The craziest climate story of the last few months must be the shenanigans at Chinese-owned ‘British’ Steel. In order to reduce the company’s carbon emissions to save the planet from non-existent ‘global boiling’, our useless ‘Conservative’ government is giving ‘British’ Steel’s Chinese owners around £500m of our money to close down its blast furnaces, replace them with supposedly ‘environmentally-friendly’ electric arc furnaces and, in the process, fire over 2,000 skilled British workers. As blast furnaces can melt raw iron ore as well as recycled metal, while electric arc furnaces can only melt recycled or scrap metal, British Steel seems to be turning into a glorified scrap metal merchant. Perhaps we should rename British Steel ‘Steptoe & Son Steel’? Moreover, a cynic might wonder how much effect the expensive closure of these blast furnaces and the associated job losses will actually have on the Earth’s climate.
When questioned about the ‘wisdom’ of this decision, the Business and Trade Secretary, Kemi Badenoch laughably claimed: “The U.K. Government is backing our steel sector. This proposal will secure a sustainable future for Welsh steel and is expected to save thousands of jobs in the long term.”
The only possibly amusing part of this disaster is that the Labour-supporting unions are beginning to see the catastrophic real-life consequences of their party’s (Ed Miliband’s) ludicrous Climate Change Act on the sad remnants of the British economy.
“This deal will have devastating consequences for jobs and workers,” said Gary Smith, the general secretary of the GMB. “It will rip the heart out of the Port Talbot community.”
I’d like to write more about this, but the stupidity is so mindbogglingly obvious, there’s really not much more to add.
This leads on to a rather entertaining (for all of us who have given up any hope of having intelligent politicians) story from Down Under. Our U.K. politicians are forever telling us that by abandoning cheap, reliable coal and gas energy and replacing it with unreliable and expensive supposedly ‘clean renewables’ like wind and solar, Britain will somehow become a ‘clean energy superpower’. While doing so, they seem to forget to explain how we will get our energy when the sun doesn’t shine – for example in the evening and at night – and the wind is either too weak or too strong for wind turbines to work.
Our Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak, has said: “We need to move further and faster to transition to renewable energy, and I will ensure the U.K. is at the forefront of this global movement as a clean energy superpower.“
And here’s a quote from the Labour Party’s current 2024 promises to Britain: “Labour’s fourth mission in Government will be to make Britain a clean energy superpower. We will make energy cheap and secure, so that the British public never again face spiralling bills; boost jobs and investment in every region and nation of the country; and grow our economy from the bottom up and the middle out.”
Of course, this is complete nonsense. As I have explained in a previous article for the Daily Sceptic – ‘Britain is leading the world in committing economic suicide‘ – the more renewable (‘clean’) energy a country relies on, the higher its energy costs and therefore the less competitive its industries are. You don’t need a PhD in economics to understand that. So the phrase ‘clean energy superpower’ is a brobdingnagian-sized oxymoron. If you have gloriously cheap, reliable fossil-fuel energy, you can become a manufacturing superpower like China is and India soon will be. If you are reliant on hideously expensive and unreliable supposedly ‘clean’ energy, you bankrupt your country.
Well, it appears that our friends from Down Under are making the same ludicrous promises to their long-suffering population as, just as in Britain, their few remaining industries are crushed by Australia’s ever-more-clean, ever-increasing energy costs. Australia’s Minister for Climate Change and Energy recently explained: “Our Government is laying out the roadmap for our nation to become a renewable energy superpower’. And the Australian Treasury proudly announced: “The Albanese Government’s second Budget will help to unlock Australia’s potential as a renewable energy superpower with significant investments in clean energy industries and jobs.”
If you had to choose one developed country which could have seen what nonsense the climate-catastrophists’ Greta-worshipping global boiling narrative is, you’d probably have chosen the down-to-earth, say-it-as-it-is Aussies. That they too seem to have fallen for the unhinged Net Zero climate doom-mongering is a worrying sign of how mass delusion can so easily spread.
You’ve got to laugh, otherwise you’d cry.
David Craig is the author of There is No Climate Crisis, available as an e-book or paperback from Amazon.
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Clean energy
Super power
Oxymoron if ever you saw one
Pretty
Ugly
Social
Distancing
Artificial
Intelligence
Wise
Politicians
All thinking, free people are constantly having to navigate between the Lilliputians on one side (the sheep, tying you down) and on the other side the Brobdingnagians, arbitrarily bashing you on the head (governments).
Ah Swift.
And I read that this week’s Energy Secretary has rolled over to the Renewable Unreliables by upping the contract price as demanded ( which they may not pay if “markets” go against them or has that loophole been shut definitely?)
“the stupidity is so mindbogglingly obvious”
It isn’t stupidity, it’s malice, and part of the deliberate destruction of this country.
(That’s not to say that there aren’t plenty of imbeciles who support this.)
For how much longer must we watch as our industries are dismantled, our society reined in, and our travel restricted etc all because of the massive lies about climate change and the fanatical Net Zero targets that must be met? It’s the slowest car crash in history. Jobs being thrown onto the altar of Net Zero and all this “…This proposal will secure a sustainable future for Welsh steel and is expected to save thousands of jobs in the long term.” bollocks from politicians who only know how to parrot what they’ve been told and have absolutely no effing idea about ordinary life of the citizens they are meant to represent let alone the science behind climate change but keep on offering these useless meaningless platitudes as if they do actually mean something – and to whom are they speaking to? What idiots actually believe this garbage? How much longer? Until we sit in the ruins of our beautiful country? People might want to march for this or that but I’ll tell you we need to march for ourselves and our futures before it’s too late because these effing useless politicians, these evil, corrupt see-you-next-tuesdays will bring it all down…just to ‘build back better’! I’m a bit miffed as you can tell.
A perfect summary Aethelred.
Thing is, those who support this madness think that their jobs are green. So they don’t care about working class people who do things (that make eveything else possible) that they know nothing about. However, laptops, smartphones, and the whole knowledge area of our economy, is hugely energy hungry. But these laptop midwits imagine it all happens by magic.
What?
The people that completely lost their minds over covid got abused more than any other country except perhaps China and then proceded to vote back in the tyrants that abused them?
Those down-to-earth, say-it-as-it-is Aussies?
In any case, message to DS: the governments of the UK and Australia aren’t making any decisions. This has all been decided for them. Wakey wakey.
All the governments do is sell the policies to the population. They don’t make them. They don’t even get to decide on the marketing slogans.
Clean energy superpower.
Build back better.
Safe and effextive
Even the slogans are handed down to them.
How more obvious does it need to be?
It is not about pushing back might be risky, it’s their pho#kin’ job.
Churchill faced the same issues and realised that fight back meant having the people on side and duly mobilised the media of the day. The treasonous grifter cowards we are lumbered with are just that – abject cowards.
As an Australian, I agree with your assessment 100%. That whole, laid back, anti authoritarian, smart ass larrikin persona is a complete myth. Something docile, ignorant, scared Australians conjure up to make themselves feel better as they wait for the government to tell them exactly how to think and feel. Covid was eye opening for me
As evidence, one of my cousin’s got 4 covid vaccines in a 3 month period because he was travelling between Australia and New Zealand and it was just easier to get a vaccine passport in each country if he had proof of vaccination locally.
I hope he hasn’t died yet. The jabs are lethal, and each one makes the risk of death higher.
Back in the day though, I’m talking about 1980, there seemed to be a different breed of Australian, especially out in the bush where I spent a lot of time working in old mining areas. These were what I would call ‘Ockers’, true blues, a decent type always out on the fringes of society. The urban Aussie though was a different kettle of fish.
They still exist, but unfortunately a tiny minority and their numbers are dwindling.
Bush Christmas (1947) – IMDb
One of my favourite films from the Children’s Film Foundation stable – will resist the temptation to seek comparisons….How far have “we” fallen?
Much appreciate the Aussie input. Thanks.
I “hear ” what you say but “Outback Truckers” suggests the canker not yet reached all parts of Oz….yet?
Yep – Ben Pile’s paper for Climate Debate and Together lays it all out.
https://togetherdeclaration.org/report/
-A number of strategic grant-making organisations have been established, with greater focus on particular political objectives than philanthropic foundations typically achieve.
-These foundations can be found working in close proximity to policymakers, and in drafting, lobbying and campaigning for policies.
-The grants made to and from these organisations are opaque, despite their clearly political objectives and influence in policymaking….
-Green campaigning organisations have immense resources compared to independent CSOs and vastly outspend any counterparts, including national political parties.
-Civil society is now owned by, rather than merely supported by, philanthropy.
-The influence of aligned CSOs and other public institutions is undemocratic and
-undermines democratic control of policymaking.
The Peoples’ Republic of Ardernia got a dose of being abused – and it is still going when “The White Witch” has quit Ardernia to escape “due process”…?
The Down to earth say it as it is Aussie is a myth. When it comes down to it they are mostly a weak people ruled by tyrants which they not only accept, but which the majority crave, just like the majority of people in the U.K and likewise the western world. The entire Covid dark times evidenced this fact frankly the sheep will do as they are instructed, they will hate any individuals who refuce to go along with it, and will march gratefully and thankfully to their enforced impoversihed end.
It always seems to be Britain that wants to be “world leaders” in every green absurdity going. I thought the Aussies had a little bit more sense, but they too are maybe now affected with the pretend to save the planet Liberal Progressive virus sweeping the western world that seeks to impoverish citizens by denying them the reliable and affordable energy they need to live a comfortable life. The most important commodity is energy and using renewables means that consumers pay through the nose for it’s intermittency. This seriously affects standard of living.There is no escape from the truth that fossil fuels are by far the cheapest way to produce energy but the eco socialist politicians now running virtually every wealthy western country are determined that we cannot have it, with climate change pseudo science as the excuse. You find everywhere that it is political and economic decisions that are being made and pretending to the populace that these things are being done to protect climate. ———In all of this politicians are lying to their own citizens by pretending that we can be rid of fossil fuels and replace them with wind and sun and everything will tick along just fine. —–No it won’t and No it isn’t. ————–All people in countries with the most wind turbines like Germany Denmark and the UK need to do is look at their electricity bills over that last 15 years to see how renewables have affected their wallets. The countries with the most wind have the highest bills ——-Oh dear so much for all the FREE WIND.—- Australians beware. ——–Pretending to save the planet does not come cheap.
Your comment about the UK always wanting to be world leaders has an echo of a spent force still trying to have a voice. The only world leadership they seem to be able to achieve at the moment is the lead Lemming dashing toward the cliff of socioeconomic oblivion.
I feel that things are starting to change. The window is shifting. A lot of people who I thought were climate change religionists have started saying sceptical things lately. I am hopeful. However, it took 30 plus years to create the Climate Change stupidity, it make take 30 to unravel it.
Oops. Some idiots might conclude they are laying the ground work necessary to bring about the Great Reset. Careful!
Interesting idea this reusing scrap, and producing no new steel. I wonder how many actual Materials Scientists and metallurgists have been consulted? It is probably zero, or maybe one lunatic leftie. Britain needs millions of tons of steel per year, but does not have this much scrap. Slight problem there then. Scrap does not make very good steel, without a lot of other things to remove the contaminants. These are imported, and expensive, and the processing produces a lot of nasty gases, and slag. The result, we import steel from China and India, at high prices and probably including a “carbon” tax. What have we gained? The steel is still made using coal, the same emissions plus the extra ones from the shipping, and the world is unchanged. Someone gets the carbon tax to make them richer, and our costs have increased. That doesn’t sound the least bit “Green” or even sensible to me, it sounds lunatic! And we paid £500 million to start this process? Just who are these people?
We have driven past the massive recycling Saar Stahl plant at Volklingen for ~25 years off and on – and the clone of the Appleby Frodingham plant – they seem to thrive even with German energy prices for the last couple of years….or is that not the whole story I wonder..
The Aussies are being fooled by the climatists just as they were the covidists. Shame on a once great nation.