Favourite climate-related quote of the week so far:
The claim that AGW is consistent with heavier snowfalls wasn’t mainstream until it needed to be true.
It’s a comment, from Nicholas Hallam, on this, at Bishop Hill. Heh.
Although, actually, the recent Bishop Hill posting that I find most interesting is this one, which is about a bunch of solar power grant guzzlers begging to have their grants renewed at the level they have become accustomed to. Something along those lines. The absence of any widespread public support for these chancers will reveal just what a propaganda beating the greenies have been taking for the last few years, not least from blogs like this one. Most people will react to these green supplications, if they react at all, only by saying something like: “Oh you’re losing your jobs, bad luck, join the club, but actually what we really don’t like is our fuel bills doubling.”
Until now, it’s all been sane people begging the politicians to stop chucking money down the green drain. Now the politicians are starting to rearrange things a tiny bit against the interests of some of the politically less well connected greenies, and these greenies are now also starting to beg. Yes, folks, it’s the reversing of the burden of proof. We no longer have to convince them that all that “settled science” isn’t so settled after all. They have to convince us that they aren’t scam artists. Or deluding themselves. Or a bit of both. Good luck guys.
Billions are still being tipped down the green drain. This is only the very beginning of the end of the great green scam, which will probably never completely disappear. But, once the politicians realise how little support there is for green subsidies, they will get bolder, and cut them some more. And the greenies will scream some more. And the arms of the general public will remain folded, their faces blank with contempt.
About time.
LATER: More:
“We built a business on the back of David Cameron’s promises. He has betrayed us twice. Anybody thinking of investing in government-sponsored green opportunities, I would advise them to run away.”
Or government-sponsored anything else, come to that. Welcome to politics, mate.
I watched an episode of Dragons’ Den recently, when one of the people pitching for money was a sweaty little spiv who wanted investment in his solar panel business. The little piggies couldn’t wait to get on board, because of the government subsidy this scam attracts. The fact that this subsidy is paid by poor people to help millionaires get richer was something they obviously saw as a feature, not a bug. The idea that these subsidies will now be cut is hilarious, I do so hope that the Dragons don’t lose any of their money, that would be too horrible to contemplate.
Brian, there is more controversy within the scientific community; a repeat, in some ways, of the email scandal at the University of East Anglia a year or so ago. (Bishop Hill of course played a great role in unmasking that whole business).
The alarmists are starting to look pretty vulnerable. Indeed, the UK political establishment, with David Cameron to the fore, seem to be almost out of touch with a great deal of rapidly-shifting opinion.
As I have wondered before, just when will a major, credible politician start to hit this message home? About the only one I can think of is Boris Johnson, and he isn’t really a serious figure.
Ex-Chancellor Nigel Lawson strikes me as very credible, and he has argued cogently and often against the preposterous alarm over CO2. But he is, I suppose no longer ‘major’. I do agree that there is a huge opportunity here for a politician of high integrity to make a great contribution. But virtually all of our MPs voted for the insane Climate Change Act, despite it being cobbled together over frantic months by a handful of activists and an arts graduate since ennobled. The politician will have to face admitting a severe change of opinion. That makes me think we shall have to wait for new talent.
JP
The latest little attempt by the CAGWists to claim victory (BEST etc.) had its trousers torn off in about an hour, by the first skeptics to read the report that the stupid headlines were based on. The point being such trickery no longer works, when it comes to silencing opposition. It merely supplies new ammunition to prove, to all except those who absolutely refuse to see it, how dishonest – and stupid – the climate “scientists” are.
In other words, the most recent debates have changed very little. The CAGWists were trying to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat. They failed. They only made the defeat worse.
One side says: there is no argument. The other side says: there is an argument. Onlookers, not unnaturally, now conclude: well, I guess there is an argument. I.e. the CAGWists have lost the argument, if by that is meant (and it is) that the attempt to achieve a near-unanimous public opinion on the matter, in favour of greenery, has now collapsed. All the skeptics had to do was convince the world that there is serious doubt about all this stuff, as indeed there is. The skeptics have now done this. The skeptics have won the argument. And that was true before the latest little round of arguing.
Those who said that winning an intellectual victory didn’t matter and that only the money and power matters were flat out wrong. Both are crucial. Intellectual victories matter. Ideas, bad and now good, have huge consequences.
But now that the argument has ended, in a skeptic dominated stalemate, my attention at least now shifts to decisions, to cut funding and to dump green regulations. Can this intellectual victory now be turned into a political and policy victory? This, I believe, is where the action now is.
Which is why this little demo, and the fact that I expect it to be a dismal failure, is of such interest to me.
By the way, the original title of this posting was wrong, and I have corrected it.
It used to read: “Greenies are now starting to need the support of the general public”.
This was wrong, because it implied that they might, in my opinion, get it.
It now reads “beg for the support of the general public”, which strongly implies that in my opinion they won’t get it.
Apologies for not getting in right first time.
I just wish someone would tell the BBC that the “CAGWists have lost the argument” but they have far too much to lose: http://climateresearchnews.com/2010/02/bbc-pension-funds-linked-to-climate-policy/
Frank S, the politicians can save face by claiming that they believe in their hearts that AGW is true but concede that the nation cannot afford to deal with it in the current economic climate. It’s the best we can hope for.
The number of people who read blogs like these, or who actually try and understand the issue objectively is relatively few. While most of us here accept that climate science is far from settled, and are sceptics of AGW, the vast majority of the population of the western world are completely convinced by AGW, they just are apathetic about it. In the same way as the vast general public is apathetic about nearly everything. Do not start thinking that anything will change soon. The general public and mainstream media can be convinced of something long after the better informed believe the opposite.
Someone tell the Greenies that homeowners who do not employ butlers or buy their golf carts from Aston Martin are not willing to shell out over 10K (6200-ish Pounds Sterling) for a supplemental home power source.
What will bring down the cost of solar?
A fair question, Alan. Let me take a crack at it.
Fundamentally, what would drive down the cost is more widespread use. As with any new technology, once it becomes widely adopted the growing market will attrach new entrants and more efficient manufacturing processes, all of which will serve to reduce prices. It’s not so much the photoelectric cells themselves as all the ancillary equipment (inverters, etc.).
But for that to happen we will still need some better battery technology. (Indeed, that’s a stumbling block for everything from electric cars to cell phones.) Power generated during the day must be stored for use at night, and at present that requires large banks of expensive batteries. Until that improves I don’t see a much higher adoption rate than at present.
It would also help if more utilities permitted “reverse metering”. If you could sell your excess power back to the grid it would drive down the effective cost of alternate energy sources (wind as well as solar) and thus make it more attractive to more people. And in fairness many states in the US are changing their laws to permit, or even mandate, just that.
And finally, as electric rates continue to climb the cost of private solar power will become relatively less expensive. The Obama administration and the “green” movement seem determined to make that happen, so you may get your wish soon enough!
As long as there is an interlocked global political class whose continuing engorgement requires an ever increasing state with ever increasing funds and ever increasing jurisdiction over more and more of the activities of everyday life, statist policy preferences will continue to be the path down which the societies of the world are led.
Even the developing economic powers, which had rejected many of the restrictive policies urged on them by the advocates of AGW, have recently realized the tremendous political leverage these limiting policies give their respective ruling groups, and started paying lip service to the proposals to control CO2.
Once again, it must be said—the idea that these corrupt, self-serving, political cliques might be sufficiently skilled and knowledgeable to manage entire national economies, or enact beneficial global policies, is so ridiculous that only a fervent true believer could possibly fall for such nonsense.
The whole of the 20th century was a global laboratory for the collectivist worldview to demonstrate its superiority over the chaos of the more liberal societies which made at least some allowance for individual liberties.
Is there really any honest doubt as to the results of that experiment?
No, all there is left is a pseudo-religious fanaticism which claims, regardless of all evidence to the contrary, that the technological heart of modern society must be cut out on the altar of the “peril-du-jour”, and its life’s blood of individual freedom and creativity allowed to drain down the gutters of collectivism, lest the goddess Gaeia cook us in our beds.
As in all issues, the first question is, “qui bono?”.
It is extremely unlikely that the answer to that question will be “the ordinary person trying to live, work, and raise a family in peace, with a modicum of comfort and individual freedom.”