Politicians who favor policies to fight global warming that will impose big costs on consumers might take a lesson from what’s happening in Canada. The Trudeau government imposed a new carbon tax on its citizens effective April 1, 2019. (Yes, indeed, April Fool’s Day!) But it faces legal challenges in the provinces of Ontario, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, and New Brunswick, none of which has its own carbon tax, which is why the federal tax went into effect in them. Even provinces like Alberta, … [Read more...]
Can Government Agencies Protect Us from Lying Scientists and Sycophantic Media?
Newspapers, politicians and pressure groups have been moving smoothly for decades from one forecast apocalypse to another (nuclear power, acid rain, the ozone layer, mad cow disease, nanotechnology, genetically modified crops, the millennium bug…) without waiting to be proved right or wrong. So wrote Matt Ridley at the start of "Lying with science: a guide to myth debunking," in The Spectator back in March. Well, not quite the start. He actually began with a famous quote from H.L. … [Read more...]
Beyond Partisan Ideology and Big-Oil Interests: Why Climate Skepticism Thrives
It is easy to associate climate skepticism with the Republican Party and climate alarmism with the Democratic Party. It’s also easy to brand skeptics as beneficiaries of big oil and proponents of unfettered capitalism and alarmists as in the pocket of big wind and solar and boosters of socialist central planning. But attitudes about climate change transcend political ideologies, and they should. Here are a few reasons why I, as a climate scientist, am a skeptic. 1. Will the Real Climate … [Read more...]
Wind and Solar Energy—Never Meant to Work?
What would you think if someone told you that one of the most important early champions of wind power touted it precisely because he thought it couldn't work for advanced, industrialized societies? "Aww, can't be true"? Well, it can be, and it is. In "The Question Concerning Technology" (1954), Martin Heidegger---one of the twentieth century's most influential philosophers, argued that "modern technology ... puts to nature the unreasonable demand that it supply energy which can be … [Read more...]
How the Wind Industry Gains by Losing
So you want to make a profit by selling what you produce. What do you do? Sell it for more than it costs you. But that's so old fashioned! Nowadays, you just get into the wind industry. You find state or local policymakers eager to virtue signal by supporting your renewable-, zero-carbon energy tech. And you get them to sign a contract that guarantees you get positive payment for your product even when its market price is negative. Rate- and taxpayers in Georgetown, TX, a small town … [Read more...]
Does CO2 Control Temperature, or Vice Versa?
A Cornwall Alliance follower on Facebook wrote, I remember hearing someone reputable say once that the known historical record actually shows increases in CO2 after periods of warming, rather than before them. I believe might have been referencing ice core records among others. I found him persuasive, and if this is true, it seems it would be an important hurdle for climate change alarmists to get over. Agree/disagree, insight? Climatologist Dr. David Legates, a Cornwall Alliance Senior … [Read more...]
If Global Warming Won’t Kill Us, Will Ocean Acidification?
As the stretch of years with no statistically significant global warming lengthens, environmentalists scratch their heads and ask, "Well, if we can't scare people with global warming, what can we use?" And one of their stock answers has become, "Ocean acidification!" Acid, you know? Nasty stuff! That's what very bad people throw in the faces of good people they don't like. It disfigures them for life. How terrible! Except, no. Really strong acids can do that. Battery acid, for instance. … [Read more...]
Pennsylvania Climate Action Plan – Crippling costs for no benefit
On April 29, 2019, Pennsylvania Governor Tom Wolf released the latest version of the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection’s (DEP) Climate Action Plan, announcing that Pennsylvania would join the U.S. Climate Alliance, a coalition of 24 states committed to implementing policies that support the Paris Agreement — an international collaboration from which the U.S. has withdrawn. According to the governor, “states like Pennsylvania must take action to reduce greenhouse gas … [Read more...]
Who Really Cares about the Environment?
A dozen years ago Arthur Brooks, now President of the American Enterprise Institute, shook the "Look at how much I care! I support government action for the poor!" crowd with his book Who Really Cares: America's Charity Divide--Who Gives, Who Doesn't, and Why It Matters. What he revealed, from painstaking statistical research, is that political liberals, who justify all kinds of government entitlement programs by saying that anyone who really cares about the poor should embrace them, give … [Read more...]
Why Does Global Warming Happen at the Poles though Few People Live There?
Some people wonder, "Why is global warming happening down/up there at the poles if it is because of man? There aren't too many of people living there to cause any problem." Good, common-sense question. But there’s actually a solid answer to it that suits both alarmists and skeptics about anthropogenic global warming. Local anthropogenic warming, usually called “urban heat island effect” (UHI), is the localized warming stemming from increased absorption of incoming solar energy by … [Read more...]
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