The economies of the developed countries are built on waste and cheap energy. The waste takes many forms, including pollution, greenhouses gases, resources used once and then buried, topsoil loss, planned obsolescence, and the diversion of capital to wasteful businesses in the form of subsidies. The cheap energy, of course, has largely been coal and oil, and those days are coming to an end. China, India, and the other developing nations cannot afford this waste-based economy, and must leapfrog us straight to the new green economy.

Saying the economy of the developed world is enormously wasteful is another way of saying that it is grossly inefficient. Any country that eliminates this waste and inefficiency gains a significant competitive advantage. This will become exponentially more true as carbon pollution is priced into goods one-way-or-another, and as the cost of transportation and manufacturing increases with the price of oil. Such a country will also be cleaner and her citizens healthier – both of which also translate to competitive advantage.

China, India, and other developing countries can build coal plants and highways, and they can model their buildings, cities, infrastructure, and economy after our own, but that would be a huge mistake. Most people have pulled their heads out of wherever they had them stuck and realise that the price of oil is going to go up, and that oil is going to become progressively more difficult to come by for reasons both geological and political. Even ignoring pollution and global warming, there simply is not enough oil for the billions in the developing world to own gas-powered cars. Continue reading →

Yesterday morning, somewhere around 4:00,  the electricity went off. The temperature outside was freezing: 0C (32F); the temperature inside dropped to 16C (61F) within two hours, at which point the electricity was restored. It was a gentle reminder of how vulnerable and energy-dependent we are.

Sixteen degrees Celsius is certainly easily survivable. Had the power remained off for a few more hours, however, the inside temperature would have taken as little as 8 hours to reach the outside temperature of 0C. That’s not so easy to live in, especially with no electric lights, stove, or refrigerator, never mind television or computer. At least we wouldn’t have had to worry about the contents of the freezer.

A few years ago my parents did live through a very unpleasant and potentially dangerous power outage: the Canadian ice storm of 1998. They went over one week without electricity in temperatures hovering about the freezing mark, and that event was a motivating factor behind them deciding to sell their farm and move into the city. For hundreds of thousands of people, pipes had to be drained, cooking was by BBQ and campstove, and 600,000 people had to leave their homes. Continue reading →

I interviewed Elizabeth May yesterday on my “Climate Change Reality Radio Show,” Breakin’ Ice, and she’s certainly a smart cookie. By far the most knowledgeable of the federal leaders on global warming, greening the economy, and so on, she’s also the only one who ‘gets’ the danger of climate change. I’ll post back when the podcast is available.

But there is one critical thing she doesn’t get, and neither do most well-meaning people: Those she is up against have a different morality. I have called it the Predator Morality, as it accurately describes the behaviour of the deniers and free market fundamentalists. Think about the Canadian Harper government; these are people who wrote a secret manual on subverting our democratic system. Do you really think they are going to negotiate in good faith or that their word can be trusted?These are people who put ideology before their own children. Calling them predators is not name-calling; it is an accurate description of their observed behaviour.

To a predator, all truth is relative because Might Makes Right. Predators believe that he with the power makes the rules, and therefore the only thing that matters or is true is the truth as he sees it. To a predator, it is not wrong to lie to achieve power or other goals. It is perfectly acceptable to sacrifice others for your good; they were obviously weaker. If inconvenient scientific ‘facts’ arise, then they should be suppressed and the blasphemous scientists discredited or fired. Continue reading →

Rex Murphy is given a national platform each week on the CBC to spout off about whatever he wants – and the truth be damned, apparently. He is entitled to believe whatever he wants, of course. But when he speaks – during the CBC news time slot – he should be held to the same standards of truth that the rest of the show is. I cannot imagine the CBC allowing Mr. Murphy to cite uncredentialed quacks while giving advice to people with cancer, but that is exactly what he does with climate science.

In his timeslot and on the CBC’s website, Mr. Murphy recommends ignoring Canada’s climate scientists in favour of two deniers, neither of whom is a climate scientist. McIntyre is a retired mining stock promoter and McKitrick is an economist, but this doesn’t stop either of them from claiming expertise in climate science. McKitrick, like Murphy, has ties to the Libertarian Fraser Institute, which receives funding from Big Oil.

At best, that Rex believes these two calls into question his sense. At worst, his integrity is in doubt. Is Rex Murphy receiving compensation of any kind from fossil fuel or auto companies? Continue reading →