h/t Breitbart – White House National Economic Council director Gary Cohn has just re-opened the US Government’s war on coal.
Gary Cohn Relaunches War on Coal: Fuel from America’s Heartland ‘Doesn’t Make Much Sense Anymore’
White House National Economic Council director Gary Cohn, a former Goldman Sachs banking executive, has reopened the U.S. government’s war on coal in direct contravention of directions from President Donald Trump.
“Coal doesn’t even make that much sense anymore as a feedstock,” Cohn said in Europe on Air Force One, while speaking for the White House to the press, the New York Times’ Brad Plumer noted.
“Natural gas, which we have become an abundant producer, which we’re going to become a major exporter is, is such a cleaner fuel,” Cohn continued.
Trump adviser Gary Cohn a bit off-message on Air Force One, per pool report: “Coal doesn’t even make that much sense anymore as a feedstock” http://pic.twitter.com/0QLXZOik6k
Frankly I’m getting very disappointed about this kind of thing. The Trump Presidency is supposed to deliver the straight shooting leadership we’ve all been waiting for, the White House administration which doesn’t have to be continuously reminded about the President’s campaign promises.
A chief economic advisor who despises coal has no place in the government of a President who expects future support from coal country.
A meteorologist and an analytical chemist teamed up explore the claims that CO2 levels drive climate. (They also mention the role of underwater volcanoes, a drum that I have been beating for more than 20 years.)
In their newly published paper, ‘Role of atmospheric carbon dioxide in climate change‘, meteorologist Dr Martin Hertzberg and analytical chemist Hans Schreuder cite a plethora of data concerning what is known – and currently accepted – about the role of carbon dioxide in climate change (global warming).
The data examined includes:
(a) Vostok (Antarctica) ice-core measurements;
(b) rising CO2 levels in the atmosphere;
(c) temperature changes that precede CO2 changes;
(d) global temperature trends;
(e) satellite data;
(f) effect of solar activity.
The two highly qualified scientists found that:
“Nothing in the data supports the supposition that atmospheric CO2 is a driver of weather or climate, or that human emissions control atmospheric CO2.”
Any changes in CO2 levels are “overwhelmingly natural.”
Looking at the relationship between CO2 and climate over the past 400,000 years, the data indicate that human-caused CO2 emissions had no influence on the Earth’s temperature,
Even though CO2 levels doubled during warming periods in the past 400,000 years, any change in climate could not have come from human emissions, which were essentially nil.
“Empirical evidence does not support the claim that anthropogenic CO2 emissions cause global warming and/or climate change.
“The preponderance of evidence suggests that human emission is not a significant factor in the increase (of CO2 levels).”
“Fossil fuels are not a significant source of atmospheric CO2,” the authors insist. Instead, forces and motions in the oceans and atmosphere are driven mainly by the following:
• The motions of the Earth relative to the Sun
• Variations in solar activity
• The distribution of land and water on the Earth’s surface,
• Motions within the Earth’s oceans that determine moisture content and ocean surface temperatures (El Nino and La Nina).
• Volcanic eruptions
• Underwater volcanic eruptions, including ‘black smokers’ that spew super-heated water continuously. Underwater volcanoes are expected to number in the hundreds of thousands.
The two long-time scientists also found that changes in temperature almost always preceded changes in CO2 levels, meaning that global warming alarmists have it backward. Carbon dioxide levels do not drive the climate. Instead, CO2 levels respond to climate.
Even during the last 59 years, the authors found a negative correlation between CO2 levels and climate.
Martin Hertzberg was first trained as a meteorologist at the US Naval Postgraduate School and served as a forecasting and research aerologist at the Fleet Weather Central in Washington DC. He subsequently obtained a PhD in Physical Chemistry at Stanford and later served as a Fulbright Professor.
Dr Hertzberg established and supervised the explosion testing laboratory at the U. S. Bureau of Mines facility in Pittsburgh (now NIOSH). Test equipment developed in that laboratory has been widely replicated and incorporated into ASTM standards. Published test results from that laboratory are used for the hazard evaluation of industrial dusts and gases. He is an internationally recognized expert on combustion, flames, explosions and fire research with over 100 publications in those areas. While with the Federal Government he served as a consultant for several Government Agencies (MSHA, DOE, NAS) and professional groups (such as EPRI). He is the author of two US patents: (1) sub-micron particulate detectors, and (2) multi-channel infra-red pyrometers.
Hertzberg is also a long time climate writer and is a well-published skeptic of anthropogenic global warming/climate change.
Hans Schreuder trained as an analytical chemist in The Hague and spent 15 years working in that field, testing pharmaceutical products as well as researching the recycling of plastics and rubber. For another 15 years, he gained extensive experience as an international technical contractor, including writing quality control manuals whilst working in South Africa. He was accepted as a member of MENSA after passing the relevant tests.
Schreuder has long been a staunch and highly regarded critic of the greenhouse gas theory and outspoken commentator, using his two websites as a publishing hub for fellow scientists critical of the theory. Schreuder has written many articles on the subject and in May 2009 submitted a 109-page written report, supplemented with a 45-min oral submission, to the Northern Ireland Climate Change Committee.
Cold low pressure will cross Wyoming today and bring periods of
snow to portions of the mountains today and tonight. The highest amounts of snow will be above 8500 feet.
Absaroka Mountains-Teton and Gros Ventre Mountains-
Wind River Mountains West-Wind River Mountains East-
May 26 2017…WINTER WEATHER ADVISORY IN EFFECT FROM 6 AM THIS MORNING TO MIDNIGHT MDT TONIGHT…
* TIMING…Snow will begin in the Tetons around daybreak and
spread east during the day. Snow will taper off during the
evening.
* TOTAL SNOWFALL…4 to 10 inches.
* MAIN IMPACT…Mountain passes will become slick and snow
covered. Visibility may be reduced to under one half mile at
times.
“Follow the money. There are companies that want to game the system of using carbon dioxide as a currency to make money.”
European countries and major corporations are pressuring President Donald Trump to remain in the Paris climate agreement despite his promises on the campaign to withdraw the United States from the Obama-era deal that never gained congressional approval.
The Trump administration so far is sticking with being undecided—at least until Trump returns to the United States from his first foreign trip, where on Friday, he’s meeting with Group of Seven ally countries, which support the agreement.
Back home, the pressure is growing from multinational corporations, even the energy sector, which have opposed stricter limitations on carbon.
Exxon Mobil Corp., once run by Trump’s secretary of state, Rex Tillerson, Royal Dutch Shell, and BP are urging the administration to remain in the agreement. Meanwhile, coal mining company Cloud Peak Energy urged the administration to remain.
“BP and Shell are European companies and it’s impossible to do business in Europe without towing the political line,” Myron Ebell, director of the Center for Energy and Environment at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, told The Daily Signal. He added that for oil and gas companies, “the only way to get the price of gas back up is to kill coal. The Paris Agreement kills fossil fuels, but it kills coal first.”
Ebell was part of Trump’s transition team overseeing the Environmental Protection Agency.
The Competitive Enterprise Institute sponsored an ad showing Trump during the campaign saying, “We are going to cancel the Paris climate agreement and stop all payments of the United States tax dollars to U.N. global warming programs.”
While corporate support might seem surprising, it’s very much the same old story for large companies seeking an advantage over smaller competitors, said Katie Tubb, a policy analyst with The Heritage Foundation.
“Big business and big government often go hand-in-hand. Big businesses generally can absorb and adapt to the costs of complying with burdensome regulation, of which Paris is a wellspring,” Tubb told The Daily Signal. “Smaller companies have a much harder time complying, which means less competition for big business. This is especially true if big business can influence the substance of regulations to favor themselves or freeze out competitors. I think in other cases; these large companies are just looking for PR points.”
President Barack Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry led the United States into the Paris climate change agreement, along with 170 other countries. The agreement commits member countries to shift their energy industries away from fossil fuels and toward green energy.
Two dozen major U.S. companies—including Apple, Microsoft, Google, Facebook, the Hartford, Levi Strauss, PG&E, and Morgan Stanley—sent an open letter to Trump published in The New York Times and other newspapers across the country, urging him to remain in the deal. The letter says:
By requiring action by developed and developing countries alike, the agreement ensures a more balanced global effort, reducing the risk of competitive imbalances for U.S. companies … By expanding markets for innovative clean technologies, the agreement generates jobs and economic growth. U.S. companies are well positioned to lead in these markets.
U.S. business is best served by a stable and practical framework facilitating an effective and balanced global response. The Paris Agreement provides such a framework. As other countries invest in advanced technologies and move forward with the Paris Agreement, we believe the United States can best exercise global leadership and advance U.S. interests by remaining a full partner in this vital global effort.
Generally, larger energy companies have an advantage under the climate deal, said Fred Palmer, senior fellow for energy and climate at the Heartland Institute.
“Follow the money,” Palmer told The Daily Signal. “There are companies that want to game the system of using [carbon dioxide] as a currency to make money.”
After meetings at the Vatican earlier this week, Tillerson said, “The president indicated we’re still thinking about that, that he hasn’t made a final decision.”
Ahead of the G7 meeting, Trump chief economic adviser Gary Cohn, the director of the White House National Economic Council, told a pool reporter Friday that the president is weighing both sides.
“I think he’s leaning to understand the European position. Look, as you know from the U.S., there’s very strong views on both sides,” Cohn said. “He also knows that Paris has important meaning to many of the European leaders. And he wants to clearly hear what the European leaders have to say.”
Ebell warned that if the administration seeks to make a deal to stay in the agreement, perhaps with a lower commitment than the Obama administration pledged, then a future president could simply increase the U.S. commitment. That’s why, Ebell said, it’s best for the United States to get out.
Iowa Climate Science Education 