A new research study from The University of Alabama in Huntsville, a part of the University of Alabama System, addresses a central question of climate change research: how much warming can be expected from adding carbon dioxide to the atmosphere through fossil fuel burning and other activities as standards of living increase around the world?
UAH Earth System Science Center Research Scientist Dr. Roy Spencer and UAH Earth System Science Center Director and Alabama State Climatologist Dr. John R. Christy have spent 10 years developing a one-dimensional climate model to answer this elusive question.
Their latest research study was published in the September 2023 issue of Theoretical and Applied Climatology journal titled “Effective climate sensitivity distributions from a 1D model of global ocean and land temperature trends, 1970–2021.”
Spencer and Christy’s climate model, based upon objective measured data, found carbon dioxide does not have as big of an effect of warming of the atmosphere when compared with other climate models.
“For over 30 years, dozens of highly sophisticated computerized climate models based upon theory have been unable to agree on an answer. That’s why we developed our own one-dimensional climate model to provide an answer,” says. Dr. Spencer.
Current climate models range over a factor of three, from 1.8 to 5.6° Celsius, in the amount of warming produced in response to a doubling of atmospheric carbon dioxide. This warming response to double carbon dioxide is called “effective climate sensitivity.” Determining its magnitude has remained elusive for decades.
When compared to other current climate models, the research results from Spencer and Christy’s one-dimensional climate model approached the bottom end of the range, 1.9° Celsius. The lower UAH value indicates that the climate impact of increasing carbon dioxide concentrations is much less that that based on other climate models.
“An important assumption of our model, as well as the more complex models used by others, is that all climate change is human caused,” Spencer states. “If recent warming is partly natural, it would further reduce climate sensitivity.”
What distinguishes this model developed at UAH from others is that it is driven by actual observations of warming, rather than theoretical assumptions about how the climate system responds to increasing greenhouse gases.
The one-dimensional climate model uses a variety of observational datasets of warming between 1970 and 2021 of the deep ocean and land, along with associated uncertainty ranges. These datasets produced a range of estimates of climate sensitivity based upon basic concepts of energy conservation.
“The 52-year period since 1970 is key. It represents the period of most rapid warming, with the highest confidence in the observational data of deep-ocean warming,” Spencer states.
The results of Spencer and Christy’s research also showed a period of the most rapid growth in atmospheric carbon dioxide. This is due to their climate model accounting for heat storage in deeper layers of land, which other climate models ignore.
A critical advantage of their simple model is that it conserves energy.
“It should be a requirement that any physics-based model of global warming should meet,” Spencer says. “Current computerized climate models continue to have difficulty achieving this aspect.”
The model is simple enough that other scientists can easily adapt it to updated or improved global temperature measurements as they become available.
More information: Roy W. Spencer et al, Effective climate sensitivity distributions from a 1D model of global ocean and land temperature trends, 1970–2021, Theoretical and Applied Climatology (2023). DOI: 10.1007/s00704-023-04634-7
EpochTV host Roman Balmakov’s documentary, “No Farmers No Food,” shows that climate policies are being used to push farmers out of business, cause a decline in animal husbandry, and promote the human consumption of insect protein. Balmakov accurately describes how climate activists are collaborating with governments around the world to shut down farms by imposing burdensome regulations and top-down decrees on farmers, allegedly to prevent a purported climate crisis.
Balmakov explains in the film that the United Nations leads these efforts.
“People in charge of some of the most powerful organizations on the planet have determined that agriculture, specifically animal agriculture, is to blame for global warming, and global warming is to blame for the high prices of food and food shortages,” says Balmakov.
The film cites a variety of specific policies imposed by governments around the world that are driving farmers out of business, such as water regulations in California, nitrogen policies in the Netherlands, and organic farming mandates in Sri Lanka. These policies are also leading to food shortages and higher food prices. Climate Realism has likewise previously reported on the dangerous results of these perverse policies, in “Yes, Breitbart, The Netherlands Anti-Agriculture Scheme Is a Disturbing Development,” covering the voluntary-or-else government buyouts of small to midsized farms in the Netherlands, as well as a scheme in Britain to “rewild” farmland. Climate Realism also discussed how the Sri Lankan government’s push to take its agriculture industry all organic resulted a rapid and steep reduction in output, and an equally rapid and steep increase in food prices.
Data show that amid modest warming, world crop production and yields are increasing, regularly setting new records, as has been discussed in dozens of articles on Climate Realism. For most places food security has improved, and hunger and malnutrition have fallen significantly during the recent period of climate change.
Take for example world production of staple food crops like rice, corn, and wheat. All of these crops, according to data from the United Nations’ own Food and Agriculture Organization, have seen steady production increases over the same time period that alarmists have been warning of a dangerous warming. (See Figure below)
Research shows that carbon dioxide is contributing to this increase in crop production because of the fertilization effect of higher CO2 levels. Additionally, the modest warming of the past decades has likely contributed to a slight increase in precipitation in the northern hemisphere and the “bread basket” regions, which means that less groundwater is needed for irrigation.
Eating bugs is certainly not going to help anything. As Climate Realism pointed out, here, for example, insects are not bulletproof earth-friendly health foods, in fact they can cause serious allergic reactions and other health complications. Also, replacing cattle with insects is unlikely to improve emissions, because factory-scale insect farming for human consumption is energy intensive, especially in the quantities needed if proponents intend to totally replace other animal proteins.
As The Epoch Times explains, Balmakov’s “documentary shines the spotlight on how some innocuous-sounding policies are harmful to the food supply.” The facts indicate that climate change does not threaten the global food supply. Rather, as Balmakov’s documentary shows, it is governments and international agencies retrograde farm policies which threaten the continued growth in food production, by eschewing modern agricultural technological innovations which have brought about the largest, fastest decline in hunger around the world in history, during the past century. Banning fertilizers and pesticides, limiting the amount of water that can be used for farming and ranching, restricting fossil fuel development and use, and threatening livestock ranchers over the amount of methane produced by their animals, can only result in reduced food production and increased hunger.
Congratulations are in order for EpochTV and Balmakov for producing and promoting this important documentary. The impact of green policies on the food supply is one of the most dangerous emerging global issues. Shockingly, as Balmakov exposes, these policies are largely driven by climate alarmists in governments and supported by the climate alarmists in the mainstream media.
Linnea Lueken is a Research Fellow with the Arthur B. Robinson Center on Climate and Environmental Policy. While she was an intern with The Heartland Institute in 2018, she co-authored a Heartland Institute Policy Brief “Debunking Four Persistent Myths About Hydraulic Fracturing.”
This week we look at green energy, and a book showing how it will likely fail in the near future.
This week we look at green energy, and a book showing how it will likely fail in the near future. Think wind, solar, and batteries can replace the hydrocarbon fuels that power our modern industrialized society?
Think wind, solar, and batteries can replace the hydrocarbon fuels that power our modern industrialized society? Green Breakdown shows why the Net Zero agenda―a forced transition to renewable energy―is costly, dangerous, and destined for failure. Using science, economics, and in-depth analysis, author Steve Goreham exposes the weaknesses in the planned green energy transition and predicts a coming renewable energy failure.
Join our host, Anthony Watts, and weekly panelists, Dr. Sterling Burnett and Linnea Lueken, and author Steve Goreham as we look at the pitfalls. Tune in LIVE for Climate Change Roundtable at Noon CT/1PM ET this Friday to engage in this enlightening discussion. Don’t forget to leave your questions to have them answered live during the show! Tune in to share your thoughts and be a part of the conversation.
Artificial intelligence (AI) is taking the world by storm. New AI applications are announced daily. Amazon, Apple, Google, Meta, Microsoft, and many companies tout plans for artificial intelligence capabilities. But the AI revolution is bad news for global efforts to achieve net-zero emissions.
The AI revolution is based on high-performance AI chips, which are capable of revolutionary levels of computer processing power and capable of sorting through vast amounts of stored data. Multiple AI chips reside on each of dozens of boards, housed in endless racks of servers, which are sited in warehouse-sized AI data centers. While the rack of a conventional server of a data center draws roughly seven kilowatts of electricity, an AI server rack can use up to 50 kilowatts of power.
Spending on artificial intelligence infrastructure is projected to grow at a compound annual rate of 44% over the next six years. Total data center power requirements will increase by at least a factor of six and maybe by as much as 10 times by 2029. Greenhouse gas emissions from AI data centers will increase by similar amount.
The International Energy Agency estimates that data centers account for 1-1.5 percent of world electricity use and are responsible for about one percent of energy-related greenhouse gas emissions. But the rapid growth of AI infrastructure, coupled with a jump in electricity consumption as power-hungry AI server racks replace conventional server racks, will cause carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from data centers to skyrocket. Artificial intelligence will become a major contributor to global CO2 emissions by 2030, contrary to Net Zero goals.
Proponents define Net Zero as a zero balance between the amount of greenhouse gases emitted from human industrial processes and the amount removed from the atmosphere. They claim that Net Zero must be attained by 2050 to limit the rise in global temperatures to 1.5oC above the background temperature level of the 1800s. Wind turbines, solar panels, heat pumps, biofuels, hydrogen fuel, and carbon dioxide capture and storage are all promoted as vehicles to get to Net Zero.
But virtually nothing that our modern society does is “zero emissions.” If you build a house, sizeable greenhouse gases are emitted by cutting down trees for producing lumber, mining materials and manufacturing wire and components for electricity, producing plastic or copper for pipes, manufacturing drywall, roofing, brick, glass, concrete, and many other materials. Manufacturing of household furnishings, such as furniture, appliances, and computers, also emits large quantities of CO2. Transportation of all these materials emits greenhouse gases. Even a grass hut isn’t Net Zero. CO2 is released when you cut down grass and wood to build the hut.
Net Zero is fundamentally a zero-growth ideology. The United Nations, the International Energy Agency, and green leaders call for an eight percent reduction in world energy consumption by 2050. But energy consumption increased 47 percent from 2000 to 2021. They call for a 40 percent reduction in carbon dioxide emissions by 2030. But global CO2 emissions increased by 44 percent from 2000 to 2021. The AI revolution and other programs for societal development run contrary to the zero-growth plans of Net Zero.
Today, about 700 million people do not have access to electricity. Another two billion people suffer from daily electrical power blackouts. If your home in the United States has an air conditioner, you consume triple the electricity that is used by people in one-third of Earth’s population. Net Zero demands for a global reduction in energy use run counter to history and common sense.
Far away from artificial intelligence, the residents of developing nations lack many things that we take for granted in wealthy nations. People in the US and Europe enjoy at least one vehicle for every two residents, compared to fewer than four vehicles per 100 people in India and Africa. In sub-Saharan Africa, where daily temperatures often exceed 86oF (30oC), only one in sixteen people has air conditioning. Forty percent of these people don’t even own a fan. As another example, residents in wealthy countries use about 20 times as much plastic as residents in undeveloped countries. The people of developing nations will choose economic growth over the no-growth policies of Net Zero.
Driven by the expansion of new technologies such as artificial intelligence and the need for economic growth in developing countries, there is zero chance that Net Zero will be achieved by 2050. Energy consumption and CO2 emissions will continue to rise for decades to come.
Steve Goreham is a speaker on energy, the environment, and public policy and the author of the new bestselling bookGreen Breakdown: The Coming Renewable Energy Failure.
Mario Loyola explains at Real Clear Wire EPA’s Illegal Power Play. Excerpts in italics with my bolds and added images.
EPA’s Ambitious Gambit to Reorganize America’s Electricity
The U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in West Virginia v. EPA last year was a historic defeat for the Environmental Protection Agency. Not only did the Court rule that the 2015 Clean Power Plan, President Obama’s signature climate regulation, was unconstitutional; it also dramatically limited EPA’s power to regulate carbon emissions under the Clean Air Act (CAA) moving forward.
That left the agency with two courses of action. It could take its lumps and focus on proposing regulations with a high chance of surviving federal court review. Or it could stake everything on a final desperate attempt to decarbonize America’s power sector, and go for the win in keeping with President Biden’s commitment to net zero carbon emissions.
On May 23, 2023, EPA chose the latter, proposing carbon emissions standards for power plants far more ambitious than those struck down by the Supreme Court last year.
Like other EPA climate regulations, the proposed emissions standards under Section 111 of CAA are not designed to reduce emissions from standard power plants, but rather to force a rapid transition away from reliable and affordable sources of dispatchable power—natural gas and coal—to intermittent renewables and new kinds of power plants that don’t even exist yet. Together with EPA’s electric vehicle mandates, the proposed rule would be a train wreck for the American electricity grid and society as a whole, endangering economic competitiveness and energy security while yielding no measurable climate benefit.
Those hoping for a dramatic finish to Biden’s climate action will not be disappointed: the proposal has so many legal vulnerabilities that it would be a miracle nightmare if the rule survives federal court review.
Under the proposed rule, which President Biden hopes to finalize by next summer, large new or modified natural gas plants and existing coal plants would be required to virtually eliminate carbon emissions by 2038, at the latest. Under Section 111(a) “New Source Performance Standards” (NSPS), large new or modified combined-cycle natural gas plants, which currently supply roughly 30% of the nation’s electricity, would be required to achieve close to zero carbon emissions, either by implementing carbon capture and storage (CCS) to capture 90% of carbon emissions by 2035, or by switching from natural gas to 98% “green” hydrogen co-firing by 2038. In addition, under Section 111(d) emissions guidelines, existing coal plants, which currently supply more than 20% of America’s electricity, would be required to virtually eliminate carbon emissions by implementing CCS by 2035.
Interestingly, EPA declined to promulgate NSPS for coal plants because, as it explains, there are no plans to build any new coal plants in the U.S. It declined to promulgate emissions guidelines for existing natural gas plants out of concern for feasibility. Even more interesting, when EPA sent the proposed rule to the White House for regulatory review under E.O. 12866, it contained no emissions guidelines for existing plants at all, and therefore would not have applied to coal plants at all. The White House reportedly sent it back to EPA with orders to put a Section 111(d) rule for existing coal plants in the proposal. This suggests that EPA itself is not very confident in the ability of the Section 111(d) rule to survive court review.
Section 111 of CAA, the same provision at issue in West Virginia v. EPA, authorizes EPA to mandate “the degree of emission limitation achievable through the application of the best system of emission reduction which (taking into account the cost of achieving such reduction and any nonair quality health and environmental impact and energy requirements) the Administrator determines has been adequately demonstrated.”
Section 111 sets a high bar, especially after West Virginia v. EPA. The proposed rule falls woefully short. It has at least three major legal vulnerabilities, any one of which would be sufficient for a court to strike the rule down.
First, neither CCS nor green hydrogen is anywhere near “adequately demonstrated” within the meaning of Section 111.
Second, EPA has systematically ignored crucial costs and impacts that it is required to take into account in setting emissions standards under Section 111.
Third, like the “best system of emission reduction” struck down in West Virginia v. EPA, the new rule would require sweeping regulatory action and infrastructure investments entirely outside the fence line of the regulated facilities, thereby raising the “major question” doctrine’s presumption against the agency’s interpretation of the law.
The Mandated Technologies Have Not Been “Adequately Demonstrated”
Contrary to the unambiguous pronouncements of the D.C. Circuit, EPA treats Section 111 as if it were a technology-forcing provision throughout the proposed rule. For example, EPA claims that CCS has been “adequately demonstrated” for natural gas plants based on small-scale demonstrations at coal plants. But the coal demonstrations cited involve only small slipstreams (carbon captured from a small percentage of the plant’s total emissions) for use in the food industry. Moreover, the coal plant demonstrations do not involve the sophisticated combined-cycle configurations of large natural gas plants—in which the exhaust from the primary combustion cycle is used to heat the steam generator of the second cycle—that the new standards focus on.
In the several hundred pages laying out the proposed rule, EPA provides just two examples of demonstrations at natural gas plants. One, at Bellingham, Massachusetts, captured only a 10% slipstream and closed in 2005 because it was not economical. That was a decade before the Obama-era Clean Power Plan, in which EPA correctly rejected CCS as inadequately demonstrated and too costly. The other, a project at Peterhead, Scotland, is still in planning and may not even be built. Neither can be used as the basis for an adequately demonstrated BSER.
Furthermore, EPA’s CCS mandate would require a massive buildout of carbon transport and storage infrastructure, which has not been adequately demonstrated and would require sweeping investments and regulatory changes by developers and government authorities unrelated to the entities subject to regulation under Section 111 of CAA. Like the measures “beyond the fence line” of regulated entities that were struck down in West Virginia v. EPA, this massive infrastructure buildout would be beyond the ability of EPA-regulated entities to implement.
Co-firing with low-carbon hydrogen is even further from being adequately demonstrated. Nearly all hydrogen today is produced using carbon-intensive methods. Indeed, electrolysis from renewable and nuclear power produces only trivial quantities, and EPA doesn’t even bother to estimate the cost, feasibility, or time it would take to build out the vast amount of new renewable and nuclear power capacity that would be needed to make the low-GHG hydrogen a practicable option for power plants.
In short, neither CCS nor “green” hydrogen co-firing meets the Section 111 legal standards of “adequately demonstrated” BSER.
EPA Has Ignored the Proposed Rule’s Costs, as well as Its Health, Environment, and Energy Impacts
In determining that a technology is “adequately demonstrated” under Section 111, EPA must take into account the costs of the rule, as well as the health, environment, and energy impacts of the rule. Courts have interpreted this as requiring that costs be reasonable. That poses a threshold problem for EPA’s proposed rule because EPA can point to no measurable environmental benefit that would result from compliance. EPA has based all its greenhouse gas regulations on the same original 2010 Endangerment Finding, which has serious problems of its own, as William Happer and Richard Lindzen note in their July 2023 comment letter to the proposed rule. It has not been demonstrated that the sources subject to the rule make a significant contribution to a condition of air pollution that endangers human health, and the finding mentions the 2021 Technical Support Document on Social Cost of Carbon only in connection with a regulatory impact analysis that is unrelated to the requirements of CAA. Under such circumstances, there is a threshold question of whether any significant costs could be reasonable.
There are other problems with EPA’s estimate of costs and impacts.
First, its estimate of costs is highly speculative. The rule would affect a host of entities and government authorities across the whole society, the vast majority of them not subject to regulation under CAA, and EPA has little clue as to how they will adjust to the rule. If its cost estimates are off by any significant amount, regulated entities could well react by shuttering, rather than attempting to comply, which would create a situation of dangerous energy scarcity with skyrocketing prices. In parts of the country where fossil energy is restricted as a matter of policy, such as California, the electricity grid is on the verge of dangerous blackouts almost every evening in the summer.
And those restrictions are modest, compared with those now contemplated by EPA.
EPA’s most egregious failure to properly account for costs is that it subtracts the amount of federal subsidies from the cost estimate, a nominal reduction of $369 billion based on CBO’s score. That figure will likely turn out to be much greater, given the subsidies’ lack of date-certain sunset.
As for the impact on electricity prices, EPA estimates that the rule would lead to a price increase of 13%. That is almost certainly a woeful underestimate. In California, where a much milder form of renewable energy mandate has been in place for years, end-user electricity costs are twice the national average. The costs of compliance with the new rules could be far more exorbitant. As further explained below, CCS would reduce the power output of the relevant plants by at least 30%, while green hydrogen would likely be three to four times more expensive to produce and deliver as current demonstrations using natural gas.
Given the number of factors outside EPA’s expertise and jurisdiction that would determine how much time and money all that infrastructure would cost, EPA’s estimates are little more than conjecture.
The Power Plant Rule Raises the Same “Major Question” as in West Virginia v. EPA
The Court held that EPA’s interpretation raised a “major question” and that, in the absence of clear congressional authorization, the claimed power exceeded EPA’s statutory authority. The Court noted that EPA’s approach to BSER allowed it to set emissions standards at whatever level the agency wanted, regardless of whether any regulated entity could feasibly comply with the new standards. The Court noted that the Clean Power Plan would result “in numerical emissions ceilings so strict that no existing coal plant would have been able to achieve them without engaging in [generation-shifting].”
EPA’s new power plant rule relies on a similarly expansive definition of BSER to establish standards that can be met only by shifting generation away from fossil sources.
The only way that regulated sources could comply with the rule would be if states or utilities (or other developers) would build a major interstate infrastructure for CCS and “green” hydrogen, including tens of thousands of miles of specialized pipelines, massive underground storage facilities for CO2, and large-scale facilities for the production and transport of hydrogen gas from renewable sources. Whether to develop such infrastructure is a decision totally beyond the control of regulated entities.
The claimed power would regulate a significant portion of the American economy,entails political impact of great significance, and intrudes on mattersthat are the traditional domain of the states.
EPA’s Persistent Usurpation of Congressional Authority
EPA’s efforts to restrict greenhouse gas emissions from power plants and other sources represent a dangerous overreach of executive power. Congress never authorized EPA to regulate greenhouse gases in this expansive manner. By trying to reorganize the country’s electricity-sector limits through executive fiat, rather than the legislative process, EPA is abusing its authority and circumventing democracy.
Net zero climate policy raises novel issues that affect every American citizenin almost every aspect of modern life. Policy requiring suchtransformative change should be left to Congress.
Reuters is predicting the possible election of a right wing government on a platform of repealing climate policies which are devastating the countryside.
New Zealand farmers set for right-wing protest vote over climate change policies
By Lucy Craymer September 27, 20234:49 PM GMT+10 Updated 13 hours ago
WELLINGTON, Sept 27 (Reuters) – Rural voter anger at New Zealand’s environmental policies to tackle climate change and reduce carbon emissions may contribute to a return of right-wing parties to power at an Oct. 14 election, a shift that could diminish the country’s green image.
A flirtation with the New Zealand Labour Party in the 2020 election by rural voters, some for the first time in decades, has ended due to environmental policies such as planting pine forests on grazing land and taxing livestock methane burps.
Warning that livelihoods are at stake, farmers are looking to conservative candidates who will unwind or delay these Labour policies.
[1/2] FILE PHOTO:Cows graze near wind farms on the east coast region of Hawke’s Bay, New Zealand October 30, 2020. Picture taken October 30, 2020. REUTERS/Praveen Menon/File Photo
I wouldn’t get too excited. What passes for right wing in New Zealand is politically equivalent to a party of moderate democrats in the USA. The new party will possibly even support Net Zero, just at a slower pace.
But I suspect any relief from the green wrecking ball would be welcome, in a New Zealand economy which has seen pretty much every sphere of productive economic activity laid under siege from their current crop of far left greens.
h/t Chris Nisbet – “If you’re a climate change denier at the moment or even a minimalist, I just don’t understand how you can hold that position to be honest.” – The words of NZ opposition leader Christopher Luxon, whom farmers are hoping will roll back damaging climate policies of the current administration.
BOEM pretends it knows the noise impairment levels for Right Whales but hides its own admitted lack of knowledge on the issue and also obscures its ongoing research that will not be completed for several years.
The Biden Administration is rushing headlong to start the massive construction of offshore wind power projects off the East Coast. The wind industry calls these installations “farms”.
In no way, shape, or form do they resemble bucolic farms?
They are massive, noisy, complicated, metal, concrete, and fiberglass factories consisting of thousands of steel towers, all taller than the Washington Monument, topped by fiberglass blades longer than a football field, and surrounded by tons of rock required to prevent ocean scouring.
Even if one subscribes to the absurd theory that carbon dioxide controls the climate, these factories will, when considering the energy and materials required to construct them, result in zero reduction of CO2 in the atmosphere and have zero impact on world climate.
Repeat: zero reduction of CO2 in the atmosphere and zero impact on climate.
But vendors believe there could be a lot of money to be made in this business, and the wind industry has been effective in sprinkling seed money into the coffers of politicians and so-called environmental groups to support the legislation necessary to pay for this boondoggle – money which will ultimately be derived from hapless electricity consumers who want nothing more than cheap, reliable electricity to power their daily lives, and who will find out too late in the game that offshore wind will be neither cheap, reliable, or environmentally friendly.
Fortunately, several citizen groups have been formed that are vigorously opposing this massive industrialization of the ocean. The two leading organizations are Save Right Whales Coalition, led by Lisa Linowes: https://saverightwhales.org/, and Save Long Beach Island, led by Dr. Robert Stern https://www.savelbi.org. In addition, Michael Shellenberger has produced a terrific documentary, Thrown to the Wind, which provides an eye-opening view into the real world of noise produced by so-called survey ships. Save LBI has also initiated litigation in New Jersey federal court seeking to revoke the permits issued by BOEM authorizing this preconstruction activity.
Officially listed as an endangered species by all State and federal governments, the Right Whale falls under the protection of both the Marine Mammal Protection Act and the Endangered Species Act. These statutes require wind energy companies to obtain an “incidental take” permit for the Right Whales and other protected marine mammals while engaged in pre-construction site assessment work, which consists of sonar blasting the ocean floor to determine the placement of the wind turbines.
Last year, BOEM issued a dozen “take” permits to different wind developers who spent the winter months sonar blasting off the East Coast.
Between December 2022 and May of this year, 60 large whales, including one Right Whale, washed up dead on the beaches of NY, NJ, and VA. BOEM put together a “hastily called ” news conference to counter the outcry from the public over this outbreak of dead whales.
BOEM seemed absolutely sure there was no connection between the dead whales and sonar blasting: “At this point, there is no scientific evidence”, BOEM claimed in carefully worded lawyer jargon, ” that noise resulting from offshore wind site characterization surveys could potentially cause mortality of whales”. It concluded, ” There are no known links between recent large whale mortalities and ongoing offshore wind surveys”.
But what BOEM did not mention, or even reference, was the fact that it has funded a program currently underway that is designed precisely to answer the question of the extent to which sonar noise adversely impacts Baleen whales. Nor did BOEM mention that it had virtually no knowledge of the impact of sonar noise on large whales when it authorized the IHAs that permitted sonar mapping off the East Coast.
The program, termed “Auditory Weighting Function for Low Frequency Whales,” consists of three studies that examine the underwater noise abilities of the minke and humpback whales as proxies for Right Whales and other Baleen whales.
The program, begun in 2021, contains some startling admissions. First, BOEM is very clear in admitting that it does not know how sonar noise impacts “low frequency” whales. “The hearing abilities of ‘low frequency’ whales”, it explained, “remain one of the ‘major unknowns’ as the regulatory community has tried to deal with the effects of noise on marine mammals.” It added, “This information is imperative for BOEM to assess the potential effects of noise-producing actions (from both oil and gas and renewable energy) on these species, many of which are highly threatened”. It further conceded, ” the data need is national information on just one species of baleen whale which will significantly advance the current understanding (which is almost nonexistent) ……”.
Second, it acknowledged that “we are required to know this information for analyses under the Marine Mammal Protection Act and the Endangered Species Act.” It further explains that ” the lack of meaningful, validated data for LF whales has made it extremely challenging for NMFS and others to derive meaningful regulatory ‘not to exceed thresholds’ for noise sources, as required under the MMPA and ESA”.
This means that the program, when completed, will provide guidance for the entire government concerning acceptable noise levels for both oil and gas and offshore wind development.
So why hasn’t BOEM acknowledged that it does not know noise impairment levels for large whales, and why hasn’t it revealed the existence of this program, which will produce the information it is “required to know” under the MMPA and ESA?
The reason is obvious. The studies are being conducted right now and have not yet been completed. The final report and conclusions of the studies are not scheduled for completion until June 2025, almost two years from now.
BOEM is obviously hiding the existence of these critical studies. BOEM does not yet know the impact of sonar signals on Baleen whales, it is very clear that under the Marine Mammal Protection Act BOEM is required to rely on ” the best scientific information available” in crafting underwater noise regulations. In its rush to authorize offshore wind construction before the elections in November 2024, BOEM is relying on guesswork and outdated guesswork, at that. The Federal Code of Regulations makes it very clear that BOEM cannot hide behind the excuse that this critical information is not available when it knows full well that the data will be derived from ongoing studies that are organized and funded by BOEM itself.
At a minimum, this set of facts would support a temporary injunction prohibiting BOEM from issuing further IHAs until the studies have been completed and the data has been incorporated into definitive regulations. Any final Environmental Impact Statement issued by the EPA that fails to incorporate the data to be derived from these latest studies will be de facto misleading and de jure unlawful.
When BOEM claims that “there is no evidence” linking the recent outbreak of whale deaths due to sonar testing, it is engaging in obvious and easily provable deception. This is a classic case of gaslighting. BOEM cannot sweep its “knowledge gap” concerning Right Whale noise impairment under the rug and expect the courts to approve any further offshore wind development.
Johnson has spent the last four decades working in the public and private sectors in Virginia, primarily in the fields of project finance and maritime transportation.
He began his career in public service as Chairman of the Board of the Virginia Port Authority. He was appointed by President George W. Bush, and confirmed by the Senate, as a member of the Overseas Private Investment Corporation, and most recently, as Administrator of the St. Lawrence Seaway Development Corporation.
In that capacity, he became knowledgeable in the field of climate and its impact on the Great Lakes. He currently serves on CFACT’s Board of Advisors.
Johnson holds a B.A. degree from Yale University, and a J.D. from the University of Virginia.
Biznews published excerpts from an interview with Dr. William Happer Sign Elimination of CO2 is a suicide pact. Text below in italiics with my bolds and added images.
Overview
It’s safe to assume no one consciously sets out to challenge a narrative as deeply entrenched and emotionally charged as climate change. Dr William Happer, an American physicist and Professor Emeritus in the Department of Physics at Princeton University, certainly didn’t. It was only in 1991, upon Happer’s appointment by President George W Bush as director of Energy Research in the US Department of Energy, that his interaction with climate change authorities – and their refusal to engage in customary scientific debate on climate change – piqued his interest.
Thereafter, Happer was dismissed for his contrarian views and ‘head butting’ with climate change luminary Al Gore, only to be brought back to Washington by former president Donald Trump in 2018. BizNews spoke to Happer about his prodigious career and discovery that the burgeoning climate change hysteria had no scientific basis. Happer meticulously detailed why and how CO2, the “demon gas”, is not a pollutant but is essential to mankind’s prosperity.
Professor William Happer on the effect of carbon dioxide on planet Earth
Carbon dioxide is what drives life on Earth. The growth of plants depends on carbon dioxide. The carbon dioxide in the air diffuses into the leaves of plants through little holes, and the plants combine this with water and it requires energy. This energy comes from sunlight. So, the combination of carbon dioxide, the so-called pollutant, water and sunlight is what makes life. You know, that’s what we live on. And carbon dioxide at the present time is much lower [in] concentration than has prevailed over most of geological history. [During] most of geological history, it’s pretty clear from proxy records, CO2 levels have been two or three times greater than they are now.
We probably don’t have enough fossil fuels around to restore those levels where plants evolve and where they function best.
But even the relatively small increases we’ve had – from maybe 280, 300 parts per million 200 years ago to a little over 400 today – that’s not a big increase. It’s 35%, maybe. But it has caused greening all around the Earth. You can see that from satellites looking down over the last two or three decades. Earth is getting greener. Especially arid regions are getting greener. You know, the edges of the great deserts of the Earth are shrinking. They’re not growing, they are shrinking.
They’re shrinking because of more CO2. And the reason is that there are a number of benefits from more CO2, but one of the most important ones is that if there’s more CO2, plants can live with less water. They don’t waste as much water with more CO2 in the air, because they grow leaves with fewer holes in them so they don’t leak as much water. And the little holes, the stomata – the little mouths, that’s what it means and it’s where the CO2 comes in – don’t open as wide. So, the problem with sucking CO2 out of the air, which is what plants have to do, is for every CO2 molecule that diffuses into your leaf, you lose a hundred water molecules diffusing the other way. This is a real dilemma for the planet.
It’s true. CO2 is a greenhouse gas and it warms the Earth, but the warming isn’t enough to matter.
It’s very small. And so, it’s probably beneficial on balance. If you double CO2, it seems like a lot, that’s a 100% increase of CO2. How much does that affect the cooling radiation that goes off to space? That sounds like a lot, but in effect it only decreases the radiation to space by 1%. So, 100% increase of CO2, 1% decrease in radiation to space. It’s a very small effect, and you don’t have to change the Earth’s temperature very much or cloudiness very much to bring it back into equilibrium with the situation before you increase the CO2.
So, it’s an ineffective climate influencer. Yet you get this demon gas that is going to cause us all to boil to death or something like that. Nothing could be further from the truth. It’s a trivial gas, but it’s very, very good for life on Earth. More CO2 has been wonderful for mankind because it helps provide the abundance of food we have today and it’s caused no harm, whatsoever.
On climate change activism having become like a religious cult
It is a religious cult for many people. Many people have stopped believing in traditional religions, you know? So, they don’t believe in God, but they need something beyond themselves to believe in. What could be more noble than saving the planet? “The planet is threatened by the demon gas CO2, so we’re going to save it.” The fact that it means essentially suicide for the human race doesn’t get into their brains. But that is what it means.
You cannot immediately eliminate CO2 and let the human population survive. It can’t be done. So, it’s a suicide pact, you know, what is being proposed.
The movement is a joke – a little bit – but it’s not so different from a coalition of organised crime and religious fanaticism. And the religious fanatics … You know, you don’t argue with someone about their religion. This is not a joking matter. It brings crusades and religious wars and God knows what. So, that’s a big problem. There is this religious aspect; so many people now have been brainwashed into thinking there really is an emergency. And anyone who stands in the way of saving the planet is Satan incarnate. They are sincere people but they’re just badly misled.
Many of the most vociferous climate emergency folks; if you press them, they say, “Yes, the real problem is not fossil fuels, it’s human beings. You know, there are just too many people. We should not have more than a billion people.” We’re roughly eight billion now, so that means seven out of eight of us should disappear from the planet. This is extremely dangerous. It’s an evil cult.
On what has been lost owing to climate hysteria
The alarmist community recognised 20 years ago that the warming is a lot less than their models had predicted. “Just you wait,” they’d say, “Sooner or later it will warm. But in the meantime, we need something else to keep the alarm going.” And they seized on extreme weather and rising sea levels and ocean acidification… Things that really were not warming. And they changed the name from global warming to climate change because warming wasn’t going to cut it. There wasn’t enough warming.
Earth has an unstable climate which isn’t very well understood to this day, and it would be wonderful if we understood it better. But I think our ability to understand it has been set back very badly by the climate hysteria. So, what could’ve been 20, 30 years of good, basic research and real understanding of the climate has been wasted with hysteria about this false climate emergency, which does not exist. In the meantime, the real parts of the climate – which would be good to understand – have been ignored.
“Personally , I’ve now reached a point where I believe breaking the law for the climate is the ethically responsible thing to do.” (- Chris Packham, UK Wildlife TV presenter & conservationist)
Andrew Griffiths and Verel Rodrigues, UK climate activists, refuse to question climate alarm and forced energy transformation. They are frustrated despite major (anti-commoner) government intervention for not doing enough. And this in a country that produces about one percent of global GHG emissions.
Instead of checking their premises, Griffiths and Rodrigues (and others) want to double down. So what is the floor on despair–when you “hit bottom” in the vernacular of addiction? Is it open-ended violence?!
Watching this eco documentary just after watching Rishi Sunak’s roll back on climate policies genuinely restored hope that there is a significant shift coming. I am grateful for Chris Packham showing leadership and pledging full support to those who break the law for climate.
Documentary presenters don’t usually make a virtue out of bewilderment, but these are confounding, confusing times. Chris Packham: Is It Time to Break the Law? – an extraordinary, anguished think piece – opens with an audio montage of Packham’s desperate thoughts about the climate crisis, arranged so they chaotically overlap. This chattering inner monologue is accompanied by the unforgettable sight of the presenter’s face slowly being smothered in thick, black crude oil.
OK, the “oil” is probably treacle, but Packham’s film does involve the idea of putting his own safety and future on the line. It is beyond merely thought provoking: it follows him as he deals with a profound dilemma about how to live his life, and what that life is for, and it tells us that this is a decision we at home must also now make. The climate apocalypse is here and, despite fires and floods around the world, there is still – maddeningly – little sign of the change needed to avert the deeper catastrophe that is coming. Voting hasn’t worked. Peaceful protest hasn’t worked. Rational debate hasn’t worked. What now?
Bring on the violence, the article and its subject continues:
Packham, however, is deeply sympathetic towards the ordinary people who have become some of Britain’s most hardline climate activists, via actions organized by the guerrilla pressure group Just Stop Oil. … Packham opines that society ought to feel shame at putting principled people behind high walls and razor wire.
But the risks these pioneers are willing to brave are not confined to retaliation by the state. Viral clips of the actions of Just Stop Oil increasingly feature members of the public taking grim pleasure in reacting with violence, from shoving activists out of the road to driving heavy goods vehicles at them. Packham states that those people have been riled up by “the rightwing media”, referring to a Mail Online article in which Just Stop Oil activists are called “zealots” who have formed a “mob”.
Knowing what is at stake, Packham is still inclined towards extreme measures – not just approving of them, but participating in them himself…. Self-confessedly lost and uncertain, he seeks further counsel. He meets the Swedish ecology professor Andreas Malm, whose book How to Blow Up a Pipeline is worth the publishing deal just for the title. Malm stresses that he doesn’t mean literally blowing things up. Well, not necessarily. But he does advocate sabotaging pipelines or other fossil-fuel infrastructure….
In the end, Packham does not make TV history by publicly announcing his intention to commit an imprisonable offence, though he does reiterate his support for climate activists who cross that line. There is one obvious reason to hope he doesn’t get himself sent to jail: it would stop him making programmes as honest, as challenging and as urgently relevant as this.
Reaction on LinkedIn
Verel’s post seconding Packham got a cool reaction. Stated the self-described “Social Entrepreneur, UN Award Recipient, Inventor, Vegan” Theo Cosmora:
Instead of spending hours sitting in the middle of the road stopping others’ important travel, which may well include someone reaching hospital in time for an urgent operation or giving birth, spend the time and resources raising money for and deploying one of these in permitted river locations around the country to deliver clean very low cost 24/7 energy to local communities nationwide.
It’s important to understand that the solutions to all are problems are already here, but they are being delayed by lack of awareness, lack of funding, and delay tactics by the fossil fuel industry. The most important thing is social change. How do we change ourselves if we are not aware of how pressing the issues we face are? Most of the population is just trying to survive, they don’t have the mental capacity to think about how climate change is going to affect them 10 years down the line.
Assuming that technology is going to fix all of our problems without fixing ourselves, is only going to create more problems. It’s a deadly cycle. Worth reflecting on this for a few days
They don’t have the mental capacity. Well, that pretty much says in all about you, does it not? We know, you are special, you are mentally capable. We bow down to your genius.
Given that you are already committed to that reality, you are not open to reason, logic, or fact based-dialog. In other words, your mind is closed and you have moved on to justifying violence in the name of the “greater good.” That makes you no better to the millions who have come before you. They all thought they were right as well.
Verel: For goodness sakes, check your premises. Don’t assume, study. Human betterment is just the opposite of what you are proposing as the God in the Machine. “The road to hell is paved with good intentions.”
Yes – there are times when governments pass laws that go against basic morality and those with morals should disobey. However regarding the use of energy to live that some say will bring disaster sometime in the future is hardly a moral imperative. Especially in light of the ongoing debate by good and honest skeptics. It is in fact immoral to silence those who may in fact be right.
But Verel might be beyond saving. He has a religion, the Church of Climate. As he commented to one critic:
I don’t see sitting in the road to raise awareness about how climate change is going to kill so many people across the world as violent. Allowing and being complicit with climate change to killing millions of people is not moral, and I support those who are doing their best to raise awareness about this crisis in whatever way they can, as long as they are not violent.
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Global warming, climate change, all these things are just a dream come true for politicians. I deal with evidence and not with frightening computer models because the seeker after truth does not put his faith in any consensus. The road to the truth is long and hard, but this is the road we must follow. People who describe the unprecedented comfort and ease of modern life as a climate disaster, in my opinion have no idea what a real problem is.
