Deben denies interests in energy

A grand committee of the House of Lords has been examining the provisions of the Energy Bill. The video of the meeting is below. The contributions to the debate are remarkable in that almost every speaker had to acknowledge a financial interest in the side they were supporting. One of the few exceptions was Matt Ridley (from 17:19.25), who pointed out that he was speaking against his declared interest in coal and in favour of gas.

During the debate, Lord Deben declared (16:52.00) that he had no business interests in areas related to the bill (although he declared his interests in the CCC and GLOBE International during his speech).

According to Veolia Water UK - which readers will recall has a business connecting new power generators to the grid -  he remains chairman of the board.

His failure, once again, to acknowledge his conflict of interest is presumably because if he acknowledges it now, he will be accepting by implication that he should have declared it when he stood as chairman of the Climate Change Committee. He has no choice except to try to tough it out.

(Incidentally, Nigel Lawson, from 17:33.0 onwards, was on very good form)

Update on Jul 3, 2013 by Bishop Hill

Later on in the debate, Deben says something about having stopped himself having anything to do with the bit of the company (presumably Veolia) that is involved with grid connections.

Not sure this is going to wash.

Kelly in the Times

Mike Kelly had a letter in the Times yesterday, following on from the story about possible energy blackouts.

Sir, If we have rolling blackouts in the grid in the coming winters, where does the responsibility lie? Real engineers know that infrastructure projects take a decade to deliver. Our preoccupation with alternative energies that do not generate electricity for weeks on end in dark winters originates with the drafters of the Climate Change Bill, who should have taken heed of engineers. A lack of electricity on demand is characteristic of Third World countries, and our country has been betrayed that this should happen to us. We are contemplating sanctions for misbehaviour in the healthcare and banking sectors; why not in the energy policy sector?

Professor Michael J. Kelly
Prince Philip Professor of Technology, University of Cambridge

PCC throws out complaint against David Rose

The Press Complaints Commission has thrown out a complaint about David Rose's Mail on Sunday article about climate sensitivity. This is the text of their ruling.

The complainant, an environmentalist and the author of greenerblog.blogspot.com, was concerned that the newspaper had published an article on the subject of climate change – both in print and online – which contained a number of alleged inaccuracies, misleading statements and distortions in breach of Clause 1 (Accuracy) of the Editors’ Code of Practice.

Under the terms of Clause 1, “the press must take care not to publish inaccurate, misleading, or distorted information”; “a significant inaccuracy, misleading statement or distortion once recognised must be corrected promptly and with due prominence”; and “the press, whilst free to be partisan, must distinguish clearly between comment, conjecture and fact”.

Click to read more ...

More from the SciTech inquiry

Last week the Commons Science and Technology COmmittee took further evidence in its inquiry into the public understanding of climate change. The evidence was taken at the Science Museum, so there was no video stream, but the transcript has now appeared.

The witnesses were Nick Pidgeon, Understanding Risk Research Group, Cardiff University, Chris Rapley, Communicating Climate Science Policy Commission, UCL, and Alex Burch, Director of Learning, Science Museum Group.

The transcript is here.

An ethically dubious research project

Some months ago, I posted a link to a lecture by Chris Rapley. The lecture itself was fairly bog-standard chanting of the climate change sutras (the barmy sutras?), but towards the end was something rather intriguing. After the lecture proper was a Q&A session, and although most of this had been cut from the recording the first exchanges seem to have been missed. The first concerned whether we sceptics really believe the things we say, and Rapley's answer was, to say the least, fascinating. Have a listen here (the audio is slightly muffled at first, but improves).

Click to read more ...

EU considers minor expansion of corrupt biofuels scheme

Having compelled the use of biofuels in transport fuel the European Union is now having to deal with the consequences.

...overall, when land-use effects are taken into account, most varieties of biodiesel turn out to produce more emissions than bioethanol — and often more than fossil fuels.

The effect wipes out more than two-thirds of the carbon emissions that Europe’s renewable-energy policy was supposed to save by 2020, says David Laborde, a researcher at the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) in Washington DC, which has produced influential reports for the European Commission.

In response the Commission has decided not to expand the biofuels mandate, but the EU Parliament is still wondering whether to increase it slightly.

Expanding a scheme that damages consumers and does little or nothing for the environment looks a lot like insanity. Much that goes on in the public sector does. But of course, once you understand that the biofuels mandate is driven by corruption, it all makes sense.

The insanity of central planning

Here's an extraordinary story from Friday, which I missed at the time, but picked up via Timmy.

NHS hospitals are being asked to cut their power demand from the National Grid as part of a government attempt to stave off power blackouts, which the energy watchdog Ofgem warns could arrive as early as 2015.

According to one energy company, four hospitals have already signed up to a deal under which they will reduce demand at peak times by using diesel-fired generators.

So in order to save the planet from the perils of carbon dioxide, we are going to run major power users on diesel generators. Canny, Mr Davey, canny.

The sheer idiocy of the situation the environmentalists in DECC have got us in to is almost unbelievable. I see no alternative to closing the whole department.