EU

Things still seem to be going downhill for the EU, or at least for the left-wing elements of it.

To the world’s poor, electricity (including air conditioning), modern highways, quality medical care, and so much more of the good things first world people take for granted are routinely denied them out of concern for the environment (sic), or rather the elites’ insistence that they rule over the poor with a paternalistic (slavemaster) hand. CFACT Senior Policy Advisor Paul Driessen calls the actions of these elites “callous, immoral, eco-imperialistic, and genocidal.” As newly elected Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte says, “They think they can dictate our destiny,” but we will not submit to their rule.

Europe’s plans to reduce carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions by switching from conventional oil to biofuels actually ended up increasing emissions.

Fighting global warming will require “profound lifestyle changes” for millions of people, according to leaked European Union documents obtained by The Guardian. Eat more insects?

Europe is pushing people into energy poverty and killing industry’s ability to compete. Can others learn before it’s too late?

The Economist helped push Britain into the “greenest” carbon policies in the known world. Now, even though the global temperatures haven’t risen for more than 15 years they have created their very own energy crisis.

The perverse UN is at it again — with fake predictions of massive world population growth that belie the declining birth rates in just about every nation on earth. They also expect us to provide energy for all of these imaginary extra people by cutting back drastically on highly efficient fossil and nuclear fuels. The likely end result of their policies? Chaos and panic and massive destruction of wildlife habitat.

It was not merely the fact that an Italian bureaucrat decided to import an otherwise banned GM crop from America that was so ironic. In addition to the special exemptions granted on a case-by-case basis to Czech, Spanish, Portuguese and Slovakian farmers, countries throughout Europe, including Italy, have imported GM corn from America in the past under a whole different array of special, case-by-case exemptions granted on a strictly controlled basis by bureaucrats in Brussels. What made Rabboni’s final decision so hypocritical, and frankly absurd, were the sheer quantities involved and the astronomical expense for an already overextended Italian treasury.

Will a newly empowered Merkel be able to finally grapple realistically with Germany’s energy needs? Can she assemble a coalition which is able to do so?

Reuters reports German renewable energy subsidies may cost its consumers an extra $1.34 trillion over the next 20 years (about $6,400 per family)—but won’t provide much dependable power! In the U.S., President Obama has ordered his EPA to cut back electricity, starting with the coal-fired plants and working up to the natural gas from “fracking.”

If America starts using more renewable energy, what will that do to our electricity prices? While some claim that getting electricity from the sun and wind is cheap and affordable, the real world experience of European countries that have taken this route has proven otherwise.

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.

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.

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?

The division of power in the EU system apparently works sometimes. Today we are expecting a decision by the Council to, if not  to trash it all together, at least partly stall the money shuffling for vague climate reasons.

Good so.

It’s quite natural that all attention is focused on the American elections. In Europe, the focus seems to be two-fold; continuous focus on politics we can’t afford and reluctant, though desperate in rhetorics, on what is a real crisis.

Italy and Spain seem to have at least survived the first shock of the Euro crisis, while Greece is still  hanging on a limb with riots in the streets. Eurocrats look concerned while turning a blind eye, focusing instead on protecting their own interests in the ongoing – long-term – budget process.