It is critical that we review the whole story of ‘Climate Change’ as this is underpinning the government drive for the removal of carbon-based fuels from our society. The climate may well be changing, it may well be that there is a minor increase in global temperatures, but this has not been shown to be caused by anything that we humans have, or are doing. The science is incomplete and there are serious disagreements. Many scientists are afraid to actually speak out against the dogma of climate change for fear of losing their jobs and grants. Most politicians and their supporters in the media are ignorant and work purely on emotions and fear.
The ‘Climate Change’ fear mongers proclaim that the burning of carbon fuels, but especially coal, and oil for transport, is producing large masses of carbon dioxide which reside in the atmosphere and create a greenhouse effect, warming the planet. This hypothesis is unproven but it is very simplistic and enables proponents to generate fear amongst the unknowing public who will then accept the solutions proposed by the ‘Climate Change’ activists. In Australia there is a false suggestion that Australia, by eliminating the burning of carbon fuels, will have some effect upon worldwide atmospheric carbon dioxide. This is false as China, India, Vietnam, and Indonesia, along with other smaller nations, are still building coal-fired power stations, far in excess of the total number of coal-fired power stations in Australia. Coal-fired power stations are being built because they are generally the cheapest method of producing bulk electricity, an essential for industry and our developed lifestyle, anywhere.
Some of the forecast disasters proposed are bushfires, floods, extreme weather and runaway global temperatures, making the planet uninhabitable. This is real fear-mongering. Rather than look at each instance and analysing why the disaster had occurred, it is just described as a result of global warming and no action is therefore taken, except to further try and reduce the burning of carbon fuels. Many of these adverse conditions are due to terrible planning and management on the part of governments, who are allowing an ever-increasing population to build urban areas where they should never be built and not taking actions to reduce or eliminate potential risks due to natural weather conditions, land topography and vegetation growth.
There is no doubt that cities are getting hotter, but that has to be expected when they are expanding into huge metropolises, covered in steel, concrete and bitumen, all massive heat sinks and devoid of natural vegetation and water courses. These megacities absorb huge amounts of energy, in the forms of electricity, oil and gas, produced elsewhere, for heating, cooling and ventilation, for cooking, lighting and transport, not forgetting commercial and industrial activities and the mass of bodies, all producing and losing heat. These areas do require some action to obviate the adverse effects of heat, but in most cases, the temperatures experienced are not excessive and can be accommodated by slight lifestyle, or building design changes. The situation in rural areas is not so clear, as there are far fewer monitoring points but again there is no threat to either human or other forms of life, which can adapt or move.
Humans are supremely adaptable and can live under almost any conditions from hot and humid tropics, to freezing arctic, hot dry deserts, to high mountains and flat prairies, in forested or heathland, even on water. We eat everything, whether animal or vegetable and have the ability to grow and transport anywhere and to store food for years.
In general, there is not an increase in either violent storms, rainfall or sunshine anywhere and sea levels are not rising by anything like the exaggerated modelled amount forecast. It is nil to millimetres, rather than the much higher levels of a half to one metre forecast. None of the fearmonger forecasts over the past fifty years have ever eventuated. Similarly, more people actually die from cold weather exposure than hot weather, and fewer people are impacted from severe weather conditions than was the case in the past, despite the trebling in world population during the past seventy-five years. As far as temperature rises are concerned the fear of a one-and-a-half degree Celsius rise should be of no concern; that is less than the difference in temperatures between Hobart and Melbourne or Brisbane and Cairns. It is even less than the temperature rise from breakfast to lunch, just about anywhere, at any time.
There is no doubt that carbon dioxide is produced when carbon-based fuels are burned, whether that be oil, gas, coal or wood. It is a natural chemical reaction. However, modern coal-fired power stations have exceedingly good control over their combustion and even though coal can be dirty, in that it contains other chemicals apart from carbon and hydrogen, most of these are scrubbed out and the major components of a boiler discharge are water vapour and carbon dioxide, both colourless gases at the temperature they are discharged.
Carbon dioxide is not a poisonous gas, it is an essential gas for the photosynthesis of plants, which not only produces plant growth but also has a byproduct of oxygen, essential for our survival and the survival of all living objects. Carbon is the building material for life on Earth. Water vapour, in the form of clouds, is a much more effective heat trap than carbon dioxide, as can be observed on cloudy nights which are much warmer than cloudless nights.
Over the aeons, there have been enormous changes in the atmosphere. Carbon dioxide used to be a far larger part of our atmosphere than it is at present, with levels up to 8,000ppm, when temperatures were also lower than they are today. Nowadays the level is closer to 430ppm and rising slowly, as is the earth’s temperature, as we are still emerging from an ice age, which was not caused by carbon dioxide but by extra-terrestrial influences. With that slow rise in carbon dioxide levels there has been a noticeable increase in the greening of the planet; plant growth has accelerated and has been reclaiming some desert areas.
The minimum carbon dioxide level, below which plants are unable to use it and will therefore die, followed by all other life forms which depend upon plants, including humans, is in the region of 250ppm. There is no discussion about the actual optimum level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, whether this should be 300ppm, 400ppm, 500ppm, or even higher. In the past, in prehistoric times, carbon dioxide levels have far exceeded those that exist today and plant life was far more prolific. Vast amounts of what was atmospheric carbon has now has been locked up in oil and coal, as well as in some rock formations.
Experience and testing have shown that the optimum carbon dioxide level for plants is between 800ppm and 1000ppm. This is used as a basis for greenhouse farming where plant growth is accelerated by up to twice normal levels. It has also been noted that tree growth around some coal-fired power stations is greater than outside an approximately 20km range.
Although carbon dioxide is not poisonous it is heavier than air and, in high concentrations, it can displace oxygen and result in asphyxiation. The actual concentrations, especially in open-air conditions, is uncertain but it is certainly in excess of those found in greenhouses, so 1000ppm may not be too much.
The renewable energy industry; basically, windfarms and solar cell suppliers and users; and politicians have been creating fear to manipulate the public opinion, to make them believe that proven reliable economical coal and oil-fired power stations are destroying the planet. Considerable amount of money are being made by not actually doing very much and with little economic risk, as the public purse is financing the whole system. But despite this, the cost of electricity is forever rising as more and more renewable energy projects are approved and built and reliable coal-fired power stations are allowed to degenerate and close. Our electricity distribution system was not build for intermittent and dispersed wind and solar generation; which by themselves cannot support the grid; and so our distribution system has to be rebuilt to accommodate the new renewables.
Overseas there appears to be an awakening. The ever-rising cost of renewable energy projects and their unreliability are resulting in the recommissioning of old coal-fired power stations and the building of new gas-powered and nuclear power stations. The latter, a proven, safe, reliable, very long-term energy generator, is illegal in Australia, despite our abundance of uranium, a cheap fuel with a long life and nowadays, with no problems associated with disposal of the waste.
Despite the claims by Chris Bowen et al, there is no need for nuclear power to be exorbitantly expensive. Most of the expense is involved with the clearing of red and green tape, and has nothing to do with the actual cost of construction. Most of a nuclear power station machinery, excepting the nuclear reactor, is similar, if not identical, to a conventional coal-fired power station, so a nuclear power station can be built on the site of a decommissioned coal-fired power station, with all the services, manpower and skills already available. Retraining for the operation of the nuclear reactor is easy to accomplish and can be done in far less time than is required to build the facility.
In addition to the very high cost associated with trying to convert our electricity system to one powered by renewables, serious objections are being raised by farmers and environmentalists against the damage being done by huge solar and wind farms sited on prime agricultural land and the clearing of vast areas of virgin bush and rainforests for windfarms which are an eyesore, a pollutant on the scenery. They are being approved where land clearing for any other purpose would be rejected. Land areas required by wind and solar farms to try and replace coal-fired power stations are in the order of hundreds of times larger.
Lastly, wind generators and solar cells have a fairly short life, twenty to 25 years and then they have to be replaced. Much of the material from which they are build is not recyclable nor will it decay quickly, so we are creating a situation where vast amounts of waste material will have to be disposed of in ways that have not yet been devised. Coal-fired power stations have a life expectancy of fifty or sixty years and nuclear power stations have an even longer life. There is also serious doubt that there are enough resources available anywhere, to convert all electricity production to renewables. The world is consuming essential resources quicker than they can be replaced and for some minerals and materials, there is no replacement.
It is more than time that the fearmongers were called out for the lies that they tell. Tell a big enough lie and keep repeating it and eventually people will believe it.
There is no need to remove all carbon-based fuels from our energy and transport systems. Apart from anything else net zero openly admits that this is not necessary. There is a place for them, just a there is a place for some renewables. It is possible to convert many transport systems to electricity just as some heating and cooking can be converted, but this will require a huge increase in power generation and the only way to do this in time frames that are being discussed, even 2050, is by using the proven technologies of gas-fired combined cycle plants, coal and especially nuclear energy for the long term. New technologies may well emerge but it would be stupid to rely upon technologies that are unknown or unproven, especially at commercial scale.
The alternative is a continued decay in our standard of living and the loss of our developed country status.
