The UN will not be happy about this. The global movement is falling apart.
Japan, third largest economy in the world, and the land of Kyoto itself, has dumped their ambitious plan to reduce emissions by 25% by 2020. Now they warn that their emissions may rise instead.
Cabinet members said on Friday they had agreed a new target with an updated time frame, under which Japan would seek to cut carbon dioxide emissions by 3.8 per cent by 2020 compared with their level in 2005. Nobuteru Ishihara, the environment minister, is to defend the goal next week when he joins international climate talks in Warsaw.
Japan’s previous target used an earlier and more challenging baseline: 1990, the benchmark year for the Kyoto agreement and a time when Japanese emissions were lower. Compared with that year, Japan said in 2009, it would cut its emissions by one-quarter by 2020.
The new target announced on Friday represents a 3 per cent rise over the same 30-year period – a difference from the previous goal that is about equal to the annual carbon dioxide emissions of Spain.
Read more at the Financial Times
It is being painted as being due to the Fukushima reactor, which no doubt played a role. Japan used to get 30% of its electricity from nuclear power and those reactors are currently out of action (though some may be restarted soon). But it was not meeting the targets beforehand anyway and was already paying billions to buy carbon credits.
Japan 2006: “Japan is at risk of falling well short of its commitment to reduce greenhouse gas emissions under the Kyoto Protocol, with fiscal 2005 combined discharges of all greenhouse gases having increased 8.1% from fiscal 1990 levels.”
“Achieving the target will be difficult,” says an Environment Ministry official (in 2006.)
Japan 2008: “Japanese households and businesses could end up paying more than $500 billion to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 11 percent over the next decade, the trade and industry ministry said Wednesday.”
Japan 2010: “Tokyo Electric Power Co (9501.T), Japan’s biggest utility, spent $229 million in the last business year on carbon credits, paving the way to achieve a self-imposed target to help Japan to meet its Kyoto Protocol commitments.”
Japan did warn people in 2011 that it might have to revise the target.
“Japan’s wealth has been draining out” due to buying carbon credits from East European countries and China, Mr. Nobutani said.
METI estimates Japan has paid as much as ¥800 billion ($10.4 billion) to buy 400 million metric tons of carbon credits.
Environmentalists not happy
Bloomberg: “Environmental experts say this can have a “devastating impact” on the ongoing climate change talks in Warsaw.”
“Su Wei, China’s lead climate negotiator at the UN talks in Warsaw, expressed ‘‘dismay’’ prior to Ishihara’s announcement after reports indicated Japan would scale back its ambitions.”
Poverty does a wonderful job of freeing the taxpayer of their delusions.
Socialism masquerading as environmentalism,I wonder what that translates like in Japanese?
Buying carbon credits is almost as effective as tossing virgins into volcanoes.
Except one leaves you much poorer with zero gain, the other lets you excerise absolute power over the other virgins,as well as sending a social message as to the wisdom of allowing the state into your sex life.
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It’s also politics masquerading as academic snobbery. It’s amazing how much of this stuff gets filed under ‘science’ in the MSM.
The only way to call it ‘science’ would be to say it’s ‘political science’ which is an ironic oxymoron IMHO.
Most of it is accompanied by the usual hubristic, contemptuous, arrogant attitude that Jo so often highlights here.
Sooooo many of these academic snobs and self appointed AGW celebs are actually less qualified and less experienced than the people they clearly love to publicly sneer at.
Sooooo many of them have assumed that they’re entitled to interfere and tell others how to ‘suck eggs’ when the only place they’ve likely ever seen a chook is on the TV or online or as a pic in some academic paper.
They’re failing to understand that we need to move on and that in places like Australia, the electorate has spoken loud and clear!
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Political Science is an ironic oxymoron …
I like you already … Have a green thumb.
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”Buying carbon credits is almost as effective as tossing virgins into volcanoes.”
I couldn’t have expressed it better. Carbon is taxed because it’s easier to tax carbon rather than any of the other variables that contribute to greenhouse gasses and weather
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Carbon is taxed because it’s easier to tax carbon rather than any of the other variables that contribute to greenhouse gasses and weather
No, carbon (dioxide) is taxed because it’s easier than admitting that they want to redistribute your wealth.
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And then they wonder why they can’t convince the girls to remain celibate.
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You have to laugh, not just about yet another country starting to come to its senses on energy, but about buying carbon credits from Eastern Europe and China.
Buying something intangible from countries which probably had no real intangibles to sell, but were dreamed up into supposed reality by groups whose business ethics might be considered as being a tad questionable.
In other words, even the most gullible and stupid eventually get fed up with knowingly being scammed so often.
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I remain amazed that educated adults have sat around negotiating tables over the past few years and managed to convince themselves these ideas had any merit whatsoever. I mea buying air tickets from countries that you cannot even verify are changing that air in the way you agreed??? Its pure madness.
It just shows how distracted people can get from common sense when they are frightened enough. But fear has to be realised in order to stick, the longer you experience something without the fear you were warned about being realised the harder it is to maintain that fear. Its becoming clear to most thinking people and intelligent nations now that AGW, even if real, is well down the list of things they need to concern themselves with in order to ensure their people have decent lives for generations to come. In an amazing light bulb moment, they are dragged back to the ultimate logic, “its the economy stupid”.
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Bang on with the fear factor Safety, It’s one of the bases for what is perceived as “Power” and the MSM keep trying it on http://www.skynews.com.au/national/article.aspx?id=924834
I mean how childish can you get a “Fossil” award really who gives a flying fossil about that? and being someone who has never been in a white collar or bureaucratic environment I have to ask what psychological condition are these people in?.
I am now certain Gillard had a vision of the “Men with blue ties” in a clubhouse with a sign above the door saying “He Man Woman Haters Club.”
Nothing screams louder or more annoying than a left winger scorned.
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It has never been about climate. And it has certainly never been about science, other than using a bunch of third rate scientists, to man the front office.
It has always been about what goes on in the back office. And that is money laundering, in the sense of transferring (swapping if you like) natural wealth and national assets, between the major players. From a geopolitical point of view, one of the causes of war is an imbalance in access to natural or industrial resources (the only true measure of wealth). How natural then, for the UN, whose original mandate was to prevent war world war from reoccurring, to think it a good idea to come up with a scheme to redistribute the worlds natural wealth.
This is why Harper, Abbott, and now Nobuteru Ishihara, are starting to call foul. Canada, Australia, and Japan are sophisticated enough to realise what is going on, but have been excluded from the wealth reapportionment, for some reason.
China is also starting to show expansionist tendencies, and I can’t help wondering if that is also not connected in some way. Perhaps they want to grab what they can, while there is some left.
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Rekeke,
“China is also starting to show expansionist tendencies”
In shipping terms they already have, 4 years ago I was in Hambantota (the presidents home area) in the south of Sri Lanka, and the work that China were doing on that new port is staggering. Here is Robert Kaplan on the Chinese expansion in shipping, pipelines etc across the Indian ocean. (very interesting video)
The new port is now operating, along with hundreds of government buildings (CHOGAM), sports arenas and industry. After spending over $1.5 billion on this port, they plan to spend $15 billion on expanding the Colombo harbour.
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I agree. It is a good example of concern over resource availability. There are lots of resources sitting in the Indian Ocean, not to mention the strategic importance of the trade routes.
So Russia has befriended India, and China is befriending Pakistan and Sri Lanka. It is a global game of Go. [reference here]
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Also China is investing billions in Africa. I was there a couple of years ago and everywhere I went there were roads, hospitals etc all being built by China as part of a resource deal (ie they build infrastructure for countries that can’t afford it in exchange for the right ti dig up their minerals, oil, coal etc).
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Great news and impeccable timing!
The Financial Times link above requires a login for limited access. Try the link below:
http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/20dfeda0-4dc1-11e3-8fa5-00144feabdc0.html?ftcamp=published_links%2Frss%2Fhome_asia%2Ffeed%2F%2Fproduct#axzz2kk2JAgaq
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Login is still Free at the Financial Times, as long as you register.
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Sorry. The link I posted above is behind a pay wall as well. I had full access to the Financial Times article when I googled it. It seems that the link reverts back to a pay wall once it’s posted.
Anyhow I found a Reuters article as well:
http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/11/15/us-climate-japan-idUSBRE9AE00P20131115
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Free looks on the FT site are very limited, from past experience FT only allows 2 views at different pages and often are time restricted as well.
Registration is still free though…
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There is a website that charts the relationship of CO2 emissions and growth per capita over time. At gapminder, I have charted four countries. Japan and South Korea against Niger and Ethiopia.
See how CO2 emissions leapt with growth for the Asian Tigers. Add in the USA to see how economic depression is so successful at cutting CO2 emissions, and how, without any policy, emissions per capita have been falling.
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When economic rationalism kicks in, all fancy ideologies like the global warming alarmism fade away. Wait until when the world sinks into another depression in the years/decades ahead. The AGW, if it’s not dead and buried by then will well and truly be dumped like a hot potato. Some of the leading scam artists should then be jailed for conducting the biggest scam of all times.
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Spot on. Life is a question of priorities and almost every nation on the planet has far bigger problems right now than trying to enact the fantasies of Tim Flannery and Granny Milne.
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What’s sauce for the goose, …
If its good enough for Lord Monckton for quietly & calmly pointing out a few unavoidable facts in Doha, why shouldn’t FoE be expelled for ” expressing solidarity with a non- sanctioned banner” , regardless of what it might have stated ?
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That banner:-
Youth observers expelled from UN climate change talks in Warsaw for Philippines Solidarity
by Takver – Climate IMC
Thursday Nov 14th, 2013 9:36 PM
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Which says that the whole shooting match is being managed at the microcosmic level – it is all theatre.
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The idiots at the IPCC should check Dr. Roy Spencer’s satellite temperature data. They show very little rise in the planet’s temperature even as atmospheric CO2 continues to rise. Japan should tell the IPCC and the environmentalists to get lost!
http://www.drroyspencer.com/latest-global-temperatures/
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REVALATION! Developed and Developing countries have bigger issues than taxing air to achieve four fifths of sweet eff A.
I guess common sense had to get a look in sooner or later.
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Jo,
Hilary has taken to musical themes too
http://hro001.wordpress.com/2013/11/14/tis-the-season-to-be-gloomy-an-annotated-climate-carol/
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Jo,
FYI
http://thepointman.wordpress.com/2013/11/15/australia-you-beaut/
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Is there is an element of ‘crying over spilt milt’ here or perhaps ‘closing the gate after the horse has bolted’?
I find it impossible to conceive that Japanese financial expertise was incapable of a basic insight that – NO quid pro quo ever existed for the ETS billions they shelled out. Did they not understood that they were the willing host in a parasitical relationship with blood sucking, wealth redistributing Green
environmentalistscommunists at the UN, where the only final outcome would be impoverishment and primitivisation.They have woken up. And so they damn well should.
Even those in ‘Guardianista-land‘ are twigging:
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African countries about to throw their toys out of the pram, again.
As they can already see it’s not working, Why don’t they just save the second week for something worthwhile and all go home now ?
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Joe V
[quote] “500 NGO’s across the continent” [ /quote] Thats the African continent .
And every one of them on the public teat big time.
Governments around the world could do humanity a real service and save multi billions of wealth and still get a much better outcome for Africans if they just totaly cut off all tax payer funded handouts to nearly all of those human suffering promoting NGO leaches.
About a couple of dozen decent, honest and efficiently run NGO’s would probably accomplish as much or a lot more for Africans on a tiny fraction of the funds those nefarious leeching 500 NGO’s are now screwing out of governments and the western and developed world populace with their piteous cries and emotive propaganda, most of which is all about ensuring that their executives and multitudinous professional report writers can live high on the hog while not much is left over of the public donations to actually do anything of use for the Africans.
Paint me cynical in the extreme over the piteous cries of those NGO’s most of whom are arguably passively corrupt beyond any measure that ordinary citizens or businesses would tolerate.
Damn! I must be getting grumpy and curmudgeonious, apparently an old age characteristic which my kids are inclined to harp on while within my hearing range.
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Manfred –
your link is to Las Vegas Guardian Express, not UK Guardian.
from the Reuters’ coverage, still trying to spin it for nuclear but, even with all the writers/editors involved, failing stupendously:
“It is regrettable,” Christiana Figueres, the U.N.’s climate chief, told Reuters of Japan’s goal. But she predicted that Japan’s planned investments in energy efficiency and renewable power would prove that the target could be toughened…
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe advocates a return to nuclear, but says he wants to reduce Japan’s reliance on it over time. The process of restarting reactors will begin next year at the earliest and some will never come back on line due to safety concerns.
With Abe facing opposition to nuclear power even from within his own party, the weaker emissions commitment could be an argument for restarting reactors, given that Japan for decades has touted the technology as clean energy…
Hiroshi Minami, Japan’s chief negotiator at the U.N. talks, said the new goal “is based on zero nuclear power” in future. He said the original target was based on a nuclear share of more than 40 percent of electricity generation.
The nuclear shutdown could prove convenient for Abe in that it allows his government to abandon a target that some said was too optimistic. “Anyone could have seen that this was just impossible,” said energy analyst Akira Ishii.
(By Elaine Lies and Stian Reklev; Additional reporting by Michael Szabo and Alister Doyle in WARSAW and Osamu Tsukimori in TOKYO; Writing by William Mallard; Editing by Robin Pomeroy)
http://ca.news.yahoo.com/japan-drastically-scales-back-co2-emissions-cut-target-002021962–business.html
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Thanks for the clarification Pat. My oversight. On reflection, it’s probably a long way down the road before The Grauniad capitulates to the degree I implied. Pity. My morning optimism demonstrates observer bias nicely.
Damn. And it so helped the headache.
20
If Japan us still pledging $16 Billion to waste on paying other countries for not producing more CO2 it is clearly still taking this stuff seriously, so must clearly be agonising over its reduction in emissions reduction .
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What would be FAR MORE SENSIBLE is if the $16 Billion was to go towards helping undeveloped countries overcome some of their REAL PROBLEMS. Health, energy, etc
All developed nations have a reliable, well organised electricity system,(discounting, now, the UK… sorry guys, but the next few years are going to be cruel for you over there).
It is one of the main features that sets them apart from the less developed countries.
Provision of funds for the development of solid, reliable energy systems in 3rd world countries, rather than actually STOPPING such development, should be a top priority.
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Andy, that presumes that governments would know how best to allocate resources to satisfy the most urgent and important wants. They don’t. The reason we know this, is because the fact that governments have to confiscate the funds by threats of imprisonment, disproves the assumption. The fact that people obviously value something else more highly than whatever government wants to spend it on, irrefutably proves that government cannot presumed competent to allocate scarce resources to more highly-valued ends. Otherwise there’d be no need for the funding to be by way of taxation, would there? People would simply write a cheque to Consolidated Revenue for as much as they think the government deserves, and the revenue would be no less. Does anyone really think that’s true?
Far better for the poor of the world would be for government to simply stop taking the funds from the productive portion of the population in the first place. The claims of socialists to improve the lot of the poor are false both morally and pragmatically. The solution is not more governmental action, it’s less.
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Justin.. I don’t think I mentioned “governments” in my post at all.
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AndyG55: “What would be FAR MORE SENSIBLE is if the $16 Billion was to go towards helping undeveloped countries overcome some of their REAL PROBLEMS. Health, energy, etc”
Hmmm. The work needed to bring health and energy deficits up to modern standard has all been done. Western nations, particularly Anglo ones have done most of that work one and a half to half a century ago. All the underdeveloped countries need to do is copy the best bits. Just why ‘we’ have to shell out $16 bil or any friggin’ $ at all is just fluffery. There are countries in Africa with twice the manpower population of say the UK and 3 times that of Oz. Just look at Indonesia compared to Oz. They have 200 million, 10 times the Oz manpower supply and have continued to waste it, yet Oz is still expected to ‘give’ them foreign aid. It is high time the ‘underdeveloped’ nations were seen as wastrels akin to housos living off benefits instead of getting a friggin’ job.
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Is it possible Japan is taking the mickey here, we will spend 16 billion to buy your raw resources and lower you emissions by doing all manufacturing in Japan?
As for the adaptation pledge, I too, would offer to pledge billions to help poor countries with their unicorn infestations.
Costs zero to mitigate nonexistent problems ,no?
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U.N. carbon prices plummet as EU readies restrictions
LONDON, Nov 15 (Reuters) – Prices of U.N.-backed carbon credits from developed countries fell by more than half on Friday after the European Commission said it had determined how many will be eligible in its carbon market, the largest source of demand for the units…
http://www.pointcarbon.com/news/reutersnews/1.2982063
30
so much nonsense in this piece, read all:
14 Nov: Bloomberg: Ezra Klein: One Senator’s War Against Climate Change
(Ezra Klein is a columnist and blogger at The Washington Post and a policy analyst for MSNBC & more…)
Every week, Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, a Rhode Island Democrat, heads to the floor of the Senate, sets up an easel and some poster board, and delivers a speech. He works hard on these speeches. They’re deeply researched and beautifully crafted. He delivers them with passion — to a mostly empty room. His colleagues figure they have better things to do than listen. But 100 years from now, when our grandchildren look back and try to understand what we were doing while the world burned, these speeches may well be some of the most famed rhetoric of the age.
The speeches are on climate change. They range in tone from morally outraged to deeply wonky. One focused on how best to structure a carbon fee…
“There is a path before us,” he said in a phone interview. “The first part has already been done, and that is the president’s climate action plan for new and existing power plants. When faced with the cost of compliance I think those polluters might well decide that an economywide carbon fee makes more sense. The second is people are starting to fight over this issue in elections in a very big way. I think you’ll see deniers pay a heavier electoral price.”
To Whitehouse, this isn’t just an isolated policy issue. It’s a test of American democracy — one that might reverberate long into the future…
With little hope of legislation moving anytime soon, and few paying attention to his weekly floor speeches, I asked Whitehouse whether his addresses were really aimed at his own descendants — at leaving a record of how he fought against denialists and cowards who refused to protect the one and only planet we have.
“I very much want my grandchildren to know that I fought the good fight,” he replied. “But much more than that, I want to turn this around.”
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-11-13/one-senator-s-war-against-climate-change.html
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(From 2 Timothy 4:7) Appropriate religious reference, at least he’s honest.
Notice how none of the people focus on how best to structure a carbon fee, actually stop using electricity or petrol? That would be an obvious way “we as a society” could cut “our” carbon emissions, wouldn’t it? Simply stop heating and lighting their houses with the dreaded fossil fuels.
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Somebody voted for this sad, demented soul? It takes all sorts, I suppose.
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The Useless Nations can KMA,it has never achieved anything except death and destruction.The level of waste and incompetence would make the ALP feel at home.It is a cancerous growth and should be treated as such.Australia should withdraw from and cut all tie’s with it.Cheers <:o)
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Weak rules threaten UN climate plan for forests
WARSAW, Nov 15 (Reuters) – Investments in a U.N. plan to halt deforestation could suffer as U.N. climate talks in Warsaw have failed to agree rules to guarantee the rights of indigenous peoples and to protect local biodiversity, observers said…
REDD has already attracted significant funds from early movers who have invested in forestry protection schemes, some in the hope of gaining carbon credits that might later be traded in schemes set up to reduce industrial emissions, even though the final rules for the programme have not yet been negotiated…
But observer groups in Warsaw, where delegates from 190 nations are negotiating further regulations for REDD, say weak safeguards might damage the scheme’s credibility and scare off potential investors.
A text stating when host countries must report on how they are safeguarding the livelihoods of indigenous people and biological diversity is unclear and non-binding, they say…
The rules are needed to ensure that well meaning projects do not end up hurting indigenous people, for example by preventing them pursuing legitimate economic interests, or damaging the environment by things such as fast-growing tree plantations that are not suitable for the local wildlife.
The text might be reopened for negotiations next week, but due to the conference’s heavy workload this was considered unlikely by several negotiators speaking to Reuters…
http://www.pointcarbon.com/news/reutersnews/1.2983209
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NZ carbon drops to 3-month low as buyers wait
WARSAW, Nov 15 (Reuters) – Spot permits in New Zealand’s emissions trading scheme fell 8.7 percent over the week to close on Friday at NZ$3.15, the lowest level since mid-August as continuing weak demand put downward pressure on prices…
http://www.pointcarbon.com/news/reutersnews/1.2977728?&ref=searchlist
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“shows the crucial role that many experts say nuclear power must play” – huh? what a spin:
15 Nov: NYT: Japan Shelves Plan to Slash Emissions, Citing Fukushima
by Hiroko Tabuchi & David Jolly
More broadly, Japan’s action shows the crucial role that many experts say nuclear power must play if humankind has any chance of reaching its emissions goals. Just two weeks ago, four prominent climate scientists wrote an open letter calling for environmental groups to embrace nuclear power as the only hope to head off catastrophic global warming…
In the year through March, Japan released the equivalent of 1.2 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide, more than 7 percent higher than the year preceding the nuclear accident and 14 percent higher than levels in 1990…
Japan’s new target assumes that no nuclear reactors will come online by 2020 and that the country will make energy savings of about 20 percent by investing in renewable energy sources and energy-efficient technology, Mr. Ishihara said…
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/16/world/asia/japan-shelves-plan-to-slash-emissions-citing-fukushima.html?_r=0
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15 Nov: UK Financial Times: Japan in greenhouse gas emissions U-turn
By Jonathan Soble in Tokyo and Jan Cienski in Warsaw
The Japanese announcement comes several days after Australia introduced legislation to repeal its carbon price, a step that was applauded by Canada. Ms Smith said that potential emissions backtracking by several industrial nations, coupled with Poland’s lack of enthusiasm for big emissions cuts and its continued reliance on coal, are making for an unsatisfactory summit.
An official with the Polish presidency called the reaction “hysterical”, saying that “most delegations have taken this pretty calmly” seeing it as being the result of Japan’s decision to back away from relying on nuclear power after the Fukushima disaster…
***In a poll published on Tuesday by the Asahi newspaper, 60 per cent of respondents said they supported abandoning nuclear power altogether, against 25 per cent who favoured the technology’s continued use…
Even if the target is revised, the 2009 goal is almost certain to remain out of reach, since many reactors are too old or too close to Fukushima to be restarted. The most ardent supporters of nuclear power say that at most half of Japan’s facilities will be used again…
http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/20dfeda0-4dc1-11e3-8fa5-00144feabdc0.html
10
I am amazed at the scientific illiteracy of supporters of the AGW industry and their attack on carbon(dioxide). All mankind, people, cows, and plants, etc. are totally dependent on the synthesis of carbohydrate for life, and carbon dioxide is the basic feedstock. And yet they want to set-up various regimes to limit its concentration in the atmosphere on the dubious premise that it causes global warming.
There has been no significant warming for the past 15+ years, and not much since the little Ice age, perhaps a degree Celsius.
So what’s the real agenda, governments wanting more taxes, socialist wealth distribution, or just plain greed by those who see an opportunity to amass fortunes flogging carbon credits on dumb politicians and their ilk.
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“I am amazed at the scientific illiteracy of supporters of the AGW industry”
I’m not… we get a few here that are definitely in that category.
It seems to be a defining characteristic.
161
Where is your red thumb friend? Taking the night off?
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Trying to explain why global warming causes warmer polar regions, with more ice and snow.
Or trying to work out why the “extra heat” doesn’t register on thermometers, only causes disasters. After all, if the “missing heat” is in the ocean deeps shouldn’t it be causing typhoons under a 1000 metres of sea.
Or, picketing Shell service stations in the UK (see the Bishop) to bring about the release of the Arctic 30.
Or maybe all the contradictions have made their tiny brains go POP.
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I’m obviously using the wrong bait today. 🙁
71
I heard falafel works well
00
for the record:
as of the time of this comment, my Google News page does not have a single link to the Japan story, not in my own mix of stories, nor in “world” list nor in “top stories” list.
those google al-GOREithms still rule.
50
more trouble ahead:
16 Nov: The Hindu: Draft text creates flutter at Warsaw climate meet
A draft text of a ministerial decision on the controversial phasing out of refrigerant and global warming gases – hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) – circulating in the negotiations stirred debate on late Friday night on how the talks would progress over the week …
The source of the text, which was also accessed by The Hindu, could not be ascertained. The operative part of the on page text said that the countries should agree to adopting “appropriate measures under the Montreal Protocol on substances that deplete the ozone layer to progressively reduce the production and consumption of HFCs, based on, inter alia, an examination of economically viable and technically feasible alternatives, and to continue to include HFCs within the scope of the convention and its Kyoto Protocol for accounting and reporting of emissions.”
In other words, it asked the countries to decide at the Warsaw meeting of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change that it would agree to let the global warming gas be dealt with under the Montreal Protocol, which deals with ozone-depleting substances so far and does not have the principles of equity and common but differentiated responsibilities enshrined in it.
This is a controversial move that India, China and several other countries had successfully opposed at a recent meeting of the Montreal Protocol. While it’s a proposal that has had the backing of the US, the EU and number of other developing and developed countries, it turned controversial especially this year. First there was a G20 declaration to which India and China – two of the fastest growing markets for refrigerant gases – signed up taking them a step closer to the HFC phase out under Montreal Protocol. Then on the eve of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s visit to Washington, the US pulled all stops to get him to sign on the dotted line for a faster decision on the phase out under Montreal Protocol. The diplomatic hard ball back-fired for the US, with India warning that the costs of transition and issues of control of alternative technology by few US-based companies had not been resolved. India stepped back and soon when the Montreal Protocol meeting happened in October it was able to block any hasty decision on this along with China, Argentina, Saudi Arabia, Argentina, Indonesia and about 10 other countries.
They warned that the technology was untested, extremely costly and in the hands of the few and the proposal would make India and China jump to costlier alternatives in time even as the developed world did a slow phase down of the gas.
Failed at the Montreal Protocol, the developed countries and their other allies promised to reopen the subject at the Warsaw climate convention talks. The EU pushed from the early days at the negotiations without finding traction at the negotiators level. The five days of negotiations did not see any give in from the developing countries.
Now this text has emerged on Friday night sending the developing countries that are opposed to the move as well as about how contentious issues would be dealt with in the high-level segment scurrying for consultations…
http://www.thehindu.com/sci-tech/energy-and-environment/draft-text-creates-flutter-at-warsaw-climate-meet/article5355952.ece
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Thank you Jo, this just keeps on getting better and better.
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Now we get to wait for the brain fart of an analysis from the media rabitting on about how “as disasters increase, countries will find it more difficult to reduce their targets and we’re all gonna burn in dantes inferno I tell ya and it’s all your fault too ”
Just remember that I called it – if it hasn’t already been done, I will be surprised.
Personally, I love the whales I hear they taste yummy. No one ever stands up for the millions of Krill you get killed by whales each and every day. Save the Krill, I say.
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LOL yeah that’s like the comedian’s take on dolphin-safe tuna. He said “Dolphin-safe tuna? That’s alright if you’re a dolphin, but what if you’re a tuna?”
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Yes , beware of the Kriller Whales.
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Save the Whales – Collect the Whole Set.
20
At the risk of exposing my ignorance, exactly what, pray tell, has China pledged in the way of reducing their own CO2 emissions? Perhaps self-criticism has gone out of style or maybe they are just practicing “leadership by example, with Chinese characteristics”.
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I thought ‘developing’ countries only had to benefit, rather than contribute ?
Don’t forget most of what the developed nations have to contribute they’ll be borrowing from China anyway.
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More to the point, why is China, the largest carbon dioxide emitting country in the world, in a position to sell ‘carbon dioxide credits’. Are we talking about the same type of scam here such as, for example, the one the European socialist economies used to get Russia to sign up to Kyoto 1. They succeeded in doing this by giving Russia an emitting target that was so far beyond their emissions at the time that they could not possibly exceed the limit – in other words they were given a free pass.
Which so-called treaty did China sign up to that enabled them to trade ‘carbon dioxide credits’. Was it a case of the European socialists wanting so desperately to include China for propaganda purposes that they gave China emitting targets they could not possibly exceed, thus allowing the Chinese to cash in by selling credits to other countries.
We have to remember that China’s own renewables programs appear to be directed mostly at creating the illusion of taking action. Here is a thorough analysis – note especially the scamming that is going on. Also, China is building coal fired power plants at astounding levels. But you get a true picture of the Chinese position when you consider that China and other countries retaliated against Europe when the Europeans tried to apply emissions permits to aviation.
So it seems we have a situation where the Chinese are creating the illusion of participating in emissions reductions efforts, firstly, to make money out of it and, secondly, to avoid the expense of actually doing something, and Western leftists are complicit in this deception so that they – that is, Western leftists – can continue their crusade against fossil fuels.
130
Of course. Nobody ever thinks the Chinese are stupid. At least, not more than once.
It has been argued that China is an agronomic nation because the majority of the country is given over to manual, and in some areas subsistence farming. Industry is confined to the eastern seaboard, which is less than five percent of the total land area, and therefore is not statistically significant, in the wider context.
60
This sounds so much like the Tory Troughers you can hear talking up how much China are doing.
The Chinese Puzzle of Chairman Yeo.
& Lord Deben’s:
While both they and the Chinese have UK Energy Minister Ed Davey eating out of their lap, on Climate and handing UK Energy policy over to become hostage to their vested interests.
Ed in China Daily
30
15 Nov: News Ltd: Nick Perry: Aus govt mocked by NGOs at climate summit
AUSTRALIA has won its third “fossil of the day” award at the UN climate talks in Warsaw, as international environment groups attempt to embarrass the Abbott government on the world stage over its decision to scrap the carbon tax…
It has won three of the four “fossil” awards handed out so far, with host nation Poland bagging one over its decision to hold a coal summit at the same time as the UN talks…
Business groups at the summit are questioning recent policy changes in Australia.
Baker and McKenzie climate lawyer Ilona Millar said she had fielded questions from business delegates asking about the future of carbon pricing in Australia, and when the repeal was to occur.
“A lot of people who are working in that space are a little bit perplexed about why you would move away from a market-based approach,” she told AAP from Warsaw on Friday.
Those excited about Australia’s carbon market linking with Europe’s emissions trading scheme had expressed “some disappointment” at the prospect of it being dismantled, she said…
http://www.news.com.au/national/breaking-news/aus-govt-mocked-by-ngos-at-climate-summit/story-e6frfku9-1226761116478
a new fossil:
15 Nov: ClimateNewsNetwork: Paul Brown: Warsaw—Day 5: Dismay as Japan Abandons Greenhouse Targets
Kimiko Hirata, a Japanese representative of CAN, said “Japan is betraying these talks; this is very very disappointing, totally unhelpful, not to say destructive.”
Fossil of the day
She was particularly alarmed that the decision had been announced in the middle of the climate talks after more than two years of deliberations. “The government process has been totally without transparency. OK, 50 plants were shut down, but emissions only rose by 7.5% overall.
“This is just an excuse. Japan could still reduce emissions by 2020, I only hope that there will be such an internal and international reaction that the Government will reconsider.”
Japan was awarded the “fossil of the day” award by non-government organisations, reserved for the nation judged to have done most to obstruct progress at the climate talks…
http://www.climatenewsnetwork.net/2013/11/warsaw-day-5-dismay-as-japan-abandons-greenhouse-targets/
15 Nov: Tri-City Herald: AP: Monika Scislowska: Japan dials back climate change emissions target
Climate activists following the talks in Warsaw named Japan “fossil of the day,” a dubious honor meant to tag a country blocking progress on combating climate change. Dressed up in dark suits to look like Cabinet ministers, the activists ate sushi over colleagues pretending to be victims of the typhoon that has killed thousands of people in the Philippines…
http://www.tri-cityherald.com/2013/11/15/2677418/japan-dials-back-climate-change.html
20
Japan should say no thank you to buying carbon credits and go on about doing what is best for Japan. Let the UN stew about it if they don’t like it. What can the UN do about it? I think nothing worth worrying about.
90
Joe V –
Reuters: Minami said the aid will be a mix of grants and loans, with $13 billion coming from the government and the rest from the private sector…
http://www.japantoday.com/smartphone/view/national/japan-slashes-greenhouse-gas-reduction-goal-target
no break-down of grants/loans but given Bank of Japan’s Quantatative Easing program, printing more Yen isn’t a problem!
40
Just to show the depths to which the global warmist ideology has descended to and it’s practioners abject contortions and dishonesty, from the German P Gosselins NoTricksZone blog.
Report Claims Forests In Germany Ailing Due In Part To Climate Change: Winters Have Been “Too Frosty”!
[quote]
To illustrate the absurdity that global warming science has become, global warming is claimed to cause climate change, which in turn now causes winters to be too cold!
This is what some leading German state officials would like to have people believe. –
[ End Quote]
60
And I read recently somewhere that AGW causes increased volcanic activity….as if they could add any more cataclysms to the list (rhetorical). The following has a fair presentation explaining the issue.
The climate-volcano connection doesn’t apply to Earth’s current warming trend, of course, because we’re not in the middle of an ice age–it’s been 12,000 years since the world’s continents felt the weight of all that frozen water. (And yes! When it melted, there were lots more eruptions than normal!)
20
Of course, if you take the temperature range of magma: 600C to 1000C, and then you add the observed increase in atmospheric temperature of climate change: 0.01C, then it is obvious, to a thinking person such as myself, that a tipping point must be reached, at some stage.
10
as with all CAGW figures:
14 Nov: ClimateDepot Special Report: Marc Morano: Climate Poll Con Job: ‘When you don’t like the poll numbers, make up your own poll’ – Media Duped Again By Stanford U. Pollster Jon Krosnick’s Shoddy Agenda Driven Climate Polling
http://www.climatedepot.com/2013/11/14/climate-poll-con-job-when-you-dont-like-the-poll-numbers-make-up-your-own-poll-media-duped-again-by-stanford-u-pollster-jon-krosnicks-shoddy-agenda-driven-climate-polling-a-climate-dep/
10
shameless:
16 Nov: UK Guardian: Cameron links typhoon Haiyan to climate change
Prime minister seemingly endorses stance that global warming is creating more extreme weather patterns
Rowena Mason in Colombo, and Damian Carrington
There is growing evidence that climate change is causing more extreme weather disasters such as the Philippines typhoon, David Cameron said.
In remarks likely to infuriate the green sceptics in his party, the prime minister gave his first acknowledgement that global warming may be linked to increasingly intense storms across the world…
However, Cameron spoke out on the need to tackle global warming at the Commonwealth summit in Colombo, Sri Lanka, after typhoon Haiyan killed at least 4,000 people and caused devastation across the Philippines.
Asked on Fridaywhether climate change was linked to the Philippines disaster, Cameron said: “I’ll leave the scientists to speak for themselves about the link between severe weather events and climate change. But the evidence seems to me to be growing. As a practical politician, I think the sensible thing is to say let’s take preventative and mitigating steps given the chances this might be the case.”
He added: “Scientists are giving us a very certain message. Even if you’re less certain than the scientists, it makes sense to act both in terms of trying to prevent and mitigate.”…
Cameron’s comments come after Ed Davey, energy secretary, said it was possible that rising sea levels caused by global warming may have made some islands more vulnerable and made storms more intense.
However, Lord Lawson, a former Tory chancellor and leading figure in the party’s climate sceptic lobby, claimed on Thursday that there was absolutely no link between Haiyan and global warming…
***In comments appeared designed to appeal to sceptics in his party, Cameron made the case that Britain should tackle climate change as an “insurance policy”.
“There is no doubt there have been an increasing number of severe weather events in recent years,” he said. “And I’m not a scientist but it’s always seemed to me one of the strongest arguments about climate change is, even if you’re only 90% certain or 80% certain or 70% certain, if I said to you there’s a 60% chance your house might burn down, do you want to take out some insurance – you take out some insurance. I think we should think about climate change like that.”…
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/nov/16/david-cameron-climate-change-typhoon-haiyan
15 Nov: UK Guardian: Japan under fire for scaling back plans to cut greenhouse gases
UN climate talks in Warsaw face setback as U-turn on emissions angers developing countries in shadow of typhoon Haiyan
by John Vidal in Warsaw and Terry Macalister
The UN climate talks in Warsaw, Poland, were faced with a new crisis on Friday, after Japan, the world’s fifth largest greenhouse gas emitter, slashed its plans to reduce emissions from 25% to just 3.8% on 2005 figures.
The move was immediately criticised as “irresponsible” and “unambitious” by developing countries and climate groups at the talks…
Britain’s energy and climate change secretary, Ed Davey, called the decision “deeply disappointing” and at odds with the need to tackle global warming.
He was still hopeful that the UK and other members of the G8 leading economies could encourage Tokyo to change its mind.
“It is deeply disappointing that the Japanese government has taken this decision to significantly revise down its 2020 emissions target. This announcement runs counter to the broader political commitment to tackle climate change, recently reaffirmed by G8, as well as the enhanced ambition we have seen from the world’s major emitters,” he argued in unusually robust terms.
“Yet I believe we can persuade Japan to change her mind again, to resume her leadership role in the world on climate change. Despite the challenges, if the public backs the government it can invest in low carbon electricity,” he added…
***The aid package is thought to include supplying developing countries with “green” technologies developed by Japanese firms, including offshore wind turbines, fuel-cell vehicles and high-tech housing insulation. No figures were given on the scale of the emission cuts that the package might achieve…
http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2013/nov/15/japan-scaling-back-cut-greenhouse-gases
20
UK PM Camerone says:
Cripes. They’re speaking from the same crib sheet! That is almost exactly what the NZ Minister of Climate, Dr Smith wrote to me years ago.
There simply must be a UN briefing paper about how to keep the sheeple quiescent.
80
I would have thought that the Precautionary Principle has been obsolete since it was tried in 431BC, but here’s Cameron trotting it out.
When the leading state in ancient Greece, Athens, demanded Sparta make certain concessions. They pointed out that refusal would lead to war, and IF they won the result would disastrous for Sparta (loss of land, life, slaves etc.)
The Spartans replied IF? and subsequently Athens wound up as a provincial backwater of little importance.
20
Only because the Spartans had Brad Pitt.
20
Graeme, you write,
“I would have thought that the Precautionary Principle has been obsolete since it was tried in 431BC, but here’s Cameron trotting it out.
When the leading state in ancient Greece, Athens, demanded Sparta make certain concessions. They pointed out that refusal would lead to war, and IF they won the result would disastrous for Sparta (loss of land, life, slaves etc.)”
I know I’m being a pedant here but I believe you have your date & incident wrong. The conflict was not between Sparta and Athens, but rather between Sparta and Philip II of Macedon which is well north of Athens.
10
She Who Must Be Obeyed is Japanese, and she has some pretty crisp things to say about TEPCO. They include terms which I haven’t heard before, some of which translate as “nepotism’ and “old boy’s network”, and others which (since this is a family site) i will leave untranslated.
“METI estimates Japan has paid as much as ¥800 billion ($10.4 billion) to buy 400 million metric tons of carbon credits.”
Well, since is this is supposed to be a form of socialism, that money will be used for the benefit of the working people, won’t it?
60
RoHa,
Yeah, all those hard working Financial Services Bankers. It’s hard work shuffling numbers around. And remembering the real risk ratings on all those CDOs. I mean cut them some slack – you trying having to pay off a couple of maseratis….
40
it’s been quite a week for Japan:
12 Nov: Japan Times: JIJI: Plan to lower radiation readings OK’d
To facilitate the return of evacuees, the Nuclear Regulation Authority has approved a change in the way radiation doses are monitored around the crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power station that will effectively result in lower readings, but observers warn this could raise public mistrust.
The change calls for basing monitoring on data from dosimeters held by individual residents.
It was proposed by the regulatory commission’s secretariat at its meeting Monday and gained broad-based consensus…
The new method is expected to help promote the return of evacuees as well as reduce costs for decontaminating areas tainted by radioactive fallout from the Tokyo Electric Power Co. plant.
But a change in the monitoring method could heighten local residents’ mistrust of the government, observers said…
Decontamination costs are estimated at Yen2.53 trillion to Yen5.13 trillion in Fukushima Prefecture, excluding radioactive waste disposal
In the city of Fukushima, Ichiro Kowata, 77, an evacuee from Iitate, called for the government to more fully explain the proposed method change. “Younger people say they can’t trust statements that suddenly declare areas to be safe when they have been called dangerous until now,” he said.
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2013/11/12/national/plan-to-lower-radiation-readings-okd/
00
People who are dismayed by Japan’s statement should really read Nigel Lawsons “Appeal to Reason : A Cool Look At Global Warming”. There is this wonderful part towards the the end where he basically states that there is no technical, economic or political mechanism to put in place what is required – the de-industrialisation of the west. Anyone who thinks there is “doesn’t need to worry about saving this planet ….. they are already living on a different one”. The move by Japan just illustrates this reality. There is absolutely no point putting in place targets and making ‘commitments’ if there is no mechanism to make them happen.
It can’t have been a very good summit in Warsaw …..lets look at the facts. Japan reneges on previous commitments, Australia moves to scrap carbon tax and doesn’t even turn up – which Canada applauds, 50,000 Poles demonstrate against environmentalism, coal conference next door, US blocks wealth re-distribution plan, Europe wrings hands in angst as it looks into the black hole of impoverishment and global irrelevance. Oh yes, and meanwhile we are now in 17th year of no global warming, ironically almost exactly the same number of years these stupid conferences have been taking place. Its over folks.
170
And it’s also worth remembering that in 1996 CO2 levels were just under 360ppm, and are now 400ppm – which is an increase of about 11%.
No more needs to be said.
60
… and it still has another week to go.
40
Every time I have been in Warsaw, it has either been raining, or snowing. It sounds like the ideal place to discuss something as dreary as climate change.
20
Talking about falling apart, have you seen this?
Not sure what it means.
“Corn futures fall after EPA ethanol proposal”
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11158300
NEW YORK (AP) Corn futures fell Friday after the Environmental Protection Agency proposed to reduce the amount of ethanol in the nation’s fuel supply for the first time.
December corn fell 4.5 cents, or 1.1 percent, to $4.22 a bushel.
The EPA issued a proposal that oil refiners blend 15.2 billion gallons of renewable fuel, which is roughly 3 billion gallons below what was required in a 2007 law passed by Congress.
The law requires oil refiners to blend gasoline with 10 percent ethanol in an effort to address global warming. The law pushed corn prices higher.
Soybeans, which can be used in make biodiesel, another renewable fuel, fell 33 cents, or 2.5 percent, to $12.805 a bushel.
Wheat edged down a quarter of a cent to $6.445 a bushel.
30
My understanding is that this is simply a response to the fact that people are driving fewer miles and using less fuel. The 10% ethanol in fuel still remains.
10
Don,
the EPA wants to reduce the amount of ethanol in fuel. Excuse is possible engine damage but real reason is growing awareness of the economic and environmental damage.
Growing monoculture, expansion of farms into environmental areas and even virgin soils, with inevitable results.
See http://bigstory.ap.org/article/secret-dirty-cost-obamas-green-power-push-1
See also http://bigstory.ap.org/topic/ethanol
Bear in mind the obvious ax being ground at this site.
20
That was what I thought but now I see this.
“The EPA’s proposed biofuel reduction follows concerns from oil companies and some automobile advocates that more than 10 percent ethanol in motor fuel could cause engine damage, a potential issue that’s known as the blend wall.
The EPA said adding more ethanol, at a time that fuel economy is improving, would push the percentage past 10 percent. Nearly all gasoline sold in the United States now has up to 10 percent ethanol, the agency said.
Read more here: http://www.kansascity.com/2013/11/15/4624584/epa-orders-cut-in-ethanol-in-gasoline.html#storylink=cpy ”
and
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/11/16/schadenfreude-and-a-they-told-you-so-moment-ap-investigation-corn-based-ethanol-causes-environment-damage/#more-97541
10
That’s a confused article from Kansas City.
Basically, the EPA wants less ethanol in total blended into the fuel supply. With an improvement in the economy the total fuel usage will rise, so the percentage will drop.
What is very obvious is the statements from the farmer lobby, the bio-fuels lobby and the ‘green’ idiots. The first two barely raised their snouts from the trough. They’re in it for the money. The ‘green’ idiots believe (I can’t bring myself to say they think) that bio-fuels are good for the environment.
I hope the latter make a trek into the Arctic in a bio-fueled vehicle which runs out of ‘gas’ in the middle of a group of polar bears.
50
O/T (just for MattyB)
Climate Communicators divulge secrets for effective communication
“We’re not blaming scientists for the fix that we’re in, but scientists often do shoot their own foot in what they’re communicating,” Hassol says.
The audience will be somewhat assuaged by using positive words, Somerville says.
People are less likely to tune out a message that’s positive, inspirational and not miserable, Somerville says.
.
Our climate communicators could use a lesson from the Snowmen Prophets of Doom.
40
Polish people gived warm welcome to UN conference
“”…. As more than 50,000 enthusiastic Poles gathered in downtown Warsaw on Monday to celebrate National Independence Day, with millions more watching on live television, CFACT president David Rothbard was invited to the stage to deliver an impassioned address celebrating freedom and warning against the dangerous and oppressive climate agenda of the UN.
Before what was one of the largest audienWarsaw climate rally crowdces to ever hear a speech denouncing UN global warming policies, Rothbard said he was honored to stand with the Poles in a “new battle for freedom against those who would use environmental and climate alarmism to steal away our liberties and give international bureaucrats control over our energy sources, our daily lives, our prosperity, and our national sovereignty.
The address was carried live on national television and covered by a large number of international media outlets. It took place just as the UN was kicking off its COP19 climate conference a few kilometers away……”
https://www.cfact.org/2013/11/12/cfact-rallies-50000-poles-against-climate-treaty/
20
If less Arctic Winter Ice means a colder spring in the Northern Hemisphere, does more Arctic Winter Ice mean a warmer Autumn in the Northern Hemisphere?
10
This might be of interest – a further indication of the gradual restoration of sanity?
It’s from the UK’s ‘911 and Porsche World’ magazine, December 2013 issue no.237 page 10, written by David Sutherland.
“The development of electric cars may slacken now that the German government has torpedoed proposed EU emissions laws. But are these overweight battery cars a good idea anyway?
Most people without a specialist knowledge of the motor industry probably think electric cars are the answer to the pollution problem. The industry’s recent offerings, not least Porsche’s Panamera S E-Hybrid, have been superbly engineered and pretty reasonable to drive, and while sales have not been growing at a fast rate, they did seem to be becoming a logical part of the automotive landscape.
That was until Angela Merkel, now arguably Europe’s most influential politician, exposed the wooly and insubstantial basis of their existence. As reported in these pages, in late October the German Chancellor, in fighting her car industry’s corner, vetoed a stringent EU emissions target previously agreed for 2020 that most German car makers had no hope of meeting, due to their cars being bigger engined and more powerful than most.
Prior to this, Porsche, and particularly BMW and Mercedes Benz had put a lot of resources into electric cars. Their story was they were being green, but their main motivation was that zero emissions cars help keep their average CO2 emissions down. It was even said that Mercedes only persisted with Smart, believed to be a big loss maker, for the low emissions it generated.
But with the planned 95g/km cap now history, the industry has just lost its incentive to build electric cars. So maybe these cars – which with their battery packs and complex engineering are still of questionable efficiency when seen in the greater energy context – will revert to the side show they were previously.
In the longer term electric cars will almost certainly play an important role. But meanwhile the removal of a distorting legislative force allows car makers like Porsche to get cleaner and more efficient without having to whistle to the Brussels tune.”
30
“Environmentalists not happy”
I thought that was part of the clinical diagnosis of the condition. Can anyone point me towards confirmed evidence that there has ever been a happy environmentalist?
60
“Environmentalists not being happy”.
That IS the condition. So they want to make everyone else miserable and CO2 penury is just a means to do it.
What they didn’t count on is you cann’t sustain misery and people just get tired of it.
Short attention spans and low tolerance for misery … they should just declare the 2nd week of the Warsaw summit a party and be done with the pretence.
50
Neither can I imagine why anyone afflicted with environ-mentalism could be fundamentally happy. Afterall, many are leading double lives pretending not to be rampant socialists to begin with. Afterall, so much of what is advocated results in a raft of both intended and unintended consequences that are unpleasant, expensive, inefficient inconvenient, useless and environmentally destructive. If what they suggested was so magnificent, so economic, so efficient would it not present a compelling and persuading argument for wider adoption? It has been said before and I paraphrase: it’s a wonderful party until someone else’s money runs out.
In the meantime, the results of their dourly despondent endeavours are observed everywhere. The contraction of the name of a vital atmospheric gas to ‘carbon’, and its subsequent demonsisation together with words like fossil, footprint, anthropogenic, warming, weather, climate, wealth, oil, fuel, car, smoke, genetic, big-, to list a few. Their solid contributions to policies and practices that lead to or aggravate economic ruination, stagnation and the further impoverishment of those already struggling. The ravaging of bird and bat populations, the decline of prairie land and chickens, the promotion of a useless fiat currency, an entirely new elite of sanctimonious carbon hating money lauderers, administrators, banksters, peddlers and advisers, policy analysts and carbon accountants, school brainrinsing, diminished hotel room services under the aegis of ‘saving our environment’ without a commensurate reduction in hotel room cost, the ever growing list of imposed eco-guilts and frankly, reasons to simply go and jump off the nearest motorway bridge.
No sir. They are not happy. They are by definition emotionally immobilised in perpetual misery. In this state they are incapable of present moment or future happiness. The only time they could feel an ersatz happiness is when they yank our chains. The imposition of their belief provides them with a momentary and illusory tingle. They sense power and control. As many others have found in history, this is an intoxicating and heady motivation that supplants anything as mundane as ‘happiness’.
It is also a descent into irrational nonsense, corruption and inhumanity. People are finally begnning to see and sense it for what it is. Once the drama used to capture power is revealed, everyone can see the Emperior has no clothers.
70
Fabulous – a new word – ‘clothers’. A Gary Larsen ‘Far Side’ DANG moment.
20
Is that like “birthers” for prudes?
00
Birthers
Rereke, I consider myself a moderately informed hombre de mundo. Your worldly experience eclipses most, if not all, but certainly mine!
00
Manfred,
I have to admit you got me on that. I meant to type “bathers” (being a colloquialism for a bathing suit – though why they are a “suit” beats me) and it came out as birthers.
The really scary thing though, was that I made the same typing error in writing this response. I think I am finally losing it, not that I can remember ever having an “it” to lose.
00
Australia gets fossil of the day . Could these be sent to Milne,Bandt & Flannery for “services” to the Australian public
40
Well obviously Japan was going to ditch the Kyoto scam to save their economy.
Just do the math, you can’t run the Cold Lasers on Super-X3 with wind power.
60
The Fukushima Commentary is a long-running “blog” of what is actually going on in Japan. There are birefs from Japan’s media, etc and a few comments on why such stragne things are happening.
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. — Arthur C. Clarke
While Japan fosters the illusion that it is a country of hi-tech geeks who all very bright and understand what makes their toys tick, it seems that the truth is far removed. While there are certainly technology leaders, the bulk of the population, and that, as in Australia, includes the ruling class is burdened by superstition and in maintaining the status quo; which in Japan is exascerbated by a strong tradition of respect for authority and sense of one’s place in society.
Japan consumes hi-tech with little appreciation of what goes into making stuff and what it takes to keep that stuff working. In recent decades, the chasm between technical understanding and the consumers of the technology has widened. (Same holds true for Australia and many “Western Countries”.)
Prosperity has produced apathy. Individuals tend to be obsessed with doing things that make them happy today. Quasi-religions spring up to fill that happiness void. They are used to being told what they should do; even if they consult charlatans for advice. That seems to work until something breaks. And there’s nobody around who understands enough and to express it with sufficient confidence and persuasion to fix it.
We must not let our fears of tomorrow prevent us from doing what we know has to be done today.
In the Fukushima Commentary you’ll read about political machinations, management that can’t manage because they have no technical appreciation of the technology that they are supposed to be manageing; public relations officers who thought it was a good idea to present the improbable worst-case scenario as though it were a likely outcome to the salivating media; fearmongers fuelling the debate; government paying people handsomely to be refugees, … The persistent disaster is one of man-made devastation wrought on the lives of those who lived in the region, evacuated and prohibited from returning home to rebuild. Due to some fantasy that there is no such thing as a safe dose of radiation and that radiation levels are “excessive” when they are a fraction of the background radiation levels experienced by several billion other people on the planet.
Some form of sanity will prevail. Eventually.
While overseas on holiday in June 2011, I had a brief and broken conversation with a student from Japan. I expressed confidence that, eventually, the peoples’ traditional resolve and common sense would triumph and let the people get back to their homes. But first the curtains of fear, woven by the deluded, the insane, the media, governments and NGO’s, have to be torn to shreds.
There should be no profit from the misery of others.
110
Bernd has it absolutely correct here.
These days tech savvy means that they know how to operate the thing they are holding.
However, when it comes to where the electrical power to run all these things comes from, well that comes from the hole in the wall.
As to the actual generation of the power itself, barely one in a thousand has even the slightest comprehension, let alone the understanding of how electrical power is made.
And therein lies the problem.
The belief is that if it generates electrical power then it is all the same.
Coal fired power is old technology and wind and solar are new technology.
Old is well, old, and anything new is similar to what they hold in their hand, new technology, therefore good, therefore infinitely better than old, if you can see the point I’m getting at here.
Everything that generates electrical power is exactly the same.
The perception is that coal fired power is the T Model Ford, and wind and solar are the latest model top of the range BMW. They are both cars and they both perform the same task, but the newer version, because it is newer, is infinitely better.
You just cannot tell people that there is such a thing as new technology coal fired power and that it is also the latest model top of the range Mercedes.
Coal is old. Wind/Solar are new. Both do the same. Supply electricity that comes out of the hole in the wall.
Because coal fired power is so huge and provides the baseline that all these boutique solar and wind deliver out that hole in the wall, the perception is that wind and solar just come out of the hole in the wall just like coal fired power.
I’m capitalising this not to shout, but to make a point. It’s in block quotes so that Bolding it has more of an efffect.
It would only take two/three days. That’s all.
After that. End of story. No more crap about how good wind and solar are.
People just do not want to know.
It comes out of the hole in the wall.
It’s always there.
Its’ all the same.
Well, it isn’t.
Tony.
230
You are so right Tony. But it just ain’t gonna happen like that, is it ? Rather it ‘ll be like boiling the frog, shutting down & decommissioning a few at a time so that they cannot be restarted . That way by the time it is realised – well it won’t matter because it’ll be far too late by then.
60
Eddie:
they have been doing that in the UK until about 3 months ago some of the smarter ones started to realise that they were going to “freeze their butts off” either in the coming winter and/or in the 2014/15 winter.
Hence the sudden resolution of the new nuclear stations standoff by throwing money at the applicant to supply power at twice the current rate. (Mind you, I think it mostly public relations (to look like they’re doing something) as the nuclear power stations won’t be running for at least 7 years).
Then there is the subsidies for diesel generators going to the (what is the UK version of pink batt installers?) to generate when those wind turbines don’t.
Money, money, money …and it will all raise the cost of electricity to the ‘expendable’ poor. Make no mistake Cameroon the ecoloon is a right nasty piece of work.
80
Well Cameroon was turning his nastiness to better use this week , being nasty to the much nastier Sri Lankan regime. Taking the opportunity of the Commonwealth Heads conference in Colombo to be the first foreign leader to visit to the Tamil North since 1948 and drawing attention to the oppression and murder that’s been going on there .
Putting the President of Sri Lanka on notice that he better investigate himself sharpish or suffer the attention of the UN for alleged war crimes.
Now he has found the courage to stand up to small countries perhaps he’ll find skme courage to stand up to his Lib Dem partners who are rapidly ensuring Zbritain hasn’t got an Energy future of its own
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There seems to be little interest in how something operates anymore. People are more intersted in what happens when you put 2000V through a plasma panel, shoot a PS4 with a high powered rifle, drop a smart phone from a balcony, hit a tablet with baseball bats, etc.
To know how to operate something makes people feel smart, to try and understand how it functions would achieve the exact opposite.
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Germany’s generators have given notice of shutdowns of conventional, mostly load-following power stations because they have becoem commercially unviable to operate due to the priorities given to intermittent, unpredictable and variable electricity from “renewables”. Those stations spend much of their time consuming a great deal of fuel and other resources while putting no electricity onto the grid at all. They need to “idle” so that they can respond quickly to changes in the demand and the ability of other generators to supply. But while those idling generators are not supplying, they cannot directly recover their operating costs.
With priority given to (subsidised) “renewables”, the time spent by generators on idle increases and they peak price necessary to recover the total operating costs of the generators are not acceptable to the market. Being multi-nationals, the operators’ plans including some of the newer plant (some less than 3 years old) into a nearby country with a better market for operations.
If Merkel’s government “allows” the shutdown of those generators, then Germany will find itself facing power shortages which they could, as the do at present, fill with “imports”, but the price of the imports will increase as a result of the shortage. For German industry, that is not a good answer.
OTOH, if Merkel provides (taxpayers’) subsidies to the generators to keep them idling, then there will not only be a multi-lateral political backlash (Greens, EU, subsidised “renewables” industry, etc.). Germany is alread “in trouble” with the EU because it exempts large energy consumers from paying the indulgences imposed on others for their energetic sins. The EU views that arrangement as a “subsidy” to German industry and Germany is threatened with large fines, payable to the EU, for such transgressions.
The real solution is even less palatable to politics in Germany; to abandon the Energiewende and the underlying fantasy of “CO2 pollution” completely. The Energiewende is not something that can be “stopped” overnight because existing contracts run up to about 2025; but proposals for new projects and new subsidies can certainly be sent to the document shredder.
In the end, curtailing institutionalised corruption of energy supply provides the only way forward. Everything else just goes around in ever-decreasing circles; steered by self-interest groups and powered by the money taken from taxayers and energy users.
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The biggest initial concern regarding Fukushima was the amount of water-born radiation released from the spent fuel rods.
But the press has never once queried, to my knowledge, why so many spent rods were being held on site, in the first place.
If you dig (as one of my colleagues, who speaks and reads Japanese, did), you can find a whole story of the local Green Party raising objections, and starting legal actions, to prevent the removal, and transportation of the rods to a place where they could be safely disposed of.
The idea, I guess, is that the plant would eventually have to stop production, because of the buildup of old material. The reality, of course, is that the disaster was a lot worse than it needs to have been.
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Off Topic.
It mirrors Spain.
Arizona Approves Grid-Connection Fees For Solar Rooftops
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-11-15/arizona-regulators-impose-power-grid-fees-for-solar-roofs.html
A $4.90 a month fee for anyone with roof top solar. The question i ask is, when will a disposal fee come into place? In about 15/20 years time, all these panels will start to fail and disposal will become an issue.
I don’t think burying them in landfill would be wise considering the toxic compounds involved.
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Thanks for mentioning this Steve.
Read this article from January how a now bankrupt solar panel manufacturer in the U.S. has panels that are unsellable.
The only way that they are allowed to dispose of them is to bury them, encased in concrete.
Bankrupt Abound Solar To Bury Unused Solar Panels In Cement
Tony.
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Ban doesn’t hesitate to blame Hyannis on Climate Change
Would that be more jobs for the usual suspects, that Aus. Won’t employ any more.
40
Do they have an ETA on this tipping point yet? Surely if they can predict scenarios with 95% confidence, they can give us a date by now. At least every other prophecy had a date to look forward to. Like when we all woke up on the 1st January 2000 amazed that we were still alive and our toasters still worked.
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My toaster didn’t work.
She was still in bed with a hangover. 😉
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Brett,
The trouble with too precise prophecies is they might be misinterpreted.
10
Or like this?
10
This is O/T but Matt Ridley’s speech has been posted at the Catallaxy Blog, a brilliant speech which he finishes on a great note.
link here
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Bangkok Post Obituary:
17 Nov: Bangkok Post Editorial: Climate picture out of Warsaw looking bleak
It’s hard to imagine a worse scenario for action on climate change than what is shaping up in Warsaw, Poland, at the Conference of the Parties (COP19), which runs until Friday. The negotiations have been labelled the “Coal COP” …
Japan announced in Warsaw on Friday that it is rescinding its pledge to reduce greenhouse gases by 25% of 1990 levels by 2020, citing the Fukushima nuclear plant crisis as the reason…
Even more damaging to efforts to mitigate the effects of global warning is China’s decision to embark on the construction of at least nine large-scale coal-fuelled synthetic natural gas (SNG) plants in northwestern China and Inner Mongolia. According to the journal Nature Climate Change, these plants would emit seven times the greenhouse gases of conventional natural gas plants…
Meanwhile Canada and the US are betting on bitumen from the tar sands of Alberta, a thick, heavy oil that is among the most greenhouse gas-intensive forms of petroleum to produce. Estimates are that tar sands oil contributes from 15% to 100% more greenhouse gases per barrel than conventional oils because of the resources needed to process it. Aren’t we supposed to be going the other way? …
However, the chances for pro-active measures and a unified policy to head off global warming coming out of Warsaw or any other climate change venue don’t look promising when the two biggest producers of…
http://www.bangkokpost.com/opinion/opinion/380223/climate-picture-out-of-warsaw-looking-bleak
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Pat
Looks like Australia saved a few bucks by not sending a team of junketeers to this little fiasco, eh?
Truth. Don’t you just love it?
Cheers,
Speedy
50
having used the $100bn/year pledge to get “poor nations” onside, this should wake those nations up to the reality. time for those nations to call out CAGW for the scam it always was:
17 Nov: NYT: Steven Lee Myers/Nicholas Kulish: Growing Clamor About Inequities of Climate Crisis
(Steven Lee Myers reported from Warsaw, and Nicholas Kulish from Nairobi, Kenya. Justin Gillis contributed reporting from New York, David Jolly from Paris, and Mohammed Ibrahim from Mogadishu, Somalia)
From the time a scientific consensus emerged that human activity was changing the climate, it has been understood that the nations that contributed least to the problem would be hurt the most. Now, even as the possible consequences of climate change have surged — from the typhoons that have raked the Philippines and India this year to the droughts in Africa, to rising sea levels that threaten to submerge entire island nations — no consensus has emerged over how to rectify what many call “climate injustice.”…
The sheer magnitude and complexity of the issue make such compensation unlikely. The notion of seeking justice for a global catastrophe that affects almost every country — with enormous implications for economic development — is not only immensely complicated but also politically daunting.
It assumes the culpability of the world’s most developed nations, including the United States and those in Europe, and implies a moral responsibility to bear the costs, even as those same nations seek to draft a new treaty over the next two years that would for the first time compel reductions by rapidly emerging nations like China and India. As a group, developing countries will within a decade have accounted for more than half of all historical emissions, making them responsible for a large share of the continuing impact humanity will make, if not the impact already made.
Assigning liability for specific events — like Typhoon Haiyan, which struck the Philippines with winds of at least 140 miles an hour, making it one of the strongest storms on record — is nearly impossible…
How to compensate those nations hardest hit by climate changes remains divisive, even among advocates for such action. Some have argued that wealthy countries need to create a huge pool of money to help poorer countries recover from seemingly inevitable losses of the tangible and intangible, like destroyed traditions…
***The United States and other rich countries have made their opposition to large-scale compensation clear. Todd D. Stern, the State Department’s envoy on climate issues, bluntly told a gathering at Chatham House in London last month that large-scale resources from the world’s richest nations would not be forthcoming.
“The fiscal reality of the United States and other developed countries is not going to allow it,” he said. “This is not just a matter of the recent financial crisis. It is structural, based on the huge obligations we face from aging populations and other pressing needs for infrastructure, education, health care and the like. We must and will strive to keep increasing our climate finance, but it is important that all of us see the world as it is.”
Appeals to rectify the injustice of climate change, he added, will backfire. “Lectures about compensation, reparations and the like will produce nothing but antipathy among developed country policy makers and their publics,” he said…
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/17/world/growing-clamor-about-inequities-of-climate-crisis.html?_r=0
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If the ABC Was Relevant
(Pt 60). (The African Beggar.)
[Scene: A domestic lounge in a suburb somewhere. There is a knock on the front door. BRYAN answers. It is JOHN.]
John: Good day to you sir. My name is Robert Mugabe and I am here to collect your climate debt.
Bryan: Robert Mugabe – the infamous Prime Minister of Zimbabwe?
John: No sir, I am very famous, and was recently re-elected as Prime Minister of Zimbabwe by 109% of the voting public.
Bryan: Congratulations – but what’s this climate debt?
John: It is money you owe the great people of Zimbabwe to compensate them for the damage you have done to their envirionment.
Bryan: What damage?
John: Well, sir, Zimbabwe (formerly the oppressive state of Rhodesia) was the food bowl of Africa until runaway greenhouse gas emissions from Australia threw our economy into bankrupcy and our people into starvation.
Bryan: Didn’t this all happen about the same time that you took over as Prime Minister?
John: Yes sir, it was all very unfortunate.
Bryan: Couldn’t the bankrupcy and the starvation be due to corruption and the collapse of law which accompanied the handover of power to you and your croneys?
John: No, sir, that is very wrong and the United Nations is very sure about that. Ask the IPCC. Five thousand dollars please…
Bryan: Then why didn’t other countries in Africa – ones where you weren’t Prime Minister – have the same problems?
John: I don’t think we should discuss this at this time sir. You are only saying this because I am a black man. Five thousand dollars please…
Bryan: And this money would all go to the good people of Zimbabwe?
John: Oh, yes, sir. All the good people will be rejoicing.
Bryan: You wouldn’t just pocket the cash – you and your croneys?
John: Oh, no, no, no sir.
Bryan: Not like a conspicuous amount of foreign aid from the UN and other organisations soon after it arrives in Zimbabwe?
John: No, sir, you have my word for that.
Bryan: So, by giving you this money, I will not be supporting a corrupt and croneyistic government and helping them to perpetuate the poverty and misery of the Zimbabwean people?
John: Of course not sir – I promise.
Bryan: OK – Here you go. [Opens wallet]. A hundred trillion dollars – keep the change.
John: Thank you sir! [Looks at banknote.] I can’t accept this!
Bryan: Why not?
John: It’s worthless – it’s from the Zimbabwean government.
Bryan: My point exactly. Goodbye. [Shuts door.]
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definitely time for those promised the cash to bail out of the CAGW scam:
15 Nov: Bloomberg: Alex Morales: U.S., EU, Reject Brazilian Call for Climate Equity Metric
The U.S. and European Union blocked a proposal supported by 130 nations including Brazil and China that would use pollution levels dating back to the industrial revolution to help set limits on emissions in the future.
Australia and Canada joined in opposing discussion of the plan when it was introduced Nov. 11 at the start of two weeks of United Nations-sponsored talks Warsaw…
“Temperature is a lagging indicator and does not show up until well after emissions have occurred,” U.S. envoy Kim Carnahan told delegates on Nov. 11. “Such an approach would provide some countries with cover to act in a manner that is much less ambitious than their current capabilities.”…
Carnahan was joined by delegates from the EU, Norway, Switzerland, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Israel in opposing Brazil’s plan. The G77, a group of more than 130 developing nations, along with China have since thrown their support behind it…
“The IPCC procedures don’t allow for such a rapid response, and this risks delaying our important work,” said Geert Fremout, a diplomat from Belgium who spoke for the EU on the issue.
Marcondes de Carvalho of Brazil said delegates should let the IPCC decide whether the work is “doable.” …
Delegates including Fremout and Carnahan also made procedural objections, stating that Brazil shouldn’t have raised the issue in a forum called the Subsidiary Body for Scientific and Technological Advice, when a separate stream of negotiations has been tasked with devising the 2015 agreement…
For the EU’s Lefevere, that means owning up to emissions yet to be made.
“It’s not just responsibility for past emissions,” Lefevere said. “It’s responsibilities for current and future emissions.”
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-11-15/u-s-eu-reject-brazilian-call-for-climate-equity-metric.html
50
***NOTHING BEING OFFERED EXCEPT EMISSIONS TRADING!
16 Nov: RTCC (Responding to Climate Change): Sophie Yeo: Pressure mounts on EU as UN climate talks falter
Pressure is mounting on the European Union to make up for the lack of ambition shown by fellow developed countries Japan, Australia and Canada at UN talks in Poland.
Japan has attracted the brunt of fury after reducing its international emissions reduction targets, but negotiators from developing countries have told RTCC of their disappointment that the EU has failed to set out out a clear and ambitious pathway to a climate change deal in 2015…
Many developing countries say they are still concerned the EU has not ratified the second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol, agreed at UN talks in Doha last December…
Quamrul Chowdhury, lead negotiator for the Least Developed Countries, told RTCC that a failure to come up with a mechanism through which to deal with loss and damage would also have a negative impact on the levels of trust between developed and developing countries.
“An international mechanism for loss and damage is a strike here in Warsaw, because that will help keep an assurance for a robust agreement in 2015,” adding that such a mechanism should not only address economic losses but also the social losses that come with climate change.
Failure to achieve this, he said, “will erode the level of confidence, the level of trust. In this convention we need to build a level of trust so we can build on a robust agreement in 2015. For that from now on we have to work very hard, day in day out, for 24 hours a day.”…
Research by Climate Tracker Action coming out next week will show that the EU will have to increase its domestic 2020 target to a 45% emissions reduction target by 2020 if it is to maintain its position as a role model. This is an unlikely target, considering its current target of 20% emissions reductions.
The EU also needs to commit to the upper end of its target of a 80-95% emissions reduction by 2050, said Wendel Trio, director of the European branch of the Climate Action Network, speaking today at a panel in Warsaw.
This is a realistic target he said, as “continuing with this pathway of what we’ve done over the last five years will bring us to 95%.” This would involve a 2% reduction per year of emissions…
But Jakub Koniecki, a member of the Climate Action cabinet within the EU, told RTCC that he disagreed with the perception that the EU had taken a back seat in the current international negotiations, and that it continued to set an example to other countries.
***He said: “Looking at what we do domestically and looking not only at the headline reduction targets, we are (aren’t?) delivering on the Kyoto commitments obviously, but the instruments we have developed such as the emissions trading scheme, such as the way we finance things… these are things you can really easily copy if you like, so I think it is quite good leadership.”…
NGOs say they are concerned at the level of business engagement with the talks, and also a decision by UN climate chief Christiana Figueres to attend a coal summit hosted by Poland on Monday.
“Governments have come here and we’re moving backwards,” WWF’s head of Climate and Energy Samantha Smith told RTCC at the protest.
“We’re super frustrated, we’re hoping this process next week can make some forward movement, but if it doesn’t, we really have to question why are governments here, why are we here, and what is the UNFCCC Secretariat doing about this?” she added.
http://www.rtcc.org/2013/11/16/pressure-mounts-on-eu-as-un-climate-talks-falter/
30
Pat
As NGO gal said:
Exactly, my little Non-Goer friend. What is the point of this gabfest? Not much, is there?
The Aussie government didn’t bother – perhaps because Warmists don’t have any REAL evidence, do they?
Cheers,
Speedy
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The term ‘pathway’ , so beloved of pseudo-academic, theorising administrators, has become irrevocably linked with a process of terminal decline, ever since the implementation of a pathway for terminally ill patients highlighted that enamourment with the process , as much of having a process, was coming at the expense of the care the process was supposed to be delivering.
As a result the Liverpool Care pathway ( the only place that most normal people had heard the term used in this way) was eventually dropped altogether by the medical establishment.
Liverpool care pathway, a cautionary tale BMJ , 31 July 2013.
Referring to any bureaucratic process now as a ‘pathway’ is inviting not only ridicule, but an implicit inference of failure, in the minds of normal people.
The Kyoto protocol has had it’s last rites, though many still seem to be having difficulty coming to terms with its failure. Lets hope the actions of Australia and Japan will help them.
20
The pathway of which they speak us a euphemism (or an EUphemism if you like) for a way out.
It gives some time for all those who haven’t yet realised , still to come to terms.
20
Ban Ki Moon among them it seems.
It’s a great line but what it really means is there’s the real world (just the one) and there are the many cloud cuckoo lands which occupy so much head space.
20
At the GetUp rally in Melbourne Tim Flannery said “We can’t leave a matter as important as climate change to Australian politicians. We must stand up and be counted.”
Isn’t that what happened on Sept 7th and got him sacked?
Also if this matter cannot be left to politicians, shouldn’t he have declined the $180,000 per year and said it was not a matter for politicians? Can we have our money back Flim Flam?
71
In the Sanity Olympics taking place in Warsaw, the Host Nation is trailing with a single gold in the early days. Australia leads the medal tally with three Golds, and the USA is yet to score.
http://www.news.com.au/national/breaking-news/aus-govt-mocked-by-ngos-at-climate-summit/story-e6frfku9-1226761116478
Damn, news just in of a late break from Japan that’s bound to impress the judges!
50
I think that is great. The reaction from the delegates, and the awarding of “prizes” is what inadequate teachers do to embarrass kids in primary school. It is not the way that diplomacy is done.
The NGO’s have totally over-reacted, and not considered the fact that saying anything at all, only draws attention to what Australia has done. And it also draws attention to the fact that there are precious few sanctions that can be applied to countries that break ranks, shrug, and say that they ain’t gonna play any more.
By far the best strategy would have been to say nothing publicly, and then make the offers that could not be refused, in the back room. Well they have blown that option. Who’s got the popcorn?
40
Morning All.
I’m so sick of my Gravatar – it is just NOT me! Can anyone suggest an easy way to change this image?
Merci
Speedy
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Have a look at en.gravatar.com
20
Speedy, I only stumbled on it.
I’ve been contributing at the Blog where I am now the senior Editor (Sarc – big deal – /sarc)
The site owner would take my Posts via email. After two weeks of this, and an email every second day, and having to do all the work himself, he gave me login facility, so I could write my posts directly to the blog.
Then after 6 Months, when it was obvious I wasn’t just a FIFO contributor, and doing so much, he asked me to assist with posting the other Posts we take on a daily basis. It took a while to learn all the ropes, but it got easier. Then after 6 Months he promoted me to senior editor. (I’m still laughing at myself even now) Senior Editor. Just means I do all but one of the daily Posts. Doesn’t mean I get paid any more, as bloggers do it all for free anyway.
He still handles all the site Admin etc.
I get asked (often) why I don’t just open my own site here in Oz. No need. The site I contribute at is already monumentally larger than any site I could open under my own name.
Early on, the site owner asked me to do a profile thing and include an image, so I just used that one of me taken in some good clobber one ANZAC Day.
From that point forward whenever I leave comments at any other site, that image is what appears as my Avatar if I link back to the blog, which I do at most sites.
So, my suggestion to change your Avatar is to open up your own blog site. There’s no real need even to contribute to it. I’m sure they’re free to open, and I’ve lost count of the number of totally empty blog sites I’ve visited. In the Profile area, no need even to add anything there. Just pick anything you want as an Avatar at your site, and from that point forward, whenever you comment anywhere, that will be your Avatar if you link back to your (empty if you wish) Blog.
If I could let go with a little secret here, it could even be like our good friend Gee Aye, with his leaf. That’s his Avatar from his almost empty blog.
Just a suggestion.
And I’m almost certain there must be an even easier way. Just not bothered to find out.
Tony.
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I’m proud of my emptiness
01
ABC climate change contribution is a Q&A programme to be made in India at a cost of several hundred thousand dollars, presenter Tony Jones, a guest and production crew of some 17 people. The excuse is that ABC has a responsibility to enlighten Australians.
40
And it’s working.
My wallet feels lighter already.
70
CC occurs during thousands of years, climate variability occurs during a lifetime
We can only say CC is happening now if we compare today’s climate to that of millennia ago, not last year
10
This is very bad news indeed after that ambitious 25% cut on emissions. One good news is that the U.S. seems to be doing better in this department with the decreasing of particulate emissions and advancements in emissions control technology and diesel engine design. EPA seems to agree as well with its projection of black soot declining by 86% by 2030.
I have been doing research on this subject lately particularly about the subject of carbon emissions. One of my articles cover the U.S. progress on this topic. If you want to take a look just head over to fuelandfriction.com.
00
”Buying carbon credits is almost as effective as tossing virgins into volcanoes.”
Lol, the wit! I must say that my realist friends here are truly a marvel. Keep it up, love it!
11
Both are certainly a monumental waste !
01