the UK and is somehow, supposedly, green. And we do need to look again at the law of the land – the feel-good commitment to be Net Zero by 2050. 

The Tories and Reform have woken up to this. It seems many in Labour have, too, though it’s likely Ed Miliband will barricade himself in his office with hostages before recognising the political and economic reality that’s coming into focus.

Policies change. They evolve. They adapt to meet circumstances. They encounter problems and breakthroughs at unexpected moments. They do not always conform with political aspirations and timelines and badly-written law, and it seems that the penny is beginning to drop. 

By CityAM

BrewDog Sells ‘Net Zero’ Forest Amid Mounting Losses

Brewdog has sold an £8.8 million Scottish forest it acquired just five years ago as part of its Net Zero drive after mounting losses forced it to cut spending.

Two men stand in a grassy field holding signs that read 'DRINK PUNK. KILL CARBON.' and 'BREWDOG FOREST. COMING SOON.' with a mountainous landscape in the background.

FromThe Daily Sceptic

By Will Jones

Brewdog has sold an £8.8 million Scottish forest it acquired just five years ago as part of its Net Zero drive after mounting losses forced it to cut spending. The Telegraph has the story.

The site, a former grouse moor known as the Kinrara Estate, was acquired by the brewer in 2020 to help with its Net Zero credentials. At the time, the Scottish brewer had grand plans to plant millions of trees and turn it into Scotland’s “biggest ever” forest.

However the initial planting was a failure because the trees died and Brewdog had now sold the estate to rewilding outfit, Oxygen Conservation.

“The time is right to hand over the reins to an organisation that specialises in protecting and investing in natural capital,” Brewdog said.

Under then-chief executive James Watt, the company said the project would help it become the world’s first carbon negative beer brand and be funded partly by sales of its Lost Forest beer.

However Brewdog, which rose to prominence for its eye-catching stunts, was forced to retract many of the claims about the forest after unveiling the purchase to much fanfare.

These included admitting that the estate was actually 9,142 acres rather than over 12,000 acres as claimed and that the site would absorb much less CO2 annually than original expected.

The move signals Brewdog’s bid to revive its fortunes and focus on its main brewing business after a slide in sales.

The company’s latest accounts showed it posted a loss of £37 million last year, the fifth consecutive year of losses.

In August, BrewDog’s beers were also axed by almost 2,000 pubs across the country, cutting the distribution of the embattled brewer’s drinks by a third.

Worth reading in full.

Academia awakening to my almost two-decade call on hurricanes

I have been advocating for an overhaul of the Saffir-Simpson scale since 2008. The inspiration for this came indirectly from Bill O’Reilly. I was on his show the night before Hurricane Ike hit Texas, when the storm was downgraded from a Category 3 to a Category 2, prompting his comment: “So this won’t be so bad.” As we all know, Ike was devastating. O’Reilly, like most people, did not know about the weaknesses of the Saffir-Simpson scale. 

A satellite image of a powerful hurricane approaching the southeastern coast of the United States, showcasing swirling cloud patterns and the storm's eye.

From CFACT

By Joe Bastardi

Aerial view of a powerful hurricane showcasing its spiral cloud formation and eye, with a blue ocean background.

I have been advocating for an overhaul of the Saffir-Simpson scale since 2008. The inspiration for this came indirectly from Bill O’Reilly. I was on his show the night before Hurricane Ike hit Texas, when the storm was downgraded from a Category 3 to a Category 2, prompting his comment: “So this won’t be so bad.” As we all know, Ike was devastating. O’Reilly, like most people, did not know about the weaknesses of the Saffir-Simpson scale. The problem with the Saffir-Simpson scale is fourfold:

  1. A monster storm like Ike does not simply drop from a Category 3 to a Category 2. It might go from a 3.02 to a 2.98, as Ike essentially did, but the difference in damage caused by a 15 mph wind speed reduction from 109 to 95 mph is immense. However, distinguishing between 111 mph (Category 3) and 109 mph (Category 2) is challenging. This shows the scale is flawed.
  2. The size of a storm matters in terms of its cumulative energy. This is especially true for large storms that push significant water ahead of them. For instance, the great 1962 Mid-Atlantic storm was non-tropical and had winds below 60 mph, but its large area of gales caused substantial water pile-up. Hurricane Sandy and Katrina are classic examples. How could Category 3/4 Katrina produce a surge as high as Category 5 Camille, and over a larger area? While Katrina’s winds at the center weakened, making it a “Category 3,” its total cumulative energy exceeded that of Camille, a smaller storm. Even the National Hurricane Center acknowledged in a blog last year, “Size Matters.”
  3. Pressure tendency is an additional metric. I contend that a rapidly intensifying storm channels a high amount of wind to the surface due to favorable development conditions. Conversely, a weakening storm does the opposite. A prime example is Hurricane Idalia in 2023, which the National Hurricane Center insisted was a major hurricane at landfall, despite no storm chaser I know believing it was stronger than a Category 1. No observations recorded gusts over 90 mph, let alone sustained winds of 111 mph or more. The storm was weakening rapidly, so depending on the rate of weakening, we could add or subtract from the total score. Previously, I waited to incorporate the raw score of the five essential parameters (described below), but I now believe including pressure tendency as an additional metric added to the end of the six metrics is enough.
  4. An objective test is needed to assess whether storms are truly worsening. This counters climate hysteria, claiming conditions are worse than ever, as people fixate on storm categories rather than the full picture. My power and impact scale avoids rapid category swings by incorporating more metrics.

I have been sharing this approach with clients, WeatherBell subscribers, and social media followers for years. The idea emerged in 2008, and in 2011, when I joined WeatherBell.com, I had the freedom to develop it further while identifying areas where Accumulated Cyclone Energy (ACE) would exceed 50% of the season’s average or fall below normal. The total number of storms is a secondary issue to me; impact is what matters most. Understanding the hemispheric pattern and recognizing that the global tropical cyclone season is a byproduct of it is crucial not only for tropical forecasts but also for grasping the broader weather pattern. This is why the Madden-Julian Oscillation (MJO) is vital to me, as tropical features significantly influence the entire pattern.


I am writing this now because someone in academia is finally addressing this issue. I am reviewing the evolution of my idea to show it originated in the private sector nearly two decades ago. A man-made global warming skeptic like me is unlikely to be heeded by agencies with substantial funding that push man-made global warming narratives (NOAA, not the National Hurricane Center, which I believe operates with integrity regardless of their views). When, not if, the scale is updated, we will know who said what and when.

By the way, reanalyzing storms using this scale would be a worthwhile investment for the National Hurricane Center. It would likely debunk the notion that activity is worsening just because Category 5 storms are appearing. If those pushing this narrative examined the Western Pacific and Indian Ocean, they would understand why we are seeing these patterns. Distorted warming has spread out the main development regions, leading to more small storms developing further north. Under the right conditions, rapid intensification occurs, but these storms are also further north. This ties to the overall spreading of heat, with greater warming in the north than in the tropics and a weakening Hadley cell. If we consider the global picture, the Western Pacific, which accounts for nearly 60% of the Northern Hemisphere ACE, has had only two above-normal years in the last 20, signaling a significant change. While people focus on our seasons, more people live in the path of typhoons than hurricanes, which is a positive. However, as usual, arguments in the politicized sewer of climate and weather rely on propaganda tactics, highlighting partial truths while ignoring the full picture. To demonstrate my objectivity, consider this year: despite storms staying offshore but in our red zone, the Carolina beaches have taken a pounding. Yet cherry-picked narratives claim the season is underwhelming. This is dangerous, given the distortion I’ve described, which has led to active major late-season (after September 15) hits over the past decade. If I were on the other side, arguing it’s worse than ever, I could point out that this is only the third time since 1900 that the first three hurricanes of a season reached major status. We nearly had four in a row, but Imelda fell short.

Meanwhile, no one highlights the most remarkable non-signal: the Western Pacific is again well below normal, with one of the lowest ACE-to-storm ratios on record and only one super typhoon when the average is eight or nine. This is overlooked because the focus is on scoring political points rather than understanding the full picture.

Now, let’s examine the Power and Impact Scale we have developed.

This is the latest version; the first version appeared in 2011.

6 metrics form the base of the scale:

Saffir Simpson SLP

Saffir Simpson Max wind

Max wind gust

Extent of 64 kt wind. Total of all quadrants divided by 100.

Extent of 50 kts wind. Total of all quadrants divided by 150.

34 kt wind. Total of all quadrants divided by 200.

SLP pressure addition or subtraction to the total above based on 12-hour tendency.

Divide by 6.

The major hurricane starts at 2.5, and we can get categories that are higher than 5 because we used tenths. Very tough to do since the storm would have to be quite large in wind extent.

So, I respect the Saffir-Simpson scale and use pressure and wind as an input.

Table illustrating the Saffir-Simpson hurricane wind scale categories along with their corresponding wind speeds, pressure measurements, and potential storm surge heights.

But crucial to this is the idea of tenths. For instance, if you have a storm with a 985 mb pressure and 90 mph winds, the pressure category gets a 1.7 and the wind will get a 1.7. So, they are added up. You also respect the gusts. The storm, just using the Saffir-Simpson this way, would be a 1.7, not a one — and it should be, because its metrics are closer to 2 than 1.

We also have a gust category.

So again:

The 64 kt wind extent score is the total divided by 100.

The 50 kt wind extent is the total divided by 150.

The 34 kt wind extent is the total divided by 200.

So, let’s take Katrina before the first landfall:

Technical weather data showing estimated minimum central pressure, eye diameter, and maximum sustained winds of a storm, including wind extents at various categories.

Sea level pressure is 1.7, max wind is 1, and gust is 1.8.

64 kt wind extent 1.

50 kt wind extent is .6

34 kt wind extent is 1.3

That total gives us 7.4, but the pressure fall of 15 mb in 12 hours adds .75 ( rounded to 8).

So, the total score is 8.2, divided by 6.

Katrina’s first landfall on the power and impact scale was rounded, 1.4.

What about the max intensity on Sunday before landfall?

Image of a weather report displaying estimated minimum central pressure, eye diameter, and maximum sustained winds for a storm.

Slp gives us a 5.4 (that’s right, you can go over 5).

Max winds give us a 5.2

max gusts gives us a 5.8 ( 200 is 6)

extent of 64 kt winds 2.8

extent of 50 kt winds  2.5

extent of 34 kt winds 2.9

30 mb pressure fall in 12 hours adds 2.5

So, the total 27.5 divided by 6 gives us 4.6.  (The smaller radius of strong winds is limiting it)

How about landfall?

Diagram showing estimated minimum central pressure and wind information for a hurricane, including eye diameter, maximum sustained winds, and wind extent in various quadrants.

SLP 5.2

Max wind 4.8

Max gust  5.6

extent 64 kt wind 3.1

extent 50 kt wind 3.1

extent 34 kt wind 3.7

Raw score is 25.5, but there was a 10 mb SLP rise in 12 hours, so we take .5 off.

25 divided by 6 gives us 4.2.

You need these metrics to quantify the total power of the storm. It’s not a hard concept. People may think, “Wow, this is too complicated.” But think about it. How much damage did Katrina cause? $125 billion.

What was the total damage from Sandy? $68.7 billion, seventh costliest on record. That is due to the large area of high wind and its energy driving so much water into the coast. Given the idea that every category the damage increases tenfold, how is a Cat 1 on Saffir-Simpson scale only half as costly as Katrina? It should be much, much less costly. But if we dig into the power and impact scale, you can see why.

So, what was Sandy at landfall?

Text displaying estimated minimum central pressure and maximum sustained winds for a storm, including wind extent data in various quadrants.

SLP was 4

Max Sustained winds. 1.6.

Gusts 2.9

extent hurricane winds. 2.3

50 kt winds 5.5

34 kt winds  7

Wow. Look at those last two. Do you realize how much energy is involved in producing that, and what impact it has on raising the ocean?

total: 23.3

So Sandy was a 3.9 on the scale.

And why not? Look at the extent of that wind.

So, think about how Sandy was a Category 1 on Saffir-Simpson, and Katrina, with her first hit, also a Category 1?  Which storm — using a scale with more metrics — would indicate who had the most power and therefore the greater impact? Suppose the levees had held in New Orleans; then Katrina’s damage would likely have been less, and just a bit over Sandy’s, with Katrina’s second hit. Notice how the power and impact scale would have led to that conclusion in the first place.

So this is the updated scale, which I have been working on since 2008. Other categories may be added (storm surge, for instance, which responds to the wind and coastal variations). Rain has to be separate, since it involves non-wind parameters.

So that is where this stands now. By including more metrics like this, you get the total picture of the entire storm, not just a snapshot at the center.  The public does not have to get into the weeds with the parameters; they are smart enough to figure out tenths and understand that we are describing the total storm. By developing a database with this, you can better inform people about what to expect relative to past storms. And though it should not be a consideration, in this day and age it has to be; it will form a basis of objectively looking at storms and removing the cherry-picking that is done to make points that don’t show the total picture.

Like I said, there is no way a man-made global warming skeptic will be involved with the final scale despite pushing this for so long.  But it’s been out there for anyone to see.

For me, it’s composing a song no one will ever hear, but you do it anyway out of love and gratitude.

California: “Carbon-Free” by 2045

That’s a relief! The carbon units are off the hook. Carbon-free is just another meaningless slogan.

A man in a suit passionately speaking into a microphone, with the text 'No gas and oil' prominently displayed.

From Watts Up With That?

Guest “V’ger is coming! V’ger is coming!” by David Middleton

Carbon-free?

https://videopress.com/v/aLA5cQfS?resizeToParent=true&cover=true&autoPlay=true&loop=true&playsinline=true&preloadContent=metadata&useAverageColor=true

September 25th, 2025 | Earth & Climate

Study reveals roadmap for carbon-free California by 2045

A new study shows California can go carbon-free mostly using current and emerging solutions – but to get there, it must overcome regulatory challenges and scale technologies at an unprecedented pace.

In brief

  • California will need to more than double its electricity generation capacity to achieve net-zero emissions by 2045.
  • Half of emissions cuts are achievable with existing technologies like electric vehicles, pending regulatory barriers, while another quarter could come from early-stage technologies.
  • The final fourth of reductions will require breakthrough technologies still in the research phase, such as decarbonized planes and ships, low-emission refrigerants, and removal of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

A 2022 California law mandates net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2045 and negative emissions every year thereafter.

[…]

“Reaching net-zero by 2045 is not so much a challenge in cost,” said Benson, “but a challenge in getting the necessary technologies available in time and establishing the social, political, and economic environment to deploy these technologies rapidly and broadly.”

Stanford Report

That’s a relief! The carbon units are off the hook. Carbon-free is just another meaningless slogan.

California will need to more than double its electricity generation capacity to achieve net-zero emissions by 2045.

In 2006, California’s total solar generation capacity was 112 MW. It’s now almost 17,000 MW… More than 7 doublings.

Graph depicting California's solar generation capacity from 2002 to 2024, showing significant growth in megawatts (MW) over the years.

And, contrary to the propaganda, solar power isn’t getting cheaper in California.

Line graph depicting the average cost per watt of solar power from 2015 to 2025, showing two lines: one for systems under 10kW and another for systems over 10kW.
California solar generation cost

In 2006, California’s wind generation capacity was about 2 MW. It’s now almost 72 MW… Almost 5 doublings.

A bar graph showing the capacity of renewable energy sources in megawatts (MW) from 2004 to 2024, with blue bars representing capacity in each year and yellow bars indicating prior years' capacity.
California Wind Generation Capacity

Over that same time period, California’s electricity generation actually declined.

Line graph displaying California's electricity generation (GWh/yr) from 1980 to 2025, with three different lines representing total system electric generation, California generation plus net imports, and total in-state generation.
California Electrical Energy Generation

Doubling solar and wind capacity will just yield more of this:

Line graph showing monthly solar and wind curtailments in California from January 2015 to December 2024, with two curves representing solar (yellow) and wind (green) curtailments measured in thousand megawatt-hours.
EIA

And that’s the bit semi-grounded in reality!

First 52%: Commercial technologies

The necessary technologies already in commercial use that could halve California emissions include renewable electricity generation, batteries for storing that energy, electric passenger vehicles, heat pumps, and machines that produce methane fuel from wastewater, manure, and food and plant waste.

[…]

The authors estimate electric passenger vehicles, solar and wind power, reduced in-state oil production, and replacement of fossil-based gas with methane fuel made through anaerobic digestion could eliminate 44% of the state’s greenhouse gas emissions (based on estimated 2045 emissions if the state were to continue business as usual).

Stanford Report

Batteries? There’s “no Moore’s Law for batteries“.

Line graph showing the average cost per watt of solar energy from 2015 to 2025, with two series representing costs for systems less than 10kW and those greater than or equal to 10kW.
California Energy Storage Cost

California is already well-ahead of the curve in reducing “in-state oil production.”

Line graph showing California's field production of crude oil from 1990 to 2022, indicating a decline in production measured in thousand barrels per day.
EIA

“Methane fuel made through anaerobic digestion” WTF?

Infographic illustrating the process of anaerobic digestion, showing various feedstocks like manure, wastewater biosolids, and food waste, and the resultant biogas and digestate products.
EPA

California actually ranks first in the nation in biogas potential, with the capacity to generate over 280 billion cubic feet (Bcf) of “renewable natural gas” per year. In 2023, California consumed 2,085 Bcf of natural gas. Even if California maxed out its “methane fuel made through anaerobic digestion” capacity, it could only replace a bit over 10% of its current natural gas capacity.

Regular natural gas, renewable natural gas and biogas all rely on the same chemical equation for energy production:

  • CH4 + 2O2 –> CO2 +2H2O

Can someone explain to me the carbon freeness of biogas? I suppose they plan to dispose of the CO2 this way:

Next 25%: Early-stage technologies

The authors estimate a quarter of emissions abatement could come from technologies in the early stages of commercialization, including zero-emission heavy-duty vehicles, clean industrial heating from electricity and hydrogen, and carbon capture and sequestration (CCS).

[…]

Stanford Report

While CCS will technically work, it takes at least four years to get a Class VI CCS permit approved by the EPA or state agency with primacy. The EPA currently has 240 CCS well permit applications that it has received since 2021. Only 3 are are in the “Prepare Final Permit Decision Phase.” Only 55 of those permit applications are in California and none have moved beyond the preliminary “Technical Review Phase.” In contrast, 64 permit applications are in Texas or its state waters. All 3 of the “Prepare Final Permit Decision Phase” applications are in Texas. The odds are that Texas will be sequestering CO2 long before California, while increasing oil & gas production… Irony can be so ironic.

Might as well add pixie dust and unicorn flatulence to this section:

Final 23%: Research-phase technologies

Nascent technologies still in the research phase include decarbonized trains, planes, and boats; low-emission refrigerants; and carbon dioxide removal (CDR) from the atmosphere. Replacing fossil fuels for planes, trains, and boats with electricity, hydrogen, and renewable fuels faces challenges from their weight, cargo capacity, costs, and the limited availability of clean fuels.

[…]

Stanford Report

Decarbonized trains? California can’t even build a carbonized train!

Infographic comparing California's high-speed rail project estimates from 2008 and current projections, showing original completion date of 2020 and new expected completion date of 2033+, along with the estimated total costs increasing from $33 billion to $88-128 billion, and the total tracks laid dropping from 520 miles to 0 miles.
Cato Institute

V’Ger actually seems less science fictiony than this “roadmap for a carbon-free California.” For what it’s worth, here’s their publication:

  • Neutel, Joshua, Andrew Berson, Sarah Saltzer, Adam Brandt, John Weyant, Franklin M. Orr, Sally M. Benson. What will it take to get to net-zero emissions in California?. Energy Policy. Volume 208, 2026,114848, ISSN 0301-4215, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enpol.2025.114848.