Liberal corruption and incompetence.

3 MW Wind Turbines a Threat to Rural Village of Cesme

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Nina Pierpont Warns Against An Entirely Avoidable Turkish Wind Farm Disaster

July 5, 2014 by  

Calvin-Nina001

NINA PIERPONT, M.D., Ph.D.

June 30, 2014
Ms. Esen Fatma Cesme Belediyesi (Municipality)
İnönü Mah. 2001 Sk. No: 2 Çeşme / İZMİR
Turkey

Dear Ms. Kabadayi-Whiting,

I write to you at the request of Madeleine Kura, who tells me the charming, historical town of Cesme is about to have half a dozen 3 MW industrial wind turbines built on the edge of town, a mere 500 m from people’s homes. (I’m told that at least one of the turbines will be 300 m from a school.) Furthermore, all this construction will be in hilly terrain.

Let me explain, clinically, why this is a bad idea. In 2009 I published what was then the definitive study of health effects caused by wind turbine infrasound on people living within 2 km of industrial turbines. The book, “Wind Turbine Syndrome: A Report on a Natural Experiment” (K-Selected Books), included 60 pages of raw data in the form of case histories (using case cross-over studies), demonstrating that living in proximity to wind turbines dys-regulates the inner ear vestibular organs controlling balance, position, and spatial awareness. Effectively, sufferers experience symptoms of sea-sickness, along with several related pathologies.

It turns out all this has been well known since the 1980s, when the US Department of Energy commissioned a report on wind turbine health effects — the report subsequently published by physicist Dr. N D Kelley and his colleagues at the Solar Research Institute in Golden, Colorado, bearing the title, “A Methodology for Assessment of Wind Turbine Noise Generation,” Transactions of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, v. 104 (May 1982), pp. 112-120.

In this paper we have presented evidence to support the hypothesis that one of the major causal agents responsible for the annoyance of nearby residents by wind turbine noise is the excitation of highly resonant structural and air volume modes by the coherent, low-frequency sound radiated by large wind turbines.

Further, there is evidence that the strong resonances found in the acoustic pressure field within rooms [in people’s homes] . . . indicates a coupling of sub-audible energy [infrasound] to human body resonances at 5, 12, and 17-25 Hz, resulting in a sensation of whole-body vibration (p. 120).

I discovered the same thing in my research. What Kelly et al. refer to as a “sensation of whole-body vibration,” I refer to as Visceral Vibratory Vestibular Disturbance (VVVD): “The internal quivering, vibration, or pulsation and the associated complex of agitation, anxiety, alarm, irritability, tachycardia, nausea, and sleep disturbance together make up what I refer to as Visceral Vibratory Vestibular Disturbance (VVVD)” (“Wind Turbine Syndrome,” p. 59).

Five years later, Dr. Kelley gave a follow-up paper at the Windpower ‘87 Conference & Exposition in San Francisco, titled “A Proposed Metric for Assessing the Potential of Community Annoyance from Wind Turbine Low-Frequency Noise Emissions.” Just so you understand the terminology, “emissions” means “noise & vibration.” And the term “low frequency” includes infrasound. And the antiseptic phrase “community annoyance” is code for Wind Turbine Syndrome — except the name had not been coined in1987. (I created it decades later.) Kelley’s research once again had been funded by the US Department of Energy, Contract No. DE-AC02-83CH10093.

We electronically simulated three interior environments resulting from low-frequency acoustical loads radiated from both individual turbines and groups of upwind and downwind turbines. . . .

Experience with wind turbines has shown that it is possible . . . for low-frequency acoustic noise radiated from the turbine rotor to interact with residential structures of nearby communities and annoy the occupants. . . .

The modern wind turbine radiates its peak sound power (energy) in the very low frequency range, typically between 1 and 10 Hz [i.e., infrasound]. . . .

Our experience with the low-frequency noise emissions from a single, 2 MW MOD-1 wind turbine demonstrated that . . . it was possible to cause annoyance within homes in the surrounding community with relatively low levels of LF-range [low frequency range] acoustic noise. An extensive investigation of the MOD-1 situation revealed that this annoyance was the result of a coupling of the turbine’s impulsive low-frequency acoustic energy into the structures of some of the surrounding homes. This often created an annoyance environment that was frequently confined to within the home itself (p. 1, emphasis in original).

I am attaching a copy of Kelley’s 1987 paper.

Besides my research, which pretty much duplicates Kelley’s, there is the work of Dr. Alec Salt, Professor of Otolaryngology in the School of Medicine at Washington University (St. Louis, Missouri), where he is director of the Cochlear Fluids Research Laboratory. Professor Salt is a highly respected neuro-physiologist specializing in inner ear disorders and in particular the mysteries of the cochlea.

Prof. Salt’s research dovetails with mine and with Dr. Kelley’s. For many years, acousticians and noise engineers have vigorously maintained that “if you can’t hear it, it can’t hurt you.” That is to say in the case of wind turbines, “If you can’t hear the low-frequency noise in the infrasound range, it can’t hurt you.” (lnfrasound, by definition, is noise below the hearing threshold, typically pegged at 20 Hz and lower. People feel infrasound in various parts of the body, though typically they cannot hear it.) In any case, Professor Salt and his colleagues have demonstrated conclusively, definitively, that infrasound does in fact disturb the very fine hair cells of the cochlea.

With this discovery, one of the main arguments advanced by the wind energy industry — namely, that wind turbine infrasound was too low to be harmful to people, since they could not hear it — was demolished. Prof. Salt has proven that, “If you can’t hear it, it can still harm you.”

This past winter, Professor Salt and his colleague, Professor Lichtenhan, published “How Does Wind Turbine Noise Affect People?” Acoustics Today, v. 10 (Winter 2014), pp. 20-28. The following is a lengthy excerpt:

The essence of the current debate is that on one hand you have the well-funded wind industry (1) advocating that infrasound be ignored because the measured levels are below the threshold of human hearing, allowing noise levels to be adequately documented through A-weighted sound measurements; (2) dismissing the possibility that any variants of wind turbine syndrome exist (Pierpont 2009) even when physicians (e.g., Steven D. Rauch, M.D. at Harvard Medical School) cannot otherwise explain some patients’ symptoms; and (3) arguing that it is unnecessary to separate wind turbines and homes based on prevailing sound levels.

On the other hand, you have many people who claim to be so distressed by the effects of wind turbine noise that they cannot tolerate living in their homes. Some move away, either at financial loss or bought-out by the turbine operators. Others live with the discomfort, often requiring medical therapies to deal with their symptoms. Some, even members of the same family, may be unaffected. Below is a description of the disturbance experienced by a woman in Europe we received a few weeks ago as part of an unsolicited e-mail.

From the moment that the turbines began working, I experienced vertigo-like symptoms on an ongoing basis. In many respects, what I am experiencing now is actually worse than the ‘dizziness’ I have previously experienced, as the associated nausea is much more intense. For me the pulsating, humming, noise that the turbines emit is the predominant sound that I hear and that really seems to affect me.

While the Chief Scientist [the person who came to take sound measurements in her house] undertaking the measurement informed me that he was aware of the low frequency hum the turbines produced (he lives close to a wind farm himself, and had recorded the humming noise levels indoors in his own home) he advised that I could tune this noise out and that any adverse symptoms I was experiencing were simply psychosomatic. . . .

Given the knowledge that the ear responds to low frequency sounds and infrasound, we knew that comparisons with benign sources were invalid and the logic to A-weight sound measurements was deeply flawed scientifically. . .

From this understanding we conclude that very low frequency sounds and infrasound, at levels well below those that are heard, readily stimulate the cochlea. Low frequency sounds and infrasound from wind turbines can therefore stimulate the ear at levels well below those that are heard. . . .

No one has ever evaluated whether tympanostomy tubes alleviate the symptoms of those living near wind turbines. From the patient’s perspective, this may be preferable to moving out of their homes or using medical treatments for vertigo, nausea, and/or sleep disturbance. The results of such treatment, whether positive, negative, would likely have considerable scientific influence on the wind turbine noise debate. . . .

Another concern that must be dealt with is the development of wind turbine noise measurements that have clinical relevance. The use of A-weighting must be reassessed as it is based on insensitive, Inner Hair Cell (IHC)-mediated hearing and grossly misrepresents inner ear stimulation generated by the noise. In the scientific domain, A-weighting sound measurements would be unacceptable when many elements of the ear exhibit a higher sensitivity than hearing. The wind industry should be held to the same high standards. Full-spectrum monitoring, which has been adopted in some reports, is essential. . . .

Given the present evidence, it seems risky at best to continue the current gamble that infrasound stimulation of the ear stays confined to the ear and has no other effects on the body. For this to be true, all the mechanisms we have outlined (low frequency-induced amplitude modulation, low frequency sound-induced endolymph volume changes, infrasound stimulation of type II afferent nerves, infrasound exacerbation of noise-induced damage and direct infrasound stimulation of vestibular organs) would have to be insignificant. We know this is highly unlikely and we anticipate novel findings in the coming years that will influence the debate.

I suspect you are beginning to get a clear picture of the problem — and why I’m writing to you.

The typical symptoms of what is now known worldwide as Wind Turbine Syndrome are: sleep disturbance, headache, tinnitus (ringing or buzzing in the ears), ear pressure, dizziness (a general term that includes vertigo, light-headedness, sensation of almost fainting, etc.). nausea, visual blurring, tachycardia (rapid heart rate), irritability, problems with concentration and memory, and panic episodes associated with sensations of internal pulsation or quivering which arise when awake or asleep.

Does everybody living near wind turbines experience Wind Turbine Syndrome? By no means! What I discovered is that people with (a) motion sensitivity, (b) migraine disorder, (c) the elderly (50 years and older), (d) inner ear damage, and (e) autistic children and adults — all these are at statistically significant high risk.

The solution is simple: industrial wind turbines must be set back, well away from people’s homes, schools, places of work, and anywhere else people regularly congregate. In my 2009 report, I recommended a minimum setback of 2 km in level terrain. Studies done around the world since then have persuaded me that 2 km is not sufficient, especially in hilly or mountainous terrain — as with Cesme. In Cesme’s case, setbacks should be more in the order of 5 km or greater.

Hence my alarm when notified by Ms. Kura that Cesme is considering 500 m (or less) setbacks. This is wholly inadequate. I guarantee that, unless the setbacks are increased substantially, there will be numerous victims of Wind Turbine Syndrome.

There’s more. Dr. Salt referred to Dr. Steven Rauch, above. Dr. Rauch, a physician, is the Medical Director of Harvard Medical School’s renowned Clinical Balance and Vestibular Center, part of the Massachusetts Eye & Ear Infirmary. Dr. Rauch was recently interviewed by The New Republic:

Dr. Steven Rauch, an otologist at the Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary and a professor at Harvard Medical School, believes WTS [Wind Turbine Syndrome] is real. Patients who have come to him to discuss WTS suffer from a “very consistent” collection of symptoms, he says. Rauch compares WTS to migraines, adding that people who suffer from migraines are among the most susceptible to turbines. There’s no existing test for either condition but “Nobody questions whether or not migraine is real.”

“The patients deserve the benefit of the doubt,” Rauch says. “It’s clear from the documents that come out of the industry that they’re trying very hard to suppress the notion of WTS and they’ve done it in a way that [involves] a lot of blaming the victim” (“Big Wind Is Better Than Big Oil, But Just as Bad at P.R.,” by Alex Halperin in The New Republic, June 16, 2014).

Dr. Rauch made a similar statement to ABC News last fall.

I met with Dr. Rauch in Cambridge, Mass., several years ago. He has read my “Wind Turbine Syndrome” book. You’re welcome to contact him for his clinical opinion. Notice, he actually treats WTS victims, and furthermore his specialty is neuro-otology — precisely the clinical specialty appropriate to WTS, since WTS is mainly a vestibular disorder. (You might consider Dr. Rauch the “pope” of vestibular disease.)

Shifting gears, a group of mechanical engineers at the University of Minnesota recently mapped the airflow turbulence patterns of a 2.5 MW wind turbine. Their technique was ingenious: “A large searchlight with custom reflecting optics generated a two-dimensional light sheet next to the 130-m-tall wind turbine for illuminating the snow particles in a 36-m-wide by 36-m-high area.” They literally mapped the vortices being hurled off the turbine blades, using a blizzard (!) as a kind of background screen. Visit this website to see and savor the dramatic results. http://discover.umn.edu/news/science-technology/new-study-uses-blizzard-measure-wind-turbine-airflow  Click open the video and notice the pulsed pressure waves from the blades — punching holes, as it were, in the swirling snow. You can watch the video on YouTube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OHl_0s4qqUY.

Think of volleys of acoustic artillery, much of it in the low frequency and infrasound range. Imagine the residents of Cesme being bombarded by this day and night.

You are looking at the huge, pulsed, sound pressure waves responsible for Wind Turbine Syndrome.

Ms. Kura tells me the turbines destined for Cesme are 3 MW. Several years ago, the noted Danish noise engineer, Professor Henrik Moller at Aalborg University, published a paper titled “Low-Frequency Noise from Large Wind Turbines,” Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, vol. 129, no. 6 (June 2011), pp. 3727-3744. Moller and his colleague, Christian Sejer Pedersen, demonstrated that “the larger the turbine, the ongreater the ILFN (infrasound and low frequency noise) produced.” The following is the abstract of their paper:

As wind turbines get larger, worries have emerged that the turbine noise would move down in frequency and that the low-frequency noise would cause annoyance for the neighbors. The noise emission from 48 wind turbines with nominal electric power up to 3.6 MW is analyzed and discussed.

The relative amount of low-frequency noise is higher for large turbines (2.3–3.6 MW) than for small turbines (2 MW), and the difference is statistically significant. The difference can also be expressed as a downward shift of the spectrum of approximately one-third of an octave.

A further shift of similar size is suggested for future turbines in the 10 MW range.

Due to the air absorption, the higher low-frequency content becomes even more pronounced when sound pressure levels in relevant neighbor distances are considered.

Even when A-weighted levels are considered, a substantial part of the noise is at low frequencies and, for several of the investigated large turbines, the one-third octave band with the highest level is at or below 250 Hz.

It is thus beyond any doubt that the low-frequency part of the spectrum plays an important role in the noise at the neighbors.

Given all of the above, you can see why I am concerned for the residents of Cesme.

A final word. The clinical literature, including publications by the World Health Organization on health effects from infrasound exposure, typically use the word that Dr. Kelley used in his reports to the US Department of Energy — “annoyance.” It’s really not an appropriate word. It vastly understates the sickness caused by infrasound exposure. (A mosquito bite is an annoyance. Wind turbine infrasound, on the other hand, triggers a debilitating cascade of illnesses whose features I enumerated, above.)

In medicine, we clinicians are morally bound to exercise what’s called the “precautionary principle.” That is, if we don’t know for certain that a procedure is harmless, we are obliged to exercise extreme caution in performing the procedure, in this instance building industrial wind turbines — which are well-known to produce impulsive (i.e., amplitude-modulated) infrasound — near people’s homes. This is, after all, common sense.

For decades, the wind industry flatly denied their turbines produced infrasound. It took monumental efforts by people like me to debunk this fallacy. Wind industry advocates likewise argued that only downwind turbines created noise, that is, low-frequency noise. Dr. Kelley and his research team effectively debunked that falsehood, in the articles referred to above. Finally, the wind industry clung to the fiction that, “If you can’t hear it, it can’t hurt you.” Professor Salt deflated that one.

It’s time to recognize that the global wind industry has hidden behind a series of (what turned out to be) falsehoods. Their untruths have been exposed and corrected in the published clinical and scientific literature, as shown above.

There is no excuse for building wind turbines in proximity to people’s homes.

Sincerely,

Nina Pierpont, M.D.*, Ph.D.**
*M.D. from The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine
**Ph.D. from Princeton University in Population Biology/Evolutionary Biology/Ecology
***B.A. (Biology, with honors), Yale University

For a pdf version of the letter click here.

To find out what Neil Kelley’s research was all about see our posts hereand here and here.

For an insight into Prof Alec Salt’s work see this video.

And, for a taste of what the good people of Çeşme will get to suffer if this disaster is realised, see our post here.

Cesme Turkey

Obama Doesn’t Care About Reducing CO2….he Wants to Reduce the American’s Standard of Living….Dramatically!

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Message to the President: data shows ‘CO2 Reduction is Futile’

Posted on July 4, 2014 by 

The record of recent Man-made CO2 emissions: 1965 -2013 shows that China and the developing world is laughing at your position, Mr. President.

Guest essay by Ed Hoskins

The following calculations and graphics are based on information on national CO2 emission levels worldwide published by BP[1]in June 2014 for the period from 1965 up until 2013. The data is well corroborated by previous similar datasets published by the CDIAC, Guardian [2] and Google up until 2009 [3]. These notes and figures provide a short commentary on that CO2 emissions history.

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The contrast between the developed and developing worlds is stark in terms of their history of CO2 emissions and the likely prognosis for their future CO2 output.

Since 1980 CO2 emissions from the developed world have shown virtually no increase, whereas the developing world has had a fourfold increase since 1980: that increase is accelerating.

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Similarly the CO2 output per head is declining in the developed world whereas it is accelerating the developing world.

In October 2010 Professor Richard Muller made the dilemma for all those who hope to control global warming by reducing CO2 emissions clear: in essence he said[4]:

“the Developing World is not joining-in with CO2 emission reductions nor does it have any intention of doing so.

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The failure of worldwide action negates the unilateral action of any individual western Nation”.

This presentation divides the world nations into seven logical groups with distinct attitudes to CO2 control:

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These graphs of total CO2 emission history show that up until 2013:

§ There is stabilisation or reduction of emissions from developed economies since 1980.

§ The USA, simply by exploiting shale gas for electricity generation, has already reduced its CO2 emissions by some 9.5% since 2005[5]. That alone has already had more CO2 emission reduction effect than the entire Kyoto protocol[6] [7].

§ CO2 emissions from the developed economies rejecting action on CO2 have hardly grown since 2005.

§ The European Union (27) has reduced its CO2 emissions by ~14% since 2005.

However:

§ CO2 emissions from the developing world as a whole overtook the developed world in 2007 and are now a third larger than the developed world’s CO2 emissions.

§ there has been a very rapid escalation of Chinese CO2 emissions since the year 2000[8].

§ China overtook the USA CO2 emissions in 2006, and Chinese emissions are now ~62% greater than the USA, the escalation in Chinese CO2 emissions continues. Chinese emissions have grown by +75% since 2005 and China continues to build coal fired powerstations to supply the bulk of its electricity as demand grows.

§ India has accelerating emissions[9], growing from a low base by +63% since 2005. India too is building coal fired powerstations to increase the supply of electricity as 25% of its population still has no access to electric power.

§ there is inexorable emissions growth from the Rest of the World economies, from a low base, they have grown by +30% since 2005.

So any CO2 emissions reduction achieved by the Developed Nations will be entirely negated by the increases in CO2 emissions from Developing Nations.

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However probably more significant than the total CO2 emissions output is the comparison of the emissions/head for the various nation groups.

§ The EU(27) even with active legal measures have maintained a fairly level CO2 emission rate but have managed to reduce their CO2 emissions/head by ~16% since 2005. Much of the recent downward trend is largely attributed to their declining economies.

§ The USA has already reduced its CO2 emissions/head by ~22% since in 2005, mainly arising from the use of shale gas for electricity generation.

§ Russia, Japan, Canada and Australia have only grown their emissions/head by ~1% since 2005.

§ China’s CO2 emissions/head have increased ~11 fold since 1965. China overtook the world-wide average in 2003 and surpassed the rapidly developing nations in 2006. China’s emissions / head at 7.0 tonnes / head are now approaching the level of the EU(27) nations.

§ India’s CO2 emissions have grown by 4.7 times over the period and are now showing recent modest acceleration. That increasing rate is likely to grow substantially with increased use of coal for electricity generation[10].

§ The eight rapidly developing nations have shown consistent growth from a low base in 1965 at 5.6 times. They exceeded the world average CO2 emissions level in 1997.

§ The Rest of the World (~160 Nations), 36% of world population, have grown CO2 emissions consistently but only by 2.6 times since 1965, this group will be the likely origin of major future emissions growth as they strive for better standards of living.

§ Overall average world-wide emissions/head have remained relatively steady but with early growth in the decade from 1965. It amounts to 1.6 times since 1965.

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When the participating nations particularly EU(27) are compared with Chinese CO2 emissions/head, an interesting picture arises:

§ Chinese CO2 emissions at 7.01mt/head for its 1.3 billion population are already ~43% greater than the worldwide average. Those emissions are still growing fast.

§ At 5.5mt/head, France, with ~80% nuclear electricity generation, has the lowest CO2 emission rates in the developed world and is at only ~12% above the world-wide average.

§ China’s CO2 emissions/head exceeded France’s CO2 emissions/head in 2009 and are now 22% higher.

§ The UK at 7.2mt/head is now only ~48% higher than the world-wide average and only about ~3% higher than China. So China is likely to overtake the UK in the near future.

§ Germany, one of the largest CO2 emitters in Europe, has emissions/head ~100% higher than the worldwide average and is still ~49% higher than China. Germany’s emissions/head have increased recently because they are now burning much larger quantities of brown coal to compensate them for the “possibly irrational” closure of their nuclear generating capacity.

This must question the logic of Green attitudes in opposing Nuclear power. Following the Fukushima disaster, the German government position of rapidly eliminating nuclear power in a country with no earthquake risk and no chance of tsunamis should not be tenable.

If CO2 emissions really were a concern to arrest Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming / Man-made Climate Change, these results particularly from France show starkly the very real advantage of using Nuclear power for electricity generation.

Professor Fritz Vahrenholt was CEO of RWE Innogy, the major German windpower supplier, he had pioneered Germany’s significant advances in renewable energy, especially in the development of wind power.

Previously Professor Vahrenholt had fully accepted the IPCC as the foundation of his understanding of mankind’s effect on climate change. However, with his scientific background as chemist, he re-examined IPCC reports in detail. He found many errors, inconsistencies and unsupported assertions. Accordingly he has now entirely revised his position.

Professor Vahrenholt’s diagram below is from his July 2012 lecture at the Royal Society[11] [12], it shows the miniscule impact of the enormously costly efforts at decarbonisation in Germany, (die Energiewende), in comparison with the inevitable escalation of CO2 emissions from the rest of the world.

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The underdeveloped nations are bound to become progressively more industrialised and more intensive users of fossil fuels to power their development and widen their distribution of electricity.

The futility of the expenditure of vast resources on Green activities in Germany becomes clear. German actions with increasing risks to its energy security and the growing risk to the German economy as its manufacturing industries seek more congenial energy / business environments, could only ever reduce Germany’s CO2 emissions by ~150,000,000 tonnes between 2006 and 2030.

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That would only amount to ~1/100 of the concomitant growth in other CO2 emissions from the developing world. According to Bjorn Lomborg the $100billion German investment in solar power alone, not including other renewable investments, can only reduce the onset of Global Warming by a matter of about 37 hours by the year 2100[13].

This point is re-emphasised above, by cross comparing the annual growth in emissions from China and India with the full annual emissions from key European countries. Chinese CO2 emissions growth in some years can exceed the total UK and French emissions level and even approach the German level on occasions.

Professor Varhenholt is now convinced that it is nature and in particular the behaviour of the sun that is responsible for our continually changing climate, and as he said as the final point of his Royal society lecture:

“This change can only develop first with a revolution of our minds.”

“It’s not mankind creating climate. It’s the sun: stupid.”

Professor Varhenholt and his colleague Sebastian Luening have now published a best seller in Germany “Die Kalte Sonne”, the book now released in English as

“The Neglected Sun: Why the Sun Precludes Climate Catastrophe”[14].

[1] http://www.bp.com/en/global/corporate/about-bp/energy-economics/statistical-review-of-world-energy.html

[2] http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2011/jan/31/world-carbon-dioxide-emissions-country-data-co2#data

[3] https://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0AonYZs4MzlZbdFF1QW00ckYzOG0yWkZqcUhnNDVlSWc&hl=en#gid=1

[4] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U5m6KzDnv7k

[5] http://www.c3headlines.com/2013/07/a-fracking-revolution-us-now-leads-world-in-co2-emission-reductions-.html

[6]http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/project_syndicate/2012/09/thanks_to_fracking_u_s_carbon_emissions_are_at_the_lowest_levels_in_20_years_.html

[7] http://www.oilandgasonline.com/doc/u-s-fracking-has-carbon-more-whole-world-s-wind-solar-0001

[8] http://www.pbl.nl/en/news/pressreleases/2011/steep-increase-in-global-co2-emissions-despite-reductions-by-industrialised-countries

[9] http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2011-06-10/global-warming/29642669_1_kyoto-protocol-second-commitment-period-

[10] http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/home/environment/global-warming/India-invokes-right-to-grow-to-tell-rich-nations-of-its-stand-on-future-climate-change-negotiations/articleshow/36724848.cms

[11] http://www.thegwpf.org/vahrenholt-lecture/

[12] http://kaltesonne.de/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/vahrenholt-2012-annual-gwpf-lecture.pdf

[13] http://www.lomborg.com/content/2013-03-germany-pays-billions-delay-global-warming-37-hours

[14] http://notrickszone.com

Thankfully, our Feds are Not as Stupid, as the Prov. Liberals would like….

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Kelly McParland: Joe Oliver channels Jim Flaherty in telling Ontario to quit whining and solve its own budget problems

Kelly McParland | July 3, 2014 | Last Updated: Jul 3 10:41 AM ET

Minister of Finance Joe Oliver: not buying what Ontario is selling

THE CANADIAN PRESS/Sean Kilpatrick,   
Minister of Finance Joe Oliver: not buying what Ontario is selling.

When the late Jim Flaherty was finance minister, he got a certain joy from taking pot shots at Ontario’s economy, which he felt was badly managed under a series of Liberal governments.

In a 2012 speech he said the province had “no one to blame but themselves” for their troubles, and complained that “Ontario’s spending mismanagement is a problem for the entire country.”

“I would hope that they’re able to manage their spending better than they have been able to do over the past eight or nine years of government.”

He had plenty of justification for his taunts. Under his direction, the federal budget was well on the way to being balanced, while Ontario couldn’t seem to get a handle on its much-smaller shortfall,  for all the bold talk from Queen’s Park.  At the time of Flaherty’s address, Ontario expected a deficit of more than $12 billion, but was promising to bring it down. Two years later, it is still expecting a deficit of more than $12 billion and is still promising to bring it down.

Ontario debt rating outlook cut to negative by Moody’s

Moody’s credit rating agency changed the outlook on Ontario’s debt rating Wednesday to negative from stable, citing concerns about the province’s ability to eliminate a $12.5 billion deficit by 2017-18 as scheduled.

“After several years of weak to moderate economic growth, and higher than previously anticipated deficits projected for the next two years, the province is facing a greater challenge to return to balanced outcomes than previously anticipated,” Moody’s Investors Service said in a statement.

The change in outlook affects approximately $250 billion in debt securities, Moody’s said as it reaffirmed Ontario’s Aa2 ratings.

The ratings agency didn’t wait for the Liberals to introduce their budget July 14 before lowering the outlook to negative, but Premier Kathleen Wynne has said it will be identical to the May 1 fiscal plan that was rejected by the opposition parties, triggering the June 12 election.

It was reported that the Prime Minister’s Office eventually intervened and suggested Mr. Flaherty put a sock in it. His successor, Joe Oliver, lacks Mr. Flaherty’s brashness, but also seems to have been freed of the sock. In an article in the Financial PostThursday, Mr. Oliver suggests, in the politest of terms, that the new government of Kathleen Wynne has no one but itself to blame for the mess it’s made of its economy, and should stop bleating at Ottawa to come to its rescue.

In response to complaints from Ms. Wynne and her Finance Minister, Charles Sousa, that Ontario has somehow been shortchanged – a charge they’ve used to divert attention from their ongoing borrowing binge – Mr. Oliver dismissed their charge as “both false and sad…. False because it is contradicted by the facts and sad because Ontario used to take pride in being a contributor to Confederation and now is squabbling for a greater piece of the pie.”

Money for Ontario under the three main federal transfer programs have all increased dramatically since the Harper government took office in 2006; a 76% hike overall, to a record $19.2 billion, he said. Of that, $2 billion is under the equalization program,  which is designed to help less prosperous provinces, which Ontario didn’t used to be.

“As the engine of the Canadian economy, Ontario had never collected Equalization money until 2009,” Oliver notes  sharply. “The year before, Premier Dalton McGuinty argued it was time to kill the program, which Ontario was paying into. Now that it is a ‘have-not’ province receiving equalization funds, the Ontario government has changed its tune and wants more.”

The finance minister’s rebuke appeared the same day Moody’s debt rating agency cut the outlook on Ontario’s debt to negative, a reflection of its inability to get a handle on its finances.  The move was long forecast, particularly after Mr. Sousa unveiled a big-spending budget in May in an effort to stave off an election.  The election took place anyway, producing a surprising majority for the Liberals, indicating Ontarians are unaccountably sanguine about the state of the economy even as professional watchdogs like Moody’s grow increasingly alarmed.

The heart of the problem is the Liberal pledge to reduce the deficit to zero by 2017-18.  Even with interest rates near historic lows, this year’s $12.5 billion deficit is  25% higher than forecast, and Ms. Wynne was unable to explain how it could be eliminated in three years other than to suggest the economy would grow thanks to government “investment.” Ontario already spends almost 10% of its revenue financing the debt. And that will only grow if Moody’s follows up its warning with a downgrade, making borrowing pricier. Signalling how little it thinks of Liberal promises, the agency didn’t even wait for Mr. Sousa to re-introduce his budget to deliver its verdict.

Related

Ontarians voted for a fairy tale in June, and already the tale is unraveling. After pouring millions into efforts to get Wynne re-elected, Ontario teachers are already building a strike campaign in anticipation of a walkout in the fall. Mr. Sousa can’t possibly cut costs without reducing public service jobs, which represent the majority of provincial spending. If he doesn’t cut costs, a downgrade is inevitable. If he does cut jobs he’s following exactly the line proposed by the Conservatives during the campaign, when they were denounced by the Liberals as heartless beasts.

Oh well. You make your bed. Mr. Sousa and Ms. Wynne will no doubt continue to insist their troubles are all caused by those other heartless Tories, the ones in Ottawa, despite the $20 billion they’ve been getting. It’s going to wear pretty thin, though, over the next four years.

National Post

Wind Company, Forced to Act Responsibly, Pulls Out of Project….Yaaayyyy!!

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Developer pulls out of planned Indiana wind farm

1:34 PM, Jul 4, 2014
4 hours ago 
 
Copyright 2013 Scripps Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

TIPTON, Ind. – A developer has withdrawn plans for a wind farm in central Indiana.

Colorado-based juwi Wind announced Thursday it is giving up plans to erect 94 wind turbines in a rural area northwest of Tipton. Tipton is 35 miles north of Indianapolis.

The company sued the Tipton County zoning board nearly a year ago, claiming the board overreached its authority by increasing the distance wind turbines had to be from property lines and requiring a plan to protect property values for landowners in the area who weren’t taking part in the development.

The Kokomo Tribune reports (http://bit.ly/1qW90D4 ) that juwi said the stipulations effectively made the $300 million project impossible.

The future of the lawsuit is unclear.

——

Information from: Kokomo Tribune, http://www.ktonline.com

Copyright 2014 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This m

Not Everyone is Dumb Enough to Believe Climate Alarmists!

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APOLLO ASTRONAUT: CLIMATE ALARMISM IS THE ‘BIGGEST FRAUD IN THE FIELD OF SCIENCE’

Written by Craig Bannister, cnsnews.com

 

Climate alarmism is “the biggest fraud in the field of science” and the 97% consensus claim is nonsensical, Apollo 7 astronaut Walter Cunningham tells MRCTV in a preview of his presentation at the upcoming Heartland Institute climate conference, July 7-9.Cunningham

“Since about 2000, I looked farther and farther into it,” Col. Cunningham (USMC, Ret.) tells MRCTV in an exclusive interview. “I found that not one of the claims that the alarmists were making out there had any bearings, whatsoever. And, so, it was kind of a no-brainer to come to the conclusion.”

Cunningham rejects the notion of man-made climate, not only as fact – but also as even qualifying as an actual “theory”:

“In the media, it was being called a theory. Obviously, they didn’t know what it means to be a theory.”

“If we go back to the warmist hypothesis – not a theory, but, a hypothesis – they’ve been saying from the very beginning that carbon dioxide levels are abnormally high, that higher levels of carbon dioxide are bad for humans, and they thought warmer temperatures are bad for our world, and they thought we were able to override natural forces to control the earth’s temperature. So, as I’ve looked into those, that’s the problem that I’ve found, because I didn’t find any of those to be correct – and, they certainly were not a theory, it was just their guess at what they wanted to see in the data they were looking at.”

Cunningham urges Americans to look at the data and decide for themselves, instead of taking anyone else’s word for it:

“You go out and take a look at it and you find out that a lot of it is pure nonsense and wishful thinking on the part of the alarmists who are looking for more and more money to fall into their hands.”

“Don’t believe it just because your professor said it. You gotta go take a look at it. Go back and look at the history of temperature and carbon dioxide, and you look at the value of carbon dioxide, and how it’s a benefit today.”

Cunningham notes that, while climate alarmists are concerned that the atmosphere currently contains 400 parts per million of CO2, that’s only a tenth of the level his spacecraft had to reach before causing concern. In his Apollo craft, an alarm would go off when CO2 reached 4,000 parts per million and, in today’s space shuttle, the trigger is 5,000. And, in submarines where crewmen may be on three-month missions, CO2 has to reach 8,000 parts per million before the alarm is activated.

“In one area after another, we find these people overly concerned about, one, the danger they’re trying to push on us and, secondly, the claim that we can somehow or other control the earth’s temperature by affecting it,” Cunningham says.

“I can’t say we don’t have any impact, at all, but it’d be so miniscule and so tiny, that it wouldn’t be worth any effort.”

So, what does dictate the Earth’s temperature? Cunningham says it’s well-established that “principle controllers” are natural forces like sun, ocean temperature, and even volcanic activity.

Thus, he calls climate alarmism “the biggest fraud in the field of science”:

“The case is, to me, really, it’s laughable to find somebody who claims to be a serious scientist – that he would buy into this. So, I would really question anybody who claims to be a scientist doing this – so, what they do is try to control the nomenclature.”

“To me, it’s almost laughable, it’s the biggest fraud in the field of science, certainly in my lifetime, maybe the biggest one in centuries.”

“If you go back and you look at the data that has been well-documented over the years, you can look and see, for example, that right now both carbon dioxide and temperature are simultaneously at one of the lowest levels in at least the last 600-800 million years. The last time they were both together at this low a level, more or less, was 300 million years ago, and if you go back go back about 500-600 million years ago, carbon dioxide was 15 times higherthan what it is now. So, what I’m getting at is this, the history shows you that most of this is just plain nonsensical today.”

“And, the amazing thing to people like me… is that there are people that believe the nonsense they’re being fed.”

The media are largely to blame for public misconceptions – not because they’re intentionally misleading the public, but because they “just don’t want to go into the time and trouble to find out.” “If they do go into it and look at it for themselves, they become a lot more neutral in their presentation,” he says.

Worst of all, Cunningham says, media are promoting the “nonsensical” claim that there’s scientific consensus accepting the hypothesis of man-made climate:

“When they’re out propagating this so-called 97% of scientists believe we’re controlling the temperature – I mean, that’s the most nonsensical, stupid number in the world – and all they have to do is do a little research on Google – I’m not going to do it for them – go in there and take a look and you find out that’s a ridiculous statement that people are making – and even the president makes a statement like that.”

“If you have a totally anonymous survey of real scientists involved in this field, I would almost guarantee you that you going to have a majority that are not going to agree with the alarmists.”

“I can only tell you that, even back in the days of Apollo, we didn’t have to face this kind of nonsense,”Cunningham concludes.

A License to Kill…Certainly goes against everything “sustainable” or “green”!

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Obama grants wind industry permit to kill eagles, ruffling more than feathers

 Obama administration says no prosecution for…
By cutting a company a break to promote wind energy, the Obama administration may have opened a can of worms.

 

On Eagles' wings: Solomon, a 14-year-old golden eagle, is unable to fly or survive in the wild because his wing was severed by a wind turbine. Despite a 1940 protection act, a California wind energy generator will not be penalized for killing a limited number of eagles.On Eagles’ wings: Solomon, a 14-year-old golden eagle, is unable to fly or survive in the wild because his wing was severed by a wind turbine. Despite a 1940 protection act, a California wind energy generator will not be penalized for killing a limited number of eagles.

By Valerie Richardson

–

The Washington Times

Wednesday, July 2, 2014            (AP Photo/Noah Berger) (Associated Press photographs)

The Interior Department’s decision to extend by sixfold the permit period prompted Mr. Sandoval to create a video game, “Greed Energy Kills,” which depicts cartoon birds and bats trying to avoid turbines.

Wind farms typically feature clusters of turbines that can rise as high as a 30-story building, with whirling rotors that can reach more than 150 mph at the tips of the blades. Eagles scanning the ground below for a meal often do not see the danger until it is too late.

The conservancy lawsuit cites the 1940 Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act, which provides fines and jail time for those who kill eagles on purpose or by accident. The law even prohibits possession of eagle feathers, talons and beaks.

In 2009, the Fish and Wildlife Service added a provision to the 1940 law allowing permits for eagle kills when they are incidental to an otherwise legal activity, such as construction or transportation projects.

Since the 1980s, wind turbines have killed an estimated 2,000 to 3,000 eagles, but the industry has paid only one fine, Mr. Johns said.

“If you or I get caught with an eagle feather, we’ve got some serious explaining to do. We’re going to pay a hefty fine,” said Mr. Johns. “There’s no exception noted in the law for the wind industry. The notion that somehow they’re entitled when the law doesn’t provide for it is ridiculous.”

Read more: http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/jul/2/california-grants-wind-industry-permit-to-kills-ea/?page=2#ixzz36RnPOX00 
Follow us: @washtimes on Twitter

Wind Energy – The Novelty has Worn Off, and the Truth has Come out!

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Tuesday, June 17, 2014

Why Not Wind: an open letter

 
To whom it may concern:

This is a brief representation of the reasons industrial-scale wind is a destructive boondoggle that only fools – or worse – would approve.

Unlike “conventional” power sources, wind does not follow demand. As the Bonneville Power Authority in the Pacific Northwest of the USA has shown, the relationship between load and wind generation is essentially random (www.wind-watch.org/pix/493). That means that wind can never replace dispatchable sources that are needed to meet actual demand.

The contribution of wind generation is therefore an illusion, because the grid has to supply steady power in response to demand, and as the wind rises and falls, the grid maintains supply by relying on its already built-in excess capacity.

That is also why meaningful reductions in carbon emissions are not seen: because fuel continues to be burned in “spinning reserve” plants which are kept active to kick in when needed for meeting surges in demand or, now, drops in the wind. Denmark’s famously high wind penetration is possible only because it is connected to the large Nordic and the German grids – so that Denmark’s wind power actually constitutes a very small fraction of that total system capacity. To make further wind capacity possible (despite a public backlash that has essentially stopped onshore wind development since 2003), Denmark is now building a connection to the Dutch grid.

Another reason that meaningful reductions in carbon emissions are not seen is that the first source to be modulated to balance wind is usually hydro. This is seen quite clearly in Spain, another country with high wind penetration: The changes in electricity from hydro are an almost exact inverse of those from wind (https://demanda.ree.es/generacion_acumulada.html). This is also seen in the USA’s Pacific Northwest (http://transmission.bpa.gov/business/operations/Wind/baltwg.aspx).

Finally, on systems with sufficient natural gas–powered generators, which can ramp on and off quickly enough to balance wind’s highly variable infeed, wind forces those generators to operate far less efficiently than they would otherwise. It is like city versus highway driving. According to several analyses (e.g., www.wind-watch.org/doc/?p=1568), the carbon emissions from gas + wind are not significantly different from gas alone and in some cases may be more.

And again, whatever the effect, wind is always an add-on. The grid must be able to operate reliably without it, because very often, and often for very long stretches of time, wind is indeed in the doldrums: It is not there.

And beware the illusion of “average” output. The fact is that any wind turbine or group of turbines generates at or above its average rate (which is typically 20%–30% of the nameplate capacity, depending on the site) only about 40% of the time. Because of the physics of extracting energy from wind, the rest of the time production approaches zero. About one-third of the time, wind production is absolutely zero.

As an add-on, therefore, its costs are completely unnecessary and wasteful. And even if, by some miracle, it were a reliable, dispatchable, reasonably continuous source, its costs would still be enormous – not only economically, but also environmentally. Wind is a very diffuse resource and therefore requires a massive mechanical system to catch any useful amount. That means ever larger blades on ever taller towers in ever larger arrays. And the only places where that is feasible are the very places we need to preserve as useful agricultural land, scenic landscapes that are so important to our soul (and to tourism), and wild land where the natural world can thrive.

Besides the obvious damage to the land of heavy-duty roads for construction and continued maintenance, huge concrete platforms, new powerlines, and substations (while making no meaningful contribution to the actual operation of the grid) and the visual intrusion of 150-metre (500-ft) structures with strobe lights and rotating blades, there are serious adverse impacts from the giant airplane-like blades cutting through 6,000–8,000 square metres (1.5–2 acres) of vertical airspace both day and night: pulsating noise (including infrasound which is felt more than heard) that carries great distances and disturbs neighbors (especially at night, when there is a greater expectation of – and need for – quiet), even threatening their physical health, pressure vortices that kill bats by destroying their lungs, blade tip speeds of 300 km/h that also kill bats as well as birds, particularly raptors, many of which are already endangered, and vibration that carries through the tower into the ground with effects on soil integrity and flora and fauna that have yet to be studied.

In short, the benefits of industrial-scale wind are minuscule, while its adverse impacts and costs are great. Its only effect is to provide greenwashing (and tax avoidance) for business-as-usual energy producers and lip-service politicians, while opening up to vast industrial development land that has been otherwise fiercely protected – most disturbingly by many of the same groups now clamoring for wind.

Industrial-scale wind is all the more outrageous for the massive flow of public money into the private bank accounts of developers. It is not surprising to learn that Enron established the package of subsidies and regulatory “innovations” that made the modern wind industry possible. Or that in Italy, the Mafia was an early backer of developers. It is indeed a criminal enterprise: crony capitalism, anti-environment rapaciousness, and hucksterism at its most duplicitous.

After decades of recorded experience, there is no longer any excuse to fall for it.

 ~~
Eric Rosenbloom
President, National Wind Watch, Inc. (www.wind-watch.org)

Mr Rosenbloom lives in Vermont, USA, where he works as a science editor, writer, and typographer. He has studied and written about wind energy since 2003. He was invited to join the board, and then elected President (a wholly volunteer position), of National Wind Watch in 2006, a year after it was founded by citizens from 10 states who met to share their concerns about the risks and impacts of wind energy development. National Wind Watch is a 501(c)(3) educational charity registered in Massachusetts.

Communities Forced to Fight in Court, but the Court is Heavily Biased!

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WIND TURBINES

Lambton County council backs request to participate in second environmental review tribunal hearing 

By Barbara Simpson, Sarnia Observer

Wednesday, July 2, 2014 

 

Lambton County may join a second legal battle brewing over the development of another industrial wind farm in its boundaries.

County council voted Wednesday in favour of joining a potential environmental review tribunal hearing in the event the Ministry of the Environment approves Suncor’s 46-turbine Cedar Point Wind project set for Plympton-Wyoming, Lambton Shores and Warwick Township.

This move would mark the county’s second time participating as a party before the environmental review tribunal.

The county is currently participating in a tribunal hearing over NextEra Energy’s 92-turbine Jericho Wind Energy project. The tribunal must find serious harm could be caused to human or environmental health before it can overturn the project’s MOE approval.

Deputy Warden Bev MacDougall lauded county solicitor David Cribbs’ efforts representing council and county ratepayers at the Jericho hearing.

Despite the costs and risks associated with the county’s participation, she said its voice needs to be heard and its approach needs to be consistent in dealing with industrial wind farms.

“I believe if you go to the first (hearing) with all the work and all the preparation, it will prepare you for the second one,” she said.

Over the course of 18 wind turbine tribunal hearings, none of the parties have received cost awards, according to a letter from Keith Watson, president of We’re Against Industrial Turbines – Plympton-Wyoming (WAIT-PW).

In the letter, Watson called for county council to decide on becoming a party in a potential Cedar Point appeal at this time because the MOE approval could come when county council isn’t regularly meeting over the summer.

WAIT-PW member Audrey Broer applauded council’s backing of the possible appeal.

“They are the first county in Ontario that said, ‘We are an unwilling host and we stand by that.’”

barbara.simpson@sunmedia.ca

Those with Nothing to Hide….Hide Nothing, and Then There’s the Gov’t!

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Breaking EPA’s climate sciences secrecy barriers

FOIA request seeks hidden data and analyses that agency claims back up its climate rulings

milloy-v-epa

Can you imagine telling the IRS you don’t need to complete all their forms or provide records to back up your claim for a tax refund? Or saying your company’s assurances that its medical products are safe and effective should satisfy the FDA? Especially if some of your data don’t actually support your claims – or you “can’t find” key data, research and other records, because your hard drive conveniently crashed? But, you tell them, people you paid to review your information said it’s accurate, so there’s no problem.

Do you suppose the government would accept your assurance that there’s “not a smidgen” of corruption, error or doubt – perhaps because 97% of your close colleagues agree with you? Or that your actions affect only a small amount of tax money, or a small number of customers – so the agencies shouldn’t worry?

If you were the Environmental Protection Agency, White House-operated US Global Change Research Program and their participating agencies (NOAA, NASA, NSF, etc.), you’d get away with all of that.

Using billions of our tax dollars, these government entities fund the research they use, select research that supports their regulatory agenda (while ignoring studies that do not), and handpick the “independent” experts who peer-review the research. As a recent analysis reveals, the agencies also give “significant financial support” to United Nations and other organizations that prepare computer models and other assessments. They then use the results to justify regulations that will cost countless billions of dollars and affect the lives, livelihoods, liberties, living standards, health, welfare and life spans of every American.

EPA utilized this clever maneuver to determine that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases “endanger” public health and welfare. It then devised devious reports, including national climate change assessments – and expensive, punitive regulations to control emissions of those gases from vehicles, electrical generating plants and countless other sources.

At the very least, you would expect that this supposedly “scientific” review process – and the data and studies involved in it – should be subject to rigorous, least-discretionary standards designed to ensure their quality, integrity, credibility and reliability, as well as truly independent expert review. Indeed they are.

The Information Quality Act of 2000 and subsequent Office of Management and Budget guidelines require that all federal agencies ensure and maximize “the quality, objectivity, utility and integrity of information disseminated by Federal agencies.” The rules also call for proper peer review of all “influential scientific information” and “highly influential scientific assessments,” particularly if they could be used as the basis for regulatory action. Finally, they direct federal agencies to provide adequate administrative mechanisms enabling affected parties to review agency failures to respond to requests for correction or reconsideration of the scientific information.

EPA and other agencies apparently think these rules are burdensome, inconvenient, and a threat to their independence and regulatory agenda. They routinely ignore the rules, and resist attempts by outside experts to gain access to data and studies. EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy has said she intends to “protect” them from people and organizations she decides “are not qualified to analyze” the materials.

Thus EPA’s Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee reviews the agency’s CO2 and pollution data, studies and conclusions – for which EPA has paid CASAC’s 15 members $180.8 million since 2000. The American Lung Association has received $24.7 million in EPA grants over the past 15 years and $43 million overall via a total of 591 federal grants, for applauding and promoting government agency decisions. Big Green foundations bankrolled the ALA with an additional $76 million, under 2,806 grants.

These payoffs raise serious questions about EPA, CASAC and ALA integrity and credibility.

Meanwhile, real stakeholders – families and companies that will be severely impacted by the rules, and organizations and experts trying to protect their interests – are systematically denied access to data, studies, scientific assessments and other information. CASAC excludes from its ranks industry and other experts who might question EPA findings. EPA stonewalls and slow-walks FOIA requests and denies requests for correction and reconsideration. One lawyer who’s filed FOIA cases since 1978 says the Obama Administration is bar-none “the worst” in history on transparency. Even members of Congress get nowhere, resulting in testy confrontations with Ms. McCarthy and other EPA officials.

The stakes are high, particularly in view of the Obama EPA’s war on coal mining, coal-fired power plants, businesses and industries that require reliable, affordable electricity – and families, communities and entire states whose jobs, health and welfare will suffer under this anti-fossil fuel agenda. States that mine and use coal will be bludgeoned. Because they pay a larger portion of their incomes on energy and food, elderly, minority and poor families are especially vulnerable and will suffer greatly.

That is why the House of Representatives is moving forward on the Secret Science Reform Act. It is why the Institute for Trade, Standards and Sustainable Development is again filing new FOIA requests with EPA and other agencies that are hiding their junk science, manipulating laws and strangling our economy.

The agencies’ benefit-cost analyses are equally deceptive. EPA claims its latest coal-fueled power plant rules (requiring an impossible 30% reduction in carbon dioxide emissions by 2030) would bring $30 billion in “climate benefits” versus $7.3 billion in costs. Even the left-leaning Brookings Institution has trashed the agency’s analysis – pointing out that the low-balled costs will be paid by American taxpayers, consumers, businesses and workers, whereas the highly conjectural benefits will be accrued globally.

That violates President Clinton’s 1993 Executive Order 12688, which requires that agencies “assess both the costs and benefits” of a proposed regulation, and adopt it “only upon a reasoned determination that the benefits … justify its costs.” EO 12866 specifies that only benefits to US citizens be counted. Once that’s done, the EPA benefits plummet to between $2.1 billion and $6.9 billion. That means its kill-coal rules costAmericans $400 million to $4.8 billion more than the clearly inflated benefits, using EPA’s own numbers.

Moreover, the US Chamber of Commerce calculates that the regulations will actually penalize the United States $51 billion. Energy analyst Roger Bezdek estimates that the benefits of using carbon-based fuels outweigh any hypothesized “social costs of carbon” by orders of magnitude: 50-to-1 (using the inflated SCC of $36/ton of CO2 concocted by EPA and other federal agencies in 2013) – and 500-to-1 (using the equally arbitrary $22/ton estimate that they cooked up in 2010).

Even more intolerable, these punitive EPA rules will have virtually no effect on atmospheric CO2 levels, because China, India, Germany and other countries will continue to burn coal and other fossil fuels. They will likewise have no effect on global temperatures, even accepting the Obama/EPA/IPCC notion that carbon dioxide is now the primary cause of climate change. Even EPA models acknowledge that its rules will prevent an undetectable 0.018 degrees Celsius (0.032 deg F) of total global warming in 100 years!

Fortunately, the Supreme Court recently ruled that EPA does not have the authority to rewrite federal laws to serve its power-grabbing agendas. FOIA requests seeking disclosure of EPA records that could reveal a rigged climate science peer review process – and legal actions under the Information Quality Act seeking correction of resultant data corruption – could compel courts to reconsider their all-too-common practice of deferring to “agency discretion” on scientific and regulatory matters. That clearly scares these federales.

The feds have become accustomed to saying “We don’t need no stinkin’ badges.” The prospect of having to share their data, methodologies and research with experts outside their closed circle of regulators, collaborators and eco-activists almost makes them soil their shorts.

Bright sunlight has always been the best disinfectant for mold, slime and corruption. With America’s economy, international competitiveness, jobs, health and welfare at stake, we need that sunlight now.

Paul Driessen is senior policy analyst for the Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow (www.cfact.org) and author of Eco-Imperialism: Green power – Black death. Lawrence Kogan is CEO of the Institute for Trade, Standards and Sustainable Development (www.ITSSD.org).