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| A delegate is seen at the G20 environmental and climate sustainability ministers’ meeting in Chennai on July 28, where ministers failed to agree on targets to reduce emissions and accelerate the energy transition |
It’s an endless task dealing with misinformation from the climate alarmist side!
Now, I say that with tongue firmly in cheek. It’s “their side” that’s moaning about “misinformation” on the side of the “climate deniers”, the “climate delayers”, the “climate deflectors” or whatever the smear phrase du jour.
Being a “free speech absolutist”, I’m for ditching this horrid new word “misinformation” and its sinister sister “disinformation”. Be done. Be gone. As Mao said: "Let a thousand flower bloom. Let a thousand schools of thought contend”. May the best ideas, the truth, win.
But, that’s not the way of today’s Left. Which is obsessed with winkling out misinformation. An “epidemic” it is, according to the WHO chief.
So let me do a job on them, the “other side”, the climate alarmists. Via the article above, from the deliciously-named Vibhuit Garg of the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA). And yes, it does exist, and it does have a staff and much funding. All of which is focussed on the Climate Change agenda, on getting rid of fossil fuels and replacing them with renewables. They’re firmly against nuclear, which has always struck me as an odd stance for those claiming to be so concerned about the climate. After all: nuclear supporters also support renewables. But renewable supporters don’t support nuclear. Weird.
ADDED: I should classify this anti-nuclear-stance itself as “misinformation”, since the science does not support it. There are 440 nuclear stations around the world, active for over 70 years, with exemplary safety records (even allowing for Chernobyl and Fukushima), producing 10% of the world’s electricity and another dozen countries are planning 50+ new nuclear power projects. Does the IEEFA know something all them don’t? I don’t think so.
Anyway, to the article:
Para 1:
After a summer of unprecedented heatwaves, intensified by climate change, Group of 20 leaders are set to meet this weekend for the G20 summit in New Delhi, India. UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres has warned that time is running out as the world inches closer to meltdown, and called on all countries to accelerate action to cut emissions.
Misinformation:
- “... intensified by climate change”. Maybe, maybe not. According to IPCC and UK Met office projections. More likely is that they happen more often; not necessarily more intense. According to those IPCC and Met Office folks anyways.
- Antonio Guterres: his “warning” is irresponsible and called out by professor Jim Skea, the new head of the IPCC:
- "Apocalyptic messaging ‘paralyses’ the public and stops them from getting a grip on crisis”.
- “... the world inches closer to meltdown...”: No, it’s not. Not according to the IPCC, see here. Rising temps, yes. “Meltdown", no. If you go through scenarios for 2100, almost all have Greenland and Antarctica growing in size!
But while the G20 is responsible for around 80 per cent of global carbon emissions, and was founded to enable the necessary coordination to prevent world crises, leaders are not expected to deliver any substantive progress on emissions reductions at the summit.
Misinformation:
“... world crises...”
What crises? Where’s the evidence? For the last one hundred years, things have only got better in terms of the deaths and damage from climate related events. There is nothing in any of the IPCC scenarios (which to many scientists are themselves too much on the alarmist side) which suggests anything that should mean any kind of crisis. Yes, we will have floods, droughts, landslides and heatwaves. And perhaps even more than before. But there is nothing -- nothing given as evidence -- to suggest we will have a harder time dealing with the forthcoming climate change.
Para 3:
Fast-growing G20 heavyweights, including China, India and Indonesia, have argued that the cost of aggressively cutting emissions is simply too high and stiff targets would hamper economic development. But these arguments are getting weaker. The cost of onshore wind and solar power has fallen below the cost of coal power, with offshore wind on a par with coal, according to BloombergNEF analysis.
Not Misinformation:
“...the cost of aggressively cutting emissions is simply too high...”.
Correct! China, India and Indonesia have argued correctly. Countries like Germany that have moved fast and aggressively have found that out. Australia is in the process of finding out.
Misinformation:
"But these arguments are getting weaker..." et. seq.
We’ve been hearing for decades about how renewables are getting cheaper. And indeed they have. In terms of the base cost of the Wind turbines and the cost of solar arrays. By now they ought be so cheap that there’s no need for any subsidy to support them. Economics should take over. But they aren’t overall cheaper for reasons that have to do with their intermittency, the need for batteries or other storage (Snowy 2.0 anyone?); the need for back-up from non-renewable baseload power like gas or nuclear; and the need for completely new transmissions lines to bring wind and solar to market.
If onshore wind and solar were really cheaper -- on a Levelised Cost of Electricity basis, which takes the whole building and operation cycle into account -- then there would be no need for articles like the one by Vibhuit Garg, no need for G20 climate meetings, no need for Paris Accords, no need for yet more COPs. The market would take care of it.
I could go on with critiques, but I won’t. I risk damaging the top of the table from hitting the nail too hard. The main point is that there’s misinformation on the side of the Climate Alarmism, which "our side" will call out. The difference is that we’re willing to talk and debate. While the Alarmist side wants only to shut us down, via weaponised “misinformation” hunting, the modern version of communist hunting. And they do so via throttling the cash flow of companies, like X, who don’t hew completely to their view. That’s dangerous and unfair, but also viciously effective.
