If we are winning this war, we would expect to see signs of retreat, and many signs have crossed my desk recently.
1. The EU abandons the Unilateral Kyoto Agreement
Reuters 14th Sept. Read between the lines, and hidden amongst the rest:
Connie Hedegaard’s comments were delivered alongside a warning that Europe would not automatically sign up again to the U.N.’s Kyoto Protocol, the main global deal to tackle climate change.
Hedegaard said progress looked “very difficult” in the run up to global climate talks in Cancun, Mexico in November, and that nobody should expect the EU to sign up to an extension of the Kyoto Protocol unless loopholes are closed and other big players commit.
(Thanks to Benny Pieser)
2. Russia and China have never been fooled by the Big Scare Campaign
The Russian bets that coal mining will be a good deal for 25 years to come. China agrees. I don’t think either of these countries is thinking seriously about paying a carbon price on top.
China to offer Russia US$6-billion loan for 25-year coal supply
The Ministry of Industry and Trade of the Russian Federation said in a statement posted on its website that China last month has agreed to offer Russia US$6 billion in loan in exchange for a 25-year long coal supply, sources reported.
According to the statement, China plans to increase its annual coal import from Russia to 15 million tons in the next five years, and then further to increase to at least 20 million tons in 20 years.
h/t Brian H
3. The lobbyists are going home:
Climate advocates stung by defeat in the Senate are folding one of their big umbrella lobbying groups.
Clean Energy Works, a coalition of 80 environmental, religious, veteran and labor groups, will phase out its operations this fall as Democratic congressional leaders abandon plans for a sweeping bill to cap greenhouse gas emissions.
At its peak, the coalition had 200 field organizers in key states and more than 45 staffers based out of a “war room” in downtown Washington. It is led by Paul Tewes, who ran President Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign operations in Iowa and other battleground states.
4. Only half as many people use carbon offsets for their jet travel.
From Bolt: Going off their offsets
More than 90 per cent of passengers who book online through Qantas and Jetstar decline to offset their carbon emissions…
The percentage of people taking up offsets on Jetstar drops to between four per cent and five per cent on long flights and sits in the six per cent to 6.5 per cent range on trans-Tasman flights.
Overall figures at Jetstar have also fallen back from more than 10 per cent since it began its offset scheme in 2007.
4. Al Gore’s team of trained speakers are not so popular
His team will only do 6 talks in Sept 2010 compared to 100 in Sept 2009 (and 193 last October).
From comments on Tom Nelsons site, one reader claimed that Gores group had “finished their job”.
Sean responded:
Al Gore’s presentations have done their job and the decline in his influence is disturbing a skeptic fantasy?? Gore had a $300 million plan to sell the climate consensus and during the campaign, the number of people skeptical about the climate consensus doubled. The man gets up to $100,000 an appearance but can’t take questions from the audience. Your hero Gore is running scared from free speech…
6. The Environmental Movement is in Retreat. Washington Post
The collapsing crusade for legislation to combat climate change raises a question: Has ever a political movement made so little of so many advantages? Its implosion has continued since “the Cluster of Copenhagen, when world leaders assembled for the single most unproductive and chaotic global gathering ever held.” So says Walter Russell Mead, who has an explanation: Bambi became Godzilla.
That is, a small band of skeptics became the dogmatic establishment. In his Via Meadia blog, Mead, a professor of politics at Bard College and Yale, notes that “the greenest president in American history had the largest congressional majority of any president since Lyndon Johnson,” but the environmentalists’ legislation foundered because they got “on the wrong side of doubt.”
7. Bookings for The Climate Cabaret at Cancun are down by … 80%
Organisers are only expected to attract around 8000 people this year, nothing like the 45,000 circus which was Copenhagen.
Plus Carbon credits are hardly selling for 10c each on the Chicago Climate Exchange. Did I say “short those carbon credits”, back in February 2009?
Don’t party yet
But having said all this, I’ll post the counter-post soon: The Wall of Money (send in your suggestions). There are educational programs, books, seminars, Expos, councils ruling on carbon action plans, and journalists who still call Nobel prize winning scientists dirty names. Here in Australia we have only 9 months before our “traffic light” coalition of Green-Red-and-Yellow get the green light in the Senate. Once that happens, we are pretty much dependent on Tony Windsor – a man who doesn’t have a computer, unless we get lucky with a freak by-election, and the state of play changes. There is a long way to go.
We have nine months to convince the Australian government that bringing in a carbon trading scheme would be electoral death. That means convincing the voters. Anyone want to give talks at rotary groups, schools, or scout halls? Maybe we can fill the hole Al’s tired fans have left.
UPDATE (from Comments below)
8 9 10 From Wes George:
8. Penny Wrong is gone. New climate propaganda minister Greg Combet adjusts the goal posts:
“…the coal industry “absolutely” has a future as he pursues his three key policy reform objectives: pursuing renewable energy; energy efficiency; and the development of a carbon price for Australia…
…Mr Combet said he was not in the business of applying the adjective “dirty” to coal. “People will use whatever language they want. But you won’t hear me using it,” he said. “You do not take the back of the axe to the fundamentals of the Australian economy. ”
9. “THE world’s biggest mining company, BHP Billiton, is urging the Gillard government to impose a tax on carbon before any international agreement.”
It’s truly a sign of the times when Big Coal decides the political climate is ripe to game. BHP, by feigning reasonableness, can manipulate a weak, eager-to-show results government into a carbon tax lite. Something that helps raises the bar of entry to smaller players and through a complex web of subsidies, tax cuts in other areas, etc, will end up being revenue neutral for the big boys with the silent battlers picking up the tab at the end of the day.. Everyone’s pleased. The business climate is calmed. Planet saved.
10. “World Bank invests record sums in coal”
“…There are roughly 1.6 billion people in developing countries–700 million of whom are in Africa and 550 million in South Asia–who lack access to electricity. Because coal is often cheap and abundant, and the need for electricity is so great, coal plants are going to be built with or without our support.”
Based on deeds, China (and to a lesser extent Russia) has never bought in to the scare campaign, yet based on words, they try to provide the illusion that they ‘agree’ with the consensus. It’s absolutely clear that they are positioning themselves to kick our economic buts by driving their economies with cheap coal as the west stupidly uses the most expensive energy available, taxing the hell out of it in the process. The reason for their public agreement with CAGW is simply to encourage us to follow the self destructive path we’ve started and they are happy to lend us whatever money we require in order to continue our self destructive tendencies. It’s too bad that the powers that be will not understand this until it’s too late.
George
10
The most dangerous animal is the wounded one.
The religious movement is wounded. It is going to get a lot worse before it gets better. Good luck in your quest with the Oz Government. I think in 7 weeks we will have killed it in the colonies for at least 2 more years.
10
jo –
perhaps sceptics would find it easier to approach others in the community if we had a flyer/poster with easily understandable quotes from the CAGW team proving, in their own words, that CAGW isn’t in fact happening according to their own predictions.
there could also be some quotes from CAGW insiders who are now sceptics, a few quotes re the failure of subsidised renewables and how they often require backup from conventional power stations and are, therefore,twice as costly for the consumer, and a few quotes on the carbon scam.
if only we could put together the quotes here and then print them off for use in our communities.
i would suggest the poster begins with your “sceptic” vs “gullible” quote, a simple summary of how few temperature databases are involved, how they interconnect and are being questioned as to their veracity, plus the quote on the so-called “concensus” and a brief rundown of the major CAGW players jones/mann/schneider/schmidt et al:
my suggestions:
13 June 2000: National Post: The IPCC consensus on climate change was phoney, says IPCC insider
The UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change misled the press and public into believing that thousands of scientists backed its claims on manmade global warming, according to Mike Hulme, a prominent climate scientist and IPCC insider. The actual number of scientists who backed that claim was “only a few dozen experts,” he states in a paper for Progress in Physical Geography, co-authored with student Martin Mahony
http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2010/06/13/the-ipcc-consensus-on-climate-change-was-phoney-says-ipcc-insider/
9 Oct 2009: BBC: Paul Hudson: Whatever happened to global warming?
The title of this may be a surprise. So might the fact that the warmest year recorded globally was not last year, or 2007, but 1998. For the last decade we have not observed any increase in global temperatures. What’s more, climate models did not forecast it even though man-made carbon dioxide, the gas thought to be responsible for warming our planet, has continued to rise. So what on earth is going on?
Climate change sceptics, who passionately and consistently argue that man’s influence on our climate is overstated, say they saw it coming.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/paulhudson/2009/10/whatever-happened-to-global-wa.shtml
From the Climategate emails released November 2009, reacting to the BBC’s Paul Hudson’s article above:
12 Oct 2009: From: Kevin Trenberth to Michael Mann, copied to Stephen H Schneider, Myles Allen, Peter Stott, Philip D. Jones, Benjamin Santer, Tom Wigley, Thomas R Karl, Gavin Schmidt, James Hansen , Michael Oppenheimer
“The fact is that we can’t account for the lack of warming at the moment and it is a travesty that we can’t. The CERES data published in the August BAMS 09 supplement on 2008
shows there should be even more warming: but the data are surely wrong. Our observing system is inadequate.”
http://www.eastangliaemails.com/emails.php?eid=1048&filename=1255352257.txt
at the end, it could say:
for further information, visit WUWT.com, climateaudit.org, joannenova.com.au, bishophill.squarespace.com/ etc
i’d finish with:
this list was compiled in honour of one of the earliest Australian sceptics, the late John Daly.
25 Nov 2009: Examiner Tasmania: Climate change email cowardly: widow
A “COWARDLY” email has forced Hadspen woman Amy Daly to relive the tragic death of her climate-change sceptic husband.
Mrs Daly said yesterday that the email, made public by computer hackers, had only made her more determined to spread her late husband’s message.
It was written by the head of Britain’s Climatic Research Unit Phil Jones, who wrote to a colleague that the death of John Daly was “cheering news”…
“If he says such things about John then obviously he had a fear of John – he thought he didn’t have enough scientific knowledge to challenge it so he had to do something as nasty as that.”…
The climate had been a lifelong passion for Mr Daly, who first started to study the topics as an officer in the Merchant Navy, Mrs Daly said.
He believed that global warming was a scare campaign…
Mrs Daly vowed to maintain her late husband’s website, saying it was important to maintain debate.
“The last thing I want is to lose all the work John did,” she said.
“He spent 15 years doing it.
“Also, it’s important that climate change should be proved.”
http://www.examiner.com.au/news/local/news/environment/climate-change-email-cowardly-widow/1686761.aspx
10
The enviromentals have begun rewriting history.
After quoting the phrase ‘the science is settled’ I wanted to know a little more about who the original quote belonged to.
Google ‘the science is settled’, and top of the page – Wikipedia. William M Connolley states There are no known examples of its use outside the skeptic press, though some of the statements that were made have similar implications.
Really? I haven’t followed the argument as closely as some who contribute here, but even to my ears that sounded a tad inaccurate.
The very next item, as it happened, not only provided evidence to the contrary, but also provided interesting detail on Connolley himself.
Following the link to the NYT delivered this succinct quote from Kary Mullis:
Global warmers predict that global warming is coming, and our emissions are to blame. They do that to keep us worried about our role in the whole thing. If we aren’t worried and guilty, we might not pay their salaries. It’s that simple.
10
I’d say that this might be dead (not wounded). There are too may regular people looking. The “doctors of truth” don’t like the idea of being caught “doctoring” so they will just fade away.
My worry now, is that the lessons learned and mistakes made during this attempt at world wide control of human activity will be used against us again and sooner than later. We need to be on the lookout.
10
Someone will get sick or die, and this nation will be saved from this idiocy. Also, the Conservatives in the US are hopefully going to kick some arse November.
10
Slightly off topic, but does the support for for Tea Party backed candidates in the upcoming congressional elections undermine Obama’s push for cap & trade even further? and if so will it weaken the resolve of other nations to weaken their economies even more.
10
At last we now know what the secret deal between Gillard & the 3 big miners contained……….
this morning we are told that BHP believes an ETS is inevitable & the way to go & that Gillard should get it all up & running as soon as possible.
This bit of wisdom “traded for a reduction in mining tax”???
Do these people think the ALL of the elctorate are stupid.
10
8. Penny Wrong is gone. New climate propaganda minister Greg Combet adjusts the goal posts:
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/coal-industry-is-safe-says-greg-combet/story-fn59niix-1225919936683
9. “THE world’s biggest mining company, BHP Billiton, is urging the Gillard government to impose a tax on carbon before any international agreement.”
It’s truly a sign of the times when Big Coal decides the political climate is ripe to game. BHP, by feigning reasonableness, can manipulate a weak, eager-to-show results government into a carbon tax lite. Something that helps raises the bar of entry to smaller players and through a complex web of subsidies, tax cuts in other areas, etc, will end up being revenue neutral for the big boys with the silent battlers picking up the tab at the end of the day.. Everyone’s pleased. The business climate is calmed. Planet saved.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/bhp-boss-marius-kloppers-its-time-for-carbon-tax/story-fn59niix-1225924335319
10. “World Bank invests record sums in coal”
http://blogs.worldbank.org/climatechange/why-coal
10
Another one to add to your list Jo. While Lord Turball is linked to the group that asked Andrew Montford to do a “review of the UK reviews” on climategate , he is also a former head of the civil service in the UK so his comments would at least be looked at. This interview is revealing
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/09/14/lord_turnbull_interview/
10
Kloppers of BHP-Billiton has called for a Carnon price in Australia before the rest of the world adopts one.
As he heads the world’s largest mining company, does this mean we are facing a carbon price irrespective of the opposition to it by showning the Anthropogenic Global Warming Fraud for what it is?
I recall overhearing public servants in Perth travelling on the Fremantle train service discussing the nuts and bolts of implementing a carbon tax over five years ago, so it seems its on the cards (carbon tax) despite our protestations.
10
The signs are there 🙂 They’re not ready to give AGW up but they can see that cutting CO2 is a money pit.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthnews/7997668/Climate-change-is-inevitable-says-Caroline-Spelman.html
The next stage will be headlines like ‘scientists say we might have longer to adapt to global warming than previously thought’. Or ‘global warming to be delayed by enexpected increase in natural cooling factors’. And gawd help up if they finally come up with ‘ice age not postponed by global warming, scientists say we have only a few years to adapt’.
10
What bugs me is that the likes of Gillard seem to be blissfully ignorant of what is going on in the rest of the world. Thankfully, “yes, we will” seems to be currently “yes, we’re still talking about it”, rather than “yes, we have”.
10
Graham @ 8 and Louis @ 11; I too heard Marius Kloppers on AM this morning advocating a carbon tax; of course Brown jumped all over it, avuncular assassin that he is. But it is interesting to speculate why Kloppers would do this. Some sort of payback for the SPMT which in its revised form was so much better for the big companies? The big coal producers are already faking it with the clean coal scam so maybe it’s another example of say one thing and do another; with the doing here, postponing the ETS/carbon tax, as long as possible until the whole wretched thing collapses in the US and Europe.
10
lol . Who’s conducting the scare campaign here?
10
Unfortunately I think 9 months is not enough – we need 2 to 3 years for the cold cycle to become so obvious that the politicians cannot say the ‘world is warming’ and get away with it.
Also unfortunately that once adopted an ETS will not be overturned for decades because of the permanent Green balance of power situation in the Senate.
I suggest continuing to highlight as much as possible the unexpected consequences of ETS and proactive AGW moves already in existence, eg
– NZ farmers who are selling their profitable sheep to collect taxpayer funded subsidies to grow trees instead – which (in Green theory) never can be cut down
– German wind industry which actually causes more CO2 to be generated than if it didn’t exist (and the same will happen here with the mandatory renewable energy legislation now in force)
– The HFC22 scandal
– The vast rorting of the EU carbon credits scheme and the attraction of such to organised crime
Then there’s the rise in electricity prices.
Also, Julia Gillard was conspicuously clear in saying before the election that the ETS and an interim carbon tax were ruled out until at least 2013. Coupled with Kevin Rudd’s ETS backflip we may be able to hold Julia Gillard to this promise, since backflipping on a backflip would make the ALP look even worse (but don’t count on the ABC or Fairfax press to go in hard…).
10
Big Government, Big Business and Big Unions all in bed together, the perfect trifecta for greenies, they probably can’t believe their luck.
10
Jo wrote:
Traffic lights need electricity to work. 😉
The Greens want to shut down uranium exports that are 35% of energy exports, according to ABARE. A BIG earner for Australia.
The biggest consumer of energy in Australia is electricity production. More than 30%. Most of that is from coal.
Combet’s words:
So no ETS. Uranium mining and exports to continue. Unless one can’t believe what politicians say. 😉
10
To quote a friend, whenever someone suggested a conspiracy his question was “Have you discounted stupidity?”.
I think stupidty applies to AGW.
10
Maybe you could add this to your list “The 97% ‘Consensus’ plummets to 34.7%” From Hockey Schtick
10
Sunspots could soon disappear for decades: study
http://www.physorg.com/news203746768.html
Heh. Looks like we may need to increase the budget for the Ministry of Climate Change. 😉
10
Bruce in post 16,
Julia Gillard proclaimed there will be a carbon dioxide tax this term at about 9:30 pm the night before the election so if she brings one in she will simply be honouring an election promise.
There seems to be a bit of conflicting information surrounding a CO2 tax at the moment and dont forget we live in a new age of politics where pollies are encouraged to vote how they feel and not along party lines. We have already seen this with the Greens promising the coalition to vote with them re maternity leave. Wilkie voting against Labor with mining tax (wants it bigger) etc.
One thing no one has mentioned as yet is that in this new age of modern politics both labor and coalition MPs may be encouraged to cross the floor. I wonder how many labor MPs secretly think AGW is crap and dont want a new TAX, conversely how many Coalition MPs think the end is nigh and want a TAX.
10
Wes 21,
L & P need decent sized sunspots to take ongoing measurements their biggest problem has been the tiny specks we have seen over the passed few years have not been big enough for them.
Hathaway has had more failed predictions than i’ve had hot dinners so treat everything he says with a grain of salt.
I believe the sunspots have little to do with our climate but they are a proxy for something else that does. Unfortunately the climate conspiracy orchestrated by the IPCC has rejected L & P and similar work and only consider TSI to be affective on our climate. This fact alone should set alarm bells ringing in the gullible believers minds i honestly think some people are just stooopid.
10
My gut reaction to the astonishing BHP announcement this morning is the following… how much coal exposure does BHP have in Australia relative to its competitors? I think you may find its competition more heavily impacted, and increased demand for BHP gas might offset the losses on the coal side… who knows? I bet they did the numbers at BHP HQ before making that splash in the media… of this you can be certain.
10
Hi Joanne, Given the recent propensity of prominent people to blithely say that “there will eventually be a price on carbon”, e.g. Tony Windsor, Rob Oakeshott, Warwick McGibbon and now Marius Kloppers, can I request that you do another, updated article about what such a tax would do to Australia? What new countries are really considering it?
As far as I can see, sceptics have largely won in the US. Brits are now hugely sceptical, but unfortunately Cameron still embraces the science. Scepticism is spreading through Europe, but the ETS still rolls on. Can you get some new information on the real costs of their ETS to these economies? This dopey concept of “certainty of investment” now seems to be the latest justification. I can only hope that Abbott and the Coalition hold to their zero tolerance position on this tax. Of course Turnbull is a worry, but this policy is one of the few really distinguishing points of difference to Labor, which I am sure helped the Coalition nearly win government. With the new Green-Labor-Independents alliance, you are right to say that we only have nine months to change public opinion – what a scary gestation period.
10
Talking about signs of retreat, the carbon exchange market is not looking healthy. They blame the downturn in climate change inaction. Or could it perhaps rather be be an awakening?
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSLDE6791WI20100811
10
Is Deutsche Bank one of BHP’s major sources of credit ?? ( ref. Jo’s thread of a couple of days ago0
10
Crakar24 at #22
Sorry I forgot a link to Julia Gillard’s announcement about 2013:
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/07/08/2947643.htm
“Prime Minister Julia Gillard says she will not revive the Government’s emissions trading scheme until at least 2013.”
10
We might have Kloppers but Europe has O’Leary
http://www.independent.ie/business/irish/global-warming-is-bullstsays-ryanair-boss-oleary-2333336.html
10
Bruce,
Trust me when i say Gillard promised a new CO2 tax at the eleventh hour, typical sly, sleazy, gutless manoeuvre by Gillard and labor. Dont worry we will get one in the next 9 months and when they accuse her of breaking a promise they will simply replay her statement she made on radio the night before the election.
10
Crakar24 @23
Yeah, I know. But it’s fun to laugh at the technocrats and pols that have bet their farms fearmongering apocalyptic warming. How they must blanche when a even a shonky solar model points towards a new Maunder. Heh. Now if those solar scientists, all ten of ’em, could just get a “consensus” on. 😉
* * *
Bulldust @ 24
Exactly. BHP is playing the government for the chumps they are. Tell ’em what they want to hear then negotiate a sweet deal so full of complexities that lost in the details is an outcome which somehow benefits BHP’s bottomline. Beware of Greeks bearing gifts. This weak minority government would sign anything with the words “Carbon” and “Tax” on it, just so it can say they accomplished something.
10
To “Bruce of Newcastle” (16)
RED GILLARD announced on election eve, I imagine she though the gullible voters would not notice!), that if elected she WOULD introduce an ETS!
Have a read of this..
Duplicitous last minute declaration of intent:-
http://joannenova.com.au/2010/08/duplicitous-last-minute-declaration-of-intent/comment-page-2/#comment-77135
10
To “Bruce of Newcastle” (28)
The article you quoted from the ABC was superceded by a later announcement by red gillard…..
10
The Guardian (link) had an article recently about the US Senate being taken over by “Climate Zombies” (Skeptics) in November. I think you can forget about any US cap and trade legislation for the foreseeable future. Not many other nations will want to take the risk of being among the few that torpedo their economies when the US, China, India, Russia, etc. aren’t going along.
10
BobC, unfortunately Australia may just be one of the few to self-torpedo. Garnaut and Brown (for starters) just love Kloppers at the moment;
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/09/16/3013414.htm
The enlightening thing with this news article is actually reading between the lines…oh, and there are a couple of “Dept of the Bleedin` Obvious” admissions as well.
10
pat(#3) Thank-you pat for your very informative post above. I like your suggestion about hard copy information we can carry in the back pocket or purse. A great debt of gratitude must also go to Jo Nova for inspiring me daily with her consistent display of qualities of mind and spirit which have become increasingly rare as the 21st century atempts to invite us further and further into a reality distorting postmodern maze of hooks and mirrors. Those qualities being true moral, ethical, intellectual courage and integrity. Knowing of the existence of such leadership helps me to get up every morning to face yet another day of struggling through the cesspool that is contemporary irrationalism. Thanks must also go to “the coward” Phill Jones of U.E.A. for alerting me (albeit inadvertantly) to the work and website of climate researcher John Daly. Knowlage of johns work has come to me as “cheering news”. Good on ya Phill. cheers everyone.
10
Just heard Christine Milne being interviewed by Leon Delaney on 2SM. Of course she is all for a tax or a price. I would prefer a tax if it comes to that as it could be repealed when the voters realise they have been duped; a price means some unscrambling of an egg. Never-the-less once the cool sets in and a few enquiries are publicised the party responsible will get caned. Andrew Montford of Bishop Hill fame has released a scathing report on the various UK whitewashes and has received some publicity. He also has some heavy hitters in his team whom the press recognise such as Lord Turnbull, a previous head of the Public Service.
Should the Republicans and in particular the Tea Party nominees get up in November there will be both the numbers and the desire to pursue some enquiries in the US. All this augers well for serious action prior to July in Canberra. The biggest challenge is making sure the public are aware of what is happening globally.
I agree with some earlier commentators that China and Russia see advantages for thenselves in the West heading down the expensive and useless path of decarbonisation. The big coal producers will simply sell to the developing nations avoiding any carbon taxes here thus the environmental benefit of a tax is completely offset.
We are governed by fools and none so foolish as Rob Oneshott, Gillard and the Greens. Actually the Greens probably know exactly what they are doing, it’s the others who are in a quandry.
I sent a note to Leon Delaney with the link from AC @ 20. Thanks. It is a good summary of the state of play. We should all be flooding the letters columns with up to date stories showing the doubt that now exists about AGW/CC. Just make sure that it is accurate.
10
Cohenite
Kloppers is actually supporting a carbon tax to offset the Mining Resource Super Tax.
10
Wes George @21
Magnetic fields are caused by electrical currents, so when the magnetic field wanes, that is because the driving electrical current has decreased in power density. Just like turning down the dial on an electric radiator.
10
BHP may be advocating that the government put a price on carbon in the name of “(business) certainty”, but Kloppers also said – and this has not been widely picked up by the MSM – that it should come with a compensation plan for fossil fuel producing companies until such a time that the rest of the world implements a comparable price on carbon.
From the article linked in #35:
“And in the end, Mr Kloppers argues it is household consumers who will have to pay the bill.” (my emphasis)
In other words, BHP can be seen to be good planetary protectors, but they will never pay: We, the people, will – indefinitely, because “the world” will never be able to agree to put a uniform price on carbon!
10
Oops! That avatar in # 40 is obviously not me, unless I’m having an “opposite gender day”. Was using someone elses computer. Back on my own now! 🙂
10
The Mafia goes green and other carbon scam stories:
http://www.meetchristians.com/new/tr_fr_view_thread.php?TID=1226398&r=0&F=2
10
Afternoon All.
Here’s a survey for those of us who are engineers/scientists in Australia – see below. It’s a chance to input our opinion to the peak body of the scientific societies of Australia. Don’t let your silence indicate your consent of their pro-AGW stance!
http://FAST-SURVEY-2010-Members.questionpro.com
Cheers,
Speedy
10
Bob Brown, the leader of the Greens here in Oz has said that he’d be happy with a carbon tax of $23 adjusted 4% annually plus inflation (say 3%) (total 7% per year).
Some quick back of envelope calculations shows petrol prices will go up by 5c per litre.
Also,
From my latest electricity bill, 2.39 tonnes (monthly) or $55 (9% increase).
But ofcourse, everything we do/purchase involves emissions, so the impact on inflation will be comparatively high. This also will lead to higher interest rates, hence higher inflation etc.
According to the Carbon Dioxide Information Analysys center of Oak Ridge Tennessee, (doi 10.3334/CDIAC/00001) Australias emissions in 2006 was…
101,458,000 metric tonnes.
At $23 perT, some $2,333,534,000 will be removed from productive work in the economy and flushed down the infinite Beurocratic Black Hole EVERY YEAR increasing at 7% per annum if Bob (I know what’s good for you) Brown gets his way with GillRudd.
I would appreciate others checking my figures.
To be balanced, $2.3billon is 0.2% of the Oz economy, or just under 1% of the Federal Govt budget. It doesn’t sound much.
I’d invite others to comment why this amount will not have a negative impact on our economy and on individuals.
10
I’m actually not averse to the idea of a carbon tax, but if any one believes it will actually have an impact on the climate they must be on something very strong and very illegal. The problem is that, as I see it, a carbon tax would have its biggest effect on the mortgage belts, which would be political suicide for Julia. A mining tax on the other hand would cream money off those nasty miners, nobble the mining industry, lower infaltionary pressures, and help keep interest rates down. A big positive in the mortgage belts. Swap a growing economy for the maintenance of suburban housing prices. I think Julia will take the line of lease political resistance and trade a carbon tax for a mining tax. It would be delusional to believe they would implement both taxes at once when the political margin is so narrow. The only beneficiaries would be the Greens and Julia hardly needs to boost their credibility. The ALP has lost too much ground to them already.
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Speedy No 43 has a gem.
I will be circulating this and I suggest all realists take the time to do so. It’s a rare opportunity.
They also invite the public to participate – not just engineers and scientists.
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Baa Humbug; there simply is no way of calculating the full extent of the cost of a carbon tax because of the hidden costs like GDP shrinkage that really hit places like Spain which had de facto carbon taxes in the form of massive subsidisation of renewables; which don’t work. This article is instructive:
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/ets-to-shrink-regional-growth/story-e6frg6nf-1225691476399
Louis: so you reckon Kloppers is doing a swifty and looking to replace the MRST with a cost neutral carbon tax. As I understand it most of BHP’s operations, including coal, is geared for the export market which will be exempt. Maybe Kloppers is just trying to establish some corporate good-will with the feral greens.
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Terry McCrann gives Mr. Kloppers a serve – had to smile cynically at the quip concluding the article, about the most appropriate price on carbon to “guarantee certainty”…
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/business/terry-mccranns-column/marius-kloppers-sells-bhp-billitons-soul/story-e6frfig6-1225924317912
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So we have a South African(Kloppers) who is head of a multi national company saying Australia should not wait for the world to implement a carbon tax. How good of him.
I agree Gillard’s rag-tag are enough to make any sceptic nervous but I don’t think she is a believer for one moment. Who was it who talked Rudd into dumping the ets? A carbon tax is suicide politics pure and simple and Julia aint the sacrificial type, but she has inherited/contributed to some very difficult politics. Look at her reply to Kloppers in the OZ. All ducking and weaving. Building consensus blah blah. What if you can’t get consensus? She has no intention of putting her head on the block.
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Some very interesting reading which sheds light on what a detrimental effect an ETS, based in the FRAUD of man made global warming, would have………
Back to the 19th century:-
http://www.lavoisier.com.au/articles/climate-policy/science-and-policy/backtothe19C.pdf
The madness of an ETS:-
http://www.agvance.com.au/node/419
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Could it be that Kloppers is setting the government up to go nuclear and to fuel the new stations with BHPB uranium? He knows the renewables are a crock and will need such subsidies as to make the nukes viable. As electricity becomes dearer because of the tax people wont use less but will demand cheaper. A cry that few governments will be able to resist particularly when they observe the rest of the world abandoning the process of decarbonisation.
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Cohenite,
Given the failure of the ETS last year, and needing revenue to fund their fiscal black hole, the ALP then went for the Mining Resource Rent Tax – aimed at the iron ore and coal miners, but not the rest (base metals and gold producers), so that market sector is in full steam ahead mode, under the assumption of no carbon or super profits (MRRT) tax. The MRRT also suffered a little, but whatever, the present government has run out of money and needs to fund its promises.
How is the problem, and taxing the mining industry the obvious solution.
But, the Commonwealth does not own the minerals, the states do, so what next?
I am not sure I understand what Kloppers is aiming at, but it’s got to be good for BHP and that means its not good for the rest of us.
Given the mismatch between the ALP and the Greens politically, I wonder if Kloppers might also be throwing a rhetorical hand grenade into the political sphere? If the Liberals get in, there will be no ETS, Carbon or MRRT tax.
What is intriguing is that the world wide western bureacracies, including the UN, seem to be continuing to assume that there will be a global carbon tax. Just what their confidence is based on remains obscure, to say the least.
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Lawrie
In addition I know that BHP-B’s Olympic Dam mine only made a profit for one year and continues to make a loss. Selling that unranium to subisidised power utilities to lower GHE seems a cunning plan, in Baldrick’s sense.
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Even the warmist BBC may be slowly giving up. The following article, despite having a typical alarmist headline, includes the words “Researchers say projections of summer ice disappearing entirely within the next few years increasingly look wrong” and “But computer models projecting a disappearance very soon seem to have been too extreme”
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-11322310
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RE: Luis Hissink #52
“What is intriguing is that the world wide western bureacracies, including the UN, seem to be continuing to assume that there will be a global carbon tax. Just what their confidence is based on remains obscure, to say the least.”
Damn right. One of the the most fallacious bits of throwaway rhetoric going around at the moment would have to be – “It’s inevitable that their will be a price on carbon”. It’s basically a pretence. More like them trying to steer the narrative while it sinks below the waves. Bonn barely made the news, carbon markets in trouble. Looks like a final stand occurring right now. They are sensing a window in the early stages of this govt and need to get something going.
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^^Wouldn’t hold your breath on that, they’re only clinging to power with the support of the Greens, and 3 Independents who have all said they support a carbon price/tax. I don’t think Gillard would want to do anything that might upset that alliance.
It might be better to try convincing 2 Independents to switch their support from the ALP, to the LNP to form government (1941 style). If the LNP were to form government, there’ll be no carbon tax or mining tax.
So I think focus should be targeting the Independents that “carbon trading scheme would be electoral death” for them, as 2 of them are from conservative leaning electorates.
I don’t think we should waste time to try and convince the ALP Australian government. If we want to be sure there won’t ever be a mining tax or carbon tax, then focus must be on convincing 2 Independents to drop their support for the ALP.
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The EU statement is interesting – it is not all that it appears to be:
The EU started its own ETS a year before the UN Kyoto protocol kicked in. They are two separate and different systems.
The EU ETS tracks emissions credits through a hierarchy of registries. Credits can only be issued, transferred within the EU system, and then redeemed. Since they are uniquely numbered and traceable, the system is therefore reasonably robust. The EU ETS is not restricted to the EU countries, other countries can join as well – Norway has, for one.
The trouble we have seen with theft of credits in emissions trading, non-delivery of offsets, the CDM by-product fraud, and the land-grab for forests under REDD, etc. have all been flaws in the UNFCCC system of Assigned Allocation Units (AAU’s), which are not easily traceable between issuance and redemption. AAU’s are also rather convenient as a pass-through “currency” in money laundering, since they are officially a commodity and not a currency, and are therefore not subject to banking oversight.
When the EU says, “… that Europe would not automatically sign up again to the U.N.’s Kyoto Protocol …” they are really saying that the UNFCCC trading mechanism is a dog, and they don’t want anything more to do with it, unless the UNFCCC can bring the “rogue” countries and NGO’s to heel at Cancun. (I don’t think that will happen, and apparently neither do they).
They are not saying that the EU ETS system is going to be scrapped, and I don’t expect it to be.
There is also nothing to stop the EU making a case to Canberra for Australia to join the EU scheme, rather than set up its own UNFCCC registry, especially with all the uncertainty around Cancun. Geography is not a problem. Any problems their might be, would be purely political. This could have some appeal to Labour, because they could literally be in the game within days of the required legislation being passed, with little else being required than an exchange of diplomatic letters.
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It’s gobsmacking how a South African CEO of a major multi-national mining corporation has suddenly transmogrified into Bob Brown’s go-to man on how Australia should manage “carbon pollution.
ROTFL. The hypocrisy is so stunning, we’re all mullets now.
Something tells me that this won’t end well for our new wet-behind-the ears Greenies in the parliament. heh. It might not end well for Kloppers either.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJcm4-L5iOA&feature=related
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Other commenters have already mentioned a couple of reasons why BHP would favor a carbon tax (may increase their domestic gas sales and lead to domestic uranium sales). The third reason is probably that most of their coal is exported, and Kloppers is proposing that exports be exempt from a carbon tax. The big losers will be the suppliers of coal to the domestic power industry.
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Any ETS or Carbon Tax will inevitably cause people to reconsider their household budgeting and one of the first casualties will be donations to charity, followed by “luxuries” such as unnecessary insurance payments. People may also be less inclined to do voluntary work as they may have to find another source of income to make ends meet. School sporting events, which already have difficulty getting parents to assist, may fold. The Greens should enjoy that as sport = increased huffing and puffing of that naughty CO2.
On an amusing note: yesterday I walked past one of Adelaide’s best known hotels and it had a sign proudly proclaiming “voted Adelaide’s worst vegetarian restaurant”. Good place for a sceptics get together I reckon!
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Louis,
By now it doesn’t matter. Positions have been taken, careers and money have been put at risk and scams are in place. It all needs to be protected. And what government could resist a good excuse for a tax? So of course they go on and they hope it will work.
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Another Scientist saying the GreenHouse Effect is very weak.
I notice Gillard doesnt refer to Global Warming anymore and only mentions her belief in “Climate Change”
http://hockeyschtick.blogspot.com/
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Fe @ 56
It might be better to try convincing 2 Independents to switch their support from the ALP, to the LNP to form government (1941 style). If the LNP were to form government, there’ll be no carbon tax or mining tax.
The Greens and independents have already put a hand out to Tony Abbott, saying they would help the Liberals pass any legislation they agreed with. They’d call it government best practice, or something like that. I’d call it having a bet each way.
They’ve bought a ticket on a ship that’s not 100% seaworthy and they know it. They’re looking to secure a seat in the lifeboat.
Personally I think Abbott should wait for the minority players to come to him or we’ll just see Tony I’m-So-Full-Of-Wind-Sir and the rest auctioning their vote again. Labor whored itself to these characters and in the long run the Libs will serve themselves and the country better if they avoid that.
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[…] Al Gore’s presentations have done their job and the decline in his influence is disturbing a skeptic fantasy?? Gore had a $300 million plan to sell the climate consensus and during the campaign, the number of people skeptical about the climate consensus doubled. The man gets up to $100,000 an appearance but can’t take questions from the audience. Your hero Gore is running scared from free speech… H/T Jo Nova […]
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The Greens policy is to shut down uranium mines and its export. It would be a sad day for Australia if that were allowed to happen. It’s not just the loss of export money. It would be akin to Saudi Arabia plus other countries deciding not to sell any oil in order to lower CO2 emissions. The sudden loss of access to a strategic material would incur the wrath of countless nations. If China could not get its uranium from here they would come here to get it. Already we are disliked by India because we refuse to sell uranium to it. The excuse is that India has not signed the ‘Non Proliferation Act’. That is a pretty flimsy excuse in my opinion. It is a snub in their eyes. India is a Commonwealth of Nations country that is supposed to be a far closer friend than China. It also contains the largest English speaking population in the world. Plus they play cricket.
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Climate Spectator , that great unbiased reporter of the climate news, has an article claiming Deutsche has foreshadowed a carbon price of $93. Thats a far cry from Bob Browns $23. It would, if introduced, put paid to the coal industry overnight. In turn that should put paid to Comrade Julia.
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Bob – Very much so. The core of the Tea Party is reduced federal government. At the core of Obama’s Policy is more power in DC – definitely at odds. it will set it back – for how long is a matter of guess work, but I suspect for as long as the Tea Party remains a viable force.
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