Military Veterans and Patriots

Tag: Climate change

  • The Green Energy Apocalyse

    The Green Energy Apocalyse

    The Green Energy Apocalypse

    Plunging ourselves into extinction.

    December 5, 2024 by Bruce Thornton for Frontpage Magazine

    Someday our descendants will look back on the Age of Climate Change and marvel how a civilization with so much wealth, scientific knowledge, and sophisticated technologies could have willfully wrecked their economies and plunged themselves into poverty or extinction.

    More astonishing to them, this civilizational suicide had been based on an unproven hypothesis like Anthropogenic Catastrophic Global Warming––the idea that human-produced atmospheric CO2 emissions would destroy their civilization unless fossil fuels, the cheap, abundant energy that created the modern world, were abandoned.

    Moreover, the portents of that future apocalypse are relentlessly multiplying across the rich Western nations, despite the ever-growing evidence that the hypothesis radically simplifies how a complex global climate works over space and time. More troubling, the proposed solution for lowering emissions enough to stave off the alleged disaster cannot be realized by eliminating fossil-fuels.

    Thankfully, the election of Donald Trump offers hope that the suicidal “renewable” energy programs and policies will be rolled back.

    For now, resistance to the zero net carbon narrative is growing. Even at the U.N.’s grand climate powwow held in Dubai in January, the UAE’s Minister of Industry, Dr. Sultan Al-Jaber, made the classic gaffe of speaking that truth out loud in front of the conclave of true believers. The Paris Accords’ goal to limit the global temperature increase to 1.5 degrees Celsius by 2030 was a chimera: “‘There is no science out there, or no scenario out there that says the phase-out of fossil fuel is what’s going to achieve 1.5,’ Al-Jaber said at an online event on Nov. 21, “adding a pointed barb to the hosts that it would be impossible to stop burning fossil fuels and sustain economic development, ‘unless you want to take the world back into caves.’”

    And if a government minister is an untrustworthy witness, listen to MIT professor of atmospheric science Richard Lindzen, and Princeton emeritus professor of physics William Happer, who wrote  in 2021, “We are both scientists who can attest that the research literature does not support the claim of a climate emergency. Nor will there be one. None of the lurid predictions — dangerously accelerating sea-level rise, increasingly extreme weather, more deadly forest fires, unprecedented warming, etc. — are any more accurate than the fire-and-brimstone sermons used to stoke fanaticism in medieval crusaders.”

    But despite numerous other exposures of how dubious the science is, the Western nations continue to double-down on transitioning to “clean energy,” mostly by phasing out gas-powered automobiles and mandating they be replaced by electric vehicles through taxpayer-funded subsidies and draconian government regulations.

    This distortion of the free market enriches a few green corporate rent-seekers, at the expense of consumers who have to pay more for electricity, gasoline, or the gas-powered automobiles they prefer to EVs dependent on intermittent energy sources like solar panels and wind turbines. Meanwhile, the higher costs for energy harms the whole economy, especially the automobile industry.

    Just look at the straits that some of the world’s largest economies have put themselves in by pursuing net zero use of carbon. Great Britain, the seventh biggest economy in the world, “is killing its auto industry,” as the Wall Street Journal’s headline reads. Automaker Stellantis is closing a plant, at the cost of 1100 jobs. America’s Ford is shedding 800 at its British plant, and Nissan has warned the government that it also might scale back production.

    Why? “The culprit,” the Journal writes, “as always these days, is the forced political march to electric vehicles. Britain requires manufacturers to steadily boost the proportion of EVs in their annual sales. Currently the quota is 22% and rising every year. Rishi Sunak’s Tory administration tried to push the final phase-out of new internal-combustion cars to 2035, but the new Labour Party government vows to bring the deadline back to 2030. Even the current quota is proving impossible to meet as consumers spurn EVs.”

    An economy managed by government fiat, as the U.S.S.R. and every socialist country have shown, in the end will fail and drag the people’s wealth down with it. And bribing customers and manufacturers to purchase and build an unwanted product further burdens a nation’s fisc with more debt and misallocated resources. In the U.K., “The total cost to manufacturers of the mandate has hit nearly £6 billion this year, SMMT estimates: about £4 billion in discounts and sales incentives car companies offered to boost EV sales, and £1.8 in outright fines for each ‘excess’ internal-combustion car sold.”

    Britain is just one of several European economies that are falling deeper and deeper into the “renewable energy” rabbit hole. In Germany, Volkswagen has been forced to shut down three factories at the cost of 10,000 jobs. And the U.S. during the Biden administration also took the country on a “renewable energy” and net-zero carbon bender as well. True to its status as the bellwether of every lefty lunatic fad, California under its failed governor is binging on the same toxic “global warming” brew, driving its economy and citizens towards a fiscal cliff.

    Under the aegis of “climate action,” Governor Gavin Newsom, as the Wall Street Journal reports, and the Democrat-controlled state government have targeted two critical industries for California’s economy comprising “a perfect storm of laws, regulations and lawsuits designed to eliminate oil and farming.” But that’s not all: “Every essential foundation of a healthy, affordable economy is under attack. But rather than acknowledge this storm, California’s Gov. Gavin Newsom is doing everything in his power to make it worse.”

    Key to this assault is the unholy grail of net-zero carbon emissions, supported by billions in subsidies for “renewable” energy, and regulatory attacks on fossil fuel energy. “As a result, California’s households and businesses pay for the most expensive electricity and gasoline in the lower 48 states. It’s all for nothing. California still relies on oil and gas for 80% of its energy, a reliance on fossil fuel that is the same as the national average.”

    That astonishing paradox of trying to get rid of the energy resources that provide 80% not just of the U.S.’s energy, but the whole world’s, is powerful evidence of how unscientific and incoherent the whole net-zero carbon pursuit is. Moreover, what reductions of carbon emissions that have already occurred result not from pie-in-the-sky expensive mandates or bribes to consumers and manufacturers to buy and produce electric cars, but from the development of shale fracking, which produces cleaner natural gas for generating electricity.

    But that’s not all: California is “sitting on tens of trillions of cubic feet of reserves” of natural gas. “California used to produce 60% of the oil it consumed, but despite reserves estimated as high as 30 billion barrels, in-state production is down to 23% of consumption.”

    As the Journal concludes, “These are the consequences of a state run by rent-seeking renewable-energy firms and the environmentalist fanatics that offer them political cover. Mr. Newsom’s climate action is hitting every industry and every household.”

    Finally, these feckless “renewable energy” policies are damaging economies most of which are already confronting huge loads of debt, amassed over the years to pay for entitlement transfers that few politicians dare to pare back and reform. These costs also make financing the West’s military preparedness more difficult, exposing us to our enemies’ adventurism.

    Adding the expense of discarding cheap, abundant fossil fuel energy––and the difficult, if not impossible, task of replacing carbon energy with “clean energy” and electric cars, for which there are nowhere near enough transmission lines, charging stations, and high-capacity battery storage––make our fiscal straits dire to the point of being suicidal. For as economist Herbert Stein famously said, “If something cannot go on forever, it will stop.”

    That’s especially true in our case, given our geopolitical rivals like China and Russia, who want to usurp the West’s preeminent role in global affairs. The former is perfectly happy to burn tons of dirty coal to generate electricity; while the latter sits on the world’s 8th largest oil reserves. Both are ruled by ruthless realists, and care nothing for our romantic environmentalism, and are immune to our arrogant virtue-signaling.

    Thankfully, the election of Donald Trump offers hope that the suicidal “renewable” energy programs and policies will be rolled back. Apocalypse, like decline, is not a destiny but a choice. Trump established his realist climate policy bona fides during his first term, and strengthened them by his cabinet choices so far. By reprising those policy changes and making others, Trump can rein in the suicidal war on fossil fuels, and rev up our production and exports of energy to our allies, reducing Iran and Russia’s geopolitical leverage.

    That’s how we can make the West––the freest and wealthiest civilization in history––great again.

    If current news can be believed, which is always suspect, this hoax may be dying. Slowly but countries do not seen as eager to dump money into the idiocy.

  • WEF: Covid ‘ Was thé Test’ for ‘Huge Number of Unimaginable Restrictions’

    WEF: Covid ‘ Was thé Test’ for ‘Huge Number of Unimaginable Restrictions’

    WEF: Covid ‘Was the Test’ for ‘Huge Number of Unimaginable Restrictions’

    From Slaynews

    The globalist World Economic Forum (WEF) has declared that the Covid pandemic was merely “the test” for “a huge number of unimaginable restrictions” on the general public’s freedoms.

    In a post on the WEF’s website, Klaus Schwab’s Switzerland-based organization gloats that the willingness of “billions of citizens across the world” to comply with Covid restrictions proves that members of the public can be manipulated into accepting “individual social responsibility.”

    The WEF lauds how “billions” of people complied with Covid “restrictions,” arguing that they would do the same under the guise of reducing carbon emissions.

    Titled “My Carbon: An approach for inclusive and sustainable cities,” the article suggests that the same fear tactics could be used to impose further “restrictions” on the general public.

    The subject of the piece is how to convince people to adopt “personal carbon allowance programs.”

    The WEF laments that such schemes have so far been largely unsuccessful.

    However, Schwab’s group notes that improvements in tracking and surveillance technology are helping to overcome “political resistance” against such programs.

    “COVID-19 was the test of social responsibility,” the article asserts.

    It continues by commending how “a huge number of unimaginable restrictions for public health were adopted by billions of citizens across the world.”

    “There were numerous examples globally of maintaining social distancing, wearing masks, mass vaccinations, and acceptance of contact-tracing applications for public health, which demonstrated the core of individual social responsibility,” the WEF adds.

    The organization goes on to cite how so many people complied with lockdown mandates, despite overwhelming evidence of the harmful consequences such restrictions had on society.

    The WEF then implies that the public would behave in a similarly obsequious manner in other areas of life.

    Such conformity would be encouraged via technology, including artificial intelligence, digitization, and “smart home” devices, argues the group.

    The article goes on to call for a social-credit style carbon emissions rationing scheme.

    Such a scheme would provide “individual advisories on lower carbon and ethical choices for consumption of product and services,” the WEF suggests.

    New social norms would also be created to define what “a fair share” of personal emissions represents and determine “acceptable levels” of personal emissions.

    The WEF has frequently touted the “success” of Covid restrictions as an example of how similar tactics could be used again to control the public.

    WEF founder Klaus Schwab’s daughter boasted during a panel discussion that similar restrictions could be imposed under the guise of “fighting climate change.”

    As Slay News reported, Nicole Schwab declared that tyrannical restrictions during the Covid pandemic served as a precursor to coming “climate lockdowns.”

    According to the younger Schwab, Covid was a “tremendous opportunity” to test how the public would comply with authoritarian measures that could be used to usher in the WEF’s “Great Reset” agenda.

    The WEF’s promotion of the “climate crisis” narrative seeks to “create a change that is not incremental…to position nature at the core of the economy,” according to the WEF’s founder’s daughter.

    Nicole Schwab made the comments in a newly unearthed video that was recorded during a WEF panel discussion in 2020.

    The WEF has been increasingly attempting to blur the lines between Covid and the so-called “climate crisis.”

    As Slay News reported, the WEF, billionaire Bill Gates, and their globalist allies are advancing plans that allegedly seek to “save the planet” from “global warming” through the use of vaccines.

    In recent months, unelected elites have been targeting the global food supply over claims that farming contributes to the so-called “climate crisis.”

    The WEF and the United Nations (UN) insist that emissions from agriculture are preventing governments from complying with “Net Zero” targets.

    The meet the goals of the WEF’s “Net Zero” agenda, governments are increasingly under pressure to destroy the farming industry, despite the obvious threat to the food supply.

    Gates, America’s largest farm owner and a vocal advocate of the anti-meat agenda, has been funding the development of new vaccines through his organization which he claims will help tackle “global warming.”

    According to Gates, livestock destined for the food supply can be injected with his vaccines to reduce their “methane emissions.”

    Obviously, this means the vaccines will end up in the food supply.

    However, reporter Yudi Sherman warns that the globalists are not planning to stop at just vaccinating animals and will also target the general public with the so-called “climate vaccines.”

    What is frightening is the current push for additional vaccination due to an increase in COVID cases. People are already driving around in masks, shopping in masks, talking, in hushed frightened tones, about COVID. Obviously, they learned zero from the near current past.

  • United Nations Demands…

    United Nations Demands…

    United Nations Demands $150 TRILLION to Fight ‘Climate Change’

    Frank Bergman for Slay News January 8, 2024 – 

    antonio-gutteres-wef-uniated-nations-climate-change.jpg

    The United Nations (UN) is demanding that taxpayers around the world cough up a staggering $150 trillion to fight “man-made climate change”  – a fabricated “crisis” that the unelected globalist organization helped to create.

    The UN made the demands in a new report published by its Department of Economic and Social Affairs.

    The agency claims that it needs global governments to commit to handing over $5.3 trillion per year to the bureaucratic agency.

    According to the report, the UN needs $150 trillion in order to “save the planet” from “global warming” by complying with the “Agenda 2050” goals of the World Economic Forum (WEF).

    In its report on the World Economic Situation and Prospects for 2024, the UN reiterates its 17 Sustainable Development Goals.

    However, the “goals” are deeply aligned with Marxism and appear to have little to do with actually protecting the environment.

    The widely criticized goals are often used as inspiration for many Western nations’ diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) legislation, as well as policies related to climate change.

    “Gender Equity,” “Sustainable Cities and Communities,” and “Quality Education” are among the 17 goals.

    Also included are “Affordable and Clean Energy” and “Climate Action.”

    It is under these categories that the United Nations suggests astronomical amounts of funding in order to reach its goals.

    The organization’s climate action goals are referred to as “global climate finance,” which it reveals reached a whopping $803 billion annually in 2020.

    This was reportedly a 12% increase compared to prior years.

    However, just a few years later the global organization has decided that this figure is nowhere near enough.

    The report stated that the enormous sum “still falls short of the levels needed to limit warming.”

    “Fossil-fuel-related flows exceeded climate financing for adaptation and mitigation in 2020,” the report warns.

    However, despite pushing for Marxist ideology to fight climate “inequity,” the report fails to call out China – the largest polluter in the world by a very large margin.

    The full report revealed the true desired number; an estimated $150 trillion by 2050. This equates to $5.3 trillion annually to “combat climate change and its impacts,” the report read.

    The funds are supposedly needed to transition energy and infrastructure.

    The report also complained that the terms of the Paris Climate Agreement of 2015 have not been adhered to by participating countries.

    “The pledge by developed countries to provide $100 billion in climate finance annually by 2020 was never fully met, with funding totaling only $89.6 billion in 2021,” the report explained.

    The United Nations has also recommended other gigantic budgets to reach the WEF’s “Net Zero” goals to comply with “Agenda 203o.”

    An estimated $35-40 billion was suggested to allow for socialist-style universal electricity access.

    The global consortium was not shy about dealing in make-believe sums of money throughout the 2024 report.

    The word “trillion” in relation to dollars was mentioned 52 times in the document.

    Despite the never-ending climate funding, the document also alleges that “conflict and climate change” caused havoc for the lives of millions.

    However, the organization also claims to be worried that it jeopardized the UN’s “progress towards sustainable development.”

    One has to wonder why anyone believes the UN can adequately do anything considering their record on multiple issues. Rather than giving a single penny, just tell them to go pound sand, plus seriously reduce the funds we already give them!

  • Second Nobel Prize Winner..

    Second Nobel Prize Winner..

    Second Nobel Prize Winner Signs Letter With 1,600 Scientists Declaring Climate ‘Emergency’ A Myth

    Tristan Justice for federalist.com

    Lassen National Park

    A coalition of more than 1,600 scientists critical of their peers’ hyperbolic claims about climate change drew a prominent recruit to sign their 2019 declaration that the climate “emergency” is a myth.

    John Clauser, who won last year’s Nobel Prize in physics, became the second Nobel laureate last month to sign the document with 1,607 other scientists rebuking the idea of a climate crisis.

    “Climate science should be less political, while climate policies should be more scientific,” the declaration organized by the Climate Intelligence Foundation (CLINTEL) reads. “Scientists should openly address uncertainties and exaggerations in their predictions of global warming, while politicians should dispassionately count the real costs as well as the imagined benefits of their policy measures.”

    Last year, the International Energy Agency (IEA) debuted a roadmap to net-zero emissions that became the model for corporate bishops of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) standards. A June reportfrom the Energy Policy Research Foundation criticized the initiatives outlined as a “green mirage.” The IEA roadmap, researchers wrote, “will dramatically increase energy costs, devastate Western economies, and increase human suffering.”

    “The aim of global policy should be ‘prosperity for all’ by providing reliable and affordable energy at all times,” reads CLINTEL’s World Climate Declaration. “There is no climate emergency. Therefore, there is no cause for panic and alarm.”

    Norwegian-American engineer Ivan Giaever, who won the Nobel Prize in physics in 1973, is also a signatory to the declaration.

    “The popular narrative about climate change reflects a dangerous corruption of science that threatens the world’s economy and the well-being of billions of people. Misguided climate science has metastasized into massive shock-journalistic pseudoscience,” Clauser said. “In turn, the pseudoscience has become a scapegoat for a wide variety of other unrelated ills. It has been promoted and extended by similarly misguided business marketing agents, politicians, journalists, government agencies, and environmentalists.”

    The document makes several claims that contradict popular narratives peddled by climate hysterics. For example, the planet is warming slower than predicted and has not driven a spike in natural disasters. 

    Mega-disasters are actually on the decline, while the destruction from natural events such as hurricanes and wildfires is on the rise. The increase in billion-dollar disasters, however, is a result of there being more to destroy. But that hasn’t stopped legacy outlets from blaming every natural event on the “climate crisis.” Two years ago, The New York Times published “Postcards From A World On Fire” despite natural disaster deaths declining by 90 percent. 

    The World Climate Declaration also notes that carbon dioxide is plant food, “not a pollutant.”

    “It is essential to all life on Earth,” the document reads.

    In fact, reforestation is on the rise, promoted by a global “greening” effect proliferating plant growth.

  • Science Sunday -Climate

    Science Sunday -Climate

    1,200 Scientists, Scholars Declare:

    ‘There Is No Climate Emergency’

    Frank Bergman for Slay News August19, 20225 

    A group of almost 1200 of the world’s leading scientists and scholars has signed a document to declare that “there is no climate emergency.”

    The group, led by a Nobel Prize laureate, signed the declaration that states climate science is based more on personal beliefs and political agendas than rigorous scientific facts.

    The World Climate Declaration warns that climate science “should be less political, while climate policies should be more scientific.”

    “Scientists should openly address uncertainties and exaggerations in their predictions of global warming, while politicians should dispassionately count the real costs as well as the imagined benefits of their policy measures,” the declaration reads.

    According to a report by WND, the declaration was organized by Climate Intelligence.

    The organization is an independent policy foundation founded in 2019 by Dutch emeritus professor of geophysics Guus Berkhout and Dutch science journalist Marcel Crok.

    The U.K. website the Daily Sceptic reported that one of the lead authors of the declaration, atmospheric physicist Richard Lindzen, has called the current climate narrative “absurd.”

    However, relentless propaganda from grant-dependent academics and agenda-driven journalists has generated a widely accepted narrative that the science is “settled.”

    “We should free ourselves from the naïve belief in immature climate models,” the WCD states.

    “In future, climate research must give significantly more emphasis to empirical science.”

    Last week, Democrat President Joe Biden signed the radical “Inflation Reduction Act.”

    The bill spends $368 billion of taxpayer money on “green” energy with the aim of reducing CO2 emissions by 40% by 2030.

    While Biden was vice president under Barack Obama, the administration subsidized “green” energy with federal grants and tax breaks.

    In 2009, Biden himself announced a $535 million loan guarantee for the solar panel company Solyndra to go along with $700 million in venture capital funding.

    Biden said the plant built with that money would power more than half a million homes.

    But two years later, the company filed for bankruptcy and shut down its operations.

    The World Climate Declaration points out that since emerging from the Little Ice Age in the mid-19th century, the world has warmed significantly less than predicted by the U.N.’s International Panel on Climate Change’s models.

    “The gap between the real world and the modeled world tells us that we are far from understanding climate change,” the WCD states.

    The declaration argues Earth’s climate has varied, with cold and warm periods, for as long as the planet has existed, and it is “no surprise that we are experiencing a period of warming.”

    The climate models “are not remotely plausible as global policy tools,” ignoring, for one, the benefits of carbon dioxide, which is “not a pollutant.”

    “It is essential to all life on Earth,” the declaration says.

    “Photosynthesis is a blessing. More CO2 is beneficial for nature, greening the Earth; additional CO2 in the air has promoted growth in global plant biomass.

    “It is also good for agriculture, increasing the yield of crops worldwide.”

    There is no statistical evidence, the signatories say, “that global warming is intensifying hurricanes, floods, droughts, and such-like natural disasters, or making them more frequent.”

    “There is no climate emergency.

    “We strongly oppose the harmful and unrealistic net-zero CO2 policy proposed for 2050.”

    Last year, Steven Koonin, an under-secretary of science in the Obama administration, published a book titled “Unsettled” that said, “the science is insufficient to make useful projections about how the climate will change over the coming decades, much less what our actions will be.”

    The idea that climate change is settled demeans and chills the scientific enterprise, he contended, “retarding its progress in these important matters.”

    In 2020, the long-time green activist Michael Shellenberger wrote a book called “Apocalypse Never.”

    In the book, Shellenberger laments that the conversation about climate change has “spiraled out of control.”

    There is zero doubt any attention will be paid to this group of scientists. In fact, it is more likely they will receive no more grant money and will be ostracized.

  • Climate Change V: Pumpkins; Data Changes; Emission Controls

    Climate Change V: Pumpkins; Data Changes; Emission Controls

    Just when you think there can’t possibly be more governmental insanity, the Department of Energy posts warnings of methane pollution due to “Pumpkins”.  

    While there may be a scientific basis for some concern about anthropogenic methane production; what with all the organic materials that are interred in our landfills; that pumpkins should be maligned as a major contributor of methane is another one of those theories that cannot be truly quantified. While we can laugh at this “Significant” news flash from the fall of 2015, in retrospect it gives us an insight into a governmental agency’s grasping efforts at control.

    Then there is this Dust-up between Lamar Smith, R-Texas, Chairman of the Committee of Science, Space and Technology and NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration).

    Lamar Alexander

    Changes made to data by the agency with no explanation show an increase in surface temperatures that does not comport with previously published temperature data.  Foot dragging by the agency only intensifies the suspicion that the data change was done to help the administration’s Climate Change Agenda.  This has forced the committee to issue a subpoena on Oct. 13 2015 to force compliance with committee requests for documents that explain agency actions. This shows a deliberate denial of the right of congressional oversight forcing a subpoena to be issued.  House Science Committee Chairman Lamar Smith finally subpoenaed a June study and intra agency employee e-mails about the study in October, the committee began receiving documents and emails from NOAA officials on December 16, 2015

    The EPA’s “Clean Power Plan” mandates a 32% reduction in emissions by existing power plants by 2030.

    This will kill coal fired power generation as the rules are so stringent that existing technology can’t build a new generating station that can meet the emission standards, much less an existing plant.  24 states have filed a motion to hold the EPA’s new rules in abeyance until such time as a court can rule on the validity of the rules.  26 state attorney general associations and numerous business groups have also filed a brief seeking delay until the legal issues are settled. Reversal of this egregious act by the Trump administration brought some sanity into the regulation of power plants and was a welcome relief to electrical ratepayers.  Sadly, the return of these rules by the Biden administration leads us back into the prospect of devastating electrical rates and possible brown/blackouts as electrical generation is turning to renewables, principally wind and solar that cannot reliably fulfill electrical demands.

    This is government overreach on a scale not seen before.  When you combine all the rules the Obama administration has promulgated and enacted without due process, the result is breath-taking in its scope.                                                                                                                                                       

    Note:  The current cabal orchestrated by AOC is pushing the same kind of fertilizer that was being conveyed during the Obama administration.                                                                                                                                                              

    A mismanaged congress has to bear some of the blame just as the policy wonks that continually shovel more of this Climate Change manure.  The fact that agencies can delay and act with disdain and belligerence to congressional requests for documents is outside the pale of law.  A complicit DOJ makes the task of correction even harder.

    Under the Trump administration, rule making has taken a sharp turn; for every new regulation the agency must retire two old regulations.  Couple that with a congress that has shown a desire to rein in these small fiefdoms the agencies have become, progress is achievable.                                                                                                                                                        

    Note: The Biden administration (aka Obama II) has gutted the majority of the moves made by the Trump administration and is strongly supporting the “New Green Deal” which will gut the American economy.

    Walt Mow

    You can find the previous installments of this series here, here, here and here.

  • Climate Change IV: Water in the Atmosphere; Culprit, or No…

    Climate Change IV: Water in the Atmosphere; Culprit, or No…

    Science is an ever changing discipline that is forced to re-evaluate and adapt as new evidence is advanced.   Just as Ptolemy’s geocentric theory was supplanted by the Copernican heliocentric model; so too must the non-working models of Climate Change adapt to the realities of proven scientific investigation.  

    According to the theory of Global Warming, GHGs are trapping heat that would be radiated back into space.  Thankfully the earth does not release significant amounts of heat from its molten core.  Simple math dictates that the earth cannot produce more heat than it receives from the sun.  This brings us to the main point of dissent, that man is the primary cause of Global Warming.    

    The Kyoto Protocol calls for a mandatory 30% reduction in CO2 emissions in all industrialized nations.  Currently, man made CO2 emissions total 3.5%.   Even the most optimistic predictions forecast a miniscule 1/20th of a degree in warming by 2050.  This is touted as real progress??? 

    “Water Vapor”, classified as a “GreenHouse Gas”, is the most significant of all GHGs; it contributes from 60 to 95% of the entire “GreenHouse Effect” and is the most abundant gas in earth’s atmosphere.  The fact that 99.999% of all water vapor is naturally occurring is far too often overlooked.

    A good third of the globe’s oceans lie in the tropics; this is where a significant majority of the water vapor that ends up in the atmosphere is generated.  Lesser amounts do enter the equation with even solid ice releasing water vapor through a process known as sublimation. In other words, the entire planet contributes to atmospheric water content.

    Saline waters make up some 96% of all water on the planet.  Fresh water breaks down thus:  68% is locked up in ice and glaciers, 30% in ground water and just 2% for the rest of all water usage.  Of this 70% is used in irrigation, 20% in industrial applications with a scant 10% for human consumption.

    It takes approximately 2.5 gallons of water to produce 1 gallon of biofuel.  Again, this is touted as real progress in the overall effort to control man made GHGs.  With this kind of wasteful allocation of water, is there no honesty to be found in the Liberal/Progressive argument?  NO, but that sure isn’t going to deter the likes of Herr Gore from pushing this convoluted agenda or their insisting we make sacrifices to bolster this flawed theory.

    Water, that most critical ingredient to life on this planet, is under attack by a Liberal/Progressive agenda that seeks to control not only the waters of this nation, but our very freedom as well.   Is water the culprit here, or is it the proponents of a system that seeks control of all we see, hear and do???

     After all my remonstrations about things not holding water, I must eat my words and tell you, our atmosphere, among other things, DOES hold water!!!

    Walt Mow 

  • Climate Change III…

    Climate Change III…

    Not Quite More of the Same…

    Opinion poll taken by the Daily Caller, September 30, 2015:  Is Climate Change a hoax?         94% responded yes; 4% no; 3% not sure.

    Hotly debated by both sides, with claims of deception and downright falsehoods by both parties, is there no consensus to be had?  Unfortunately, No … and this is the most deceptive part of the entire debate.  If anyone dares disagree with the scientific community that supports the theory that Climate Change is the result of man’s actions they are deemed “Deniers”.  

    Contradictory evidence is ignored, rejected as outside the discussion or denied a fair hearing.  Is this the way to conduct serious scientific discussion?”… Again NO!

    ”To acquire wealth is difficult, to preserve it more difficult, but to spend it wisely is the most difficult of all”, English editor and literature, Edward Parsons Day.  

    Even after spending billions to validate their claims, no negligible effect has been noticed in the distribution of GHGs, nor can they point to a decline in these gases.  To justify spending with no negligible results is dishonest and only leads to more distrust of those individuals that claim Climate Change as being detrimental to mankind.                             Note: The Wuflu being a worldwide epidemic may be responsible for a small reduction in GHGs.

    Has Climate Change has become the new religion of the left?  Webster’s dictionary defines “Idolatry” as the “Excessive love or veneration for anything”.  Are they so wedded to this mantra that differing opinions are rejected out of hand?  The intransigence they display speaks volumes about their inability to accept differing opinions.

    Herr Gore’s prediction that the Arctic would be ice free by 2013 did not happen.  To justify the statement the goalposts have been advanced to the 2030s.  How disingenuous is this?  An article in the Daily Mail puts the warming over the past 150 years at 0.8 degrees Centigrade.  

    The U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Healy in the ice Wednesday, Oct. 3, 2018, about 715 miles north of Utqiaġvik, Alaska, in the Arctic.  USCG photo.

    To put this in perspective, in 2015 a US Coast Guard icebreaker was unable to open a channel in the Canadian arctic to allow a number of yachts to complete a journey through the “NorthWest Passage”.  The Coast Guard’s inability to break through was due to thick ice conditions.   This past summer a Norwegian Icebreaker was unable to complete a journey to the North Pole due to extremely thick ice.

    To be clear, the thickness of ice has much more to do with the ability of ice breakers to open sea lanes than the extent of ice coverage. 

    The earth has experienced many changes.  To wit; tropical plant fossils found on Ellesmere Island in the Canadian arctic and glacial deposits within 10 degrees of the equator.  Is this definitive proof of global changes?   To be honest, NO!!  Is the disparity due to plate tectonics?  Possibly, this is one explanation for the dispersal of tropical vegetation in the arctic and glacial deposits near the equator. 

    Global Warming is at one end of the scale, while Snow Ball Earth is the other end.  We keep hearing what we must do to prevent Global warming but they are mute on the subject of Snow Ball Earth.  Is it more plausible that a warming earth is coming than the theory that another ice age is coming?  The trigger mechanisms for a cooling earth are many.  Among them are: a super volcano eruption, a possibility; a real reduction in GHGs, not very likely; less solar output, again, possible and finally, perturbations of the earth’s orbit, which has happened in earth’s history.  Unfortunately, the mantra is always towards warming when cooling is just as plausible.

    Records, those damnable things that dispute so much of the narrative are shunted aside with little recognition of their validity.  1936 was to see 14 record highs ranging from a low of 109 degrees in Cumberland and Frederick, Maryland, to a high of 121degrees in Steele N.D. and Alton, Kansas.  Not only did this heat wave linger for some time, (with record high temps beginning July 5 and ending August 10) but it was to spread from the high plains to the Gulf States and eastward to the upper reaches of the Chesapeake.

    Death Valley, Cal. holds the record for the highest temperature with 134 degrees set in 1913.  The year 1994 was to post a series of 4 records in late June ranging from 128 degrees in Lake Havasu, Arizona to 120 degrees in Oklahoma.  The current heat wave in late June is but another weather anomaly that the left wants to accord to manmade Climate Change.

    Abnormally high temperatures are no more reliable than record lows when the overall temperature scale is used as a guide to determining whether we are experiencing a warming or cooling trend.

    “It is inaccurate to say I hate everything.   I am strongly in favor of common sense, common honesty, and common decency”.   H. L. Mencken  

    Honest and open debate would do much to foster an understanding between the differing points of view, but it is not possible without these ingredients.       

    Walt Mow

  • Climate Change II… A Debatable Issue?

    Climate Change II… A Debatable Issue?

    Well, not really…

    Editors note: This piece is the second in a series of articles on climate change by our old codger in the canyon Walt Mow.

    Climate Change is not the debate, but whether man is exacerbating an increase in GreenHouse Gases (GHGs), thereby speeding Climate Change.  Conflicting reports and studies do nothing to make the issue either understandable for the layperson, nor does it convey a sense of consensus.  

    The statement that consensus has been reached and the “Science is Settled” does not correctly convey the reality as there are numerous scientists and weather specialists who disagree.

    “Those who speak of the incompatibility of science and religion either make science say that which it never said or make religion say that which it never taught.”  

    Pope Pius XI

    I think it appropriate that we examine the statement closely.  The term “Settled Science” is obviously an oxymoron as science is an ongoing endeavor where dissent is an essential part of the overall scientific conversation.

    “Settled” for instance:  according to Webster’s;  Settle, Settled, Settling, as a “transitive verb” has 13 variations of usage; as an “intransitive verb”, there are 8 additional variations of usage.  Yes, I am aware that some of the variations may be eliminated, but confusion arises as to which ones when it comes to correctly stating the issue?  

    “Science”: according to Webster’s; Science, a noun, has 7 variations of usage; again of these variations, which most closely and correctly define the issue of so-called “Climate Change”.

    Putting aside the obvious disparity of consensus with regards wordage, and to help put this issue into context the layperson can understand, we need only consult history where we will find numerous exhibits of unusual variations in the weather.  For instance, during the 14th Century there was a general cool-down of the northern hemisphere that was to decimate the Viking colonization of Greenland; in the 17th century cereal grains in Europe failed during what is called “The Little Ice Age”; coming to more recent history we find the destructive drought east of the Rocky Mountains in 1964 & 1965; the drought in France in 1976.

    Reconstruction of Viking dwellings near Qassiarsuk in southern Greenland 

    History also gives us numerous examples of “Settled Science” being rejected, only to be supplanted by new scientific evidence that replaced the original doctrine. One prime example was to consume 40+ years before the scientific community accepted the findings of Dr. J. Harlen Bretz as he explained the “Spokane Floods”, a series of catastrophic floods during the Pleistocene epoch.

    “Science is simply common sense at its best – that is, rigidly accurate in observation, and merciless to fallacy in logic.” 

    Thomas H. Huxley

    I was able to converse with a group of Marshall Islanders that were relocated from their island homeland.  They confirmed that rising sea levels had forced relocation on them, but we must remember that sea levels are constantly changing.  Factor in the geologic history of these islands; a series of hot spots similar to those that feed the Hawaiian volcanoes formed the original islands 70 million years ago.  The hot spots went extinct 40 million years ago and the disintegration began as they sank into the sea under their own weight.  Subsidence of the land may well be an ongoing event in geologic time, just as we have recently seen in the far western end of the Hawaiian chain.

    During the Pleistocene epoch sea levels fluctuated from 300 feet below today’s levels to 150 feet above today’s levels.  Just as the Cordilleran Ice Sheet advanced and retreated alternately leaving large areas above sea level and flooding at the other end of the scale aiding the natural erosion of Islands and sea shores alike.

    We are an adaptable species, but we do not accept change readily.  Those who challenge or otherwise disagree with the statement of “Settled Science” are called “Deniers” when in truth they simply are asking to be heard as they have a different point of view.  I do not call these people “Deniers” but rather “Doubters” as they see data that draws them to a different conclusion.                                                                                                                                             

    “Great is the power of steady misrepresentation; the history of science shows that fortunately this power does not long endure.”                                                                             

    Charles Darwin

    The men quoted in this piece did not accept the notion that science is an unassailable thing, but rather that as knowledge changed, so did their perspective, and that is it should be; but these same men would be labeled “Deniers” based on the standards of today.  I take umbrage at the term “Denier” but readily accept the title of “Doubter” as it is most descriptive of how I view the issue of “Climate Change”.

    To be clear, I do not challenge the fact that the climate is changing, only the conclusion that man is destroying the planet.  How do they explain the surge in the growth of ice in the Arctic?  Simple, overlook the data.  When you look at the conflicting opinions and data that does not support their hypothesis of manmade GHGs as the source of “Climate Change” or “Global Warming”, it (pardon the pun) “Does Not Hold Water”.

    Author’s Note:  Although the major part of this series was written six years ago, much of the argument for man’s contribution to GreenHouse Gases has remained the same.  We have seen a change of administrations that has done much to correct the bizarre and sometimes despotic rules that were such a large part of the previous administration.  Now we are under another administration that fully supports the myth that man made pollution is causing and driving Climate Change.

    Walt Mow   Fall 2015

  • Climate Change: Reality or Hoax

    Climate Change: Reality or Hoax

    Hurricanes ravage the Atlantic and Gulf coasts, tornadoes sweep across the plains leaving death and destruction, drought conditions revive worries of a return of the “Dust Bowl”.  A depleted Ogallala aquifer only adds to the worry; add in the marginal lands that have been turned to corn production to satisfy an EPA ethanol requirement and the possibility is raised exponentially.  While the southwest suffers yet another severe drought and outbreaks of Arctic cold dip to the shores of the Gulf of Mexico.  

    “Lurid Headlines” do not begin to tell the story of climate and the cyclical nature of weather events and trends.  Nor do they reflect the realities of scientific studies that do not agree with the claims of dire consequences that will occur unless man desists in creating the so-called “Greenhouse Gases”.

     “Skeptical, I am.”  This sums up my stand on the subject, my reasons for skepticism are many.  Based on my own powers of observation and looking at historical weather events, what I see is simply the planet going through normal climatic cycles.  I certainly do not deny that weather can be wild; a Colorado squall that contained “Thunder Snow” with the lightning strikes less than a ¼ mile away, suffice it to say I have a healthy respect for Mother Nature.

     What makes me so sure? Consider this; accounts of the winters Washington’s Army spent at Morristown, NJ and Valley Forge PA were just as brutal as the storms that have swept these same areas today.  Going further back in history, the Anasazi abandoned their pueblos and cliff dwellings around 1200 AD due to a severe drought, just as the Southwestern US is suffering today.  

    Anazazi ruins

    The one biggest contributor to the Earth’s weather is the Sun.  More sunshine, more warmth, less sunshine, less warmth; yes, I know, it’s a little more complicated than that. BUT, and it is a BIGGIE, the sun has more to do with Earth’s weather than man and his actions. 

    A decreasing number of sunspots have some scientists comparing this to the Maunder Minimum, clearly one of the contributors to the “Little Ice Age”.  Volcanic activity is often considered to be a major contributor and the rise in volcanic activity around the Pacific‘s “Ring of Fire” may force the scientific community to address the fact that the triggers for an “Ice Age” may be fast approaching “critical mass”???

    Tree ring studies (dendrochronology) of Bristlecone Pine, some of the oldest living organisms in North America, bear out the cyclical dry to wet cycles with some regularity.  With living BCP’s as old as 5,000+ years, and dead trees adding an additional 5,000 years of tree ring history to verify the ebb and flow of climatic cycles, the hypothesis that man made pollution is driving climate change, excuse the pun, ” just does not hold water“.

    Bristlecone pine

    Weather patterns are changing, of that there can be little doubt, but do these changes rise to a level needful of catastrophic adjustment by humankind?  I think not, how about you??