GWPF Newsletter - U-Turn: German Christian Democrats Ditch Carbon Tax

China Building 300 New Coal Power Plants Around The World

In this newsletter:

1) U-Turn: German Christian Democrats Ditch Carbon Tax
Spiegel Online, 3 May 2019
 
2) Fearing Public Revolt, German Economy Minister “Not Convinced” Of Carbon Tax
Clean Energy Wire, 3 May 2019

 
3) Majority Of Brits Unwilling To Cut Back To Fight Climate Change, Poll Finds
Sky News, 2 May 2019

4) China Building 300 New Coal Power Plants Around The World
NPR, 29 April 2019

5) St Greta Claims She Is Able To “See” Carbon Dioxide In The Air
Watts Up With That, 2 May 2019
 
6) How Britain’s Climate Campaigners Are Increasing CO2 Emissions
John Hinderaker, PowerLine, 28 March 2019
 
7) Climate Change Committee Says Homes Should Be Heated 2C Below What Most People Find Comfortable
Climate Scepticism, 2 May 2019
 
8) Fracking Boss Jim Ratcliffe Hits Out At 'Pathetic' Government
BBC News, 1 May 2019

Full details:

1) U-Turn: German Christian Democrats Ditch Carbon Tax
Spiegel Online, 3 May 2019  

Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer, the leader of Germany’s Christian Democrats (CDU), has bowed to pressure by the party’s business wing: The CDU will not accept a carbon tax, according to information by SPIEGEL magazine.

The Christian Democrats (CDU) will position itself against a carbon tax on climate protection. Party leader Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer decreed at the party’s board meeting last Monday that the party will change its position on climate accordingly.

The minister-president of Lower Saxony, Bernd Althusmann, one of the co-authors of the draft climate paper, had previously explained the conditions under which such a tax would make sense. Several participants in the meeting had spoken out against a tax on carbon dioxide emissions. “In that case we will remove the carbon tax from the position paper,” Kramp-Karrenbauer said.

The position paper is expected to be adopted at a special meeting of the Executive Board after the European elections. Kramp-Karrenbauer’s position is not uncontroversial in the party. For example, Schleswig-Holstein’s minister-president Daniel Günther had called for a carbon tax. What is more, the positioning should cause trouble in the Government coalition. Environment Minister Svenja Schulze (Social Democrats/SPD) has called for the introduction of a carbon tax.

For CDU party leader Kramp-Karrenbauer the decision is a defeat. The fact that the CDU is now positioning itself against a carbon tax leaves the Christian Democrats again as a party for which the interests of Germany’s economy are more important than those of climate protection. Kramp-Karrenbauer wanted to change this perception in order to prevent the migration of Union voters to the Greens.

Translation GWPF

Full story (in German)

see also - Majority of Germans Oppose Carbon Tax

Only a third of Germans are in favour of the controversial tax which is supposed to help protecting the climate. Green voters favour its  most, but AfD voters are most opposed…
 
2) Fearing Public Revolt, German Economy Minister “Not Convinced” Of Carbon Tax
Clean Energy Wire, 3 May 2019

Germany’s economy and energy minister Peter Altmaier is sceptical of the idea of introducing a tax on CO₂, he said on Maybrit Illner, a political television talk show by public broadcaster ZDF.

“As far as the CO₂ tax is concerned, I say: I am not convinced of it, and I also believe that it would be wrong to rush a decision." While the federal government is currently discussing “all possibilities,” the disadvantages outweigh the positive effects of such a tax, he said, referring to the yellow vests protests in France.

“There will be winners and losers. […] In the end, we must not put a heavier burden on either the economy or the people,” he said, adding that it would require a “huge bureaucratic effort” to introduce a CO₂ price in a socially fair way – one that does not overburden low-income households, especially those in the countryside. The minister called emissions trading the most efficient solution from an economic perspective. Altmaier also said Germany must decrease its levy to support renewables expansion, and abolish the electricity tax.

Full story
3) Majority Of Brits Unwilling To Cut Back To Fight Climate Change, Poll Finds
Sky News, 2 May 2019

The majority of Britons are unwilling to significantly reduce the amount they drive, fly and eat meat in order to combat climate change, a Sky Data poll reveals.



Just over half - 53% - say they would be unwilling even in principle to significantly reduce the amount they fly, while 28% say they would be willing to give up travelling by plane or reduce the amount they do so significantly (19% say they never fly anyway).

People responding to polls often overclaim their willingness to change their behaviour in ways considered socially desirable - but despite this some 52% say they would be unwilling to reduce the amount of meat they eat much (31%) or at all (21%) to help reduce global warming.

Four in ten say they would be willing to either reduce their meat consumption significantly (35%) or give it up entirely (five percent). A further eight percent do not eat meat.

A report from the Committee on Climate Change called for people to reduce how much meat they eat and how often they fly.

Some 56% say they would be unwilling to drive significantly less to protect the environment, with 28% saying they would be willing to reduce the amount they drive significantly or give it up entirely (17% already do not drive).

Full story
 
4) China Building 300 New Coal Power Plants Around The World
NPR, 29 April 2019

China is building or planning more than 300 coal plants in places as widely spread as Turkey, Vietnam, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Egypt and the Philippines.


The flow of Chinese financing for new coal-fired power plants throughout Africa, Europe, the Middle East, and Asia. GLOBAL COAL FINANCE TRACKER / COALSWARM

China, known as the world’s biggest polluter, has been taking dramatic steps to clean up and fight climate change.

So why is it also building hundreds of coal-fired power plants in other countries?

President Xi Jinping hosted the Belt and Road Forum in Beijing over the weekend, promoting his signature foreign policy of building massive infrastructureand trade links across several continents.

The forum, attended by leaders and delegates of nearly 40 countries, came amid growing criticism of China’s projects, including their effect on the environment.

Xi took the highly unusual step, for him, of meeting with international journalists, during which he repeated the slogan that he is committed to “open, clean and green development.”

Yet China’s overseas ventures include hundreds of electric power plants that burn coal, which is a significant emitter of the carbon scientifically linked to climate change.

Edward Cunningham, a specialist on China and its energy markets at Harvard University, tells NPR that China is building or planning more than 300 coal plants in places as widely spread as Turkey, Vietnam, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Egypt and the Philippines.

Days before the forum with its “clean and green” theme, the latest Chinese-built coal plant opened in Pakistan.

The plants are significant investments at a time when most nations of the world, including China, have committed to fighting climate change. “When you put money down and put steel into the ground for a coal-fired power plant,” says Cunningham, “it’s a 40- or 50-year commitment.”

Full post

See also GWPF Report: 
The Road From Paris: China's Climate U-Turn 



 
5) St Greta Claims She Is Able To “See” Carbon Dioxide In The Air
Watts Up With That, 2 May 2019
Anthony Watts

At first, I thought this had to be a joke. Then I thought it must be some sort of misinterpretation. Sadly, no.
From the website Afrinik, quoting the book –Scener ur hjärtat by Malena Ernman, Svante Thunberg:

According to her mother Malena Ernman (48), 16-year-old Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg can see CO2 with the naked eye. She writes that in the book ‘Scenes from the heart. Our life for the climate’, which she wrote with her family.

Greta was diagnosed as a child with obsessive-compulsive disorder and Asperger’s syndrome, just like her younger sister Beata. The activist also has a photographic memory.

She knows all the capitals by heart and can list all the chemical elements of the periodic table within one minute. In addition, she has another gift according to her mother.

“Greta is able to see what other people cannot see,” writes Malena Ernman in the book.

“She can see carbon dioxide with the naked eye. She sees how it flows out of chimneys and changes the atmosphere in a landfill.”

Of course, with a ~ 410 parts per million concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere, we know that is a physical impossibility.

Full post
 
6) How Britain’s Climate Campaigners Are Increasing CO2 Emissions
John Hinderaker, PowerLine, 28 March 2019

Britain has a fracking industry–or could have one, anyway, if it weren’t for the Greens’ political clout. It finally became too much for Natascha Engel, Britain’s “fracking czar,” who quit with a blistering letter of resignation:

Natascha Engel’s decision to walk away from such a high-profile role is driven, she says, by her dismay that Ministers are jeopardising Britain’s energy security because they would rather appease noisy green campaigners than listen to scientists’ advice.

The result, she says in an exclusive interview, is that government policy is strangling the UK shale gas industry at birth – despite overwhelming scientific evidence that fracking, if properly regulated, is totally safe.

Killing off this industry, says Ms Engel, a former Labour MP, will cause higher, not lower, greenhouse-gas emissions, as we are forced to rely on increased imports of gas.

The United States is the only country to reduce significantly its CO2 emissions; we did it by substitution natural gas for coal in power generation. But Britain’s Greens won’t let that country develop its considerable natural gas reserves.

Extinction Rebellion (XR), which is demanding zero emissions by 2025 – bringing Central London to almost a standstill for much of the past two weeks with its ‘direct action’ protests – also campaigns against fracking.

[L]ast night, [Engel] revealed, she submitted an explosive resignation letter to Energy Secretary Greg Clark. It says she is stepping down because ‘a perfectly viable industry is being wasted because of a Government policy driven by environmental lobbying rather than science, evidence and a desire to see UK industry flourish’.

The Government, it adds, is ‘listening to a small but loud environmental movement that opposes in principle all extraction of fossil fuels. The campaign against fracking has been highly successful in raising the profile – and filling the coffers – of some campaign groups, but they do not represent local residents nor the wider population.’

British Greens suppress natural gas production by limiting earth tremors caused by fracking to 0.5 on the Richter scale, a barely detectable level. No such standard applies to, for example, quarry blasting or construction. Engle explains:

Ms Engel says: ‘A 0.5 tremor is much weaker than the rumble you might feel when walking above a Tube train. Yet if a frack unleashes a tremor rated 0.5 [caused when water is pumped underground into the shale to crack it and release the gas it holds] operators have to stop what they’re doing for 18 hours… this is making fracking impossible.’

The success of fracking in the US and Canada has led to an economic boom in these countries but also, crucially, lower emissions – because burning gas produces far less CO2 than burning coal, which it has partly replaced. In America and Canada, the limits imposed on the tremors that can legally be caused by fracking are much greater, according to Ms Engel: between 2 and 4.5 on the Richter scale.

Given the Greens’ intransigence, how does Britain generate electricity? It simply imports gas that was produced elsewhere, thus increasing CO2 emissions and outsourcing jobs and tax revenues to other countries. It also commits the ultimate environmental folly by burning “biomass,” i.e., low-quality trees from the southern U.S. that are shipped to Britain at considerable expense. I wrote about the biomass folly, which is imposed on Britain by environmentalists, here and here. The last link is especially informative if you are interested in the details of the biomass fiasco.

Britain’s Greens want to substitute renewable energy sources for the natural gas that can be produced by fracking. But, as Ms. Engel explains, this simply can’t be done:

The irony, she says, is that by wrecking the shale gas industry, which the British Geological Survey says has the potential to supply Britain with gas for many decades, the Government is certain to increase emissions.

‘If you look at energy use as a whole, including heating and transport, gas accounts for 40 per cent of the total. There is simply no way renewables can fill that gap at the moment. We get less than five per cent of our total energy from wind and only 0.5 per cent from solar.’

Hence, she says, the inevitable consequence of killing the shale gas industry is that the quantity of gas burnt in UK homes, businesses and power stations imported from abroad will soar – and with it, the far bigger carbon footprint caused by the process of making liquified natural gas and transporting it here. Ms Engel says imported gas already costs £7 billion a year.

Full post
 
7) Climate Change Committee Says Homes Should Be Heated 2C Below What Most People Find Comfortable
Climate Scepticism, 2 May 2019
Jaime Jessop

In order to not save the world from supposedly dangerous anthropogenic global warming (because UK GHG emissions are tiny – and going downwards – in comparison to emissions from China and India, which are huge, and increasing), the UK climate change committee has recommended that householders set their central heating thermostat to 19C. This is 2C below the temperature which most people living in Britain consider to be ideal. It is also 2C below what Age UK recommend for older people in their living rooms, in order to maintain health.

The original idea was that the government insulated people’s homes and encouraged the building of new eco-homes so that it became much easier (and cheaper) to efficiently heat our living spaces to a ‘comfortable’ temperature. It seems that’s not good enough anymore. In order to get to zero emissions by 2050 – thereby virtue-signalling our way into decimating our industrial competitiveness, our environment, economy, and the social and physical mobility of large swathes of the populace, whilst doing virtually nothing to change the climate – we must not heat our homes to the perceived optimum temperature for normal, healthy people and have them a full 2 degrees Celsius colder than that which is recommended to maintain the health of elderly and sick people.

Full post
 
8) Fracking Boss Jim Ratcliffe Hits Out At 'Pathetic' Government
BBC News, 1 May 2019

Britain's richest man has called the government's attitude to fracking for gas "pathetic", accusing ministers of listening to a vocal minority rather than looking at the science.

Sir Jim Ratcliffe, whose firm Ineos is conducting exploratory fracking tests, said the north of England was sitting on potential huge energy resources.

But restrictions were making it unviable for firms, he told the BBC.

On Monday, the UK's shale gas tsar resigned after just six months.

Natascha Engel, a former Labour MP, said fracking was being throttled by rules preventing mini earthquakes.

Current government rules mean fracking must be suspended every time a 0.5 magnitude tremor is detected. But Ms Engel said the cautious approach to tremors had created a de facto ban on fracking.

Mr Ratcliffe said he agreed with Ms Engel's criticism. "I think the government has been pathetic on the subject, frankly - honestly, I do," Mr Ratcliffe said.

The government was listening to "a very vocal, but a minuscule, minority of people, and I think there's a high degree of ignorance".

Full story

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.