UN Green Climate Fund: good for bankers, bureaucrats, but not so much the poor

Green Climate Fund, Logo. UN Green Climate Fund (GCF) — nice rort if you can get it

The UN climate fund was set up in 2010 but has yet to send a single dollar of project money to its star sinking island (which isn’t sinking, but is poor).

The NY Times has a long article describing how billions of dollars is being spent, but somehow it seems to be going to the wrong places. Given the lack of accountability, voters, and elections, who could have seen that coming?

The  GCF GONGO is ruled by a Board of 24 people who jetset to Korea, hand out other people’s money, and get applause. In 2012 they were seeking immunity from all laws and taxes. Presumably they succeeded. In 2014, they were caught funding a new coal power station in Indonesia to reduce carbon emissions. I wondered if that was rorting, cronyism, or ‘success’. Greens were not happy. Now we find out that the rest of the money is ending up with the renewables industry, investment bankers, and bureaucrats:

U.N. Climate Fund Promised Billions to Poor Nations. For Some, the Wait Is Long.

Transparency, not so good:

The observers took issue, for example, with a proposed project that would hand out $265 million in equity and grants to Geeref Next, a Luxembourg-based investment fund that proposed to finance renewable energy or energy efficiency projects in about 30 countries — with no explicit plan to disclose what those projects would be.

Money was supposed to go to cute local enterprises, but ended up in bank accounts in London:

…why the fund’s finances, set up to back locally owned projects that reach the most vulnerable communities, were going toward private-sector enterprises led by global investment firms — like $110 million in loans and grants for solar projects in Kazakhstan led by London-based United Green Energy and the investment arm of Kazakhstan’s sovereign wealth fund.

Fifty million dollars went on payments to things like a Hydro Dam in Tajikistan. But if the climate models are right, there will be no water in it. (At least we know there’s no risk of that.)

Ninety percent of the funds are not going towards the original mandate:

….less than a tenth of the funding has gone to the kind of projects that make up the fund’s mandate: those owned and controlled by the poorer nations themselves.

How many billion do we need to pay to get someone to answer the phone?

The fund’s secretariat did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

Kiribati needs desalination to get safe water. Instead the UN fund gave them half a million to prepare a new application.

Kiribati scored a small victory this year when it qualified for a $586,000 grant to help the country prepare a new application to the fund.

The UN excuse – they are beginners:

“But we just started. There are competing interests — from countries, from the private sector, and we are trying to wade through this maze of conflicting interests,” he said. “We will get there.”

Only seven years in and nothing to show for it. Lucky their world is not facing a crisis.

__________________

9.8 out of 10 based on 66 ratings

85 comments to UN Green Climate Fund: good for bankers, bureaucrats, but not so much the poor

  • #
    Idiot_Wind

    As a British English speaker I was not familiar with the word ‘rorting’. However, the Collins on-line dictionary defines it variously as informal Australian:-
    noun
    1. a rowdy party or celebration;
    2. a dishonest scheme;
    verb
    3. to take unfair advantage of something.

    Regards,
    I_W.

    —-
    I learn something every day. Thank you. I did not know it was AustraliaNZ -Jo

    200

    • #
      Yonniestone

      Consider ‘rorting’ to be part of the international language IW, we had to invent our own because c#@t$ was already used for politicians Colloquially.

      161

      • #

        Ever noticed how the 99% seems to be very quiet when it comes to bankers, financiers, Big Oil etc and their roles in the Green Scam?

        181

        • #
          Glen Michel

          How ignoble is noble cause corruption? It’s impossible to impress the extent of this …….. We’re only in in it for the money! Wisdom has always been in short supply.

          50

  • #
    Yonniestone

    The Clinton Foundations fingerprints HAS to be on this somewhere, if not at least they had the decency to rort a real alternative power source.

    211

  • #

    Most of the recipients of the Green Climate Fund are countries governed by despotic leaders who care more about staying in power and increasing their personal bank accounts than bettering the lives of the people they govern. Most of the Green Climate Fund will end up in palaces, yachts and monuments to the despots.

    300

    • #
      NB

      Monuments are employment projects; yachts will be required when victim-countries are engulfed by the sea; palaces are built because, um, they will be needed for the poor, and they will house essential government service providers. The benevolence knows no bounds. Swimming pools are a good measure of benevolence, too. These are installed as small, local, reservoirs for when the rain stops.

      110

      • #
        Russ Wood

        On “Small, local reservoirs” – there was quite a fuss when our South African President Zuma used about $4 million of taxpayers money to build up his own personal home in KZN. When trying to excuse the extensive additions as “security features”, the Minister of Police said the the huge swimming pool was a “fire pool” in case of emergency. (Thatched roofs, you know).

        30

    • #

      Most of the countries in the United Nations are receivers – that votes in favor of receiving.

      70

  • #
    Manfred

    The UN excuse – they are beginners:

    “But we just started. There are competing interests — from countries, from the private sector, and we are trying to wade through this maze of conflicting interests,” he said. “We will get there.”

    The Achilles heel of the totalitarian bureaucrat. They are always doomed to end up thinking that everyone else is less smart than they are – classic Dunning Kruger. Inevitably it seems, they will betray themselves over and over again. (Unskilled and unaware of it: how difficulties in recognising one’s own incompetence lead to inflated self-assessments; Kruger & Dunning 1999)

    And they have the track record to prove it.

    How Corrupt Is the United Nations? | Claudia Rosett | Apr 2006

    “We still do not know the full extent of these debacles—the more sensational ones include the disappearance of UN funds earmarked for tsunami relief in Indonesia and the exposure of a transnational network of pedophiliac rape by UN peacekeepers in Africa—and we may never know.”

    The sordid truth about the oil-for-food scandal | Con Coughlin | Oct 2004

    “…concerns the fecklessness of the United Nations, not to mention the treacherous conduct of some of its security council members, in its dealings with Saddam’s regime between the end of the 1991 Gulf war and last year’s Operation Iraqi Freedom.”

    “…the opposition of France and Russia to the war was that both countries’ political establishments were deeply implicated in a lucrative scam to divert the profits of the UN’s oil-for-food programme into their own private coffers.”

    The euphemistically termed ‘Green Fund’ appears most likely to become the scam of all scams (if you exclude the ETS), well at least until the next one, or the UN is defunded back to core business — peace and aid.

    290

  • #
    Roger

    I sometimes wonder if there is any difference between the UN and the way it operates and the way that Robert Mugabe’s government in Zimbabwe has operated and made millionaires and billionaires out of the elite – but then I think, of course there is, the UN doesn’t murder opponents (or at least not so far as I know).

    191

    • #
      Dave in the States

      Roger, you were right on the money in another thread about this climate reparations business when you wrote: “It is taking money from poor people in rich nations and giving it to rich people in poor nations.” That was classic.

      140

    • #
      Manfred

      Roger, it strikes me that any distinction between murder and the incarceration in poverty of the peoples of Africa or the Pacific Island nations for example, is a distinction too fine to make, unless that is, one is a UNEP bureaucrat with magnifying monocle clamped to one eye of ideology.

      60

  • #
    sophocles

    Ahh. That will be the fund the Fijian Prime Minister, Frank Bainamarama is trying to extract some money from. He has a village on the island of Vanua Levu, Vunidogoloa, which has been ‘suffering from rising sea level and has had to be relocated two or three kilometers inland.

    A New Zealand television reporter with the usual ‘impeccable and reliable’ research assured viewers this village has been being slowly inundated which is, of course, caused by “ climate change sealevel rise.

    Apparently, according to a villager speaking on the bulletin, this slow inundation has been busy for the last fifty or so years. Well. That’s longer than Global Warming, but it has senior officials worried.

    Senior government official Alipate Bolalevu, says more than 600 villages across Fiji have been identified as threatened by rising sea levels.

    More than 40 settlements are expected to be relocated within the next 10 years.

    Sounds like tectonic action, namely subduction, ie: the land is sinking, the sea is not rising. The Kermadec Tonga Trench swings by or through the Fiji island chain. One Plate on one side of the trench is subducting under the other plate. Quick, out with the life rafts! CO2 is causing the land to sink!

    Along most of the Trench, it’s the Pacific Plate subducting under the Australian Plate but I haven’t checked this where Fiji is concerned. Climate Change, as a cause, though, can be immediately ruled out. Nils Axel Morner points out the corals in Fiji say sea level in most places in Fiji is static and has been for at least the last seventy years. “The corals don’t lie

    Never mind what is happening. It’s the Climate Fund Frankie is after to cover relocation costs. So if the subduction can be pinned on Climate Change, he sees he’s got a better chance at that fund.

    Besides, if he does work out it’s subduction, he’ll likely turn to claiming it’s “all Australia’s fault” and be demanding money with menaces. At least he doesn’t have nuclear nor a ballistic missile programs.

    180

    • #
      el gordo

      Fiji has joined China’s Belt and Road Initiative, so if worse comes to worse they can build up the islands like they did in the South China Sea.

      Of course now that global cooling has begun that won’t be necessary, because sea level is going to fall.

      ‘Sea level changes over the past 500 years at Ysawa Islands, Fiji, show that sea level was +70 cm high in the 16th and 17th centuries, -50 cm low in the 18th century and that stability (with some oscillations) prevailed in the 19th, 20th and early 21st centuries.

      ‘This, Mörner writes, is almost identical to the sea level change documented in the Maldives, Bangladesh and Goa (India), and thus would point to a mutual driving force.’

      Notrickszone

      140

  • #
    John F. Hultquist

    GFC –> GCF ?


    Ahem. Oops Yes. Thanks@! – J

    30

  • #
    robert rosicka

    OT but I see there was a media stunt in Brisbane of all places where they asked loaded questions on the Adani coal mine only about 8 people in the crowd supported the mine .
    I’m not to sure if they asked about mining coal on the Great Barrier Reef but that’s the sort of gathering it was .
    Being in the inner city I wonder how many greens and leftards were stacked in the audience and also why the meeting wasn’t held in rural QLD where the jobs and mine is going to be .
    Shame on Fox News .

    140

  • #
    Dennis

    Socialism masquerading as environmentalism, the attack of capitalism as the world has known it.

    141

  • #
    robert rosicka

    More OT but I couldn’t believe what ABC have written here as to the reason why South Australia has high electricity prices .

    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-11-17/curious-adelaide-the-problem-of-power/9158240

    80

    • #
      Rod Stuart

      The ABC are masters of obfuscation and conflation.
      While avoiding things that are downright false, other pertinent information is ignored.
      It’s called ‘spin’. The ABC has dozens of Sheilas with a PhD in Spin. Hence spin doctors.

      151

      • #
        Manfred

        The ABC has dozens of Sheilas with a PhD in Spin. Hence spin doctors.

        On the other hand … ABC has a cohort of the walking dead, each with a bachelors ‘degree’ in communication ‘science’ who connive to describe themselves as ‘spin doctors’.

        60

    • #
      Mark M

      Here is an ABC moment.

      Spot the Denier …

      ABC, 2013: The release of the IPCC Fifth Assessment Report provides details that stamp out the myths and distortions of those trying to discredit climate science.

      Has the Earth stopped warming over the past 15 years?

      The answer is an emphatic no, writes Will Steffen.

      ABC, 2015: The recent global warming ‘pause’ is partly due to a naturally-occurring cyclical cooling of the Pacific Ocean, say a team of scientists, who add that the pause is unlikely to last much longer.

      In 2013, the U.N. panel of climate scientists said the pause in warming was due to factors including natural swings such as shifts in ocean heat, sun-dimming volcanic eruptions and a decline in solar output in an 11-year cycle.

      “The slowdown in warming is probably a combination of several different factors,” says Michael Mann.

      100

      • #
        el gordo

        Will Steffen said the heat is hiding in the oceans around Australia and he got the word from the CSIRO Climate Report.

        ‘Sea-surface temperatures in the Australian region have warmed by 0.9°C since 1900. In 2013, temperatures were 0.5°C above the 1961–1990 average of 22.3°C. Sea-surface temperatures around parts of Australia have been mostly well-above average since 2010, with persistent regions of very warm to highest-on-record temperatures to the south and west of the continent throughout much of 2013.’

        The Red Team will take a crack at that.

        50

        • #
          Graeme No.3

          I don’t think he was the Prat on the ABC News approx. 16.15 in Adelaide talking about the Berlin Climate Conference, On and On about Renewables, the necessity to eliminate coal use, the coming switch world wide to renewables etc. Fortunately my car service was finished so I left it behind, although a deal of my trip home was spent on a letter to the newspapers about the differing standards that the ABC enjoys. Any commercial station that ran a 5 minute or more advertisement so devoid of factual evidence would be prosecuted, but because these “prats” describe themselves as ‘environmentalists’ they can be given free air time on the ABC. Sure they might be sincere, although gullible, ignorant and scientifically idiots but the ABC neither checks the facts nor seems capable of doing so.
          Hithertoo I have avoided the ABC and have been inclined to let them alone – on the grounds that it was best to concentrate them in a sheltered kindergarten – but from now on I shall be pushing for the ABC to be split up, and normal standards to be applied in the various sections or else.
          And I don’t like their use of commercial advertising. Ever since I purchased a David Attenborough Doco I can’t turn to Google without pop up adds from the ABC about local releases of Discovery Channel documentaries that I bought years ago.

          70

          • #
            Serp

            “Advocate Bent Causes” appears to be its mission. I’ve largely stopped listening to it, an unimaginable circumstance even twelve months ago.

            30

      • #
        el gordo

        The situation has changed dramatically since Will spoke those words. All the world’s oceans are now cooling, particularly noticeable of WA.

        https://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2017/10/global-sst-10-26-2017.gif

        60

    • #
      pat

      the final line says it all (about theirABC):

      “I would definitely investigate solar PV to see if you could lop off the majority of your daytime use. That should pay off in the long run.”

      the rest of the article is gibberish.

      70

  • #

    The way to stop sea level rise is to do what the Maldives did and invest billions in luxury resorts, hotels, airstrips, airports. Works every time. No more aqualung cabinet meetings in the Maldives!

    And I suppose the way to get some Western Gongo to part with actual money to do an actual hydro project in Central Asia is to show how China is waiting to help out with dough and Russia with gas. (In fact the Tajikstan project is not good at all for downstream Uzbekistan, the sixth biggest cotton producer in the world, just ahead of Oz. Uzbekistan is punishing old enemy Tajikstan by withholding gas. Kyrgyzstan dams are a further threat to Uzbeki water, but Russia has been generous in funding them in exchange for removal of US bases. And everyone is a threat to the Aral Sea, though, to be fair, the World Bank has done some useful restoration work there.)

    90

  • #
    • #
      Graeme No.3

      Piffle.
      Evidence of occupation long ago is not evidence that it was current people who were there. The Mungo deposits split into Gracile and thickset types who may, or may not, have evolved into modern aborigines.
      It may be that the earliest remains were dumb, primitive sub-humans sort of like current ABC talking heads.

      60

  • #
    • #
      Rereke Whakaaro

      Yes, people who are not well informed, think that the islands just sit there, as a static entity, waiting to be eroded.

      That might be true, of the White Cliffs of Dover, except there is not a lot of erosion there either, come to think of it.

      Also, the south western Pacific is volcanic, where the Pacific Plate abuts to the Australian Plate. Volcanoes have a reputation of pushing “stuff” up hill, including islands.

      It must be hard for the poor climate worriers to learn all about climate variation, only to find that their favourite catastrophe is caused by physics in a field they have learnt little, bordering on nothing, about.

      80

      • #

        Thoughts from the turnip field.

        Knowledge tempered with
        Socratic scepticism is
        preferable to shaminist
        exhortations ter trust
        their messages of fear’n guilt
        “thou -shalt -nots” fer
        raisons d’etat.

        A serf.

        30

      • #
        Graeme No.3

        RW:

        The White Cliffs of Dover (and the South Downs and the French cliffs of Calais) were laid down in the Cretaceous by minute sea creatures and represent roughtly a million years of deposition. Quite remarkable really when you consider the oceans MUST have been acidic (ABC science fact) because the CO2 level was 4-5 times that at present, i.e. 1600-1950 ppm. Unfortunately real scientists refuse to change the facts to suit the theory, so the gullibles will have to ignore that time.

        70

  • #
    TdeF

    Real poverty is energy poverty. A refrigerator for antibiotics or babies die. Some relief from the heat at the equator. Even the poorest societies need to charge their phones. It is amazing how the smart phone has changed the world. So while we pay $6Bn a year for windmills in South Australia to be owned by foreigners, how many windmills have been built in Kiribati? The greatest number of windmills are in countries which have no need for them at all, so it is not about social justice. As for Green charities, they are typical charities, all about paying their own wages and travel expenses. Accountability? None.

    251

    • #
      TdeF

      I suppose it is a silly question, but how much would you get for a second hand windmill? Is it even saleable? Silly because we the paying public do not own them. That’s why Jay Weatherill is building his own power station for his goverment. Only a nutcase would be dependent on windmills.

      121

    • #

      ‘To tackle the double challenge of energy poverty and climate change –
      producing clean, affordable energy at a pace that will meet rising
      demand without environmental detriment – all stakeholders must step up
      efforts to transform the world’s energy systems ‘for everyone’s benefit,
      said U.N.Secretary-General António Guterres on Wednesday.-2/11,2017 New York.

      The irony it burns, While dolling out dollars to deserving nations,
      the UN is committing them, and us to energy poverty…, intermittent,
      inefficient ‘renewable’ energy poverty.

      50

  • #
    OriginalSteve

    In the Bible, unclean evil spirits that would mislead the entire world are depicted as frogs ( frogs are very old representations of pagan gods)..coincidence given the green thing?

    “And I saw three unclean spirits like frogs come out of the mouth of the dragon, and out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the mouth of the false prophet.

    For they are the spirits of devils, working miracles, which go forth unto the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to gather them to the battle of that great day of God Almighty.

    ( Rev 17:13-14)

    80

    • #
      Rereke Whakaaro

      … unclean spirits like frogs …

      If you squirt liquid oxygen at them, and then hit them with a hammer, do they shatter into a thousand pieces? Frogs and toads do.

      Caution: Do not try this at home.

      20

  • #
    Graeme#4

    Has Australia paid any money into the global climate fund, as a result of the commitment in Paris? I don’t believe Australia has so far.

    40

    • #
      Sceptical Sam

      Regrettably it has.

      According to “The Australian” a sum of $200 million was committed by Julie Bishop in 2014:

      Australia to contribute $200m to green climate fund

      A $200 million government backflip on an international green climate fund will come at the expense of Australia’s foreign aid budget.

      In a bittersweet victory for green groups, Foreign Minister Julie Bishop today announced to a UN climate change conference in Lima that Australia would now contribute to a $10 billion fund that aims to help developing nations tackle global warming.

      It came after the Prime Minister revealed a “fair and reasonable” contribution to the Green Fund based on caring for rainforests in South East Asia.

      The decision is a reversal of its stance at the G20 summit in November.

      But the $200m pledge will come from an already-plundered foreign aid budget.

      Cabinet finalised the decision on Australia’s contribution to the fund — which Mr Abbott has criticised in the past — with the input of Julie Bishop from the climate conference in Lima. The contribution of $200m will be paid over four years, bringing total international contributions to the fund to over the target of USD$10 billion.

      “The Australian” 10 December 2014

      http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/climate/australia-to-contribute-200m-to-green-climate-fund/news-story/444f9361dd13c714cdbd90ce62009b44

      50

    • #
      Raven

      Has Australia paid any money into the global climate fund […]

      Paid into it?

      Crikey, Deputy Secretary of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Ewen McDonald boasts how we ran the racket for three out of the last five years!

      Australia’s engagement
      Australia has had a long engagement with the Fund. We have pledged AUD200 million to it and we hold a seat on its Board. I have also served as Co‑Chair of the Board for three out of the last five years.

      Link

      50

  • #
    pattoh

    Virtue signalling all the way to the bank…………/sarc.

    60

  • #
    OriginalSteve

    Bit of a bonanza for fake news today:

    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-11-17/why-your-morning-coffee-will-taste-different-and-cost-more/9158774

    “The countless cups of coffee downed during the UN’s COP23 climate summit in Bonn may seem insignificant.

    But if coffee consumption has any message, it is that climate change is personal.

    Worldwide, more than 2.75 billion cups of coffee are consumed every day. Half of all Australians love a good coffee to kick-start each morning.

    Yet, as climate change influences weather patterns around the world, coffee yields and quality are already suffering, and pests and diseases are on the rise.

    Fairtrade Australia & New Zealand’s report on the climate risks to coffee, A Brewing Storm, found that the total area suitable for growing coffee will be halved by 2050 if global warming goes unchecked. By 2080, wild coffee — a crucial genetic resource for farmers — could vanish entirely.”

    Yep…pure best manufactured nonsense….

    But wait…theres more…..

    Feel the quality, Squire….

    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-11-17/20-countries-have-signed-up-to-phase-out-coal-power-by-2030/9161056

    And what are they going to replace it with? Perhaps we should corner the market for unicorns and rainbows – they will be in demand…and issue future “engineers” with smiley faces stickers where the official university seal used to be on their degrees…..such will be their worth if climatye change is taken in any way seriously by engineers….

    “Twenty countries including Britain, Canada and New Zealand have joined an international alliance to phase out coal from power generation before 2030.

    The Powering Past Coal Alliance was unveiled at the COP23 climate talks in Bonn, Germany, which were working out the technical details of the 2015 Paris Agreement.

    “I think we can safely say that the response has been overwhelming,” Canadian Environment Minister Catherine McKenna said.

    The alliance, which isn’t legally binding, was launched days after a pro-coal presentation by the Trump administration jarred with many ministers who wanted the talks to focus on cleaner energy sources.

    Australia isn’t part of the alliance, which also doesn’t include some of the world’s biggest coal users China, India, the United States, Germany and Russia.”

    Good…there is a general rule of thumb – if you start playing with manure, soon you will smell like it….

    60

    • #
      Andrew McRae

      There was another great line in the coffee story that I was expecting someone here to mention, but nobody has yet so here it goes.

      But even more alarmingly, about 70 per cent of the world’s 25 million coffee producers are smallholders. Many of these smallholders lack the capacity to plan more than a year ahead, much less for decades of climate change.

      How’s the condescension? Aside from implying that anyone who doesn’t try to centrally plan the world’s economy 33 years in advance must be stupid, there’s another smug implication here. They actually believe scientists have the planning capacity to predict the climate 33 years in advance. When they can predict 23 years correctly, then they can try for 33 or 63, but they haven’t done it yet.

      40

  • #
    pat

    reminder:

    11 Nov: NewHampshireUnionLeader Editorial: Carbon and energy: Renewables haven’t cut costs
    Don’t look now, but efforts to reduce carbon dioxide by spending vast amounts on solar and wind power have not put much of a dent into curbing what many believe to be the chief cause, manmade at least, of climate change.
    “Carbon intensity,” a measure of how much CO2 is generated for each unit of energy consumed, has not dropped in 20 years…

    ***But there was one “renewable” power source not mentioned by Porter. It is hydropower. It doesn’t have the unreliability issues of wind or solar, and it is easily integrated into existing power grids. Anyone know of any hydropower handy?
    http://www.unionleader.com/article/20171112/OPINION01/171119901

    6 Nov: Yale Daily News: Maya Chandra: Students protest Yale link to transmission line
    A coalition of student protesters presented the Yale Investments Office with an open letter on Oct. 26 demanding that the University withdraw Yale-owned real estate from a deal allowing the construction of a transmission line through New Hampshire.
    The proposed transmission line, called Northern Pass, would carry energy from Canada’s hydropower plants through New Hampshire and into New England…
    Hydro-Quebec spokeswoman Lynn St-Laurent disputed those claims about hydropower, arguing that it is “absolutely false” to say that Hydro-Quebec reservoirs produce larger carbon footprints than other sources of renewable energy…
    While the Northern Pass is still under review by the New Hampshire Site Evaluation Committee, Eversource spokesman Martin Murray said the company is confident that the project will reduce New England’s reliance on less sustainable, more expensive fossil fuels. In doing so, carbon emissions will go down by three million tons each year, saving the region $600 million annually, Murray said…

    TODAY:

    16 Nov: ABC America: $1.6B Canada-New England hydropower project wins key permit
    By Michael Casey
    The Department of Energy on Thursday awarded a key permit for a transmission project that would carry hydropower from Canada to more than a million homes in southern New England.

    The granting of what is called the Presidential permit allows for the $1.6 billion project to take hydropower across an international border and connect to the United States grid. First conceived in 2010, the Northern Pass project calls for building a 192-mile electricity transmission line from Pittsburg to Deerfield in New Hampshire, carrying enough Hydro-Quebec energy to power about a 1.1 million homes…

    “We are pleased to see the DOE permitting process for Northern Pass draw to a close, and appreciate the years of diligent work done by the federal agencies in reaching this critical project milestone,” Bill Quinlan, president of the utility Eversource New Hampshire, said in a statement.
    “With the New Hampshire and Canadian permitting processes also nearing completion, and considering we have all major contractor, equipment and labor agreements in place, Northern Pass is on track to begin construction by mid-2018,” he said…

    Republican Gov. Chris Sununu, who has long favored the project, said it would be a “home-run for small businesses, rate-payers, and clean energy advocates.”
    “Today, New Hampshire is one step closer to lowering energy rates across the Granite State,” he said in a statement…
    http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/16b-canada-england-hydropower-project-wins-key-permit-51204321

    40

  • #
    pat

    a tale of water:

    first a speech:

    15 Nov: White House: Remarks by President Trump on His Trip to Asia
    Last week, 42 South Korean companies announced their intent to invest in projects worth more than $17 billion dollars in the United States, and 24 companies announced plans to purchase $58 billion dollars in American goods and services…
    In China, we also announced $250 billion worth in trade-investment deals that will create jobs in the United States…
    I announced that the United States is ready to make bilateral trade deals with any nation in the region that wants to be our partner in fair and reciprocal trade…
    I am particularly pleased that the United States and Vietnam recently announced $12 billion in commercial agreements, which will include $10 billion in U.S. content…
    Everywhere we went, I reaffirmed our vision for cooperation between proud, independent and sovereign countries — and I made clear that the United States will be a reliable friend, a strong partner, and a powerful advocate for its own citizens…
    We have established a new framework for trade that will ensure reciprocity through enforcement actions, reform of international organizations, and new fair trade deals that benefit the United States and our partners.
    https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2017/11/15/remarks-president-trump-his-trip-asia

    so how was it reported all over the FakeNewsMSM?

    16 Nov: Reuters: Jeff Mason: In post-Asia trip speech, Trump makes news … with water
    The day after returning from a 12-day journey to Asia, Trump delivered a more than 20-minute live address to tout his accomplishments on the trip…
    Partway through his remarks, the president, who was speaking loudly to the assembled press, paused as cameras rolled to have a drink. Foiled at first when he could not locate any water on his podium, ***reporters pointed out there was a bottle on a table to his right. He reached for the bottle of water and sipped.
    Trump’s drink of water lit up social media…
    Others on social media noted the irony of Trump’s choice of an imported refreshment – ***Fiji Water – during a speech in which one of the main themes was a pledge to reduce U.S. trade deficits with foreign nations…

    Bloomberg: Mike Dorning: Trump’s Water-Bottle Fumble Steals the Show During His Asia Trip Recap

    this Fiji Water:

    2010: Mother Jones: Obama sips it. Paris Hilton loves it. Mary J. Blige won’t sing without it. How did a plastic water bottle, imported from a military dictatorship thousands of miles away, become the epitome of cool?
    Two bottles sat on a table between Al Gore and Mos Def during a 2006 MySpace “Artist on Artist” discussion on climate change. Fiji was what panelists sipped at the “Life After Capitalism” conference held in New York City during the 2004 RNC protests; Fiji reps were even credentialed at last year’s Democratic convention, where they handed out tens of thousands of bottles…

    back to the present:

    Elle UK: Donald Trump Pauses White House Address To Drink Water And It’s Really Awkward To Watch
    TWEET: **Peter Gleick…

    16 Nov: BizPacReview: Frieda Powers: Trump shocks world by drinking Fiji water after trade statement. Then, a startling revelation…
    TWEET: ***Peter Gleick: The bottle of #water Trump drank at his [press] conference today appears to be Fiji Water, imported 7,800 miles from Fiji to DC. Because American water isn’t good enough, I guess.

    But former Fox News host Eric Bolling offered some clarity – and simple research…

    TWEET: Eric Bolling: Before you go there…. Fiji Water is sourced in Fiji but the company is headquartered in Los Angeles, California. They pay US taxes. And the imports are GOOD for our vast global trade imbalances.

    Which prompted others on Twitter to back up the revelation…
    http://www.bizpacreview.com/2017/11/16/trump-shocks-world-drinking-fiji-water-trade-statement-startling-revelation-563475

    Yes, it is THAT Peter Gleick:

    A LATER TWEET: Peter Gleick: For context, the imported Fiji Water Trump drank at his press conference cost about 6000 times more than the cost of high-quality tap water. Which, BTW, Trump’s EPA is trying to ruin.
    2:27 PM – 15 Nov 2017
    1 Reply only:
    Fanny Foxtrot: Fiji water is the very best water you can drink….that said, he drank what was available to him…..can you find something else to whine about, please!
    https://twitter.com/PeterGleick/status/930925130766802944

    FIRST TWEET – SEEKING OUT THE EVIDENCE:
    Peter Gleick: Help Twitter friends. Can anyone get a good enough view of the bottled #water Trump drank from at his “press” conference today to confirm the brand?
    TWEET: Peter Gleick: Thank you all!

    SOME REPLIES TO THE TWEET MAKING THE MSM TODAY:

    TWEET: Peter Gleick: The bottle of #water Trump drank at his [press] conference today appears to be Fiji Water, imported 7,800 miles from Fiji to DC. Because American water isn’t good enough, I guess.
    1:30 PM – 15 Nov 2017

    FROM REPLIES:
    General reminder Obama drank it too…

    To pick on the water our president drinks only means you have nothing substantial to say. Get a life!…

    Suddenly a old, shriveled, irrelevant bearded liberal wants to whine about globalism…

    grow up and find a new profession…

    what poor, pathetic lives you loons must live when all you can do is criticize what water brand was placed next to him…
    https://twitter.com/PeterGleick/status/930910846494101514

    INSANITY RULES.

    60

    • #
      AndyG55

      Wait there, Trump supports the Fijian economy, and the left get all uppity.

      They really are a weird lot, aren’t they ! 🙂

      31

  • #
    pat

    16 Nov: SanFranciscoChronicle: AP: Pope rebukes climate deniers as ‘perverse’ in Bonn message
    by Nicole Winfield
    Pope Francis on Thursday rebuked those who deny the science behind global warming and urged negotiators at climate talks in Germany to avoid falling prey to such “perverse attitudes” and instead accelerate efforts to curb greenhouse gas emissions.
    Francis issued a message to the Bonn meeting, which is working to implement the 2015 Paris accord aimed at capping global emissions.

    In it, Francis called climate change “one of the most worrisome phenomena that humanity is facing.” He urged negotiators to take action free of special interests and political or economic pressures, and to instead engage in an honest dialogue about the future of the planet.

    Francis didn’t cite any countries by name, but the United States has announced it is withdrawing from the Paris accord, and President Donald Trump has nominated several people in his administration who question scientists’ conclusions that human activity is behind the global rise in temperatures. At the same time, the U.S. administration has promoted the use of fossil fuels like coal for U.S. energy needs…

    In his message, the Argentine pope denounced that efforts to combat climate change are often frustrated by those who deny the science behind it or are indifferent to it, those who are resigned to it or think it can be solved by technical solutions, which he termed “inadequate.”
    “We must avoid falling into these four perverse attitudes, which certainly don’t help honest research and sincere, productive dialogue,” he said.
    http://www.sfchronicle.com/news/world/article/Pope-rebukes-climate-deniers-as-perverse-in-12361964.php

    40

    • #
      el gordo

      ‘….climate change “one of the most worrisome phenomena that humanity is facing.”

      The abrupt cooling in the southern hemisphere, snow on the ground in Chile and South Africa late in the season, is only the start of a worrisome trend.

      60

  • #
    OriginalSteve

    Whoops…..

    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-11-17/abc-data-leaked-online-discovered-by-ukrainian-firm/9159022

    “A Ukrainian cybersecurity firm has discovered an unsecured cache of ABC Commercial files, which it says includes two years of database backups, email addresses and hashed passwords.

    The files were found by cybersecurity firm Kromtech on an incorrectly configured internet service.

    The company initially attempted to alert the ABC of the data breach on Wednesday.

    Kromtech head of communications Bob Diachenko said the firm found the publicly accessible data by accident using a simple search tool.

    “We used a public search engine, and this tool allows you to search for any open databases connected to the internet,” Mr Diachenko said.

    “So we ran the search … and one of the links that we saw was a link to the commercial department of the ABC.”

    Kromtech said the exposed data included 1,800 daily backups of an ABC Commercial database, as well as requests sent by overseas TV producers to the ABC to license its content.

    The data was stored on a widely-used commercial cloud service run by internet giant Amazon, called Amazon S3.

    An ABC spokesperson said the corporation was notified of “a data exposure” on November 16 and technology teams “moved to solve this issue as soon as they became aware”.

    30

  • #
    pat

    an alternative plan given the failure of the GCF/no further US dollars?

    16 Nov: ClimateChangeNews: Call for polluters to pay ‘climate damages tax’
    Disappointed by slow progress at UN talks in Bonn, 50 organisations and individuals demand a fossil fuel levy to compensate victims of climate change impacts
    By Abu Siddique
    ???Global civil society organizations are calling for a tax on fossil fuel supplies to fund support to people hit by climate change impacts.
    Polluters should pay for homes and livelihoods wrecked by rising seas and increasingly extreme weather, campaigners argued in a statement issued alongside UN climate talks in Bonn, Germany…

    Negotiators agreed in Bonn on Tuesday to hold an “expert dialogue” in 2018 on raising funds for climate change victims, deferring the contentious discussion for another year. Developed countries do not accept liability for damages caused by global warming…

    Julie-Anne Richards of the Climate Justice Programme said “At Cop23 rich countries have done everything they can to stump discussion on ways to fund the poorest people on the frontline of climate impacts…
    Other signatories to the declaration included Canadian author Naomi Klein, British journalists George Monbiot and Maya Goodfellow, and NGOs Oxfam, Greenpeace, WWF and Care International.

    Bangladeshi negotiator Ziaul Haque said vulnerable countries welcomed any source of funding, but expressed scepticism about the campaign.
    He commented: “While the developed countries are not paying heed to the climatic damage, how can we expect that their polluting industries will raise funds to address the damage?”
    http://www.climatechangenews.com/2017/11/16/call-polluters-pay-climate-damages-tax/

    20

  • #
    TdeF

    It’s not science. It’s about money. How many times have you heard of charities, even huge charities which soaked up every dollar they received. Fake charities too. In every era there are people on the lookout for corruption, ripoffs, rivers of money, opportunities. There is always a cover story like saving the pink eyed upright toe sloth but in reality, you donations go to someone who is on a yacht off Ibiza.

    In fact I would put the whole UN as a charity, funded largely by the US after WWII. Preventing war? I could just see Tonga challenging Russia or Robert Mugabe threatening the US. They are all in it for the money and at present the biggest money is in “Climate Change”. The science. Too bad there is no science, CO2 is beneficial and all variations are perfectly natural. Pulling in $1.5Trillion a year, what politician is going to criticize this money train.

    Of course we had one. “Climate change is crap.” “Socialism masquerading as envionmentalism”. The UN worked hard to get rid of Tony Abbott and the French PM before Paris, as Lord Monckton warned they would. Malcolm Turnbull and his black hand now control the country. Their interest in what is good for the people of Australia? Zero.

    100

  • #
    pat

    behind paywall:

    16 Nov: UK Times: €1.2 billion-a-year cost of wind farms ‘unsustainable’
    by Seán McCárthaigh,, Senior Ireland News Reporter
    The government is subsidising wind farms to the tune of €1.2 billion a year without a proper cost-benefit analysis of their ability to reduce CO2 emissions, a report has claimed.
    The campaign group Wind Aware Ireland believes that the state’s wind energy policy is unsustainable. It estimates that expenditure through the public service obligation levy and other supports result in CO2 emissions being cut by only between 2.6 and 4 per cent.
    Paula Byrne, a spokeswoman for Wind Aware Ireland, said the amount spent annually on wind energy could clearly not keep pace because the country was moving towards even more ambitious emissions targets.
    She accused the government and state bodies such as the Commission for Regulation of Utilities of failing to conduct a serious analysis of…

    16 Nov: Independent, Ireland: Wind power not the answer to lowering C02 emissions, claims lobby group
    by Allison Bray
    Increasing wind energy is not the answer to decreasing the country’s carbon emissions, according to campaign group Wind Aware.
    The national group, comprised of about 50 local community groups opposed to wind farms, released a report yesterday claiming that the deployment of wind energy is only reducing carbon dioxide emissions by less than 5pc.

    The ‘Costs of Wind Energy in Ireland’ report claims this is despite a 2007 white paper on energy in which the Government pledged that a third of electricity would be generated by renewable resources by 2020.
    “Most of this was to be achieved by deploying large amounts of on-shore wind energy. The aim of the plan was to reduce Ireland’s C02 emissions,” the report stated.

    According to the report, only between 2.6pc and 4pc of carbon emissions are reduced by wind energy because “wind is an intermittent source of power that cannot be stored on a grid-scale, it has knock-on effects on how the grid operates”.
    “Conventional generators must be ramped up and down to balance wind,” the report said.
    Wind Aware spokeswoman Laura Byrne said: “Increasing wind energy does not necessarily reduce emissions.
    “There’s a perception out there that renewables, and wind in particular, equals emissions reduction, but they don’t.
    “Because wind doesn’t always blow and you can’t store the electricity, you always have to have all of your fossil fuel plants either running or on stand-by – so they’re now producing more emissions than if they were running all the time,” she said.

    The report calls on the Government to look instead at other options, such as retro-fitting insulation in homes and converting coal-fired power stations to biomass in order to cut carbon emissions.
    “Our energy policy must be urgently reviewed and all current actions paused until full analysis has taken place of the most cost-effective and sustainable way to de-carbonise,” the report concluded.
    https://www.independent.ie/news/environment/wind-power-not-the-answer-to-lowering-c02-emissions-claims-lobby-group-36324902.html

    following links to the 28-page report:

    15 Nov: WindWatch: from FarmersJournalIreland: Colm McCarthy: comprehensive catalogue of wind energy costs needed
    It should not have been left to this voluntary group to raise these vital policy questions…
    But Irish policy has become excessively reliant on the subsidisation of renewable electricity generation and a new report from the lobby group Wind Aware (LINK) released on Wednesday argues that the costs, not all of them fully visible, have become excessive. Ireland has enough windmills, in a nutshell, and more promising routes to emission reduction lie elsewhere…

    Wind farms have recently been contributing about one-quarter of Ireland’s electricity requirement, a high figure by international standards. The problem is that this contribution has become very costly and there is a risk that any attempt to further increase the share from wind, or from other intermittent technologies such as solar, will add more and more cost, for less and less in emission reduction.
    There is a rational ceiling on the amount of renewable electricity generation to aim for and Ireland is already at, or very close, to the ceiling. Bear in mind that 81% of emissions come from sectors other than power generation…

    Electricity has become relatively more costly in Ireland than in many competitor countries and the high costs of wind power are a large part of the explanation…READ ON
    https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2017/11/16/colm-mccarthy-comprehensive-catalogue-of-wind-energy-costs-needed/

    40

    • #
      TdeF

      You have to love the illogic.

      ““Conventional generators must be ramped up and down to balance wind”

      So you have to vary the strong steady power to cope with the vagaries of random wind? That is absurd. So the wind association is blaming steady coal and nuclear power for their problems in producing steady power?

      When the Global Cooling appears in the next few years, as is certain, wait for the explanation that CO2 causes Global cooling too.

      70

  • #
    pat

    Carbon Pulse has removed this piece which i posted on jo’s previous thread yesterday:

    16 Nov: CarbonPulse: Just a game: China ETS to kick off with two years of simulated trade, no compliance obligations
    China’s national emissions trading scheme is set to be a “game” when it starts in the coming months, with no real trades or compliance obligations during its first two years of operation, two sources close to the market’s design process said Wednesday.

    and replaced it with:

    16 Nov: CarbonPulse: UPDATE – China ETS to kick off with two years of simulated trade, no compliance obligations
    (Updates to indicate that Wang and Chai spoke in their personal capacities, and that their statements did not represent those of the Chinese government, ICF or IETA)

    still sounds like it’s JUST A GAME to me.

    30

  • #
    pat

    so much CAGW/”renewables” propaganda in here, no wonder Reuters required so many staff to produce it; ignoring the propaganda, u end up with:

    15 Nov: Reuters: Poland turns to fossil fuel soulmate Trump as coal output flags
    by Agnieszka Barteczko, Barbara Lewis
    (Additional reporting by Anna Koper in Warsaw, Wojciech Zurawski in Katowice, Polina Devitt in Moscow, Vera Eckert in Frankfurt and Tim Gardner in Washington; editing by David Stamp)
    Poland’s state coal trader Weglokoks is to due receive its first ever shipment of U.S. coal imminently and industry sources expect state or private buyers to take at least three more cargoes over the next seven months, even though Europe as a whole is shifting away from the most carbon-intensive energy source.

    With both countries led by fossil fuel advocates, the benefits are mutual. Poland has to meet a shortfall left by the failure of national mining giant PGG to achieve its production targets, while U.S. miners are relying on export growth as power utilities at home switch to cheaper, cleaner alternatives…

    Until now, only private importers have bought coal cargoes from the United States, and the industry sources say the Weglokoks purchase proves the trend is gathering momentum.
    “Everyone is trying to buy U.S. coal. If you have coal now, you’re the king,” an executive at one Polish mine said…
    Poland will host next year’s round of U.N. climate talks in the southern city of Katowice – the center of the coal-producing Silesia region and PGG’s home…

    Polish imports of U.S. coal have already leapt more than 500 percent in the first half of this year, figures from the U.S. Energy Information Administration show…
    By contrast, Poland is building three new coal power stations…

    However, a source close to one utility said Russian imports could be essential due to the risk that not enough U.S. coal arrives in time, should the winter be severe. “Imports from Russia would be more politically correct than cold heaters in the winter,” he told Reuters, asking not to be named…
    https://www.reuters.com/article/us-poland-coal-analysis/poland-turns-to-fossil-fuel-soulmate-trump-as-coal-output-flags-idUSKBN1DF1YJ?feedType=RSS&feedName=environmentNews

    30

  • #
    pat

    15 Nov: E&E News: ADVOCACY: Climate civil war brewing at ALEC
    by Zack Colman
    Members of the American Legislative Exchange Council, a heavyweight conservative policy organization, are feuding about their approach to climate change.
    ALEC’s conservative wing says the organization — which convenes corporations, think tanks and legislators — is capitulating to left-of-center interests to regain funders after an exodus of corporate titans like Google LLC and Royal Dutch Shell PLC over the organization’s climate change positions. Others, however, contend that the conversation on climate has shifted away from hard-liners, with a growing number of Republicans and conservatives embracing clean technology and climate science, according to several of the group’s members…

    And it will soon come to a head, as ALEC members prepare to vote on a measure that takes aim at U.S. EPA’s endangerment finding on greenhouse gases. The Obama-era finding is a compilation of scientific evidence that forms the legal basis for EPA greenhouse gas regulations. It’s despised by many conservatives.
    ALEC’s Energy, Environment and Agriculture Task Force is slated to vote on a draft resolution (LINK) at a meeting in Nashville, Tenn., next month that calls “upon the Environmental Protection Agency to withdraw the 2009 endangerment finding for carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases and conduct a new rulemaking on this issue.”
    If ALEC ultimately adopts the resolution, it will serve as a model resolution for state and federal lawmakers to express their disdain for the EPA finding…

    The tug of war at ALEC mirrors the fight between voices skeptical of ***mainstream climate science — like the nonprofit Heartland Institute — and groups that are more moderate on climate change, like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
    Heartland is rumored to be behind the endangerment resolution, with former North Dakota state Rep. Bette Grande (R) — who now freelances for Heartland and participates in ALEC matters — thought to have drafted it and handed off the language to a state lawmaker and ALEC member.
    Heartland did not respond to a request for comment…

    Corporate America, meanwhile, largely supported staying in the Paris climate agreement and retaining the Clean Power Plan — an Obama administration rule to curb power plant emissions — but ultimately lost those battles to far-right groups, though some hope Trump will ultimately remain in the global climate pact…

    The endangerment finding vote may serve as a bellwether for where ALEC stands on climate change.
    Is ALEC part and parcel of a conservative movement that has questioned climate change and the policy responses to it? Or does it operate among the wider atmosphere of ***reputation-conscious corporations and even some moderates who have opposed the Trump administration on climate change?…

    But conservatives familiar with ALEC said they’re concerned that the organization has gravitated to satisfying interests that aren’t committed to the free-market principles upon which the group was created. They said that dynamic is most apparent in the energy and environment space.
    “When it comes to the policies of the organization, ALEC does have strong positions on issues that are consistent with the free market,” Blair said. “The issue is if they are planning to upend those principles to fundraise in the future.”
    They worry that ALEC is trying to plug a funding gap following the high-profile exits of Google, ***BP PLC, Enterprise Rent-A-Car, ***Royal Dutch Shell PLC and others, all of which blamed the organization’s stance on climate change for their departure…

    The conservative billionaire industrialist Koch brothers are big donors; Exxon Mobil Corp., a member of the Energy, Environment and Agriculture Task Force, is also a major funder…READ ALL
    https://www.eenews.net/stories/1060066527

    10

  • #
    pat

    behind paywall:

    15 Nov: UK Telegraph: US strategic supremacy is alive and well, led by energy
    By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard
    Over the last week the International Energy Agency and OPEC have both capitulated on the phenomenon of US shale, acknowledging that the US will achieve unparalleled dominance of global oil and gas supply by the mid-2020s.
    What they do not acknowledge – the Déformation professionnelle of the oil culture – is that it ***will be followed by a Chinese and Indian switch to post-fossil transport in the 2030s. The imperatives of climate policy will force this shift to electrification, Trump or no Trump.

    This sequence has grim implications for Russia and the hydrocarbon regimes that have failed to diversify, and for the oil majors with such a heavy weighting on the London Stock Exchange.
    It means the cyclical recovery of crude prices may be stunted, and painfully slow, before giving way to “peak oil” and irreversible decline as…
    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2017/11/15/us-strategic-supremacy-alive-led-energy/

    FULL TEXT AT PRESS READER, THO WHY THE POMPOUS EVANS-PRITCHARD INSERTS THIS EXCERPT INTO A PIECE COVERING FUTURE DECADES – OTHER THAN TO EARN GLOBALIST BROWNIE POINTS – IS BEYOND ME:

    16 Nov: Press Reader: UK Telegraph: America was king of petrol cars, but who will rule the electric age?
    By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard
    Set against this is a dysfunctional US President who trashes American leadership and threatens to wreck the multilateral global order. My assumption is that he will be swept away briskly, a historical curiosity…
    https://www.pressreader.com/uk/the-daily-telegraph-business/20171116/281517931412585

    40

    • #
      OriginalSteve

      Yes the irony of trying to retrofit a perfectly good capitalist system that runs on diesel with a typically inept socialist one that runs on fossil fuel powered electricity…..

      You couldnt make this stuff up…..

      40

    • #
      Peter C

      Electrification is a very good idea.

      Our train network has been progressively electrified over the past 50 years and this is being extended now.

      Trams are also electric powered transport and they are also making a comeback across the world.

      The real issue is; where does the electricity come from?
      Coal or Nuclear power plants are the only solution.

      60

  • #
    Phillip Bratby

    Is there any UN organisation that isn’t rife with corruption?

    70

  • #
    Bitter&twisted

    Follow the money.
    Then you will find the climate crooks.

    30

  • #
    pat

    best to read all for the nuanced victory:

    15 Nov: Scroll.in: Nitin Sethi: Bonn climate summit: India and other developing countries score a victory
    Developed countries will now need to report what they have done so far to stop climate change.

    India, China and other members of the Like-Minded Developing Countries group won a big victory at the Bonn climate change summit on Wednesday. After a week of bitter negotiations, they ensured that developed countries will have to report on what they will do by 2020 to protect the world against climate change…

    In 2010 and 2011, the developed world had promised to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by specific levels. Most developed countries, with the exception of some like the US, committed to do so under the Kyoto Protocol of 1997 – a globally agreed-upon set of rules for rich nations to follow to reduce emissions. The developed countries also committed to provide up to $100 billion in funds by 2020 and transfer green technologies to developing counties. This came to be called as the pre-2020 agenda of the climate change talks…

    But at the Bonn talks, India and other developing countries found that this pre-2020 agenda had been dropped from the formal UN negotiations. That meant the developed countries would not be held accountable for their commitments up to 2020…

    But on Wednesday the developed countries eventually gave in…READ ALL
    https://scroll.in/article/858020/bonn-climate-summit-india-and-other-developing-countries-score-a-victory

    30

  • #
    Raven

    Here’s the latest report (November 2017) from the Green Climate Fund.

    Notice how much they haven’t done.
    Out of that enormous pile of money, they’ve disbursed a paltry $131.1 million.

    Here’s the Green Climate Fund twitter feed.

    Scroll down and note the sheer number of troughers tagging along on in this rort.
    Yes, theres a pic of Ewen McDonald in there too.

    This is just a tiny corner of the vast Green Industrial Complex.

    40

    • #
      el gordo

      The noble cause corruption at the GCF persuaded the Chinese to set up their own fund called South-South Cooperation, where they sell renewables to the poverty stricken nations to the south of Beijing.

      This is not to be confused with the South East Asian Co-prosperity Sphere, which was an earlier Japanese idea.

      30

  • #
    Henning Nielsen

    The NYT writes that the UN fund har 10,3 bill. $. Is this correct? Looking at their “resources mobilization” website,

    http://www.greenclimate.fund/how-we-work/resource-mobilization

    one can see columns for “announced”, presumeably meaning “promised” in some way, and “signed”.

    However, the most recently updated list:
    http://www.greenclimate.fund/documents/20182/24868/Status_of_Pledges.pdf/eef538d3-2987-4659-8c7c-5566ed6afd19

    has information about “disbursed”, and there one sees that the US has only paid 1 bill. out of the 3 that are listed as “signed”. The disbursed list has no total sum! While the signed list proudly announces a sum of 10,1 bill.$ It may seem then, that the fund is somewhat 20% smaller than reported by the NYT.

    It is also interesting to see which country pays the most, the list (resources mobilization) is ranged by payment per capita, where of course Sweden, the ever-willing global saviours, are on top with 58$, Norway right behind at third place, while the more hard-nosed Danes are not willing to contribute more than 12, and the benighted Icelanders a measly 2$. Shame, shame 🙂 Australia gives 8, but NZ -oh dear!- only a paltry contribution of 0,5. No doubt their mountains will soon disappear in the sea.

    30

  • #
    AndyG55

    From WUWT, apparently Macron the macaroon, says he will cover the contributions that the USA is no longer going to provide to the climate trough.

    https://wattsupwiththat.com/2017/11/17/climate-clown-macron-taunts-trump-demands-green-trade-tariffs/

    Yeah.. good luck with that !

    61

    • #
      pat

      AndyG55 –

      what Macron is talking about is peanuts…for the IPCC, not the GCF.

      the figure from WUWT –

      The US currently contributes around €2 million (£1.8 million) a year to the IPCC

      50

  • #
    Hot under the collar

    Maybe the US needs to investigate the UN Green Climate Fund for possible fraud and money laundering?

    40

  • #
    STJOHNOFGRAFTON

    The UN. Run by scammers. Funded by the gullible.

    30

  • #

    CO2 isn’t a pollutant.

    The Worldwide Harmonised Light Vehicle Test Procedure (WLTP) information web site says:

    The WLTP laboratory test is used to measure fuel consumption and CO2 emissions from passenger cars, as well as their pollutant emissions.

    ACEA (European Automobile Manufacturers’ Association) provides that information web site for the benefit of consumers and other parties during that crazy ride of transition from the totally unrealistic NEDC (New European Driving Cycle) to the slightly less-ridiculous WLTP over the coming few years.

    30