MemHT Portal • 30 NOV 2011

David Whitehouse | GWGF

Once again, for political reasons, the Met Office is “jumping the gun” and drawing conclusions about the global annual temperature of 2011 before all the data has come in. It is also erroneously saying that even with a globally cooling La Nina event 2011 is a record year.
 
Reported in the Times today (paywall) and in the Guardian are a series of statements prepared by the UK Met Office that are a masterclass of spin in the use of statistics. The Met Office Press release is here.

The Times: World temperatures still rising (as spring daffodils flower in November). Hannah Devlin, Science Correspondent:

Temperatures across the world are continuing to rise as predicted by climate change scientists, according to the latest global figures released by the Met Office.

The figures, timed to coincide with the UN climate conference in South Africa, show that this year is likely to be the eleventh warmest on record. The average global temperature for the first ten months of 2011 was 14.36C (57.85F), 0.36C above the long-term average.

Although cooler than last year, scientists said this is explained by a weather phenomenon called La Niña, which causes a temporary cooling of the global climate.

When 2011 is compared with previous La Niña years, it ranks as the warmest since records began in 1850. Peter Stott, from the Met Office, said: “This year we have seen a very persistent and strong La Niña, which brings cooler water to the surface of the Pacific Ocean. This has a global impact on weather and temperatures, and is one of the key reasons why this year does not figure as highly as 2010 in the rankings.”

He added that the Met Office stood by a previous prediction that half the years in this decade would be warmer globally than 1998, the warmest year to date.

Phil Jones, director of the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia, which worked with the Met Office on the figures, said that the records provided “overwhelming” evidence that the climate has warmed, but that  not every year would be warmer than the last.
 
There is a great deal of misrepresentation in this article. Somehow its twisted logic concludes that even as 2011 turns out to be a rather cool year, as it admits probably the 11th warmest on record taking us back to the temperatures in the 1990’s before the recent warmest decade on record, somehow the world’s temperature continues to rise as expected.

Read entire article
]]> • 28 NOV 2011

Taxpayers will have to pay billions of pounds a year equipping council houses, town halls, hospitals and other public buildings with the latest green technology, under new proposals by the European Commission.

By Robert Watts | The Telegraph

Local authorities and other public bodies, already struggling with spending cuts, will be obliged to fit schools, swimming pools and libraries, with state-of-the-art insulation, boilers, generators and windows.
 
Councils say the plan as it affects them alone would cost taxpayers up to £50bn.
 
The draft Energy Efficiency Directive states public bodies should "lead by example" and "purchase only products, services and buildings with high energy efficiency performance".
 
Public bodies will also be obliged to refurbish 3% of their properties to the high energy-efficient specification each year, under the plans.
 
Local authorities say the proposals – set to take effect in just over two years – may force them to make even deeper cuts to core services, such as rubbish collection and care for the elderly. It is understood ministers also strongly oppose the directive.
 
Read entire article
]]> • 28 NOV 2011

By Martyn Brown | Daily Express

FRESH outrage erupted yesterday over the cost of details of the aid package overseas aid after it emerged that Britain is to stump up £1billion to help African countries fight climate change.
Energy Secretary Chris Huhne will spearhead the megadeal that will see taxpayers shelling out for projects to help farmers insure their crops against flooding and drought.

Other schemes include installing solar power in villages and building slurry pits that can produce gas to power generators.

The move will infuriate millions of hard-pressed taxpayers trying to make ends meet. South Africa, the most economically advanced in the continent, is one of the continent, it is one of the countries to receive the handout.

Last year, its economy grew by 2.8 per cent while Britain's grew by just 1.8 per cent.

Ukip MEP Godfrey Bloom said: It is inconceivable that the Government feels able to spend money on climate change in Africa when its austerity measures at home are causing such pain. If we have the money then we should spend it here.” Mr Huhne is expected to announce details of the aid package ahead of talks at a United Nations summit on climate change in Durban, South Africa, which starts this week.

Read entire article ]]> • 28 NOV 2011

BBC sought advice from global warming scientists on economy, drama, music... and even game shows

By David Rose | Mail Online

Britain’s leading green activist research centre spent £15,000 on seminars for top BBC executives  in an apparent bid to block climate change sceptics from the airwaves, a vast new cache of leaked ‘Climategate’ emails has revealed.

The emails – part of a trove of more than 5,200 messages that appear to have been stolen from computers at the University of East Anglia – shed light for the first time on an incestuous web of interlocking relationships between BBC journalists and the university’s scientists, which goes back more than a decade.

They show that University staff vetted BBC scripts, used their contacts at the Corporation to stop sceptics being interviewed and were consulted about how the broadcaster should alter its programme output.

Like the first ‘Climategate’ leaks two years ago, they were placed last week on a Russian server by an anonymous source.

Again like their predecessors, they have emerged just before a United Nations climate summit, which is to start this week in Durban.

Read entire article ]]> • 28 NOV 2011

Channel Four



The film, made by British television producer Martin Durkin, presents scientists, economists, politicians, writers, and others who dispute the scientific consensus regarding anthropogenic global warming.

The film's basic premise is that the current scientific opinion on the anthropogenic causes of global warming has numerous scientific flaws, and that vested monetary interests in the scientific establishment and the media discourage the public and the scientific community from acknowledging or even debating this. The film asserts that the publicised scientific consensus is the product of a "global warming activist industry" driven by a desire for research funding. Other culprits, according to the film, are Western environmentalists promoting expensive solar and wind power over cheap fossil fuels in Africa, resulting in African countries being held back from industrialising.

The film won best documentary at the 2007 Io Isabella International Film Week.

A number of academics, environmentalists, think-tank consultants and writers are interviewed in the film in support of its various assertions. They include the Canadian environmentalist Patrick Moore, former member of Greenpeace but for the past 21 years a critic of the organisation; Richard Lindzen, professor of meteorology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology; Patrick Michaels, Research Professor of Environmental Sciences at the University of Virginia; Nigel Calder, editor of New Scientist from 1962 to 1966; John Christy, professor and director of the Earth System Science Center at University of Alabama; Paul Reiter of the Pasteur Institute; former British Chancellor of the Exchequer Nigel Lawson; and Piers Corbyn, a British weather forecaster.

Carl Wunsch, professor of oceanography at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, was also interviewed but has since said that he strongly disagrees with the film's conclusions and the way his interview material was used.

Youtube.com ]]> • 25 NOV 2011

• Chris Huhne makes comments during Commons statement
• Claim based on assumption home energy use drops by a third

By Sean Poulter | Mail Online

Families will pay £280 a year in ‘green taxes’ by 2020 to fund the shift to wind, solar and nuclear power, ministers  admitted yesterday.

The huge cost faced by ordinary people will pay for the Government’s pledge to cut carbon emissions and be ‘the greenest ever’.

Households currently pay £89 a year on their bills for the green energy drive, but this will increase every year to reach £280 by 2020, according to the Government’s Department for Energy and Climate Change (DECC).

The ‘taxes’ will provide almost £8billion a year towards the £200billion cost of vast wind farms, nuclear power stations, a new pylon network, and to put up solar panels.

But in a bizarre statement, energy and climate change secretary Chris Huhne told the House of Commons that his policies mean  consumers will actually be better off.

He said: ‘By 2020, we expect household bills to be 7 per cent – or £94 – lower than they would otherwise be without our policies.

‘Britain’s homes will be cheaper to heat and light than if we did nothing.’

Read entire article ]]> • 25 NOV 2011

Market Watch

MUNICH, Nov. 25, 2011 /PRNewswire via COMTEX/ -- CFACT will cosponsor an international climate conference in Munich on Friday and Saturday, November 25th and 26th at Munich's Hotel Maritim. The conference is also cosponsored by EIKE, the European Institute for Climate and Energy, the Berlin Manhattan Institute and others.

CFACT has joined in presenting a number of conferences in Europe and CFACT Europe Executive Director Dr. Holger Thuss reports that this conference will be the largest and most successful yet. The conference will feature numerous scientists including Dr. Horst-Joachim Ludecke, Dr. Gernot Patzelt, Dipl. Meteorologe Klaus-Eckart Puls, Dr. Henrik Svensmark and others. Dr. Svensmark will comment on his research on the role of solar radiation in cloud formation which was the subject of recent research by CERN the European Organization for Nuclear Research and home of the Hardon super collider.

The Munich conference comes on the very eve of COP17 the UN conference on climate change in Durban, South Africa.

Following Munich, CFACT will send a spirited delegation to Durban which will feature Lord Christopher Monckton, Dr. Kelvin Kemm, Dr. Leon Louwe, CFACT Executive Director Craig Rucker and staff.

Lord Monckton and Marc Morano both make extremely articulate, informed and interesting guests on television and radio and offer valuable balance for print and online journalism. Kelvin Kemm and Leon Louw will offer unique South African perspectives. Craig Rucker co-founded CFACT well over two decades ago and offers a wealth of public policy experience.

Global warming science and policy is anything but settled. CFACT looks forward to engaging in a balanced, civil, informed and genuine dialogue in Munich and in Durban.

Read entire article

See also:
Senator James Inhofe to Join CFACT's Mission to Debunk Climate Propaganda and Provide Balanced Perspective at UN's COP17 in Durban, South Africa (Market Watch) ]]> • 23 NOV 2011

By JUSTIN GILLIS and LESLIE KAUFMAN | New York Times

The anonymous hacker who shook the world of climate science two years ago by posting a trove of stolen e-mails delivered a new batch on Tuesday, stirring up climate-change contrarians a little more than a week before global negotiations on greenhouse gases are to begin in Durban, South Africa.

The new e-mails appeared remarkably similar to the ones released two years ago just ahead of a similar conference in Copenhagen. They involved the same scientists and many of the same issues, and some of them carried a similar tone: catty remarks by the scientists, often about papers written by others in the field.

Climate scientists said the release was likely intended to torpedo any potential progress in the Durban negotiations, though not much progress had been expected anyway given that countries have been reluctant to commit to binding emissions limits.

Read entire article ]]> • 22 NOV 2011

UKIP
 
Several thousand new emails have come to light purporting to show that these involved in pushing the 'We are all going to die' line in politics of climate change have at a lot more questions to answer.

Godfrey Bloom MEP, The UKIIP Energy spokesman said: "The person (or persons) unknown who leaked thousands of emails between climate scientists in 2009, leading to the 'Climategate' scandal has struck again.
 
"Thousands more emails have now been released into the public domain, revealing more about the institutional corruption at the heart of this pseudo-scientific enterprise designed to relieve people of their cash.
 
"Nobody has had time to digest the full impact of these messages yet but what seems obvious at first blush is that those involved in Climategate and the institutional defence of rank climate change alarmism, fraud, and deceit are going to struggle to cover their a***s this time.

"None of this would have happened had there been an honest and transparent public debate about climate change. But right from the start of this sordid affair, vested interests and political ambitions hid themselves in the complex world of climate  science. People with enough sense to see through massive gaps in knowledge about the climate saw through the scam, and called it out as so much bullshit.

"We got called 'deniers'", said Bloom,
 
"But now the boot is on the other foot, and for the last two years, the alarmists have been fighting a rearguard action.
 
"Climate change scare stories no longer create moral high ground for politicians and their useful idiots in the environmental movement. What seems to have motivated the release of these emails is concern that the trillions of pounds that will be wasted on climate change policies the world over will take from the poor, increasing world poverty, death, and disease."

Read entire article
]]> • 18 NOV 2011

Ian Burrell, The Independent | The GWPF

The London-based television company being investigated by Ofcom over a global news fixing row tried to “cultivate” a world-famous environmental economist and other leading opinion formers in the green movement for the documentaries it made for the BBC and other news broadcasters.
 
FBC Media claims in its promotional literature that it targeted Professor Jeffrey Sachs, director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University in New York, to be an “ambassador” for its corporate client on programmes it made about the controversial palm oil industry in Malaysia.
 
Mr Sachs, a special adviser to United Nations secretary general Ban-Ki Moon, was a prominent interviewee on a BBC World “Third Eye” documentary about Malaysia which was produced by FBC. The Independent has established that FBC was paid £17m by the Malaysian government to work on a “global strategic communications campaign”. The documentary was one of eight FBC programmes made for the BBC found to have been in “serious” breach of corporation editorial guidelines in a report issued yesterday by the BBC Trust.
 
FBC also worked for Sime Darby, the world’s biggest palm oil producer, and in a report for the Malaysian company gives a series of “campaign highlights”, among which is the “cultivation of influential ‘ambassadors’ such as the Earth Institute’s Jeffrey Sachs”. It refers to Sime Darby “champions”, among whom Mr Sachs is listed.

In a statement, the Earth Institute said Professor Sachs was “surprised and dismayed to see this completely inaccurate and utterly absurd portrayal of him”. It said: “He is not an ambassador or anything else for this company (Sime Darby). He has absolutely no personal relationship with the company and has never, indeed would never, serve as an ‘ambassador’ or ‘champion’ to any corporation.”
 
The Institute said Sachs had been “mischaracterized” in a way that was “quite troubling”.

Read entire article
]]> • 14 NOV 2011

Ginni Thomas | Leaders, The Daily Caller

The left despises Lord Christopher Monckton.
 
A domestic and science policy adviser to then-British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s, Monckton has become the bane of the radical environmental movement. He articulately debunks the intellectual foundation of global warming theory for the layperson.
 
Though former Vice President Al Gore has so far ignored Monckton’s repeated challenges to debate the science behind climate change, Monckton’s arguments have spread far and wide. A video of a 2009 speech about environmental extremists in Minnesota, for instance, attracted more than 3.5 million views on the Internet in 30 days.
 
Both informative and entertaining, Monckton also has experience as a businessman, architect and public speaker. Last week, he sat down with The Daily Caller’s Ginni Thomas to discuss the dangers of the radical environmental agenda, the politicization of science by the left, what gives him hope and much more.
 
Watch video (in 9 parts)
]]> • 13 NOV 2011

Ginni Thomas | The Daily Caller

Lord Christopher Monckton, former adviser to Margaret Thatcher, has a challenge for former Vice President Al Gore: debate me.
 
Think the science of climate change is settled? Monckton is ready to go toe-to-toe with climate change’s leading voice.
 
“By the way, Al baby, if you’re watching, I’m still waiting for a proper reply to my challenge to you of 2007 that you and I should debate the issue on national television,” Monckton challenged in an interview with The Daily Caller’s Ginni Thomas.
 
Look for the full interview Monday morning at The Daily Caller.
 
Watch (1 min 21 sec)


]]> • 08 NOV 2011

EurActiv (EU must double energy grid funding, says study)

European Union nations must nearly double investment in power grid construction in the decade after 2020 if they are to get on the path to carbon-free electricity by mid-century, the European Climate Foundation (ECF) think-tank said yesterday (7 November).

The European Commission raised the goal of virtually emissions-free electricity in its 2050 road map towards a low-carbon economy, published earlier this year, as the means to achieve an 80%-95% cut in carbon emissions that scientists say is needed by then to stave off the worst effects of global warming.

"The European Union needs to establish a credible and adequate policy framework to ensure implementation of the current plans and to steer the decarbonisation of the power sector beyond 2020," says the ECF report.

To meet 2020 goals to cut carbon by 20% and increase the share of renewable energy to 20%, member states need to increase transmission lines by 14%, or 42,000 kilometers (26,097.6 miles), at a cost of €628 billion over this decade.

For the next 10 years, the cost climbs to €1.2 trillion, said the ECF's report – Power Perspectives 2030: On the Road to a Decarbonised Power Sector in Europe.

In what it labels an "on-track" scenario, based on the EU managing fully to implement its plans up to 2020 and projects in 2030 in line with targeted emissions cuts, it anticipates a power mix in 2030 made up of 50% renewable energy.

The rest would include 34% fossil fuels, plus a further 8% from carbon capture and storage, and 17% nuclear.

Perfecting the grid is crucial to optimising available renewable energy, which tends to be concentrated on the fringes of Europe.

Read entire article]]> • 07 NOV 2011

Report finds Britons more concerned with keeping warm than worrying about the environment

By Tom Bawden | The Independent (Hard-up UK puts climate change on back burner)

Britain's carbon emissions grew faster than the economy last year for the first time since 1996, as a cash-strapped population relegated the environment down its league of concerns and spent more money keeping warm, according to a new report.

The rise in Britain's so-called carbon intensity increases the danger that the country will miss legally binding targets on reducing emissions, warns PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), the consultancy behind the report.

Furthermore, it found that Britain's rising carbon intensity is part of a worldwide trend which threatens to push global warming above a two-degree Celsius increase on pre-industrial levels.

This is the temperature that the G8 group of leading economies has pledged not to breach in the hope of avoiding the worst consequences of climate change.

Leo Johnson, partner for sustainability and climate change at PwC, said: "Our analysis points unambiguously towards one conclusion, that we are at the limits of what is achievable in terms of carbon reduction.

"The G20 economies have moved from travelling too slowly in the right direction to travelling in the wrong direction. The results call into question the likelihood of global decarbonisation ever happening rapidly enough to limit global warming to 2 degrees Celsius," Mr Johnson added.

Read entire article
]]> • 04 NOV 2011

EurActiv

European Union plans to charge airlines for carbon emissions are "discriminatory" and violate global laws, a group of 26 countries including the United States and China, according to a joint declaration.

India, which hosted a two-day meeting in New Delhi this week, said delegates from the non-EU countries, which are also members of the U.N.'s International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) executive council, agreed to lodge a formal protest against the EU's new rules at the council's next meeting.

"There was wide concern expressed by all countries present, without exception, that the unilaterally imposed EU (emissions trading scheme) measures were inconsistent with the international legal regimes," the statement said.

"The legal infirmities in the EU laws were pointed out. It was stated by the various delegates that they were also discriminatory (to) carriers."

The EU says it needs to put a price on carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions to guard against future climate impacts such as crop failures, droughts or flooding.

It has launched an emissions trading scheme ETS.L to help it cut carbon dioxide emissions, which it has pledged to reduce by 20 percent below 1990 levels by 2020.

Read entire article
]]> • 04 NOV 2011

Michael Coren - Arena | Sun News Network (Canada)



Youtube.com
]]> • 04 NOV 2011

By Perry Chiaramonte | Fox News

A scathing new expose on the U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change  -- which sets the world's agenda when it comes to the current state of the climate -- claims that its reports have often been written by graduate students with little or no experience in their field of study and whose efforts normally might be barely enough to satisfy grad school requirements.
 
Grad students often co-author scientific papers to help with the laborious task of writing. Such papers are rarely the cornerstone for trillions of dollars worth of government climate funding, however -- nor do they win Nobel Peace prizes.
 
“We’ve been told for the past two decades that 'the Climate Bible' was written by the world’s foremost experts,” Canadian journalist Donna Laframboise told FoxNews.com. “But the fact is, you are just not qualified without a doctorate. In academia you aren't even on the radar at that point.”
 
The IPCC insists that the lead authors of individual sections of its climate report are indeed the pre-eminent experts in their field.
 
"These authors are nominated by governments and selected based on expertise,” a spokesman told FoxNews.com. “Author teams on IPCC chapters are a mix of individuals who have excelled in their fields of specialism."

Read entire article
]]> • 03 NOV 2011

EurActiv

Targets proposed in the EU’s draft energy efficiency directive are being contested by member states, with Britain and the Netherlands pushing for some provisions to be deleted entirely, EurActiv has learned.

One headline figure in the original directive – a mandatory 3% annual public buildings renovation rate – has been slated for deletion in the latest EU draft, seen by EurActiv.

One EU diplomat involved in the discussions told EurActiv that the amendment had been made because of “the current budgetary restraints of member states.”

“Because of these, there are many questions by member states about what the implication of this specific provision would be,” the diplomat said. “There are many different views in play on how this could be changed.”

Read entire article
]]> • 01 NOV 2011

By Julie Carpenter | Daily Express

IT'S one of the hottest feuds in science - climate chance zealots insist that we're still destroying the planet but now another scientist has warned the cast-iron evidence just isn't there.

FOR a minute there it seemed the global warming debate had finally been resolved.

While for years scientists and sceptics have raged against each other on the crucial topic, new research hailed “the most definitive study into temperature data gathered by weather stations over the past half-century” seemed to come to an authoritative conclusion.

Global warming IS real it said, strengthening the need for us all to reduce carbon emissions and boost efforts to try to save the planet.

And this research was headed by a physicist who had previously been a sceptic of global warming and an outspoken critic of the science underpinning it, lending the results even greater credibility.

Read entire article

See also:
The voice of the climate change critics (Daily Express)]]> • 01 NOV 2011

By Joe Bast | Somewaht Reasonable (Member of EU Parliament Gives ‘Climate Change Reconsidered’ a Favorable Review)

Heartland’s latest contribution to the global warming debate — Climate Change Reconsidered: 2011 Interim Report – has made an impression on Roger Helmer, a member of the European Parliament. He reviewed the book, which we reprint below:
 
Maybe it’s because of the huge success on the Amazon Best-Seller lists of popular books debunking climate hysteria that true believers insist that “there is no peer-reviewed science challenging the consensus on climate change”.  Maybe these claims are also based on prejudice, hubris and a good dash of financial interest and rent-seeking.
 
Of course they’re wrong even in their own terms.  Many of the popular best-sellers include copious and detailed references to peer-reviewed science.  Even “State of Fear”, the Michael Crichton novel based on the climate issue, while avowedly fiction, foot-noted a great deal of serious science.
 
And as the old proverb has it, people in glass houses should be very careful about throwing stones.  We’ve been told many times that the regular IPCC reports represent a clear consensus of the Scientific Community on the issue, and are based solely on peer-reviewed science.  If only.  As we’ve seen over the last couple of years, many of the more outlandish and alarmist claims in the IPCC reports have been based not on peer-reviewed science, but on “grey literature” — the propaganda sheets and press releases distributed by fanatical green NGOs (many of which are part-funded by the European Commission — but that’s another story).
 
But for those who prefer their science hard-core, not populist, hope is at hand.  Indeed it’s been at hand for some time, in the form of the NIPCC (Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change) Report.  First published in 2009, we now have the updated 2011 Interim Report, published by the Heartland Institute (whose conferences I have been privileged to attend).

Read entire article
]]> • 31 OCT 2011

The 'energy and climate change' secretary demonstrates his breathtaking unfitness once again.

By Christopher Booker | The Telegraph

Chris Huhne demonstrated again last week his breathtaking unfitness to run Britain’s “energy and climate change” policy. Addressing a conference of RenewableUK, the chief lobby group for the wind industry, he won a big hand for attacking “the climate sceptics and armchair engineers” (such as me) who continually point out the futility of his infatuation with windmills. Then he reeled off various factual errors, to confirm once more that he hasn’t a clue what he is talking about.

He said that electricity demand rises to “a high of 80 gigawatts every day”. But if he looks at the fifth chapter of his own department’s Digest of United Kingdom Energy Statistics, he will see that only very occasionally does demand scrape above 60GW. He also claimed that “10 per cent of our electricity capacity is renewable”. His ministry’s figures show that he exaggerated this by more than 60 per cent. Most tellingly, his use of that weasel word “capacity”, rather than “output”, hides the fact that last year the output of our 3,500 windmills put together averaged 1.16GW – less than is generated, unsubsidised, by a single large gas-fired power station, at only a fraction of the cost.
 
Read entire article
]]> • 18 OCT 2011

By John Ingham | Daily Express

THE EU’s green energy campaign could double household electricity bills by 2050, a report warned yesterday.

It predicted 20 years of rising electricity prices as Europe comes to rely on wind farms for up to half its electricity, compared to 5 per cent today.

The report from the European Commission says bills will rise by 50 per cent by 2030 and 100 per cent by 2050. This would take the average annual bill in Britain for electricity alone to £1,052, according to the uSwitch website.

The study examines how the EU can meet its target of cutting greenhouse gas emissions to 80-95 per cent of 1990 levels by 2050 and looks at efficiency, renewables, nuclear power and carbon storage.

Britain plans thousands of wind farms and increased penalties for energy-intensive firms which emit large volumes of greenhouse gases.But yesterday the head of Tata Steel’s European division, Karl-Ulrich Koehler, warned the Government that its green drive is threatening the firm’s plans to invest £1.2billion in Britain by 2016.

Read entire article

See also:
Energy firms to send 8 million letters telling how to find cheaper deals (Daily Express)]]> • 18 OCT 2011

By Maria Babbage | The Spec

Ontario residents could end up paying some of the highest costs for electricity in the developing world because providing wind and solar energy will cost about 40 per cent more than government estimates, according to a new study.
 
Ratepayers should expect their electricity bills to rise by 65 per cent by 2015 and 141 per cent by 2030 — substantially more than current government predictions of 46 per cent and 100 per cent, the study found.
 
The average residential user's annual bill, which currently stands at $1,700, will exceed $2,800 by 2015 and be over $4,100 by 2030, it predicts.
 
Certain costs weren't included in the government's estimates, such as inflation, transmitting electricity to the provincial grid from wind and solar facilities and backup generation for potential disruptions, the study found.
 
Those higher costs would erode the competitiveness of businesses in Ontario and pose challenges for low-income households, said University of Guelph professor and agricultural economist Glenn Fox, who co-authored the study with retired banker Parker Gallant.
 
Bills could climb even higher because the study didn't include other potential costs, such as possible cost overruns as the province refurbishes its nuclear fleet.
 
The study found a number of omitted costs of renewable energy that weren't included in Ontario's long-term energy plan, which was released last year by the governing Liberals.
 
The plan underestimates the capital costs of wind turbines, for example, and fails to attach any individual dollar values to specific transmission projects to put renewable energy projects on the provincial grid, the study said.
 
The plan also lowballs the costs of backing up renewable energy with natural gas-fired plants when the wind isn't blowing and the sun isn't shining, saying it will cost $1.8 billion when it will likely cost closer to $9.6 billion.
 
The study also found that the government's green energy policies are affecting the province's finances.
 
Due to the costs of connecting renewables to the provincial grid, Hydro One has reduced its dividend payments to the province, affecting the government's ability to reduce a provincial debt that currently stands at $230 billion.

Read entire article
]]> • 11 OCT 2011

By Mathew Carr and Catherine Airlie | Bloomberg

The U.K. is using a regulatory “trick” to introduce its carbon tax on fossil-fueled power generation, which would not have been allowed under European Union emissions trading law, said the U.K. unit of RWE AG.

Britain is using an exemption under the EU Energy Products Directive to proceed with its tax, which it named a carbon floor, John McElroy, director of policy at RWE Npower, said in an interview at the Platts emissions conference in Brussels.

“That’s the trick that they have used,” he said Oct. 6. “It’s not permitted under the EU emissions trading system.”

Chancellor George Osborne in March fixed a carbon tax of 4.94 pounds ($7.71) a metric ton from 2013 to raise revenue and prompt investment into power generation such as wind farms and nuclear. Wind turbines are subsidized and the coalition government has said no subsidy will be given to new nuclear power stations. The government indicated the tax, part of the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition agreement when they took office in May 2010, may rise to 9.86 pounds in 2015.

Read entire article

]]> • 11 OCT 2011

By Martin Banks | The Parliament Magazine

A parliamentary hearing was told that fraudsters are increasingly trying to cash in on the rising popularity of renewable energy.

The hearing on Tuesday heard that "environmental crime" is on the rise throughout Europe, particularly in Italy where it is already described as a "serious problem".

Antonio Pergolizzi, coordinator of an Italian environmental NGO, told MEPs that EU funding for the renewable energy industry was particularly at risk of abuse by such "gangs".

He said that over the next 10 years, Italy alone was expected to receive up to €10bn of public money, much of it from the EU, for the renewable and energy efficiency sector.

He warned, "Great care will have to be taken with this money. We need more auditing and more controls to ensure it does not fall into the hands of the Mafia."

Read entire article

]]> • 09 OCT 2011

EurActiv

Over 100 top scientists and economists have written to the European Commission calling for indirect land use change (ILUC) to be accounted for in EU biofuels policy making.

The letter, seen by EurActiv, argues that assigning biofuels a zero or "carbon neutral" emissions value – as the EU has done – “is clearly not supported by the [best available] science”.

Because of “flawed” accounting conventions, “the European Union's target for renewable energy in transport may fail to deliver genuine carbon savings in the real world,” the scientists argue.

“It could end up as merely an exercise on paper that promotes widespread deforestation and higher food prices.”

The letter’s signatories include: Daniel Kammen, the World Bank’s chief technical specialist for renewable energy; Kenneth Arrow, a Nobel Memorial Prize winner and Professor Emeritus at Stanford University; Thomas Lovejoy, chair of the Heinz Centre for Biodiversity, and several professors.

Since 2008, EU member states have been obliged to raise the share of biofuels in the energy mix to 10% by 2020.

Read entire article
]]> • 09 OCT 2011

By Tim Shipman | Mail Online

One of the more interesting developments of an otherwise dull party conference season was George Osborne's decision to announce a go slow on Britain's reduction of carbon emissions.

The plot thickened when David Cameron - who once hugged huskies in the quest to go green - made not one mention of the politics of climate change during his conference speech.

This has sent a warming glow through the ranks of the right. Both Tim Montgomerie at ConservativeHome and Fraser Nelson have latched on to the Osborne speech as a key moment.

To paraphrase Rachel Sylvester's excellent phrase, no one is asking you to vote blue to go green now that we are in the red.

So far the Liberal Democrats have kept quiet about this.

But I can reveal there is rumbling disquiet in the yellow ranks and private demands for crisis talks on what the heck the Chancellor was playing at.

Mr Osborne told the Tory conference that Britain will not put British firms at a disadvantage by cutting carbon emissions faster than other countries.

Senior Lib Dems accused Mr Osborne of peddling ‘red meat’ for his party faithful that risks contradicting government policy, since the Government has enshrined in law a pledge to cut carbon emissions by 30 per cent by 2020.

Read entire article]]> • 05 OCT 2011

By Valentina Pop | EUobserver

The European Commission on Tuesday (4 October) proposed that oil derived from tar sands be given a higher greenhouse-gas emission value, a move slammed as "unjustified" and "discriminatory" by Canada, the world's largest producer of this fossil fuel.

After more than a year of internal wrangling and amid strong lobbying from the oil industry and the Canadian government, the 27 EU commissioners agreed to qualify tar sands as a quarter more CO2 polluting than crude oil. The draft bill still needs approval of the EU legislature and member states and will require suppliers to reduce transport-fuel carbon emissions.

“With this measure, we are sending a clear signal to fossil-fuel suppliers. As fossil fuels will be a reality in the foreseeable future, it’s important to give them the right value,” EU climate commissioner Connie Hedegaard said after the decision was approved. The Danish politician managed to overcome resistance from her German colleague, in charge of energy policy, who had adopted a more industry-favourable line.

But the move is likely to complicate EU-Canadian talks on a free trade agreement that should have been sealed later this year.

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See also:
Oil sands imports could be banned under EU directive (Guardian)]]> • 03 OCT 2011

Economic Times

NEW DELHI: In a first-of-its-kind initiative, member nations of UN aviation body, International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), and other non-European Union (EU) states led by India have come together to protest against EU's proposal to put a charge on carbon emissions from airlines.

EU's proposal to cap planet-warming gases under its emission trading system makes it mandatory for airlines flying into its airspace to buy carbon credits equivalent to the carbon dioxide emitted by their aircraft. This is supposed to come into effect from January next.

The meeting of 26 countries, chaired by civil aviation secretary SNA Zaidi, adopted a joint declaration on Friday, stating EU's proposal is inconsistent with international law. The participants also concurred that the EU-ETS measures were in violation of the Chicago convention governing aviation.

"We think that the EU's proposal is illegal because it seeks to charge airlines for the lag of journey outside its airspace. This is an extra-territorial principle, which is illegal," Zaidi said.

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India, 25 others oppose EU airline carbon charge plan (Reuters)
]]> • 03 OCT 2011

Economic Times

LONDON: European Union plans to make oil refiners pay for carbon emissions from 2013 could accelerate European refinery closures and encourage them to relocate outside the EU to avoid higher operating costs that could run into millions of euros a year.

The UK refining industry is seen as being at particular risk due to UK government plans for a carbon floor price that may be above the level set by the market. UK companies such as Ineos are worried they will be put at a competitive disadvantage.

The UK government is planning to introduce the carbon price floor at 16 pounds ($25.09) a tonne from April 1, 2013, rising each year to 30 pounds a tonne in 2020.

But Tom Crotty, group director of Ineos, said this potentially "sticks the UK out on a limb" relative to the rest of Europe. "The problem is that energy-intensive users in the UK may get hit quite hard relative to other countries if that carbon price differential opens up."

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