GWPF Newsletter: Australian Govt Promises To Abandon Green Subsidies & Ignore Climate Targets

Climate Change Action Off The Agenda Under Morrison Government

In this newsletter:

1) Australian Govt Promises To Abandon Green Subsidies & Ignore Climate Targets To Bring Down Energy Costs
The Daily Telegraph, 30 August 2018

2) Climate Change Action Off The Agenda Under Morrison Government
The New Daily, 30 August 2018

 
3) New Australian PM Already Under Pressure On New Coal Power
The Australian, 28 August 2018
 
4) Anti-Green U-Turn: Report For French Govt Proposes New Nuclear Reactors
Reuters, 30 August 2018
 
5) Japan’s Nuclear Revival Threatens Renewable Energy Subsidies
Reuters, 29 August 2018 
 
6) Populists May Rip Up Sweden’s Green Energy Policy 
Bloomberg, 16 August 2018
 
7) New Report Exposes Global Warming ‘Law Enforcement For Rent’
Brendan Kirby, LifeZette, 29 August 2018
 
8) From Twitter Mobs To The Moral Police, The Decline Of Free Speech Is Society’s Gravest Threat
Allister Heath, The Daily Telegraph, 30 August 2018
 
9) And Finally: UN Appointed Climate Science Team Demands The End Of Capitalism
Watts Up With That? 29 August 2018

Full details:

1) Australian Govt Promises To Abandon Green Subsidies & Ignore Climate Targets To Bring Down Energy Costs
The Daily Telegraph, 30 August 2018

RENEWABLE energy subsidies and emission-reduction targets will be replaced with a focus on lowering electricity prices under the Morrison government.



New Energy Minister Angus Taylor said the federal energy policy has been “a mess” and says the fact prices have soared while blackouts persist means something has “gone terribly wrong”.

Mr Taylor said he won’t be scared to take the extreme measure of divestment, or forcing energy retailers to sell off part of their business, if they inflate electricity bills.

“The power to divest is obviously a last resort,” he said.

Pitching himself as the “minister for reducing electricity prices,” Mr Taylor will today admit in a speech that energy policy had not been designed with Australians in mind, as ideological objectives caused those in charge to “lose sight” of the aim of keeping the lights on.

“The challenge now is to accept that we had a mess and we are now fixing it, with one aim only — to reduce power prices while keeping the lights on,” he said.

“This government has made great strides on energy in recent times, but energy policy was bogged down for years in complexity.

The complex schemes Mr Taylor refers to are understood to the Large-scale Renewable Energy Target (LRET), which subsidises the development of renewable energy.

The Daily Telegraph understands emission-reduction will also play no future role in energy policy.

Asked directly if he will keep any emission-reduction targets, Mr Taylor said his only focus was lowering power bills and improving reliability.

“I am focusing only on price, unambiguously and no other distractions,” he said.

“Price is the goal. We are not going to get into ideological debates.”

However, the emission-­reduction targets would need to be formally dumped in Cabinet. The name of the new energy policy is not expected to be the National Energy Guarantee, but this would also need to be changed at Cabinet.

Full story

see also New Australian PM Won’t Last Long Without Slashing Green Subsidies
 
2) Climate Change Action Off The Agenda Under Morrison Government
The New Daily, 30 August 2018

Energy Minister Angus Taylor has unveiled a new energy policy focused exclusively on reducing electricity prices, in a strong signal the Morrison government will abandon all efforts to lower carbon emissions.

The move comes a week after the issue of climate change precipitated the ousting of former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull.

“My No.1 priority is very, very simple,” Mr Taylor said in a speech on Thursday. “It is to reduce power prices, and to do this while we keep the lights on.”

He would do this, he said, by empowering consumers to shop around, cracking down on price gouging, and increasing “reliable supply” – a phrase that has come to refer to keeping coal-fired power stations running.

“It’s ironic that in a country with an abundance of natural resources – coal, gas, water, solar, wind – we should be in the position we are today. We have to leverage those resources, not leave them in the ground.”

He listed two ways in which this would be done: encouraging states to lifting moratoria on coal and gas exploration, and underwriting “new stable low-cost generation for commercial and industrial customers”.

The latter appeared to be a commitment for the government to guarantee that coal-fired power stations would remain open. Not a single policy to increase investment in renewables or lower emissions was announced.

Mr Taylor attacked Labor for putting climate change at the centre of its energy policy.

“The difference between us and them could not be more stark. Labor’s platform puts climate change at the centre of their broader economic strategy.

“But as the Prime Minister said, this government is instead focused on delivering for all Australians and that means reducing electricity prices and cost-of-living pressures.”

Despite announcing no policies to address carbon emissions, and despite attacking Labor for prioritising the issue, Mr Taylor insisted he was not a climate sceptic.

Full story
 
3) New Australian PM Already Under Pressure On New Coal Power
The Australian, 28 August 2018
Geoff Chambers

Whether it’s marginal seats in Queensland, western Sydney or Victoria, the message is clear: voters want action on energy prices, not emissions targets.

Scott Morrison previously declared new coal-fired power stations wouldn’t be able to generate electricity at “the same price as old coal-fired power stations”.

The new Prime Minister — who took a lump of coal into parliament and accused Labor of “coalaphobia” — is under pressure from colleagues to support clean-coal technology. As Resources Minister Matt Canavan said yesterday: “We need to hearken to a new era of energy and resources abundance. God has given us an abundance of energy below the ground but we need to convert that to an abundance above the ground to bring on more energy supply and lower prices.”

Morrison, as treasurer, said in April that it wasn’t “an economic fact” that you could “open up one down the road and all of a sudden it is producing power at the same price as Bayswater or any of the others”.

Treasurer Josh Frydenberg, the architect of the doomed national energy guarantee, yesterday continued the “technology-agnostic” line that crippled Malcolm Turnbull, saying renewables would play an important role. “When it comes to the energy mix, it is an all-of-the-above approach — that has not changed,” he said. “We need to maintain coal in the system because it is the bedrock of our energy system, but we also need to make way for renewables and the important role they can play in the future.”

To cut through on energy, Angus Taylor, Morrison and Frydenberg will have to change their language.

Turnbull’s energy slogans — dominated by words such as “dispatchable”, “technology-neutral” and “Snowy 2.0” — have fallen flat for Australians, who want affordable power.

In his first press conference as leader on Friday, Morrison was asked whether his government would retain the NEG. He focused his response on driving down power prices and pledging to put in place the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission report, which backbenchers are demanding be fast-tracked.

Whether it’s marginal seats in Queensland, western Sydney or Victoria, the message is clear: voters want action on prices, not emissions targets.

With Asia importing a record amount of Australian coal, and building new clean-coal-fired power stations to drive down emissions and secure cheap power, Morrison will be expected by conservative colleagues and Coalition voters to ditch Turnbull’s strategy of playing both sides of the fence.

4) Anti-Green U-Turn: Report For French Govt Proposes New Nuclear Reactors
Reuters, 30 August 2018

A report commissioned by France’s government proposed building five new nuclear reactors, Les Echos reported on Thursday, two days after Environment Minister Nicolas Hulot resigned and said that progress on goals such as a shift to renewable energy was too slow.

The report, prepared for Hulot and Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire, examines how to maintain the industrial capacity of a French nuclear sector that slowed reactor construction in the 1990s, the business daily said. Among its proposals is the building of five new EPR reactors starting in 2025.

“Government policy isn’t decided by a report,” Le Maire told Radio Classique when questioned about the Les Echos report on it. Nuclear power is “an asset for France”, he added, mentioning its low greenhouse emissions and costs he described as “competitive”.

Hulot, a former presenter of environmental TV programs and a popular figure in France, resigned on Tuesday during a live interview in a blow to President Emmanual Macron’s already tarnished green credentials.

The resignation has added to political headaches afflicting Macron, whose ratings are at their lowest since his May 2017 election, and may yet prompt a wider government reshuffle.

Full story

5) Japan’s Nuclear Revival Threatens Renewable Energy Subsidies
Reuters, 29 August 2018 

TOKYO, Aug 29 (Reuters) – Kyushu Electric Power Co may start restricting third-party supplies of solar energy after it restarts a fourth nuclear reactor, the company said on Wednesday, underscoring the risks to a government push to boost renewable energy.

Japan’s fifth-biggest utility by sales plans to restart the No. 2 reactor at its Sendai station later on Wednesday, giving Kyushu the most nuclear generation since the 2011 Fukushima disaster led to the shutdown of Japan’s atomic power sector.

“Output restrictions can occur when power demand is low and solar power generation is high, such as in the autumn, spring or at the year-end and beginning of the year,” the spokesman said.

The Fukushima disaster prompted a shift in Japan toward renewable energy, backed by mandatory preferential rates for solar, wind and other supplies.

Introduced in 2012, the preferential rates, known as feed-in-tariffs, were at the time among the highest in the world, sparking a rush of investments by startups and other companies.

Only one of Japan’s other nine nuclear operators, Kansai Electric Power Co, the country’s second-biggest utility by sales, so far has reactors running.

However, the slow return of nuclear, which once accounted for 30 percent of Japan’s electricity generation, is now threatening the once-guaranteed income for operators of renewables.

Full story

6) Populists May Rip Up Sweden’s Green Energy Policy 
Bloomberg, 16 August 2018

Sweden’s biggest ever cross-party energy deal was designed to provide stability for utilities for almost three decades, but the 2016 accord is now at risk of being ripped up after next month’s general election.

The Sweden Democrats, which some polls show could emerge as the biggest party, would revoke nuclear-plant closures central to the agreement if they came to power. The Christian Democrats, one of the accord’s co-signers, on Tuesday echoed that view and pressed for key parts of the deal to be renegotiated.

The agreement ended more than 30 years of bickering over nuclear power, extended support for renewable energy and stated that there should be zero emissions impacting the climate by 2045. It effectively boosted the lives of the nation’s six newest reactors until at least 2040, but didn’t address how the capacity of four older Vattenfall AB and EON SE units will be replaced.

“It is an empty agreement that lacks concrete details,” said Runar Brannlund, head of economics research at Umea University in northern Sweden. “It doesn’t deal with how to have enough capacity when the wind does not blow and the sun does not shine. But sooner or later this will become a real issue that the parties will handle, and then we will see how they act.”

Whoever emerges as the winner next month will have to act fast. Grid manager Svenska Kraftnat warned that the nation from this winter will depend on imports to meet peak demand. It could get even worse if Vattenfall’s Ringhals reactors on the west coast are shut in two years time as planned.

There are several options to replace the lost capacity, including adding more plants to a national reserve, batteries or increased demand flexibility. But unless something is done, Sweden will be dependent on imports and could face soaring power prices, according to the network manager.

Full story

7) New Report Exposes Global Warming ‘Law Enforcement For Rent’
Brendan Kirby, LifeZette, 29 August 2018

Report details how wealthy donors are paying for lawyers to pursue environmental cases by state AGs 

Deep-pocketed global warming activists have been pouring big bucks into attorneys general’s offices to pay for lawyers to advance their agenda and use the powers of the law to take actions they never could achieve alone, according to a new report. 

Released Wednesday by the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI), the 56-page document dubbed “Law Enforcement for Rent” paints a damning view of the cozy relationship between environmental activists and Democratic attorneys general in several states that have pulled off an end run around the democratic process — grabbing resources they have not been able to get from lawmakers.

“This is political. We have a policymaking process. They tried it and failed,” said Christopher Horner, a fellow at the think tank who wrote the report. “So their stance is, ‘It’s not working, so we’re going to use law enforcement.’”

Horner said the tactic has given environmental activists a new avenue to increase restrictions on carbon emissions after Congress rebuffed them, the Supreme Court blocked a regulatory plan then-President Barack Obama offered, and other supportive politicians lost races at the state and national levels.

“They failed at the ballot box,” he said. “They failed at legislation. They failed via the rule-making process … So they’re going to use the courts.”

At best, Horner said, the public-private partnerships are unethical. At worst, they are illegal, he said.

Environmental activists spend hundreds of millions of dollars a year in an attempt to discredit global warming “deniers,” according to the report. That eye-popping total emerges from a public records request by CEI that produced an email from an aide to California Gov. Jerry Brown last year to staff members of the governors of Washington and New York states.

Full story

8) From Twitter Mobs To The Moral Police, The Decline Of Free Speech Is Society’s Gravest Threat
Allister Heath, The Daily Telegraph, 30 August 2018

The decline of free speech is now the greatest threat facing Britain and the West. Without the freedom to think freely, to question, to disagree, we are nothing. When will we finally have the courage to rise up and put the new totalitarians back in their box?

Never before has it been so easy to communicate, to express one’s views, to write, publish, talk or broadcast. Yet instead of ushering in the golden age for free speech and rational enquiry that so many of us expected, the very technologies that were meant to liberate us are being used to stifle expression and stamp out dissent.

“You can’t say that”, “you must say this”: on social media, in universities and increasingly in every other institution across the land, a hideous battle is raging, and liberty is losing. The range of views that can be expressed without fear of reprisal has narrowed dramatically, partly because we’ve lost the language and manners required to disagree constructively.

Whoever holds a different opinion – on Brexit, on social issues, on anything – is dismissed as “bonkers”, “mad”, “laugh out loud” stupid, to be chased out of the village; there is no longer any sense of proportionality, just an all or nothing, snap assessment. Like in the witch-hunts of yore, the burden of proof is reversed: you must prove you are not guilty of offending others’ feelings, which is impossible.

The strategy, for tens of thousands of activists working in digital packs, is to bully, shame and destroy anybody who doesn’t agree with them, who dares to express a different opinion or who fails to signal their virtue appropriately. Ad hominem attacks were once seen as bad form: today they are rationalised using bogus theories. Reality in the era of fake news no longer matters: if somebody believes that somebody said or meant something, then it must be true. A vague feeling is enough.

Nobody from the sensible Left or sensible Right is immune from this catastrophic outbreak of nihilism; everything and everyone is fair game. Take Victoria Atkins, the woman’s minister, who said that she is “a little cautious” about the number of teenagers undergoing gender reassignment treatment. She was immediately targeted for annihilation. It’s an attempt at imposing digital “speech licenses”: those who do not meet the fashionable orthodoxy of the moment have no right to be heard.

The aim is to encourage self-censorship, policed by an army of vigilantes. It’s working: nobody ever comes to the defence of those being trashed, and mainstream Britain is quietly withdrawing, ensuring that the public discourse is ever more dominated by the angriest voices.

The New ‘Woke’ Priesthood

The new moral police is much like the old, or at least that which existed during Medieval times; they are seeking to enforce a new religion for Western atheists. It is a sickening charade: how can such people not see what they are doing? There is good and evil, sacred texts (the tenets of cultural Marxism, most of the time), supporting documents (dubious “evidence” produced by parti-pris social scientists, much of which cannot be replicated), a priesthood, an original sin (Western imperialism, usually), excommunications (for those who question the unquestionable), confessions (on Twitter, usually), repentance and of course the constant Inquisition and use of the auto-da-fé. Irony is well and truly dead.

The reality is that free speech isn’t just about a legal system that allows you, with some restrictions, to say, write or publish what you want. No, free speech describes an entire ethical system that places the utmost value on people’s right to express their beliefs, to dissent, to think for themselves, to debate, to discuss and, yes, to err. It is an integral element of the classical liberal character, and, for a short while, such an approach became the norm in many Western countries.

Real freedom of expression implies some measure of openness, of curiosity, the ability to listen, at least occasionally, to others and to learn to live with difference. It is an approach, an attitude, not merely a set of laws, a “human right” or a constitutional amendment; it is based on a realistic, humble approach to the limits of human knowledge. It is optimistic about the ability of good ideas to weed out bad ones: for most free speech advocates, getting to the truth is an iterative process of trial and error.

Cultural Collectivism

Free speech, understood in this way, is thus the embodiment of Western liberalism, of the enlightenment values that have transformed the world for the better. Of course, there will always be some boundaries and rightly so. But a society where most speech is technically allowed but any deviations from arbitrary and highly controlled norms triggers instant action from outrage mobs isn’t free any longer.

True friends of free speech genuinely relish living in an intellectually diverse society, one characterised by a constant clash of visions, where ideas are held up to scrutiny. In her Friends of Voltaire, the British writer Evelyn Beatrice Hall summarised his thoughts aptly: “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it”, she said, a phrase which is often misattributed to the French philosopher. The phrase used to be cited so often as to have become cliched. Today, one rarely hears it.

Technology alone didn’t trigger this revolution: with the decline of communism, elites have embraced a new form of cultural, rather than economic, collectivism. Individualism is passé: the validity of an argument is no longer to be assessed directly and objectively, these idiot savants in our universities now believe. Instead, the only thing that matters is the group that the speaker or writer is deemed to belong to. Who said something is key; what they said less so.

Full post

9) And Finally: UN Appointed Climate Science Team Demands The End Of Capitalism
Watts Up With That? 29 August 2018

A team of scientists appointed by the United Nations has reported that a free market system cannot provide the economic transition required to defeat climate change:

 

Scientists Warn the UN of Capitalism’s Imminent Demise

Aug 28 2018, 1:40am
By Nafeez Ahmed

A climate change-fueled switch away from fossil fuels means the worldwide economy will fundamentally need to change.

Capitalism as we know it is over. So suggests a new report commissioned by a group of scientists appointed by the UN Secretary-General. The main reason? We’re transitioning rapidly to a radically different global economy, due to our increasingly unsustainable exploitation of the planet’s environmental resources.

Climate change and species extinctions are accelerating even as societies are experiencing rising inequality, unemployment, slow economic growth, rising debt levels, and impotent governments.

Contrary to the way policymakers usually think about these problems, the new report says that these are not really separate crises at all.…

For the “first time in human history,” the paper says, capitalist economies are “shifting to energy sources that are less energy efficient.” This applies to all forms of energy. Producing usable energy (“exergy”) to keep powering “both basic and non-basic human activities” in industrial civilisation “will require more, not less, effort.” …

The shift to renewables might help solve the climate challenge, but for the foreseeable future will not generate the same levels of energy as cheap, conventional oil.…

Read more: https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/43pek3/scientists-warn-the-un-of-capitalisms-imminent-demise

The new report is available here

The London-based Global Warming Policy Forum is a world leading think tank on global warming policy issues. The GWPF newsletter is prepared by Director Dr Benny Peiser - for more information, please visit the website at www.thegwpf.com.