Updates to Pragmatic Environmentalist Pages  

This is another summary of updates I made to the pages I maintain at  Pragmatic Environmentalist of New York and Reforming the Energy Vision Inconvenient Truths.  I have an extensive list of reference materials on my original blog that I occasionally update when I run across an article that is particularly interesting and relevant and this blog also has reference material.  This article describes some recent page updates and I also have highlighted a few recent articles that don’t fit my needs on those pages.

I started blogging in late 2017 on New York’s energy policies because I was convinced that they are going to end as an expensive boondoggle driving electricity prices in particular and energy prices in general significantly higher. Reforming the Energy Vision (REV) was the previous comprehensive energy strategy for New York. I wrote about the inconvenient unpublicized or missing pieces of New York State’s REV policy: implementation plan, costs and impacts. At some point I should probably combine that blog with this one but in the meantime, I maintain them both.  The opinions expressed in this post do not reflect the position of any of my previous employers or any other company I have been associated with, these comments are mine alone.

I ran across an intriguing video that sums up the future of New York’s energy future under the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act and linked to it in my page for lessons to be learned from others.  Andrew Bolt describes the effects of green energy policies on Australia.  He makes that point that “willful ignorance” on climate change is making people “poorer and weaker”.  New York is not as far along as Australia on our transition but the same thing is going to happen here.   

I updated theClimate Claims page that addresses the alleged threat of a climate driven existential threat with links to a two part series by Kip Hansen “Reprise — Why I Don’t Deny: Confessions of a Climate Skeptic”.  Hansen updated his original five-year old articles after a conversation with a colleague who’s only understanding of the issue came from main stream media.  The articles update the originals with newer information.  In the first part, he describes the temperature and explains that the temperatures have been increasing since 1650 – 1700.  That is important because that is 150 to 200 years before the start of increased GHG emissions associated with the industrial revolution.  He explains that he agrees that global warming is happening and  human activity causes [some of] it.] but he does not agree with the assertion that CO₂ and other anthropogenic emissions  are “the dominant cause of the observed warming since the mid-20th century.”  He says that he disagrees with the attribution and the effect size.

In the second article Hansen provides his reasoning for this position.  He shows that sea-level rise that is also attributed to anthropogenic warming follows the temperature record.  It has been rising since 1700 when it bottomed out at the end of the Little Ice Age.  He also presents data on snow and ice cover that behave similarly.  He concludes that:

The IPCC and the Climate Science community have, so far, failed to rule out the CO₂ driven global warming hypothesis —  nothing more.    They have, however, shown in their historical reconstructions that the main bodies of evidence their hypothesis relies on — surface air temperature, sea level rise, snow and ice cover —  all started changing long before CO₂ concentrations could possibly had any appreciable effect.

I also added a link to Judith Curry’s latest presentation on climate uncertainty and risk.  She gave a 20-minute presentation at the ICCC Conference and the blog post summarizes the main points.  She does a great job explaining “what we know, versus what we don’t and cannot know” and how that should but does not affect climate policy.  It all comes back to how climate risk is characterized and she argues that is not being done will today. 

I updated my renewable energy feasibility page with this zoning requirements link.  Kevon Martis has prepared wind and solar zoning talks that have the pro-renewable groups spun up because they effectively provide information to keep local control of wind and solar siting.  Robert Bradley writes about a hit piece describing him of sowing fear and misinformation about renewable energy.  When asked by people wanting help, Martis gives a 40-60 minute wind or solar zoning talk, answers questions and then goes home. The links to the two talks are here and here. 

The Climate Act and all its components repeatedly claim that that weather events are getting worse as the justification for the net-zero transition.  I provide examples of problems with those claims at the Climate Change Impacts page.  The Climate Fact Sheet: January 2023 Edition addresses media claims in January 2023 that all run counter to the popular narrative.  

I added a link on my Electric Vehicle Issues page “Are electric vehicle charging stations really worth taxpayer money?”.  Steve Goreham looks into the costs of electric vehicle charging stations and concludes that it’s unlikely that charging fees can cover the capital and operating costs of public chargers or make money for investors.  Ultimately, he predicts that public charging stations will eventually owned by the electric utilities paid for by higher electricity prices and hidden subsidy costs to consumers.

Finally, I have added a page with links to relevant videos.  The following videos are included:

Climate Science

• Unsettled Climate Science:  Link is to a post that includes videos of a discussion between Jordan Peterson and Steven Koonin, on-line material, and a couple of debates.
• Climate Change: What do scientists say? Prager University presentation by Richard Lindzen

New York Net-Zero Transition

• Andrew Bolt describes the effects of green energy policies on Australia.  He makes that point that “willful ignorance” on climate change is making people “poorer and weaker”.  New York is not as far along as Australia on our transition but the same thing is going to happen here.   
• The Federation of Polish Sportsmen hosted a presentation about the Climate Act on February 16, 2023 that is a good overview of New York specific issues.

Implementation Issues

• Mark Mills: The energy transition delusion: inescapable mineral realities shows that the amount of mining necessary to provide the raw materials needed for the net-zero transition is so large that the transition is impossible.
• Li-Ion battery fires: Paul Christensen, Professor of Pure and Applied Electrochemistry at Newcastle University in the United Kingdom gave a presentation at PV magazine’s Insight Australia event in 2021 that describes the risks  of thermal runaway fires in li-ion batteries. His videos of thermal runaway tests are terrifying.   
• Problems with hydrogen: Link to a post with a video and description of contents

Climate Change Issues

• Ronald Stein interview with The Epoch Times
• Climate Science What does it say Lindzen
• Tom Nelson interview with Javier Vinós on the search for natural climate change.
• Why there is no ‘climate crisis’  debunks the hysterical claims of an existential threat
• The Bias in Science Jordan Peterson interview of Richard Lindzen
• The models are OK the predictions are wrong.  Jordan Peterson interview of Judith Curry