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By Jo Nova
Le Pen has weaponized ‘punitive’ environmental policies, and voters seem to like that
In the largest turnout since 1981, French voters chose the “Far Right” National Rally party in a record vote of 33 per cent. It is the first round of voting with the second on July 7th, but The Washington Post is already comparing the potentially “shocking” French election result with the 2016 Brexit win in the UK. The Guardian said the unthinkable has become plausible.
French elections: Why is the rejection of environmentalism a driving force behind France’s far-right vote?
By Matthieu Goar, Le Monde
After long neglecting environmental issues, the far-right party has made the denunciation of allegedly ‘punitive’ environmental policies into its new electoral weapon.
The former presidential candidate railed against “Brussels,” which “forces you, almost overnight, to change your boiler for €15,000,” against the “authoritarian reductions to agricultural land” and against the “heartless European Commission.”
“Don’t they have as their objective the reduction of human activity as a whole?” she asked, before connecting the issue to her obsession with French people’s daily lives, a strategy that […]
By Jo Nova
It is in effect: If there is a train and it’s less than a 2.5 hour trip, in France you can’t fly — unless of course, you own your own private jet, the most “polluting” kind of plane (according to the EcoWorriers). How does that make “carbon sense”? Are we saving the planet, or just stopping the riff-raff from traveling?
It’s one rule for you, another for the Feudal overlords.
Private planes make 5 to 14 times as much CO2, but they are “good to go”?
by Valentina Morando, Impakter
… numerous studies demonstrate that private jets are much more impactful to the environment than other modes of transportations.
They are about “5 to 14 times more polluting than commercial planes (per passenger),” a report published by the Transport and Environment group in 2021 states.
According to a recent study, “only 1% of the population causes 50% of global aviation emissions.”
Right now there are only three routes in France that will be banned, Paris-Orly to Bordeaux, Nantes and Lyon affecting only 2.5% of all domestic flights. The original plan was to ban five more routes, but the […]
By Jo Nova
Macron suggests the EU take a “break”from more environmental regulations
h/t To NetZeroWatch
The left side of politics is fracturing over climate and energy. The Green Party of France is calling Macron irresponsible and accusing him of “climate denial” for the sin of daring to suggest the EU already has enough environmental regulations:
[Macron] insisted that, when it comes to the regulatory side, the EU is “ahead of the Americans, the Chinese and of any other power in the world.” During a speech on how to revive the French industry on Thursday at the Elysée, President Emmanuel Macron called for “a European regulatory break.” “We have already passed lots of environmental regulations at European level, more than other countries,” he said. “Now we should be implementing them, not making new changes in the rules or we are going to loose all our [industrial] players.” — Politico
Macron was not suggesting anything as radical as actually unwinding Green legislation. But the mere act of not pandering 100% to sacred Green goals meant pushback for apostasy was swift and hard and a complete overreaction:
Gavin Mortimer, The Spectator
“…from […]
By Jo Nova
The core baseload of the European grid is in trouble, and there is no back up. If the rest of Europe had enough coal or nuclear power, this wouldn’t be so bad, but they were all too worried about heatwaves in 2100 they forgot…
Half the French Nuclear Fleet will not be back in time for winter and there is no other nation that fill the gap. | Photo by Spiritrespect.
This is bad news for Europe. Half of France’s nuclear power fleet were already out of action and EDF was hoping to bring “all of them” back online for winter. But they’ve just announced that at least four plants they planned to restart will suffer a major delay. France’s electricity prices have hit €1,000 per MWh for January delivery. (Which is a blockbuster $1,500 AUD).
France’s large nuclear fleet is normally a major exporter of electricity, referred to as the “backbone” of the whole European grid. Blackouts are not only being forecast in France, but there is growing recognition that they are now more likely in the UK too. Where else will this spread?
To make matters worse, a week ago, a pipe ruptured […]
By Jo Nova It’s the Reality TV version of “Democracy”
For three years the workers of France revolted in Yellow Vest protests week after relentless week, even though the media ignored them, they kept returning. President Macron had to do something that looked like he was listening. So 150 people won the lucky dip draw to be the actors in a show pretending to be “the People’s Government of France”. Only they, apparently, thought they were doing something important. For nine months these 150 people were supposed to learn climate science and figure out what the other 65 million French citizens would have chosen had they been there. Naturally, they were marinated and baked in approved ClimateThink, and no dissenting scientists or citizens were invited.
After this intense love in, they came up with a list of policies as big as a phone book, the government picked the ones they were probably going to do anyway, and flicked the ones they weren’t and then proclaimed the citizens had spoken! In theory there was supposed to be a Referendum option at the end, but this, well, nevermind, became just another round of votes in Parliament.
The 150 were selected from […]
In France the government is banning events “because of a heatwave” of 40 degrees C (104F) — as if adult mammals cannot figure out whether the temperature is too hot for their own health. Ancestors of mice and rats worked out their own temperature sensors and behaviour changes 200 million years ago. It’s a Big Government attempt to infantalize and gaslight the whole population. Will they obey?
It’s only the region around Bordeaux but will French teenagers accept being told to stay home in forty degree heat, something that millions of humans live with all over the world every summer?
The Counter Signal: Heatwave lockdowns: Region in France bans outdoor gatherings
“Everyone now faces a health risk,” official Fabienne Buccio told France Bleu radio, after announcing the regional restrictions around Bordeaux. Outdoor events – including, ironically, annual ‘Resistance’ celebrations – are banned until the officials declare the heatwave is over. They’re even restricting some indoor events that don’t have air conditioning.
BBC: Outdoor public events have been banned in an area of France as a record breaking heatwave sweeps across Europe.
Concerts and large public gatherings have been called off in the Gironde department around Bordeaux. […]
Once, when the West could build things, problems got solved
Back in 2007 at least a few people still remembered that golden era. Here’s Dr Ziggy Switkowski, who at the time was head of the Prime Minister’s nuclear task force:
The French in 15 years went from zero reactors to 59 reactors and 80% of their electricity is nuclear. — ABC
Now we don’t even dream of success. If we had started in 2007, Australia could have had ten plants finished already.
Back in the 1970s and 80’s eh? Wow look at that take off…
The first nuclear plant in France was built by the EDF in 1962. Then the 1972 oil crisis put a rocket under the industry. So Prime Minister Pierre Messmer came up with a plan to build an unbelievable 170 nuclear plants by 2000.
Theanphibian https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Electricity_in_France.svg
By the mid 1980s it was clear that would not happen, but not for the reasons you might think. The problem was not that they weren’t building plants fast enough, but that they were building them too fast. Demand wasn’t rising fast enough to keep up. The plants are most efficient running at 80-90% but by […]
Strategically, this seems like it matters.
The French nuclear power plants are the backbone of the EU grid, but this winter, just when Europe is trying to not-buy-Russian-Gas, the French might need to import power instead of export it.
France runs off 70% nuclear power — it’s highest proportion in the world, and the second largest fleet — after the USA. For some reason, known only to international bankers or Renewable Gods, Early in Macron’s reign, he decided to reduce the carbon-free reliable nukes to just 50% by 2035 and fill the gap with short-lived, unreliable generators that cost a lot, need storage, backup, rare metals from China and slave labor from the Congo. Perhaps he was afraid (or whoever it was that helped him get elected) that France would show up all the schmuck-countries going to renewables?
But then the gas crisis started in Europe last October, and like clockwork, in November President Macron muttered the words “energy independence” and belatedly announced that it wasn’t such a bad idea to build some new nuclear plants. As things got more serious, in late February the French nuclear safety authority decided to extend the life of the 32 oldest reactors for […]
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JoNova A science presenter, writer, speaker & former TV host; author of The Skeptic's Handbook (over 200,000 copies distributed & available in 15 languages).
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