Some time ago, I posted about the return of a shop-soiled messiah by the name of Tony Blair. Since being forced out of office, he has found various niches on the world scene from which to keep his name alive in the media. Acting as a roving ambassador for an organisation called The Climate Group is one of these, and it is in this capacity that he recently visited Japan. His mission was an attempt to salvage the road map for a drastic reduction in carbon emissions which was outlined at the Bali (son of Kyoto) Climate Conference last December.On the BBC Radio4 Today programme the following proposition was put to the ex-prime minister – in the form of a question – by James Naughty:
There was a poll here the other day which suggested, to the horror of some people in the environmental movement, that people don’t yet buy the seriousness, as you believe it to be, of the climate crisis. So politicians have not managed to persuade them.
The response was vintage Blair:
“I think people, basically, are persuaded, actually.”
Now there are a couple, or three, interesting things about this brief exchange. Why does Naughty assume that it is up to politicians, not scientists, to convince the public that climate change is really a problem? Had Blair actually seen the Ipsos MORI research that Naughty was referring to and, if not, why not?
Then there is the matter of “basically” and “persuaded” in his answer. I can think of a lot of occasions when I have been persuaded, and at least a few when I have not been persuaded, but I cannot think of a single instance when I have been ‘basically’ persuaded of anything. It sounds like one of those mythical medical conditions such as being slightly pregnant or dying of a suspected heart attack. But you have to admit that Blair’s response would sound pretty convincing to a radio audience who are only half listening as they finish breakfast or drive to work. Why an experienced journalist like James Naughty would let such a lame answer go unchallenged is quite another matter.
Well, Tony Blair really should take a very close look at this new poll. It is an update of research that was carried out a year ago, which I posted about in detail here. Advocates of anthropogenic global warming were horrified when they heard that 56% of respondents are aware that there are still many scientists who question the human effect on climate change. Their horror will not be diminished by the updated findings; this figure has now risen to 60%, with the number of those who disagree remaining the same at 22%.
This growth in scepticism has taken place against the background of a deluge of alarmist propaganda inspired by the most recent IPCC report, which was supposed to have removed all doubt from the scientific case for environmental disaster. Politicians and the media have devoted vast amounts of verbiage to the cause of convincing everyone that the use of fossil fuels is destroying the planet, but this seems to have had a negative impact on public opinion.
So what is Tony Blair doing on behalf of The Climate Group in Tokyo?
Japan will chair the current G8 meeting of world leaders, and Tony wants to make sure that climate change is at the top of the agenda. More than that, he wants to ensure that the carbon emission reduction targets for 2050 that were discussed at the Bali conference in December are implemented worldwide. This would mean a reduction to half of 2000 levels over the next 42 years, and a reduction of 25% to 40% by 2020. But at the time of the get-together in Bali, no one had spotted that there was an oil crisis on the horizon.
Expensive oil hurts, and we now have a ludicrous situation where governments that have dutifully espoused the cause of global warming are hammering on the doors of the oil producers and pleading with them to increase supplies of one of the commodities that is supposed to be destroying the planet. (See this post on Gordon Brown’s visit to Jidda) Add to this the prospect of a global switch over the next few decades from relatively cheap fossil fuel based energy supplies to the vastly more expensive ‘renewables’, and the future for the world economy looks very bleak indeed.
Politically, the situation is beginning to look like the kind of farce that would test the imagination of even he most accomplished satirist. While Gordon Brown was in Jedah pleading with OPEC for more investment in oil production, Patricia Hewitt – a leading Blairite who has held a string of ministerial posts at the Treasury and also at Trade and Industry – was confiding her innermost thoughts to the press. Here is what she had to say to a national newspaper:
In a pointed reaction to Mr Brown’s attempts to persuade Opec to increase oil production, she told The Independent on Sunday: “My feeling is that there is quite a welcome among the public for politicians who say oil and energy prices are going to remain high.”
Presumably the Ipsos MORI poll passed Mrs Hewitt by too. With only 22% of voters convinced that the scientific case for anthropogenic global warming is watertight, celebrating higher oil prices as a means of saving the planet is hardly likely to play well with the electorate.
If these are the views of an influential, but out of work, minister, then what do members of the government think? Here is what John Hutton, the business secretary, told the BBC recently:
We’ve got to work on the short term, and that means dealing with the problem about investing for the future and bringing on all of the oil and gas reserves that we can as quickly as we can, creating the right framework for that type of international investment, and we’ll be addressing that later today. In the process I think that we can send a very strong signal to the market about continuity of supply in the medium to longer term, but as we do those things we’ve got to deal with the other really important side of the demand-supply equation which is becoming more energy efficient ourselves, moving towards low carbon forms of technology and there is a very strong consensus here and I am sure that this is reflected right around all the capitals in the world that that is basically the sensible ingredient that can go towards the addressing the present difficulties that we’re facing.
His confusion is evident even in the breathless way in which he expressed himself. Apparently he is telling us that in order to save the planet our consumption of oil must be cut dramatically, but at the same time reassure oil producers that demand for their products will continue to surge even in the medium and long term, thereby justifying investment in increased production. These aspirations, quite simply, are not compatible.
It remains to be seen what line, if any, the G8 will take on climate change. A pre-conference report broadcast last night by the BBC made much of the global energy and food crises, but of global warming it breathed not a word. And it is difficult to know what the world leaders who have gathered in Japan can say on this subject at the moment without falling into the same mire of confusion that is already besetting UK politics.
Tony Blair’s mission to the chairman of the G8 may have looked feasible when it was planned, but world politics suddenly seems to have reached one of those turning points where there is no clear indication which path it may follow. To talk about the highly speculative risk of climate change in the same breath as the very real oil and food crises that we are certainly facing will invite unwelcome comparisons of the relative credibility of these threats. Worse, the reckless environmental propaganda of the last few years may be at least part of the cause of our present problems.
Here are some extracts from a BBC report on the G8 all-night deliberations on climate change:
How could it have taken an all night session to replace one meaningless form of words with another? A target for 42 years ahead has still not been set, let alone any interim targets that would alow progress to be assessed.
Arguably this fudge removes carbon emissions reduction from the global political agenda for the foreseeable future.
“Retired” politicians like Tony Blair selling the wary public “Kyoto”-type carbon taxes or carbon footprint cap and trade schemes? Sounds like a loser.
For a plan to get the USA “weaned” from foreign oil imports in a relatively short time period see:
http://www.usnews.com/blogs/the-ticker/2008/7/8/pickens-plan.html
This is a practical proposal from someone who really understands the US energy situation (not a politician). It’s not as “glitzy” a presentation as Al Gore’s “AIT” (another “retired” politician), but it contains more facts plus a proposed solution to the US energy “crunch”.
It makes sense as a real solution for a real problem, even if you don’t believe that human CO2 emissions are a problem for our planet.
Max
Max,
Wind turbines are certainly a successful and fashionable way of generating returns for investors, and they generate green headlines for politicians, corporations and quasi-governmental agencies very efficiently too. Only when you look at their ability to generate large quantities of electricity do they disappoint.
It is hardly surprising that wind generation has caught the eye of that redoubtable old Klondiker, T. Boone Pickens:
It is worth reading the whole of this article as, between the lines of what is clearly a very carefully constructed UNEP press release, there seem to be signs that a bubble is just about to burst. The very well researched and referenced article by Ruth Lea, which Robin linked to here , is also worth a visit if you missed it.
Does Switzerland have a wind generation programme?
Of course, anything Tony Blair says must be tainted: his Climate Group is backed by those major players in the fossil fuel industry, BP and Shell.
#4: It’ interesting to see how well the insurance industry and merchant banks are represented too.
This article is relevant to this discussion. China, India, Brazil, Indonesia and Mexico are set to be five of the top eight economies by 2050. Therefore, as McRae says,
These are precisely the countries whose CO2 emissions are growing most rapidly – hence their extraordinary economic development. Therefore anyone thinking that emissions will be reduced to 50% of 1990 levels (or whatever the current “target” or “aim” might be), or indeed will be reduced at all, is living in dreamland. It’s not going to happen: we’d better get used to it.
T. Boone Pickens’ plans to save the planet by covering the landscape with wind turbines has attracted the attention of JunkScience’s Steve Milloy, here.
It would seem that Pickens’ intentions may not be quite as altruistic as his multi-million pound PR campaign to launch the scheme would have us believe.
Finally, the news is starting to get out there….C/O Green Watch…….
No consensus, and no warming, either
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/no_consensus_and_no_warming_either#36855
Increased CO2 concentration in the atmosphere results in cooling rather than warming
http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~content=a788582859~db=all
The study abstracted below is from January 2008 and was published in “Energy Sources”. The authors of study are: Geologists Dr. George Chilingar, and L.F. Khilyuk of the University of Southern California and Russian scientist Dr. Oleg Sorochtin (name also sometimes transliterated as Soroktin) of the Institute of Oceanology at the Russian Academy of Sciences — who has authored more than 300 studies, nine books
Abstract
The writers investigated the effect of CO2 emission on the temperature of atmosphere. Computations based on the adiabatic theory of greenhouse effect show that increasing CO2 concentration in the atmosphere results in cooling rather than warming of the Earth’s atmosphere.
Hi TonyN,
Thanks for input on the T. Boone Pickens “wind” proposal.
Is it a “Boone-doggle” or just a lot of Texas “hot air”?
In any case, I’m sure TBP will be prospecting for some big bucks (and his wells usually do not come in “dry”).
As I understand his (still to be released in detail) proposal, it starts from the assumption that the US balance of payments is seriously impacted by the massive amounts of very expensive oil imports (70% of its demand).
It goes on to postulate that 30% of US electrical power generation comes from natural gas, and that this natural gas could easily be used as automotive fuel, thereby reducing the amount of oil imported.
Further, he postulates that it is virtually impossible in the USA today to convert these natural gas power generation plants to nuclear plants in the next 10 years, due to resistance from green “environmental advocacy” groups that still hum the “Three Mile Island” and “Chernobyl” mantra.
Then he points out that there is a lot of wind (not just hot air) in Texas and other regions from Texas to Canada, and that large scale German/Danish wind turbine technology (as piloted in Sweetwater, Texas) shows promise to be able to generate electrical power competitively at today’s energy costs.
So his proposal to shift natural gas from power generation to automotive fuel by replacing it with wind power appears to make sense.
Nuclear plants would make just as much sense (and probably be more viable economically), but his point is that they are not viable politically due to anti-nuc greenie groups (and their lawyers) today.
I cannot judge whether or not his assumptions and postulations are correct or not; I can just say that this old oilfield guy and corporate raider has been right more times than he has been wrong, so his story is worth considering (for the USA, that is).
Now to Switzerland.
Wind power generation is an even worse prospect here than solar. Look out on Lake Geneva or other lakes. The wind surfers have a real hard time getting any action here. This s not “wind country”. Maybe (unlike in Texas) there are just too many mountains in the way.
Regards,
Max
Hi TonyN,
Back again.
To the TBP proposal.
Coal-fired power plants also make economic sense (for the USA that has major coal reserves), as does automotive fuel generation from coal (SASOL in South Africa), but with today’s AGW hysteria, these alternates also have a political hurdle to overcome.
If the current global cooling trend continues for another year or so, this hurdle may just disappear as IPCC gets disbanded, Hansen gets retired and politicians (including Al Gore) switch to a new “crisis of the day”.
But wiley old TBP is betting that that may take a bit longer and there are “problems to be solved and bucks to be made” today. After all, he’s getting up in years.
Regards,
Max
Max
In terms of energy security, I think that your argument, and JBP’s, stands up well, except for the inclusion of wind in the scenario. The other means of generation that you mention all have some legitimate claim to efficiency: wind does not. It also has a visual footprint that far exceeds the others and I am at a loss to know how anyone can see this as being ‘environmentally friendly’.
So far as the Swiss wind energy resource is concerned, I should have seen that answer coming! Having spent a fair amount of time wandering around the Alps – but not a great deal of it in Switzerland sadly – the absence of wind is one of the things one notices if one is used to the UK mountains.
But wind does have one unique advantage. Like the church towers and spires which advertised the power of the medieval church, wind turbines are a conspicuous testament to the green credentials of those who are responsible for their construction. Just ask yourself whether Pickens would have got a fraction of the publicity or political support for his scheme if wind had not been part of the equation.
There is an excellent analysis of the economics of wind generation here,
and although it comes from an avowedly activist site, I have yet to come across anyone who can pick serious holes in it.