CLIMATE COMPENSATION FOR "LOSS AND DAMAGE"

Apparently this year's climate conference is due to try and reach agreement on the subject of "loss and damage" caused allegedly by climate change caused by global warming caused by the burning of fossil fuels. The linked article, below, discusses this and points out the obvious difficulties of dealing with such a nebulous subject, but as it points out, once the principle has been accepted then some funding becomes expected. Yet another drain on the taxpayer. It is too easy for politicians to spend or give away other people's money to make caring and generous gestures

 COP27 — the Camel’s Nose of Loss and Damage Enters the Talks – Watts Up With That?

FOSSIL FUELS MAKING A MASSIVE COME BACK!

 Vijay Jayaraj: The world is transitioning to fossil fuels

The Washington Times, 25 October 2022
 
Despite the fanfare surrounding wind and solar, the world’s dependency on fossil fuels is increasing. Last week, Saudi Aramco CEO Amin Nasser said that the world is now “transitioning to coal.”

Saad al-Kaabi, Qatar‘s energy minister, says: “Many countries particularly in Europe which had been strong advocates of green energy and carbon-free future have made a sudden and sharp U-turn. Today, coal burning is once again on the rise reaching its highest levels since 2014.”

They are right. Global coal demand will reach a historic high in 2022, similar to 2013’s record levels. According to the International Energy Agency, “Global coal consumption is forecast to rise by 0.7 percent in 2022 to 8 billion tons. … Coal consumption in the European Union is expected to rise by seven percent in 2022 on top of last year’s 14 percent jump.”

Coal will continue to be a sought-after energy source as “rising gas prices after 2030 will make existing coal-fired generation more economic,” the IEA says. Global energy demand will grow by 47% from now through 2050, and oil is expected to be the major source of energy.

Analysts are projecting “a huge gas-to-coal fuel transition in power and industrial sectors” of Europe. Yes, not gas to renewables, but gas to coal. In fact, the European Union’s coal consumption grew 16% year-on-year for the first half of 2022. European countries imported 7.9 million tons of thermal coal in June, more than doubling year-on-year. Annual coal imports are expected to reach 100 million tons by the end of the year, the highest since 2017.

Even in the most developed economies of the West like Germany and the United Kingdom, fossil fuels continue to dominate as the only dependable source of energy. Germany is set to become the third-highest importer of Indonesian coal in 2023, ranked just below coal-guzzling China and India.

AP says, “Coal, long treated as a legacy fuel in Europe, is now helping the continent safeguard its power supply and cope with the dramatic rise in natural gas prices caused by the war.” Rather than wind or solar, it is coal that is keeping the lights on in Europe.

Taking stock of the tremendous performance of coal, a Shaw and Partners senior analyst commented: “Who would have thought dirty ol’ coal would have been the best-performing equities in the last financial year? So far this financial year it’s also the best-performing sector.”

Given this reality, can Western economies protect themselves from being victims of their own green policies that neither produce the required energy nor save the planet?

Many Western leaders are not ready to admit that this is a misery self-inflicted by their green-energy obsession that compromised the supply of fossil fuels.

The global green energy movement’s primary goal is to make economies transition to renewable sources of energy, a move that some believe will help save the planet from climate change. But sources like wind, solar, and biomass are neither reliable nor affordable — nor even “renewable.” These indisputable facts were disregarded as Western economies continued to make their so-called energy transition.

As a result, much of Europe, the U.K. and North America find themselves in energy turmoil.

Instead of harvesting their abundance of fossil fuels, these economies are in a state of lamentation, desperate for the procurement of the very fuel sources they once despised.

Last week, the White House said it was concerned about a cut in oil production announced by OPEC, despite the Biden administration’s denigration of domestic oil. In Europe, leaders are livid over a gas shortage, another fossil fuel that they claim is bad for the planet.

Qatar’s Saad Al-Kaabi says that European “green” policies are responsible for high energy prices and that leaders in the West “don’t have a plan.” Energy shortages have forced them to return to the most dependable sources — coal and oil. They are now scampering to ensure energy security for winter, when many believe likely that there will be power blackouts in the U.K. and Germany.

The world is now transitioning to fossil fuels — not renewables, despite vast amounts of time and money spent on developing wind and solar technologies.

Vijay Jayaraj is a research associate at the CO2 Coalition, Arlington, Virginia. He holds a master’s degree in environmental sciences from the University of East Anglia and resides in India.

THE SVALBARD DECEPTION

 We are constantly being told that global warming is "much worse than we feared" and that we ought to be panicking. A recent example of this was on the news in the last dew days. Svalbard we were told is warming at "six times the global average". Here: BBC Worried That Svalbard Is As Hot As In 1922 | NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT (wordpress.com) Paul Homewood reveals the truth, which is that Svalbard was warmer in the 1920s and has subsequently cooled until the 1960s and then warmed again. 

SOMALIAN HYPOCRITES SIGN OIL DEAL

 I don't expect anyone will be surprised to learn that the Somalian government are developing their oil industry while at the same time demanding billions of dollars in compensation for the "climate damage" which they blame on fossil fuels. See here: Somali Government Signs Controversial Coastline Exploration - East African Business Week (busiweek.com)

As Paul Homewood explains the current drought in Somalia is not unusual. He shows the evidence here: Somalia Say Drought Is Due To Climate Change, As They Demand Billions | NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT (wordpress.com)

The whole "climate crisis" issue is entirely political and is used by political leaders to further their own interests. Any scientific pronouncements are infected by the political imperative. Most people have far too much to lose to try and stand out against the prevailing narrative. 

It will all end in failure, as the UN is now itself forecasting, see here: Climate change: UN warns key warming threshold slipping from sight - BBC News There is no way the world will ever follow the path to do without fossil fuels while there is no credible alternative and the penny is finally dropping. Unfortunately my country (UK) will cling to its ruinous path to the bitter end.

RENEWABLES - THE DOWNSIDE

 Following on from yesterday's thought provoking video I invite you to listen to a very interesting and powerful short lecture by someone who really believes in living in harmony with nature and yet has come to the conclusion that renewables cannot provide the answer. See what he has to say for yourself.

Why renewables can’t save the planet | Michael Shellenberger | TEDxDanubia - YouTube

HOW MUCH ENERGY WILL THE WORLD NEED?

The title of this article is crucial to understanding whether "net zero" is a realistic proposition. Here is a short video which succinctly explains the issue and why renewables will never be the solution. They may play a small role, but going down the route of trying to replace all fossil fuels with them is simply a foolish fantasy. 

How Much Energy Will the World Need? - YouTube

The Chinese and most of the developing world understands this already, but they keep the pretence going in order to weaken the gullible and naive Western governments which are willing to go along with it 

NET ZERO IS KILLING BRITISH MANUFACTURING

 London, 15 October - Energy costs will close two major ‘green’ manufacturing operations

 

• BMW is moving manufacturing of the electric Mini from the UK to China where manufacturing is powered by cheap coal.

 

 

• Britishvolt, a major battery manufacturing startup, is on the brink of collapse.

 

Both companies have cited high energy prices as the reason for their problems.

 

Claims that the UK’s economy will be based around ‘green industries’ are clearly false.

 

• Manufacturing of renewables and EVs will be built in places where energy is cheap, which means places where it is derived from fossil fuels.

 

• European wind turbine manufacturers are financially struggling and cutting jobs, losing market share to Chinese competitors benefiting from cheap coal.

 

• Net Zero is driving the wholesale deindustrialisation of Britain which threatens to make the UK uninvestable.

 

The economic crisis can only be solved by cheap energy

 

• There will be no economic growth without cheap energy.

 

• Cheap energy can only be delivered through increased supply of fossil fuels and nuclear, and elimination of renewables.

 

Net Zero plans must be cancelled as a matter of urgency.

 

Net Zero is unattainable and a danger to national well-being

UK FARM LAND UNDER THREAT FROM SOLAR PANEL DEVELOPMENT

 

London, 11 October - Net Zero Watch today welcomed media reports that the Secretary of State for the Department of Food, Environment and Rural Affairs (DEFRA), The Rt Hon Ranil Jayawardena MP, is minded to tighten planning advice to discourage the development of large scale solar photovoltaic power stations on farmland. Net Zero Watch has warned of this misuse of farmland and its threat to food security in two papers by our energy editor, Dr John Constable.   The most recent of which was published in March this year: The Case for Reform of Solar Energy Planning Guidance.   The loss of agricultural land is on a highly significant scale with 30,000 acres or more currently facing proposals for solar photovoltaic, and much more in the early stages of development, putting further pressure on land use.   The UK currently has approximately 14.8 million acres of arable land, the lowest level since 1945. In the decade 2009–2019, the arable area fell by about 740,000 acres, and the area of land lost to agriculture currently stands at about 99,000 acres per year. The area facing solar development is a highly significant increment to an already undesirable trend. The UK is approximately 61% self-sufficient in food production, and 75% self-sufficient in indigenous food types.   However, this relatively reassuring picture is put into doubt by the decline in agricultural area under cultivation and by population growth, which adds approximately 400,000 people to feed each year. On these assumptions, within twenty years the UK will be feeding a population that is considerably larger, but from an arable landbase that has shrunk by 13%. This would imply an import dependency of about 50% or more.   Against this background Mr. Jayawardena’s move to restrain development is obviously wise. We must hope that the government is not deflected by protests from vested interests in the solar industry and their followers in parliament.   NZW’s energy director, Dr. Constable, said:   "Farmland is already a solar converter making food, which is much more valuable than third-rate and very expensive electrons from solar photovoltaic cells. The fact that some green campaigners would rather have low grade electricity than high quality British farm produce shows how bizarrely irrational environmentalism has become."   Contact   Dr John Constable. Energy Director, Net Zero Watch e: john.constable.1837@gmail.com

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ARE WE PAYING WIND FARMS TWICE FOR ELECTRICITY?

 This article gives strong evidence that we are. How windfarms charge you twice for the same electricity - Net Zero Watch

No wonder that our electricity bills are shooting up!

NET ZERO CAUSING MODERN FARMING METHODS TO BE ABANDONED

Read this article from the Mail on Sunday to see what is happening 

Forcing farmers to join the rush for Net Zero will see millions go hungry, GEORDIE BURNETT-STUART | Daily Mail Online

So we can expect less choice and more costly food.

WHY WIND TURBINES WILL NEVER SUPPLY ENOUGH ELECTRICITY FOR OUR NEEDS

Here is the answer to all those who think that we can simply stop using fossil fuels and use wind power to have cheap limitless wind energy instead:

 The impossibility of Windmills - YouTube

THE BIG ELECTRIC VEHICLE LIE

Below is a link to a most informative video about EV untruths. The film-maker is someone who appears to believe that CO2 emissions need to be reduced, making his arguments all the more believable.

 THE BIG EV LIE. Why They Won't Save the Planet & All About Dirty Electricity | TheCarGuys.tv - YouTube

EXTREME WEATHER NOT INCREASING SAYS NEW REPORT

Here is the evidence to refute all the spurious claims about extreme weather.  

No Positive Trends In Extreme Weather Found | NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT (wordpress.com)

What we are constantly being told on the TV news and in the press are simply exaggeration put out by scientists whose jobs depend on finding an increase in extreme weather. Why do the TV companies never publish reports that challenge the so-called consensus? I believe there is only one explanation - they want to push out propaganda.

IPCC REPORT SHOWN TO BE FULL OF EXAGGERATION AND FALSE CLAIMS

 This detailed study, below, looks at some of the most outlandish claims made in the most recent IPCC report and compares the claims with the actual data. It reveals that the IPCC cannot be trusted. It shows that the IPCC are simply a propaganda tool for the people who run the UN that are trying to convince the western world that they must continue with their increasingly unpopular policies, whatever the cost to the people who must put up with ever more costly energy.

Here is the link: Extreme Weather: The IPCC's Changing Tune (thegwpf.org) 

THE CLIMATE THAT IS NEVER MENTIONED

 Here is the climate story that is not heard on our news bulletins.

Regions of Russia And Belarus Suffer Earliest Frosts On Record; Cold Benchmarks Fall In New Zealand; September Snow Forecast For NW U.S.; + USDA Crop Estimates Revised Lower - Electroverse

HOW TO FIX THE UK ENERGY COST CRISIS

A very sensible and practical set of proposals from the GWPF.

 fixing-energy-cost-crisis.pdf (netzerowatch.com) 

But will the government have the courage to adopt them?

POLICE ACT AGAINST A LAW-ABIDING MEMBER OF THE PUBLIC FOR EXPRESSING A VIEW

Who will be next to be arrested for expressing a view which causes "anxiety"? The video below shows the experience of one person. 

Bad Law : The Rise Of The British Gestapo - YouTube

THE REAL REASON FOR OUR ENERGY DISASTER

Below is a great essay explaining why the West is in such a disastrous situation with energy. As the author says, it is not simply down to Putin's war - it is a foolish policy of trying to do away with fossil fuels which has been a long term descent into the disaster of today. Do read it yourself. 

How governments and the cult of net zero wrecked the energy market | NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT (wordpress.com)

CLIMATE SCEPTIC SCIENTISTS RAISE THEIR VOICES

 Declaration saying “There is no climate emergency” trends on Twitter – Greenies have meltdown

Chris Morrison, Daily Sceptic, 23 August 2022



The increasing numbers of scientists prepared to break ranks with the ‘settled’ politicised science of climate change would suggest various causes for their scepticism other than bungs from oil companies.

Professor Dr. Knut Loschke studied crystallography, chemistry, physics, mathematics and computer science. In the course of a long career he founded an IT company, and is an honorary professor at the University of Technology, Economics and Culture in Leipzig. As part of his work at the University, he deals with the energy industry and climate change. He served the German Bundestag as an expert in ‘Artificial Intelligence’. But Professor Loschke is annoyed, very annoyed, as he demonstrated in this recent Facebook post.
 
I’m sick. Or, to put it even more clearly: I’m fed up with permanent and increasingly religious climate ramblings, fantasies about the energy transition, worship of electric cars, horror stories and doomsday scenarios from Corona to conflagrations and weather disasters. I can’t stand the people who shout into microphones and cameras, or print it in newspapers every day. I suffer from having to see how science is turned into a whore of politics.
 
It seems that scientists like Professor Loschke are fighting back, tired of being abused and often ignored for scientific work that fails to conform to a fashionable political narrative. Last week, the Daily Sceptic highlighted the ongoing World Climate Declaration (WCD), now signed by over 1,100 scientists and professionals. Headed by the Norwegian physics Nobel Prize laureate Professor Ivar Giaever, the WCD says there is no climate emergency. Climate science is said to have degenerated into a discussion based on beliefs, not on sound science. Our story about the WCD attracted enormous interest on social media and is one of the most widely read articles we have ever published. Enormous efforts were made to trash the Declaration, and many of the people who signed have been personally abused.

The WCD is signed by no less than 235 professors drawn from a wide variety of scientific and other academic disciplines. Thirteen of the 28 WCD lead supporters are professors, seven out of the 10 Greek signatories likewise, and 11 out of the 24 from Norway. The climate scientist and writer Willie Soon recently listed a number of the academic disciplines that are helpful in studying the changing climate. They include: astronomy, solar physics, geology, geochemistry, paleoclimatology, glaciology, oceanography, ecology and history. It was not a complete lists, he added. The breadth of experience from scientists and non-scientists found in the WCD list encompasses most, if not all of these areas of study. People with thousands of years of cumulative practical experience are calling for the study of climate science to be less political and for governments’ climate policies to be more scientific.

Another German scientist, the distinguished experimental physics specialist Professor Hermann Harde, recently dismissed the idea that humans control the climate via carbon dioxide emissions as an “absolute delusion”. He warned politicians that it would be an irresponsible energy policy to continue to ignore more serious peer-reviewed scientific publications that show a much smaller human impact on climate than previously thought.

We recently reported Harde’s comments and referred to the fact that for years German politicians have been able to make virtuous green noises by banning nuclear and fossil fuel production, while relying on an unstable Russia to make up the energy short fall. The sheer stupidity of that policy is likely to become apparent in Germany this winter. Already problems are mounting, with the German newspaper Handlesblatt reporting that the megawatt price of electricity jumped last week to a new high in daily trading. A megawatt hour cost €563, compared to just €23 a year ago. Of course, the ruinous policies behind Net Zero are responsible for this.
 
In the U.K., the spike in international gas prices, and an increasing reliance on unreliable renewables, means the consumer energy price cap could be raised to £6,000, an amount that is almost certainly beyond the means of a significant portion of the population. Under these conditions, a cold winter could kill thousands of people.

Before he died, the acclaimed physicist Professor Freeman Dyson – a signatory of the CWD – noted that the “people who are supposed to be the experts and claim to understand the science, are precisely the people who are blind to the evidence”. Professor Richard Lindzen, a WCD lead signatory, evidently agrees, having said that the current climate narrative is “absurd”, even though trillions of dollars currently says it is not. It remains to be seen what will run out first – the money, or the tolerance of citizens to become poor under command-and-control, hard-left Net Zero regimes.

For years, green activists and journalists have been able to hide behind the obvious canards that the science surrounding the human involvement in climate change is ‘settled’, and that 99% of scientists agree with that statement. The arrogance behind this political stance is on display with a tweet from the Guardian writer George – “Don’t mention the coral!” – Monbiot, who made an oblique reference to the recent WCD article.

As we have reported before, 48 Italian science professors recently wrote to their Government, stating that human responsibility for climate change is “unjustifiably exaggerated and catastrophic predictions are not realistic”.
 
Activists such as Monbiot regularly traduce ‘deniers’ for their supposed links to funding from oil companies (although he recently dismissed the suggestion that the Guardian’s lavish funding by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation influences its coverage in the slightest). Particular ire is often reserved for geologists, since they are much in employment demand from companies that seek to extract mineral riches from the Earth. Geology also provides an important insight into the paleoclimatic record. Geologists are often sceptical about claims that humans are causing sudden changes in the climate. One might say that they have seen it all before. The only scientist who went to the moon on Apollo was a geologist called Harrison Schmitt, and his position is that there is “no evidence” that humans cause climate change.

The increasing numbers of scientists prepared to break ranks with the ‘settled’ politicised science of climate change would suggest various causes for their scepticism other than bungs from oil companies.

THIS IS WHAT NET ZERO LOOKS LIKE

 

Take a look at the day-ahead market prices across Europe for 23 August 2022  and see who has the most costly electricity.

MAP OF THE DAY: Day-ahead electricity prices in Europe are eye-watering, with lots of countries setting record highs for today. Notable to see the Nordics close to €400 per MWh, and Germany at €600. Before 2020, anything above €75-100 was considered expensive - @JavierBlas 

A VERY CONVENIENT CRISIS

 I have thought for some time that the steep rise in fuel and energy prices actually provides the government with the ideal conditions for bringing about changes in consumer behaviour that would have been extremely difficult otherwise. The Russian invasion of Ukraine has provided an ideal cover which can be blamed for all the rise when actually quite a lot of it is down to the increasing cost of changing over to intermittent renewables with all the back up and extra grid connections.

Notice how the price increase predictions are getting more and more outrageous. It would not surprise me if the actual rises are a bit lower with people thinking they are not quite as bad as feared, even though they will still be very significant, with the government even getting praise for keeping them down. Such increase will lead to the public being ready to accept the new high-priced renewables as seeming relatively reasonable. 

I will confidently predict that we will never return to the prices of a few years ago. The new normal will be of costly energy, which is just what the government would have liked to impose, but dare not, without a really good reason. Putin has provided it.  

Had the government backed fracking and encouraged more development of the North Sea reserves we would now have self-sufficient sources. We could even have agreed a gas price with the drilling companies in return for a long term commitment to purchase the gas, just as we do for new nuclear powered electricity, or wind farms. Instead we have become obsessed with achieving Net Zero, a policy that will have no measurable benefit at all, only a huge cost.  

NO SIGN OF A CLIMATE CRISIS SAYS LATEST REPORT

 Empirical observations show no sign of ‘climate crisis’ 

Global Warming Policy Foundation, 14 April 2022



A systematic review of climate trends and observational data by an eminent climate scientist has found no evidence to support the claim of a climate crisis.

In his annual State of the Climate report, Ole Humlum, emeritus professor at the University of Oslo, examined detailed patterns in temperature changes in the atmosphere and oceans together with trends in climate impacts. Many of these show no significant trends and suggest that poorly understood natural cycles are involved.
 
And while the report finds gentle warming, there is no evidence of dramatic changes, with snow cover stable, sea ice levels recovering, and no change in storm activity.
 
Professor Humlum said:
 
“A year ago, I warned that there was great risk in using computer modelling and immature science to make extraordinary claims. The empirical observations I have reviewed show very gentle warming and no evidence of a climate crisis.”
 
GWPF director, Dr Benny Peiser said:
 
“It’s extraordinary that anyone should think there is a climate crisis. Year after year our annual assessment of climate trends document just how little has been  changing in the last 30 years.
 
The habitual climate alarmism is mainly driven by scientists’ computer modelling rather than observational evidence.”
 
Ole Humlum: State of the Climate 2021 (pdf)

WHY HAS SCIENCE COME TO THIS?

I have read some propaganda dressed as science many times, but when this story figured prominently on the main ITV news (Thursday 18th August), I simply could not believe that such weak evidence was presented as though it was undisputable fact. Of course, as usual, there was no opportunity for anyone to make any challenge. Here is the link to the story:  

Bees getting stressed by climate change, London research suggests | ITV News London

Just look at the reasoning. First they look at museum specimens of bumblebees and notice that their wings exhibit high asymmetry – very differently shaped right and left wings and conclude that this must be due to the creatures having experienced stress during development which affected their normal growth. 

This could have been due to any number of factors, but amazingly (and I think you may be ahead of me here!) they decide to look at climate change as a possible cause. And yes, they find a connection!! They found that in hotter and wetter years bees showed higher wing asymmetry. (They don't seem to have decided whether it was the heat or the rain. Was it always hotter and wetter in the same years?) 

Just in case this reasoning was flawed they also did a second study, published in Methods in Ecology & Evolution, in which they sequenced the genomes of more than a hundred bumblebee museum specimens dating back more than 130 years in the hope of finding a link between genetic changes and climate change.

DROUGHT IN 2022 - IS IT A RESULT OF CLIMATE CHANGE?

  Roger Pielke Jr: What the media won't tell you about drought in Europe

Roger Pielke Jr., 15 August 2022
 

[...] Europe is in the midst of what has been called the worst drought in 500 years. According to a drought expert with the European Commission in comments last week:

"We haven't analysed fully the event (this year's drought), because it is still ongoing, but based on my experience I think that this is perhaps even more extreme than 2018. Just to give you an idea the 2018 drought was so extreme that, looking back at least the last 500 years, there were no other events similar to the drought of 2018, but this year I think it is really worse than 2018."
 
While a full analysis of the ongoing 2022 European drought remains to be completed, so too the drought itself, it is clearly exceptional if not unprecedented. In this post I take a close look at the state of understanding the possible role of climate change n this year’s drought.
 
Specifically, I report on what the most recent assessment report (AR6) of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and underlying literature and data say about the detection of trends in Western and Central European drought and the attribution of those trends to greenhouse gas emissions. The figure below shows the specific region that is the focus of this post, which includes all of Germany, most of France, Hungary, Poland, Ukraine, and western Russia among other nations.


 
In general, for the other three regions in the above map the IPCC expects with varying levels of confidence at at different levels of warming by 2100 drought to decrease in Northern Europe (NEU, which includes the UK), increase in the Mediterranean (MED) and to be highly uncertain in Eastern Europe (EEU). I will be happy to explore these other regions in depth in a future post. (See IPCC AR6 Chapter 11 if you’d like to explore for yourself.)
 
For Western and Central Europe, and especially for Germany and Northern France which are the subject of considerable news coverage right now, accurate representations of the current state of scientific understandings of drought are typically absent. Instead, we see many confident claims by journalists and some scientists of that this year’s drought is a signal of (or, if you prefer — fueled by, linked to, evidence of) human-caused climate change.

Let’s take a look at what the peer-reviewed literature and the IPCC actually say about drought trends in this region and their possible attribution to climate change.
 
One recent study — Vincente-Serrano et al. 2020 — looked at long-term trends in drought in Western Europe from 1851 to 2018, with a focus on precipitation deficits. (Note that their geographical definition of Western Europe differs slightly from that of the IPCC). The figure below shows trends aggregated for the region as a whole. They conclude: “Our study stresses that from the long-term (1851–2018) perspective there are no generally consistent trends in droughts across Western Europe.”

Source: Vincente-Serrano et al. 2020

 
The paper goes through a number of different metrics of drought for various subregions across Europe. The authors are careful to note that there are other metrics of drought which may show different results:
 
"We emphasize that our findings should be seen in the context of the drought metric applied. Our assessment of drought characteristics is based on SPI, which is a precipitation-based metric. For a long-term assessment of drought in the region, it is not possible to use metrics that employ other important variables (e.g., streamflow, soil moisture, or AED)."

Another recent study — Oikonomou et al. 2020 — looked at more recent trends, from 1969 to 2018, and inclusive of all four of the IPCC European sub-regions. They found overall:
 
"Seemingly, one of the central outcomes of this research is that there is little change in drought characteristics for 1969–2018. It also seems, no particular tendencies for more or less frequent droughts in the two major geographical domains of Europe are present. This reinforces the stochastic nature of the drought natural hazard."

Of course, as the studies above acknowledge, trend analyses can be sensitive to start and end dates. One reason for this sensitivity is the fact that climate varies a great deal even without the presence of human forcings — and this variability is of course one of the challenges facing the detection of long-term trends, especially for rare events.
 
For its part, the IPCC AR6 — which summarizes a much broader literature than the two papers cited above — classifies drought into three categories: meteorological, hydrological and agricultural/ecological which emphasize respectively precipitation, streamflow and soil moisture.

With respect to hydrological drought in Western and Central Europe the IPCC could not be stronger in its conclusion:
 
"in areas of Western and Central Europe and Northern Europe, there is no evidence of changes in the severity of hydrological droughts since 1950"
 
For hydrological drought the IPCC is also quite strong in its conclusions:
 
"Low confidence: Weak or insignificant trends"
 
The IPCC lumps WCE in with many other global regions in its conclusion that, “Past increases in agricultural and ecological droughts are found on all continents and several regions” which it expresses with medium confidence, a qualitative judgment which is typically interpreted as about a 50-50 chance of being true.
 
Looking to the future the IPCC is quite clear that we should not expect to be able to attribute trends in drought to climate change today. The IPCC projects only medium confidence for increases in hydrological agricultural/ecological drought at 2 and 4 degrees C increases in temperature and low confidence for increases in meteorological drought at 2C. In short, the IPCC does not expect that either detection or attribution should occur in 2022, when we are still well below 2C and suggests that it may be many decades before detection and attribution claims can be more strongly supported.
 
I have stitched together the summary table from IPCC AR6 Chapter 11 on the various metrics of drought and reproduced that below (alternatively, flip to pp. 1689-90 in Chapter 11 of IPCC AR6).

IPCC AR6 summary of it conclusions for various metrics of drought for Western and Central Europe. Source: Chapter 11, 1689-90
 
The bottom line:
 
In Western and Central Europe — basically Atlantic France all the way to Moscow, north of the Mediterranean region and south of the North Sea region — the IPCC and the underlying peer reviewed research on which it assesses has concluded that drought has not increased and, logically, that increased drought cannot be attributed to human-caused climate change. The only exception here is that the IPCC has medium confidence in an increasing trend of soil moisture deficits in some subregions, however the IPCC has low confidence that this trend can be attributed to human-caused climate change. Looking to future, at temperature changes of 2C and more, at present the IPCC does not expect the current state of scientific understandings to change. But stay tuned — that’s why we do science.