From NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT

By Paul Homewood

h/t Robin Guenier

When AEP throws his toys out of the pram, you know the Net Zero agenda is in big trouble!

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2023/08/01/china-clean-tech-revolution-leader-defeatist-britain/

It’s not worth pasting the whole article. It’s the usual load of twaddle.

But let’s take a closer look at his claims:

1) He claims we are losing our leadership in the clean-tech race. In his words, “China is running away with the great prize of the 21stC”.But building more solar farms and EVs does not alter the fact that China dominates the manufacturing side; not least because of its access to cheap coal power.

2) He claims that the UK is at risk of sticking to horse-power as others embrace the steam engine. But we switched to steam power because it was so much better. If renewables and EVs were so good, we would switch again, without the need for bans and subsidies.

3) He goes on to claim that greenhouse gas emissions have already peaked in most of the world, and are even peaking today in China.Although economic growth has slowed since 2019, there is no sign that global emissions have peaked. Since 2010, while OECD emissions have dropped by 11%, non-OECD have risen by 27% and are now double the former.

4) He repeats the usual nonsense that renewable energy is much cheaper, but ignores the wider system costs and refuses to accept that you simply cannot run a modern economy on wind and solar power alone.

5) He talks of EVs reaching purchase price parity by 2025 – (which planet is he on?) – if he is right, of course, we would not need to ban petrol cars.

6) As usual, AEP is gushing about how wonderful China are! What is it with AEP and China? Don’t worry about all these new coal power plants they are building, he says,  because they are building 6 GW of renewable capacity for every 1 GW of coal, which is only needed now as back up.

What a clown! Does he not know that this 1 GW of coal power will produce more electricity than his 6 GW of solar?

China know full well that they need fossil fuels for the bulk of their energy, and that wind and solar can only ever be top ups – that is why they still only supply 7% of the country’s energy.

AEP is right about one thing though. He stresses that China is desperate to become energy independent, scared that it could have supplies of oil and gas shut off in a global conflict. That, of course, is why they are maximising their own reserves of coal, as well as doing deals with Russia.

But what about the other side of the coin? His renewable dream would leave the UK and the rest of the West at the tender mercy of Xi and the CCCP. Don’t forget that when the current batch of solar panels and EVs pack up in ten or fifteen years time, we will need to replace them with new ones from China.

That’s not a future I would care to think about. I am surprised AEP thinks otherwise.