GWPF -NOTE TO THE GOVERNMENT

 The Prime Minister’s radical decarbonisation plans will burden Britons with astronomical costs which will trigger rising public discontent.

London, 4 December: The Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, has today announced that as part of the drive to Net Zero the United Kingdom will aim to cut its emissions in 2030 by 68% as compared to the 1990 baseline, a substantial increase over and above the previous 57% target.

 

The official 1990 baseline for the UK’s greenhouse gas emissions is 794.4 MtCO2e (million metric tonnes of CO2 equivalent). Increasing the official 2030 target from a 57% to a 68% reduction implies a total reduction of 540 MtCO2e per year.

 

The cost of emissions reductions through current policies, such as wind power, is approximately £100-£150/tCO2e, and, in spite of industry propaganda, figures of more than £200/tCO2e are plausible for the future. Hence, the new target translates to a cost of between £50 billion and £100 billion per year.

 

The “Express Service” required to deliver the Prime Minister’s target can only increase this cost still further.

 

Even at the lower end of these estimates, spending at this level will place a significant burden on households already faced with the long-run impact of the measures taken to address coronavirus.

 

British businesses will see their competitiveness post-Brexit eroded when they most need to be rebuilding their position in the international markets.

 

Dr Benny Peiser, the GWPF director, said

 

"Boris Johnson is indulging in radical gesture politics in the run up to COP26, and attempts to send friendly messages to Mr Biden. But these gestures come at astronomical costs and burdens which are unsustainable.

 

"As the unaffordability and infeasibility of these extreme plans becomes apparent, public discontent will only grow while the irresponsibility of this Conservative government is unlikely to be forgotten by voters.”

 

Contact

 

Dr Benny Peiser

Director, Global Warming Policy Forum

m: 07553 361717

e: peiser@thegwpf.com

Reading the above made me find out what Boris has written about climate change before becoming PM. I found an interesting summary here: Boris Johnson | DeSmog UK

Here are a few extracts: January 2013

In a Telegraph opinion column entitled “It’s snowing, and it really feels like the start of a mini ice age. Something is up with our winter weather. Could it be the Sun is having a slow patch?” he wrote the following: [10]

“As a species, we human beings have become so blind with conceit and self-love that we genuinely believe that the fate of the planet is in our hands — when the reality is that everything, or almost everything, depends on the behaviour and caprice of the gigantic thermonuclear fireball around which we revolve.”

“I am all for theories about climate change, and would not for a moment dispute the wisdom or good intentions of the vast majority of scientists. But I am also an empiricist; and I observe that something appears to be up with our winter weather, and to call it “warming” is obviously to strain the language.” 

“I wish I knew more about what is going on, and why. It is time to consult once again the learned astrophysicist, Piers Corbyn. Now Piers has a very good record of forecasting the weather. He has been bang on about these cold winters. Like JMW Turner and the Aztecs he thinks we should be paying more attention to the Sun. According to Piers, global temperature depends not on concentrations of CO2 but on the mood of our celestial orb.” 

December 20, 2015

Writing in the Telegraph, Johnson argued recent warm winter weather had nothing to do with climate change: [9]

“In the view of Piers and his colleagues at WeatherAction, it is all about sun spots, and he is on record as believing that we are now due for a new 'Maunder Minimum' – like the famous cold spell in the 17th century, when the Thames froze several times,” Johnson wrote. 

“Whatever is happening to the weather at the moment, he said, it is nothing to do with the conventional doctrine of climate change.”

So, what does he really believe? I don't think anyone really knows, but the above suggests that he is inconsistent, at least. I hope that his present support for such ruinous policies is simply opportunist. The problem is there are plenty of others who are only too willing to bankrupt the country, even though they must know that these policies will have no measurable effect on the Earth's temperature or climate.