One more reason not to give funds to the UN, but do enjoy the contortions.
Japan claimed it spent $1b on a particular action against climate change, which made the UN happy. But it turns out that money went to Japanese companies to build coal fired power stations in Indonesia, which makes the UN very unhappy because the UN does not support coal-powered projects, even if they lower CO2 emissions. Coal is evil, after all.
Newsweek: U.N. climate chief Christiana Figueres was apparently unaware of where those funds wound up until it was brought to her attention by the AP. Figueres told the AP that “there is no argument” for supporting coal-powered projects with climate money, and that “unabated coal has no room in the future energy system.”
Watch the anamorphosis as the PR picture turns inside out. Good money becomes bad money. What was UN money becomes not-UN money. What was a CO2 reduction (with a more efficient coal fired power) becomes unsupportable.
The journalists at Reuters had to correct their Newsweek article within hours:
This article was corrected to clarify that the nearly $1 billion were not specifically U.N. funds, but rather Japanese funds that Japan claimed at the U.N. were part of its contribution to a U.N. initiative on climate finance.
So it was UN money and part of the “climate momentum” in 2009, but now that it might embarrass the UN (because coal is evil, after all) it’s called Japanese money.
Despite the update the article still says the money is UN money:
The funding came from a pot of money established by the U.N. in 2009, when wealthy nations pledged to accumulate $30 billion in climate finance over the following three years. At the time, Japan agreed to provide about half that sum.
Is it rorting, cronyism, “success” or all three?
So the UN didn’t have any watchdog or clear directives in place, and they’ve been caught. But against their finest intentions, quite possibly the new coal fired stations are reducing CO2. Though they won’t be changing the climate.
The Japanese defend themselves saying there was never a formal definition of what constitutes “climate finance”, and they’ve broken no law or treaty. According to Associated Press “Japan says these plants burn coal more efficiently and are therefore cleaner than old coal plants.” This is quite likely — the new hotter super-critical coal plants which cut emissions by as much as 15% , but oh the dilemma.
If environmentalists really cared about CO2 emissions, they would love the new coal power. Wind and solar dream of being that environmentally useful. The more we use renewables, the less CO2 they save. In South Australia residents pay 150 times as much for energy that produces almost as much CO2 as would have been made anyway.
Rinse, Repeat, recycle that corruption
The UN is not too concerned about whether the environmental donations get wasted, or achieve anything for the environment. Apparently they value the PR more.
Meanwhile, the recently-established Green Climate Fund, which has similar goals to help poorer nations adapt to the warming climate, also has no watchdog agency or formal definition of climate finance, according to the AP. President Obama recently pledged $3 billion to the fund.
You could be forgiven for thinking that the priority UN outcome is not about getting the weather to change, but about getting more of your money in order to continue to not change the weather.
Other posts:
- Wind farms — are 96% useless, and cost 150 times more than necessary for what they do
- Finally, a way to get energy from Wind Turbines. Burn them, make cement!
- ABC bias against coal hurts the poor and the workers: Sell the ABC
- Let’s copy California and have less jobs, less money, less energy. Feel that Green Glory!
- Solar panels: warm your house or burn it down? Bankrupt your company?
- OK to kill endangered birds? Yes if you are a windfarm. Greens seem to be fine with that.
- Let’s copy Germany: 23,000 wind towers make 7% of its electricity to stop 0 degrees of warming
Jo notes …
Winners: Japanese Companies. Indonesia. Japanese Politicians (temporarily) – “look at all these jobs exporting high tech power stations”.
Losers: Japanese people taking a monetary haircut (or is that hari kari) – as I suspect that the money came from newly minted yen directly from a QE (pick a number less than 20…) episode from the JCB.
The real, long term winner was Indonesia.
(slow hand clap…) well played.
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The Japanese I have had the fortune to work with, have all been very clear thinkers. But they do like to have firm rules to work by; they don’t do subtlety and nuance, and if they are given vague instructions, they tend to question until they are sure they understand.
But subtlety and nuance is what the UN is all about – saying things in such a way that the speaker, or those the speaker represents, can never really be held to account.
I can imagine a team of Japanese Engineers asking why they could no longer build coal fired generation stations, and being told that it was because of the amount of carbon dioxide they produced. But rather than abandon coal fired generation all together (which was the subtle and nuanced message), the engineers would have taken that literally, and developed techniques that still used coal, but significantly reduce the amount of carbon dioxide output.
Problem solved — unless you are a latte-sipper at the UN.
The really good thing, once the Japanese have got these new stations perfected, is they will be able to ramp up production and produce them by the hundreds for the UN to deliver to sub-Saharan Africa, as a gift from the world.
Won’t that be great?
421
Is there lots of coal in Sub Saharan Africa – I didn’t know.
90
Shush!
Neither do the bureaucrats at the UN.
Don’t let the mere truth interfere with a good story. The UN certainly doesn’t.
240
“Neither do the bureaucrats at the UN. ”
Actually RW, I’d be pretty sure they do know..
They are just fighting using every bit of slime and stench they can muster to make sure those sub-Saharan countries don’t utilise that coal to bring themselves out of poverty.
Having strong economies in South Africa would ruin it for the UN’s world government agenda.
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Yes, Griss, I am aware that there is a great deal of buried carbon in Southern Africa. I just avoided a direct response to ExWarmist, for comedic purposes, sigh!
And let’s not forget that some of the buried carbon in South Africa, has the wrong crystalline structure, and that impedes mining for coal. But that can’t be helped, and I understand that the South Africans are slowly removing the non-combustible carbon, while the UN still allows them to. (insert dry humour smiley here).
150
Have I missed soemthing – since when does the UN have any say over governance in a country?
Its a private organisation like the US Fedral Reserve and as such it cant……. oh … hang on….
90
Carbon is a girl’s best friend!
110
The sahar was once a vast green plain. It likely has quantities of coal but whether in economic concentrations and depths, I cannot say.
30
The Congo is incredibly blessed with natural mineral wealth – coal, cobalt, copper, diamonds, gold, manganese, offshore petroleum, silver, tin, uranium and zinc. Leopold II, King of Belgian, no fool he, was the de facto owner of the Congo Free State from 1885 to 1908.
Any surprise that the elite do not want Africa developed by the Africans? Or that China and Russia via the BRICS Development Bank, a rival to the banksters World Bank are making a grab for it?
Things get interesting when you realize the BRICS countries are amassing gold. Both Russia and China have been rattling the cage for several years making it obvious they want to see the end of the US Dollar as the World Reserve Currency. The USD being a fiat currency controlled by bankers.
Congress has no idea of how much gold is in Fort Knox. The bankers won’t let them count it. Calculations show the USA has no ‘Good Deliverable Gold’ left. The Great American Disaster: How Much Gold Remains In Fort Knox?
Remember this was the gold confiscated from US citizens by FDR to back the Federal Reserve bank script that was then transferred to European banks. While US citizens could not exchange Federal Reserve bank script for gold, foreign banks could and did so with abandon until Nixon closed the gold window in 1971. That was when Nixon took the USD off the gold standard completely and the Federal Reserve started printing US dollars like there was no tomorrow.
China for several years has encouraged her citizens to BUY GOLD. China Urges Citizens to Buy Gold and Silver
Next the Chinese government has been buying up gold.
China Working Quietly To Buy Up Gold
Russia is also buying gold. Putin Turns Black Gold to Bullion as Russia Outbuys World
Next is Mining Gold.
Global Gold Mining Production
For the map, click the center then hover over a country. For the actual amounts go to the bottom left of the map and click the magnifying glass.
Three of the BRICS countries have increased gold mining and they are the world’s top producers. The US has gold but the UNITED NATIONS BLOCKED the mine near Yellowstone. Both Australia and Canada have stepped up gold mining while the USA has decreased gold mining.
……
As an aside here is interesting scuttlebutt about gold and the international stage. Remember Gadhafi’s son was attending the Fabian’s London School of Economics thanks to Gadhafi’s good buddy Tony Blair. Seems Sonny may have learned a few things about gold, fiat currency and economics and passed them on to old Dad.
Blair also had six private meetings with the dictator in the three years after he left Downing Street. This would have been when Blair was the Middle East envoy for the United Nations. Blair became envoy on the day he resigned as Prime Minister in June of 2007. Tony Blair was also hired in 2008 by JP Morgan.
Gadhafi could not get away with that plan but it looks like the BRICS countries are going to try next. Too bad Clinton gave China US technology, military secrets as well as our jobs while chasing the illusion of Interdependence.
I think China and Russia are a heck of a lot more interested in world domination than in world interdependence and the UN’s pipe dream of Global Governance. China especially.
Lessons of history: China’s century of humiliation
China Picks at the Scab to Keep the Wound Fresh
30
Yep – there’s lots of coal in Southern Africa. However, the South African Government has fallen for the IPCC Bulls*, and is instituting a ‘carbon tax’ on anyone (read the power stations, steel mills and cement factories) that dares to burn it! And this is a country with declining manufacturing, exporting and employment! Oh, and at the moment, insufficient electrical power due to failures at some power stations, leading to scheduled blackouts across the country. Oh yes, and it’s cool, windless and raining, so PLEASE don’t suggest ‘renewables’.
40
Nothing surprises me with the UN. It has a history of being two faced.
A prime case in point – the UNRWA run palestinian schools were being consistently used overtly for Hamas ammo dumps and firing positions. But all the same time, the UN said they wanted peace.
Yeah, right….
110
I have experienced this just as you described, also with South Korean engineers. Its a very refreshing rawness compared to some of the local ‘yeah, no worries’.
40
RW,
The technology of clean coal is in its infancy, as is the long term safe solution to CO2 storage.
31
Frank,
USC coal power is already THE CLEANEST method of producing electricty.
The Safest and BEST place to store CO2 is in the atmosphere.
This is WHERE IT BELONGS as part of the carbon cycle which provides sustenance for all life on Earth.
50
What the Warmists always over look: Carbon starvation in glacial trees recovered from the La Brea tar pits, southern California.
30
Those graphs you see of CO2 swinging backwards and forwards between around 180 to 240 are an absolute classic “predator/prey” graphic…
….. showing just how DESPERATELY LOW that range of CO2 really is. Only just above survival of life on Earth.
We must NEVER allow the atmospheric CO2 level to drop to those dangerously low levels again.
41
You are very correct Griss.
Another thing the warmists and people in general rarely consider is cold oceans suck up CO2 so if and when the earth heads to it’s cold stable state the ‘high values’ of 400 ppm CO2 are going to drop like a rock when animals need as much plant growth as possible to survive.
Also higher CO2 levels make C3 plants (over 95 % of plant species) more drought resistant and glacial conditions are DRY.
Genetic evidence suggests that Human population size fell to about 10,000 adults between 50 and 100 thousand years ago. (Some estimate go as low as 40 breeding pairs) The Mount Toba eruption and the instant deep Ice Age are blamed.
Late Pleistocene human population bottlenecks, volcanic winter, and differentiation of modern humans.
Volcanoes, of course are always erupting some where on earth but none are near the power of the Mount Toba eruption. Let’s hope it stays that way.
http://www.volcano.si.edu/reports_weekly.cfm#vn_282110
20
Well said.
11
I do not claim to know much about nanotechnology, so I never discuss it.
On the other hand, the UN and Greens love to flaunt their lack of economic literacy, as Jo’s article clearly demonstrates.
In a sane world, there would be no fanatical rush towards unreliable expensive energy, while scorning and discarding the cheap, reliable type. The problem clearly is that those who support such energy policies are economic illiterates.
Save the World syndrome blinds our political ‘elite’ to economic reality. If you don’t have to take responsibility for your actions, the likelihood of you being habitually stupid must obviously rise exponentially – step forward the western world’s leaders on the left of the political spectrum.
Economic illiteracy has spawned the jamboree in Paris next year, which will attempt to push the world into economic suicide in a futile attempt to solve a non-problem.
Just imagine what it would be like to live in a sane world without all this green BS.
360
Hi Peter, I would respectfully suggest that the political spectrum is independent of habitual stupidity.
70
Bare in mind, the mentioned Christiana Figueres is the same UN climate tool who praises Communist China’s political system because they “avoid legislative hurdles”. ie: They don’t have any one who would oppose them!
Now, in regards to Economic illiteracy of the Left and its activist minions…This is simple to explain: They don’t put a moral value on money.
What I mean is, we have a bunch of people who have NEVER done an honest day’s work in their lives! (Actual work that regular Jane/Joe citizen does). Seriously, look at every one of them! They travel around the world to their “conferences” (Climate Change circle jerking) because they have created privileged positions for themselves (which are paid for by UN funds…That are taken from taxpayers). And if they’re those upper-middle class activists, daddy or Govt (welfare/benefits) pays for their activism!…Again, taxpayers!
When one has no real moral values, do you honestly expect them to understand something simple as “You can’t spend more money than you have, else you’ll dig yourself a serious financial hole.”
…They don’t understand that leaving debt/deficit to the next generation of children is immoral. They don’t care. Because its not THEIR money! They have NEVER needed to work for it! This is why they NEVER hold anyone accountable when they distribute other people’s money! (See UN, ALP, Democrats, etc.)
The Left is all about them (their symbolism of how morally superior they are), their stupid narratives (to quash the truth), and how to trick people into funding all their BS! (Its for the children! Its for the poor! Its for the women! etc). These are selfish, childish, sociopathic, delusional degenerates with too much time on their hands. There is no point in debating with them like you would someone with some common sense. Because they cannot mentally comprehend analysis (scientific method), data, numbers, economics, etc. These people are feelings-based to the point of delusion. There really is something mentally wrong with them! Something between their ears is broken. There is no line they won’t cross, in order to reach their goals.
Honestly, if you repaired the Education of the Western world (Australia, Canada, USA, UK, etc) and actually taught people to be politically aware, to fight to know where all the money goes, etc; No one would vote for the Left! No one would support the United Nations. No one would tolerate incompetent politicians. The politicians would be of better quality as they are forced into doing the right thing (political culture will change). Everyone would question everything! And these lunatic Left scammers would all run and hide as pitch forks, cricket bats, baseball bats, etc would be flying in their direction!
This is why I say for all Conservatives and common sense folks to take the gloves off. Stop being nice. The Left aren’t nice to you, why should you offer them any kindness? They are playing for keeps. No more appeasement. No more accommodating their BS under the banner of “tolerance”. Just look at what they’ve done so far! Do you honestly think they would stop? They will take things all the way because no one is stopping them!
When they say we are “Haters” and are “intolerant”, agree with them! Then mock them. Throw snark back at them. Throw their own hypocrisy against them. Always uses words like “So let me get this straight…” and then throw their BS back at them. (See what Peter Costello and Scott Morrison does to Lefties like Gillian Triggs and Sarah Hanson-Young…The latter always realise their stupidity and they shrink into silence! Because they thought they know better until someone points otherwise! Everything is self-esteem to them! They will start talking about how they have a degree and are “educated”. They are empty! No substance! Break their fragile self-esteem, and you soon realise they aren’t strong at all! Just a pack of fakes! There’s nothing to be afraid of when you consistently tell them to stick it where the sun don’t shine.)
In the real world, NO ONE CARES about Climate Change…Its right at the bottom of their priorities.
Look at this United Nations global survey => http://data.myworld2015.org/
The best way to attack Lefties is to record them on video. Then throw it up on Youtube, Facebook, Twitter, etc. Make sure everyone sees it. Remember, they must hide their true nature from the public until they reach their objective. One can stop them cold and put them on the defensive when you have videos of them sprouting their nonsense among their circle-jerk conferences. Always make sure to have them recorded on multiple occasions. So they cannot deny that its a “one off”!
220
Christiana Figueres, executive secretary of the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change, invoked the ancient jaguar goddess Ixchel in her opening statement to delegates gathered in Cancun, Mexico, noting that Ixchel was not only goddess of the moon, but also “the goddess of reason, creativity and weaving. May she inspire you — because today, you are gathered in Cancun to weave together the elements of a solid response to climate change, using both reason and creativity as your tools.”
“Excellencies, the goddess Ixchel would probably tell you that a tapestry is the result of the skilful interlacing of many threads,” said Figueres, who hails from Costa Rica and started her greetings in Spanish before switching to English. “I am convinced that 20 years from now, we will admire the policy tapestry that you have woven together and think back fondly to Cancun and the inspiration of Ixchel.”
Thankfully the Western world was driven over the last few hundred years by theistic mores such as “have dominion over the Earth and subdue it”, rather than the worship of the weather gods. To whom of course human sacrifice always was and still is the way to keep them happy.
120
“Do not answer a fool with his own stupidity, or you will be like him.” ( Proverbs 26:4 )
60
Arrghh… no thank you. In the pictures I’ve seen she looks like an unhappy George Lopez.
Oh.. did you mean bear?
20
Oops! 🙁
Was someone asleep at the switch? How could this happen in such a well run organization as the UN?
170
Off topic but it won’t be seen if I put it anywhere else.
Here’s some good judgment from NOAA. Don’t blame California drought on man made climate change.
Did they miss an opportunity to fan the flames or has someone in charge kept a firm grip on reality? I hope it’s the latter.
90
I resisted this at first but the more I think about it the more I think a challenge to Kevin Trenberth is in order.
So Kevin, where is this extra hotter air from climate change? I dare you to answer me with anything that can stand up under decent scrutiny. I dare you, Kevin!
Now’s your chance so go for it!
60
You know the UN doesn’t believe this CAGW BS.
FWIW, if all the population haters like Obama, Holdren, Ehrlich, and the UN leadership at large thought for one minute CO2 would cause global warming and ultimately the early deaths of billions of people, they’d be lighting bonfires on Main Street and taking flame throwers to the rain forest.
Science czars like Holdren certainly know millions of poor people will continue to die from lack of energy and millions more will be left to suffer in poverty.
He and his pals profit handsomely as long as they can keep pushing the fear and the story in any form. As long as CAGW is kept alive with no outcome they can continue to guess the future and for them, it’s Green
200
Hi Mike,
You may well be right.
The UN is in it’s essential organisational DNA – A Political Machine.
It’s foremost value will be the acquisition of power – it’s foremost method – deceit.
190
Dont also forget the UN at its heart is OCCULT.
I cant stress this enough.
As such, it is the spiritual enemy of Christianity & Judaism, which is also why it hates Israel so much and so consistently.
People dont see the religious face of the UN, but its very dark.
It plays by un-Godly rules, and certainly not the moral rules we would expect, so dont be surprised when it does something appalling – by our traditional Christian-Judeo standards.
In Christianity – the means are modified by a Godly moral framework.
In Communism, the end justifies the means i.e. no Christian morals.
100
Good comment Mike. I agree if the people haters you mention thought for one minute that increased CO2 would kill people, and especially in the third world countries where population is growing, they would be for thousands and thousands of coal power plants without any CO2 control. And, they would be demanding that the industrialized nations provide these high-CO2 emitting power plants to any poor country that would have them.
By the way, ever notice that Obama et. al you mention above, and people who believe the same, never ever want to participate in population reductions themselves? But, they sure want it among the world’s poorest people.
120
mike restin: it strikes me that you have accurately described the sociopathic mind.
50
It’s easy to see coming because they telegraph their every move.
Like a train wreck happening before our eyes and we stand in awe and disbelief watching it unfold and it seems we’re unable to stop their lies from doing major damage.
10
Is JB just being contrarian, as the ‘ Guardian’ suggests ?
Good on her. If the only honest outcome of a Paris summit is unschievable, so be it.
80
Oops. forgot the Link
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/dec/08/abbott-government-accused-of-trying-to-set-up-climate-change-talks-for-failure
80
the Graniad neglects to mention that Abbotts position is also the condition set by the EU against their emissions target.
I perceive that all the parties are moving towards ambitious targets dependent on impossible conditions on others.
In other words – failure at Paris is a given and they are playing pass the blame parcel.
30
It does show that it is all about financial donations (for little or no benifit), but no commitments that could suggest a pass or failure.
All smoke and mirrors.
120
I think it’s a good move for Bishop to attend.
It prevents the love media from running headlines about Australia not caring enough to send someone.
100
Sure, but a bit of a waste of a full blown Foreign Minister surely.
60
But could have some productive talks with a Chinese delegate, maybe? Nothing to do with global-warming, of course, but the potential for agreements about other issues that really matter.
50
“UN Climate Funds build coal plants — do we call it corruption, or is it success?
One more reason not to give funds to the UN, but do enjoy the contortions.
Japan claimed it spent $1b on a particular action against climate change, “
The [problem] is that Japan, or indeed any nation, should feel the need to pay in to this fund in the first place. It finances the bloated antidemocratic bureaucratic monster of the UN.
It is a corruption of democracy that nations are required to first gain permission from the UN to get their own money back in order to do those things that the nation requires to be done. Only to be told by the unelected UN that the nation (and its peoples) are wrong in what they spend their money on.
Stop the corruption – tell the UN where to go!
181
I see I’m in moderation again.
00
I see why –
I used the F-word,
[Snip! Not helpful, Tom] -Fly
30
Maybe if I just [snipped – please stay on the topic] -Fly
20
Coal is not evil. In many countries it is the only way out of poverty and misery. And, if advanced nations such as Japan can continue making coal power plants more efficient, then good for them too.
160
You’ll never get any UN money with a backwards attitude like that.</sarc>
50
“
Rex Murphy, a Canadian icon, writes:
“Environmentalism can be defined as a movement that can only exist in a world that has defied its imperatives. There are no flashmobs, no Twitter campaigns, no networking of activists or oil sands tours, no media coverage — except in those countries where the economies have provided the technology, and the leisure, for what is essentially a parasitic endeavour. The environmental movement is as technologically enabled as the industries it opposes. It depends far more deeply than it will ever admit on precisely what it deplores.
To bring 50,000 green activists to a Copenhagen or a Rio for one of those gigantic environmental summits requires the exertion of manifold technologies and the primary sources of energy that make them possible. To have the luxury of protest you must have an economy that blankets it. The world’s poor don’t do sit-ins; poverty is their padlock, and it is not — as on Burnaby Mountain, or an XL site — a theatrical toy for idle green moralists.
To protest energy requires energy — and a world without the fuels and engines environmentalists protest is one in which they could not function and they would not, iPhoneless, wish to live.”
More entertaining reading here:
http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2014/12/06/rex-murphy-has-the-environmental-movement-ever-seen-a-collapse-it-didnt-want-to-be-on-the-brink-of/
Dec 8, 2014 at 2:20 PM | Unregistered CommenterPolitical Junkie”
From comments at http://bishophill.squarespace.com/blog/2014/12/8/judge-rule-of-law-challenged-by-greens.html#comments
160
It is OK.
The Indonesians will OFF SET the emissions from these power plants with the REDUCTIONS in emissions from kerosene lamps, wood fires etc.
These offsets come to slightly more for a net saving, so if the UN could send another billion dollars Indonesia will make further reductions.
90
But we don’t want them to offset those emissions, we want more. That extra CO2 could help grow a lot of food in a part of the world that needs it.
30
The ballad of Christiana Figueres….
http://youtu.be/eXQPD6OcugY
40
Dear Jo,
When are you going to write that book I’ve been waiting for every year from you? I really enjoy your writing here and can’t help imagining how well your accessible writing style would work in a book about the scandal of CAGW, given that now you now have years of archives from this place to draw upon; you also write clearly and with great humour, which is great asset when trying to communicate often difficult, technical issues around climate science.
Please hurry up! My Kindle is waiting!
—–
Thanks for prodding. You may just inspire me to get organized! – Jo
30
Sort of on thread –
“That was over faster than a knife fight in a phone box. One minute the US and China are ready to join forces to save the world, the next they split on the precise mechanism for measuring that modest aim.”
More at http://www.breitbart.com/Breitbart-London/2014/12/08/UN-Climate-Commitment-in-Tatters-Due-to-Chinese-Secrecy
90
” “This announcement is a political signal from these two countries. If we understand it as a signal, it is a good thing and it is a first for China to stand up and say it will cap its emissions,” Samantha Smith, the leader of the WWF’s Global Climate and Energy Initiative, chirruped at the news.
”
They are desperate to see a signal, any signal , where there is none. Hotspot anyone ?
A gesture at most, that means nothing.
80
“…join forces to save the world, the next they split on the precise mechanism for measuring that modest aim.”
Love the understatement, and thats in the lead paragraph 🙂
80
“Such a brief display of bi-partisanship is not what US lead climate envoy Todd Stern imagined when Obama sealed his original deal.”
Ha ha ha ha ha ha…. Great article.
60
Echos of COPenhagen, when didn’t they divide on what they would commit to verifiably ?
It would be something quite unexpected and rather major acievemènt in itself if Lima were to come anywhere near being as big a flop as Copenhagen was in 2009. Especially now considering how little interest there is in the whole thing.
Hadn’t Obama not long been elected back then. Will the 5year demise of the Climate Change nonsense become another defining issue of his presidency ?
50
We can dream, can’t we?
40
I want to know when the Union Labor Party of Australia will cap its emissions
60
John Setka will let you know.
All in good time. The man has a state to run at the moment
60
The Road to Paris 2015
Sharan Burrow
Leading the workers’ fight on climate
Initially trained as a teacher, Burrow has been active in the Australian trade union movement for several decades.
(she doesn’t look that old)
In May this year Burrow led a renewed ‘Unions4Climate’ movement, explicitly designed to contribute to the political debate on the run up to Paris 2015 and offering the powerful line that ‘There are no jobs on a dead planet’.
http://roadtoparis.info/top-list/20-women-making-waves-climate-change-debate/sharan-burrow/
. . .
Electricity Bill Shorten would be so proud.
PS. Where is Joannenova?
Surely in the “top 20 of women making waves in climate change”?
50
There certainly aren’t any jobs without reliable power. She’s just another witch hopping on the broomstick of climate change fear mongering in my opinion.
31
Then F*S keep releasing that LIFE-GIVING CO2 from its accidental sequestration.
42
Not of the right stripe, don’t you know. Doesn’t play a team game. Comes from somewhere obscure, and lets plebs comment on her bloggie-thing.
40
Jo’s stripe is pretty much down the centre.
Well balanced common-sense and great patience with the scientific illiteratia.
53
There is no poetry in you Griss, no ephemerality. What a literal life you must lead (good alliteration there, I might use that again), full of facts, and detail, and none of the wonder of a child.
20
“and none of the wonder of a child”
People who know me would beg to differ. 😉
41
The way I read it, and see it; is the big numbers seem impressive, therefor there is success in gaining big numbers. They don’t monitor or care about where the money is spent. This fact should tell any sane person that the “aid” is not the goal. It’s the collection and distribution of big numbers. Ego, self-importance, aggrandisement, status, etc. Any aid that does happen is purely incidental, i.e.: They don’t monitor where the money is spent.
50
Jo – just wondering how the powers that be actually calculate the volume of CO2 emitted by the target industries. Accurate within a range of????
—
Good question! — Jo
20
Jo can you do an update on Ebola because that was a failure of money in WHfund surely. Also I have done my bit to suggest training and paying immune survivors with obvious quick improvements .
50
Helen – yes, I’m a couple of weeks out of date, but at last reading, the situation was that the curves were getting less steep (thank goodness). Missionaries and companies in the danger zones were doing better infection control and information awareness programs with plastic bags on hands for carers when gloves were not available and buckets of chlorine. For me the critical point was when 2 weeks passed after Amanda Vinson (texas nurse) flew and no one was infected despite an Ebola patient flying with a fever. This told us that Ebola is not easily transmissible (we are so lucky) until the final horrible last few days of the patients illness when they become very dangerous.
We still need to monitor for dangerous mutations. Evolution of Ebola is inevitable and could still be devastating.
30
Or it could evolve into a state that is no worse than the common cold. Let us not get too excited.
50
Could indeed be beneficial if it reduced propensity to be gullible.
20
Agreed,but it does need to be kept a close eye on.Let’s hope that it doesn’t mutate into something more lethal,or that it doesn’t mix with something like AIDS and add the ability to negate the immune system to it’s makeup.
20
but this was known before this outbreak. I don’t think data from Texas nurses is superior to the many studies done during previous outbreaks.
10
Yet another example of taking the money out of the pockets of poor people in rich countries and putting it in the pockets of rich people in poor countries.
100
Another point worth mentioning here is that Japan has a long history of using ‘foreign aid’ as a means of enabling Japanese companies to establish themselves in new markets.
It would be interesting to study the evolution of the Left in non-Western countries. Our leftists generally have a grievance with society and therefore promote everything that operates against the interests of our society. It is exactly the same psychology as that which drives a common vandal to destroy things of value to others. With foreign aid, for example, leftists do not see it as ‘giving’ to someone else; they see it as a way of ‘punishing’ our society for perceived wrongs or injustices, as they see them. Similarly, their obsession with ‘refugees’ has nothing to do with a desire to help others. Perverse as it sounds, they promote the interests of ‘refugees’ precisely because they see it as something that is harmful to our society. The same applies in pretty much all social policy areas.
Do the Left operate in the same way in non-Western societies? Outwardly, it would appear not. Sure, there are lots of malcontents, but they seem either to be a lot fewer in number than we have in our society or to have less influence. I read not too long ago that in villages across China resentment of those who are succeeding in the new economy is growing. So perhaps ‘going Left’ is a part of the evolution of an economy and society. As the middle class develops, becomes educated and gains political power, will the same self-destructiveness emerge in their societies? I’m tempted to say yes, but Japan seems to have defied this trend. One significant difference is that nationalism and race are big issues in Japan. Could it be that the relative cohesiveness of their society has diluted the urge the Left has to work against the interests of their society?
Any ideas?
70
Remember that awful earthquake and tsunami? There were lots of lefty reporters here in the US that were genuinely shocked and absolutely clueless as to why there wasn’t any looting or crime. Funny how that is. No leftists, no looting. I work on lots of projects for the Japanese and both my wife and I have worked there, but I don’t pretend to understand them well. One really important thing… they take responsibility for themselves and those around them. The have pride in what they do and are extremely hard workers. They still revere the family and respect each other and their elders. They aren’t great with women yet, but they’re getting there. That’s a big chunk of it right there IMO, responsibility and respect go a long, long way.
81
But, NielsZoo, I’m afraid I can never forgive them for the torture of dolphins. I have a video titled Earthlings that includes vision of dophins being lassoed around the tail, hauled out onto a hard stand and then being hooked up to a truck and towed ALIVE across the concrete to a nearby slaughterhouse, where their throats are slit with a flensing knife. The animals writhe in agony and one even starts to violently spasm, much to the amusement of onlookers. Travel to Japan and, where possible, Japanese goods are off my agenda. I just found it on YouTube. Warning – avoid it if it will upset you. I cannot begin to describe the dark thoughts that run through my mind when I watch this. I ban everything Norwegian and Danish for the same reason.
Also, you might like to read about the Nanking massacre and the war crimes trials held in Australia after WW2. Here’s a summary of some of them. Try to get hold of Webb’s. He describes Australian soldiers being bayoneted in the anus for pure amusement, and PNG natives being raped and then having their breasts cut off.
Also, you need to look into the treatment of foreigners in Japan and, especially, the descendants of slaves and sex slaves.
And then there is the schoolgirls’ panties thing.
All I am saying is, don’t believe the Hollywood myths about Japan. Like us, they have problems, but it seems some of their problems are very different to ours. I remember once sitting through a lecture at which there were guest Japanese police, lawyers or academics – I can’t recall which. During the question session a stupid girl got up and asked, ‘Do a lot of criminals in Japan confess to their crimes?’ Straight away you could see what was coming: she was asking that question purely as a lead-in to the next one, which was driven by her naive infatuation with the idea of a noble society in which everyone performed their duty to society. The guest gave an ‘i guess so’ type answer and, sure enough, the girl then asked, ‘Is that because they feel they have a duty to society …’ and so on. The thing I found most amusing was that you could tell that the guest didn’t have a clue what she was getting at. I guess he didn’t watch the same Hollywood movie.
21
Sorry, I’m well aware of their failings (and have been ignoring Hollywood for decades on all topics.) My observations are just that, observations based on working with them for about 15 years. All societies have dark spots in our make up. I don’t know your cultural heritage, but I could almost guarantee finding similar travesties in it both extant and historical. You can’t show me a society or culture without them. They are better than they were 50 years ago as are most of us and will be better still 50 years from now. (Here in the US our Progressive loons are working very hard to drag us backwards, but that’s another rant.)
60
Barry, I hope you are at least as upset when the knife is held by a person from a different region and the innocent animal left with it’s throat cut was a journalist not food.
60
Windmills were only ever a fantasy solution to a fantasy problem.
Yesterday on commercial drive radio news there was one of those funny items that climate change is an important issue among voters. Who writes this stuff? Why is it reported? Is it even true?
Or is that just the Greens sympathetic media again, pushing their agenda. Our Australian Foreign minister in Lima had to state the obvious that if China and India will not do anything about their CO2 emissions, there is no point in 1.5% Australia doing anything more, beyond meeting our agreed targets. No one seems to want to even argue that the world has not warmed for nearly twenty years and there is no connection demonstrated between CO2 and Global Warming and no connection whatsoever with Climate Change, whatever that is.
Around the world the only issue in Western democracies is the political consequence of 15% Green votes handing control of basically conservative countries to extreme left wing minority governments, controlled by the Greens in most seats. As a consequence, in the longest period of world peace in human history, our biggest collective project is to build tens of thousands of windmills while knowing full well that they are practically useless. The incredible opportunity to collectively build and plan for the future is being completely lost and the UN self justifying bureaucracy has utterly lost its way, as if anointing Muamar Gaddafi a Human Rights hero just three years ago did not broadcast that fact.
History will record this as both a blossoming of human potential and a massive lost opportunity as the fossil fuel runs out. The simplest way to reduce population growth and create a sustainable future is through wealth and electrical power, not through poverty and turning out the lights, but collectively we are doing so little in Western countries and less in other countries where so much needs to be done and can be done. Lines of useless giant windmills, stationary on the skyline and in the oceans will be our Stonehenges, our Easter Island statues, our pyramids. Pointless Shamanistic religious sculptures, all for the Don Quixote vote.
70
I saved the world over the weekend. I most certainly did. All the NPC’s at the end of the game told me so. There were fireworks and everything.
The major difference is I knew I was playing a game and whatever I killed, destroyed, ignored, whatever would not harm anyone in the real world in any way.
Now if we can get these yutzes in the UN and other places of power to stop treating us and the world like it is a large game for their entertainment perhaps we’d make some actual progress.
Someday I’m going to meet a progressive that is actually concerned with progress. I suspect it will be an NPC in a video game.
40
8 Dec: AP: Dina Cappiello: Fuel to the fire? Fuel exports soar under Obama
The carbon embedded in those exports helps the U.S. meet its political goals by taking it off its pollution balance sheet…
But an Associated Press analysis of the data shows that U.S. exports of gasoline and diesel more than made up for the savings at home in pollution abroad, releasing roughly more than 1 billion tons of carbon pollution into the atmosphere elsewhere during the same period.
“It’s a false image,” said Onel Masardule of the Indigenous People’s Biocultural Climate Change Assessment Initiative, a Peru-based environmental group that recently studied the Guna and climate change. “In reality, the U.S. is still contaminating.”
Among the recipients is Panama, where imports of diesel and gasoline from the U.S. have nearly quadrupled since 2008…
This fossil fuel trade has soared under Obama as he has overseen a domestic boom in oil and natural gas production and ordered the biggest increases in fuel economy in history…
***The boom has helped the U.S. reduce oil imports and create jobs in oil fields and ports. Without it, the Obama administration would be much further from a goal to double U.S. exports. The trade deficit would be wider…
***There is no clear accounting of what America’s growth as a fossil-fuel powerhouse is doing to the global warming picture. The administration has chosen not to get to the bottom of that…
U.S. projects that increase energy exports could be considered in such an analysis, such as huge terminals planned for the West Coast to send more coal abroad for power plants. Trade agreements could factor in the implications of energy trade on global warming. But not one trade pact negotiated by the Obama White House mentions global warming…
https://news.yahoo.com/fuel-fire-fuel-exports-soar-under-obama-090854047.html
***and, apart from the odd news agency report such as the above, the CAGW infested/invested MSM won’t get to the bottom of it either.
CAGW – too toxic for UK pollies to mention!
8 Dec: Guardian: Patrick Wintour: Michael Gove bars Tory minister Amber Rudd from Lima climate change talks
In recent months it has sometimes appeared as if the Conservative side of the coalition is embarrassed by its commitment to climate change – doing as little as possible, for instance, to publicise its promise to spend more than £600m on the Green Climate fund, money designed to help developing countries adapt to climate change. The US pledged $3bn during the G20 summit but the UK tried to keep its generous funding secret for as long as possible.
Greenpeace UK energy and climate campaigner Vicky Wyatt: “Last winter’s devastating floods showed there’s no drawbridge Britain can pull up to keep safe from the impacts of climate change. If David Cameron wants the public to trust him with the country’s security, he should dispatch his climate minister to Lima at once.”
At the weekend Ed Miliband accused the government of dither and denial over climate change, as green groups complained the chancellor had made no mention of climate change in his autumn statement…
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/dec/07/gove-bars-rudd-climate-change-minister-lima-talks-counter-terror-vote
30
Come on, you can’t expect a UN climate chief to notice every single billion that get rorted away. Her job is to say stuff like: “The climate’s been shot again. Round up all the usual suspects.” And the usual suspects are invariably people they can shake down for more billions.
50
Was it a rort? Is a Sulphur free and particulate free and more efficient coal power supply not a great boon to people who burn wood? Are we to keep the coal and gas and oil in the ground? What exactly is the rort? The Japanese saw the opportunity to supply a need, build a future, provide power and make some money while putting in a power station which is clean, unless you consider an odorless, tiny, no dangerous gas pollution?
No, it is all about the demonization of coal. Perhaps we should call it Old Plant Matter or Natural Coal. Then it would be fine. Is there a real scientist among the Greens? I doubt it. Druids and scientists are opposites. One believes everything they are told and the others believe nothing. Pick which is which.
40
Just some boring old statistics first.
Australia has a population of 24 Million and consumes 210TWH of generated power.
Indonesia has a population of 250 Million and consumes 185TWH of generated power.
So Indonesia has more than 10 times the population and consumes only 88% of the power we do here in Australia, telling me straight away that there could be up to a hundred million people who have no access at all to electrical power, and even the remaining people would have nowhere near what we take as normal access to power.
Most of that power generation is Thermal power, either coal fired or natural gas fired, 165TWH or 89%. The remaining generation is made up almost equally between Geothermal and both normal and pumped storage Hydro power. There is zero solar power and maybe a couple of wind towers supplying virtually zero power.
There are huge plans underway in Indonesia for more power generation, virtually all of it thermal, coal fired or gas fired. There are also plans for more geothermal and hydro as well, but no wind and no solar. Note here that when we talk USC coal fired power, each unit can drive a 1000MW generator and when it comes to geothermal, it can support units which drive units between 50 and perhaps 100MW, and similar here for the proposed new hydro as well.
This new plant here in question is a two unit USC coal fired power plant, running 2 X 1000MW generators.
The power it will generate comes in at 8.8% of what is already existing power delivery.
Indonesia has in the planning a further 21,000MW of NEW thermal power, (13,000MW for coal, and 8,000MW for Natural gas) which will more than double their current generation.
I would have thought that the United Nations would be overjoyed that Indonesia, and its partners, here Japan, and umm, also the Chinese now, are doing something to bring the people of Indonesia up to a standard of life that we already have.
Even doubling Indonesia’s power generation still puts them at only 20% of what we have here in Australia.
Note how Countries which the UN still classifies as DevelopING couldn’t really care a fig about the CO2 emissions reduction plans of the UN.
Why?
Because the UNFCCC and its Kyoto Protocol enshrines that all these Developing Countries need to do is just to report their emissions, and nothing else. See now why the UN so desperately wants a replacement for that particular Protocol.
Incidentally, for the same amount of that $1 Billion, Indonesia could have constructed around 100 wind towers, a pretty large wind plant really. It would have delivered the same power over the recording 12 Month period that WILL be delivered by this new coal fired power plant in, umm ….. 15 days of normal operation.
Tony.
130
Great post. Excellent complement to Jo’s article.
30
Tony,
Great post.
We only just missed out by the last Federal election on becoming a developing country ourselves…
30
it’s all smoke & mirrors:
from a Guardian piece of 23 Nov that i posted recently:
“Analysis earlier this year by Washington-based NGO Oil Change International showed that the (World) Bank had funded $21bn (£13bn) of fossil fuel projects since 2008”
another reminder:
26 Nov: HuffPo: Mission Impossible
Besides not addressing climate issues systematically in its policies, the Bank’s portfolio continues to inlclude investment in fossil fuel projects. In 2010, the World Bank approved a $3.75 billion coal power project for South Africa. The new 4,800 MW coal power plant, the fourth largest in the world, will come online and start polluting more in the next few months. On the other hand, the Bank’s private lending arm, International Finance Corporation, continues to finance the Tata Mundra project, a 4,000 MW coal plant, in Gujarat, India. President Kim has, in many instances, declared that the Bank will continue financing coal and has called this approach a difficult “trade-off” that will be embraced in the countries where other options of energy don’t exist. Kosovo seems to be the next country where the Bank is set to invest more money into coal and the institution is eyeing countries in Africa for possible such projects in the future. According to a study by Oil Change International on subsidizing coal, the Multilateral Development Bank that provides the most coal funding is the World Bank Group with $6.1 billion between the years of 2007 – 2013…
Despite having a nearly $4.1 billion dollar annual energy portfolio, the World Bank has failed to pony up a meager $500 million in investment for beyond-the-grid clean energy markets…
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/nezir-sinani/mission-impossible_b_6220514.html
now READ ALL of this address & Q&A at the Council of Foreign Relations in Washington DC by World Bank’s Jim Yong Kim on 8 Dec (btw Kim isn’t going to Lima):
8 Dec: CFR: A Conversation With World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim
Speaker: Jim Yong Kim, President, World Bank
Presider: Mark Tercek, President and Chief Executive Officer, Nature Conservancy
KIM: thank you, Mark, for your very kind introduction. The Nature Conservancy has played such an important role in climate change and also environmental preservation issues worldwide. And your very innovative leadership has taken it to even greater heights.
And given the time you spent in the financial world, you will know very well one of the themes of my talk today, which is that economic policy is the key to mobilizing a coordinated global response to climate change…
KIM: Paris must be where we make the rallying cry for effective management of local, national, and global economies to fight climate change…
***Three, a financial package that recognizes that public development funds and climate finance should be used to catalyze innovative financing for adaptation and mitigation. Financial flows cannot reach the levels we need in the necessary timeframe without some form of networked carbon market, some sort of networked carbon market based on the market mechanisms, taxes, and enabling environments we are beginning to see introduced all around the world…
But for these efforts to coalesce and bring us to zero net emissions, we will have to find sufficient financing. It is the critical component of a Paris agreement. This compelling evidence suggesting that if countries use their regulatory capacity to get prices right, incentivize clean investment, and use the full range of policy instruments available to them, they will experience greater investment flows…
The strong demand from investors for appropriately structured green, climate-friendly investments is reflected in the speed at which investors have responded to the growing green bond market. About $35 billion in green bonds has been issued so far this year, and a robust liquid green credit market is taking shape.
But green bonds will not be the answer for the most vulnerable, especially those in the least developed and fragile and conflict-affected states. For these countries, public development funds and climate finance will always play a critical role…
KIM FROM Q&A: Well, we don’t have enough money to do it, but what if we were able to structure a deal that normally a sovereign wealth fund or, you know, a pension fund might think of as too risky, but if we do all the work and we build in safeguards all along the way, can we, with a relatively small initial investment, crowd in other investors to invest in the kind of infrastructure we need?…
http://www.cfr.org/global/conversation-world-bank-group-president-jim-yong-kim/p33913
30
and, if u r not busy watching the cricket (or working hard), read all of the very lengthy New Yorker piece about Nature Conservancy head, Mark Tercek, who presided over World Bank President, Jim Yong Kim’s address to the CFR:
12 May: New Yorker: D.T. Max: Green Is Good
The Nature Conservancy wants to persuade big business to save the environment
The Nature Conservancy, led by Mark Tercek, is partnering with Dow, whose chemical plant in Freeport, Texas, is the largest in North America.
The Nature Conservancy, which is responsible for protecting a hundred and nineteen million acres in thirty-five countries, is the biggest environmental nongovernmental organization in the world…
***Tercek, a former partner at Goldman Sachs, thinks that environmental organizations rely on fuzzy science and fail to harness the power of markets…
When Tercek told Henry Paulson, the head of Goldman, that he was contemplating leaving the firm, Paulson offered him the job of running the bank’s sustainability and environmental unit. Paulson had created the group to help the firm operate by green principles. It was also supposed to educate Goldman in avoiding environmentally unsound deals. There were business opportunities in conservation as well. The right to pollute was becoming a marketable commodity, through proposals like cap-and-trade, which would permit companies to emit a fixed amount of pollution and trade with others for their allotments. Goldman owned part of the Chicago Climate Exchange, which handled transactions involving pollution credits. The division was fuelled by “enlightened self-interest,” Tercek recalls. “Hank is a tough-minded businessperson.”…
Goldman was both an investor and the investment banker for the private-equity groups. The deal was controversial and remains so. Many green activists felt that the environmentalists who offered support for the deal had been snookered, and argued that continued popular pressure could have eliminated the coal-fired plants. One environmental leader told the Wall Street Journal that the conservation groups supporting the T.X.U. deal “should be hung for what they’ve done.” Tercek’s response is “Should there have been no coal-fired plants? Well, fine, but then no one will have electricity.”…
***The Nature Conservancy, which has an annual budget of nearly six hundred million dollars, is not a nimble organization. It consists of fifty state boards, with thirteen hundred trustees. Since they raise most of the money, they have most of the power, and they still focus heavily on saving land from development. Tercek, who often speaks of “big-tent environmentalism,” praises the states’ work, pointing out that the Nature Conservancy still sequesters more land “than anyone.” …
Because Tercek is, above all, a pragmatist, he willingly engages with least-bad alternatives. He does not oppose genetically modified food, nuclear power, or fracking, hoping only to play a role in easing their environmental impacts…
Colombia has proposed to build seventeen new dams…
Nevertheless, the Nature Conservancy has agreed to consult on the dams. Tercek found the decision easy: the dams are likely to be built no matter what, and even wind and solar power have drawbacks. “We work in a gray place,” Tercek says. “You have to accept some ambiguity.”
Although this all sounds reasonable, it can seem strange that the Nature Conservancy is supporting a very large intervention in a delicate water system, especially given that, in the States, it is celebrated for its efforts to remove dams…
The standard history of the Nature Conservancy, published in 2005, is titled “Nature’s Keepers.” Last year, Tercek published a book called “Nature’s Fortune.” Clearly aimed at business executives, it asserts, “Every farmer knows you should not eat your seed corn, and every banker knows you should not spend your principal. Yet that is exactly what we are doing. . . . Natural capital is not inexhaustible.”…
http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/05/12/green-is-good
40
“Is it rorting, cronyism, “success” or all three?”
Ooh, multiple choice!
I’ll be choosing number 3: Success
Why? Settled Science!
As the World Warms, Part of the American Southeast Cools
There are several explanations for regional “global warming hole,” scientists say.
The (carbon (sic) pollution emitted by coal-fired power plants may have contributed to cooler temperatures in some regions of the Southeast.
This power plant in Cartersville, Georgia, is one of the biggest in the country.
Although the Deep South has a reputation for hot, steamy weather, part of the Southeastern United States actually experienced cooler-than-normal temperatures in the years between 1991 and 2012.
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/05/140509-global-warming-hole-southeast-climate-change-science/
. . .
Yep. Put me down for success!
40
That 30 billion fund would sure help provide clean water to the 3rd world.
Oh, but wait, that would actually SAVE lives, wouldn’t it?
80
Well since 1st world fossil fuel money is being used to build renewable energy plants in 3rd world countries, it seems only fair that 1st world renewable energy money is being used to build fossil fuel plants in 3rd world countries.
80
The UN are trying to buy mates, this is just a glance the other way while a $1 billion brown paper bag is left under the desk, saving the climate can wait while cash incentives, just oops, find their way to disillusioned countries the UN can ill afford to lose favor from.
I hope the money finds it’s way back to the rightful owners, as it was dubiously acquired in the first place, that would be Karma.
30
Ya gotta love the iggorance of the UN. A power station in the UK converts from burning coal to (imported) wood chips and that’s OK. But new more efficient coal stations, because they are coal, aren’t.
What on this earth and off it do they think coal is?
It’s just trees which have been buried for a few million years.
40
You make a very rational point.
But as far as the bureaucrats in the UN are concerned, building any new coal-fired generation is taboo, because it, “sends contradictory messages”, and is, “unhelpful”.
To work properly, propaganda must be as pure, and as consistent, as possible. “Coal is bad”, is a very simple message, that translates well, and can be used anywhere in the world.
Saying that some coal is bad, but other coal is alright, is just too confusing for the hoi polloi to get their feeble minds around. Better to have none, and be done with it.
50
’tis so.
Messages must be very simple.
Procedures are mde to be followed.
Resistance is futile.
30
and fits in with the comforting ‘coal is derdy’ narrative.
30
Good News!
“Queensland Deputy Premier Jeff Seeney has intervened to force the removal of all references to climate change-derived sea level rises from the regional plan of Moreton Bay Regional Council, a decision experts say could have wide ramifications.
On coming to office, the LNP removed a Bligh government requirement for councils to incorporate the 0.8-metre rise in sea level, putting itself at odds with the insurance industry and the majority of scientific opinion.
Dr Justine Bell, an expert on climate change adaptation in the University of Queensland’s law school, said the Moreton Bay move could have state-wide implications.”
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-12-09/seeney-removes-climate-change-references-from-council-plan/5954914
60
We can but hope …
30
Not quite this thread but check the graph on oil costs
http://www.smalldeadanimals.com/archives/its-probably-no-300.html#comments
10
Translation for the trolls: someone whose livelihood depends on there being a problem for which they can proclaim themselves an “expert” at solving.
How much “climate change adaptation” has been done, and for how long? How many years must one be involved in successful plans where we can see the results of their suggested adaptations in order to become an “expert” at it?
Doesn’t seem to me that the field has been around long enough for anyone to be an “expert” at it. And we all know how important it is to you to have “experts” to tell you what to think.
50
Seeing as this thread has UN in the title
The tersest description I’ve seen on Agenda 21
http://cherylgallant.com/2014/08/28/report-parliament-9/#gform_wrapper_42
Via Small Dead Animals
30
Cheryl has been listening to Rosa Koire.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QK2sZUs2l_U
20
Try YouTube: Christopher Monckton agenda 21
And then there’s:
‘Peter Spencer versus The Commonwealth’, (not to mention the Thomson cattle farmers who seem to have gone into the archives.)
40
recently i posted this broken dream:
September 2009: CNBC: Carbon Trading May Dwarf That of Crude Oil
“I’m estimating carbon markets could be worth $2 trillion in transaction value – money changing hands – within five years of trading (starting),” says Bart Chilton, a Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) commissioner, who’s also chairman of its energy and environmental markets advisory committee. “That would make it the largest physically traded commodity in the US, surpassing even oil.”…
http://www.cnbc.com/id/32540966
now i found this one, which surprises me more, because it is post-Climategate:
April 2010: CNBC: Natlie Erlich: Carbon Could Be No. 1 Commodity: Exchange Chief
Carbon trading is set to become the world’s largest commodity market, Richard Sandor, chairman and founder of the Chicago Climate Exchange, told CNBC.com.
“Carbon, when it becomes worldwide, will be unambiguously the largest commodity in the world,” Sandor said in an interview. “The world emits 35 billion tons; it’s priced at $20; that’s $700 billion. Put a 10-20 multiple like you do on futures, [and] you’re talking about $10 trillion at maturity.”…
Time Magazine named him “Hero of the Planet” in 2002, and the “father of carbon trading” in 2007.
“In ’89-’90 someone came to me and said, ‘you commoditize interest rates, do you think you can commoditize air?’” he said. “You could cap the emissions that any utility has, and if they go below that cap, they can sell their emissions, their rights to emit— and if you can go above it, you can buy someone else’s. So it drives compliance.”…
In fact, the CCX has partnered with China’s largest oil and gas producer and supplier CNPC and the City of Tianjin to develop sulfur dioxide emissions and water pollutants markets. The exchange has also teamed up with China’s central bank to establish a research institute in Chicago and Beijing to advance corporate and industrial use of emissions markets.
“They have their eye on the ball,” said Sandor. “I had lunch with the chairman, Governor Zhou, and he’s like their Ben Bernanke. And Governor Zhou knows more about cap-and-trade than half or 75 percent of the people I know anywhere. So when a central banker can talk chapter and verse about emissions trading, it’s telling you something.”
http://www.cnbc.com/id/36782147#
hasn’t quite worked out as planned, though, has it? give thanx.
30
ex.warmist.
Actually there are very large coal reserves in sub-Saharan Africa, particularly in the Karoo Basin extending from South Africa, into Zimbabwe, and Zambia, Mozambique and southern Tanzania.
30