Bishop Hill Scientists squeal at rising energy bills
The scientific community is united in its belief that global warming is a real and present danger. In fact, so pressing is the crisis that it demands dramatic cutbacks in carbon emissions; rising fuel prices are pretty much a given. There is only a handful of swivel-eyed "deniers" who say otherwise.
Or so the story goes. I'm sure the truth is a little different.
If I actually believed this stuff though, I would find it hard not to feel just the tiniest hint of satisfaction at yesterday's article in the Guardian:
World-class research into future sources of green energy is under threat in Britain from an environmental tax designed to boost energy efficiency and drive down carbon emissions, scientists claim.
Some facilities must find hundreds of thousands of pounds to settle their green tax bills, putting jobs and research at risk.
The unexpected impact of the government's carbon reduction commitment (CRC) scheme is so severe that scientists and research funders have lobbied ministers for an exemption to reduce the bills.
Apparently the Culham Centre for Fusion Energy is one of the facilities worst hit, but you have to wonder if this is a luxury with the fate of the planet at stake.
Reader Comments (28)
Perfect! The effect of the tax is to prevent anyone from carrying out the research that might demonstrate the tax is unnecessary! Orwell and Kafka would be so proud!
Why do research on fusion when you can plaster the land in windmills? Damn I forgot, peak wind is here.
This is a depressing article. The last bit where the response of affected citizens is to lobby government for favours is what's depressing. One, such lobbying is nearly pure deadweight loss. Two, it demonstrates the enormous new-found power the green movement has handed to politicians. This power doesn't do anything to help the environment. It just makes politicians richer and the rest of us all poorer. Including, it seems, environmentalists. An entirely forseeable, foreseen and predicted own goal.
Speaking of "swivel-eyed deniers", I see that Komment Macht Frei is reporting that the GOP has taken "Climate Denial" out of the crank fringe and made it mainstream.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2011/may/30/climate-change-conspiracy-theory
This is a particularly peverse outcome. But of course, the Grauniad doesn't stop to look at the effect of this nonsense on a swathe of what remains of British Industry. British jobs will be our single biggest export. And don't imagine that we will be able to afford to import goods and materials once our own industries are gone.
We still have a lot to do
1 BBC running with Oxfam report as its headliner blaming climate change, big business and subsidies for rising food prices without a hint of challenge or acknowledgement of the real damage done by MMCC namely ripping up land for food to grow for bio crap
2 Lord Stern on R4 just now - usual rubbish no challenge
P
Here is the link...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/may/30/environmental-tax-threatens-green-energy-research
Being somewhat disconnected from reality is surely a requirement for dyed-in-the-wool CO2-alarmists, apart from those who have spotted the hoo-ha as an ideal vehicle for their political ambitions. I wonder if we shall see exemptions being granted for those deemed worthy? The current American government passed a burdensome healthcare bill, and have ever since been merrily granting exemptions to many groups which vigorously supported it, not least various trade unions. Examples here: http://washingtonexaminer.com/politics/2011/05/obama-skirts-rule-law-reward-pals-punish-foes .
In Australia today, economist Ross Garnaut advised the Federal Government that an initial carbon price of $26 per tonne was suitable for imposition on carbon polluters. While costs from electricity production would rise and be passed on to the consumer, the government would use its generousity to rebate part (50% of consumer price increases vested on the poor has been mentioned) of the first year's $11.5 billion total take, to the poorer parts of the community. It is not yet clear if the afore-mentioned 10% will be creamed off for the UN, or the IPCC and associates.
Those taking the rebate money are somehow supposed to spend it in a way that does not increase GHG. These people with rebates will find it essentially impossible to spend while reducing GHG emission. No suggested list of expenditure choices is given, merely the mouthing of directing spending to green friendly industries.
The equation then becomes one of whether the fossil fuel electricity generators can spend funds with less effect on GHGs than can a couple of million uninformed people with a sudden rebate of the same size. The answer is NO. The producers are streets ahead on efficiency.
It is another dose of Robin Hood economics, where the Government takes money from the wealthy, then keeps it.
There is a tax on mining profits still in the pipeline.
I've been to China many times. Its sanitation is poor, but it's starting to smell sweeter by the month.
"The unexpected impact of the government's carbon reduction commitment .."
It really didn't occur to them..?
Lots of hand-wringing on R4 this morning, with Lord Stern in 'it's worse than we thought' mode and frequent allusion to the potential damage to crop yields by GW. No mention, naturally, of the actual effect on crop yields from extra CO2.
"Culham Centre for Fusion Energy "
I was on-site during the construction of the buildings for the JET project during the early eighties.
OMG, that is 30 years ago and memories are still vivid - like the multi-hundred tonne concrete beam that had to be lifted several metres, dead level, to allow the overhead crane through the shield wall between the workshop and the torus hall.
Interesting times, but I am not sure that it is fair to describe the work they do there as a "luxury". This is a long term research project and until something else comes along with the same or better prospects then the UK had better keep funding stuff like this.
See: http://www.ccfe.ac.uk/FAQ.aspx
"When can we expect electricity generated from fusion to be available?
Experimental fusion machines have now produced fusion powers of more than ten megawatts. A new machine under construction, called ITER, will be capable of producing 500 megawatts of fusion power. ITER is expected to start operating in 2019. Although it will be on the scale needed for a power station, there will still be technological issues to address to produce steady, reliable electricity, so it is anticipated that a prototype power station will be needed after ITER. Electricity generation is expected in 30 to 40 years, depending on funding and technical progress."
With more and more governments in the West falling into the deadly trap of abandoning coal and nuclear power stations at the whim of the appalling people described in "Tiny world", surely this research should continue.
I don't know about scientists squealing about energy prices, but looking at the contract I've just got from Eon for my September prices, there will be 'blood in the streets' if this is an example of future UK prices...
Current: Primary units 9.750p Standing charge: 8.047p
New contract: First 3k units 17.84p then 15.65p per unit. Standing charge: 13.82p
Or Standing charge 19.05p with 13.22p per unit
I'm spoilt for choice!
What happened to "too cheap to meter" ROTFL
The law of unintended consequences kicks in once more.
Has anyone been watching the BBC2 series "All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace"?
It is to be recommended.
Last night's programme was very insightful on the invention of ecosystems and how the phrase "the balance of nature" became a phrase of common usage. It turns out it was all wrong. People put too much faith in computer models.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b011lvb9
Yep, they can lobby for exemptions and poor sodding Joe Public can take a running jump. Makes me want to spit!
Finally perhaps we will see the rest of the scientific community starting to stand up against the climate 'scientist' colleagues.
It was all well and good for non-climate scientists to stand on the side lines for years, and remain silent while their comrades abused the scientific principles, destroyed trust in the scientific community, and became advocates for re-engineering the world. But now that the effects are coming home to roost (i.e. higher energy costs, green taxes, cuts to funding), we can only hope that these other scientists will now make a stand, excommunicate climate scientists and bring some sanity back into the world.
Hey, we need to careful that we don't create an irony-blackhole here. Spacetime can only stand so much irony in one place.
Do these guys even listen to themselves?
Oh the irony. The climate physics folks that can't make verifiable predictions 50 years into the future are causing heartburn for the nuclear physics folks whose own promise of unlimited energy is always 50 years off from the present time.
So far as the Oxfam Report is concerned, we need to remember that the old Oxford Committee for Famine Relief is now one of the main cheerleaders for the cAGW scam. Remember all the huge billboards and newspaper adverts threatening climate doom just before Copenhagen (and frequently at other times, also).
I would be exceptionally cautious about any 'report' prepared by Oxfam, they are another political campaigning group just like RSPB and WWF.
And, by extension, their weird beliefs are responsible for the biofuels scam, so moaning about the outcome are as logical as RSPB whinging about birds getting shredded (although in both cases they tend to keep quite quiet when it suits them).
It also should be pointed out that (disaster relief perhaps excluded), giving out food aid hasn't exactly been a great success in encouraging indigenous agricultural production in the Third World. And that's even before we get started with our chums in the EU and the CAP.
The Oxfam Report is right about one thing. Bio-fuels should receive no subsidy.
'...tiniest hint of self-satisfaction'?! I burst out laughing. Easily the funniest thing to have occurred in the Warming World War this year. As well, spot on John Shade. Best wishes for the blog, JakartaJaap
I'd second Mac's recommendation for the Adam Curtis series.
Last night's episode took a coolly scathing look at environmentalism. There was the politics misusing science, scientists coming up with the theory first then trying to find the facts that fit - and torturing the data if they didn't, the teaching of a theory as absolute fact which turned out to be wrong and the reluctance of the the evangelists to accept real world data which upset their elegant theory.
Of course the elephant in the room was that this shared the major hallmarks of CAGW. I find it difficult to believe that this didn't occur to Curtis but I don't know if he is sceptical but didn't mention CAGW for some reason (possibly simply because he didn't want a controversy about CAGW to sideline the point he was making) or he thinks that despite the similarities CAGW is true anyway.
iPlayer links:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b011lvb9/episodes/player
Re Mac reference to "All watched over..." BBC2
I agree, it's facinating stuff. It is intriguing to reflect on how much modern 'science' was spawned by 'hippies' - chaos theory for one. Maybe we need a new term for these ideas: 'psychedelic science' maybe? Several of these guys fried their brains with LSD. As incidentally did a certain Dale Vince OBE who similarly fried his brains and now runs Ecotricity. He recently claimed that when one of his turbine blades flew off that it was probably caused by a collision with a UFO. He also believes that wind farms can be screened (with trees? er doesn't that cut the wind to the turbines?), that they don't kill birds or reduce local property prices.
The demand for subsidy for paying their electricity bill when their own stupidity encouraged the politicians to be equally stupid is irony of the finest quality; if this situation wasn't so sad it would be incredibly funny.
As a Kiwi shortly flying home after some years spent observing my UK cousins, I can only rejoice that those Whitehall bounders who stripped us Colonials of our British identity back in the 1960s were actually using prescience and foresight of the first order to do us the most enormous favour and are now providing a model of such rich stupidity that even our dozy lot of pollys must get the message, and soon.
Irritating, though, were the newish BBC productions on WWII and I was more than a little surprised to hear their politically-correct commenters describing the Aussie, Kiwi, Canuk, Saffer etc fighting men and women as non-British.
Bloody cheek, actually.
Mac and artwest are right,this is such a departure for the bbc.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b011lvb9/episodes/player
The BBC program sounds very interesting. Unfortunately we get the old "not available in your area". Scant chance of the ABC picking this one up I should say.
Geoff Cruickshank
One of the episodes at least is available here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uz2j3BhL47c
May 31, 2011 at 11:46 AM | Sean
"the nuclear physics folks whose own promise of unlimited energy is always 50 years off from the present time."
Some of us will have a better idea in about 10 years from the present as to whether fusion power is feasible at the 500MW level.
If not, then, once again tax payer will have been hosed up the wall.
Nothing new there, unlike the outstanding success of multi-billion GBP "subsidy farming" now underway in order to save the planet. /sarc off.
If it does work, then some of us will only need to wait 20 to 30 years.
I pushed the "70 and above" button on the survey, hence "some of us".
Chin up!
To slightly mis-quote Basil Fawlty, this comes straight from the Department of the Bleedin' Obvious....