With Germany scouring the world for supplies of oil and gas and firing up dormant coal power stations, one of its most distinguished atmospheric scientists, Professor Hermann Harde, has castigated politicians for reacting to increasingly shrill climate horror stories and “believing they can save the world”. Many of the research studies and “horror scenarios” are not based on a secure physical foundation, he says, “but rather represent computer games that reflect what was fed in”. The idea that humans can control the climate with their CO2 emissions is said to be an “absolute delusion”.
In Professor Harde’s view, there exists considerable doubt about a “scientifically untenable thesis” of purely human-caused climate change, “and it is completely wrong to assume that 97% of climate scientists, or even more, would assume only anthropogenic warming”. In his view, climate and energy policy can only gain popular acceptance when they are based on reliable knowledge, “and not on speculations or belief”. Harde retired a few years ago from Helmut Schmidt University in Hamburg as Professor of Experimental Physics after a long career in science academia.
For many years, Germany’s politicians have been able to make virtuous green noises by closing nuclear power stations and banning exploration for fossil fuel. At the same time, the country started importing large quantities oil and gas from an unstable Russia. The war in Ukraine has suddenly brought home to Germany, and the EU, the sheer stupidity of this dangerous policy.
In Harde’s view, the move to impose ‘climate emergency’ policies was led by competition between different research groups to outdo each other predicting horror scenarios. Alarming predictions attracted media attention, “and our decision-makers felt obliged to quickly react”. But, noted Harde, it is absolutely clear that without a reliable and sufficient energy supply, “Germany and many other countries that take such a path will end in anarchy”.
Professor Harde’s research leads him to state that the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change overestimates by five times the thermal effect of doubling carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. He points to the “highly overlapping and saturated absorption bands” of CO2 and water vapour, and the significant reduced effect of greenhouses gases under cloud cover. He goes on to state that the recent increase in CO2 has caused warming of less than 0.3°C over the last century.
He continues:
Since only about 15% of the global CO2 increase is of anthropogenic origin, just 15% of 0.3°C, i.e., less than 0.05°C remains, which can be attributed to humans in the overall balance. In view of this vanishingly small contribution, of which the Germans are only involved with 2.1% [of emissions], it is absurd to assume that an exit from fossil fuels could even remotely have an impact on our climate. Changes of our climate can be traced back to natural interaction processes that exceed our human influence by orders of magnitude.
In Professor Hande’s opinion, modern climate science has developed more as an ideology and world view, rather than a serious science. Scientists who question or point to serious inconsistencies about human-caused or anthropogenic global warming, are “publicly discredited” and excluded from research funds. In addition, research contributions in journals are supressed, and in a reference to the recent Professor Peter Ridd case in Australia, placed on leave or dismissed from their university. After all, he notes, this is “settled climate science”, and doubts about the harmful effect of CO2 on the environment and the climate are not allowed, “because it is about nothing less than saving the planet”.
What we call truths, continues Harde, depends to a large extent on our state of knowledge. He suggests that climate science requires a fundamental review of the hypotheses and a shift away from the widely established climate industry. Science must not be misled by commerce, politics or ideology, he says. It is the genuine task of universities and state-funded research institutions “to investigate contradictory issues and to ensure independent, free research that gives us honest answers, even when these answers are often complex and do not fit into a desired political context”.
Harde concludes by warning politicians that it would be an irresponsible environmental and energy policy to continue to ignore serious peer-reviewed scientific publications that show a much smaller human impact on the climate than previously thought. It is also irresponsible to shut down a reliable, adequate and affordable energy supply, to be replaced by millions of wind turbines, “that destroy our nature and shred trillions of birds and insects”.
Chris Morrison is the Daily Sceptic’s Environment Editor.
Postscript: It has been pointed out that a 2018 report by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) found that “human activities are estimated to have caused approximately 1.0°C of global warming above pre-industrial levels”. This view is supported by findings from such organisations as the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), and the IPCC, which indicate that human activity is the greatest contributor to global warming, primarily through its emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases.
In Chris Morrison’s defence, the role of human activity in causing global warming is still a matter of dispute among climate scientists and the claim that it is “the greatest contributor to global warming” is not in reality ‘settled science’. Most people know what the IPCC thinks, since its views are widely reported. Our article reported an alternative view, one held by a distinguished atmospheric scientist. We believe science progresses by debating hypotheses such as these, not pretending they are ‘settled’ and dismissing views that challenge them as beyond the pale.
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Good Lord a scientist talking sense about the whole ” carbon ” myth.
If only we had politicians that could listen and understand .
They understand perfectly. They understand it can be used as one of the main drivers for social and economic change, which is why they will never question.
I agree, it’s the same in every sphere it seems…different ‘agendas’ are being rolled out that ordinary people don’t agree with in the main, so they have to manufacture consent from people with ridiculous amounts of, mainly MSM propaganda, and of course the censorship of anyone straying from the approved line.
Good point .Reading The real Anthony Fauci and have come to the conclusion that the the whole “manmade” climate crisis has now become to big to fail or question .To much money and reputations pinned to it,despite the facts .Just like the Pharma government industrial complex.
They really are a bunch of cnuts..
Of course Merkel did a lot of damage to Germany’s energy supply by illogically closing down nuclear power following Fukushima.
Merkel is a WEF Young Global Leader alumnus… Just following orders.
Yes, yes but why?
To state that it’s not the existential threat they say it is is not impressive, intellectually at least. (He maybe taking career risk which would be impressive.)
The interesting question to me is why the western establishment insist on something they can’t believe to be true themselves.
Everyone has their pet theories. Mine is that it’s a geopolitical issue. Western countries – the ones pushing the climate agenda – have fewer natural energy resources than non-western ones. And natural energy resources confer wealth and power. I see it as a geopolitical power game. They’re trying to destroy the market for natural energy sources to limit the challenge to Western geopolitical supremacy.
That’s my theory and I’m sticking with it.
Geology and politics in tandem. There is a lot of lignite (brown coal) surface mining in parts of Germany, much of it being used for electric power generation. Although there has been a lot of investment in and encouragement of renewable energy products over there (and much of the kit in my English house came from companies there), there’s still a lot of business in the coal trade, especially in former East Germany.
Last year, Germany imported 41.1 million tons (37 million tonnes) of coal, according to the VDKi.
About half of the country’s hard coal (used for heating) and three-quarters of its steam coal (used for power production) come from Russia.
In 2021, Germany paid Russia about 2.2 billion euros ($2.4bn).
In total, Europe buys about 8 billion euros ($8bn) worth of coal from Russia annually.
So now they are all scrambling to find alternative sources of coal, which will force prices up….
Meanwhile the German government said on Sunday it would pass emergency laws to reopen mothballed coal plants for electricity generation and auction gas supplies to industry to incentivise businesses to curb consumption. The move illustrated the depth of concern in Berlin over possible gas shortages in the winter months.
the whole thing is like watching a car crash in slow motion…
Germany is at position six in the list of of countries by coal reserves and the USA on position one. Almost half of the know oil reserves on the planet (44.8%) are in (in this order) Venezuela, Saui Arabia and Canada. The so-called west wouldn’t need to import fossil fuels for quite some time if this wasn’t cheaper than using the domestic resources first and if Venezuela recently started to dominate the world, I somehow missed that.
Also, you assertion that natural energy resources confer wealth and power, is simply wrong: An advanced, industrialized society is necessary for coal, oil and natural gas to be of any use. Resources are without value if there’s no demand for them and in the real world, the situation is the exact opposite. Eg, some Australians are convinced that China exerts an undue amount of power over Australia because it imports a real lot of Australian coal. Nobody believes Australia exerts power over China in a meaningful way.
Hmmm…or maybe the plentiful natural resources are necessary for an advanced industrial society to thrive…..which seems more likely to me.
I’m not sure how you can say these plentiful resources don’t confer power, because although they might not always, it’s hard to see which ‘powerful’ country hasn’t either had them, or has them!
The countries we currently see as the most powerful, as you put it, in the real world, are ones that have plentiful natural resources.
Hmmm…or maybe the plentiful natural resources are necessary for an advanced industrial society to thrive…..which seems more likely to me.
You’re framing this as contradiction but it isn’t one. My statement was that coal, oil and natural gas are of no or only very limited use without all kinds of industries making use of them. Eg, the Russians are selling natural gas and oil because they have no other use for it. Without a buyer, they’d have no use for it. To a degree, that’s actually hampering them: They can make more money with less investment by selling raw materials than they could by replicating the facilities processing them in Russia. Hence, they’ll remain relatively underdeveloped. This is much more true for lesser countries with a lot of natural resources. Fairly small parts of society become immensely wealthy by selling the countries resources to foreigners. The general population remains poor and lives under pretty primitive conditions.
Saudi Arabia, Abu Dhabi, Qatar, Brunei, Kuwait, are not industrialised societies. And are phenomenally wealthy thanks to the oil.
Norway was a relatively poor country, now has the biggest sovereign wealth fund in the world. It’s from North Sea oil.
If Venezuelans aren’t living in prosperity, it certainly isn’t because the have oil, but rather because the resource is being managed in such a way that they don’t get the benefit from it. But some one surely is.
Russia’s wealth, badly distributed as it is, largely comes from its natural resources, and in particular its oil and gas.
I. could go on but I think that natural energy resources confer wealth and power is pretty self evident. This is the only thing that isn’t really up for question from my “theory”.
What you can certainly question is whether the wealth and power it confers to other nations is of concern to western powers.
I think that answer to that is certainly yes. The crises of the 1970s were triggered by Saudi Arabia’s pricing shenanigans which led to a close US-Saudi alliance of oil for weapons. That’s just one example of the kind of power that can and has been used against the west by an oil and gas rich country.
And more questionable is whether western elites have purposely co-opted and turbo charged the climate change story to try to destroy demand for these hitherto very valuable natural resources.
What we can probably agree on is that wherever their passion for climate change comes from, it’s not for concern for the temperature of the planet.
What we can probably agree on is that wherever their passion for climate change comes from, it’s not for concern for the temperature of the planet.
Temperature of the planet is an entirely fictional construct. I’m also absolutely no fan of trying to second-guess someone elses real motivations for doing something, not the least because they don’t matter that much. The story of the porgessive left is basically We must be in undisputed command of everything, otherwise, a not so distant apocalypse will wipe out mankind. As usual for these people, they’re repurposing Christian concepts. What they obviously want is unlimited political power or as much of that as can be achieved. And they’re trying to get that by frightening people and presenting themselves as the only saviours of the thus frightened people.
LOL
When the stated objectives make no sense and defy all reason, I’m not sure what I’m left with but trying to understand what the actual agenda is.
I attended a talk in Leicester by Nick Clegg when he was deputy Prime Minister. It gave a great insight into the extent to which the political class really bought its own climate propaganda (which was evidently not much). My memory is hazy, so I can’t repeat his exact words, but when asked a question about ‘climate deniers’, his position was that even if it turned out that all the apocalyptic predictions were wrong, the wealth of the energy market provided a fantastic opportunity to bolster government revenue through taxation.
He neglected to explain how increased costs to energy producers would not be passed to consumers, but I took his statement to express a view that the ‘climate crisis’ (as it was later known) provided government a perfect Trojan Horse in which to smuggle an otherwise explosively unpopular form of taxation.
Politicians have mortgaged off the future wealth of their countries for decades in order to inflate state sectors and bribe large sections of the electorate, and have been left presiding over mountains of debt. There’s a good chance that from their point of view, at the core of this whole scam lies an opportunity to dig their way out of trouble by taking control of and taxing the use of energy. Their naïve fixation with the nebulous idea of a ‘green economy’ is additional testament to this.
To do this, they have colluded with academia (grants / status), the media and PR industries (grants / bungs / status), the financial sector (carbon trading / wealth creation / laundering of public money), charities (laundering), the wider state sector (employment / favours / influence), each other (directorships / lobbying / opportunity for unhindered corruption / influence) and empire-building institutions like the EU and UN (creep of powers / increase of size and influence) by creating vast incentives for unconditional support in this enterprise, using the opportunity that access to public finances provides. Plus they’ve been able to easily leverage the support of the disaffected young and misanthropic left, who have always been easy to manipulate by promising influence in return for their ability to agitate.
So all the comments here are correct in one way or another – the whole thing doesn’t even require a conscious conspiracy, which is why it’s so difficult to oppose; just a set of diverse but collectively very powerful groups promoting their own interests at the cost of the public. It’s been seen time and again throughout history in feudalistic societies (particularly communism), though arguably never before on this scale.
Balloon and lead spring to mind.
Well of course the poplitical class will not change direction. They are intent on using the MMGW myth to increase their control over society and the economy. Their mentors, the greenies, will not yioeld and with the help of the MSM they will destroy any politician who steps out of line.
The German government is living on borrowed time; only because the greens are in the coalition have they got away with their temporarty apostasy driven by industrial pressure.
Lucky for Germany they mothballed coal fired stations – that gives huge advantage that gives them over the UK, where Cameron-Clegg and successors were in extacy over the physical destruction of our coal fired capacity. One could almost image a German – Russian alliance to defeat the west through encouragingeveryone else to go green and burn our boats ! ok sorry, that would be CO2 intensive.
They can try and cancel as many as they like but they cannot suppress the facts.
Professor Ian Plimer April 2022
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=txQcX0fm5bs
CO2 is a TRACE gas of which humankind contributes ‘sod all’ in the scale of things.
It is an enjoyable watch, funny in parts, like when he cannot get his share of the pie on offer.
Enjoy
More brilliant stuff. Many thanks.
So ….. our politicians could listen to:
a) a calm, rational scientist pointing out provable FACTS
b) climate change modellers (who are as reliable as Prof Ferguson) and are corrupted by research funding
c) an unqualified, hysterical young girl with mental health problems
They chose (b) and (c). And as a result, our economy is wrecked; we have no energy security and the cost of heating our homes is tripling.
Unfortunately, it’s going to take a great deal more than Prof Harde speaking truth to power to undo the brainwashing propaganda of the past decade.
So sad, tragic even but you are absolutely correct. God help us all.
At a news conference in Brussels, Christiana Figueres, executive secretary of U.N.’s Framework Convention on Climate Change, admitted that the goal of environmental activists is not to save the world from ecological calamity but to destroy capitalism.
“This is the first time in the history of mankind that we are setting ourselves the task of intentionally, within a defined period of time, to change the economic development model that has been reigning for at least 150 years, since the Industrial Revolution,” she said.
Referring to a new international treaty environmentalists hope will be adopted at the Paris climate change conference later this year, she added:
“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.”
http://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/climate-change-scare-tool-to-destroy-capitalism/