European nations revert to their ‘climate ambitions’ as exorbitant prices become apparent – Are you up with that?
Via: administrators – Total climate inventory
Many climate ambitions will end in 2021
In Britain, Germany and France, the leaders turned back when the exorbitant prices of their plans became apparent.
By Joseph C. Sternberg
It’s the New Year’s resolution season, and don’t be surprised if politicians all over the world accept the same informal pledge: Say as little as possible about climate change by 2022. They’ve got a head start. head for that solution, working hard even before Friday night’s social distancing parties begin.
The biggest, most exciting and most telling escalation is happening in the UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced in October an ambitious policy program to bring Britain to zero carbon-dioxide emissions by 2050. That was Mr. Johnson’s public relations coup ahead of the COP26 global climate conference he hosted in Glasgow. Its also unusual honesty about how such environmental ambitions will cost individual households and businesses – a point that politicians often avoid for all sorts of obvious reasons.
Inevitably, the twists and turns began before the document was even written. The most controversial component of Mr Johnson’s zero-net boondoggle debate has to do with efforts to steer households away from gas-fired boilers 86 per cent of whom rely on hot water and central heating. .
Mr Johnson said in October he hoped that by 2035 the government would be able to phase out the installation of new natural gas heating units. That represents a step back from previous plans to require carbon-saving heat pumps in new homes. at the earliest in 2025, and the extended deadline still faces stiff opposition due to the high cost of heat pumps.
And the “boiler gate” is just the beginning of the big and small reversal. Among the many, count the delay to next year (at least) of a formal public comment process for an enhanced emissions trading system. One reason for procrastination, Telegraph report, it is Mr. Johnson’s colleagues who cannot agree on which corners of the economy should become the new subject of the rules – although they clearly agree that automotive fuels and fossil fuels should be excluded. family.
Among the smaller inversions, Ministry of Transport in November back from a plan requiring small businesses with parking on their premises to install electric vehicle charging points. The proposed rules governing other structures such as new homes, residential conversions and developments use a very porous new blend to resemble a well-aerated Swiss cheese, with Cost limitation is a top concern. This difficulty in installing charging stations will add to the demise, sooner or later, of Mr Johnson’s plan to ban new internal combustion cars by 2030.
This is also not a phenomenon unique to the UK. Set aside the pitfalls around the green provisions of the Democrats’ Build Back Better program for lavish spending in America. Some of the most surprising climate realism is now emerging in Europe.
French President Emmanuel Macron faces a re-election campaign in 2022 and he learned the hard way in 2018 how higher fuel prices can trigger debilitating popular protests. His solution was to double down on traditional French industrial policy, especially regarding support for nuclear power. Following Macron’s directive, the European Commission in Brussels may be about to include both nuclear and natural gas on the list of environmentally friendly energy sources eligible for “green investment” from governments. and private investors. Swedish teen activist Greta Thunberg lost her mind, but she doesn’t need to convince anyone to vote for her either.
Even in Germany, politicians are starting to change their minds. Households and businesses there pay some of the highest electricity rates in Europe to cater for former Chancellor Angela Merkel’s dramatic shift towards renewable energy. German voters believe in these goals more than most other constituencies, and they elected the eco-friendly Green Party to the new governing coalition in September.
But even in Germany there seems to be a limit. The agreement strengthens the alliance between the Green Party, the larger Social Democrats and the smaller Liberal Democrats defending their climate commitments. A coal phase will occur ideal in 2030 — with the newly inserted word “ideal” extinguishing the Green ambition by marking the entire project as tentative. Carbon neutrality will wait until 2045, if it arrives, and more aggressive limits on automotive and aviation emissions will be missing.
The net-zero gimmick will be with us for a long time to come, alas. True green followers (or are they bitter stalkers?) are busy taking protective actions to insulate environmentalism from real-world political pressures, especially especially by enlisting gullible or cynical financial giants to do so through retirement fund investment allocation. cannot be done honestly through law. The political class still makes excuses for their earlier foolish promises, and the media is too infatuated with dissociative activists like Ms. Thunberg.
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