Personal Economics 101

Craig Bannister, mrcTV “I just got published in Nature because I stuck to a narrative I knew the editors would like. That’s not the way science should work,” a PhD climate scientist and adjunct faculty member at John Hopkins University’s Energy and Climate Policy Program says in a commentary excoriating the nation’s media for putting their political agenda ahead of scientific integrity. Brown holds a PhD from Duke University in Earth and Climate Sciences, a Master’s degree from San Jose State University in Meteorology & Climate Science, and a Bachelor’s degree from the University of Wisconsin – Madison in Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences. In his commentary , “I Left Out the Full Truth to Get My Climate Change Paper Published,” Brown explains that the editors’ selection of materials to publish is driven by agenda-driven bias - and not by academic rigor: “[T]he biases of the editors (and the reviewers they call upon to evaluate submissions) exert a major influence on the collective ...

 

See also: Biden Forces America to Pay Climate Reparations I've written about the business and purpose behind climate change before. The climate change movement is really just a climate change shake down. This crusade isn’t about changing the temperature of the earth. Even the most well-meaning environmental activist can’t really believe that building windmills and driving Teslas is going to cool the planet. This all about money. Hundreds of billions of dollars of government handouts. The one resolution of agreement among the politicians from 100 nations at the “Cop 27” climate conference in Egypt was that rich nations owe poor nations “climate reparations.” This is the looney concept that America is responsible for the supposed man-made warming of the planet by burning fossil fuels over the last hundred or so years. Joe Biden and his goof ball sidekick John Kerry were all to eager to buy into this “blame America first” narrative and write a 10-figure check to atone for our sin...

The untold story about “green energy” is that it can’t possibly be scaled up to provide anywhere near the energy to replace fossil fuels. (Unless we are headed back to the stone age – which is what some of the “de-growth” advocates favor). A new  World Bank Group report  finds that the production of minerals, such as graphite, lithium and cobalt, could increase by nearly 500% by 2050, to meet the growing demand for clean energy technologies. It estimates that over 3 billion tons of minerals and metals will be needed to deploy wind, solar and geothermal power, as well as energy storage, required for achieving a below 2°C future.  Recently, even some environmentalists are pointing to a the World Bank report showing that moving toward 100% solar, wind, and electric battery energy would be “just as destructive to the planet as fossil fuels.” This was the conclusion of a story in Foreign Policy magazine in 2019, The Limits of Clean Energy . A low-carbon future will be very min...

Remember the good old days when liberals demanded: “Keep the government out of the bedroom!” Well now they want the government in the bedroom, the bathroom, the kitchen, your outdoor pool… Biden just rescinded a popular 2020 Trump order that increased how much water you can use in the shower. Capping the flow from a shower head to 2.5 gallons per minute doesn’t save much water, it simply makes you stand longer under the water as it drips and drips and drips. (It reminds us of those obnoxious low flush toilets the feds mandated to save the planet, but they didn’t because you had to flush twice.) Now Biden is pushing a spate of additional energy conservation measures restricting the power that can flow to power air conditioning units, gas-fire places and electric pool heaters. Sounds like Uncle Sam is turning into Big Brother. https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/energy-department-targets-pool-heaters-and-ac-units-with-new-efficiency-rules

  But...but...but I read in Newsweek that Tornados will be 9 times more strong by 2099. NINE TIMES STRONGER. Can you image a 'tornader' with winds of 2,700 mph?  Neither can anyone else.  Winter Tornados Will Be 9 Times Stronger by 2099 If Global Warming Isn't Curtailed

By Kelly Evans The Exchange , CNBC The price of fossil fuels keeps surging. The situation in Europe is getting worse. Natural gas prices are spiking through the roof--even worse than they were   last week . Even oil is higher today as Goldman says $80 for U.S. crude could be next, up from about $70 where it's trading today. Why? Because there is "growing scarcity across physical markets," with demand for all energy except oil back at pre-pandemic levels  while "the system is becoming increasingly constrained in its ability to supply goods."    The crucial difference between the energy spike today and any prior one over the past couple decades is that this one comes as policymakers (and "ESG" investors) have  chosen to cap supply . Europe, as I've mentioned, has basically, depending on how you run the numbers to get to "net zero" emissions by 2050,  about 600 gigatons of carbon left  to produce. Even traders are taking the goal seriously t...

Why are car manufacturers still improving and spending money on combustion engines in the year 2020? Should all development research be going into electric cars and electric vehicle technology? Unfortunate news if you think ICE transportation is going away in the near future to be solely replaced by electric vehicles (EVs). The internal combustion engine is still incredibly relevant today, and can still use further improvements in order to reduce global emissions.  In this video we'll discuss scientific issues facing electric cars, environmental problems with ditching combustion engine research, how cost impacts customer decisions and manufacturer profits, and ultimately how consumer choice plays a large role in this industry. If you've ever wondered why combustion engines are still being developed, this video breaks down all the details.

A little-noticed news event this week with potentially major long-term implications for the U.S. oil and gas industry was President Biden's executive order directing federal agencies to address the risks climate change poses to the U.S. financial system and federal government. Biden's order directs federal agencies to incorporate the economic risks from climate change into decision-making, and it does not specifically address fossil fuel investments, but the concern among energy producers is that financial regulators ultimately will use their power to steer banks and investors away from the industry . Many big banks, setting targets to align their financing with the Paris climate agreement, already have ended funding for coal projects, and the oil industry fears it could be next. This week, the G7 nations agreed to stop international financing of coal projects by the end of this year and phase out such support for all fossil fuels. Also this week, environmental activists who ...

From National Law Review  (Nov. 14, 2020): One of the noteworthy moments of the recent Presidential campaign came in the candidates’ last debate, when Vice President Biden made the following comment on energy: “I would transition away from the oil industry, yes. The oil industry pollutes, significantly. It has to be replaced by renewable energy over time.” While much was made of that remark, the term “transition” was an unmistakable reference to specific language in his campaign’s July energy plan calling for a net-zero carbon economy by 2050, coupled with an intermediate net-zero commitment for the power sector by 2035. While reasonable minds may differ as to whether those goals are achievable without major technological breakthroughs or robust use of offset mechanisms (or both), the language of a “transition over time” is familiar. Echoes of such a transition can be found in the climate policies of oil & gas and power sector companies and in policy debates happening in the ha...

By Hayden Ludwig The Heartland Institute Population control is back in the news—and for Progressives, what’s old is new again. In November, a group of 11,000 signatories calling itself the Alliance of World Scientists released a dire public letter urging the return of population pseudoscience by declaring “clearly and unequivocally that planet Earth is facing a climate emergency. “The climate crisis has arrived and is accelerating faster than most scientists expected,” according to these experts, whose ranks are rife with psychologists, computer consultants, sociologists, and about 1,100 PhD students. “It is more severe than anticipated, threatening natural ecosystems and the fate of humanity.” Left unchecked, global warming could “potentially [make] large areas of Earth uninhabitable.” In other words, it’s a typical news day for the climageddon folks, who have ratcheted up the alarmism so much recently that Oxford dictionary made “climate emergency” its 2019 word of the ye...

This guy gets it. Climate change or global warming has become a political tool to change the economies of the world. Embrace environmentalism, but not global domination. View it on YouTube .

If it doesn't exist yet, politicians will create a new tax. For example, Maryland legislators want to tax online advertising . Can you think of anything that is not taxed? The Atlantic Monthly says 2019 was the hottest year on record and the last decade was the hottest ever measured. But the Heartland Institute , which studies such data impartially, claims this data is cherry picked. For one thing, the term measured "means about 125 years." Climate changes are normally measured in much longer periods. And I'm pretty tired of the fear-mongers out there. If the climate is changing, let's take steps to adapt to it. The prospect of changing it to what we want are limited at best. I enjoy our current standard of living. I don't wish to go back to the middle ages, which is what the Green New Deal would do. Sorry Bernie. Glacier National Park used to be adorned with signs warning tourists its precious natural treasures would be "gone by 2020." The new ...

Recalling the Battle of the Bulge Seventy-five years ago, at the Battle of the Bulge (fought from Dec. 16, 1944, to Jan. 25, 1945), the United States suffered more casualties than in any other battle in its history. Some 19,000 Americans were killed, 47,500 wounded and 23,000 reported missing. Stock Picking is Hard. Deciding What Kind of Investor You Are is the First Step For new investors, the universe of investing can feel a little like the ancient terracentric paradigm. Daily stock prices are quoted. Big movers are highlighted on television. But why stocks are moving remains mysterious. Government Mandates and Crummy Dishwashers American dishwashers used to work. They were wonderful labor-saving devices. They kept our kitchens cleaner. They sanitized the dishes, helping to stop cross-contamination and generally improving health over the iffy process of handwashing. …Then one day they just stopped doing the work. What happened? In 2020 Climate Science Needs To Hit the Res...

Climate change activists are not just interested in reducing carbon emissions in order to "save the planet." Their underlying desire is to overturn capitalism and replace it with socialist governments worldwide.  Our story starts with the IPCC, or the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a U.N. organization. "And any settlement of the Global Warming issue by the UN would entail massive transfers of wealth from the citizens of wealthy countries to the politicians and bureaucrats of the poorer countries." (1) In 1992, at the first U.N. Earth Climate Summit in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Program Executive Director Maurice Strong stated, very candidly:  " We may get to the point where the only way of saving the world will be for industrialized civilization to collapse. Isn’t it our responsibility to bring this about?" (2) Former U.S. Senator Timothy Wirth (D-CO), then representing the Clinton Administration as U.S. undersecretary of state for global ...

Actually, not just a teachable moment: Let's call it a moment of decades. Australia, where its "dysfunctional" conservative government (according to left-leaning Slate magazine) just won elections, has not had a recession in 28 years.   I put that in boldface because it's a remarkable fact. I've been reading more and more about Australia lately. Thanks to Netflix, I've been able to watch some Australian TV.  I read and heard that Australia is a lot like Texas, where I currently live. This alone makes it more interesting. I've never been there, but I've put it on my bucket list.  Sometimes we don't think about Australia at all, since it is literally on the other side of the world. When it's winter in Chicago, it's summer in Sydney. The quickest trip from Chicago to Sydney I could find with a basic Google search was 20 hours, 15 minutes via San Francisco. It's actually 19 hours in the air.  Australia -- like Europe -- recently had n...

The Austin City Council recently voted to endorse the Green New Deal. Most idiotic thing I've heard in some time. This "policy" is based on ignorance, plain and simple.  From the Texas Public Policy Foundation: Writing in Forbes, Jude Clemente points out five practical problems with the Green New Deal, including the spacing needs for renewables, their unreliability and the fate of humans who are denied access to cheap, dependable energy.   “I’m only going to mention cows, airplanes, tearing down homes and buildings, railroads from the West coast to Hawaii, a $93 trillion price tag, and a hundred other things that you can do your own research on,”  Clemente writes . “I’m going to limit my focus here: not a bash fest but a reality check. We need it… The quiet reality: more renewables inevitably mean more fossil fuels.”    The TPPF Take:  Advocates of the Green New Deal (and similar legislative efforts) must face facts—the plans are unworkable.  ...

Note: This may be my first and last article on climate change, unless something new comes up that deals with economics. The entire movement is based more on politics than science. The estimated cost of "fixing" our climate is estimated to be between $11 trillion and $100 trillion. It will hurt the poor more than the rich. Carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) is not a pollutant. It only accounts for .041 percent by volume of the atmosphere and is at one of the lowest concentrations when geologic time periods are studied . Water vapor has more influence. Should we ban this also? When someone says the "debate is over" and the "science is settled" I know there is something else going on. I do not deny the climate is changing or that we need to be good stewards of our planet. Other than that, it's probably biggest hoax of all time. I've spend countless hours and days reading and studying the literature. The science IS NOT settled.  Those pushing for aggressive g...