Bloomberg News: Paris UN Climate Deal Seen Costing $12.1 Trillion Over 25 Years
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Renewable energy needs 75% more to halt global warming
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Goal of 2 degrees Celsius agreed by 195 nations in December
If the world is serious about halting the worst effects of global warming, the renewable energy industry will require $12.1 trillion of investment over the next quarter century, or about 75 percent more than current projections show for its growth.
That’s the conclusion of a report setting out the scale of the challenge facing policymakers as they look for ways to implement the Paris Agreement that in December set a framework for more than 195 nations to rein in greenhouse gases.
The findings from Bloomberg New Energy Finance and Ceres, a Boston-based coalition of investors and environmentalists, show that wind parks, solar farms and other alternatives to fossil fuels are already on course to get $6.9 trillion over the next 25 years through private investment spurred on by government support mechanisms. Another $5.2 trillion is needed to reach the United Nations goal of holding warming to 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) set out in the climate agreement.
The required expenditure averages about $484 billion a year over the period, compared with business-as-usual levels of $276 billion, according to Bloomberg calculations. Renewables attracted a record $329 billion of investment in 2015, BNEF estimates.
While the figures are large, they’re not as eye-watering as the International Energy Agency’s projection that it’ll cost $13.5 trillion between now and 2030 for countries to implement their Paris pledges, and that an extra $3 billion on top of that will help meet the temperature target. Those figures aren’t just limited to renewables: they also include energy efficiency measures.
CATO Scholars Respond to Obama’s Energy Claims
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Bjorn Lomborg: Is the focus on ‘global warming’ immoral?
In a world in which malnourishment continues to claim at least 1.4 million children’s lives each year, 1.2 billion people live in extreme poverty, and 2.6 billion lack clean drinking water and sanitation, this growing emphasis on climate aid is immoral.
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Providing the world’s most deprived countries with solar panels instead of better health care or education is inexcusable self-indulgence. Green energy sources may be good to keep on a single light or to charge a cellphone. But they are largely useless for tackling the main power challenges for the world’s poor.
According to the World Health Organization, three billion people suffer from the effects of indoor air pollution because they burn wood, coal or dung to cook. These people need access to affordable, reliable electricity today. Yet too often clean alternatives, because they aren’t considered “renewable,” aren’t receiving the funding they deserve.
A 2014 study by the Center for Global Development found that “more than 60 million additional people in poor nations could gain access to electricity if the Overseas Private Investment Corporation”—the U.S. government’s development finance institution—“were allowed to invest in natural gas projects, not just renewables.”…
The most pessimistic climate change scientist has had a sudden change of heart
MacArthur Foundation vows to push climate solutions, starting with $50M pledge to green groups
http://www.eenews.net/stories/1060023643
The charitable foundation known for its annual “genius grants” and its public broadcasting underwriter’s message promoting “a more just, verdant and peaceful world” is deepening its commitment to addressing climate change under a new multimillion-dollar program aimed at building leadership capacity and political consensus around climate solutions.
Roughly $50 million in initial funding, announced this morning by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, will be shared by nine nonprofits engaged in climate policy and advocacy. It is being characterized by the foundation as “a down payment on a major new commitment to help curb global climate disruption by significantly reducing greenhouse gas emissions.”
“Climate change, and its global disruption, threatens to undermine virtually everything we care about as human beings, from quality of life to the economy, from poverty to peace and security,” MacArthur Foundation President Julia Stasch said in a statement announcing the new initiative.…
‘The Climate Crisis & Renewable Energy Industry has become a $1.5-trillion-a-year business’
According to a 200-page analysis by the Climate Change Business Journal, this Climate Industrial Complex can be divided into nine segments: low carbon and renewable power; carbon capture and storage; energy storage, like batteries; energy efficiency; green buildings; transportation; carbon trading; climate change adaptation; and consulting and research. Consulting alone is a $27-billion-per-year industry that handles “reputation management” for companies and tries to link weather events, food shortages and other problems to climate change. Research includes engineering R&D and climate studies.
The $1.5-trillion price tag appears to exclude most of the Big Green environmentalism industry, a $13.4-billion-per-year business in the USA alone. The MacArthur Foundation just gave another $50 million to global warming alarmist groups. Ex-NY Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Chesapeake Energy gave the Sierra Club $105 million to wage war on coal (shortly before the Club began waging war on natural gas and Chesapeake Energy, in what some see as poetic justice). Warren Buffett, numerous “progressive” foundations, Vladimir Putin cronies and countless companies also give endless millions to Big Green.…
Bill Gates Dismisses Solar And Wind Energy, “Can’t Do The Job” …Cost “Beyond Astronomical”.
Bill Gates Dismisses Solar And Wind Energy, “Can’t Do The Job” …Cost “Beyond Astronomical”.
Another prominent thumbs down against wind the current renewable energy craze, this one from Bill Gates. The UK online Register here reports that the technology guru is not impressed by fad renewable energies wind and sun: “Renewable energy can’t do the job. Gov should switch green subsidies into R&D“. Moreover Gates thinks they “aren’t a viable solution for reducing CO2 levels” and that power coming mainly from solar and wind energy “would be beyond astronomical“. Gates made the comments in an interview with the Financial Times. The Register reports: As for a possible solution for energy with low CO2 emissions, Gates thinks the answer lies in technologyinnovation. The Register writes: In Bill Gates’ view, the answer is for governments to divert the massive sums of money which are currently funnelled to renewables owners to R&D instead. Gates also believes that divesture from oil and coal companies will have little impact, and that batteries for storing the sporadic supplies of wind and sun energy are not the answer. Part of the answer, gate believes, is in nuclear power. Read the whole article and analysis here.
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Flashback 2011: ‘Era of Constant Electricity at Home is Ending, says UK power chief’ — ‘Families would have to get used to only using power when it was available’
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The Daily Telegraph – March 2, 2011: ‘Era of Constant Electricity at Home is Ending, says UK power chief’
Excerpt: ‘The days of permanently available electricity may be coming to an end, the head of the power network said yesterday. Families would have to get used to only using power when it was available, rather than constantly, said Steve Holliday, chief executive of National Grid. Mr Holliday was challenged over how the country would “keep the lights on” when it relied more on wind turbines as supplies of gas dwindled. Electricity provided by wind farms will increase six-fold by 2020 but critics complain they only generate on windy days.
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“We are going to change our own behaviour and consume it when it is available and available cheaply.”
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New Yorker: ‘Has climate change made it harder for people to care about conservation?’
http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/04/06/carbon-capture
I accepted its supremacy as the environmental issue of our time, but I felt bullied by its dominance. Not only did it make every grocery-store run a guilt trip; it made me feel selfish for caring more about birds in the present than about people in the future.
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Climaticmatic stress are not well studied, but birds have been adapting to such stresses for tens of millions of years, and they’re surprising us all the time.…
Germany’s Leading Daily Calls For An End To Green Energy Subsidies! Calls Green Promises “A Fairy Tale”
Germany’s Leading Daily Calls For An End To Green Energy Subsidies! Calls Green Promises “A Fairy Tale”
Germany’s leading daily in terms of circulation Bild recently featured an op-ed piece that harshly criticizes Germany’s Energiewende (transisition to renewable energies). Clearly the Energiewende is not even coming close to living up to what is was originally billed to deliver. Despite adding more than 70 gigawatts of wind and solar capacity that will cost consumers some $200 billion, German CO2 emissions have not decreased to speak of. Coal-fired power has actually risen. In summary German electricity prices have skyrocketed and poor consumers are being hit hard. Energy-intensive industries are off-shoring operations – and jobs! A number of experts are calling the Energiewende the greatest wealth redistribution from poor to rich scheme in Germany’s history as wealthy property owners cash in with subsidized zero-risk wind and solar installations. The poor consumers are forced to cough up the money. “Enough with green power!” So it’s little wonder that major German media outlets are beginning to express doubts. Bild features an opinion piece titled: “Enough with green power!” The popular German daily calls the promises of cheap power from wind and sun “a fairy tale”. It writes: Indeed the truth is: The price of power continues to climb. Just in the past five years the power price exploded 29 percent. The reason is simple: In the energy market, central planning rules and not the free market.” Disfigured market Today there is so much installed capacity, Bild writes, that “on days with lots of sunshine and wind, the green power has to be sold to foreign countries” – even if they don’t need it. When that happens the highly subsidized power gets sold at negative prices. The result? Huge losses for power companies. This is how disfigured the electric power market has become. In summary Bild concludes that the price of power is much more expensive than it needs to be and that it is a product that needs to remain affordable. Germany’s energy policy is on the wrong path. Unfortunately there are no signs things will change anytime soon in Germany, which now has the world’s second highest electricity prices in the world after Denmark.
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