It has become increasingly clear that any observed warming during the past century is of natural origin and that the human contribution is insignificant. It is doubtful that any significant warming is attributable to greenhouse gases at all.
Once the public accepts these scientific conclusions, it should have immense consequences for policy. It will mean that the impact of rising CO2 levels is negligibly small, as has already been concluded by the NIPCC (Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change), a group of scientists skeptical of the U.N.-supported IPCC. It would also mean that wind energy, solar energy, and other "non-carbon" energy sources are not needed and are in fact counterproductive. It would remove the need for alternative fuels such as ethanol (which might please many true environmentalists). It would also mean that carbon trading, cap and trade, and fanciful schemes for carbon capture and sequestration would all end up in the dustbin of history.
One may expect a huge outcry and serious and protracted opposition from those who have built their careers on global warming hype and who have made investments in alternative energy or are looking for immense profits from carbon trading. Yet the scientific facts must win out in the long run -- even against the financial interests of favored groups, wind farm profiteers, ethanol refiners, carbon traders, and the investment firms and banks that have placed hundreds of billions of dollars of their clients' money into green projects.
Nothing has been learned from European disastrous experiences, it seems. As Bjorn Lomborg (a firm believer in AGW) reports, Germany led the world in putting up solar panels, funded by €47 billion in subsidies. The lasting legacy is a massive debt and lots of inefficient solar technology sitting on rooftops throughout a fairly cloudy country, delivering a trivial 0.1% of its total energy supply. Denmark's wind industry is almost completely dependent on taxpayer subsidies, and Danes pay the highest electricity rates of any industrialized nation. Spain has finally discontinued its solar subsidies as too costly; as Prof. Gabriel Calzada reports, the program actually caused a net loss of jobs.
Having successfully exploited domestic subsidies, Europeans are now looking at the United States as the new "land of opportunity." A recent example (described in the Wall Street Journal of Oct. 26, 2010) is the world's largest solar-thermal power plant, on 7,000 acres of Federal land in the desert of southern California. The $6-billion project is a venture by two German companies, and it may be eligible for a cash subsidy of nearly one billion dollars in taxpayer money. Even after these subsidies, the cost of the electricity generated will be 30 to 70 percent more expensive than electricity generated by natural gas, the dominant electricity-generating fuel in California.
In addition to direct subsidies, the companies are seeking federal loan guarantees and, no doubt, an array of benefits from the State of California. Solar Trust of America, a joint venture between Germany's Solar Millennium AG and privately held (mostly by Arab oil money) Ferrostaal AG, is awaiting approval from the Energy Department for a federal loan guarantee for the first two of its four planned units. Deutsche Bank AG and Citigroup Inc. are working with Solar Trust to obtain project-equity and tax-equity investment.
The White House claims that the federal cash subsidy will create three hundred permanent jobs (at about $3 million per job!). The nature of the jobs is not specified, but one may assume that there will be much need for sweepers to remove dust and dirt from about 7,000 acres of solar mirrors. Not exactly "high-tech," is it?
Comments
Hide the following 6 comments
Crimes against humanity
05.11.2010 22:03
Reason: among others, it is deliberately confusing.
-though it is a good reminder that Bjorn Lomborg still needs to face trial.
Anon
Dont Hide
06.11.2010 06:21
Thank you.
Mr Hyde
How do you take yourself seriously?!
06.11.2010 15:50
You're sounding pretty desperate to me.
sdfl
The economics of solar panels
06.11.2010 23:23
It is dead simple. Solar panels are the most visible technology to troll. But what about all the other renewables that are being installed in the EU. All those renewables are making the EU far mor competitive than the US. Those renewables are also contributing to the collapse of existing energy suppliers. Remember Enron: desparately trading energy faster and faster to make less and less money for shell companies? That is the truth of Climate Scepticism: all these nasty renewables are destroying profits.
Oh yes. Solar panels are now 5000% more efficient than they were in 1998. So, they have become economic for people who are USING not TRADING energy. As the Judge might not recognise the difference between using and trading, you might want to explain about the global economics department conspiracy - where university economists are making up this huge myth about markets and free trade in order to....
A German Panellist
A Sad Case of Denial Disease
10.11.2010 02:56
While the Republicans hunt climate witches, massive climate-driven events are hitting all over the world. This all smells like the Pope investigating Galileo, one of the first scientists.
Anything for a vote, or a big oil buck.
I'm hoping readers here have more brains that to believe this denial crap. It's way, way too late for that.
Alex Smith
host
Radio Ecoshock
Alex Smith
Homepage:
http://www.ecoshock.org
Solar panels are now 5000% more efficient than they were in 1998.
15.11.2010 10:32
one word "bullshit" prove it!
Mike D