Juno News - July 14, 2024


Is Trudeauā€™s net-zero plan destined to failļ¼Ÿ


Episode Stats

Length

14 minutes

Words per Minute

177.66216

Word Count

2,561

Sentence Count

172


Summary


Transcript

00:00:00.000 And again, we're going around the world here.
00:00:12.080 We're covering everything.
00:00:12.900 We're covering education.
00:00:14.000 We're covering indigenous issues.
00:00:15.380 We're talking about Jagmeet Singh.
00:00:16.820 We're doing it all.
00:00:17.780 But we have to cap things off with a look at one of the most profound examples of virtue
00:00:22.560 signaling by the state of putting this lofty ideological goal ahead of anything resembling
00:00:27.700 science or facts or evidence.
00:00:30.060 And that is the commitment to what is increasingly becoming a very dangerous net zero goal.
00:00:36.320 Now, this is not being a quote unquote climate denier.
00:00:39.440 It's certainly not for being anti-science.
00:00:41.180 It's about looking at the facts.
00:00:43.760 We have had a couple of major international agreements that have dealt with fossil fuel
00:00:49.640 use and emissions.
00:00:50.480 We had Kyoto back in 1997.
00:00:52.260 We had the Paris Accord back in 2015.
00:00:55.500 Since both of those, we've seen fossil fuel consumption go up.
00:00:58.440 We've seen emissions go up.
00:01:00.060 The entry into a carbon tax by Canada that has continued to increase has not stopped emissions
00:01:06.160 from increasing.
00:01:07.740 And we're wondering if you've been naive and just expected the government knew what it was
00:01:11.860 doing.
00:01:12.180 You've probably been wondering why.
00:01:13.860 Well, the reality is that this is just not working.
00:01:18.180 And what we have from our friend Kenneth Green, who has written a piece in the Toronto Stunt
00:01:23.520 about this, is a call on the government to abandon what is increasingly an unfeasible
00:01:27.900 and damaging net zero plan.
00:01:30.400 This has not worked.
00:01:31.500 It's requiring a massive phase out of fossil fuels without an alternative.
00:01:36.500 And that is the so critical part of this.
00:01:39.060 Dr. Kenneth Green joins us once again.
00:01:40.900 Always good to see you, Ken.
00:01:41.800 Thanks for coming on today.
00:01:43.140 Always good to be with you, Andrew.
00:01:44.580 So this number has just become so arbitrary.
00:01:47.500 We have to reduce by 2050.
00:01:49.420 They'll occasionally say 2040.
00:01:51.060 We have to go net zero here.
00:01:53.120 We've got to reduce emissions by this amount.
00:01:54.980 And none of it really matters in a way because they're not doing any of it.
00:01:59.080 We're not seeing any record here.
00:02:01.060 But the policy mechanisms that are supposed to get us there are causing some real harms.
00:02:06.300 Are they not?
00:02:07.440 Yes, they are.
00:02:08.000 And another one of the arbitrary targets we have is the 1.5 degrees C limiting warming to
00:02:13.200 1.5 degrees C, which actually drives all of the other ones beneath it.
00:02:18.720 The regulations on the energy sector are actually causing significant economic harm.
00:02:23.360 And in Canada and also in the United States and around the world, because energy is intrinsic
00:02:29.620 to producing economic growth and economic productivity.
00:02:34.520 And it's economic productivity and growth that lead to prosperous and thriving societies.
00:02:39.660 And so these regulations, which are increasing the cost of energy to manufacturers, to producers,
00:02:46.080 to consumers, to homeowners, are all basically causing economic suppression.
00:02:52.720 And therefore, lowering people's quality of life.
00:02:56.840 In some cases, the regulations themselves are also causing economic, leading to environmental harm,
00:03:02.840 separate from climate change, for example.
00:03:06.380 So with plastics regulations, Canada has a goal of facing out, reaching zero plastic waste by 2030.
00:03:13.940 The studies show that the substitutes people are using for plastics are actually causing more harm to the environment.
00:03:18.880 They generate more amounts of waste that have to be managed, and they pose health risks to people different than plastics do.
00:03:26.600 So the regulatory, the crusade for, or jihad for net zero 2050, is leaving a considerable amount of damage in its wake.
00:03:36.560 And the one thing that I find so fascinating about this is that no one is talking about, I shouldn't say no one, you are,
00:03:44.980 but no one in the government is talking about energy demands.
00:03:47.980 We have a lot of very ambitious goals, even if we go all in on electric vehicles, and this will require energy.
00:03:54.620 And I've yet to see anyone even so much as have a discussion about where that's going to come from.
00:03:59.060 Even when people talk about renewables, it's all very theoretical.
00:04:02.720 They have not actually provided a roadmap of matching energy needs, which will only increase,
00:04:07.820 but even at the current level, with alternative energy.
00:04:11.000 Well, energy needs are huge, not only in Canada, but in the United States, but around the world,
00:04:17.260 and especially in developing countries that are still using wood and dung for cooking fires and things.
00:04:25.340 And so the global energy demand is massive, and it will only expand with population, the global population.
00:04:34.280 But the question you ask is a really valuable one, which is how are we going to match the demand with supply?
00:04:40.020 And this is an area where governments, I believe, especially governments who are in the Western governments
00:04:46.620 and those who are in the net zero school of thought and the climate are concerned about,
00:04:51.600 basically have climate change as their center of their existence.
00:04:56.680 This is where I believe they're actually mostly insincere because they actually don't intend to supply the demand.
00:05:02.380 They promise, but they don't intend to deliver.
00:05:04.800 And historically, that's what has happened, which is they promise you an alternative
00:05:08.220 or a better version.
00:05:10.500 It's not that we don't want you to have energy.
00:05:12.660 We want you to generate it with this way, wind or solar, instead of fossil fuels.
00:05:17.000 It's not that we don't want you to have your refrigerator.
00:05:19.020 We want you to have this super hyper-efficient refrigerator.
00:05:21.940 It's not that we don't want you to have a barbecue, but it has to be an electric barbecue.
00:05:24.760 But the thing is, when the time comes for them to give you that alternative,
00:05:29.740 the electric car that matches your vehicle, you don't get it.
00:05:33.980 They don't give it to you.
00:05:35.040 And the prices never come down to match the pre-existing competitive sources.
00:05:40.640 So these things just don't manifest.
00:05:42.440 And I think that's actually a goal, which is they want to actually reduce humans' access to energy
00:05:48.680 because they want to control people more rigidly and have them do less things.
00:05:53.160 They don't want you flying around in airplanes.
00:05:56.560 That's not for the commoners.
00:05:58.160 That's for the elites.
00:05:59.780 They don't want you living in sprawling bigger houses or independent houses
00:06:03.120 or even individual houses.
00:06:05.920 They want to constrain people's behavior and constrict humanity
00:06:09.440 because that is their philosophy, is that human activity is detrimental to the world,
00:06:14.700 is killing the world.
00:06:15.660 I mean, the other thing you have to look at as well is, I think, the moving goalposts on this.
00:06:23.340 And the goalposts have not just moved on the target and on when,
00:06:26.200 but even whenever the UN COP summits on this come up,
00:06:29.800 you'll always have these radical groups that will say,
00:06:33.180 no, no, no, net zero isn't good.
00:06:34.400 We need absolute zero.
00:06:35.720 So they're actually against things that industry can do to mitigate emissions.
00:06:40.180 They're against things like carbon capture.
00:06:41.940 They're against carbon, you know, all of these alternatives.
00:06:44.040 And when you hear people talk about absolute zero, and again, it's not just fringe people.
00:06:48.760 It's some legitimate people.
00:06:50.220 They actually are anti-industry.
00:06:52.360 I mean, they're anti-human.
00:06:53.360 They want us to all just be sitting in dark rooms alone.
00:06:56.020 And that is the goal.
00:06:57.920 And that's why whenever you hear, you know, occasional proposals from some city council
00:07:01.740 in, you know, Quebec, say, to ban wood stoves,
00:07:04.680 I mean, it's actually quite revealing about just the state of contempt they have
00:07:08.340 for Western 21st century life.
00:07:10.820 It's not even Western 21st century life.
00:07:13.420 It's the life since humans harnessed fire and learned how to cook their food.
00:07:17.620 Humans need energy and use energy to transform things into the substances that keep them alive,
00:07:23.740 materials and things that keep them alive.
00:07:25.560 And so, yeah, the goalposts shift constantly.
00:07:28.340 That's something that, of course, is well-known.
00:07:31.420 And, of course, all the subsidiary goals shift as well, which is, no, it's not enough for the West
00:07:35.920 to give the developing countries a billion dollars a year.
00:07:38.680 Now they have to give them a trillion dollars a year.
00:07:40.320 Now they have to give them two trillion dollars a year in order to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions.
00:07:44.400 It is a never-ending shifting goalpost, and it has been since Kyoto in 1997.
00:07:49.140 But, again, of course, we're seeing some of that here at home as well, which is, you know,
00:07:53.700 back over the last 20 years, it was, you have to phase out coal.
00:07:58.660 We want you to phase out coal, and you can use natural gas.
00:08:01.120 And now the new call is no natural gas either, just wind and solar.
00:08:05.420 And when wind and solar, if that were to ever happen, it was all wind and solar,
00:08:09.240 then they would no doubt find a way to say, well, yeah, but no wind.
00:08:11.820 Because it's, you know, wind wheels are causing, killing birds.
00:08:15.700 And it is a ratchet to zero.
00:08:18.240 It's a ratchet to extremism.
00:08:20.240 And it is, in fact, a rejection of the idea of human nature as being an empowered species,
00:08:28.280 humanity as being an empowered species that can change the world by the use of energy and materials.
00:08:34.660 It's a rejection, a fundamental rejection of the acceptability of having human beings on your planet.
00:08:41.820 Now, I'm from Ontario, so obviously my experience is different than it is for other people,
00:08:48.060 because we have an Ontario hydroelectric.
00:08:49.860 We also have nuclear.
00:08:51.560 But nuclear is probably the greatest way to expose the utter hypocrisy from a lot of the emissions hawks,
00:08:58.500 because these people that want low emission energy sources, you bring up nuclear,
00:09:02.040 and all of a sudden, no, no, no, not like that.
00:09:03.940 Absolutely.
00:09:04.640 And that's what I say is you can recognize their actual goals by what they do,
00:09:10.060 which is the rejection of nuclear power, which was known, of course, as a non,
00:09:15.220 very low greenhouse gas emitting activity, and it's been safe, safely used for 60 years,
00:09:22.220 or actually 80 years, maybe.
00:09:24.600 The rejection of nuclear power, absolute rejection and continued rejection of it,
00:09:28.620 does show their complete and utter insincerity about the reality of what they want to achieve.
00:09:34.520 They don't want to achieve greenhouse gas emission reductions at the least cost,
00:09:39.080 while still maintaining humanity's energy profile.
00:09:43.540 And they have rejected that every single time in favor of socialist measures that control and redistribute wealth.
00:09:50.700 That's the other thing, which is you don't get to reward too many cronies if you're really relying on nuclear power.
00:09:55.220 And you don't get to play the subsidy game very much because nuclear power doesn't require a lot of subsidies.
00:10:01.640 Yeah, and I mean, it's low cost as well.
00:10:04.320 It's accessible.
00:10:06.280 I mean, obviously, there's a significant upstart cost.
00:10:08.720 But yeah, and the one thing I guess I'll say on this is that when you see electricity shortages in Alberta,
00:10:16.580 when you see other things like this, it forces people to realize that some of these discussions are a bit of a luxury item.
00:10:24.060 And that when people are giving, are living through some minus 40 degree winter,
00:10:28.780 it forces them to realize that, okay, maybe I don't want to just shut things down entirely.
00:10:33.420 So I do think that for the non-activists, there is a bit of a realization coming that some of these things are just infeasible.
00:10:40.200 I think that's true.
00:10:41.200 That's true.
00:10:41.700 I think for the non-activists, for the non-committed believers,
00:10:45.100 I think people are looking at the effects of the climate policies on their wallet,
00:10:49.120 on their house, on their wallet, on their safety, in their cars and in their houses,
00:10:54.460 and then against the climate, basically.
00:10:58.000 Safety from fires, safety from storms.
00:11:02.060 And they're seeing these climate policies are not desirable and not giving them anything of benefit.
00:11:09.400 They're not giving them a benefit, but they're certainly imposing a cost that people are increasingly seeing,
00:11:13.680 taking a bite out of their paycheck every month.
00:11:17.060 And I think that there's a loss of appetite for these extreme plans,
00:11:21.660 not only in Canada, but also around the world,
00:11:23.320 where some governments that are shifting right are vowing to move away from net zero.
00:11:29.100 At 2050, much less not going to absolute zero.
00:11:31.440 No one is ever going to absolute zero carbon emissions because it's impossible.
00:11:35.460 But I think there is a waning of enthusiasm for this.
00:11:41.300 In polls, climate change doesn't come up very highly compared to other people's other needs
00:11:47.800 for what they think is important, such as affordable housing, good education,
00:11:53.380 health care, health care, and health care.
00:11:55.160 However, I think climate has never polled very well amongst the normal people who are not activists,
00:12:01.840 which is, I think, why we have actually seen the activists held down in terms of their ambition,
00:12:08.240 the scope of their ambitions for so many years, since 1997,
00:12:11.680 to oppose draconian regulations, draconian taxes,
00:12:15.000 draconian limitations on energy for energy use,
00:12:19.240 bans on fossil fuels and things like that,
00:12:21.160 because people are not buying the extreme rhetoric.
00:12:24.860 They look out the window.
00:12:26.200 That's the thing, right?
00:12:26.920 Because one of my former colleagues or a former climatologist used to say,
00:12:31.320 don't look away from the weather report on your phone and look out the window.
00:12:35.360 Does the world look like it's being destroyed?
00:12:38.640 And so are you seeing the disasters that you're hearing about constantly,
00:12:42.680 all of the wildfires, floods, and droughts?
00:12:46.240 Is that happening near you?
00:12:48.180 And people are looking at it going, yeah, you know, I'm just not seeing it.
00:12:50.800 The air is cleaner than it's ever been before in Canada and the U.S.
00:12:54.700 in terms of normal pollutants, conventional pollution.
00:12:59.200 There's a quality of life is good.
00:13:01.320 Safety is high.
00:13:02.340 So, you know, I think people are losing enthusiasm for these issues.
00:13:05.500 And it's only a matter of time until that's reflected in the vote.
00:13:08.520 I always like when the delegate for the Maldives at the UN Climate Summit will say,
00:13:12.180 you know, we're going to be underwater any minute now.
00:13:14.160 And then you look and realize that the Maldives has opened like 30 beachfront resorts in the last year.
00:13:19.180 And you're saying, well, you're not behaving like a country that's drowning.
00:13:23.720 Yeah, they're actually growing in land mass.
00:13:25.980 That's one of the things that was the funniest things of all about the climate change and the low-lying islands thing.
00:13:30.940 And it turns out when sea levels come up, the islands grow because they're actually partly live, live ecosystems.
00:13:36.760 And so a lot of these islands that were supposed to be underwater by now have actually expanded in their land area.
00:13:43.980 And the coral reefs, of course, which were supposed to be dead 20 years ago, and dead and extinct 20 years ago, are just exploding with vigor.
00:13:55.780 So, you know, Australia was just saying, my God, we're going to lose our economy because we're going to lose our coral reefs.
00:14:01.040 It's not happening.
00:14:01.840 And they're not behaving as if they think it's going to happen.
00:14:04.180 Yeah.
00:14:04.620 Oh, it's the same.
00:14:05.280 You get the fear-mongering about polar bears in the north and their population's thriving.
00:14:09.100 So, well, it's a great piece in the Toronto Sun.
00:14:11.660 Dr. Kenneth Green, senior fellow at the Fraser Institute.
00:14:14.040 Always a pleasure, sir.
00:14:14.820 Have a great weekend.
00:14:15.720 Thank you, Andrew.
00:14:16.220 You too.
00:14:16.680 Take care.
00:14:16.900 Thanks for listening to The Andrew Lawton Show.
00:14:19.420 Support the program by donating to True North at www.tnc.news.