GWPF Newsletter: Climate Activists Ditch Polar Bear Icon

'Not Going Extinct': Court Documents Claim Canadian Polar Bear Population Is Thriving

In this newsletter:

1) 'Not Going Extinct': Court Documents Claim Canadian Polar Bear Population Is Thriving
Toronto Sun, 4 November 2019
 
2) Winning: Climate Activists Ditch Polar Bear Icon As Growing Populations Defy ‘Emergency’ Narrative
The American Mirror, 30 October 2019

 
3) Trump Formally Pulls Out Of Paris Climate Agreement
The Hill, 4 November 2019 
 
4) Reality Check: Paris Agreement -- A Blank Cheque For CO2 Emissions By China And India
Global Warming Policy Foundation, 26 May 2016 
 
5) Told You So: Meeting Paris Climate Goals 'Looks Unrealistic' As Energy Consumption Grows
Edie News, 4 November 2019
 
6) Lawsuit Says Obama Entered Paris Climate Agreement Illegally, Cites Mysterious Legal Memo
Daily Caller, 4 November 2019
 
7) Germany Faces Popular Revolt Over Hated Windmills
Bloomberg October 2019  
 
8) The UK Shale Gas Fracking ‘Ban’: Who Wins, Who Loses?
Dr John Constable: GWPF Energy Editor, 3 November 2019
 
9) And Finally: Australian PM Threatens To Outlaw Radical Climate Protests That Threaten The Economy
Deutsche Welle, 1 November 2019

Full details:

1) 'Not Going Extinct': Court Documents Claim Canadian Polar Bear Population Is Thriving
Toronto Sun, 4 November 2019

The polar bear population is increasing according to federal affidavits submitted by Inuit groups, Blacklock’s Reporter reports.

“Inuit have not noticed a significant decline in the health of the polar bears,” the director of wildlife management for the Nunavik Marine Region Wildlife Board wrote in a court affidavit.

“In fact Nunavik Inuit report that it is rare to see a skinny bear and most bears are observed to be healthy,” the affidavit read.

Environment Minister Catherine McKenna and organizations such as the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) have used the polar bear population as evidence of the effect of climate change.

However, the affidavit claimed Nunavut residents have seen an “increase in the polar bear population and a particularly notable increase since the 1980s.” The affidavits were submitted in response to hunting quota cuts made by Environment Canada.

Environment Canada cited “conservation concerns” as justification for the cuts. The Inuit challenge was ultimately dismissed.

One hunter was quoted in a Wildlife Board report saying there’s no “shortage” of polar bears and that “they’re (polar bears) not going extinct.”

Full story
 

see also: State of the Polar Bear Report 2018

2) Winning: Climate Activists Ditch Polar Bear Icon As Growing Populations Defy ‘Emergency’ Narrative
The American Mirror, 30 October 2019

Polar bears are out, and pictures of people in misery after natural disasters and choking on smog are in.

 

GWPF TV – Death of a Climate Icon

The suggested shift what “journalists” should focus on when covering the so-called “climate emergency” comes from The Guardian’s picture editor Fiona Shields, who argues “we need new imagery for new narratives.”

There’s one other convenient benefit: Polar bears are thriving in the changing climate, an inconvenient truth that contradicts the doom-and-gloom narrative promoted by climate alarmists.

“We know, from years of experience, that people love polar bears and pandas, so it is easy to see how these appealing creatures have become the emblems for the topics of endangered species and what we previously termed as global warming,” Shields wrote.

“Often, when signaling environmental stories to our readers, selecting an image of a polar bear on melting ice has been the obvious – though not necessarily appropriate – choice,” she continued. “These images tell a certain story about the climate crisis but can seem remote and abstract – a problem that is not a human one, nor one that is particularly urgent.”

The idea to focus instead on pictures of Chinese with smog masks and piles of plastic trash in developing countries comes from a group called Climate Visuals, an arm of the UK Climate Outreach lobbying group.

Climate Outreach bills itself as “a team of social scientists & comms specialists passionate about helping organisations communicate climate change beyond the green bubble.”

Shields is all in.

She’s convinced photos of folks basking in the sun at the beach or enjoying a snowy day sledding with their children are an injustice to climate change, and journalists should focus on “getting the emotional tone of imagery in line with the issue.” She wants other climate “journalists” to “join the conversation,” as well.

Full story
 
3) Trump Formally Pulls Out Of Paris Climate Agreement
The Hill, 4 November 2019 

President Trump on Monday began the yearlong process of withdrawing the U.S. from the Paris climate accord.

The official announcement cements a promise Trump made in the White House Rose Garden in 2017 when he first announced his intention to withdraw from the global climate change agreement signed by every other country in the world.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced the move in a statement.

“President Trump made the decision to withdraw from the Paris Agreement because of the unfair economic burden imposed on American workers, businesses, and taxpayers by U.S. pledges made under the Agreement,” Pompeo said. “The United States has reduced all types of emissions, even as we grow our economy and ensure our citizens’ access to affordable energy.”

“The U.S. approach incorporates the reality of the global energy mix,” he added, arguing “innovation and open markets” will drive emissions reductions.

Full story
 
4) Reality Check: Paris Agreement -- A Blank Cheque For CO2 Emissions By China And India
Global Warming Policy Foundation, 26 May 2016 

The Paris Climate Agreement, far from securing a reduction in global CO2 emissions, is fundamentally a blank cheque that allows China and India to increase their emissions as they see fit in pursuit of economic growth.



This is the conclusion of a new paper by Law Professor David Campbell (Lancaster University Law School) and published today by the Global Warming Policy Foundation.

For the last 25 years, international climate change law has failed to agree a programme of global emissions reductions. Indeed this law grants a permission to major emitters such as China and India to emit as much as they see fit. Global emissions reductions therefore have always been impossible and since 1992 global emissions have enormously increased.

Indeed, the Paris Agreement contains a categorical statement that countries such as China and India will not be obliged to undertake any reductions.

The UK Government proposes to continue with decarbonisation even though Britain’s unilateral decarbonisation is utterly pointless and thus wholly irrational.

Full paper (PDF)
 
5) Told You So: Meeting Paris Climate Goals 'Looks Unrealistic' As Energy Consumption Grows
Edie News, 4 November 2019

Global energy demand rose by 2.3% year-on-year in 2018 - a trajectory which, if sustained, will leave the world unable to meet international and national climate goals including the Paris Agreement.

That is the key finding of Capgemini’s new World Energy Markets Observatory report (WEMO), published today (4 November).

Developed in partnership with research and advisory firm VaasaETT and French law firm De Pardieu Brocas Maffei, the report tracks key climate and energy-related trends on an annual basis, taking into account national and international data surrounding policy frameworks, emissions and energy investment.

The report states that globally, progress towards key climate goals is “under threat” due to growing energy consumption – partly due to population growth and industry expansion, particularly in nations such as China and India.

Full story
 
6) Lawsuit Says Obama Entered Paris Climate Agreement Illegally, Cites Mysterious Legal Memo
Daily Caller, 4 November 2019

Former President Barack Obama illegally entered into the Paris climate agreement, a lawsuit filed Monday says, citing a legal memo the Obama administration allegedly used to justify the deal.

The lawsuit asserts that the Obama administration argued the agreement could be signed without Senate approval because it does not set “legally binding targets and timetables.” Such justifications are a misrepresentation of the law, according to the lawsuit.

“This memo demonstrates the Obama administration’s unlawful entry into the Paris treaty,” Chris Horner, a former senior fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, noted in a press statement attached to the lawsuit. The memo “represents a major political and legal scandal,” he added. Horner left CEI in April.

The lawsuit seeks documents related to the memo from the U.S. State Department through a Freedom of Information Act request.

Horner is an attorney at the Government Accountability & Oversight (GAO) in April. The nonprofit group filed the lawsuit on behalf of Energy Policy Advocates. He cited a legal memo that allegedly justifies Obama’s decision to enter the climate deal, which compels the U.S. and 200 other countries to cut greenhouse gas emissions 26% to 28% by 2025.

Senate approval is required for any international deal that seeks “to adopt 1 targets and timetables,” not merely those that are “legally binding,” Horner noted in the lawsuit, referring to a referendum produced by the Senate in 1992 after the Kyoto Protocol, an international climate agreement designed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The U.S. never ratified Kyoto.

Full story
 
7) Germany Faces Popular Revolt Over Hated Windmills
Bloomberg October 2019

The giant windmills have grown so unpopular that their construction in Germany has all but ground to a halt.

Despite their surging popularity in Germany and elsewhere in Europe, the Greens did badly in last Sunday’s election in the German state of Thuringia, and the nationalists from the Alternative for Germany Party (AfD) did very well. An important reason is that the Greens support wind energy and the AfD militates against wind turbines. The giant windmills have grown so unpopular in neighboring communities that their construction in Germany has all but ground to a halt.

There are nearly 30,000 wind turbines in Germany, more than anywhere else in Europe. Only China and the U.S., both much bigger countries, have more. Germany gets 23.5% of its energy from wind this year; it’s the biggest source of renewable energy for the country. But in the first half of 2019, only 35 wind turbines were added — an 82% drop compared with the first six months of 2018. Last year was bad, too: Just 743 turbines were added, compared with 1,792 in 2017.

This is happening because it’s getting harder to get permission to erect the turbine towers. Local regulations are getting stricter. Bavaria decided back in 2014 that the distance between a wind turbine and the nearest housing must be 10 times the height of the mast, which, given the density of dwellings, makes it hard to find a spot anywhere. Wind energy development is practically stalled in the state now.

Full story
  8) The UK Shale Gas Fracking ‘Ban’: Who Wins, Who Loses?
Dr John Constable: GWPF Energy Editor, 3 November 2019

The UK government’s new long-term moratorium on shale gas exploration will reduce competition and increase prices in the markets supplying methane to produce the large quantities of hydrogen without which the Net Zero emissions target for 2050 is infeasible.  Odd though it may seem, a shale gas “ban” makes climate change mitigation even more expensive.

In response to a technical report by the UK regulator, the Oil and Gas Authority, (Interim report of the scientific analysis of data gathered from Cuadrilla’s operations at Preston New Road), the United Kingdom’s Department of Business Energy and Industrial Strategy, has announced a “moratorium” on shale gas exploration, which has been “paused […] unless and until further evidence is provided that it can be carried out safely here” (“Government ends support for fracking”).

In spite of the headlines, this is far from a “ban”, though a reader might easily be misled into thinking it was by the forceful title of the official statement. The rest of the government’s announcement, disproportionate though it may be to the cautionary conclusions of the OGA analysis, certainly does not announce an “end” to support for shale gas.

The half-hearted stridency of the press release was echoed in subsequent remarks by the Secretary of State, Andrea Leadsom, who covered all bases when she observed that shale gas presented a “huge opportunity provided that it can be [done] safely”.  Asked if the moratorium was “forever”, the Secretary of State replied that it would remain in place for the “foreseeable future”, which may be functionally equivalent to infinity as far as investors are concerned, but falls very far short of being a firm rejection in perpetuity.

Nevertheless, the weakening of support is tangible. The Secretary of State went on to emphasise that no further planning applications for shale gas exploration will be consented, and that the permitting process would not, as had been previously planned, be moved into the category of National Significant Infrastructure Projects (NSIP), a consenting regime regarded as more likely to be favourable to the industry (Interview with the Rt Hon Andrea Leadsom, Secretary of State for BEIS).

The traffic lights, as it were, seem to be flickering from red to green and back again to red with barely an interval.

Full post
 
9) And Finally: Australian PM Threatens To Outlaw Radical Climate Protests That Threaten The Economy
Deutsche Welle, 1 November 2019

Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison on Friday threatened to outlaw climate protests, accusing them of increasingly disrupting the country’s lucrative mining industry.


Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison has described the climate justice movement as a “new breed of radical activism.”

The conservative head of Australia’s government has described climate protesters as a “new breed of radical activism.” Critics have accused Scott Morrison of trying to weaken fundamental rights in the country.

“We are working to identify serious mechanisms that can successfully outlaw these indulgent and selfish practices that threaten the livelihoods of fellow Australians,” Morrison said.

His proposal comes a day after protesters attempted to blockade a mining conference in Melbourne, which at one point triggered clashes with police.

“The right to protest does not mean there is an unlimited license to disrupt people’s lives and disrespect your fellow Australians,” Morrison said.

Morrison, who won a surprise electoral victory earlier this year, has refused to take steps to curb emissions from the coal mining industry in Australia. He is renowned for bringing coal to a parliamentary session in a show of support for the carbon-intensive resource.

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.