SCIENCE & ENVIRONMENTAL POLICY PROJECT

The Week That Was October 30, 2010

 

Quote of the Week

For me, it is far better to grasp the  Universe as it really is than to persist in  delusion, however satisfying and  reassuring. –Carl Sagan

Number of the Week 24 to 1

This Week

By Ken Haapala

On Oct. 29, the French Academy of  Sciences released a report declaring the  global warming exists and is unquestionably  due to human activity. The academy  president declared the debate is over.

Former education minister Claude  Allegre, who questioned the orthodoxy,  signed off on what he considered a  compromise report stating: "I have not  evolved, I still say the same thing, that the  exact role of carbon dioxide in the  environment has not been shown."

The report recognized uncertainties in  solar influence, clouds, oceans and  atmosphere. Those who believe that human  carbon dioxide emissions may have some  warming effect, but are not the dominant  driver of climate change, may find the  report acceptable except that it gives  carbon dioxide a principal role in climate  change. We await the translation of the full  report, but apparently there is no precision  in the report. A vague statement, no matter  how forcefully made, remains vague.  **********************************

In an article published on October 12,  Bjorn Lomborg discusses the change in the  vocabulary of the global warming  alarmists. No longer is global warming, or  climate change, the major theme. Instead,  it has been replaced by clean energy, clean  jobs – a green economy.

Lomborg also discusses how much a  green economy is costing his native  country, Denmark. He believes that drastic  carbon cuts are a poor response to global  warming.

In another article for the Investors'  Business Daily (IBD), Lomborg advocates  committing streams of money to technical  improvements in new wind and solar  energy, as well as other technical  innovations. Lomborg's comments are  rebutted in a follow-up article in IBD by  Willie Soon, Bob Carter, and David  Legates who bring up a seldom mentioned  issue: the benefits of increased CO2 Much  is made of what economists call the  external costs of carbon dioxide emissions,  namely global warming which is always  considered bad. But increased CO2 in the  atmosphere stimulates more vigorous  growth of plant life that benefits humanity  and the environment.  **********************************

The Department of Interior has  approved the building of what is called the  world's largest solar-thermal power plant  on 7,000 acres of federal land in the desert  of Southern California. The project is a  venture by two German companies.

The first half of the project could be  eligible for a cash subsidy of $900,000,000  from the stimulus bill. The cash subsidy  program ends on December 31, 2010.  Also, the companies are seeking Federal  loan guarantees and, no doubt, an array of  benefits from the state.

To put the cash subsidy perspective, it is  useful to calculate the employment  benefits. The administration claims this  project will provide up to 300 new  permanent jobs. This calculates out to  $3,000,000 per permanent job.

At that rate it would cost about $20.27  Trillion to reduce the current  unemployment rate (9.2% est. by US  Bureau of Labor Statistics) to the rough  average over the past 15 years of 5%.

$20.27 Trillion is about 1.4 times the  entire gross domestic product of the US in  2009 (estimated to be $14.26 Trillion by  the US Bureau of Economic Analysis).  The expenditure is enormous, but does it  benefit the citizens of California by  providing affordable electricity?

As seen in other reports, there are  additional solar projects in California  which promoters are trying to start before  December 31.

These stories indicate that even after  subsidies, the cost of the electricity  generated will be 30-70 percent more  expensive than electricity generated by  natural gas, the dominant electricity  generating fuel in California.

The promoters of the projects consider a  30-70 percent increase in cost to be  competitive – a clear consequence of the  state's renewable energy mandates. Only in  California!  **********************************

THE NUMBER OF THE WEEK: 24 to  1 – the number of nuclear power plants  under construction in China (as reported  by the World Nuclear Association)  compared to the number of nuclear power  plants under construction in the US.

Green energy promoters stridently insist  that we are in a race with China to develop  green energy, namely solar and wind.  Spain and Germany were in the race but  dropped out and their green energy firms  are suffering as the subsidies stopped.

The question seldom asked is China  really in the same race? Over the next  several weeks, The Number of the Week  will explore that question. If China is in a  nuclear power race it is clearly winning.  Please see Nuclear Power in China under  Energy Issues.

(Please note that the 104 nuclear power  plants in the US have a very high average  capacity factor of over 90 percent) 

Ken Haapala is Executive Vice  President, Science and Environmental  Policy Project (SEPP). ********************************** 

Why the Confusion

about Global Warming?

By S Fred Singer

No one denies that the Earth has  warmed in the past century. So of course,  the past decade must be the warmest –  even though there has been no upward  trend since the 1998 temperature peak.

Note the important distinction between  temperature level (measured in deg C or deg  F) and trend (expressed in deg C per year).

The dispute is, and always has been,  about the cause of the warming. In fact, the  major warming during the first 50 years of  the 20th century and the latter part of the  19th century is generally accepted to be  natural – a recovery from the Little Ice  Age. But there's no credible evidence that  identifies the most recent warming as  human-caused.

On the contrary, while the UN's IPCC  claims to be quite certain that it is  anthropogenic, the independent NIPCC  (Non-governmental International Panel on  Climate Change) concludes that "Nature –  Not Human Activity – Rules the Climate."

To read that report, go to

http://www.sepp.org/publications/

NIPCC_final.pdf.

In this connection note the obfuscatory  language used by the EPA in turning down  all of the “Petitions for Reconsideration”  of its Endangerment finding on CO2:

"The scientific evidence supporting  EPA's finding is robust, voluminous, and  compelling. Climate change is happening  now, and humans are contributing to it.  Multiple lines of evidence show a global  warming trend over the past 100 years.  Beyond this, melting ice in the Arctic,  melting glaciers around the world,  increasing ocean temperatures, rising sea  levels, altered precipitation patterns, and  shifting patterns of ecosystems and  wildlife habitats all confirm that our  climate is changing."

Yet there is no evidence at all that  humans are indeed contributing to  warming in a significant way. We'll see  you in court, dear EPA, and gladly  examine your "compelling" evidence! 

Fred Singer is Chairman, and  President, Science and Environmental  Policy Project (SEPP)