By definition, unlock means open, release or liberate. By advocating acceptance of funding for so-called renewable energy, the debt implications of that direction amount to greater debt captivity. This is obvious when the advocates stipulate that investment in ‘renewable capacity’ needs to triple in the next five years – more than R1 trillion – in order to stave off the “devastating warming” consequences of fossil fuel usage (The Mercury, November 25).

As it is, South Africa’s rapidly increasing and unsustainable debt burden – now 75% of GNP (R5,2 trillion) – has prompted the IMF to advise the adoption of a debt ceiling. To “accelerate renewable energy” means, therefore, accelerating debt. It also means accelerating costs for electricity consumers. Investments in wind energy in the US and Europe have dried up. Shell has just abandoned the New Jersey Atlantic Shores project in which it had invested nearly $1 billion. The  40% increase in megawatt costs for consumers deters the viability of such projects.

The word ‘renewable’ is also misleading. Wind turbines are not only very expensive and high maintenance but in themselves are not renewable. Besides, they are unreliable as key components of a secure energy infrastructure. Germany’s social and industrial experience this winter of costly, intermittent supply provides a sobering lesson as to what happens when reliable, standard energy generation sources are sidelined.

Despite the glaring shortcomings of “renewable energy,” the claim that human efforts at decarbonisation can influence climate change qualifies such believers as modern-day Canutes and henceforth should be called ‘Climate Canutes.’

Like King Canute of England who believed his power could deter the rising tide from wetting his feet as he sat on a beach, the Climate Canutes refuse to appreciate that climate change is regulated by the sun’s modes, the variable tilt of the earth and the eccentricity of the elliptical paths of the earth around the sun, all of which is validated by science and history. There is nothing humans can do about that natural phenomenon.

Fortunately, we are going to be spared the studied ignorance of the Climate Canutes because where the US goes, the world follows. President Trump’s bold rejection of the unscientific and exorbitantly costly Paris Climate Accord is restoring common sense and sanity. History will reckon with the Climate Canutes.

The post History Will Reckon With The Climate Canutes appeared first on Duncan Du Bois.

Emphasising this disconnect, Blessing Manale of the Presidential Climate Commission enthusiastically punts fiscal reform as (somehow) benefiting by increasing “climate finance” by up to R535 billion annually.

As the head of communications for the Presidential Climate Commission, Mr Manale’s mission is to promote the implementation of Act 22 of 2024. The entire Act is premised on the belief that climate change is man-made and that a low carbon footprint will “create decent work for all, social inclusion and the eradication of poverty,” as noted in section 3 (d) of the Act, which identifies it as loyally adhering to the UN’s Orwellian ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) programme.

Nonetheless, section 3 (g) of Act 22 contains an admission: There is “a need for a cautious approach which takes into account the limits of current knowledge about the causes and effects of climate change and the consequences of decisions and actions in relation thereto.”

If that admission of limitations in knowledge had been respected, it should have halted any pursuit of regulatory legislation. But it didn’t. Instead, section 3 (i) proceeds to assert that “an effective climate change response requires preventative measures to mitigate the causes of climate change through the adoption of adaptation measures.”

Thus, at six places in the Act, sections 3, 24, 25 (twice), 26 and 27, it confidently proclaims that its goal is premised on “the best available science and evidence.”

If the “best available science” was heeded instead of being bought and corrupted, there would be no need for Act 22. Wilfully, real science is not only being ignored. It is being censored. Besides the obvious absence of fossil fuels playing any role whatsoever in historically proven warming periods over the past 2,000 years, what is being studiously ignored is a reference to the Milankovic cycles.

Russian scientist Mulutin Milankovic found that fluctuations in the earth’s elliptical orbit of the sun resulted in marked irradiance differences and hence, temperature variations. The consequence of the eccentricity of the elliptical paths, he observed, is a perpetual cycle of change, making it very difficult to define a ‘normal climate.’

Another of his findings which has a bearing on weather patterns and temperatures is the tilt of the earth. It varies between 22.1 and 24.5 degrees.

Thus, despite the reality that climate change is a reality determined by natural forces millions of miles away, the same mentality that motivated the construction of the Tower of Babel now prevails.

How the closure of coal mines, de-industrialisation and decarbonisation is going to produce “decent work” and eliminate poverty while driving up debt through climate finance is the greatest deception of our time.

The post The Deception Of Climate Finance appeared first on Duncan Du Bois.