This is a cut and paste of a mid-September feature article from the last issue of my ECONOMIC LOGIC newsletter.
The formatting did not transfer perfectly to this blog, and if there are any words spelled wrong, I blame the "confuser", not me:
The formatting did not transfer perfectly to this blog, and if there are any words spelled wrong, I blame the "confuser", not me:
THE GREEN NEW SOCIALISM:
An Existential Threat to the U.S. Economy !
THE BIG PICTURE:
This article is based on the early 2019 congressional resolution introduced by Ocasio-Cortez (D., New York) and Senator Edward Markey (D., Mass.), which included no cost estimate:
Since the 1970s, some people have been predicting rising atmospheric CO2 levels will cause a "climate crisis". That's almost 50 years of wrong predictions. But they want us to keep believing. And they are more hysterical than ever!
Even if you believed carbon dioxide is the "control knob" of the global average temperature (I don't), a U.S. Green New Deal's (GND) effect on the GLOBAL average temperature would be very small. A U.S. GND would NOT stop the rise of GLOBAL CO2 emissions.
The U.S. GND is a mainly a "Socialist Manifesto" for the U.S. economy, borrowed from the Green Party. It would impose large economic costs, substituting central planning in place of market forces, to allocate resources.
U.S. electric power system reliability would decline significantly If using 100% renewable energy sources. But a large increase in service interruptions would not be acceptable to most Americans. So a large amount of fossil-fired backup generation would be needed -- 1.4 million gigawatt-hours of non-renewable backup power annually to stabilize the electric power system.
The CO2 emissions from that backup power generation would be at least 25% of CO2 emissions from all fossil fuel power generation in 2017. A 100% renewable energy mandate is not feasible without a lot of back-up power, or very expensive batteries.
A GND attacks our inexpensive, reliable mainly fossil fuel energy supply, with the goal of replacing it with an expensive, unreliable, mainly wind and solar energy supply. The U.S. leads the world in total energy production. Why attack our success with the GND, unless you hate this country?:
U.S. is #1 in total energy production
#1 in oil production
#1 in natural gas production
#1 in nuclear power
#1 in geothermal power
#1 in biofuels
#2 in wind power
#2 in solar power
#2 in coal production
#4 in hydropower
(1) The GND is mainly about converting the U.S. economy to socialism. The majority of the huge estimated cost is for "New Deal" socialist programs, not for "Green Initiatives" to replace fossil fuels with renewable energy sources.
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's Chief of Staff, Saikat Chakrabarti, was reported to say 'it’s (the GND) not about the environment, it’s about control.' I agree. The goal, and most of the spending, is expanding government control over the American public, when it is clearly not needed. Saikat Chakrabarti was fired after he said the GND was NOT originally related to climate.
(2) If you are a science denier, then you believe carbon dioxide (CO2) is "pollution", is the climate "control knob", and is causing a climate crisis.
We've been hearing climate alarmism for many decades:
A zero-CO2 emissions objective for the U.S., at best, would result in just a 0.1 to 0.2°C reduction of global warming by 2100, even under favorable assumptions. GND sponsors will not admit to the trivial global climate effect because that would significantly reduce support for the proposal.
(3) Real science clearly shows adding CO2 to the air is beneficial, greening our planet. Increasing atmospheric CO2 concentrations offers a wonderful opportunity to increase crop productivity, because increased CO2 increases photosynthesis rates. A U.S. GND would not stop the GLOBAL rise of CO2, so plants will still be "happy" about the rising CO2 levels.
Climate change predictions are based on lab experiments (closed system infrared spectroscopy, using artificially dried air), suggesting CO2 from burning fossil fuels ought to cause mild global warming in the troposphere. But climate alarmists knew mild warming would scare no one, so they invented a water vapor positive feedback theory in the 1970s that would allegedly triple the warming caused by CO2 alone.
The scary global warming predictions did not happen. Reality was mild, intermittent global warming from 1975 to 1998, with little warming after 1998. There was no evidence the water vapor positive feedback theory was true.
Scientists disagree about the impacts of burning fossil fuels on the climate. There is no honest survey showing a “97% consensus” that rising CO2 will create a crisis. The 97% is an often repeated lie, far from reality. Not to mention that a consensus is meaningless in real science.
The coming climate crisis is imaginary. It's been "coming" since the 1970's, but never shows up.
So why do we get the same scary predictions for 50 years? Because there is a political purpose for climate alarmism: "The urge to save humanity from harmless carbon dioxide is a 'progressive' false front for their urge to rule". The Honest Global Warming Chart Blog
The future climate is wild guess speculation. There have already been over three decades of predicting far more global warming than actually happened, repeatedly adjusting historical temperature data to show more global warming, and falsely blaming every unusual weather event on "climate change". Actual global warming has been only 1/3 of the warming predicted by the average climate model.
"Climate change" adds up to junk science, not real science. The "coming climate change crisis" is the biggest science fraud in history. No human has the ability to predict the future climate. Not even whether the average temperature will be warmer, or colder, 100 years from now. Climate alarmists are still estimating the future average temperature using a CO2-temperature formula from the 1970s, that does not work, yet it lives on, like a climate zombie!
The GND is the worst economic proposal
I have read since the Communist Manifesto. It falsely claims to help fight a fictional coming climate crisis. But is actually an attack on the U.S. free market economy, with almost no effect on the GLOBAL climate. Supporters of the U.S. GND are science deniers -- climate alarmists -- who apparently hate capitalism, freedom and prosperity. Considering the world's "track record" for central planning outcomes, the GND should be rejected.
ENERGY USE:
Fossil fuels (oil, natural gas, coal) supply 84% of the world’s energy, down very little from 87% two decades ago. Over those two decades, total world energy use rose by 50%. The small decline in the fossil fuel share of world energy production required over $2 trillion in global spending on alternatives over that period. Wind, solar, and batteries provide about 2% of today’s world’s energy.
Solar panels on Nevada’s Nellis Air Force Base generate only 15 megawatts of electricity, about 40% of the year, from 72,000 panels on 140 acres. Arizona’s Palo Verde Nuclear Power Plant generates 760 times more electricity, from less land, 90 to 95% of the time.
Modern coal and gas-fired power plants can generate 600 megawatts, 95% of the time, using less than 300 acres. Indiana’s Fowler Ridge wind farm generates 600 megawatts, less than 30% of the year, from 350 huge turbines, using over 50,000 acres.
WHAT IS THE GREEN NEW DEAL ?
The GND is a “10-year national mobilization”
whose primary goals would be:
"Guaranteeing a job with a family-sustaining wage, adequate family and medical leave, paid vacations, and retirement security to all people of the United States."
"Providing all people of the United States with:
(i) high-quality health care;
(ii) affordable, safe, and adequate housing;
(iii) economic security; and
(iv) access to clean water, clean air, healthy and affordable food, and nature."
"Providing resources, training, and high-quality education, including higher education, to all people of the United States."
"Meeting 100 percent of the power demand in the United States through clean, renewable, and zero-emission energy sources." … by eliminating pollution and greenhouse gas emissions as much as technologically feasible."
"Repairing and upgrading the infrastructure in the United States, including: Building or upgrading to energy-efficient, distributed, and ‘smart’ power grids, and working to ensure affordable access to electricity."
"Upgrading all existing buildings in the United States and building new buildings to achieve maximal energy efficiency, water efficiency, safety, affordability, comfort, and durability, including through electrification."
"Overhauling transportation systems in the United States to eliminate pollution and greenhouse gas emissions from the transportation sector as much as is technologically feasible, including through investment in
(i) zero-emission vehicle infrastructure and manufacturing;
(ii) clean, affordable, and accessible public transportation; and (iii) high-speed rail."
"Spurring massive growth in clean manufacturing in the United States and removing pollution and greenhouse gas emissions from manufacturing and industry as much as is technologically feasible."
"Working collaboratively with farmers and ranchers in the United States to eliminate pollution and greenhouse gas emissions from the agricultural sector as much as is technologically feasible."
THE DETAILS:
Most leftists wake up each day thinking things are getting worse. In fact, the world is getting better.
Average global life expectancy has more than doubled since 1900. In 1990, nearly four in ten of the world’s people were poor; today, less than one in ten are.
That's great progress. But some people seem to hate progress. They support a "Green New Deal" that would eliminate high-paying U.S. coal, oil and gas jobs. They favor lower-wage jobs installing and maintaining Chinese-made wind turbines and solar panels. And even if the "Deal" was feasible, the predicted effect on the global average temperature would be tiny.
Our planet has had intermittent global warming since the late 1600s. The past 100 years included adding CO2 to the air from burning fossil fuels. Accurate measurements of atmospheric CO2 began in 1958. Before then, we rely on air bubbles trapped in Antarctica ice cores, for very rough estimates. Those air bubbles suggest CO2 levels started ramping up after 1940, and especially after 1950.
Many people today claim the CO2 level in the atmosphere controls the average temperature of our planet. But they have no logical explanation why rising CO2 levels did NOT cause global warming from 1940 through 1975.
Some people claim air pollution was blocking sunlight in those years, offsetting the warming effect of CO2. But that "excuse" makes no sense, because global warming started in 1975, when the air was very polluted. Air pollution certainly did NOT fall out of the air in 1975 -- In fact, SO2 levels were high for more than 20 years after 1975 -- lots of air pollution as the world was warming.
Climate change consists of two camps:
(1) Real climate science,
which studies the present and past climate, and
(2) Climate change junk science,
which consists of always wrong wild guesses
about the future climate, predicting consistent, fast,
and dangerous global warming ... when reality has been inconsistent, slow, and harmless global warming, in the past 300+ years.
My climate science blog covers (1), and refutes (2). We should NOT listen to the wild guesses about the future climate -- they are stated with great confidence, but are always wrong. FUTURE global warming is always imagined to be 100% bad news, the opposite of PAST global warming, since the 1600s, which has been 100% good news.
After reading climate science articles and studies since 1997, I know it is foolish for anyone to predict the future climate. Because predictions have been 100% wrong for many decades. The most logical guess about the future climate would be to assume that past global warming will continue, meaning the world could be about +1 degree C. warmer in 100 years, which would harm no one. In science, that type of prediction is called the "null hypothesis" ('more of the same') -- the opposite of climate alarmism.
Climate alarmism is science free, always wrong, wild guesses of FUTURE climate change, imagined to be completely different than past, actual climate change. All Democrat candidates for president in 2020 seem to believe CO2-induced climate change is the most dangerous threat the world now faces. And they seem serious in believing the world has only 11 years to prevent a coming climate apocalypse.
That means Democrat politicians are climate alarmists. But they do know how to scare people into believing only Democrats will "save the planet for the children" -- which is the modern way to "sell" their beloved socialism.
CNN CLIMATE CHANGE "MARATHON"
On September 4, 2019, ten 2020 Democrat presidential candidates participated in a CNN town hall-style forum, to explain their climate change policy positions. I did not watch the seven hours of pontification. I would have, if someone paid me $1,000 to watch. It was tough enough to read about what was said, and watch excerpts on the evening news! There was no winner. The American people were the unanimous loser.
Over seven hours, the top ten Democrat candidates for president proposed radical solutions for “climate change”. And by providing the seven hours, CNN was making a political statement about how important they think climate change ought to be in the 2020 election.
Meanwhile, the United States is the only nation in the world that has reduced CO2 emissions over the past decade-and-a-half, while growing its economy ... thanks to the growth of hydraulic fracturing (aka “fracking”), providing low cost natural gas for generating electricity, replacing coal. But almost every Democrat candidate promises to ban fracking!
Democrat contenders are willing to de-industrialize the U.S. economy, and lower our standard of living, for (junk) “science” they do not understand. CNN moderators also made many “scientific” claims that were misleading, wild speculation, or just plain baloney. For example, moderators repeatedly, and falsely, suggested Hurricane Dorian was caused by "climate change".
Some of the Democrat proposals
attacking the U.S. economy:
1. Taxing “carbon pollution.”
( aka “carbon fee”, or “carbon tax.” )
2. Banning fracking.
3. Ending oil and gas exploration on public lands.
4. Banning nuclear energy, although Sen. Cory Booker
(D-NJ) said if we need to reduce emissions quickly, nuclear power is the only way.
5. Banning plastic straws
6. Discouraging meat, although Cory Booker,
a vegan, said people can eat what you want.
7. Eliminating incandescent light bulbs.
Joe Biden blamed climate change for cancer and genocide in Darfur?? (the genocide was actually Arab Muslim militias slaughtering, raping, and displacing black African civilians).
Bernie Sanders suggested global population control, to be encouraged by U.S. organizations promoting abortion abroad.
WHAT WOULD THE GND COST ?
Douglas Holtz-Eakin, president of the AAF, a former Congressional Budget Office director, did these cost evaluations for a living. The American Action Forum, a right-leaning think tank says the Green New Deal could cost $51 trillion to $93 trillion in costs (for the government and private sector over a decade). Based on Douglas Holtz-Eakin' history, when he was CBO director, I would increase the AAF estimate to a lifetime cost in the neighborhood of $100 trillion dollars! Democrats don’t provide any believable cost studies of their own.
The American Action Forum said some of the parts of the plan have been estimated before 2019: A jobs guarantee, universal health care, plus food security, would range from $44.3 trillion to $82.1 trillion, depending on the details.
For expanding high-speed rail, the AAF estimates $8.3 trillion to $12.3 trillion, over 10 years. Retrofitting houses to an unknown efficiency standard required a wild guess.
Liberal activists say the AAF cost estimate didn’t include the cost of doing nothing to combat global warming. I strongly disagree that there is ANY cost from doing nothing. But wasting money trying too fix a nonexistent climate crisis would be a huge cost.
The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) usually does a cost estimate. But the CBO won't start work on the Green New Deal proposal until a bill emerges from the relevant Congressional committee, and that may never happen.
HISTORY OF THE GND:
The GND was created in 2006 by the Green New Deal Task Force. It's a plan for government directed 100% renewable energy by 2030 utilizing a carbon tax.
A GND could not happen in 10, or even 20, years. An electric grid powered by renewables (wind, solar, hydropower) is not even close to being feasible, and will always be expensive, for two reasons:
(1) The wind and sun are intermittent, weak (low density) sources of energy (compared with dense sources of energy, such as natural gas, coal and nuclear power), and
(2) Batteries to store lots of energy, for use when there is no wind or sun, multiply the cost of renewable energy by at least 10x. The alternative for batteries would be up to 100% back-up, using fossil fuel power plants
CO2 concern started in the late 1950's. Wild guess predictions of a 100% bad news future climate started in the 1970's. Climate hysteria started in late 2018, with Democrat AOC (Alexandria "O'Crazio" Cortez), and fellow Democrat socialists in Congress, who adapted the Green Party's Green New Deal.
In the March - April 2018 ECONOMIC LOGIC, I said that a trade war is the worst possible economic event. The Trump trade war has been very slowly ramping up since then. But the Green New Deal is much worse -- it reads like a socialist version of the Communist Manifesto. It's so radical that forced implementation could cause a civil war!
I'd hoped some reasonable people, among leftists, would have criticized the GND as extremely expensive (probably $100 trillion, over as many decades as it would take). And as pointless virtue signaling, because even if you believed CO2 was an evil gas, "fighting CO2" would require China and India to join the U.S. with their own GNDs ... and they have not expressed any interest in their own GNDs.
The only "criticism" from leftists has been indirect -- some 2020 Democrat candidates proposed their own less expensive "solutions" to the non-existent problem of "climate change".
I see the GND as a plan to implement socialism, with a jobs guarantee, free college, single-payer healthcare, etc. It has been included in the platforms of multiple Green Party candidates since 2006, such as Jill Stein, for her 2012 and 2016 presidential campaigns.
A GND "wing" emerged in the Democratic Party, led by Congresswoman AOC, after the November 2018 elections, perhaps as an effort by Democrats to steal Green Party votes in the 2020 election.
Senator Edward Markey and Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez released a fourteen-page resolution for their version of the Green New Deal on February 7, 2019.
To gain additional support, I suppose, the "climate change proposal" includes unrelated socialist wants, such as 'universal health care', increased minimum wages, and preventing private sector monopolies.
On March 26, 2019, Republicans called for an early vote on the GND resolution, without discussion or expert testimony. 42 Democrats, and Socialist Bernie Sanders, voted "present", resulting in a 57–0 defeat on the Senate floor.
HISTORICAL (HYSTERICAL?)
QUOTES ON THE POLITICS
OF CLIMATE CHANGE:
OF CLIMATE CHANGE:
“Our aim is not to save the world from ecological calamity, but to change the global economic system … This is probably the most difficult task we have ever given ourselves, which is to intentionally transform the economic development model, for the first time in human history. In simpler terms, replace free enterprise, entrepreneurial capitalism with
UN-controlled centralized, One World government and economic control.
UN Climate Chief Christiana Figueres
“We’ve got to ride this global warming issue. Even if the theory of global warming is wrong, we will be doing the right thing in terms of economic and environmental policy.” Timothy Wirth, President of the UN Foundation
”No matter if the science of global warming is all phony ... climate change provides the greatest opportunity to bring about justice and equality in the world.”
Christine Stewart,
former Canadian Minister
of the Environment
"The goal now is a socialist, redistributionist society, which is nature’s proper steward and society’s only hope.” David Brower, founder of Friends of the Earth
“If we don’t overthrow capitalism, we don’t have a chance of saving the world ecologically. I think it is possible to have an ecologically sound society under socialism. I don’t think it is possible under capitalism”
Judi Bari, principal organizer of Earth First!
Isn’t the only hope for the planet that the industrialized civilizations collapse? Isn’t it our responsibility to bring that about?” Maurice Strong, Founder of the UN Environment Programme
“We must make this an insecure and inhospitable place for capitalists and their projects. We must reclaim the roads and plowed land, halt dam construction, tear down existing dams, free shackled rivers and return to wilderness millions of acres of presently settled land.”
David Foreman, co-founder of Earth First!
“One has to free oneself from the illusion that international climate policy is environmental policy. It is not. It is actually about how we redistribute de facto the world’s wealth.” Ottmar Edenhofer, IPCC official
Contrast the above socialist / Marxist comments with quotes from a few real scientists, below:
“A model or a hypothesis cannot ‘prove’ anything. But data can invalidate a hypothesis or model. It takes only one experiment to prove me wrong.”
Albert Einstein
“Future generations will wonder in bemused amazement that the early 21st century’s developed world went into hysterical panic ... on the basis of gross exaggerations of highly uncertain computer projections ... and proceeded to contemplate a roll-back of the industrial age.” Richard Lindzen PhD, MIT professor
of atmospheric science
CLIMATE SCIENCE:
Reality vs. Speculation
Based on 22 years of climate science reading, and observing past temperature and CO2 data, it's obvious adding CO2 to the air BENEFITS plant growth on our planet. But the CO2 must be added by burning fossil fuels with modern pollution controls -- otherwise, the real air pollution (CO2 is NOT pollution) will more than offset the benefits of "CO2 enrichment". Real air pollution is a serious problem in many Chinese and Indian cities.
CO2 enrichment accelerates the growth of the plants that people and animals eat, while simultaneously reducing their water needs -- a conclusion supported by over 3,000 scientific studies summarized at the link below.
Greenhouse owner knows this, and buy CO2 enrichment systems for their greenhouses.
A coming "climate crisis" has been predicted for the past 50 years, but never shows up, because the "crisis" is imaginary. The climate of our planet alternates between warming and cooling trends. A typical example of the biggest climate change in the past 100 years is warmer winter nights in Alaska. That's no 'crisis' -- it's good news.
No one has been harmed by past global warming. The current global climate is the best it has been for humans and animals in roughly 10,000 years. One exception is the air pollution in Chinese and Indian cities. But a U.S. GND will not solve pollution problems in China. And the U.S. buying lots of solar panels from China could make their problem worse.
If you must complain about the climate, how about complaining about 2019? Did the leftist-biased media bother to tell you that January 2019 through August 2019 was the coolest January through August for the U.S. on record (since 1895) ? ***
*** see Chart below -- based on maximum daily temperatures, since 1895, at all 1,218 USHCN (U.S. Historical Climatology Network) surface weather stations:
I'm sure you never read that in the mainstream media. But they'll print ANY wild guess speculation about future climate change, if it's bad news ... and never report when 100% of the bad news predictions do not happen. The coming climate change catastrophe is like a scary campfire story that gets repeated every year: There's an invisible boogeyman (CO2), causing an invisible climate "crisis".
The "climate crisis" is promoted by one political party, the 'Democrat-Socialists', who know how to use a "crisis" to gain power. It doesn't matter if a crisis is real -- a fake "climate crisis" works just as well for politicians, when the mass media promotes it, and most people believe it.
From roughly 20,000 to 10,000 years ago, the glaciers that covered Canada, Detroit and Chicago melted, and the climate became warmer than today, during the "Holocene Optimum". Plants at that time, however, needed more CO2 in the air. I view Earth's current climate as the BEST climate for humans and animals since the Holocene Optimum, roughly 10,000 years ago.
Antarctica ice core studies identified a 100,000 year climate cycle in the past 500,000 years. Roughly 90,000 cold years, followed by 10,000 warm years. The brief warm periods are called inter-glacials. We are currently living in the Holocene inter-glacial. It's roughly 10,000 years old, and could end tomorrow, or in 1,000 years -- no one knows. When our inter-glacial ends, a cold climate will return for 90,000 years, and I expect today's mild global warming will be remembered as "the good old days" !
Plants benefit from more CO2 in the air, which is significantly 'greening' our planet. But plants would prefer the outdoor CO2 level (now about 400 ppm) to double or triple, reaching the optimum range created inside greenhouses by using CO2 enrichment systems.
Global CO2 emissions are believed to have ramped up a lot after 1950. I say "believed", because CO2 levels before 1958 are rough estimates based on air bubbles in Antarctica ice cores. About +0.5 degree C., of the total +1 degree C. global warming claimed since 1880, happened BEFORE 1950, in spite of little CO2 added to the atmosphere before 1950.
Climate alarmists claim CO2 levels are the "control knob" for the global average temperature of our planet. Unfortunately, there were no global temperature measurements until 1979, when weather satellites were launched. Data collected by those satellites can be converted to temperatures, making a near-global average possible for the first time (some areas around the north and south poles do have to be estimated).
Based on the University of Alabama (UAH) weather satellite compilation, the global average temperature was up +0.5 degrees C. from 1979 through 2018. No one knows what percentage of that mild warming was caused by the greenhouse gas CO2, other than knowing the correct answer is between 0% and 100%.
The UN's climate organization, the IPCC, claims "over half" the warming since 1950 was caused by humans -- meaning perhaps +0.3 degrees C. That's a middle of the road guess, not a fact, and no better than your guess, or mine.
Surface temperature measurements, although far from being global, say the average temperature in 1979 was the same as in 1940. Is it not strange that CO2 was being added to the atmosphere in every decade after 1940, but there was no global warming until after 1975?
Combining the surface temperature measurements from 1940 to 1979, with the UAH satellite data from 1979 through 2018, results in +0.5 degrees C. global warming in the 78 years from 1940 through 1978. Even if CO2 caused 100% of that warming (a worst case guess), that small temperature rise was harmless, and VERY FAR from being a climate crisis.
The global warming from 1975 through 2018 was mainly from 1975 through 1998. It was accompanied by a large increase in human health and prosperity. "Global warming" after 1975 was mainly in the higher, colder latitudes, mainly during the coldest six months of the year, and mainly at night. Of course you didn't know that, because the leftist-biased media would never tell you.
Climate alarmists focus on wild guess, always wrong, predictions of the FUTURE climate. Climate alarmists only "see" bad news in the future, and they have been "seeing" bad news in the future since the 1970s. We have been patiently waiting 50 years for the bad news to show up !
Climate alarmist predictions are based on a CO2-Global Warming theory from the 1970's that NEVER change ( 100% CO2 level increase = +3 degrees C. of global warming ).
The formula never changes, in spite of the fact that the average computer climate model predicts triple the global warming that actually happens (based on UAH global average temperature data since 1979).
In real science, if your predictions are wrong, then your theory has been falsified. But in the leftist climate change "religion", a 1970's-era theory that leads to wrong climate predictions, lives on forever, like a climate zombie !
In the leftist climate change "religion", any scientist can get attention by predicting bad news in the future from CO2. Even more attention by claiming 'the future will be even worse than we previously thought'.
The “coming climate change crisis” exists ONLY in the minds of leftists who reject conventional religions, but love to be part of the climate change “religion”. Leftists love to tell people what to believe about the climate, how they must live, and character attack people who express doubt, or ask questions.
Their favorite phrase is
“Scientists say …”.
“Scientists say …”.
Their favorite lie is
"97% of scientists say ... ".
"97% of scientists say ... ".