Global warming is a false myth and every serious person and scientist says so. It is not fair to refer to the U.N. panel. IPCC is not a scientific institution: it's a political body, a sort of non-government organization of green flavor. It's neither a forum of neutral scientists nor a balanced group of scientists. These people are politicized scientists who arrive there with a one-sided opinion and a one-sided assignment. Also, it's an undignified slapstick that people don't wait for the full report in May 2007 but instead respond, in such a serious way, to the summary for policymakers where all the "but's" are scratched, removed, and replaced by oversimplified theses. This is clearly such an incredible failure of so many people, from journalists to politicians. If the European Commission is instantly going to buy such a trick, we have another very good reason to think that the countries themselves, not the Commission, should be deciding about similar issues.

Q: Why should we be leery of the IPCC’s report -- or the summary of the report?

A: Well, because the report is the end product of a political agenda, and it is the political agenda of both the extreme environmentalists who of course think we are destroying the world. But it’s also the political agenda of a group of people ... who believe that industrialization and development and capitalism and the Western way is a terrible system and they want to bring it down. They couldn’t do it by attacking energy because they know that would get the public’s back up very quickly. ... The vehicle they chose was CO2, because that’s the byproduct of industry and fossil-fuel burning, which of course drives the whole thing. They think, “If we can show that that is destroying the planet, then it allows us to control.” Unfortunately, you’ve got a bunch of scientists who have this political agenda as well, and they have effectively controlled the IPCC process.

The sun's increased irradiance over the last century, not C02 emissions, is responsible for the global warming we're seeing, says the celebrated scientist, and this solar irradiance also explains the great volume of C02 emissions.
"It is no secret that increased solar irradiance warms Earth's oceans, which then triggers the emission of large amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. So the common view that man's industrial activity is a deciding factor in global warming has emerged from a misinterpretation of cause and effect relations."
Dr. Abdussamatov goes further, debunking the very notion of a greenhouse effect. "Ascribing 'greenhouse' effect properties to the Earth's atmosphere is not scientifically substantiated," he maintains. "Heated greenhouse gases, which become lighter as a result of expansion, ascend to the atmosphere only to give the absorbed heat away."
The real news from Saint Petersburg – demonstrated by cooling that is occurring on the upper layers of the world's oceans – is that Earth has hit its temperature ceiling. Solar irradiance has begun to fall, ushering in a protracted cooling period beginning in 2012 to 2015. The depth of the decline in solar irradiance reaching Earth will occur around 2040, and "will inevitably lead to a deep freeze around 2055-60" lasting some 50 years, after which temperatures will go up again.

In a sign that US electricity companies are recognising that the Democratic-controlled Congress will seek to impose aggressive climate change initiatives, six companies, including Exelon, one of the largest utility companies, on Wednesday endorsed a bill that would reduce their projected emissions by 25 per cent below projected levels by 2020.

The European Commission has set out a comprehensive package of measures to establish a new Energy Policy for Europe to combat climate change and boost energy security. A ten-point action plan sets out a series of ambitious targets on greenhouse gas emissions and renewable energy, along with proposals to create a more competitive energy market across the economic bloc, and includes a report on the implementation by the Member States of the internal market for gas and electricity as well as the results of an enquiry of the state of competition; a plan of for priority interconnections to create a European grid; proposals to promote sustainable power generation from fossil fuels; a roadmap and other initiatives to promote renewables, and; an analysis of the situation of nuclear energy in Europe. Based on the three central pillars of: a true internal energy market; accelerating the shift to low carbon energy; and energy efficiency, the mainstay of the new policy is a core objective for Europe to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 20% by 2020 with the aim to increase this target to a 30% reduction by 2020 and 60-80% by 2050.

Your view: Is carbon offsetting a con? Holidaymakers are being misled by companies who guarantee to repair the damage flights do to the atmosphere, according to the first independent study of a fast-growing market. The report claims it is not possible to state categorically that buying any "carbon offset" — as Tony Blair did grudgingly last week to counter the global warming potential of his family's New Year break in Miami Beach — will neutralise the damage that flying causes to the atmosphere.

In theory, the idea is simple. The consumer pays a third party to remove a quantity of carbon (in the form of a greenhouse gas) equal to what he or she emits. But how voluntary carbon offsets actually work is unclear at best, and potentially fraudulent at worst, say experts. The problem: No current certification or monitoring system has any teeth, and there is no easy way to confirm that offsetting companies are doing what they promise. Now, various organizations are scrambling to provide standards for what experts call a fragmented market with a product of drastically varying quality.

The European Union should cut its emissions of greenhouse gases by at least 20 percent by 2020 from 1990 levels as part of a new energy policy to fight climate change, the EU’s executive Commission said on Wednesday. The Commission called on developed nations around the world to cut emissions of gases blamed for global warming by 30 percent by 2020, saying the EU would go beyond its unilateral target if others followed suit.

Cow flatulence last night became the latest battleground in the fight for the green vote with farmers fearing they could be hit by a new levy.Politicians hit out at the levels of bovine emissions - which now account for about one million tonnes of methane a year in the UK. Whitehall officials are now preparing to get bids to analyse the financial benefits of a scheme which would see farms buying and selling "credits" for the amount of gas their herds produce.

County officials estimated that, in addition to spending $5 million in the next five years to improve energy efficiency in its public buildings, Arlington will spend more than $400,000 in the coming months to plant 1,200 trees, buy more wind-generated power, hand out more than 2,000 fluorescent light bulbs at fairs and other events and provide free energy audits of more than a dozen homes. County officials want to give residents who buy hybrid cars a break on their personal property tax — an unusual perk for a Virginia community. Cost estimates on the tax break are not available. The tax break would require approval from the Arlington County Board, but other elements of the plan, such as distributing light bulbs, can go forward without board permission.

Chicago-based independent power producer Midwest Generation announced today that it has reached agreement with Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich on a comprehensive, long-range plan that will begin reducing mercury emissions from its power plants 18 months ahead of federal regulations, followed by multi-year programs to further cut other emissions at each of the company’s six plants in Illinois.

LONDON (AFX) - British Airways PLC, Virgin Atlantic and easyJet PLC have pulled out of the UK government's carbon emission reduction scheme after Chancellor Gordon Brown doubled air passenger duty, The Independent on Sunday newspaper reported. The rise in the duty -- from 5 stg to 10 stg for standard class passengers on European flights, from 10 stg to 20 stg for business or premium classes in Europe, and from 40 stg to 80 stg for passengers flying to other destinations -- was announced by Brown in his pre-budget report last week.

The federal Environmental Protection Agency’s position that it is not required to regulate carbon dioxide emissions, seen as an element of the toxic brew advancing global warming, was contested at the U.S. Supreme Court yesterday. Among the groups filing a friend-of-the-court brief in support of such regulation was the Alliance to Protect Nantucket Sound.

The price of bringing on “higher cost energy” could reach $83 million a year, NSP says. The power corporation also argues that gearing down coal-fired plants to make room for renewable energy will make them less efficient, and even increase greenhouse gas pollution. “Under these conditions,” NSP says, “the plants emit more emissions per unit of electricity … an increase in intensity of greenhouse gas emissions.” Power corporation CEO Ralph Tedesco says the pollution comes from burning fossil fuels needed when wind power hits lulls. “The reason for that is people expect the lights to be on,” Tedesco said Tuesday, at an event unveiling three wind turbines for the Wentworth valley.

It must be a harrowing time for those who once thought the cool breeze could save us all from the coming ecocide. The expectations of wind advocates have already had to be minimized as they realize there is nothing inherently virtuous about their pet piece of tech. Alas, like recycling fanatics, they are likely to end up praising wind power as a moral enterprise that "instills good habits" and signals "green consciousness," even if the honest cost-benefit analysis goes against them in the long run.

TXU on Friday revealed the first details of how it plans to cut emissions by 20 percent while building 11 new coal-burning power units. The Dallas-based company filed a permit application with the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality to add pollution-control equipment to its existing Martin Lake coal plant in Rusk County. That plant has three coal-burning units now and would add a fourth under TXU's plans. The Martin Lake retrofit is the first of three that TXU has promised as part of its new coal strategy. Similar announcements are expected by the year's end for the three-unit Monticello plant in Titus County and the two-unit Big Brown plant in Freestone County. Each of those plants is to add one unit.

The fate of Wyoming’s energy mix in the next few decades depends a lot on what kind of signals the energy industry receives from either the market and policy-makers. Two experts assembled for the final presentation of the University of Wyoming/Casper College Energy Futures lecture series said how we deal with carbon emissions will have a great deal to do with Wyoming’s energy future.

The world’s economies have no alternative to boosting energy efficiency and lowering carbon emissions to tackle global warming, as clean energy lies decades away as a mainstream source, the head of the International Energy Agency (IEA) said here on Tuesday..... According to the IAE’s forecast for 2030, oil will remain the no 1 energy source, followed by coal and then gas. These fossil fuels will still account for 85 per cent of needs.

Indigenous peoples from the Amazon to Asia said on Wednesday that U.N.-backed clean energy projects meant to combat global warming were aggravating threats to their livelihoods. They said hydropower projects or plantations of fast-growing trees, prompted by a billion-dollar scheme under the U.N.’s Kyoto Protocol for limiting the planet’s dependence on fossil fuels, were damaging nature. “We are not only victims of climate change, we are now victims of the carbon market,” Jocelyn Therese, a spokesman for indigenous peoples of the Amazon basin, told a news conference on the fringes of U.N. talks on global warming. “Efforts that are supposed to…retard climate change are having an equally disastrous effect,” said Ana Pinto, representing indigenous peoples in India.

A U.N. conference working to fix long-term rules to fight global warming beyond 2012 "as soon as possible" was split on Tuesday over whether that meant an accord should be struck in 2008, 2009 or even 2010. Industrial investors, weighing options ranging from coal-fired power plants to wind energy, are frustrated at the possibility of years of uncertainty about rules for fossil fuel emissions upon which carbon markets depend.