CFACT is sad to learn of the untimely passing of our friend and colleague Einar Du Rietz of Sweden. Einar wrote a long-standing blog for CFACT Europe. He was a member of several CFACT delegations to UN climate conferences.

Einar loved individual freedom and it is to that he dedicated his life. What finer cause?

Rest in peace, Einar.

The new draft for a EU tobacco directive is due in time for christmas. Seldom has the political, and lobbying game been so obvious, and ridiculous.

Smokers are already harassed in most of the Union. The argument being both paternalistic and the so-called “Environmental Tobacco Smoke”, or Second Hand Smoking. As for the former, the health hazards of smoking are unquestionable. The latter is scientifically most questionable. Possibly, the most tangible health effect of chasing people outdoors for a smoke is the risk of pneumonia in this horrid winter.

Five hundred German police and tax inspectors raided offices and residences connected with Deutsche Bank in Berlin, Frankfurt and Dusselforf, Wednesday over allegations of conspiracy involving over €300 million in carbon trading tax fraud.

While a few profiteers will amass carbon trading fortunes, these schemes will not impact the climate in any meaningful way. Whether conducted legally or illegally, all carbon trading is a waste and a scam which cries out to be halted.

Energy prices are high, economies are reeling and people need relief — Along comes the shale gas revolution at just the right time.

‘What’s that,’ asks the radicals? ‘Plentiful, safe, affordable, domestically produced energy? Can’t have that. If there are no valid reasons to say no to shale, we’ll have to get creative.’

The anti-energy propaganda machine is geared up and running at full speed.

Welcome back from the desert, north European delegates and activists. You certainly picked the right spot and time, as mostly half of the continent has been suffering from the sudden winter attack and ensuing traffic chaos. Interested people have thus been spending days in frozen airports reading about your courageous battle against warming.

Scientists and policy experts just completed a European climate conference organized to coincide with the UN conference in Doha, Qatar. The warming propaganda industry likes to push the idea that all scientists back their ideology. Nothing could be further from the truth as demonstrated by this and other scientific gatherings.

Today’s Brussels news consists of the regular traffic jam, especially at Place Luxembourg, because of another tractor manifestation by European farmers.

Really not news. Rather regular, by an interest group worried that the current budget process wont allow for the continuation of the economically, environmentally and inhumane Common Agricultural Policy, already accounting for close to half the budget.

Soon, the Comission is due to wrap up the current debate on energy efficiency measures, introducing a GDP based paneuropan standard, somehow intended to be applicable all over the continent. Quite a daunting task, and not surprisingly, both business, Green NGO’s and national governments are rather sceptical. This article sums up a lot of the debate.

Join CFACT Europe at the EIKE climate conference in Munich, Germany, November 30th and December 1st, 2012. Discuss climate science and policy with scientists, scholars and policy experts as they gather just days before the UN climate summit in Qatar.

What if they gave a government program and nobody came?