Max Luke, Jessica Lovering, Alex Trembath — The Energy Collective — September 16, 2013

Germany’s renewable energy transition, the “Energiewende,” has long been a subject of scorn among conservatives, who have argued that it is a massive ratepayer-subsidized boondoggle that has harmed Germany’s economy and imposed significant regressive costs on poor and working class energy consumers. But the last several months have seen growing skepticism about the Energiewende from the center-left as well. Both Der Spiegel and Slate have published lengthy investigative pieces raising troubling questions about the costs and the environmental benefits of Germany’s headlong pursuit of an all-renewable energy future. Even left-leaning Dissent Magazine recently published a long expose about the failure of the Energiewende to reduce carbon emissions, concluding that Germany’s enormous investments in renewables, together with plans to phase out its nuclear fleet, would cost the nation a generation in the fight against global warming.

At…

The Green Party’s proposal for a mandatory ‘veggie day’ didn’t sit well with voters.

Hands up STT readers, who’s game to lend money to Infigen, Pac Hydro or Union Fenosa?

Ready to send your hard earned coin to Infigen – the crowd that backed up a $55 million loss in the year ended 30 June 2012 with an $80 million loss in the last financial year?

Our favourite whipping boys, Infigen –along with Pac Hydro, Union Fenosa and a band of similarly scurrilous scammers had all formed a disorderly queue outside the Clean Energy Finance Corporation (CEFC) ready to pocket a fat pile of cash – OUR CASH – that is, from their mates at the CEFC.

A while back we covered the shenanigans at the CEFC in: The Oz – tilting at windmills: Part 2.  In that post The Australian talked about “high-risk loans”, referring to the fact that the wind outlaws were not being called upon by the CEFC to…

Christopher Booker — The Telegraph — September 22, 2013

The real global warming disaster: green taxes, a suicidal energy policy and wasting billions on useless windmills

The news that hundreds of scientists and officials from all over the world are this weekend converging on Stockholm to discuss the next 2,000-page report from the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) again highlights what is the most terrifying political conundrum facing our country today. Emerging in instalments over the next seven months, this report will try to convince the world, without a shred of hard evidence, that the prospect of catastrophic man-made global warming is “extremely likely”.

The air is already thick with familiar claims and counterclaims, President Obama quotes yet another laughably silly paper trying to make out that “97 per cent of scientists” support the IPCC “consensus”. Sceptics point out yet again that the lack of global warming over…

Daniel Greenfield –Frontpage Magazine — September 20, 2013

Sometimes environmentalists get a bit confused and they can be forgiven for that. It can’t be easy living in perpetual ignorance while shivering every time the volcano god rumbles and Al Gore forewarns another warm winter unless a few virginal carbon credits are sacrificed.

Mr Davey, the Liberal Democrat Energy Secretary, accused Conservatives of attempting to “destroy” the UK’s renewables industry.

The Daily Telegraph last month disclosed that officials in Mr Davey’s energy department have attempted to block a report commissioned by Mr Paterson on the impact of wind farms on the countryside.

Government sources claimed that Mr Davey was concerned that the report, which will also examine how turbines affect house prices, would not “fit with Lib Dem ideology on wind farms”.

In his speech to the Lib Dem conference in Glasgow, Mr Davey said that he is being forced…

The CBC reports:

NASA reports:

By popular demand – here’s Paul’s Epistle to Australian power punters.

In our last post, Paul Miskelly gave Ian Macfarlane an almighty serve over his apparent sympathy for wind weasels.

We’ve been overwhelmed by the number of hits on – and with the responses to – Paul’s extremely well-crafted challenge to the new Industry Minister.

Here’s the letter that Paul sent to the editor of Acoustics Australia (and Macfarlane) – giving the wind industry’s pet acoustic consultants a solid whack over their (self-justified) failure to go in to bat for rural communities – a failure that STT puts down to their love of filthy wind weasel lucre and their collective contempt for hard-working, rural Australian families.

Letter to the Editor
Paul Miskelly, Mittagong, NSW

Response to article by S. Cooper, “Wind farm noise – an ethical dilemma for the Australian Acoustical Society?”, Acoustics Australia 40(2), 139-142 (2012)

I would…