…
Now that the mid-term elections are over in the US, Obama is free to announce the climate commitments that voters didn’t need to hear. (I did say this would happen.) It’s a “landmark” agreement and a “gamechanger”, but no one can point out what happens if either country doesn’t stick to its agreement.
The end-point of this grand theater of intent and glorious promises is Paris 2015.
What matters is the appearance of “momentum” — and this show ticks all the boxes. The two global superpowers make a sudden, unexpected agreement to reduce emissions and the press can call it “remarkable”, as if it has substance. Obama — the President without a majority in either house of Congress — has announced a big new target of 26% reduction by 2025. What can a lame-duck President achieve? Fluff and PR. As it happens, US emissions have been falling for years because of the miracle of shale gas and oil. This announcement supposedly doubles the pace of that reduction which was occurring anyhow, and which had nothing to do with any green policies aimed at reducing emissions. Furthermore, Obama, magically, will do it without imposing new restrictions on power plants or vehicles. What’s not to like?
The Chinese, meanwhile, were projected to hit their peak emissions in 2030 anyhow. So their big commitment is to keep doing what they were going to do anyway mostly. Let’s have a press conference. Everybody cheer. It’s historic baby.
All the important questions go unasked and unanswered
What’s the punishment, the 10,000 line legal agreement? What exactly will happen if neither country meets these “intentions” and “targets”? Is that a big slap on the wrist coming, or will someone have to pay real money — and is the fine in dollars or renminbi?
How many degrees will this agreement cool the world? Is that zero degrees to one decimal place or is that zero to two?
No one needs to mention these minor details. That’s not what matters. It’s not about the climate but about the appearance of doing something, in order to sweep the rest of the world into action:
These actions will also inject momentum into the global climate negotiations on the road to reaching a successful new climate agreement next year in Paris.
Nobody is hiding that this is about PR and not really about pollution. The first paragraph of the New York Times lays it right out:
BEIJING — China and the United States made common cause on Wednesday against the threat of climate change, staking out an ambitious joint plan to curb carbon emissions as a way to spur nations around the world to make their own cuts in greenhouse gases.
What exactly did China commit too?
…a first-ever commitment by China to stop its emissions from growing by 2030.
Sixteen years from now China may be producing a lot more CO2 each year but they promise to keep their ultra high level at the same ultra high level year after year from then on. They are promising to stick to “extreme”, but not rise to “obscene”.
You can see how strong the leader’s commitment is. Obama even wrote a letter:
Administration officials said the agreement, which was worked out quietly between the United States and China over nine months and included a letter from Mr. Obama to Mr. Xi proposing a joint approach, could galvanize efforts to negotiate a new global climate agreement by 2015.
But they did meet for two whole days with only a few distractions about military and trade stuff:
It was the signature achievement of an unexpectedly productive two days of meetings between the leaders. Mr. Obama and Mr. Xi also agreed to a military accord designed to avert clashes between Chinese and American planes and warships in the tense waters off the Chinese coast, as well as an understanding to cut tariffs for technology products. – NY Times
It doesn’t take long to change the energy infrastructure of a nation, just a couple of busy days of talking and a letter. Where is the fine print?
Al Gore came to Australia in June to get Clive Palmer to pressure Abbott to commit to doing something “if the rest of the world did”. Thank goodness he did not. How many political leaders will be fooled by a smoke and mirrors agreement like this into thinking it means something?
Mr Shorten said on Wednesday the “historic and ambitious” agreement showed global leadership from the US and China.
“At the G20 this week, Australia will hold the embarrassing title of being the only nation going backwards on climate change. With China and the United States representing around one-third of the global economy and over 40 per cent of global emissions, there will be significant momentum to deal with climate change in Brisbane,” he said.
h/t to a friend in Switzerland, Janama
Yep, a full 6 minutes on ABC TV news tonight. I went straight to check if Jo had a post yet- well done Jo, you nailed it. It’s a complete joke.
600
I was thinking the same:ABC apodeictic authoritative believe us because we are the ones you can believe!! Jake Sturmer and Juanita are hacks; nothing more or less.Pity.Truly.
200
Same, I was actually laughing.
USA sets a goal it can never and will never and has no intention of achieving and China reciprocates with a promise to do nothing for at least 15 years, then maybe do something.
It was AGW political gold, I wonder if Obama and XI had a laugh about it back stage afterwards.
210
The funniest thing I find is the australian lefties will have their noses rubbed in it by the communists – which sort of shows you china is run by capitalists ( who make communist noises ) and demand huge ammounts of coal powered electricity to make the china of today run…..
The SMH today had all the usual suspects out frothing with glee and clueless as usual….
120
China are “Capitalist Communists” – and are economically going gangbusters.
The EU are “Socialist Non-Communists” – and economically going down the gurgler.
The difference between these two economies is pretty obvious – the former pretending to cut emissions while the latter doing so on a large scale – thus explaining the disjunct between their relative economic fortunes.
90
There is a lot more to the economic differences between Europe and China then the picture that you paint.
00
The real object is a climate treaty in future climate conferences, starting with Paris 2015. Global Government in the hands of UNEP? That means International socialism.
30
Hmph! “Our” ABC funded by “us” to be the voice
of ‘progressive’-back-to-the-golden-age-pre-industrial-revolution-politicking Fer we serfs,
freed from back-breaking labour by Ol’King Coal,
it’s jest too depressing. beth-the-serf.:(
30
It’s a garage sale of disposable commitments and politics at it’s worst. Both parties have access to so many face saving caveats. Obama is a lame duck and the Chinese play long term politics, they don’t have to answer to an electorate. And the media, the dumb donkeys that they are just report like automatons (with requisite emotive inference) the triumph of it all.
50
I’ll repeat my post from the previous thread.
The bedwetters are celebrating because the US and China have agreed to cut emissions. Flannery is already on the media claiming this is a major gamechanger etc.
This is what the Chinese have agreed to do:
For its part, China agreed today to stop increasing carbon-dioxide emissions by about 2030 or earlier, with fossil fuels falling to about 80 per cent of Chinese energy use, US officials said.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/wall-street-journal/us-china-agree-climate-change-co2-emissions-plans/story-fnay3ubk-1227120687144
Q: when will you stop beating your wife?
A: well I should stop beating her within 15 years, ask me then.
Report – man agrees to stop beating his wife.
—
Very appropriate comment it was too. h/t to Janama – Jo
570
A meaningless charade. Or political grandstanding, whichever you prefer.
1) If China can’t cap its emissions by 2030, it should be ashamed of itself. Its industry is immensely dirty, and many measures exist to clean it up, which it plans to do anyway. It already has plans to build 28 new nuclear power plants, so this target is no commitment at all.
2) The US target is 27%, which rather pales alongside the EU’s 40% and the UK’s legally binding and idiotic ‘80% by 2050’. Plus, US emissions are already falling due to switching from coal to natural gas — emissions in the United States in 2012 were at their lowest since 1995.
3) Apart from gullible and simple folk who believe that CO2 is some kind of magic thermostat for the global climate, everyone will easily see that moving towards these targets will have no measurable effect on the earth’s temperature in the foreseeable future.
Needless to say, the BBC and NYT reported this ‘historic’ deal in fawning terms.
281
Rick, smarter people than me are onto them already.
http://uk.mobile.reuters.com/article/idUKL6N0T22IU20141112?irpc=932
60
Rick,
There is a difference between the dirty emissions – the choking smog like that reported in Beijing prior to the Olympics and CO2 emissions. The smog problem can be dealt with relatively cheaply as in Britain following the smogs of the late 1940s and early 1950s. That is the real harm. But to close the coal-fired power stations would send China’s growth into reverse.
Also, please do not blame China for its high total emissions. Per capita they are currently just half those of the USA or Australia.
60
Pls don’t use per capita comparisons. Per capita is totally irrelevant. China at current rates emits Australia’s total CO2 emissions in one day. Total CO2 is the relevant metric. Per capita is an activist propaganda tool.
10
In 2013 China’s CO2 emissions were 30 times those of Australia’s not 365. China’s population was 66 times that Australia. Per capita emissions are a way of getting a perspective on the numbers. See below.
00
Kevin, the Chinese don’t care. They play the long game. For them China is the centre of the universe and imperfections can be corrected over time. In their way they are exceedingly wise and I suspect the entire AGW meme is an avenue for them to explore and manipulate to their own ends. How can anyone come to any other conclusion about a country that builds coal fired power plants at the rate that they do. I suspect that they view our western democracies as quaint and amusing and not insurmountable. What I think is their downfall is they fail to grasp the indomitable nature of the individual human spirit and it doesn’t seem to occur to them that the “great leap forward” more often than not starts with the individual mind. I predict that they will be the last wall to fall. It will start with one individual as it always does.
10
Well said. Yes I have long suspected the Chinese have been playing the West for fools over Climate Change. The ‘agreement’ with Obama just confirms it. The funny thing is the urban socialists that inhabit media institutions like the NYT, Guardian, Fairfax or ‘our’ ABC don’t even know it yet. They’ve been had.
00
The Chinese have a lot to gain from the USA (and other countries) going down the road of “renewables”.
Where do you think everything for this is produced?
This agreement just assures continued prosperity for China, with zero change in emissions on their side.
20
The pressure of climate activists is ceaseless and they are slowly but surely getting their way. I, like most other Right thinkers will be on the wrong side of history I fear. We have got to fight harder. It just seems inevitable that we will lose the struggle. It’s so depressing that the side of rationality and facts is losing to the unsophisticated lies and PR of the climate socialists.
245
“The pressure of climate activists is ceaseless and they are slowly but surely getting their way.”
Gaia begs to differ.
Drudge Headlines at time of this comment:
Minnesota shatters snow record from 1898…
KEEP CALM AND SHOVEL ON…
Cold to Freeze East…
WY WINDCHILL WARNING: 35 BELOW…
FROSTBITE IN 10 MINUTES…
Winter still month away…
CHILL MAP…
Obama readies sweeping list of executive actions on ‘global warming’…
China vows to cap carbon emissions…
. . .
Aye, it’s a chill wind that blows this 2015 winter in Obama’s land of 97% certified doomsday global warming …
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Yeah, handjive, but all those things you quote are consistent with global warming. Just you see if they ain’t!
160
And if not consistent with man made global warming, then these things will be consistent with man made global cooling – and you will still have to…
1. De-industrialise.
2. Take an early retirement from life.
3. Believe and state that you believe what your betters tell you – or see point 2 above.
10
Ah yes.
We’re saved. The irony is palpable.
“Peace for our time”.
120
Sceptical Sam:
Or as Hitler remarked to his cronies after Munich “he seemed to want a piece of paper, so I gave him one”.
320
Is that like a commitment from China to go all out and ramp up it’s emissions as high as it can in the next 15 years, while America carries on shifting to shale?
270
For as long as shale lasts – it may be a bit of a mirage. Noting that fields seem to be playing out very quickly (approx 10 years or so).
REF SRSRocco Report
22
nothing like a dose of reality to calm the frenzy:
11 Nov: Carbon Brief: Rich countries subsidising fossil fuel companies by $88bn a year
An assessment of global fossil fuel subsidies from the Overseas Development Institute has found that the “US government provided companies with $5.2bn for fossil fuel exploration in 2013, Australia spent $3.5bn, Russia $2.4bn and the UK $1.2bn. Most of the support was in the form of tax breaks for exploration in deep offshore fields.” Four times as much money was spent on fossil fuel exploration as on renewable energy development, the report suggests. The UK government has responded, telling the BBC that “allowances” to help companies explore for oil and gas “[do] not constitute a subsidy”. (The Guardian )
Climate and energy news
China Oct coal output up 2.5 pct on year – industry website
Reuters reports: “China’s coal production rose 2.5 percent from a year ago to 330 million tonnes in October, according to an industry website that cited data from the National Bureau of Statistics.” (Reuters)
Global warming ‘will require more UK troops sent to fight overseas’ (UK Telegraph)
New climate science (a number of links, including)
Effects of temperature and precipitation variability on the risk of violence in sub-Saharan Africa, 1980-2012
http://www.carbonbrief.org/blog/2014/11/daily-briefing-rich-countries-subsidising-fossil-fuel-companies-by-$88bn-a-year/
11 Nov: Bloomberg: Andrew Willis: BHP Coal Mine Meeting Relocation Resistance in Colombia
Latin America’s largest open-pit coal mine is struggling to persuade some members of a small community in northeastern Colombia to relocate and may have to alter its mining strategy.
The Cerrejon venture – owned by BHP Billiton Plc, Anglo American Plc and Glencore Plc – is in relocation talks with residents of Las Casitas, where dust is approaching levels set by the World Bank, Vice-President of Public Affairs Juan Carlos Restrepo said in a telephone interview.
“We have until 2016,” he said from Bogota on Nov. 7. “Otherwise we’ll have to change our mining plans, expand the pit in a different direction or mine in other areas.” …
Resistance from some residents comes as Colombia’s government looks to boost coal production to counter a drop in revenue as thermal coal prices this month dropped to at least a seven-year low…
***Last year, the company exported 33.5 million metric tons of thermal coal, with the majority of Colombian coal exports going to European power producers including Electricite de France SA. (EDF) …
Colombia, the world’s fifth-largest coal exporter, aims to produce about 95 million tons this year, up from 85.5 million tons in 2013…
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-11-11/bhp-coal-mine-meeting-relocation-resistance-in-colombia.html
70
Server Speeds back to normal on my Mac in UK. I suspect that having been out playing without parental permission, POTUS will get another Gating when Mr and Mrs Congress hear what he’s been up to.
190
Coal is King:
12 Nov: Reuters: Krishnan Das: Goyal says may stop thermal coal imports in 2-3 yrs
India, the world’s third-largest buyer of overseas coal, may be able to stop imports of power-generating thermal coal in the next three years as state behemoth Coal India steps up production, Power and Coal Minister Piyush Goyal said on Wednesday.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government has asked Coal India, the world’s largest miner of the fuel, to more than double its output to 1 billion tonnes by 2019 to feed existing and upcoming power plants…
Around 60 of India’s 103 power plants had enough coal for less than a week’s usage as of Nov. 2 due to lower supplies from Coal India.
Imports of coal have been surging as a result, equating to about 1 percent of India’s economy.
Shipments rose to 168.4 million tonnes last fiscal year, and the government estimated earlier this year that the domestic shortage would range between 185 and 265 million tonnes by 2016/17.
And some analysts were sceptical the country would be able to end imports soon.
“India’s reliance on imports is not going away anytime soon,” said Prakash Duvvuri, head of research at consultancy OreTeam.
http://in.reuters.com/article/2014/11/12/india-coal-imports-idINKCN0IW0FJ20141112
contradictory Reuters, which has just reported “China’s coal production rose 2.5 percent from a year ago to 330 million tonnes in October” (earlier Carbon Brief link), states in the India piece that “Declining shipments to India would drag on global coal markets grappling with oversupply as top consumer and importer China ***tries to shift towards cleaner fuels”!!!
80
The planet is saved!
How I see this hallowed/hollow agreement?
HAHAHAHAHA…carbon ‘capers’.
200
China has been pulling the wool over our eyes about having a concern about Co2 for some time. They are good at saying the right thing while their efforts might look good the results don’t match the words and the sheep just love it.
From 2009:
It appears it hadn’t improved by 2011
And then there is all that pollution from the manufacturing process.
270
The ABC radio were non stop over the top CAGW propaganda all day. I had to turn them off at about 4.00pm before I threw the radio through my newly installed double glazed windows.
270
Obama’s ‘Chamberlain’ moment:
Neville Chamberlain landed at Heston Aerodrome on 30 September 1938, and spoke to the crowds there:The declaration came as president Barack Obama met his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping for talks in Beijing.
The settlement of the
CzechoslovakianClimate change problem, which has now been achieved is, in my view, only the prelude to a larger settlement in which allEurope may find peacethe world may be saved at the Paris conferece. This morning I had another talk with theGerman Chancellor, Herr HitlerPresident Xi Jinping, and here is the paper which bears his name upon it as well as mine. Some of you, perhaps, have already heard what it contains but I would just like to read it to you: ‘ … We regard the agreement signed last night and theAnglo-German NavalCarbon Emission Agreement as symbolic of the desire of our two peoplesnever to go to war with one another againto save the world from ‘catastrophic climate change.’I’m sure it is iron clad!
460
Why do I get the impression that Obama would still be spouting about CO2 even if they were were trying to avoid clashes in waters off the American coast?
I bet the Chinese leaders/negotiators fall off their chairs laughing when he leaves the room.
290
Here’s a very relevant perspective on Fossil Fuels and Morality in light of the appalling ignorance of civilization destroyers like Obama.
Excerpt from Robert Zubrin’s review of Alex Epstein’s book:
“A few more decades of ungoverned fossil-fuel use and we burn up, to put it bluntly.”
— Bill McKibben, leading environmental activist, 1989
“I came across this quote, along with many others of comparable value, while reading Alex Epstein’s just-published book, The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels. But Epstein’s book is much more than a fantastic collection of such delightfully mad environmentalist pronouncements — although that part alone is worth the purchase price.
Rather, what Epstein presents is a powerful, systematic, and relentlessly logical philosophical case for the moral value of the fossil-fuel industry, and the fundamentally immoral basis of the movement that is seeking to demonize and destroy it.”
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/392503/fossil-fuels-and-morality-robert-zubrin
150
Shorten, you idiot.
140
You know there is no logic in an argument when we are told we must conform or we will be embarrassed as a Nation? Ashamed. Our heads hung low. However Bill Shorten has yet to drag out the really big threat to Australia. People will laugh at us. Yes, we will be a laughing stock. That would be terrible.
So we should pay billions to strangers overseas for the right not to be laughed at? He is right in a way, this whole farce is high comedy while Bill and Barack keep their Buster Keaton faces and serious tones, in the background, the world’s most useless and now irrelevant Treasurer, Wayne Swan, is still banging on about Climate Change. How that happens without Global Warming is a mystery.
300
I actually though the two sets of headlines kind of summed up AGW also.
One newspaper had “Climate deal leaves Abbott in the cold”, the other had “Climate deal puts the heat on Abbott”. Yup… the news sounds about as reliable as AGW.
110
Whatever Australia does on emissions will make no difference to the global situation. That is not to denigrate Australia – it is one of the best countries in the world in which to live. It is just to point out that for every Australian, there are 15 Americans, 60 Indians, 66 Chinese and 210 people in the rest of the world.
Even the UK, with three times the population will make no difference to the world situation. But billions wasted in either country for “combating climate change” are adversely affecting the people within both countries.
131
Bill Shorten: “At the G20 this week, Australia will hold the embarrassing title of being the only nation going backwards on climate change.”
That’s ‘proud’, Bill; not ‘embarrassed’.
401
Yes when youre the only sane one in a room of fools, you look “stupid”….go figure….
Remember when your mum would use common sense to try and head of you engaging in an act of popular stupidity with your mates by saying:
“If all your friends decided to jump off a roof, would you jump off too?”
Common sense needs to be applied here.
It seems to me that socialism is a un-treatable mental condition.
80
I would suggest that your Mr Shorten is preaching to the media and not Mr/Mrs Average. Crap politicians talk through their media acolytes.
30
Obama. How do you sleep?
YANQI TOWNSHIP, China (AP) — The nights are freezing for villagers near the site of an Asia-Pacific summit on the outskirts of Beijing, where authorities have banned wood fires to curb pollution and help ensure blue skies for the leaders instead of the usual grey smog.
“I now sleep under three quilts at night,” said a man who gave only his surname, Bai, as is typical of many Chinese when speaking to journalists.
“There cannot be any smoke, and we cannot heat our brick beds,” said Bai, 68.
Traditional raised sleeping platforms in frigid northern Chinese houses are often heated by coal and provide warmth during both the day and night.
http://news.yahoo.com/blue-skies-apec-chinese-villages-lose-heat-153522082.html
190
Both Ms. Milne and Mr. Shorten praised this announcement, just pure politics nothing much to do with science. Fortunately the republicans will not join the world saviours.
200
Thanks to the unceasing and unpaid efforts of skeptics (eg on this blog) the CAGNW (h/t Griss), is gradually becoming an election looser.
The Greens have likely reached and passed, the apogee of their electoral appeal. Bill Shorten will have to find a way to wriggle out from his current position somehow. The ABC will try to keep him and Labour tied to the Climate Change agenda, which the only reason I can think of to maintain their funding.
70
Slight correction to your article. The US has agreed to NOTHING. Until the Senate ratifies it, only Obama has agreed to it (CLinton agreed to Kyoto, but the US never did).
And as you noted, he does not have the Senate any longer (he never had the Senate to the degree he needs it as it requires 67 votes – which the democrats never had).
This is a desperate attempt by a bitter man to salvage some sort of legacy. It imposes no burdens on China, as noted, but imposes great burdens on the US. And while he can get nasty in his last 2 years, without ratification, his nastiness, petulance, and pomposity will not last past January 20, 2017. The deal is still born.
400
Hes like a well tanned, male, Julia Gillard.
80
Hey come on now…
Obama has an enormous legacy see below.
1. A seemingly permanent increase in the modern version of the depression era soup kitchen.
2. The Drone Empire grows and grows with collateral civilian deaths from attacks that breech the US constitution (no war has been declared against Pakistan, Yemen, etc?)
3. Done nothing to stop the ongoing militarisation of US domestic police forces – providing a “Standing Army of Occupation?”
4. Failed to jail a single Bankster.
One could just go on and on about Obama’s legacy.
20
I was going to send Jo an email on this subject.
There is nothing new in the Chinese Presidents proposal. There have been past announcements of fossils fuel making up around 80% of the total energy mix by 2030 or 2035 From two source the present 2013 mix is 66 to 68% coal 5-6% Nat gas, 18% oil, other (nuclear, hydro, wind & biomass) 8-10%
The mix is predicted to be by 2030 around 50% coal, 12% Nat gas and still 18% oil, other 20% (with large growth in Nuclear)
The largest user of energy is electricity generation
In 2013 the generation mix was coal 66%, Hydro 21.7%, Nat gas 3.3%, nuclear 1.1%, wind 5.3% solar 0.8% and others (biomass) 1.8%. I would think that the wind generation is exaggerated (probably based on installed power and not generated power) while the nuclear is under reported for political reasons and maybe be double the quoted figure.
By 2020 it has been estimated that the mix will be coal 59.1% Hydro 22.2%, nat gas 3.4%, nuclear 4.6% wind 8.5% solar 1.4% and other 0.8%. It is very unlikely that wind or solar will increase so much but Nat gas is predicted now to be higher with csg and shale fracking from advances in USA. Also Nuclear is likely to be higher. I think the Chinese had planned 3 to 5 Thorium fueled reactors to be operating by 2020.
The cement industry is often linked with power production as a large emitter of CO2. Concrete in actual fact is the lowest energy content construction material (there is only 300kg of cement in a cubic meter of concrete) . However, China is at present by far the largest producer of cement in the world. They produce close to one tonne of cement per year per head of population -developed countries produce in the range of 300 to 450 kg/a/capita. China has all ready started on a program of shutting inefficient plants and rationalising production. Modern plants use half the fuel of old plants. The Chinese as in other parts of the world are starting to use cement extenders such as flyash from power stations and slag from steelworks. By 2030 there will be less cement produced than at present and the coal consumption will be about one third the present.
As someone has said Obama is a fool who is taking USA backwards while the Chinese are happy to help Obama so they can be the most powerful nation.
200
it’s taken a couple of hours while watching cricket in abu dhabi to get access to your site again, jo.
12 Nov: Reuters: David Stanway: UPDATE 2-China, US agree limits on emissions, but experts see little new
(Additional reporting by Kathy Chen, Stian Reklev, Matt Spetalnick in BEIJING and Valerie Volcovici in WASHINGTON; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan)
But the United States has already pledged to cut its carbon emissions by 17 percent by 2020 and it’s not clear if the new proposals will pass a Republican-dominated Congress.
In a statement, Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell branded the new U.S. emission cuts as part of Obama’s “ideological war on coal”, and said his priority in the new Congress was “easing the burden” of environmental regulations.
With China still falling short of any absolute target to reduce emissions, Obama could face even more pressure.
For China, the targets add little to its existing commitments to wean itself off carbon, environmental experts said…
“The statement is a upbeat signal to motivate other countries but the timeline China has committed to is not a binding target,” said Li Junfeng, an influential Chinese climate policy adviser linked to China’s state planning agency, the National Development and Reform Commission…
Li, the climate policy adviser, said Beijing was not expected to make any significant new commitments next year, adding that it would also be wise not to expect too much of the United States.
China will not look to America to take action against climate change, he said…
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/11/12/china-usa-climatechange-idUSL3N0T21YK20141112
***so the coal supply “is abundant and secure”, but cannot be used to relieve the energy “stress” because of CAGW!!!
12 Nov: News24: AFP: Global energy system under stress
Paris – With fossil fuels set to meet most of the increased global demand for energy, the IEA warned on Wednesday that climate change targets are at risk and conflicts could still wreak havoc with supplies.
“The global energy system is in danger of falling short of the hopes and expectations placed upon it”, the International Energy Agency said in its World Energy Outlook 2014 report.
The Paris-based body, which advises industrial oil consuming nations, forecasted global energy demand will grow 37% by 2040, with fossil fuels key to meeting that increased demand despite concerns about global warming…
While oil prices are currently at four-year lows, it sees them rising as demand increases from 90 million barrels per day in 2013 to 104mbd in 2040…
The IEA sees the fastest rate of growth among fossil fuels for natural gas, where demand should increase by more than half, becoming the leading fuel in the OECD energy mix by 2030…
***As for coal, while the supply is abundant and secure, “its future use is constrained by measures to tackle pollution and reduce CO2 emissions”, it said…
Global nuclear capacity will nevertheless increase by almost 60%, with China alone accounting for 45% of the growth…
It pointed to renewable energy technologies to help fill the shortfall in power generation as they are gaining ground, helped by global subsidies amounting to $120bn in 2013.
The share of renewable, wind, solar, hydropower, biofuels increases most in the OECD major industrialised nations, reaching 37% of power generation, the IEA said
http://www.news24.com/Green/News/Global-energy-system-under-stress-20141112-2
70
12 Nov: Bloomberg: Lananh Nguyen: China Seen Overtaking U.S. as World’s Biggest Oil User
China will overtake the U.S. as the world’s biggest oil consumer within two decades, according to the International Energy Agency.
“A landmark is reached in the early 2030s, when China becomes the largest oil-consuming country, crossing paths with the United States,” the agency said in a summary of its World Energy Outlook, which forecasts long-term energy trends. The full findings of the report will be presented at a press conference in London today…
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-11-12/china-seen-overtaking-u-s-as-world-s-biggest-oil-user.html
60
***limiting the data!
11 Nov: Bloomberg: China Blocks Smog Data After Failing to Clean Skies Before APEC
After failing to rid Beijing’s skies of pollution before a gathering of world leaders this week, Chinese officials took a different approach to smog control — ***limit the data.
Phone and Internet apps that display readings of air pollution started excluding a U.S. Embassy feed yesterday. Wang Jun, co-founder of the Air Quality Index app for Apple Inc.’s iOS, said authorities told him to stick to the city’s data. “We had no choice,” he said by phone.
Government efforts to control smog ahead of the Nov. 5-11 Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation events in Beijing had gained so much attention that the clearer skies got a nickname, “APEC blue.” …
“Upon orders from higher-ups, this month’s air quality index will use data provided by Beijing Municipal Environmental Protection Bureau,” the owners of the website beijing-air.com said in an Internet statement. “Wishing APEC Summit great success!” …
The phrase “APEC Blue” began to catch on as the APEC leadership summit ended today. One shop on Alibaba Group Holdings Ltd.’s Taobao online mall offered a string of beads whose color it describes as APEC blue. The same description was given to a pair of GPS-equipped sneakers designed to track a child’s whereabouts.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-11-11/china-blocks-smog-data-after-failing-to-clean-skies-before-apec.html
40
12 Nov: Brisbane Times: Peter Hartcher: Climate change: Co-operation and goodwill are in the air
The Sino-American announcement improves the prospects that the Paris protocol to be agreed next year might prevent a dangerous escalation of climate change…
The political symbolism is the most potent element. Only the unwise dismiss symbolism.
Symbols are tangible signs of intangible realities.
In this case it’s a symbol of a momentous reality…
Indeed, the environment minister, Greg Hunt, welcomed the news: “This is an unalloyed good thing. We want a good agreement in Paris.”
http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/federal-politics/political-opinion/climate-change-cooperation-and-goodwill-are-in-the-air-20141112-11lbni.html
40
This Obama/China agreement was nothing but a political stunt. It was pure political grandstanding. It was about Obama demonstrating his state of denial regarding the US mid-term election results that cut him at the knees and handcuffed his personal authority as President.
The agreement is not worth the paper it is written on as the US Congress has clearly indicated it will be changing direction over climate change policies in favour of economic recovery.
200
Oh, nyuk nyuk nyuk!
I can’t recall hearing so much bovine waste from two World leaders in my life.
Consider this.
The whole Chinese coal fired power fleet is larger than the current U.S. fleet, and the Chinese total is increasing.
The Chinese fleet has an average age of ten to twelve years and a life expectancy of 50 years. The U.S. fleet has an average age of 45 years with a life expectancy of 50 years, and actually certain to run longer than that in fact.
The Chinese fleet is the new High Tech USC technology, burning considerably less coal for the same power output, while the U.S. fleet is technology from the 60’s and 70’s.
U.S. emissions from coal fired power are rising, 5% for the year ending 2013, and a further 2.5% on top of that for this year so far.
As those U.S. plants close, they are being replaced by Natural Gas fired plants, and they are growing at a rate more than the coal fired plants are closing. As one coal fired plant closes, two new NG plants open, so emissions actually stay the same as those large coal fired plants will eventually shut down, time expired.
Another worry for the U.S. is their aging Nuclear power plants as they too approach time expiry.
Keep in mind that Wind Power in the U.S. has 60% of the Nameplate of Nuclear and yet only supplies 20% of the power supplied by those Nukes.
Close down a few Nukes and there goes the same supplied power as all wind power. There’s nothing to replace those Nukes with, unless they (hurriedly) build new ones.
Wind and Solar can never replace coal fired power or Nuclear Power, so it can only be done by Natural Gas, and if NG replaces those old Nukes, then emissions rise, and rise pretty considerably too.
So, the U.S. says it will lower emissions. Yeah, well, that’s bovine waste.
China says its emissions will rise (and rise and rise and rise) then plateau, and then drop off. Yeah, well, that’s also bovine waste.
China says that they plan to have renewables at 20%. Now, that’s a certainty, a dead set shoe in.
Why?
Well you see, China already has 24% of its power delivered from renewables right now, right now. It all comes from Hydro, and with hydro expanding at a phenomenal rate, they only need one new hydro for every 5 coal fired pants, and at the moment it’s doing even better than that, with a huge amount of hydro still on the way.
Wind in China delivers around 0.4% of the total generated power, and that’s not a misprint. Solar in China, well that’s around 0.01%, and I actually rounded that up.
Renewables in the U.S. are currently around 7% with hydro more than half of that. Read this closely. They will NEVER make their target with Wind or Solar power, and there’s no more hydro coming in the U.S.
So where you see the President of the U.S. saying what he has here, be fully aware that he will never achieve what he has actually said here, NEVER.
The Chinese Leader, well, at least his statement was closer to the truth than President Obama’s statement. At least he said his emissions will rise and then level off and then fall, well maybe that was a porky, but his time frame is a long long long way off, as those new coal fired plants will just hum along for decades to come, with many more new ones still to be built. The U.S. coal fired plants will just sputter and cough and then give up the ghost, virtually irreplaceable.
And who gets sucked in by all this.
Evidently everybody really.
What a joke.
Tony.
491
Tony this is a very good post. BTW have you got a link for China’s wind and solar at 0.4% and 0.01%?
20
I can’t help you on Solar, but this piece from my post at #9 has Citigroup estimating wind in China at 0.4%, the report is from 2009 but I doubt it has increased.
10
Tony,
What is China’s projected yearly increase in coal fired power compared to our total usage?
I know you have put the data up somewhere before, can’t find.
10
the Griss,
A couple of Months back now, I had to search a while before I finally found this, cut and paste the Chinese characters into a search engine and then use the Translate tab, so I hope you can pick it up okay if I put the link in here.
Now, go the the right hand column and it’s the third from the bottom total there. Keep in mind that this is just for the new plants which came on line last year, and China is slowly beginning to slow down construction of these new plants, because barely three years back, it was one new large scale plant every seven to ten days opening up, and now it’s one every 15 to 20 days.
The total there says 3650, and as you can see that’s expressed in ten thousand KiloWatts, hence a Nameplate of 36,500MW, virtually all of it new technology USC coal fired power plants, so that’s around 18 large scale coal fired power plants.
That’s 18 new plants just in one year alone, about two new Australia’s total a year.
Tony.
30
One plant every seven to ten days. That’s unbelievable. I wonder if the great and the good of the Chinese government have realised that the real sleeping dragon in their midst is the burgeoning aspirational chinese citizen.
10
IF both countries stuck to their word on this, Chinese would be generating power at about 25% of the cost of USA by about 2025. Therefore there would not be too many enterprises producing things in the USA.
Who needs a war to defeat countries when you have dills such as Obama to continually lose the chess game?
240
I can understand China needing to reduce the population – but the US and UK need to explain.
It’s estimated that 15 million British citizens are having to choose between staying warm or eating. There are plans to shut down factories this winter so that those who can afford it will be able to keep from freezing to death from blackouts and high natural gas prices.
170
“I can understand China needing to reduce the population”
Why?
00
Without the one child quota (and other) controls the population may grow beyond the country’s planned capacity to feed itself (1.5 billion people by the year 2033).
10
Quoting Tim – “It’s estimated that 15 million British citizens are having to choose between staying warm or eating”.
If most of those are adults then that is a lot of potential votes for UKIP at next year’s UK Election.
20
The masses are buying it hook, line, and sinker on the Earth Justice FB page.
60
[…] Joanne Nova has a great summary of Obama’s Chinese climate commitment: […]
00
China knows that they Will do exactly what suits them.
The A.B.C. and paid compliant media ignore the political psychology that is obvious to those of us without degrees.
My fear is that Barack Obama might actually believe them.
90
The irony about these sorts of deals is that in 15 years time when the world hasn’t warmed for 33 years the warmists will claim that agreements like this saved the world. It seems to me that the hole in the ozone layer is a similar non problem solved by actions that can never be proven to have been non solutions. At least if here countries reduce emissions by using nuclear power and gas they won’t destroy the global economies at the same time. Pity the Europeans who seem hellbent on energy policies which will seek to use renewables to reduce emissions. The slow growth in Germany is just a preview of the economic basket case that the EU will become if they don’t change their policies.
100
Obama never has followed the Constitution, federal law or his oath of office. So I expect nothing but dishonesty, that way I’m never disappointed.
On the other hand, Republicans are poised to hand him his political head on a platter if they can avoid blowing it. In the meantime, he’ll no doubt also reach a useless agreement with Iran that will be good for them and bad for us. But with every step he takes down his own path from now on the backlash within his party and across the country will strengthen until he’s a eunuch for what’s left of his term. And Republicans can then elect a president if they just don’t blow their chance by doing something rash.
Tread lightly, Republicans but carry a big stick.
80
Any resemblance to a statement made by another prominent president is strictly intentional. 🙂
50
Ah, yes, America’s youngest President.
Tony.
50
I don’t believe that race, sex or age has anything to do with it.
He is simply grossly incompetent.
120
Theodore Roosevelt to be exact. But it’s not original with him. He was quoting a more general statement, “Speak softly but carry a big stick and you will go far,” the origin of which is somewhat obscure.
00
Obama has been making quite a splash in China too — stuff-up after stuff-up as you down under would put it. And Putin apparently made a similar blunder himself when he put a scarf over the shoulders of the First Lady of China. The two seem made for each other, Putin and Obama, screwups in chief.
Both men are full of themselves and that makes it beneath them to actually learn about the culture of their host and hostess. What can I say?
90
He is a eunuch with a big gun. I prefer to think of him as a wounded animal. They are irrational and extremely dangerous. Obama has no conception of responsibility or consequences. Nor any morals or ethics.
And Republicans have no balls to stand up to him.
10
Some do and some don’t. And it’s extremely important that Republicans keep the nation on their side until the 2016 presidential election is won. Politics may demand allowing a gamit now for future gains, sacrifice a pawn or even a bishop or a rook to get at the final prize — checkmate.
I hate to be in this position. I’d rather go after him with the budget and shut off money for a long list of things in the attempt to stop the EPA and Obama’s amnesty for illegal aliens that he announced yesterday (or the press got it yesterday) because he can do a lot more damage before 2016 – actually January 20, 2017 before he’s out of office.
Many in the Republican camp will need to learn discipline like they’ve never known it before. I hope they’re up to it.
10
AND MOST OF ALL, THEY NEED TO START COMMUNICATING WITH THE COUNTRY ABOUT THE PROBLEMS WE HAVE AND HOW THE CAN BE SOLVED.
The people are not stupid but they need information by which to make judgments. If they understand where you’re going and can see that it’s the right direction, they will follow.
10
Not stupid? Look at the idiots defending Gruber! Yes, many of the people are very stupid.
10
They may defend Gruber but his being exposed is working against the Democrats anyway. The problem is that only Fox News has bothered to do any real coverage of Gruber. Republicans need to be buying time on the major networks starting yesterday and keep it up until the 2016 election is won. But I doubt they’ll do it.
Gruber is enough to boil the blood of almost any voter who holds a job (or wants one) and has responsibilities he/she works to keep up with. When I first heard his statement about the stupidity of the voters I wanted to smack him in the chops. He’s inexcusable by any standard except dishonesty.
00
YOu are correct. Some do. So let me rephrase.
The republican leadership has no balls.
As far as laying low until 2016 – fine. Why not until 2020, or 2024? If there is nothing left (and there appears to be a good chance of that), why worry about an election 2 years from now when you have a totally renegade president now that is above the law? Someone made a statement to that effect. I do not recall the poster or the exact words, but I remember what I was thinking.
L’Etat c’est moi. That is Obama. And if left unchecked, that will be the country in 2 years.
It is one thing to disagree or differ on Policies. Obamacare? Ok, we wait until we have a pen that will sign a repeal. But that is just the politics. Illegal appointments, subverting the law, violating the law, violating the Constitution, subverting it! A nation based upon a principal cannot last when the principal is destroyed. And Obama is doing that. Executive actions were never meant to by pass congress or the laws. Yet that is what is happening. Illegal appointees are making rulings that affect millions, even after they are ruled illegal by SCOTUS (Obama has lost every 9-0 decision the court has made). Yet he has not changed a thing he is doing.
There is no longer any law. There is no justice. There is a tiny little despot that runs around screaming “L’Etat c’est moi!”. And the eunuchs in opposition sit on their hands.
20
More importantly, if there is no law or no move to enforce the law, that leaves only vigilante behaviour at best. When people cannot get any say in their government—well, I think there was a revolution a couple of hundered years ago about that very thing. If all the legal routes to restoring order in the US are ignored, that only leaves illegal.
10
Phil, Sheri,
I know what your point is. I’m not preaching laying low for two years, I’m preaching fight but do it wisely, not foolishly. We will need the people on our side if we’re to win the 2016 election.
I will admit this is a tough situation and it isn’t exactly clear cut as to how to proceed. But we have to succeed. Sheri’s description of the alternative will be a massacre. All the force is commanded by Obama and we have to assume they will be loyal to him. After all, they were chosen for their likelihood of being loyal to the cause.
00
When is the right time? When the enemy is banging down your door? By any measure possible, Obama has broken the law. And not only is “impeachment off the table”, but even holding him to the law is off the table!
There are no battles to pick It is a total cave in. And it does not matter about 2016, because he will do what he has been doing! Take out the opposition! Walker, Christie, Perry, McDonnell. These are garbage charges but they have removed 4 great (well, 3 great and one Obama clone) candidates.
You want to pick and chose the fights. I would like to see ANY fight.
00
Agreed. The last legal recourse people had was to elect persons they thought would stop Obama’s lawlessness. If that does not happen, there are is no legal recourse and people will have to decide if they want a king and dictator or if they want the Constitution. If they want the latter, the only way to get that is to rebel—to fight back in ways people are not going to like. This is what happens when people have no voice in their government and realize they’re out of options. It won’t be pretty, no (massacre may be accurate, I don’t know), but as long as Republicans continue to side with Obama and breaking the law, there’s no other option. Trust me, this is not what I want, but it is the inevitable outcome of a dictator taking over and no one doing a thing about it. If Republicans don’t want people angry and possibly rising up, they better stop supporting Obama. Again, I only say this because all legal means seem to have been shut down by the Republicans and they are perfectly content doing whatever Obama wants.
10
I really do understand now why a majority of Americans dislike and distrust Obama.
150
Ever since I heard about abiotic oil, I have wondered what TPTB would do if petroleum and its derivatives became as plentiful as water. How would they keep the price up if that happened? How could they use it to control politics of many countries that have the ability to produce it for themselves?
I keep wondering if we’re at the point where TPTB keep trumpeting about this manufactured “crisis” of CAGW (a/k/a climate change) to try to mislead investors to put their money into non-petroleum and non-coal energy options. That would drive the price of coal and petroleum down, right? Then when the next ice age materializes (or we get the next Carrington Event and our electrical infrastructure is toasted, or both) and everyone has to go back to petroleum-based energy (or coal), they will have cornered the market and can make it available to whom they choose. They could at the same time deny its use to those whom they choose.
I’m thinking this particular event is supposed to make the third world believe any oil they produce will not be worth going after, because China and the U.S. won’t be lining up to buy it from them.
I’m sure I haven’t accounted for all the angles. But the sheer illogic of the CAGW position leaves me puzzling over many things.
I just read about those Chinese brick beds (kang beds). If we end up in an ice age without a working electrical infrastructure, we would need to know how to build and use things like that.
The things that Al Gore said would happen have not come to pass. But the things that Robert Felix (iceagenow.info) are coming to pass.
80
I do think that there is more: the Chinese have an economic interest in alternative technologies, they are now the only world manufacturer of solar panels. The factories in China are still producing but nobody wants the panels!!! If the 2 big boys agree on the con, imagine how many Americans are going to put panels on the roof… I’m sure the USA will find money to supply Chinese solar panels to South America and to the third world. I wonder what’s in the deal for the USA…
110
Is there any way the media can be held to account for not questioning every statement made on climate change. The govenment needs to get some sort of independent body that can get across the facts to the public.
60
It never was about (air) pollution of course.
I worry that using the alarmists’ Orwellian Newspeak is the equivalent of friendly fire, further muddying the already unnecessarily complex issue, a deliberate tactic of the alarmists.
You only have to watch how the word ‘pollution’ is carefully inserted into every announcement.
CO2 is a harmless or beneficial gas, certainly not air pollution, and what seemed like a close correlation between increasing CO2 and the global mean temperature has broken down anyway — end of story.
70
Stop Press:-
Lame Duck reported to be quacking.
Peking Duck reported to be peaking.
Sources reported to be saucing.
😉
110
. . . or perhaps that should have been:-
Peking Duck reported to be ducking.
50
The Chinese know that by 2030 they will have some other power source in place such as thorium salt etc, if not, will move the goal posts.
Obama has agreed to immediately reduce the US’s competitiveness again to the Chinese advantage. so why wouldn’t they agree to this deal.
I can see the US congress allowing this to see the light of day.
40
Cant see the US congress allowing this to see the light of day.
40
P.S.
Forgot to mention I thought we were days away from the “tipping point” of irreversible global warming!!!
16 years seems a little outside this.
So anyone who cheers this deal and at the same time tells us we need to act now is again just demonstrating how dumb they are.
90
G20! Another junket, another joke on the taxpayer and another hoodwink for the naive and gullible.
40
Absolutely. In spades!!!!
7,000+ delegates PLUS an international media contingent of 3,000+.
This rivals Copenhagen’s “do absolutely nothing” fest attended by our very own Mr Rudd.
The G20 concept is good. The mechanics beggar belief.
40
Just heard the Keating numbskull (on their ABC of course) berating the Coalition about their dumb response to CAGW.
Of course they forget to tell you that there is zero anyone can do about co2 emissions or temps for thousands of years. Just ask the RS and NAS.
90
How can there be Climate Change without Global Warming?
Why are we worried about CO2 as a Greenhouse gas if it does not produce any heating?
How is the world temperature is controlled only by one tiny gas?
If it has increased by 50%, why hasn’t the temperature changed 50%?
Water is the other byproduct of burning. Why isn’t water a pollutant?
The ocean has a huge 50ml/litre concentration of CO2, 5%, 100x that of the atmosphere. Why isn’t the CO2 change due to slightly warmer water?
It is humiliating to see democratic world leaders spout nonsense while being patronized. An agreement for China to maybe do something in the future about something which does not matter once they have done as they please is humiliating. Bill Shorten agrees with Barack. A great result for democracy.
What science?
110
This really is at the core of the folly known as ACC. There is no science that relates human emissions of CO2 to climate change unless the possible resultant extra CO2 in the atmosphere causes global warming. The present “hiatus” which has lasted 18 years throws serious doubt on the validity of that bit of the generally accepted science.
The real issue perhaps is in the use of the propaganda expression “carbon pollution” by the religious alarmist propagandists. Perhaps part of the armory of those who wish to challenge what is essentially a Pagan, rather than a scientific, world view is to show that far from being a pollutant atmospheric CO2 is as vital as oxygen is to life on planet Earth.
It is interesting to note that as far as humans are concerned eight hours exposure to CO2 at 5000 ppm is regarded by Work Place Health Standards as a safe environment for humans. And of course much plant growth is optimal at 1000 to 2000 ppm.
Clueless ignoramuses like Obama, our Milne and Shorten etc are suckers for the Pagan view of a finely balanced eco system in which we human intruders must tread lightly and of course in that context our “polluting CO2” will be not only the end of we humans but all life. Obama and Shorten were lawyers, who rely on “expert witnesses” to inform their ignorance. Enough said.
10
I think Australia should adopt the Chinese policy. Expand our coal fired until 2030.
Direct Action funds would also help build some hydro/irrigation dams in northern Australia.
150
Meanwhile over at the alarmist ABC, they are running a poll….
“China and the US have struck a new deal to limit greenhouse gas emissions. Do you think Australia will need to adjust its climate change policies as a result?”
Its running neck and neck at the moment….time to vote folks.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/thedrum/ ….tell us what you think, top RHS.
40
I think we should. So “yes” from me.
1. Get rid of the Climate Institute and other climate scammers
2. Dump the RET
3. Expand our coal fired power until 2030.
But why do I get the feeling that is not what is meant by a “yes” vote. ! 🙂
Seriously though.. what a STUPID question. !!
110
The Government would dump the RET tomorrow, if it would pass the Senate. Nothing passes the Senate unless it is supported by the Palmer party and the irrational Clive Palmer. It was amazing the Carbon tax was cancelled, on condition that we investigate emission trading schemes to be implemented if the US and China and India implement them.
90
Meanwhile Germany is telling the world that coal use will continue at a pace. They have no intention of ruining their economy by pursuing more green energy madness.
http://notrickszone.com/2014/11/11/german-vice-chancellor-gabriel-puts-brakes-on-ruinous-rush-to-green-energies-others-think-weve-lost-our-marbles/
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A sensible socialist! Or one still living on this planet?
Well worth a read because you won’t find it in the SMH, the Age, the Guardian or on the ABC.
20
This German solution to the closing of its nuclear power generation viz the use of coal fired power generation is never mentioned by the ABC and other alarmist sources.
Given Germany is supposed to be a world leader in wind and solar electricity generation their silence is deafening.
20
Jo, you are both being unfair on China and underestimate the sheer political cynicism of this declaration.
The unfair bit is the comment
To appreciate the unfairness, we need to look at emissions and population figures. CDIAC (Carbon Dioxide Information Analysis Center centre) has estimates of carbon emissions for all countries from 1960-2013. Converting these to equivalent carbon emissions, in 2013 China had 9.9 billion tonnes (bt) of CO2 emissions, compared with 5.2 bt in USA and 0.34 bt in Australia. It seems a lot, but emissions per capita were 7.3 tonnes in China compared with 16.6 tonnes per capita in both USA and Australia. There are an awful lot of people in China.
China already has an emissions pledge for 2020. This is to “Reduce CO2 emissions per unit of GDP by 40–45% by 2020 compared to the 2005 level”. With 8% annual growth in GDP, it can achieve this pledge with a 5.5% growth in emissions. Based on the last few years, China is on target to meet this pledge. Then I assume that annual emissions growth decelerates to zero in 2030. This gives emissions of 14.5bt in 2020 and 24.8bt in 2030. To calculate per capita emissions in 2030, I adjust for population growth of 0.5% per annum (the rate of the last decade). On this basis there will be 1480 million Chinese in 2030, compared with 1360 million in 2013. Emissions will be 16.8 tonnes of CO2 per capita, fractionally above what Australia and the United States are producing today. China will meet its emissions targets simply by catching up with the rich countries. That Jo is why you are being unfair.
But your unfairness is nothing compared to the sheer cynicism of this declaration. All the so-called experts agree that the minimum benchmark to prevent dangerous global warming above 2-3 degrees is to quickly reduce global emissions back to 1990 levels. The CDIAC estimate for 1990 is 22.5bt. In 2030 China alone could be producing greater than 100% of the global maximum emissions to prevent (this alleged) dangerous global warming, yet still meet its pledges for both 2020 and 2030. The whole environmental movement should be denouncing President Obama, and declaring Paris 2015 a complete waste of time. On this last point both climate alarmists and climate skeptics should be in complete agreement.
41
Fairness doesn’t enter the picture.
IF CO2 is the problem (and I’m not saying that it is) then the planet doesn’t care about per capita emissions.
It’s the total CO2 being poured into the atmosphere that is the problem.
And by 2030 China is going to be pouring out heaps and Australia will still hardly register on the plots of global emissions.
Logic just doesn’t raise its head in these discussions – or so it seems……..
50
I agree with you that fairness does not enter into the picture. There are more important factors for developing countries, particularly raising living standards as fast as possible. If it considered, then any notion of global emissions reductions is a non-starter. So global figures are not mentioned.
00
BTW India intends to double coal use within 5 years.
What a sick joke the USA China agreement is.
http://www.thegwpf.com/india-intends-to-double-coal-production-within-5-years/
70
13 Nov: UK Daily Mail: Reuters: Republicans vow EPA fight as Obama touts China climate deal
By Valerie Volcovici and David Lawder
“As we enter a new Congress, I will do everything in my power to rein in and shed light on the EPA’s unchecked regulations,” said Oklahoma Senator James Inhofe, a climate change skeptic and critic of U.N. climate talks who will become the chair of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee in January…
Senator Mitch McConnell, a Kentucky Republican and incoming Senate majority leader, said his main goal when he takes the gavel is to get “the EPA reined in.”
“As I read the agreement, it requires the Chinese to do nothing at all for 16 years, while these carbon emission regulations are creating havoc in my state and in other states across the country.”…
Stuart Eizenstat, the head of the U.S. delegation under President Clinton who negotiated the Kyoto Protocol in the 1990s, said Republicans in Congress are never going to be ***moved by commitments by China…
He said they will stick to a combination of climate change denialism and a repeated argument that the United States will be forced to make carbon emission cuts while China has more than a decade to even start.
“The counter to that is to recognize the ***historic nature of this. It would be a shame to dampen China’s willingness to take action,” he said in an interview.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/wires/reuters/article-2831750/U-S-Senate-Republican-leader-criticizes-Obamas-climate-deal-China.html
10
It would be “a game changer” or ” historic” if one of the APEC nations ever carried out any sort of agreement made at these farcical fancy dress parties.
20
12 Nov: ABC America: AP: Josh Lederman: US-China Climate Deal Aims to Prod Others to Act
(AP writers Jack Cheng, Christopher Bodeen and Julie Pace in Beijing, Dina Cappiello in Washington, and Katy Daigle in New Delhi contributed to this report)
However, it wasn’t clear how either the U.S. or China would meet their goals, nor whether China’s plan to allow its emissions to grow until peaking in 2030 would negate any reductions in the U.S…
The dual announcements … came as a shock to environmentalists who had ***pined for such action but suspected China’s reluctance and Obama’s weakened political standing might interfere…
“This is, in my view, the most important bilateral climate announcement ever,” said David Sandalow, a former top environmental official at the White House and the Energy Department…
For Obama, the fight against climate change has become a central facet of the legacy he hopes to leave. Facing negligible prospects for major legislative victories during his final two years, he has sought to bypass Congress by using regulations on power plants and vehicles to cut emissions, and his aides say his ***audacity on those fronts has boosted his credibility on the issue when he meets with world leaders…
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory/us-china-climate-deal-aims-prod-act-26852050
LOL:
12 Nov: UK Telegraph: China-US climate change deal a ‘giant leap for mankind’, says IEA
Landmark accord an important step towards a global climate deal in Paris, without which “we may well say goodbye to the world we have today”, says energy watchdog
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/environment/climatechange/11226716/China-US-climate-change-deal-a-giant-leap-for-mankind-says-IEA.html
00
12 Nov: The Atlantic: Russell Berman: The Angry GOP Backlash to Obama’s Historic Climate Accord
“America’s pain is truly China’s gain,” Upton and Whitfield (Energy and Commerce Committee, Representative Fred Upton and Representative Ed Whitfield) said, “and if the president has his way, Americans will continue to be at a disadvantage for many years to come. The Chinese are promising to double their emissions while the administration is going around Congress to impose drastic new regulations inhibiting our own growth and competitiveness.”
To some extent, the shift in political momentum on climate change had its roots in the economic collapse of 2008, when in the minds of many Americans, the short-term costs of action came to outweigh the long-term benefits to the environment. And it was a lack of support from Democrats in the Senate that prevented the House-passed cap-and-trade bill from becoming law…
But now the upper ranks of the Republican Party are united in opposition to any mandatory carbon caps, and they have made EPA climate regulations a top target in 2015. The Obama administration, of course, saw all of this coming, which is why you won’t see the word “treaty” anywhere in the climate agreements either with China or other nations. The deal does not require Senate ratification, but it is more vulnerable to undoing from Obama’s successor, as when President George W. Bush pulled out of the Kyoto Protocol upon taking office in 2001.
Tuesday’s accord lends a measure of global prestige to a president who has been diminished at home. But Obama knows that when he returns from Asia, he’ll quickly have to get back on climate-change defense as he confronts resurgent Republicans on Capitol Hill.
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/11/the-angry-gop-backlash-to-obamas-historic-climate-accord/382676/
12 Nov: ABC America: AP: Josh Lederman: US-China Climate Deal Aims to Prod Others to Act
(AP writers Jack Cheng, Christopher Bodeen and Julie Pace in Beijing, Dina Cappiello in Washington, and Katy Daigle in New Delhi contributed to this report)
However, it wasn’t clear how either the U.S. or China would meet their goals, nor whether China’s plan to allow its emissions to grow until peaking in 2030 would negate any reductions in the U.S…
The dual announcements … came as a shock to environmentalists who had ***pined for such action but suspected China’s reluctance and Obama’s weakened political standing might interfere…
“This is, in my view, the most important bilateral climate announcement ever,” said David Sandalow, a former top environmental official at the White House and the Energy Department…
For Obama, the fight against climate change has become a central facet of the legacy he hopes to leave. Facing negligible prospects for major legislative victories during his final two years, he has sought to bypass Congress by using regulations on power plants and vehicles to cut emissions, and his aides say his ***audacity on those fronts has boosted his credibility on the issue when he meets with world leaders…
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory/us-china-climate-deal-aims-prod-act-26852050
00
12 Nov: UK Telegraph: China-US climate change deal a ‘giant leap for mankind’, says IEA
Landmark accord an important step towards a global climate deal in Paris, without which “we may well say goodbye to the world we have today”, says energy watchdog
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/environment/climatechange/11226716/China-US-climate-change-deal-a-giant-leap-for-mankind-says-IEA.html
00
12 Nov: Bloomberg Editorial: A Breakthrough for Climate Protection
In themselves, the targets set today are not a great leap forward. China had already expected to start lowering its carbon-dioxide emissions by 2030, and to raise its share of energy from renewable sources; given rapid growth in the sector, getting to the promised 20 percent shouldn’t be impossible. For his part, U.S. President Barack Obama had already set in motion the automobile standards and power-plant regulations that will enable the U.S. to reduce net greenhouse-gas emissions 26 percent to 28 percent below 2005 levels in the next 10 years. That both countries’ targets are realistic also makes them more likely to be met…
Another laggard is Australia…
To bring everyone else into the game, developed nations need to fulfill their pledges to mobilize, by 2020, $100 billion a year to help poorer countries reduce emissions and adapt to flooding, drought and other effects of climate change. A three-year effort to kick-start this financing, which finished in 2012, netted a mere $10 billion a year. Politically, countries such as India can’t commit to hard emissions targets without a reasonable expectation that pledged funds will materialize…
http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2014-11-12/a-breakthrough-for-climate-protection
12 Nov: Hindustan Times: Chetan Chauhan: US-China climate deal a surprise for India
The deal will also be a talking point at the G-20 summit in Australia starting from November 15…but the developing world, including India, was not enthused with the secret agreement, saying it was not enough to have a treaty in Paris to limit the increase in global temperature by 2 degrees by the turn of the century.
“The original base level for reducing emissions for rich nations was 1990 and not 2005 as announced by the US. If one makes calculations, the actual emission reduction by the US will be negligible to the 1990 level,” a senior Indian climate negotiator said, who was unwilling to be quoted as India has not officially reacted on the deal…
http://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/india-caught-unaware-on-us-china-climate-deal/article1-1285442.aspx
00
whether this is a beat-up or not, u have to love the timing:
12 Nov: WaPo: Chinese hack U.S. weather systems, satellite network
By Mary Pat Flaherty, Jason Samenow and Lisa Rein
Hackers from China breached the federal weather network recently, forcing cybersecurity teams to seal off data vital to disaster planning, aviation, shipping and scores of other crucial uses, officials said.
The intrusion occurred in late September but officials gave no indication that they had a problem until Oct. 20, according to three people familiar with the hack and the subsequent reaction by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration or NOAA, which includes the National Weather Service. Even then, NOAA did not say its systems were compromised.
Officials also said that the agency did not notify the proper authorities when it learned of the attack…
NOAA said publicly in October that it was doing “unscheduled maintenance” on its network, without saying a computer hack made that necessary…
The two-day outage skewed the accuracy of National Weather Service long-range forecasts slightly, according to NOAA…
The October satellite data outage meant the National Weather Service and centers around the world did not receive large amounts of information.
“All the operational data sent via NOAA, which is normally an excellent service, was lost,” said Stephen English, head of the satellite section at the European Center for Medium-range Forecasting located in Reading, Great Britain…
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/chinese-hack-us-weather-systems-satellite-network/2014/11/12/bef1206a-68e9-11e4-b053-65cea7903f2e_story.html
00
Let’s look at the numbers behind this idiot farce.
http://www.eia.gov/cfapps/ipdbproject/iedindex3.cfm?tid=90&pid=44&aid=8&cid=CG6,CG5,&syid=1980&eyid=2012&unit=MMTCD
In 2005 the OECD emitted 13.8 bn Ts of co2, while the non OECD (China, India etc ) emitted 14.1 bn ts. All this is per annum.
In 2012 OECD dropped 1 bn tonnes to 12.8bn ts. But the non OECD increased to 19.9 bn ts or an increase of 5.8 bn ts in just 7 years.
The USA was 6 bn ts in 2005 but dropped to 5.3 bn ts in 2012. While China was 5.1 bn ts in 2005 and 8.5 bn ts in 2012, an increase in 3.4 bn ts pa in just 7 years.
And the projections until 2040 show that the non OECD will be responsible for at least 95% of new co2 emissions of co2 over that 26 year period. What a joke, with China and India laughing all the way to the bank.
30
12 Nov: Reason: Ron Bailey: U.S.- China Climate Deal—Less Than Meets the Eye?
So at what level might China’s emissions peak? Assuming the recent 3 percent annual increase in China’s carbon dioxide equivalent greenhouse gas emissions continues for the next 16 years, emissions would reach 16 gigatonnes by 2030. If the economy continued to grow at 7 percent per year, that would imply an increase in carbon intensity (GDP per ton of emissions) of morethan 60 percent.
In 2005, the U.S. emitted the equivalent of 7.26 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide. So cutting emissions by 28 percent by 2025 implies emissions of 5.23 gigatonnes in 2025, which is about the amount that the U.S. emitted in 1992. Assuming that Chinese emissions did peak in 2030, the country could by then be emitting three times more than the U.S.
Only time will tell if the joint announcement is more “optics” than substance…
http://reason.com/blog/2014/11/12/us-china-climate-deal-less-than-meets-th
12 Nov: BBC: Matt McGrath: Will Obama’s climate surprise deliver a global deal?
So where is the history in all these histrionics?…
But the deal doesn’t stem from a philosophical determination to save the planet.
It is based on the naked political necessities of both countries.
President Obama needs to show the US Congress and public he can create a level playing field for American industry to compete with China…
But in terms of steering the world to below the 2 degree C target that scientists believe is the threshold of danger, this agreement doesn’t cut the mustard…
Taken together with the EU’s recent announcement of new climate targets for 2030, you could be forgiven for thinking that a deal in Paris is in the bag.
If only.
Cutting emissions is just one part of the negotiations, and for many countries, the least important bit.
For many, the bigger questions are about cash to cope with the impact of climate change.
Many nations want a financial mechanism that would put a legal responsibility on those who have done most to cause climate change to compensate those who suffer most from it. This is a potential iceberg for the whole process.
“There is a need for the developing countries to see that there would be certainty in terms of future flows of finance, otherwise we won’t see much ownership of this process from many of the parties in Paris,” said Tosi Mpanu-Mpanu, a senior negotiator from the Democratic Republic of Congo, speaking to me earlier this year.
And no deal without it, I ask?
“I’m not afraid to say so,” says Mr Mpanu-Mpanu.
“No money, no fund, no deal in Paris.”
http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-30019902
00
The Bolter shows why the Greens are fools and hypocrites. Not hard to do.
“The Greens are cheering a deal which lets China rip on coal-fired and nuclear plants:
China consumed as much coal as the rest of the world in 2012. It plans to build another 50 coal plants, which may produce an estimated 1.1 billion tons of carbon dioxide per year… It has 21 nuclear reactors in operation and another 28 under construction or planned.
UPDATE
The Greens cheer a deal built on technologies they actually oppose:
The Australian Greens are congratulating the US and China on their agreement to act on global warming and say it’s not too late for Australia to get on board.
“This should be a massive wake-up call to Tony Abbott. His continued climate denial and his destruction of the environment is reckless,” said Greens Leader Christine Milne.
“Tony Abbott is so busy unwinding Australia’s climate policies that he failed to notice the global economy is changing around him. He is risking billions of dollars in investment and thousands of jobs.”
In fact, the US has had emissions fall lately largely because its shale gas revolution – thanks to fracking – has dramatically lowered the price of gas, especially relative to coal, as the EPA notes:
This decrease [in emissions] from 2011 to 2012 is primarily a result of the decrease in the carbon intensity of fuels used to generate electricity due to a slight increase in the price of coal, and a significant decrease in the price of natural gas.
China’s promises to increase its non-fossil fuels to 20 per cent of all primary power supplies by using exactly the technologies the Greens hate – nuclear and hydro power:
Mainland China has 22 nuclear power reactors in operation, 26 under construction, and more about to start construction. Additional reactors are planned, including some of the world’s most advanced, to give more than a three-fold increase in nuclear capacity to at least 58 GWe by 2020, then some 150 GWe by 2030, and much more by 2050…
Most of mainland China’s electricity is produced from fossil fuels (79% from coal, 2% from gas in 2011) and hydropower (15%)… Nuclear power contributed 2.1% of the total production in 2013 – 105 billion kWh according to IAEA….
At the end of 2010, fossil fuelled capacity (mostly coal) reached 707 GWe, hydro capacity was 213 GWe (up 16.6 GWe in the year), nuclear capacity was 10.8 GWe and wind capacity reached 31 GWe…
The Greens, though, are against fracking, against nuclear and against new dams.
The Greens wish the ends but not the means. They instead push technologies that would cripple us.”
50
They don’t work but wind turbines are SSoS.
Sacred Symbols of Stupidity.
50
Actually, it’s an agreement between Obama and China. The US wants nothing to do with it or with Obama, it seems.
80
I just wanted to point out that Tony Abbott is a moron and should be replaced as Prime Minister sooner rather than later.
015
Christopher, my good friend,
I disagree with you 100%, but you are as entitled to your opinion as much as I am to mine.
80
As it happens, US emissions have been falling for years because of the miracle of economic slowdown.
60
Ah, and therein lies the rub.
Economic slowdown, leading to less power consumption, leading to less emissions.
What is happening at the moment here in Australia is that overall total electrical power consumption is indeed falling.
Greens etc will say that residential rooftop solar is doing that, and that it also has a lot to do with Australian homes (the Residential sector) consuming less power.
Okay then, just what is the extent of the fall in total power consumption.
35TWH in the last three years, and trust me, that’s a huge drop. The overall total power consumption is now down to 200TWH per year.
Okay then, look at the image at this link, and here, look at the lower of the two table boxes.
Note bottom right the total power at 200,065 and that is in GWH. (which equates to 200TWH)
Note the total residential consumption 56,081.3 (or 56.0813TWH) which is 28% of total consumption here in Oz. That percentage has risen slightly over the last couple of years as the total overall has dropped. In the U.S. residential power consumption is 38% of the overall, and the reason it is higher is that here in Oz, more residences consume Natural Gas for heating and cooking etc than in most other places around the World, hence that percentage anomaly. If ALL natural gas was replaced by electric power, then the percentage would be around the same as for the U.S. 38%.
That Australian residential total has been relatively the same for the last five or so years, perhaps dropping a little, even with the ramping up of rooftop solar installations. Keep in mind that this table shows power consumed FROM the grid. Rooftop solar power currently generates around 3TWH, and perhaps half of that is fed back to the grid, and in all probability, mostly just dumped because it is such a tiny amount and is spread across the whole of Australia, so even less when it is spread across individual grids in smaller areas, if you can see that point. So, with half that rooftop power now being consumed by the residences, that is a total of 1.5TWH of power not being consumed from the grid.
1.5TWH from rooftop solar is virtually nothing when compared to that total.
Now, look at the top table box, and the right hand column, which shows the number of consumers.
Compare the residential consumers to the Business consumers. (and here that means (a) Commerce and (b) Industry, both lumped in together)
Note there are 12 times the number of residential consumers than business, and when you refer back to the lower actual consumption table, the business sector consumes 2.55 times the total for residential, meaning that the AVERAGE business consumer uses 30 times more power than the average residence.
That’s where the bulk of the lowering consumption has come from.
Shut down a large Industry, which is a huge consumer, and suddenly, total power consumption falls away.
Small economies in the home have the most minute of effects, while shutting businesses down results in huge lowering of consumption.
That’s where the falling power consumption is happening, as businesses are driven away by making power too expensive, driven offshore to where power cost is not such a large part of the bottom line deductions.
Tony.
Post Script – Incidentally, the Victorian Desalination plant will add 1.2TWH to total power consumption, just this ONE Victorian plant alone, 0.6% of Australia’s total power consumption, around the same power which is being consumed in 198,000 Australian homes.
60
The headline should be “US and China agree to commit economic suicide. China says, ‘You first!'”
The reality is simple: It is all about the money. Obama has to appease the left in order to maintain a slim chance of being relevant so he can suck some more money out of his donor base. The donations give him political currency and that translates into political clout.
I predict in 2016 that very few Democrats, except those in hard core blue districts and states, will either be elected or reelected if they support this flagrant attempt by Obama to bypass the Senate to arrive at a de facto non binding treaty.
Voters vote their pocketbook.
Americans want good paying jobs and a future. They have made it clear that any politician that gives priority to the global warming scam over jobs and the economy is in for a reality check in the next election. It will be interesting to see how many of these deluded fools fall on their sword to appease Gaia. I can hear them now, “We who are about to die salute you!”
When the Republicans take the white house in 2016 I hope that the new president is forced to comply with the law and add the enviro wackos to the endangered species list!
140
“Nos Morituri Te Salutamus” (we who are about to die salute you).
Famous signal sent by Wing Commander John Lerew to Australian High Command during WW2, when he was orderd to defend Rabaul with 10 Wirraway trainer aircraft and 4 Hudson Bombers against an attacking force of 2 aircraft carriers, 100 aircraft, 7 cruisers and 16 destroyers.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Rabaul_(1942)
30
Not really important for residents of the Southern Hemisphere but here in America we are ruled by a written Constitution. Even the Democrats (or commucrats) on the US Supreme Court will agree to follow the Constitution as it explicitly says it is the “Supreme Law of the Land”. Only Congress (the House of Representatives who cannot be appointed even to fill vacancies caused by death and the Senate) where currently Republicans hold 226 House seats (of 435) and 45 Senate seats(of 100). The new Congress will have 240 Republicans in the House and 54 Republicans in the Senate. After the Constitution ratified Treaties outrank Congressional and State Laws but must be ratified by 2/3 of the Senate.
Obama cannot do much as his silly Executive decisions he claims are made pursuant to authority to enforce Laws can be eviscerated by Congress withholding funding. The Constitution prohibits any spending not authorized by Congress.
So Barry Soetoro (the name he used in college) and the Chinese are just pen pals on this subject.
Looks like Australia and America are about to be even more alike as the Republicans will take CO2 regulation authority away from the Executive Environmental Protection Agency.
10
One can only hope so …
30
Neville –
china/US – nuclear/fracking…it is breath-taking how the Greens/ABC/Fairfax CAGW crowd fail to recognise the bleeding obvious – it’s there in the announcements yesterday and in the latest IEA World Energy Outlook report:
13 Nov: Bloomberg: Nukes and Shale Win The Day in U.S.-China Climate Deal
By Joe Carroll and Jim Polson
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-11-12/gas-and-nuclear-win-with-new-u-s-china-climate-accord.html
of course, there are always costs:
12 Nov: Financial Times: Anjli Raval: Bill for shutting nuclear plants will reach $100 billion
The bill for closing down and cleaning up the world’s ageing nuclear reactors will exceed $100bn over the next 25 years alone, the leading energy watchdog has said, warning that governments risk underestimating the cost.
With almost 200 reactors due to be shut down by 2040, the International Energy Agency says in its annual report there are “considerable uncertainties” about decommissioning costs, reflecting governments’ limited experience in safely dismantling nuclear plants. In the last 40 years, only 10 reactors have been closed down…
The estimates for clean-up costs are contained in the IEA’s closely watched World Energy Outlook, which this year includes a comprehensive analysis of the global nuclear industry.
It will inevitably raise questions about the economics of nuclear power at a time when countries such as China and the UK are pressing ahead with ambitious reactor-building programmes…
The IEA said the amount of spent nuclear fuel will double to more than 700,000 tonnes by 2040.
But even now, Mr Birol noted, “some 60 years after the first nuclear power plant started operation, no country has yet opened a permanent disposal facility for commercial high-level waste”
Paul Dorfman of the Energy Institute at University College London noted that the IEA’s $100bn figure is only for decommissioning and does not include the costs of permanent waste disposal.
“The UK’s own decommissioning and waste disposal costs are £85bn alone, so that gives you an idea of the astronomical costs associated with nuclear,” he said…
http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/925030a2-68fb-11e4-9eeb-00144feabdc0.html#axzz3IqRmL5P5
coal looks better all the time…
10
btw what’s the best Obama talks up the China/US “deal” when he fronts an adoring crowd at Uni of Qld! i can think of a few CAGW zealots who will be in attendance!
12 Nov: ABC: Brisbane G20: St Lucia campus becomes ‘declared area’ as UQ prepares for Obama’s speech
Mr Obama will address an audience at the University of Queensland campus in St Lucia on Saturday morning on the topic of US leadership in the Asia-Pacific…
Queensland Police announced this afternoon the powers would apply from 8am on Friday until 5pm on Saturday…
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-11-12/uq-campus-becomes-declared-area-ahead-of-obama-speech/5885742
11 Nov: ABC: Brisbane G20: United States President Barack Obama to speak at University of Queensland
The president’s invite-only address at UQ’s St Lucia campus will focus on US leadership in the Asia-Pacific.
UQ vice-chancellor and president Professor Peter Høj said it was a momentous occasion for the university.
“It is a tremendous honour for UQ and will be marked as an historic occasion by many of our almost 50,000 students,” Professor Høj said.
“UQ will be pleased to welcome not only some of our own students to hear the president speak, but also guests from other universities and schools, in addition to youth leaders who contribute to our society.
“We are delighted to offer the stage so these young people can share the room with President Obama as he gives insights that will affect their futures.”
Local and international media will attend the event and broadcast Mr Obama’s speech to the world.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-11-11/barack-obama-to-speak-at-university-of-queensland/5883546
ABC is overcome with Obama-ism right now…
10
ABC even adores US military hardware, if it has an Obama connection! this story has gone around the world, with Rhianna’s comments & all:
13 Nov: ABC: Lucinda Kent: G20: US military in dusty transport practice ahead of Barack Obama’s arrival
ABC Radio National presenter and keen plane spotter Rhianna Patrick said the Osprey aircraft and two VH-3D Sea King helicopters, which will transport Mr Obama during the summit, were rare sights outside of Hollywood movies…
“We all know these aircraft purely through cinema, through news, they are like the celebrities of the aviation world,” she said.
“Air Force One is probably the most recognised aircraft in the world, closely followed by Marine One, which is what the Sea King helicopter is called when it is carrying the president.” …
Ms Patrick said the US Marine Corps fly the Osprey aircraft and Sea King helicopters in pairs.
“They always have two, a spare plane, a spare helicopter, a spare Osprey, in case one has a failure they will always have a backup,” she said.
“Of all of the world leaders’ planes, these are absolutely the stars, they are state of the art and basically blinged out with really iconic livery.” …
It has not been confirmed whether Mr Obama will arrive at a speaking engagement at the University of Queensland by helicopter, motorcade or by boat on the Brisbane River.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-11-12/g20-us-military-dusty-transport-practice-ahead-of-obama-arrival/5886772
00
I had thought that the RET legicslation had already been passed by Parliament, but maybe not!
From Andrew Bolt: “As Labor walked away from RET talks, the senator (Jaquie Lambie) repeated her stance that she would not negotiate with the government on the scheme — or vote for any legislation — unless the ADF pay offer was increased.
“Any political deals the government has with Clive will now have to be renegotiated with me,” she said.”
Could we yet be spared this useless, expensive and wasteful legislation?
ADF may have to wait for now. We might be able to make a higher pay offer later if the money is not wasted on Climate Change.
40
WHat a pathetic joke Obama has turned out to be. I mean what a sad little undergraduate stunt to pull so soon after the mid term election result. The Republicans will just roll over on this, Oh yeah! It will be open warfare with the EPA and even the Democrats in ‘cola’ states will be marching in the streets. It will end up in the US Supreme Court, the Congress or worse.
I mean the Chines and the Russians must just be pissing themselves laughing at this sad little prancer or a president.
61
I was asked will this put Tony Abbott and Australia in a difficult position. I said no Tony can say I agree we also will lower emissions in 15yrs time.
61
Yowza!
Nice one Joanne.
This article appears as a Post at the CFACT site at this link.
Tony.
Post Script – They also allow commenting at the site, and there’s more comments for this Post than is usually the case at the CFACT site.
30
Just to provide a little more information to Tony from Oz’s post at # 26.
I hope Tony doesn’t mind.
This article on China’s hydro plans from China Green News; and needless to say the SE Asian nations that rely on the rivers with their head water sources in the Himalayan Plateau are very upset by the Chinese plans to divert large percentages of water from those life giving SE Asian rivers
China’s 12th Five-year Plan: Construction on Over 60 Hydropower
[ quoted ]
An authoritative source discusses hydroelectric developments outlined in the 12th Five-year Plan.Source: China Energy News Net
http://green.news.qq.com/a/20110830/000907.htm
Construction will finish by the end of 2015 on eight large hydropower zones, each comprising several hydroelectric plants and each producing tens of millions of kilowatts.
By then, the national production of hydroelectricity will reach 910 billion kilowatt-hours, according to a report on xinhua.com.
[ edit ; 910 “billion” [ ?? ] KW hours, see USA power generation statistics below ]
An authoritative source reveals that in the coming 12th Five-year Plan of Renewable Energy Resources, hydropower will be the most prioritized source of renewable energy. During the 12th Five-year Plan period, China will begin construction on more than 60 key hydropower projects.
Previously the market expectation predicted six major hydropower zones, but the goal has now increased to eight.
Analysts say that the process of authorizing hydropower projects has accelerated since the beginning of this year. This Five-year Plan clearly emphasizes hydropower projects as a goal, and this emphasis will comprehensively speed up the activation procedure for such projects and bring about a turning point for the industry.
Over 60 hydropower projects to begin construction in five years
The above mentioned source indicated that the next five years will see construction start on major hydropower zones on the Jinsha River, the Yalong River, the Dadu River, the Lancang River, the Nujiang River, the upper main strem of the Yellow River, the Zangbo River in Tibet and one other river.
It is expected that during the 12th Five-year Plan period, the country’s hydroelectric production will reach about 87.5 million kilowatts.
Within the large hydropower zones, the plants operating on main stem rivers that will go into operation are Xiluodu, Xiangjiaba, Jinping, Nuozadu, etc. They are expected to produce about 52 million kilowatts.
Sichuan, Yunnan and other provinces in China will see about 35.5 million kilowatts generated by their hydroelectric plants on tributary rivers.
By the end of 2015, the net estimated installed capacity of these plants is expected to reach about 284 million kilowatts.
If this estimation is realized, China will be exploiting 71% of its available hydroelectric power: 100% of that from eastern and central China and about 54% of the available hydroelectric power in west China.
The development of pumped-storage hydroelectric plants will accelerate. A few days ago, the Energy Department issued a statement requesting a moderate acceleration in the construction of pumped-storage hydroelectric plants.
According to Zhang Boting, the Assistant Secretary General of the Chinese Society of Hydroelectric Engineering, the 12th Five-year Plan has adjusted the construction goal of pumped-storage hydroelectric plants from 50 to 80 million kilowatts.
[ end ]
From the EIA site;Table 1.2. Summary Statistics for the United States, 2002 – 2012
In 2012 the USA generated in total from all sources some 4,047,765 thousand Megawatt hours of electrical power.
Coal was used to generate 1 ,514,043 thousand Mega watt hours of electrical power in this sum.
Solar, thermal and photovoltaic; 4,327 thousand Megawatt hrs.
Wind; 140,822 thousand Megawatt hrs
40
Bernadett in Budapest gets the first word; long-time cap’n’taxer Stavins gets the last.
12 Nov: Bloomberg: Matthew Carr: American Carbon Market Seen as Winner With China Accord
The climate deal between the two nations, which together spew out 42 percent of the world’s emissions, may be the first step toward a global carbon market, said Bernadett Papp, an analyst at Vertis Environmental Finance Ltd. in Budapest…
It’s not clear how China and the U.S. will legislate on the deal, nor how important carbon pricing will be, according to Maria van der Hoeven, the executive director of the International Energy Agency.
“The proof of the pudding is always in the eating,” she said in an interview in London yesterday…
An accord between the U.S. and China may be “the most important development in international climate negotiations in more than a decade, perhaps two decades,” Robert Stavins, the director of the Harvard Environmental Economics Program, said by e-mail. “We’re finally moving beyond the foundation of the Kyoto Protocol, which currently accounts for 14 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions, to a truly meaningful foundation.”
http://www.businessweek.com/news/2014-11-12/u-dot-s-dot-china-carbon-deal-to-boost-chance-of-global-market
Robert N. Stavins Bio
He was … a Lead Author of the Second and Third Assessment Reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)…
Prior to coming to Harvard, Stavins was a staff economist at the Environmental Defense Fund; and before that, he managed irrigation development in the Middle East, and spent four years working in agricultural extension in West Africa as a Peace Corps volunteer. His wife, Joanna Stavins, is an Economist in the Research Department of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston.
http://www.hks.harvard.edu/fs/rstavins/bioweb.html
00
setting a “theme” or a “meme”!
12 Nov: NYT: Coral Davenport: In Climate Deal With China, Obama May Set 2016 Theme
President Obama’s landmark agreement with China to cut greenhouse gas pollution is a bet by the president and Democrats that on the issue of climate change, American voters are far ahead of Washington’s warring factions and that the environment will be a winning cause in the 2016 presidential campaign.
A variety of polls (STANFORD, YALE POLLS REFERENCED) show that a majority of American voters now believe that climate change is occurring, are worried about it, and support candidates who back policies to stop it. In particular, polls show that majorities of Hispanics, young people and unmarried women — the voters who were central to Mr. Obama’s victories in 2008 and 2012 — support candidates who back climate change policy…
“They’re giving Republicans fertile ground for attack,” said Mike Murphy, a longtime Republican strategist. “Overregulation is clearly a job killer and jobs and the economy and middle-class wages are going to be a huge issue in the 2016 presidential. And it does seem like an inside job, with Podesta setting up Hillary’s position. Politically, they’re going to put themselves in a weak position on this.”
As evidence, Republican strategists point to their recent wave of victories in this year’s midterm elections, when they campaigned aggressively against Mr. Obama’s E.P.A. regulations…
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/13/world/asia/in-climate-deal-with-china-obama-may-set-theme-for-2016.html?_r=0
00
The half Monty, this does say it all!
China and the United States stunned observers by announcing a secretly negotiated agreement
They had dear old Monty, the dead climate parrot stored in the Antarctic freezer, away from all those pesky Polar Bears, and stomped on by millions of happy feet. It was meant to be a surprise for the Brisbane G20!
But, do they really believe in reincarnation, well one of them certainly does, the other is smart enough to know Parrot is totally stuffed anyway, but just keeps smiling!
Confucius said…. Guess who?
20
Politically it seems that Obama is playing a very short sighted game as far as the record of his presidency will stand.
He has promoted and entered an unenforceable and quite impotent agreement with China where there are no long term political gains to be made,
But an agreement which might have a very strong chance of being seen to be the last throw of loaded dice by an impotent and insignificant presidency if and probably when the whole climate catastrophe and it’s associated and very reckless and unproven claims finally are seen to be what they are, a massive con by a small group of unethical climate scientists, aided and abetted by a raft of enviro fascist organizations looking to gain a major political hold over the levers of power in the western world.
Obama’s presidency seems to me to be somewhat similar to a CO2 filled party balloon.
Large and prominent but lacking anything of substance at all below the very thin veneer on it’s publicly visible surface.
All accompanied by much loud fizzing as it arcs up around the political space doing little more than making a few politicals duck a little as it loudly fizzes past and then as the gas runs out, steadily deflating until only a small saggy remnant is left to remind the world what might have been .
A sad saggy political remnant of a presidency which will quickly be forgotten as the world moves on as we all do after a party and it’s gas filled balloons slowly deflate, their role over and done with.
40
Actually one I have been thinking about for some time.
Obama and a whole host of wannabe prophets of doom, gloom and despair plus innumerable commenters of which I am one, are all going to look fairly stupid with all our rantings and ravings about the probability or not of anthropogenic catastrophic warming from both sides of the aisle if Lockheed Martin and their Skunk Works or maybe one of a half dozen other outfits crack either the Cold Fusion process which might have already been done if the claims of Rossi’s claims turn out to be real and proven.
Or alternatively the likes of LM or a few others working on similar lines crack Fusion in line with their projected timetable, by 2017 or at least by 2020.
Every single agreement, claim, science, politics, business forecasts plus, plus, all, every single one of them are operating on the premise that there will be NO further technological advancements or technological breakthroughs in power generation into the far future beyond what we have today.
And that given the history of technological advance over the last century and a half is stupidity quantified .
Naturally the greens and their CliFi ideologies [ Climate Fiction ] will claim wind and solar are technological breakthroughs.
It needs to be pointed out to them, thats if their ears aren’t completely plugged with Greenpeace hype and lies, that those old British industrialists of the late 16th century got the hell out of the 3000 years old technology of wind just as fast as they could rivet those steam engine boilers together
And solar, well if they want to live with power for less than eight hours a day then expect a significant boost to the birth rate, a very significant birth rate increase which occurred just nine months after the great North East blackout in the USA in 2003 where some 200,000 people were without power for up to 2 days.
Given the circumstances, as one of my old neighbours use to say; “You can have a lot of fun without laughing!!”
It seems they did!
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for the record, BOM forecast 29 deg for Brisbane today (it’s been a pleasant 26 deg max just south of the City).
for G20, with the outback heat arriving, they’re predicting 35 deg for Saturday and 38 deg for Sunday. let’s see how that turns out for them.
http://www.bom.gov.au/qld/forecasts/brisbane.shtml
thought i’d just check to see if MSM have been using the above as CAGW propaganda. Hannam hasn’t disappointed, tho his 36 for Sunday has been upped to 38 by BOM & his 36 for Monday is now forecast to be 33:
12 Nov: Age: Peter Hannam: Nature turns up the heat just in time for G20
At this weekend’s G20 summit, it may well be a case of “Don’t mention the warmth!”
Prime Minister Tony Abbott has done his level best to keep climate change off the G20 agenda for this weekend’s leaders summit but it seems nature is going to have the final say.
The heatwave that’s been building for days across outback Australia will make a timely arrival across south-eastern Queensland from Friday until at least Monday…
The mercury is forecast to reach 32 degrees on Friday in Brisbane before climbing to 35 on Saturday and 36 degrees on Sunday and Monday. The city’s average maximum in November is 27.8 degrees.
“The last time we had three days of 35 degrees in a row in Brisbane in November was in 1968,” said Ben McBurney, a meteorologist with Weatherzone. “It’s certainly earlier than we’d expect.”…
Mr Abbott has sought to steer discussions at the G20 summit towards efforts to generate faster global growth, relegating climate issues to sessions dealing with energy efficiency…
The government’s bid to avoid climate change had already suffered a setback with Wednesday’s announcement that the US and China would both step up efforts curb carbon dioxide emissions in a bid to avoid climate change.
Journalists are likely to press the Australian government for comments on its climate policies not least because of this week’s breakdown in talks with Labor to cut the country’s renewable energy target.
Meteorologists and climate experts are, of course, wary of reading too much into any weather event. Still, it may be a nuance lost on delegates who stray far from their air-conditioned conference cocoons, hotel suites and limousines.
http://www.theage.com.au/environment/weather/nature-turns-up-the-heat-just-in-time-for-g20-20141112-11lby3.html
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Kristian has 41 for Sunday now! who knows where that came from? bit like looking at the BOM’s rain forecasts on the weather channel – one day two thirds of the month show rain, and by the next day, there might be a single day of rain predicted for the month!
13 Nov: Brisbane Times: Kristian Silva: Police to deal with G20 heat on Sunday
A top of 31 is tipped for Friday, while maximums of 35 and 41 are forecast for Brisbane on Saturday and Sunday…
He (Brisbane City Councillor Julian Simmonds )said council workers were cleaning the roads from Brisbane to the University of Queensland’s St Lucia campus, perhaps giving the biggest hint that US President Barack Obama will travel by car to deliver his speech to a select audience on Saturday morning…
http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/queensland/brisbane-g20/police-to-deal-with-g20-heat-on-sunday-20141113-11lzmw.html
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An audience, some of whom are so impressed that they’ve turned down the ‘opportunity’.
By the way, no need to to do anything to the streets to UQ, Obummer is flying in in one of the US Marine choppers.
31
And Putin is steaming in by Destroyer, LOL have you ever seen so much bed wetting over a 4 foreign Navy ships in International waters?
Seriously there are some spineless twerps in positions of power in this country, usually if the poo hits the turbine the adults step up and take charge so lets hope there’s still some around after years of PC social engineering.
We Victorians predicted a Russian Naval attack during the Crimean War and made preparations with Popes Eye that remains unfinished, but the real plan of attack is to lure the Russians peacefully into Melbourne where the inner city luvvies will then bore them to death with constant whining about everything and nothing.
It’s a bit cruel but quicker than being ‘shirtfronted’ to death.
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Correction, the USA has agreed to nothing, Obummer has made some sort of personal meaningless treaty. http://stevengoddard.wordpress.com/2014/11/12/most-open-and-transparent-administration-makes-secret-deal-to-destroy-the-us-economy/
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China is of course willing to supply export orders for so called renewable energy equipment and hope that socialists around the world keep faith.
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James Peterson lets rip at Direct Action plan
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http://news.slashdot.org/story/14/11/12/0247217/denmark-faces-a-tricky-transition-to-100-percent-renewable-energy?sbsrc=md
This is a permanent problem, and one that they were warned about, repeatedly. Greens in the government just pretended it doesn’t exist until it’s now hitting them square in their faces. Germany is hitting the same problem with Energiewende right now.
The situation is this. Denmark produces mostly wind power nowadays. Wind power is installed mainly offshore. That means that they have huge peaks and huge offtime. Europe had wholesale electricity prices set on electricity exchanges for years now. What that means is that large producers and users buy and sell energy based either off current price, or long term contracts that usually take those peaks into account.
For actual producers, this means that free market sets the price. I.e. when wind blows and everyone is creating a huge peak, electricity price can actually dive into negative for reasons I’ll outline in a moment. And when it’s down due to too much or too little wind, you have a huge demand for electricity to replace the lost load driving the prices up.
Now for the reason for negative pricing on electricity. Normally renewables like wind functioning in fully free market would be massively unprofitable when installed in sufficient numbers because they would all produce at once > price collapses due to massive supply and lack of demand > they never get a good price on their electricity. And at the same time when they cannot produce any energy, only base power kinds of power plants produce energy and get to net a premium.
So how do you make renewables make money when they can only sell when price is cheap and not when it’s more expensive? The answer in Denmark and Germany has been to legislate priority tiers depending on your “greenness”. Essentially, not a single watt of non-renewable energy can be sold on exchange until all of renewable capacity has been sold. At the same time, same legislation prevents reliable non-renewables and renewables from spinning down their plants while they legally cannot sell anything they produce. The result is absurd. They end up paying just to get someone take the power they have to produce off their hands. Hence negative electricity prices during peak times for non-renewables who can sell their electricity on the exchange after renewables took all the offers with actual money on the table.
This obviously leads to the problem where it’s unprofitable to keep the non-renewable plants operating, so operators just shut down the plant. Except that woops, if they do, you have grid blackouts as a regular occurrence because there’s not enough base power when wind isn’t blowing and you actually stand to lose the entire grid to a blackout. Something that is unheard of in modern Northern Europe.
TL;DR Essentially, the reality is that the market is functioning too well, and as a result to make renewables profitable legislators had to massively shaft everyone else with punitive measures. And now that everyone else has been penalized into unprofitability and want out of the business, the brutal reality of the fact that wind is dysfunctional as base power is starting to hit everyone in their faces.
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For over 20 years, ad nauseum
It is shallowly tempting to say: “Serve you right” – but repeated grid failures are dangerous to the general populace
There is no accountability here. Even the concept of accountability is now lost
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I think the recent and newly minted nomenclature for black-outs caused by the intermittency and un-predictability of wind and solar power but not due in any way to major base load fossil fueled or nuclear station’s going offline or the grid going down is GREEN-OUTS
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“Administration officials said the agreement, which was worked out quietly between the United States and China over nine months and included a letter . . .”
A letter. Uff da!
Administration ‘officials’ likely make between 100,000 and 200,000 USD per year and they (how many?) spent 9 months and got the boss to sign a letter (likely written by activists on loan from Greenpeace, the WWF, and the Sierra Club).
This has got to be the worst native-government since the Continental Congress debated and adopted the Declaration of Independence. Actually poor government can go back to when King George had his “Broad Arrow” seal slashed into the tallest white pines of the eastern forests. Still, the current administration is dumber.
http://www.nelma.org/lagniappe/kings-broad-arrow-and-ewp/
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[…] “At the G20 this week, Australia will hold the embarrassing title of being the only nation going backwards on climate change. With China and the United States representing around one-third of the global economy and over 40% of global emissions, there will be significant momentum to deal with climate change in Brisbane,” he said. Yes, let’s manage the national economy according to the “Embarrassment Index” — forget productivity, health, wealth, and happiness. It’s right up there next to the GCMF: the Global Climate Momentum Factor. This article originally appeared at JoNova. […]
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“Noting that this is the first time both countries have reached an agreement on a world issue, the Chinese edition of the Global Times praises the “existence of a China-US joint leadership” BBC News
Pity it had to be on such a non-issue. There has to be a name for that.
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Seinfeld — described as being “a show about nothing”
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update re Brisbane Times’s Kristian Silva: Police to deal with G20 heat on Sunday
A top of 31 is tipped for Friday, while maximums of 35 and 41 are forecast for Brisbane on Saturday and Sunday…
Kristian got his 41 from:
13 Nov: Courier Mail: Weather: Southeast Queensland tipped to hit 38C to 41C
Brisbane will be sweltering for G20 weekend, with temperatures expected to hit 38C in the city, while western suburbs and Ipswich could reach a scorching 41C…
“If you’re in the western suburbs it will probably be approaching 40-41 degrees but it will be dry heat.”
Ipswich is forecast to hit 41C on Saturday and 40C on Sunday…
http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/weather-southeast-queensland-tipped-to-hit-38c-to-41c/story-fnkt21jb-1227121573676
being a bit deceptive, Kristian?
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This “treaty” is Obama’s way of doing domestic legislation under the color of living up to a commitment made to another country.
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[…] the Constitution and the US economy Obama’s Bogus Climate Deal with China Election over, so US, China agree to make unenforceable long term commitment with no consequences This entry was posted in Mendacity, Unvarnished. Bookmark the […]
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Recorded by surreptitious devices coming from the inner workings of Red Chinese Politboro planning session: “Let’s promise the Dufus some horsecrap projections stretched out many nebulous years and maybe he will go away.” “Yeah, Guys, that’s the plan, right.” “Agreed.” “Maybe the idiot will hamstring his economy for a promise.” “They would never do that. They are sitting on the biggest load of cheap fossil fuels in the world and have enormous competitive advantage with it.” “You have no idea what a fool we are deal with.” “Oh, I forgot there for a minute. What a maroon!” “Hey, let’s dress him up in an idiotic maroon nightshirt to make it obvious, OK? Think he’ll go for it?” Uproarious laughter follows (After translation)
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http://newsbusters.org/blogs/kyle-drennen/2014/11/13/cbs-finally-covers-gruber-revealing-obamacare-deception
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Must be why Obama just heard about it – http://www.breitbart.com/Breitbart-TV/2014/11/16/Obama-on-Gruber-I-Just-Heard-About-This-Today
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[…] do anyway mostly. Lets have a press conference. Everybody cheer. Its historic baby.Lees verder hier.Voor mijn eerdere DDSbijdragen zie hier.The following two tabs change content […]
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