Month: June 2018

Daily News 28 Jun 2018

‘EU’s Absurd Crusade To Recycle Plastic Just Makes Ocean Pollution Worse’

The European Union’s crusade to recycle plastic is making pollution of the world’s oceans worse, a climate think tank warned yesterday.

Wealthy Western countries including the UK ship millions of tons of plastic waste to poorer countries for recycling every year.

But because environmental controls in these countries are weaker, much of the plastic ends up in the sea or burned in the open, releasing dangerous chemicals.

The report by the Global Warming Policy Foundation, which advocates climate change scepticism, criticised the EU’s “absurd” crusade to recycle plastic.

And it said Brussels is also blocking the controversial option that would permanently remove plastic from the environment – “clean” incineration.

The revelation came as it was revealed yesterday that Britons throw away 55.5 billion plastic items a year.

The staggering figure works out at about 1,000 items each, with plastic food packaging, bottles and wet wipes dominating, according to pollsters Opinium Research.

Yet nine in 10 of people quizzed said they were worried about the impact of plastic on the environment.

Now the UK has been urged to tackle the production of single-use plastic.

The Foundation study, Save The Oceans – Stop Recycling Plastic, said the problem has been compounded by China’s decision earlier this year to refuse to accept plastic waste from overseas.

For the past two decades nearly half the EU’s annual six million tons of plastic waste has gone to China for recycling.

Now EU states, the USA and Japan are “desperately” turning to countries such as Vietnam, Malaysia, Indonesia and Bangladesh.

The study’s author, Finnish public health expert Dr Mikko Paunio, wrote: “Since the waste management infrastructure in South-east Asia is much more primitive than in China, it remains unclear to what extent the rejected ‘recycles’ end up in the ocean or burned in the open.”

Two years ago the Ellen MacArthur Foundation predicted that at current rates there will be more plastic in the sea than fish by 2050.

Dr Paunio said waste can be dumped en route to the Far East to avoid landfill fees in wealthy countries or dumped once there by unregulated recycling firms who want only high-quality plastic.

He cited a study that said 25 per cent of plastic that ends up in the sea “leaks” from waste management systems.

“The fact that recycling in the EU (as well as in the USA, Japan and Australia) is a major source of marine litter in Asia is completely hidden,” said Dr Paunio.

He added the “only sustainable” way forward is to dispose of plastic in properly managed landfills or incinerate it. But he said incineration is “being compromised by the EU’s new anti-incineration stance”.

Critics argue that incineration destroys valuable resources and results in pollution, but Dr Paunio said modern plants, which can be used to generate heat and energy, are clean and safe.

Full story

via The Global Warming Policy Forum (GWPF)

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June 28, 2018 at 05:10AM

Daily News 28 Jun 2018

Quote of the Week: Hansen, father of ‘global warming’, calls renewables a ‘grotesque idea’

Dr. James Hansen, writing about his 1988 senate testimony 30 years ago in an op-ed in the Boston Globe, said some very strong things when it comes to the pie-in-the-sky renewables schemes.

He starts off with:

THIRTY YEARS AGO, while the Midwest withered in massive drought and East Coast temperatures exceeded 100 degrees Fahrenheit, I testified to the Senate as a senior NASA scientist about climate change. I said that ongoing global warming was outside the range of natural variability and it could be attributed, with high confidence, to human activity — mainly from the spewing of carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping gases into the atmosphere. “It’s time to stop waffling so much and say that the evidence is pretty strong that the greenhouse effect is here,” I said.

This clear and strong message about the dangers of carbon emissions was heard. The next day, it led the front pages of newspapers across the country. Climate theory led to political action with remarkable speed. Within four years, almost all nations, including the United States, signed a Framework Convention in Rio de Janeiro, agreeing that the world must avoid dangerous human-made interference with climate.

Sadly, the principal follow-ups to Rio were the precatory Kyoto Protocol and Paris Agreement — wishful thinking, hoping that countries will make plans to reduce emissions and carry them out. In reality, most countries follow their self-interest, and global carbon emissions continue to climb (see graph at bottom).

But his finish,is quite something, and is sure to raise some eyebrows in the green sector:

The notion that renewable energies and batteries alone will provide all needed energy is fantastical. It is also a grotesque idea, because of the staggering environmental pollution from mining and material disposal, if all energy was derived from renewables and batteries. Worse, tricking the public to accept the fantasy of 100 percent renewables means that, in reality, fossil fuels reign and climate change grows.

BOOM!

Source: https://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/2018/06/26/thirty-years-later-what-needs-change-our-approach-climate-change/dUhizA5ubUSzJLJVZqv6GP/story.html

via Watts Up With That?

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June 28, 2018 at 05:01AM

Daily News 28 Jun 2018

New video by GWPF on YouTube

Save the oceans – stop recycling plastic
An explosive report from the Global Warming Policy Foundation reveals that efforts to recycle plastic are a major cause of the marine litter problem. The report, written by public health expert Dr Mikko Paunio, sets out the case for incinerating waste rather than trying to recycle it.

* Most of the plastic waste comes from just a few countries, mostly in Asia and Africa.
* 25% is “leakage” from Asian waste management processes — the rest is waste that has never been collected, but is simply thrown into rivers.
* But European countries ship inject huge quantities of waste into Asian waste management streams, ostensibly for recycling. As much as 20% — millions of tons every year — ends up in the oceans and will continue to do so.
* Since the Chinese banned waste imports at the start of the year, shipments have been diverted to other Asian countries with even weaker environmental controls.
* EU recycling is therefore a major contributor to marine waste and increasing recycling will therefore simply increase marine litter.

Author Dr Mikko Paunio says,

“It is clear that the European contribution to marine waste is a result of our efforts to recycle. However, several countries have already shown that they can reduce this contribution to near zero, by simply incinerating waste”

Despite this success, the EU is trying to redouble recycling efforts and to close down the incineration route, mistakenly believing that this will reduce carbon emissions. As Dr Paunio puts it,

“The effects look as though they will be appalling. We can expect a great deal more plastic to end up in the environment, and in the oceans in particular. If the EU was serious about its war against marine pollution it should consider banning the export of plastic recyclate rather than banning plastic straws or taxing incineration.”