Thomas Edison, you're under arrest!

14 September, 2010 by

"It's a fair cop, gov. I'll come quietly"

As the article puts it: Welcome to Green Hell. Obviously, ACM has been stocking up on incandescents since the moonbat Australian government outlawed them, and forced us all to use dim, ugly, horrifically expensive, flickery, epileptic-fit-incuding CFLs which you have to switch on, go and make a cup of tea, and by the time you return, might just be bright enough to use. And when they break, you have to sound an alarm in a three-street radius and dress up in HAZMAT clothing and breathing equipment just to put them in the freaking bin! From whence they go to a special dedicated CFL mercury recycling plant? No, to landfill. Brilliant. All to save the planet? Jeez.

Thomas Alva Edison was a genius credited with the invention of many things — the phonograph, the motion picture, the incandescent light bulb, global warming. That last credit was given by those who rank light bulbs right up there with the internal combustion engine as ravagers of the planet.

The General Electric light bulb factory in Winchester, Va., closed this month, a victim, along with its 200 employees, of a 2007 energy conservation measure passed by Congress that set standards essentially banning ordinary incandescents by 2014.

Just as they are by fuel-economy standards, consumers are denied choice and the freedom to evaluate any possible benefits on their own by the nanny state. Washington’s force and coercion are necessary because it seems the great unwashed can’t seem to see the benefits or ignore the risks of compact fluorescents, or CFLs.

In Europe, light bulbs are already a controlled substance. The 100-watt bulb was banned last year and the 75-watt became illegal as of Sept. 1.

Not surprisingly, incandescent light bulbs there quickly became a hot item, flying off the shelves while they were still available. Der Spiegel reported that German customers leave hardware stores with carts piled high with enough incandescent bulbs to last 20 years. Garages and attics throughout the Old World are full of them.

Read it here.

(h/t Climate Change Dispatch)

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Election 2010: Labor is just so last year

31 July, 2010 by

Old and falling to pieces, like Labor

Out of touch, out of control, and with a bit of luck, soon to be out of power. Magnificent timing by Labor. No sooner has Joooolya Gillard launched her innovative and original “cash for clunkers” policy to “tackle climate change” than the Yanks have, er, yanked theirs:

The White House says its cash for clunkers scheme worked well but that it will not be repeating the offer.

Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard has said she will introduce a similar scheme if re-elected.

The US cash for clunkers scheme was created last year as part of president Barack Obama’s bid to help the car industry during the financial crisis. [But Joolya’s policy isn’t about helping the car industry, because the Greens want everyone to give up cars and ride ethnic peace bicycles™, but to save the planet, of course.]

More than 500,000 drivers received rebates of up to $4,500 to upgrade their cars.

The scheme was so popular the government had to provide another $2 billion. (source)

Such a scheme here would be yet more money down the drain on pointless climate policies that could be better spent on, you know, education, health, roads, infrastructure – in fact anything else.

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Save the planet – paint the Andes

29 June, 2010 by

This guy's serious

Wacky Scheme Alert as an “inventor” from Peru decides the best way to save the planet is to start whitewashing mountains. The World Bank considered this idea worthy of a prize in its competition “100 Ideas to save the planet”. That, by the way, tells you all you ever need to know about the World Bank. ACM reported on Eduardo Gold’s plan to go ape with a tin of paint here, but now it’s actually happening:

Gold has already begun work while he waits for the 200,000-dollar prize money [200 G’s for that? The World Bank is truly insane] to fund his pilot project. His plan is to paint a total area of 70 hectares (173 acres) on three peaks in the Andean region of Ayacucho in southern Peru.

Chalon Sombrero, the name of an extinct glacier which used to irrigate a valley and several rivers, is where he’s started with a team of four men from the local village, Licapa.

The workers use jugs – rather than paintbrushes – to splash the whitewash onto loose rocks around the summit. So far they have painted some two hectares, just a tenth of the total area they aim to cover on that peak.

“A white surface reflects the sun’s rays back through the atmosphere and into space, in doing so it cools the area around it too,” explains Gold.

“In effect in creates a micro-climate, so we can say that the cold generates more cold, just as heat generates more heat.”

It’s pure climate madness. At least there is an small injection of sanity:

But Antonio Brack, Peru’s Environment Minister, told the World Bank that its funding would be better spent on other “projects which would have more impact in mitigating climate change.”

He said: “It’s nonsense.”

Actually it would be better spent on anything rather than idiotic schemes to “tackle climate change” – which we can’t anyway.

Read it here.

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Japanese told to go to bed early to cut emissions

25 June, 2010 by

Wacky Scheme No. 2: Japanese sleeping hat

Wacky Scheme Alert as those crazy Japanese decide they are going to save the planet by … going to bed earlier. Simple! Yet more interference in the way people live their lives by the ever-present green police:

The Morning Challenge campaign, unveiled by the Environment Ministry, is based on the premise that swapping late night electricity for an extra hour of morning sunlight could significantly cut the nation’s carbon footprint.

A typical family can reduce its carbon dioxide footprint by 85kg a year if everyone goes to bed and gets up one hour earlier, according to the campaign.

The amount of carbon dioxide emissions potentially saved from going to bed an hour early was the equivalent of 20 per cent of annual emissions from household lights, “Many Japanese people waste electric power at night time, for example by watching TV until very late,” a ministry spokesperson told The Daily Telegraph.

“But going to bed early and getting up early can avoid wasting electrical power which causes carbon dioxide emissions. If people change their lifestyle, we can save energy and reduce emissions.” The campaign also proposes that people take advantage of an extra hour of morning sunlight by improve their lifestyles in general by running, doing yoga and eating a nutritious breakfast. [That’s the great thing about environmentalism – you get to tell everybody else what they should and should not do, kind of like a green dictatorship]

It is the latest initiative tackling climate change by the Japanese environment ministry, which is faced with the challenge of reducing carbon dioxide emissions by 25 per cent from 1990 levels within the next decade.

Not a hope in Hell, especially with barking mad schemes like that one.

Read it here.

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Climate Madness: call for supermarket goods to have "carbon labelling"

10 June, 2010 by

Not a joke, perhaps?

You Couldn’t Make It Up Alert: More lunacy from Down Under as a local consumer group calls for products to have a label showing the amount of amount of greenhouse gases generated by a product’s raw inputs and manufacturing process. No, really, they’re 100% serious:

UK shops have hundreds of product lines with a carbon label and a UK parliamentary environment committee has said such labelling may prove the single most important measure in promoting change at home, work and in business to slow down climate change.

Australia has no such labelling and its big supermarkets and the industry body, the Australian Food and Grocery Council, are querying the consumer appetite for it and if carbon emissions should be stated on a product or if a label with a single broad environmental rating is better.

The AFGC said it couldn’t estimate when a consistent approach may be agreed and some form of labelling introduced.

Asked what the industry was doing to help raise consumer awareness, the AFGC said it had a group of retailers and manufacturers looking at options but no consumer groups were included in the group.

Choice senior food policy officer Clare Hughes said: “I think the industry needs to be showing leadership and responding by giving consumers information so that they can make sustainable choices.

“This is an area where we should be educating consumers, explaining that there are sustainability implications for the food choices that they make, and not just waiting,” Ms Hughes said.

Can you believe it? All of this is based on the assumption that CO2 is the primary driver of climate, which it almost certainly isn’t, and if it isn’t, this whole exercise is totally, utterly pointless, and will just push up the cost of essentials at the supermarket checkouts. At least the Coles supermarket chain has more sense and is politely telling them all to get lost:

“It’s premature to commit to one approach until we better understand the level of customer demand for, and understanding of, carbon labelling”.

Climate madness.

Read it here.

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Anglican bishops: "Give up carbon for Lent"

17 February, 2010 by

I hope they purchased carbon offsets for that…

I guess the church could start by not burning thousands of tons of palm fronds around the planet for Ash Wednesday services. That would remove a few tonnes of CO2 from the atmosphere (not to mention all the heretics burnt in the past – just think of the carbon footprint of that).

Several prominent Anglican British bishops are urging Christians to keep their carbon consumption in check this Lent.

The 40-day period of penitence before Easter typically sees observant Catholics, Anglicans, and Orthodox Christians give up meat, alcohol or chocolates.

But this year’s initiative aims to convince those observing Lent to try a day without an iPod or mobile phone in a bid to reduce the use of electricity – and thus trim the amount of carbon dioxide spewed [good emotive word there – Ed] into the atmosphere.

Bishop of London Rev. Richard Chartres said that the poorest people in developing countries were the hardest hit by man-made climate change.

He said Tuesday that the “Carbon Fast” was “an opportunity to demonstrate the love of God in a practical way.”

Actually, it’s the poorest people in developing countries that will be hit hardest by the global efforts to tackle climate change, denying them cheap energy to raise their standards of living… hardly a Christian good deed, is it?

Read it here.

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UK Met Office Madness: 10 years to "save the world"

10 December, 2009 by

Hysterical

Hysterical

When I was growing up in the UK, the Met Office was the centre of cool-headed, scientific thinking. As a kid I used to listen to the Shipping Forecast and plot synoptic charts from the observations. So much has changed. The Met Office is now the centre for hysterical climate alarmism, devoid of any scientific impartiality, it is now just a political mouthpiece, as evidenced by its latest rant:

The world has just ten years to bring greenhouse gas emissions under control before the damage they cause become irreversible, the Met Office has warned.

Should nations fail to tackle the issue, giant mirrors in space, artificial trees and other so called “geo-engineering solutions” will be the only way to prevent disastrous overheating of the planet, the researchers warned.

More than 190 countries are gathered in Copenhagen for UN climate change talks aimed at keeping global temperature rise below 3.6F (2C).

Pollution [pollution? – Ed] from cars and factories will have to be declining at a rate of five per cent a year by 2020, the Met Office said.

World emissions are currently growing at around three per cent per annum and it will take massive investment in renewable energy, electric cars, nuclear and other green technologies to stop the growth.

It is estimated it would cost the world around 2.5 per cent of GDP or £150 for every person on the planet to make such massive cuts.

Jason Lowe, head of mitigation advice at the Met Office, said that if the world does not manage to turn the situation around in time then temperatures will rise by more than 2C “unless you can pull carbon dioxide out of the air or reflect sunlight back into space”.

Mr Lowe knows when he’s on to a good thing. If mitigation weren’t required, he’d be out of a job.

Read it here.

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Barking madness in UK: "GPs should offer climate change advice"

30 November, 2009 by

Bonkers: any psychiatrists around?

Bonkers: any psychiatrists around?

Away from the intrigue of the Liberal leadership contest, here’s a timely reminder that climate madness is alive and well all over the globe, and nowhere more so than in the UK:

Doctors should give patients advice on climate change, a leading body of medical experts has claimed.

The Climate and Health Council, a collaboration of worldwide health organisations including the Royal College of Nursing, the Royal College of Physicians and the Royal Society of Medicine, believes there is a direct link between climate change and better health.

Their controversial plan would see GPs and nurses give out advice to their patients on how to lower their carbon footprint.

The Council believes that climate change “threatens to radically undermine the health of all peoples”.

It believes health professionals are ideally placed to promote change because “we have ethical responsibility…..as well as the capacity to influence people and our political representatives to take the necessary action”.

I can just imagine: “I’m sorry I can’t treat your chronic flatulence, but I suggest you purchase a boat-load of emissions permits instead.”

How about just letting medical professionals get on with their job – i.e. making sick people well again – instead of burdening them with pointless climate propaganda? That would be a novel idea.

Read it here, and see the Climate and Health Council website here.

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UK Climate Madness: Individual carbon rations proposed

16 November, 2009 by

That's it for the year. Don't breathe it all at once.

That's it for the year. Don't breathe it all at once.

Not an April Fool, by the way, and I guess it had to come sooner or later. The Brits have hamstrung themselves by legislating to cut CO2 emissions by a whopping 80% by 2050 [And based on 1990 levels! How could they be so stupid? Oh, hang on, so are we – Ed], but without working out first how to do it. So in desperation, the wacky schemes are coming thick and fast. Now each Brit will have a carbon allowance, and when they’ve used it up, they’ll have to buy more:

Lord Smith of Finsbury believes that implementing individual carbon allowances for every person will be the most effective way of meeting the targets for cutting greenhouse gas emissions.

It would involve people being issued with a unique number which they would hand over when purchasing products that contribute to their carbon footprint, such as fuel, airline tickets and electricity.

Like with a bank account, a statement would be sent out each month to help people keep track of what they are using.

If their “carbon account” hits zero, they would have to pay to get more credits.

Those who are frugal with their carbon usage will be able to sell their unused credits and make a profit.

Lord Smith will call for the scheme to be part of a “Green New Deal” to be introduced within 20 years when he addresses the agency’s annual conference on Monday.

An Environment Agency spokesman said only those with “extravagant lifestyles” would be affected by the carbon allowances.

And in New Labour speak, “extravagant lifestyles” means anyone not on the poverty line. I guess the next step will be oxygen credits. You are allocated a cylinder of O2 at the beginning of each year, which you have to drag around with you. If you use it up before December 31, say, by breathing a bit too heavily, then you’ll have to buy top-ups, maybe at the gas station with your 20 litres of unleaded, at a price to be determined by the market. Anyone caught breathing the oxygen in the atmosphere and not out of a tank will be sent to jail.

I can just see it: we’ll have the situation where the poorest in society will have loads of carbon credit cards, all maxed out, and then dodgy debt companies will spring up advertising on daytime TV, offering to “consolidate your carbon loans into one gargantuan one with an easy to manage monthly payment (which you still won’t be able to afford)”.

Carbon lunacy.

Read it here.

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"Paint rocks white" to stop global warming

4 November, 2009 by

The crazy ideas are falling over each other this week! Another one, as reported in The Australian:

A PERUVIAN scientist has called on his country to help slow the melting of Andean glaciers by daubing white paint on the rock and earth left behind by receding ice so they will absorb less heat.

Eduardo Gold, president of non-governmental organisation Glaciers of Peru, made the suggestion in a presentation yesterday to the country’s parliamentary commission on climate change.

Read it here.

Or if you don’t like that, how about hiring your clothes instead of buying them?

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