Game over for green energies and CO2 reductions?
Journalist Daniel Wetzel of German national daily Die Welt here presents a devastating commentary on Paris Accord and Germany’s so far “illusionary” CO2 reductions targets. The German failure is a signal that could have significant global consequences.
Wetzel not only calls the targets illusionary, he also believes the existing Energiewende (transition to green energies) is “at an end”.
2030 target completely illusionary
According to Wetzel, “The Energiewende and climate change are not among the priorities of the government” and that Germany reaching its self-imposed targets is achievable only if “everyone were forced to switch off every boiler, oven, motor. Completely illusionary.”
Lots of talk, no action
While German political leaders like to continue pretending they are taking real action to combat climate change, the reality is that the German government has been rolling back subsidies for green energies such as wind and sun over the past years. And many localities have made the permitting of wind parks far more stringent.
The days of unfettered support for green energies are over.
Germany’s CO2 equivalent greenhouse gas emissions in millions of tonnes (Source: UBA Federal Office of Environment)
The result: Germany has not reduced its CO2 equivalent emissions for close to a decade (see chart above). Wetzel writes that everyone agrees that it is unrealistic to think that Germany will somehow make the sudden downward trend turn.
German Energiewende “at the end”
The Die Welt journalist adds: “Practically all renowned environmental analysts and government experts have already determined that the German Energiewende structurally has reached the end and that a system change is needed.”
Humans burning fuel one million years
In his commentary Wetzel also reminds that humans have been using fire for some one million years, and that it cannot be expected that they will just stop doing so during the course of one single generation.
Wetzel compares the Energiewende to the Apollo space program, which put man on the moon after 12 years and 120 billion dollars of investment. He notes that compared to the great transformation which Energiewende would entail, this was peanuts.
He warns that implementing the Energiewende could cost the country a back-breaking three trillion euros (without mentioning the impact on climate would be negligible) and doubts the public would ever accept such a large-scale, draconian transformation of society.
German credibility takes a blow
Wetzel also comments the Germany’s failure to make the 2020 targets has tarnished the country’s image as a leader in climate protection, and adds: “The coalition agreement and the German Federal Budget for 2018 robbed all remaining credibility.”
In short Germany’s is not serious about reducing CO2.
Environmental groups and the Potsdam Institute, for example, are fuming, yet keep insisting it’s still not too late and achieving the target is still possible. But Wetzel injects sobriety and realism: “In the meantime we know that Germany will not only fail resoundingly to meet its self-imposed 2020 targets, but also those of the EU itself.”
With Germany as Europe’s largest economy, and regarded as a role model for all things green, the country’s failure would send a devastating message to the rest of the continent and the world: The Green Revolution was mostly a dream and was in fact never attainable. If tech-savvy Germany can’t do it, who can?
“No reality basis”
Yet, German officials continue to insist they can meet the 2030 target! But Die Welt’s Wetzel notes that doing so would mean Germany cutting it’s CO2 equivalent emissions by some 40%, or 350 million tonnes, within the next 12 years. That would mean radical and painful transformations. Recall that Germany has not managed to emissions at over the past decade (see chart above). Wetzel asks: “How credible is this target?”
Die Welt’s Wetzel summarizes:
The feasibility rhetoric of policymakers as a rule has no reality basis.”
Finally, he reminds that Germany going it alone will never work, and that climate protection has to be “organized internationally – or not at all”.
Thank you for this important news. As for “organized internationally – or not at all”, it should be clear by now that it will be not at all, thankfully.
Why the hate?
“Why the hate?”
You tell us where you get it from ?
SKEPTICS BETTER FOR ENVIRONMENT
https://moonbattery.com/study-finds-global-warming-skeptics-more-responsible-regarding-environment-than-true-believers/
Kind of the opposite of hate, the exact opposite of what the true believers falsely claim.
I have spent more of my youth on REAL environmental matters than basically ANY of the AGW apostles.
Cases like seb just DO NOT CARE about the environment. !
They HATE the very trace gas that feeds plant life and sustains all life on Earth. They want plant life to starve.
The HATE avian wildlife, and DON’T CARE about it being chopped to shreds or roasted by solar farms.
They devastate the landscape with white crucifixes, destroying trees, views, wildlife habitats, with none of the fines that would be occurred if someone else did the same thing, while making large areas unfit for human habitation.
They want prices for electricity pushed up, so that less funded people are forced to burn all sort of high-polluting garbage material.
They hold back funding for RELIABLE energy supplies in third world countries, so poor people have to continue cooking their food over dung and other horrendous substances.
But THEY JUST DON’T CARE !!!
Thank goodness for China and its funding of RELIABLE energy in Asia and Africa.
The World Bank and other AGW stall-warts ought to be ASHAMED of themselves.
You two have a very twisted perception of reality …
SebastianH claims that his opponents have a “very twisted view of reality.” The veracity of Sebastian’s claim may depend upon what reality is under consideration. If the Sebastian is disputing that his hatred is intentional and conscious, I would side with him. But if he claims that his advocated policies do not have the same impact as someone who hates, then his claim is invalid.
Seb, really doesn’t have very much idea of real REALITY, anyway.
He lives in his own little anti-science fantasy land.
@AndyG55 10. May 2018 at 5:56 AM
Yes. Everything they pretend to know is wrong. And none of it is good for humans, wildlife or our environment.
It’s not. What “we” don’t know is how anyone can even get to where you two guys are with your “knowledge” of how things really work. What does it take to become like this?
It I do confess, there are things I do hate, like needless loss of human life resulting from their rabidly harmful agendas – as described here.
https://climatechangedispatch.com/new-report-green-policies-threaten-poor-nations/amp/
seb,
You asked, “Why the hate” in your response to Henning, who merely concluded that “not at all” was the de facto status of so-called international “Climate Protection” progress / success / agreement.
Where do you see “hate” in Henning’s observation?
OP wrote: “[…] it should be clear by now that it will be not at all, thankfully.” The last word is the key.
So, you see “thankfully” as a hate word.
And then accuse US of having twisted reality !!
WOW !!!!
Comprehension skills AndyG55, you need to acquire some …
I don’t have your fetid imagination to read something like “hate” into the word THANKFULLY.
Words don’t exist in isolation, AndyG55. I understand that you don’t get this as evident by most of your replies.
THANKFULLY, I don’t have the sort of TWISTED mind you have.
Your mind lives in isolation from REALITY, seb
A fantasy la-la-land of your own self-hatred imaginings.
I Google-translated the original German article, indeed, to find its author’s despair at the inevitable failure of Energiewende.
However, what the author fails to convey is the simple truth that all this effort is completely unnecessary, because the impact of man-made CO2 on the world’s (or local) weather is practically unobservable, whereas the benefits of higher atmospheric CO2 concentration, whether due to human activities or to natural processes, are profound, observed and monetized readily in the form improved crop yields around the world.
In other words, the whole shebang is a monumental international racket: misappropriation of public monies under false pretenses. The ones pocketing the money should be taken to task.
Are you really believing this? What convinced you?
Reality
What reality is capable of convincing someone that CO2 does nothing? That it is all false pretenses?
Believing something like this requires a certain mindset and it certainly is not the one of a realist (as defined by “One who believes in seeing things the way they really are, as opposed to how they would like them to be.”).
It’s very much seeing things like they would like them to be instead of how they really are what the OP (and you guys) does …
“What reality is capable of convincing someone that CO2 does nothing?”
Do you have even the slightest proof that enhanced atmospheric CO2 doesn’t anything other than enhance pat growth ?????
You have failed and failed and failed to produce anything that differs the idea of CO2 warming from a grim Bros fairy-tale..
That is the REALITY.
IT takes a certain mindset to believe something like CO2 warming….. JUST BECAUSE !!!
And that mindset is NOT one based on any sort of REALITY.
darn typos.
“enhance pat growth ”
should be
“enhance PLANT growth..”
… although cows do have their way !!.
“impact of man-made CO2 on the world’s (or local) weather is practically unobservable”
CHECK
“whereas the benefits of higher atmospheric CO2 concentration”
CHECK
“in the form improved crop yields around the world”
CHECK
FACTS, seb, which you have ZERO arguments against.
EMPTY as always
Well said, Gus 9.
The Energiewende is irresponsible flummadidle and a scandal of German hypocrisy in which the population at large ever subservient to authority partakes no less than politics and the state.
It makes me shudder to think how a well-educated (German!!!) people could ignore the obvious fundamental shortcomings of the Energiewende for so long, and keep supporting the politicians responsible for railroading it.
To me, this shows that it is still possible to get the German people to support monumental totalitarian fantasies.
Germans are well trained to do their jobs, but are poorly informed by one-sided state media.
In fact they are really quite brainwashed. There’s a good example here right at this blog. 😊
And you are the super informed person that tells it how it is, right? That you could be monumentally wrong doesn’t even occur to you 😉
Pierre is proven correct very often.
You are proven monumentally wrong at basically every point.
It is YOU that cannot accept that you are monuMENTALLY wrong, and have ZERO SCIENCE to back up even the most basic tenet of your AGW cult belief.
Your blind arrogance cannot let you see.
You are probably one of the most wilfully uninformed AGW parrots I have ever come across.
Basically EVERYTHING you think you know is diametrically opposed to reality.
And you don’t even seem to realise it.
Why do you have to mirror everything back like a small child? “No, you are! No, he is! No, he!” …
Sorry man, I’ve never seen you back up any of your claims. Kenneth at least tries with quotes from papers even though he is careful to not actually claim anything.
I see, and what would you call Pierre’s comment that I replied to here in this thread? That’s the pinnacle of arrogance.
AndyG55, you never get anything right and here you are claiming that I would be like any objective observer would perceive you. You even go so far and throw in that I wouldn’t realize it.
This smells like the Dunning-Kruger effect. One of us is experiencing it first hand. Will you be at the next Mensa meetup to tell me that it’s me? 😉
When have you been proven correct about ANYTHING, seb?
You can’t even prove your self correct on CO2 warming !!
And you can’t even admit that to yourself.
ZERO-SCIENCE.
EMPTY RHETORIC
Those are your stock in yabber.
You have been PROVEN wrong about basically everything..
…you are just too arrogant and too ignorant to admit it.
You are experiencing brain-hosed miasma and a wilful denial of all science, just to maintain your petty AGW fantasies.
That’s why I feel indebted to you for your outstanding efforts at completing the spectrum of information.
The CO2 horsesh*t has to stop.
Got that Seb?
The “Trump effect” is starting in Germany.
You mean everything becoming super stupid? Waiting for people to use Gatorade to “water” their plant … you know, because electrolytes.
Lol
“You mean everything becoming super stupid?”
And there’s seb, leading the way !
You mean Brondo…
Indeed, Brawndo …
https://www.independent.ie/irish-news/ireland-faces-fine-for-failing-to-hit-targets-on-carbon-emissions-34714032.html
They won’t be alone.
Fascists In Charge
Pass a law that mandates the impossible, and then penalize people for violating it.
I liked the below paragraph from the German article, as the author puts his finger on a remarkable feature of the Energiewende that the German population is surprisingly insensitive to:
“Obwohl sich die utopischen Annahmen zur Zielerreichung Jahr für Jahr in Luft auflösten, gab es keine Nachsteuerung, kein Controlling. Über eine ganze Dekade hinweg erfolgte keine Revision der Aufgabenstellung, keine Überprüfung der Prämissen …”
My rough translation:
“Even though the assumptions underlying the feasibility of the Energiewende evaporated year after year, no corrections were made, and there was no controlling. During the course of a decade no efforts were made to revise the definition of the project and reexamine the project’s premisses …”
Frightening this is: reason suspended, a religious mania, a paroxysm reminiscent in its bumbling way of Hitler’s erratic conduct of war.
What I find most worrisome is the absence (until recently) of open controversy and political opposition concerning the Energiewende. It is almost as if (many) Germans are glad to have found a higher cause that entitles them to sideline pesky democracy.
That part reminded me of the Soviet Union, where they pretended everything was working just fine, and that little things could just be ignored. However, everyone knew nothing was working, but no one dared or was willing to admit it.
I can see your point. Mind you, the average German doesn’t seem to have matured yet to the point where he understands that the system doesn’t work.
Also, what the above quote points to is that pluralism is critically diminished and democracy isn’t working as it should. It’s a dangerous indicator that irrationality, a religious mania, if you like, prevails.
In a functioning democracy such blatant contradictions and absurd errors as accompany the Energiewende are quickly picked out and fiercely challenged.
It is not a good sign that this isn’t happening in Germany.
But, Georg, isn’t it possible that dissenting voices are so little represented in the media that neither we nor the dissenters are aware of their numbers?
I can think of any number of US media-driven positions with which the vast majority disagree. Indeed, the media is so distrusted here that their opposition to Trump was a great help in getting him elected.
Thanks, Penelope, for the two interesting points you’re making.
I sincerely hope that the number of the unknown dissenters is very large and growing fast. Actually, I’d be content if only the number of open-minded observers capable of critical thinking would increase, leaving them to whatever conclusions they may come to. Germans strike me as being “ökoverblödet” — dumbed down by a delusional pseudo-ecological creed; they’re so sure of the propaganda phrases that they have been conditioned to reflexively repeat that they no longer bother to take a careful look at the real relationship between man and nature. They’re perfectly content to turn the prayer wheel. In that way the greens have managed to destroy the ecological awareness of the German population – replacing concern for nature by religious orthodoxy.
As for the real proportion (critical minds versus indoctrinated followers) I have only anecdotal evidence. I live in Germany and have never met a person in the ordinary flow of life (in contrast to fringe political groups, say, like the libertarian Hayek Club) who didn’t support the Energiewende. Which observation nicely squares with this anecdote:
The other day, I gave a lecture in Czechia, where I met a professor from Cambridge (UK), to whom I presented myself as a critic of the Energiewende. All of a sudden, the guy looked almost like he was about to faint, gasping for air. The next moment, in an utterly flabbergasted manner, he confessed he had never met a German who was critical of the Energiewende. I assume Germans attending Cambridge University may be considered part of the country’s (not only intellectual/scientific) elite in terms of status and position in later life.
Other anecdotes that make me worry: encounters with academics (notable professors) in Germany who confided in me that they dare not express their true findings or views concerning AGW or the Energiewende fearing career threatening reactions from their students, the University administration and other powers-that-be, even from colleagues and fellow-scientists.
My impression is that support for the politically correct green agenda has become no less conventional, no less culturally entrenched in Germany than a greeting phrase like “Guten Tag”.
Similarly, spitting scorn and contempt at anything related to US-president Trump is simply the done thing over here. If you want to signal a fellow German that you like him, it is a useful move to advertise your hatred of Trump.
It is embarrassing to me how, time and again, fellow Germans who get to know me signal the message “You seem to be a nice guy” by regurgitating with a beaming face the latest anti-Trump media slander. That way, they feel sure they’re striking just the right note. They can’t imagine that a reasonable chap might take a differentiating view of Trump, to whom, incidentally, I ascribe at least two very positive achievements: he has awakened democracy in America from its political correct slumber, and he takes the state’s responsibility to protect the integrity of science seriously — both of which recoveries Germany is desperately in need of.
However, efforts by the Trump administration to protect genuine science to keep vulgar- and pseudoscience at bay and ensure that the dignity of science is not abused so as to palliate and push through dubious policies are treated with disdainful denial in Germany, like any move the president might care to make.
The German Anti-Trump attitude of rejecting scientific correctness in favour of political correctness is understandable, from a psychological point of view, as similar endeavours over here to restore critical thinking and the scientific method would cause Germany’s green State religion, dutifully parroted by the masses, to come crushing down.
Georg, thank you for the substantial reply. I must assume that you have the better understanding of Germany’s zeitgeist re the AGW hoax, since you are there. Your examples were interesting, and quite similar to American academic opinion. Well-educated Americans certainly repeat it — as a commenter elsewhere said– “like a demented parrot.”
However I think a major persuasion of the AGW propaganda is its offer of a large moral plum: for the price of repeating the accepted catechism you get a white horse and very pretty armour, and are dubbed savior of the whole Earth. Many simply can’t resist this illusion of heroism; this is revealed by the personal insult that they obviously feel when factual opposition is presented.
In America, and I had hoped in Germany, there is a core of resistance outside of the intelligentsia. Where there’s more than mere apathy with the realization that we are unable to affect public policy– where people still struggle for moral separation from those who are ruling– there is at least an embittered skepticism towards elite themes and warfare. For lots of Americans media yammering doesn’t constitute belief.
Among the educated, the segment still capable of independent reasoning I would say is much more limited. “Educated”, especially in recent decades, has come to mean “propagandized.”
I wish that I could concur with the widespread idea that Trump is anti-establishment. I’m very sorry, but branding him as such was only a technique by the power structure to get him elected. As is the continual “attempt to unseat Trump.” Yeah, sure. This make-believe conflict is a longlasting distraction. So long as we stare at it, we aren’t looking at the real projects which are moving forward.
I’ve probably said enough about Trump on a climate blog. Search “William Engdahl and Trump” for about 4 articles and a youtube. I flatter myself that my insight is several veils deeper than his, but his will do.
Thank you again for your considered comment. One wonders in America how we shall ever restore control to the people. It sounds as if in Germany– at least on this one topic– the masses have been mostly co-opted.
Thank you for sharing how the mind of a skeptic works, Georg Thomas. Very enlightening what you have to tell yourself to make others look wrong and yourself the keeper of the truth.
Yeah, we are all blind, of course. You know all the answers.
The silent majority of dissenters (towards the causes you seem to think dissent-worthy) … doesn’t exist.
Penelope, I’m honoured by your taking time to write a most readable reply with thoughts that entice me to ponder. Thanks also for the links; I shall look them up over the weekend. I’m looking forward to more inspiring exchanges.
And it would be fixed with the next five year plan. Always the future.
Funny how there’s no restrictions or even propaganda against China’s stupendous expansion of coal-fired plants. Is it on purpose that Europe and the US are being pushed down, and China up? Peculiar.
I’ve no theories except perhaps some rough standard-of-living equivalency between China, US & Europe is wanted– to facilitate horrid global governance?
“to facilitate horrid global governance?”
YOU NAILED IT, Penelope !!
They have even said as such !!
https://s19.postimg.cc/s5eqnxsfn/endenhofer.png
https://s19.postimg.cc/h4qhxvt2b/Figueres.png
AndyG55, Thank you for your very relevant quotes. Finally got around to checking them out. I’ve kept them to bludgeon those who WILL not see that AGW is a tool of TPTB.
There are lists of similar quote from groups like the Club of Rome. (I don’t have them saved though)
The whole AGW thing is a socialist totalitarian construct. !
Indeed, Penelope –
Instead of calling China out on matters such as real pollution (e.g., mfg or pwr plant efflux), the leftist narrative goes something like this:
“China is so far ahead of the West in renewables, with x GW wind & solar generating capacity added in just the last year alone… we are losing the battle to lead in the energy transition! So time to double down and invest more in [non-hydro renewables]!”
China is certainly no role model pollution-wise, but they are leading the renewable game in absolute numbers. They are stopping plastic trash imports. They are supporting electric vehicles like no other country. One could say they are without real competition right now.
And they are funding coal powered electricity around the world, THANKFULLY
FAR outweighing their push to renewables in an attempt to lower real pollution from old technologies.
Even the Chinese need RELIABLE electricity, and THANKFULLY they know how to make it..
…and its NOT with so-called renewables.
Most of China’s so called renewables, is of course from hydro.
“They are supporting electric vehicles like no other country.”
Delivery trikes !! And guess where most of the electricity comes from 😉
Powered by coal.
30% of the world’s CO2 emissions come from China alone, where over 50% of the world’s coal is burned. But yet they’re leading the renewable game in absolute numbers…so that’s OK.
Why would that be ok? I never said that and you need to stop making up what you imagine other people are saying/thinking.
China ..biggest CO2 emissions in the world.
And helping many countries to increase theirs.
No wonder seb is so upset and CONFUSED. ! 🙂
Are you saying that China doesn’t deserve a higher standard of living because you fear a global government if that happens?
NO, that is NOT what he is saying.
Why do you ALWAYS intentionally misinterpret what is said.??
Comprehension or “make-it-up” issues hey seb. !!!
China would bring themselves to a higher standard of living, and with them many other third world countries, if the idiotic drive to renewables would get out the way and help reliable energy supplies to be built.
Renewables have wasted so much funding that they have, possibly by intent, slowed down world progress, especially in the third world.
The anti-CO2 agenda has caused stagnation of both science and of world development.
The anti-CO2 craziness has to be brought to an end so that the world can start to move forward again. It has been held back for too long by this anti-science tom-foolery. !!
1) pretty sure Penelope is a female name
2) the irony of you bringing that up seems to completely elude you
Renewables haven’t wasted funding and the world’s progress hasn’t slowed down because of renewables. You have to get your hate for renewables under control, seriously.
Poor seb, more attention-seeking distraction for the pointlessness of his posts.
And do you really think that the money WASTED on unreliables could not have been spent of FAR BETTER things for the progress of humanity, instead of pushing up prices for poor people.
You have to get you HATRED of CO2 under control and realise that it is an ESSENTIAL part of the life cycle and more is needed in the atmosphere to feed our expanding world population.
THANKFULLY China does not share your views and is promoting and building coal fired stations in many countries that have been HELD BACK by the DELIBERATE choices of the anti-CO2 cult..
Sebastion, No, honey. I am only speculating upon the motives of TPTB.
I am speculating on your motives …
We all know your motives, seb.
Attention seeking.
That is you ONLY purpose here.
The funniest part is that the analogy of The Emperor’s New Clothes is used for the Paris Agreement by BOTH sides of the argument:
1) those unconvinced that there is even a “problem” to solve
2) those convinced that we need to act to save the climate, but cry out that the agreement isn’t more than a drop in the proverbial bucket.
The phrase, “If tech-savvy Germany can’t do it, who can?” reminded me of when the German Central Bank failed to meet the Eurozone criteria for annual deficit as a percentage of GDP about a decade and a half ago. I think it was under Schröder. After Germany failed the [fairly sensible and reasonable] measures, intended to prevent the sort of meltdown experienced by Greece over a decade later, it seemed that the rest of Europe’s national bank leaders and politicians threw in the proverbial towel.
If I recall correctly, the argument went something like, “It would be irresponsible for us to rein in [deficit] spending at a time of high unemployment!”
I no longer read any of Sebastian’s posts.
He cannot see the forest for the trees.
I’m not sure he ever reads them, either. !!