A thread in which a Blairite climate wonk counters @SteveBakerHW's claim that #NetZero is 'a “ruinous experiment”' by claiming it 'isn’t backed up by evidence', by only citing evidence from #NetZero advocates and wonks.
It uses the authority of the orthodoxy's institutions to refute heresy.
Here, the @IEA's report is taken at face value, as though there could be no questions about the IEA's thinking, let alone its standing in domestic policymaking.
And here, it is the echo of the Stern Review's orthodoxy, carried forward by the CCC and others, that the cost will "only" be 1-2% of GDP. This forgets that those "studies" can be challenged, and were simply obedient to, rather than independent of Stern.
In a healthy democracy those claims WOULD be disputed. Neither the good faith of the researchers who produce them, nor the ability of the government to implement them can be taken for granted.
Lord merely defers to convenient prognostications and promises of economic benefits -- prognostications and predictions of a kind that has characterised environmentalism's half century history of total failure.
And this is still rationing. Who will hold him to account for the policy failure?
If the issue is not resolved democratically, then the accountability is not on the voter for having made a decision, but the wonks and panjandrums who forced it.
The question is not merely "how much of a bill is subsidies", but, by how much lower bills could be if policies were designed in the consumer's interests: cheap, abundant and secure supply.
Energy storage does not exist at grid scale. It's a fantasy. It might be worth looking at. But the fact of its non existence should be addressed before policies that require it exist are imposed on us. And that is @SteveBakerHW's point.
And this is misleading. The CCC's own #NetZero policy recommendations indicate that behaviour change -- i.e. not technology -- will account for up to 62% of emissions-reduction.
I.e., it is characteristic of environmentalism that the policy cart was put before the technology horse, and that democratic 'engagement' is ditto an afterthought.
Eg. Ed Miliband calling for a climate campaign, comparable to the civil rights movements, AFTER the CC Act.
Moreover, NB that Lord only wants "engagement" on his own terms: "on the trade-offs" & "how to manage them".
He's not willing to stake the broader agenda. That is categorically not a call for democratic engagement, but characteristic of controlling Blairite wonkery and ecodogma.
Why this wont work...
None of the putative 'evidence' that Lord attempts to marshal was produced in good faith, by objective and disinterested parties.
Nobody who would object to it was invited to participate in its production or to join the institutions that produce it.
The think tanks, the academic departments named after their billionaire benefactors, the dubious global agencies, & the lofty quangos and NGOs that produced the 'research' work from an extremely narrow ideological position.
And they are extremely hostile to debate and criticism.
Even the academic funding organisations signal their ideological attachments to 'sustainability' in their mission statements and in their logos.
Environmentalism has been established in civil society, research, and in global and national political institutions without democracy.
It can be no surprise to discover, then, that those organisations reproduce environmental orthodoxy.
We would not expect religious organisations to produce refutations of their religion.
So why should we expect academics and political institutions to produce refutations of their ideological foundations?
Lord does not want it to be understood that the agenda is ideological.
He wants it to seem to be purely technical.
It isn't.
And we have no reason to take their good faith for granted.
In fact, their interventions demonstrate *exactly* that they are acting in bad faith.
Very, very bad faith, as it happens.
And no, we cannot take 'The Science' at face value, either.
So the debate cannot be narrowed to Lord's terms.
It must start from the understanding that environmentalism is, and always has been an ideological movement, which now has a long history of failure behind it.
And it must recognise that that ideology has influenced 'research'.
Environmentalism must be seen in the light that any ideological movement from the 20th Century is now seen in.
And its adherents must admit it.
Until then, they claims to desire 'engagement' are for nought.
If you want to change society, you must win the argument with society.
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This keeps getting shared. It's odd that a tech billionaire should be interested in land, but 242,000 acres is not as big a holding as would be required to bring about an apocalypse. By my calculations, it's 328 sq miles - a square 19miles on each side.
“When people attempt to rebel against the iron logic of Nature, they come into conflict with the very same principles to which they owe their existence as human beings. Their actions against Nature must lead to their own downfall.” ― Adolf Hitler
Lilico, Vine, Hodges and Peters have all made this argument: "I won’t accept another lockdown [...] to protect those who have failed to conduct their civic duty by getting the vaccine and protecting us all from infection."
"There is nothing unconservative about environmentalism – quite the opposite. Done properly, it can unite different strands of Tory thought, and tackling climate change is far too important to be ceded to the Left." -- @Madz_Grant
It should be obvious that if you need environmentalism to "unite different strands of Tory thought", then Tory thinking is disuniting and disunited. Environmentalism is not medicine for political ills. It is poison.
Yet it is what all dysfunctional political and public institutions have used to rescue themselves from their terminal mediocrity and irrelevance, and crises of legitimacy. The EU. The Royal Family. The Pope. I could go on... The green alignment belies deep foundational problems.
In what way will "legally-binding targets" to "restore nature" help to reopen the countless businesses that have folded? How will planting trees cut the millions on the waiting list? How will making life nice for fucking pigeons help recover the lost year of education?
Species are not in decline. There is no need for planting trees. The country is plenty green enough. And "legally-binding" targets merely prevent any possibility of building back anything that can help the economy.
This endless tree-hugging while millions and millions of people face an uncertain future is a symptom of totally degenerate politicians, political parties and Parliament.