climate change

Greenland Flourishes Due to Global Warming and Climate Change

by Hans Bader on May 16, 2011 · 1 comment

in Agriculture, Energy, Environment, Global Warming, International, Natural Resources, Regulation

Alarmists have been decrying the effects of global warming on Greenland for years, even though Greenland was greenest during the Medieval Warm Period, and Greenland’s Vikings, who flourished during that warm period, died out when cold temperatures returned, reducing them to starvation. (It was warmer in the year 1003 than 2003.) Now, the residents of Greenland, the world’s largest island, are once again profiting from global warming, reports the Washington Post:

“Rather than questioning global warming, many of this island’s 60,000 inhabitants seem to be racing to cash in.  The tiny capital of Nuuk is bracing for record numbers of visitors this year; the retreating sea ice means a longer tourist season and more cruise ships . . . Hunters are boasting of more and bigger caribou, and the annual cod migration is starting earlier and lasting longer. In the far south, farmers are trying their hand at an exotic form of agriculture: growing vegetables. ‘Before, the growing season was too short for vegetables,’ . . .‘Now it is getting longer each year.’”

Since 2009, the Environmental Protection Agency has sought to regulate greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide (which we breathe out and plants consume) because they supposedly threaten public health in the United States by causing global warming. President Obama has backed a corporate welfare-filled global-warming bill that would increase electricity bills. Obama admitted to the San Francisco Chronicle in 2008 that under his “cap and trade” plan to address global warming, ”electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket.”

But even if greenhouse gas emissions are the principal cause of global warming (as opposed to natural causes), it’s not clear why such warming would harm public health in a non-tropical country like America. After all, people in America’s warmer cities have lower mortality rates, and higher life expectancies, than people in its colder cities.

Warmer climates may be particularly helpful for racial minorities in Canada. Most non-white Canadians suffer from Vitamin D deficiency, putting them at risk of cancer, osteoporosis, and diabetes, according to the Toronto Globe and Mail. Lack of exposure to the sun is a big part of the problem. More than 50,000 people die every year in the United States every year as a result of inadequate sun exposure. While milk is Vitamin D enriched, many non-whites are lactose intolerant. Sunlight is the most potent source of Vitamin D. But in northern regions like Canada, sunlight alone does not provide enough Vitamin D for many people who work indoors. There,  the sunlight is too feeble in winter and fall for people’s bodies to turn sunlight into Vitamin D. To get enough Vitamin D from the sun, people have to go outside a lot during spring and summer to offset the weak sunlight in fall and winter. But increasingly sedentary lifestyles and office jobs have reduced outdoor activity. And cold temperatures in spring discourage warmth-loving people from going outside, even when the light is strong enough to produce Vitamin D. Thus, cold climates can be bad for their health.

Icemakers: Mankind’s Doom

by Ryan Young on April 20, 2011

in Energy, Environment, Global Warming, Regulation

An article at Time explains “How the Ice in Your Drink is Imperiling the Planet,” and what regulators are doing about it:

NIST is thus urging refrigerator manufacturers to look closely at the design of their icemakers, insisting that there are “substantial opportunities for efficiency improvements merely by optimizing the operations of the heaters.”

That appeal to reason, NIST officials hope, will be enough. But just in case it isn’t, the Department of Energy has announced that it intends to add 84 kilowatt hours to the efficiency rating of every refrigerator equipped with an icemaker. Consumers will feel that fact in the wallet—and if manufacturers don’t scramble to improve their numbers, they soon will too.

Senator Jim Webb Flunks Legislation 101: Says Congress Can’t Change the Law

by Hans Bader on April 15, 2011

in Economy, Employment, Energy, Environment, Global Warming, Regulation

Congress can always change the law if it chooses. For example, it passed the 1991 Civil Rights Act, which overturned many Supreme Court decisions interpreting the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

But you would never know that from reading Virginia Senator Jim Webb’s letter today in the Wall Steely Journal. In it, Webb defends his vote against a Republican amendment to block EPA regulation of carbon dioxide, an amendment supported by many Virginians because the EPA’s regulation of carbon dioxide would wipe out thousands of Virginia jobs in industries that emit carbon dioxide. (Carbon dioxide is the gas needed by plants to conduct photosynthesis. It is not poisonous or dirty, and humans emit carbon dioxide every time they breathe.)

Webb claims he voted against the amendment because the amendment would have been “a violation of the Supreme Court holding in Massachusetts v. Environmental Protection Agency,” a case that interpreted a provision of the Clean Air Act to potentially expand the EPA’s ability to regulate greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide.

The amendment would have greatly reduced future energy costs, thus saving countless jobs. In 2008, President Obama admitted that under his greenhouse gas regulations, people’s utility bills would “skyrocket,” and coal-fired power plants would go “bankrupt.”  The EPA’s own internal documents show that the administration’s global warming regulations will result in a massive “loss of steel, paper, aluminum, chemical, and cement manufacturing jobs.”

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Inhofe Takes on Global Warming Alarmist Attempted Ambush

by Lee Doren on February 18, 2011 · 1 comment

in Economy, Energy, Environment

Senator James Inhofe was recently ambushed by a few Global Warming alarmists. They wanted to know why he opposed their legislative agenda. Unfortunately for the ambushers, Inhofe was friendly and prepared to answer their questions.

In the video below, Inhofe explains why the science doesn’t justify the horrible policies that they are advocating.

Unemployment Jumps to 9.8 Percent; Stimulus and New Regulations Wipe Out Jobs

by Hans Bader on December 3, 2010

in Deregulate to Stimulate, Economy, Employment, Stimulus to Nowhere

Unemployment has jumped to 9.8 percent. The population has grown recently, but the number of jobs has remained virtually flat. The White House seems to have learned nothing from this, and there is talk of yet more wasteful stimulus spending.

The stimulus package’s costly “green jobs” subsidies sent American jobs overseas. Their biggest recipient was a bankrupt Australian company that imported Japanese turbines for a windmill farm.  79 percent of the subsidies went to foreign firms.  Spain’s “green jobs” program, which Obama cited 8 times as a model for his own green jobs and global warming programs,  completely failed, destroying jobs and driving up Spain’s skyrocketing government deficit. Each new green job “created” in Spain wiped out 2.2 existing jobs and cost $800,000.   New EPA rules dealing with global warming are expected to wipe out more than 800,000 jobs, while proposed EPA ozone rules could wipe out millions more.

48 out of 50 states have lost jobs since passage of the $800 billion stimulus package.  The Obama administration falsely claimed that passing the stimulus package would keep unemployment under 8 percent, but now it’s close to 10 percent.  The stimulus also contained other provisions that wiped out jobs in America’s export sector, and it encouraged states to impose new job-killing burdens on business through changes to their statutory unemployment-compensation schemes.

Obama’s EEOC appointees are unprecedently hostile to employers, making the Carter-era EEOC look friendly to business by comparison.  New laws backed by Obama, and Obama administration regulations governing employers, have discouraged employers from hiring new employees.

Video Games are More than Just Good for Kids

by Wayne Crews on November 9, 2010

in Culture, Nanny State, Personal Liberty, Regulation, Tech & Telecom

They will be a primary way that we learn, teach, produce and advance in the future. Jane McGonigal of Institute for the Future has the ball right now: “We’re going to see games tackling women’s rights. We’re going to see games around climate change. We’re going to see games around medical innovation, that doctors are going to play.”

These few examples are only a taste. We will see much, much more from the electronic gaming industry. The importance of video games is one reason why keeping government out of regulating them is a significant policy issue right now.

Global Food Crisis Forecast; Aggravated by Biofuels and Global Warming Legislation

by Hans Bader on October 26, 2010

in Agriculture, Energy, Environment, Ethanol, Global Warming, International, Natural Resources

A global food crisis is “forecast as prices reach record highs.”  “Rising food prices and shortages could cause instability in many countries as the cost of staple foods and vegetables reached their highest levels in two years.”  “Global wheat and maize prices recently jumped nearly 30% in a few weeks while meat prices are at 20-year highs.” “Meanwhile, the price of tomatoes in Egypt, garlic in China and bread in Pakistan are at near-record levels.”

Drought is one factor in the price spikes.  Biofuels and ethanol subsidies and mandates are another major factor.  According to the UN, “large-scale land acquisitions by foreign investors for biofuels is squeezing land suitable for agriculture.”

Ethanol subsidies have resulted in forests being destroyed in the Third World, and caused famines that have killed countless people in the world’s poorest countries.

These subsidies are expanded in the global warming legislation backed by the Obama administration.  Its ethanol subsidies will result in “damage to water supplies, soil health and air quality.”  The Washington Examiner earlier explained how the global warming bill backed by President Obama would cause deforestation by expanding ethanol subsidies, and thus increase greenhouse gas emissions in the long run.   It was larded up with corporate welfare: 85 percent of its carbon allowances were given away to special interests free of charge, thanks to lobbying that turned the bill into an orgy of corporate welfare.

Earlier, Ron Bailey wrote in Reason magazine about the “global food crisis” that has resulted in food riots across the world, in countries like Mexico, Pakistan, Indonesia, Yemen, Haiti, and Egypt.   The crisis, he notes, is caused by “stupid energy policies” in the form of ethanol “mandates” and subsidies, which result in the world’s breadbaskets producing less food and more ethanol.

In 2008, two prominent environmentalists, Lester Pearson and Jonathan Lewis, published a Washington Post editorial, “Ethanol’s Failed Promise,” which explained how ethanol subsidies and mandates are destroying the environment and fueling hunger and violence worldwide.

Turning one-fourth of our corn into fuel is affecting global food prices. U.S. food prices are rising at twice the rate of inflation, hitting the pocketbooks of lower-income Americans and people living on fixed incomes. … Deadly food riots have broken out in dozens of nations in the past few months, most recently in Haiti and Egypt. World Bank President Robert Zoellick warns of a global food emergency.

Moreover, they noted,

food-to-fuel mandates are leading to increased environmental damage. First, producing ethanol requires huge amounts of energy — most of which comes from coal. Second, the production process creates a number of hazardous byproducts, and some production facilities are reportedly dumping these in local water sources.  Third, food-to-fuel mandates are helping drive up the price of agricultural staples, leading to significant changes in land use with major environmental harm. Here in the United States, farmers are pulling land out of the federal conservation program, threatening fragile habitats. … Most troubling, though, is that the higher food prices caused in large part by food-to-fuel mandates create incentives for global deforestation, including in the Amazon basin. As Time Magazine reported this month, huge swaths of forest are being cleared for agricultural development. The result is devastating: We lose an ecological treasure and critical habitat for endangered species, as well as the world’s largest ‘carbon sink.’ And when the forests are cleared and the land plowed for farming, the carbon that had been sequestered in the plants and soil is released. Princeton scholar Tim Searchinger has modeled this impact and reports in Science magazine that the net impact of the food-to-fuel push will be an increase in global carbon emissions — and thus a catalyst for climate change.

In Human Events, Deroy Murdock explained how rising food prices resulting from ethanol forced Haitians to literally eat dirt (dirt cookies made of vegetable oil, salt, and dirt), caused tortilla riots in Mexico, and fueled violent protests in unstable “powder kegs” like Pakistan and Egypt.

In 2008, finance ministers and central bankers called for end to ethanol subsidies and biofuel mandates. South African finance minister Trevor Manuel called such subsidies “criminal.” Earlier, the Indian Finance Minister Chidambaram noted that “in a world where there is hunger and poverty, there is no policy justification for diverting food crops towards bio-fuels. Converting food into fuel is neither good policy for the poor nor for the environment.”

The EPA is now ratcheting up ethanol use, heedless of the fact that ethanol makes gasoline costlier and dirtier, increases ozone pollution, and increases the death toll from smog and air pollution.  Ethanol production also results in deforestation, soil erosion, and water pollution.

General Motors’ Losses Hidden by Deferral of Union Pension Obligations

by Hans Bader on October 21, 2010

in Bailout Watch, Economy, Employment, Labor, Regulation

Any General Motors bonds issued this year will be classified as junk by a key ratings agency.  Why?  There’s some risk GM will go bankrupt again, and it hasn’t really returned to profitability, the way it appeared to have. That’s because GM’s recent quarterly profit, which came after years of losses and tens of billions of dollars in taxpayer bailouts, was artificially created by the temporary deferral of billions of dollars in pension obligations that it owes to the United Auto Workers union.  Those unfunded pension obligations have risen by $6 billion since the end of 2009.  As Charles Lane of The Washington Post notes,

[A] little-noticed October 6 report from Fitch, the ratings agency, which highlighted the major unresolved issue of the bailout: pension obligations to its United Auto Workers employees. The union successfully resisted efforts to trim this long-term burden on the company through the bankruptcy process, and they continue to weigh heavily on the company’s future. Specifically, GM’s relatively robust free cash position – one of its major selling points in its pending IPO – is being artificially propped up by the fact that it is not yet legally required to make multi-billion-dollar payments into its ‘heavily underfunded’ U.S. pension funds. How underfunded are they? Well, the U.S. plans alone are $17 billion underfunded as of the end of 2009, Fitch says. When you include global operations, the total is $27 billion. . . GM’s pension obligations are actually $6 billion higher than they appeared at the end of 2009.

These obligations will likely have far more impact on GM’s financial future than the recent revelations that it lied about the Chevy Volt, which it was trumpeting in a “publicity stunt” to curry favor with politicians crusading against global warming.

Earlier, GM lied about whether it had paid back taxpayers for its bailout, which resulted in GM getting $50 billion in taxpayer money, and its finance arm GMAC getting another $17 billion.  (GM also received billions indirectly from taxpayers, through programs like the incredibly wasteful Cash for Clunkers, which cost  used-car and car-parts dealers billions.)

The Obama administration used the bailouts to keep the United Auto Workers’ massive compensation (worth up to $70 an hour), pension benefits, and rigid union work rules largely intact, while giving the UAW a big chunk of General Motors‘ stock, even though the UAW helped bankrupt the company.  The auto bailouts were so wasteful and so biased in favor of the UAW that they disturbed even the liberal Washington Post editorial board.

Another reason for treating GM bonds as junk is the way the Obama administration mistreated GM’s past bondholders.  It engineered the wiping out of General Motors’ bondholders, some of whom were non-union employees who had invested their life savings in the company, so that the GM stock that the Obama administration was giving the UAW would be worth more.

GM also faces increased regulatory burdens, such as CAFE rules ratcheted up in the name of global warming  (the initial tightening of those rules will wipe out at least 50,000 jobs in the auto industry), that will make it hard for it to expand its anemic 19 percent market share.  Other EPA global warming rules are expected to wipe out at least 800,000 American jobs and impose heavy costs on suppliers of materials used in manufacturing automobiles.  The EPA’s proposed ozone rules would wipe out 7.3 million jobs, according to one study.

The 10:10 Project and Zeno’s Paradox

by Ryan Young on October 5, 2010 · 1 comment

in Environment, Global Warming, Zeitgeist

The goal of the 10:10 Project is to cut carbon emissions by 10 percent per year. Sony, which supported the 10:10 Project until a promotional video featuring exploding global warming skeptics offended a lot of people, has its own project called the “Road to Zero.”

While they mean well, supporters of the two initiatives seem to have forgotten Zeno’s paradox. Suppose that people are particularly zealous about their carbon-cutting and cut 50 percent per year, not 10 percent. Not only does that make the math easier, it biases the numbers against the argument I’m making.

Their emissions would go from 1 to 1/2 to 1/4 to 1/18 to 1/16, and so on. Emissions move asymptotically towards zero, which is a fancy way of saying they never actually get there.

As with most campaigns of this sort, 10:10 and Road to Zero may succeed in making people feel good about themselves. And there is some value in that. But the schemes, especially taken together, are too clever by half. Or, more likely, the opposite.

Chris Horner on the Politics of Cap and Trade

by Richard Morrison on July 27, 2010

in Video, Zeitgeist

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ABhWORsUq1Q 285 234]

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