The West Intends Energy Suicide: Will It Succeed?

by T. Doshi, Oct 10, 2020 in Forbes


Suicide is viewed as a crime in many countries. In a court of law, it is a serious charge and the evidence needs to be conclusive for such an accusation to stand (e.g., did you actually see him attempt to jump off the bridge?). But when societies (or at least their leaders) attempt it, one can say that it safely falls under the rubric of the sovereign right to misrule. In the hallowed tradition of Western liberal democracy, so long as its political leaders are elected in free and fair elections, misrule leading to societal death by suicide is merely an unfortunate outcome of either gross negligence or culpable intention led by, say, an ideology of de-industrialization. Nevertheless, let us proceed with the case for the prosecution.

The Circumstantial Evidence Of Societal Suicide

The first piece of evidence is an astonishing article published last week in the Boston Review by a professor of anthropology in Rutgers University . The good professor opined that Zimbabwe and Puerto Rico “provide models for what we might call ‘pause-full’ electricity”. The West, he continues, has created a vast infrastructure for generating and consuming electricity 24/7, 365 days a year. Since this is based on “planet-destroying fossil fuels and nuclear power”, we need to emulate the aforementioned poor countries and save the climate by giving up the demand for the constant supply of electricity.

To be fair, the professor also noted that the Zimbabweans and Puerto Ricans did not choose to accept electricity rationing but were imposed upon by the gross negligence and corruption of their governments. The professor cannot be lightly dismissed, and the Boston Review shares its domicile with MIT and Harvard University, the temples of wisdom in modern Western civilization. And the Review has its share of kudos, at least for those of a particular persuasion: “When it comes to publishing fresh and generative ideas, Boston Review has no peer” says Robin D. G. Kelley, Professor of American History at the University of California, Los Angeles and Naomi Klein, activist and New York Times NYT-0.5% best-selling author, opines that “Boston Review is so good right now.”

Let us move on to our second piece of evidence, this time from the other side of the “climate emergency” aisle.  Professor Fritz Vahrenholt is a giant among environmental circles in Germany. (The country is well known as the world’s leading champion for all things environmental and for pushing Europe to “net zero emissions by 2050”.) Prof. Vahrenholt holds a doctorate in chemistry and started his professional career at the Federal Environmental Agency in Berlin (responsible for the chemical industry) before joining the Hessian Ministry of the Environment. From 1984 until 1990 he served as state secretary for environment, from 1991 till 1997 as minister for energy and environment in the state of Hamburg.

One day before the publication of the Boston Review article on October 5th, Prof Vahrenholt stated baldly in a German TV interview that climate science was “politicized”, “exaggerated”, and filled with “fantasy” and “fairy tales”. He pronounced that “The [Paris] Accord is already dead. Putin says it’s nonsense. […] The Americans are out. The Chinese don’t have to do anything. It’s all concentrated on a handful of European countries. The European Commission in massively on it. And I predict that they will reach the targets only if they destroy the European industries.” He lambasted Germany as a country “in denial when it comes to the broader global debate taking place on climate science”. He went on to characterize Europe’s recent push for even stricter emissions reduction targets to madness akin to Soviet central planning that is doomed to fail spectacularly.

Les chercheurs prenant le plus l’avion sont… les experts du climat

by Le Point, Oct 29,  2020


Selon une étude britannique, les climatologues voyagent en moyenne davantage en avion que les scientifiques spécialisés dans d’autres domaines.

Les arroseurs arrosés. Les climatologues alertent régulièrement et, à raison, sur les effets sur le climat des déplacements en avion, fortement émetteurs de gaz à effet de serre. Mais une étude publiée en ce mois d’octobre dans la revue Global Environmental Change vient mettre le doigt sur certains de leurs comportements. Selon cette étude britannique coordonnée par l’université de Cardiff, et relayée par Nature et Courrier International, les experts en réchauffement climatique sont les scientifiques qui voyagent le plus souvent en avion, en comparaison avec leurs collègues d’autres disciplines. Au total, plus de 1 400 chercheurs, provenant de 59 pays différents et de domaines scientifiques divers, ont été interrogés.

En moyenne, les experts du climat, qui représentaient environ 17 % des personnes sollicitées, prennent l’avion à raison de cinq fois par an. En comparaison, les chercheurs spécialisés dans d’autres disciplines disent effectuer quatre trajets par an en avion. Les vols effectués par les climatologues sont davantage domestiques qu’internationaux. Toutefois, ils avancent souvent des raisons professionnelles pour ces trajets, ce qui n’est pas forcément le cas de leurs autres collègues scientifiques. Les professeurs spécialisés dans le dérèglement climatique voyagent en avion environ neuf fois par an en moyenne, contre huit fois pour leurs collègues d’autres spécialités.

“Where’s the sea ice?” Right where it’s been for most of the Holocene.

by D. Middleton, Oct 30, 2020 in WUWT


This is sort of a sequel yesterday’s post: Where’s the sea ice? 3 reasons the Arctic freeze is unseasonably late and why it matters.

What a difference a day can make! Looks like it’s starting to crust over:

Figure 0. Daily sea ice extent map, October 29, 2020. (NSIDC)

Two key takeaways:

  1. Maximum Holocene sea ice extent occurred within the past 500-1,000 years at every location.
  2. The current sea ice extent is higher at all of the locations than over 50% to 85% of the Holocene.

While this doesn’t tell us what the sea ice extent was in million km2, it does tell us that the modern sea ice extent is larger than it was over most of the Holocene Epoch. It also tells us that the areas of currently seasonal sea ice extent have been seasonal or reduced over most of the past 5,000 years and ice-free or nearly ice-free over the prior 3,000 years or so. Here’s is the Kinnard graph plotted at the same horizontal scale as the Stein cross section: