An Inconvenient Boner

Al Gore is half right on ethanol | The Daily Caller

Dave Juday writes that late in 2010, biofuels policy briefly became a marquee topic when none other than Al Gore opined that “it is not a good policy to have these massive subsidies for first-generation ethanol,” referring to a whole suite of subsidies and mandates for corn-based ethanol. History will note the first statute to mandate the use of ethanol as an additive to certain reformulated gasoline blends passed the U.S. Senate in 1994 by then-Vice President Gore’s tie-breaking vote. The 111th Congress renewed the tax credit — but lawmakers and industry officials agreed that a more thorough debate should be had in 2011. The effect of ethanol subsidies on food prices — especially meat prices — is of particular concern. Beef prices increased 1.9 percent in February and are 10.8 percent above last February’s prices, with steak prices up 11.2 percent and ground beef prices up 9.9 percent. Pork prices increased 1 percent in February and are 8.9 percent above last February’s level.

http://dailycaller.com/2011/04/11/al-gore-is-half-right-on-ethanol/

Do Economists Agree on Climate Change? Yes | Ideas in Action

Robert Whaples reports that a poll of PhD economists, randomly selected from the ranks of the American Economic Association, reveals that most economists are not alarmed by the likelihood of continued carbon dioxide emissions. The Great Depression of 1929 to 1933 caused inflation-adjusted GDP to fall a numbing 27%. Few economists think that rising GHGs will have anywhere near this impact - only one in eight predict that GDP will fall by more than 10 percent. Almost twice as many believe that rising greenhouse gas levels will cause the economy to grow. The most popular response is that rising greenhouse gas levels will have virtually no impact on income per person (less than 1 percent lower or higher). The vast majority (73.2%) predict that the impact will be less than 5 percent one way or the other. (Here are the complete responses: a) more than 10 percent lower = 12.5%; b) about 5 to 10 percent lower = 7.1%; c) about 1 to 5 percent lower = 21.4%; d) less than 1 percent lower or higher = 35.7%; e) about 1 to 5 percent higher = 16.1%; f) more than 5 percent higher = 7.1%.)

http://www.ideasinactiontv.com/tcs_daily/2006/12/do-economists-agree-on-climate-change-yes.html

Economy In Jeopardy As Budget Deal Affirms EPA Climate Programs | Forbes

James Taylor writes that some federal programs are more damaging to the national economy than other federal programs. Accordingly, some federal spending cuts are more important to the U.S. economy than other federal spending cuts. By leaving intact Environmental Protection Agency funds to devise, implement, and enforce carbon dioxide restrictions, the House Republican leadership sowed the seeds of economic catastrophe in last week’s federal budget deal, regardless of how much spending they pared from the federal budget.

Regardless of whether the alleged spending cuts were truly spending cuts, the ongoing fixation on the raw dollar amount misses a much more important point. Excessive budget deficits are dangerous because they threaten future economic growth. Keeping this in mind, excessive budget deficits are not the sole threat to future economic growth. Some federal spending threatens future economic growth more than other federal spending. Indeed, even a balanced federal budget can devastate present and future economic activity if the spending programs are especially antagonistic to economic growth.

While Republican apologists claim victory after negotiating $38 billion in alleged spending cuts this year, they left intact funding for the EPA to impose $200 billion to $300 billion in annual punishment on the U.S. economy through carbon dioxide restrictions. Even if Boehner had convinced the Democratic leadership to accept a full $100 billion in annual spending cuts, the economic benefits of such spending cuts would pale in comparison to the economic damage imposed by EPA carbon dioxide restrictions.

http://blogs.forbes.com/jamestaylor/2011/04/13/economy-in-jeopardy-as-budget-deal-affirms-epa-climate-programs/

The Intelligent Voter’s Guide to Global Warming | Quadrant

Geoffrey Lehmann, Peter Farrell & Dick Warburton write that with Julia Gillard’s sudden switch to support for a carbon price, Australia in 2013 could be the first country to hold an election with anthropogenic global warming (AGW) as the pivotal issue. If Tony Abbott is still Opposition Leader he will see an emissions trading scheme (ETS), or carbon tax, as a target that is as vulnerable as John Hewson’s GST proposal in 1993. At that time Abbott was Hewson’s press secretary, and Hewson was “cooked slowly” by Paul Keating in a protracted election campaign.

We have written this piece as an intelligent voter’s guide to global warming—to provide basic information often missing from the debate. In Part 1 we examine the science, and in Part 2 the practicalities of an ETS and carbon tax, and the politics. All three aspects—science, economics and the associated politics—intersect and drive each other.

http://www.quadrant.org.au/magazine/issue/2011/3/the-intelligent-voter-s-guide-to-global-warming

http://www.quadrant.org.au/magazine/issue/2011/4/the-intelligent-voter-s-guide-to-global-warming-part-ii

Al Gore Cancels April Fools’ Day for Planet Earth | The Spoof

The Spoof reports that former U.S. Vice President Al Gore has recently stated that: "Things are so bad in the world, there's nothing to laugh at this year. Therefore, I have canceled April Fools' Day for 2011." Word is that Gore took this action in the hope that he will win another Nobel Peace Prize, like the one he won in 2007. Estranged wife Tipper Gore was reluctant to comment on Al's ruling. "Y'know," she said. "I think I'll just go with Abraham Lincoln's observation: It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to open one's mouth and remove all doubt."

http://www.thespoof.com/news/spoof.cfm?headline=s3i93865

Al Gore’s seawater swindle | The Washington Times

The Editor of The Washington Times writes that a recent study gathered U.S. tide-gauge readings from 57 stations where water levels had been continuously recorded for as long as 156 years. The result did suggest the sea level was increasing in the western Pacific, but this was offset by a drop in the level near the Alaskan coast. "Our analyses do not indicate acceleration in sea level in U.S. tide gauge records during the 20th century,” the study’s authors concluded. “Instead, for each time period we consider, the records show small decelerations that are consistent with a number of earlier studies of worldwide-gauge records.”

Perhaps Mr. Gore knows this. Last year, he reportedly dropped $8.9 million on a new mansion in an exclusive California neighborhood perilously close to the Pacific. With six bedrooms, six fireplaces and nine baths, Mr. Gore’s palatial ocean-view estate hardly reflects the carbon austerity he expects from everyone else. He was even caught a few years ago by the Tennessee Center for Policy Research failing to extinguish all of the lights in his larger home during “Earth Hour” in the Volunteer State.

This time around, fewer people appeared to participate in Saturday’s futile effort to showcase their awareness of global warming by turning off lights and electronic appliances for 60 minutes. According to the Montreal Gazette, power usage in Edmonton, Canada, actually increased by 1.01 percent during Earth Hour. Nothing has done a better job of cleaning up cities and extending human life than the availability of power and mobility. Instead of embracing the cold and darkness for an hour, it makes far more sense to turn on an extra incandescent bulb and read a book by its warm glow.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/mar/28/al-gores-seawater-swindle/

http://thehill.com/blogs/pundits-blog/energy-a-environment/152205-al-gore-blasts-climate-change-deniers-fundraises-for-house-dems

Nuclear Hysteria | The Independent Institute

Alvaro Vargas Llosa, author of The Che Guevara Myth and the Future of Liberty, writes that in half a century, except for the accident at Chernobyl, the very few notable incidents involving commercial reactors had minor consequences. This includes Three Mile Island in 1979, despite a partial meltdown: No one died and the levels of radiation released into the atmosphere were roughly similar to those produced by natural sources. Chernobyl, by contrast, was a victim of the Soviet Union’s political system. Despite the decrepit state of its nuclear technology, the Soviet state refused to acknowledge a problem, let alone ask for help. Past experience teaches how counterproductive overreactions can be in this sensitive field. The United States would be less dependent on fossil fuels and the Middle East (and Venezuela) if Three Mile Island had not caused three decades of virtual paralysis in its nuclear industry. Perhaps the fiasco of ethanol subsidies, which have contributed to the scarcity of food supplies, might have been avoided too.

Few parts of the world have experienced a psychosis comparable to that of a good many Europeans following the events unfolding at Japan’s earthquake-damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. The European Union’s energy commissioner, Guenther Oettinger, went from declaring a nuclear “apocalypse” to confirming an atomic “catastrophe” to stating that a number of Europe’s reactors are unsafe. German Chancellor Angela Merkel, the EU’s most influential leader, ordered a shutdown of all German reactors built before 1980. And the European media have encouraged the public to consume iodine as a precaution against radiation poisoning, despite the two vast oceans and sprawling North American continent that eastern-blowing wind from Japan would need to cross in order to reach Europe. It would be a tragic mistake for Europe to reverse the encouraging trend of recent years toward the revival of nuclear energy for civilian use. Only Russia’s autocrats and Middle Eastern tyrants, on whom European energy has an unhealthy reliance, would stand to gain.

http://www.independent.org/newsroom/article.asp?id=3017

What Really Threatens Our Future? | Townhall

Willie Soon and Barun Mitra write that energy is the Master Resource, the key to everything else. Only our Ultimate Resource – our creative intellect – is more important. People who have abundant, reliable, affordable energy – and the freedom to use it – can turn dreams and ideas into reality. Those who must rely on human and animal muscle, or open fires, remain poor. Certainly, wind turbines and solar panels are far better than primitive energy. They can bless remote villages with electricity. But they are nothing compared to reliable electricity from hydrocarbon, hydroelectric and nuclear power.

However, policies based on false claims that we can control Earth’s climate restrict access to energy and increase its cost. They perpetuate poverty, and prevent people from building better homes, having comfortable lighting and heating, using computers and modern conveniences, preserving food and medicines, and even surviving natural disasters and adapting to climate change. But even if carbon dioxide does affect climate, China, India and Brazil are building power plants and automobiles at a record pace. Their people are rapidly climbing out of poverty, using coal, oil, natural gas and hydroelectric power to achieve their dreams. Leaders of these countries are not going to tell their still-poor people that they cannot enjoy the benefits that plentiful, affordable, dependable energy can provide.

For awhile longer, rich countries will continue supporting global warming research and conferences. Researchers, bureaucrats and politicians will continue issuing dire warnings of imminent catastrophes, while they enjoy the benefits of modern energy, traveling on airplanes, attending talk fests at fancy hotels in exotic locations – all powered by coal and petroleum. They may continue telling the world’s poor how important and admirable it is that we keep living traditional, sustainable, environment-friendly lifestyles; getting by on small amounts of intermittent, unreliable, expensive electricity from wind turbines and solar panels; and giving up our dreams of a better, healthier, more prosperous life.

http://townhall.com/columnists/williesoon/2011/03/21/what_really_threatens_our_future/page/full/

Alert Al Gore: Snowcap Covers Mount Kilimanjaro | Fox News

Stan Freeman writes that if there is a poster child for global warming, it may be the vanishing snows of Kilimanjaro, which were predicted to disappear as early as 2015 in a widely-publicized report a decade ago. However, the famed snowcap is stubbornly persisting on the African peak and may not fully vanish for another 50 years, according to a University of Massachusetts scientist who had a hand in the prediction.

http://nation.foxnews.com/global-warming/2011/03/21/alert-al-gore-snowcap-covers-mount-kilimanjaro

The Garnaut Reviews’ Omissions of Material Facts | Lavoisier Group

Economist Timothy Curtin writes that Professor Ross Garnaut‟s Update 5 - The Science of Climate Change is notable for its avoidance of econometrics and counterfactuals, and concludes by invoking the authority of the Royal Society, the National Academies of Sciences (USA), and the Australian Academy of Science with their support for the findings of the International Panel on Climate Change that global warming is caused by airborne carbon dioxide. In an uncanny repeat of the views of the peak authorities in 1850, the IPCC‟s Climate Change 2007 - The Physical Science Basis goes out of its way to dismiss any role in climate change for the emissions of water vapour that are simultaneous with emissions of carbon dioxide whenever there is combustion of hydrocarbon fuels. Yet basic chemistry and physics show that while water vapour emissions are only in the range of 30-50 per cent of CO2 emissions by weight, in addition to any moisture content of the fuel, their effect on surface temperature is much larger. It follows that the Australian tax on carbon to be proposed by Garnaut‟s next Update paper (17 March 2011) will also be a tax on water vapour and thereby, unavoidably, on rainfall. The political implications of that remain to be played out, but it is characteristic of all the Garnaut work on climate change that it dwells only on the supposed external costs of hydrocarbon combustion and never mentions the demonstrably larger benefits of elevated atmospheric carbon dioxide and rainfall on the world‟s primary production.

http://www.lavoisier.com.au/articles/climate-policy/garnaut/Curtin-the-science-of-climate-change-and-carbon-taxes.pdf