UN creating more problems than it solves in attack on fossil fuels

Pakistan flooding caused by under-investment in infrastructure and corruption and attempts to meet ‘green’ goals, not ‘climate change’

By Terence Corcoran, National Post, Sept. 23, 2022

No United Nations campaign has done more to exacerbate global economic and energy problems than the UN’S Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Since its first report in 1990, the IPCC has led the global drive to eliminate carbon-emitting fossil fuels from the global economy — even though numerous critics have attacked the IPCC’S alarmist claims.

In a paper this month from the Fraser Institute, Jason S. Johnston, professor of environmental law at the University of Virginia, summarizes the IPCC’S long record of exaggerating claims that the world is on the brink of disaster.… Read more

IPCC a political, not scientific, organization

The IPCC ‘science’ is biased: it supports costly regulations to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions but suppresses or ignores scientific evidence that the costs of such action are far higher and the benefits far lower than advertised

JA­SON S. JOHN­STON, National Post, Sept. 23, 2022

Since 1990, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has produced regular assessments of the state of climate science and also provided reports on particular aspects of climate science when requested by the United Nations, its primary sponsoring entity.

The IPCC has long advertised itself as an unbiased and objective reporter on the state of climate science, and even otherwise independent-minded people often base arguments about the consequences of climate change on IPCC numbers.… Read more

Childish ‘magical thinking’ on climate change threatens Canadians’ food supply

In humanity’s experience, the best way to solve major problems is to maximize growth and use part of the wealth created to discover new technologies to solve the problem

By Brian Lee Crowley, national post, Sept. 21, 2022

In recent years, childishness has been the dominant fashion in Canada. We obsess about marginal issues that make us feel good, while nasty regimes around the world laugh at our moral pretentiousness and undermine the institutions we have so painstakingly created.

Children, as child psychologist Mary O’kane reminds us, have an innate tendency to engage in magical thinking. They often believe that if they wish hard enough for something to happen, it will.… Read more

‘Climate emergency’ based on beliefs, not sound, self-critical science

CLINTEL Declaration has more than 1,000 signatories opposing politicized views on climate change

By Conrad Black, National Post, Sept. 17, 2022

More than 1,000 signatories, including climate scientists and other experts, have endorsed a “World Climate Declaration,” asserting that there is no present climate emergency. The foundation Climate Intelligence (CLINTEL) produced a one-page statement arguing that climate science should be less political and more open about the many uncertainties in predictions of global temperature changes and more comprehensive in judging the costs and benefits of proposed policy measures, especially radical reductions in the use of fossil fuels.

CLINTEL was founded in 2019 by geophysics professor Guus Berkhout and science journalist Marcel Crok.… Read more

Planetary crisis? You haven’t heard the good news

Climate-change fear is causing life-changing anxiety at a time when the world’s major problems are actually being solved

By Bjorn Lomborg, National Post, Sept. 15, 2022

It’s easy to believe life on Earth is getting ever worse. The media constantly highlight one catastrophe after another and make terrifying predictions. With the never-ending torrent of doom and gloom about climate change and the environment, it’s understandable why many people — especially the young — genuinely believe the world is about to end. But the fact is that though problems remain the world is getting better. We just rarely hear about it.

We are incessantly told about disasters, whether it is the latest heat wave, flood, wildfire or storm.… Read more

Europe pays (and pays) for Net Zero

Governments embraced climate policy with enthusiasm—now they reel back in horror as costs and subsidies soar

Wall Street Journal, Sept. 9, 2022

New British Prime Minister Liz Truss on Sept. 7 rolled out an energy-price subsidy plan that could cost £150 billion. Throw that on the pile with the tens upon tens of billions of dollars’ worth of subsidies other European governments are offering to take the sting out of energy prices this winter. It adds up to a stunning cost for Europe’s climate-change ambitions.

The contours of Europe’s crisis are well-known by now. Governments across the Continent for decades concocted increasingly aggressive plans to reduce carbon-dioxide emissions in the name of arresting climate change.… Read more

Liberal climate warriors leave Europe in the lurch

Continent’s natural-gas crisis is morphing into a genuine power emergency. Canada could help, but won’t

By Henry Geraedts, National Post, Sept. 8, 2022

As the collapse of Europe’s energy structure begins to unfold it’s important to understand that its impact across the socio-economic landscape isn’t yet anywhere near full force. The bankruptcy of utilities and energy providers continues. France recently re-nationalized core utility EDF, operator of its nuclear plants, while Germany opted for a €9 billion bailout to save linchpin utility Uniper.

The true and overarching danger to Europe, however, is the accelerating threat to its industrial base and small businesses.… Read more

Trudeau out of step on fossil fuels

For political and ideological reasons his government cannot admit to the terribly damaging consequences of its green policies and the urgent need to fundamentally change course

BY JOE OLIVER, National Post, Sept. 1, 2o22

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau should be feeling isolated in his campaign against fossil fuels, especially liquefied natural gas (LNG), as leaders around the world reduce their countries’ reliance on inadequate renewable energy and tone down their own rhetoric about lowering GHG emissions. But for political and ideological reasons his government cannot admit to the terribly damaging consequences of its green policies and the urgent need to fundamentally change course.… Read more

Gorbachev saw dangers of command economy; climate crusaders do not

In the west, Gorbachev’s main legacy, apart from the liberation of eastern Europe, should be his rejection of the command-bureaucratic system as ‘suffocating.’ And yet we’re in an age in the west where command-bureaucratic is all the rage

By William Watson, National Post, Sept. 1, 2022

If believing in communist reform was his great strategic error, Mikhail Gorbachev’s great strategic insight was that the “command-bureaucratic system” did not work. It could win a world war. It could put a sputnik into space. If you devoted a big enough share of society’s resources to a given task, command-and-control could get it done.… Read more