Larry Bell
It seems that even wood isn’t green or renewable enough anymore. The EPA has recently banned the production and sale of 80% of America’s current wood-burning stoves, the oldest heating method known to mankind and mainstay of rural homes and many of our nation’s poorest residents. The agency’s stringent one-size-fits-all rules apply equally to heavily air-polluted cities and far cleaner plus typically colder off-grid wilderness areas such as large regions of Alaska and the American West.
While the EPA’s most recent regulations aren’t altogether new, their impacts will nonetheless be severe. Whereas restrictions had previously banned wood-burning stoves that didn’t limit fine airborne particulate emissions to 15 micrograms per cubic meter (μg/m3) of air, the change will impose a maximum 12 μg/m3 limit. To put this amount in context, the EPA estimates that secondhand tobacco smoke in a closed car can expose a person to 3,000-4,000 μg/m3 of particulates.
Most wood stoves that warm cabin and home residents from coast to coast cannot meet that standard. Older stoves that don’t cannot be traded in for updated types, but instead must be rendered inoperable, destroyed, or recycled as scrap metal.
The impacts of the EPA ruling will affect many families. According to the U.S. Census Bureau’s 2011 survey statistics, 2.4 million American housing units (12% of all homes) burned wood as their primary heating fuel, compared with 7% that depended upon fuel oil.
Local governments in some states have gone even further than the EPA, banning not only the sale of noncompliant stoves, but even their use as fireplaces. As a result, owners face fines for infractions. Puget Sound, Washington, is one such location. Montreal, Canada, proposes to eliminate all fireplaces within its city limits.
Only weeks after the EPA enacted its new stove rules, attorneys general of seven states sued the agency to crack down on wood-burning water heaters as well. The lawsuit was filed by Connecticut, Maryland, Massachusetts, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, and Vermont, all predominantly Democrat states. Claiming that the new EPA regulations didn’t go far enough to decrease particle pollution levels, the plaintiffs cited agency estimates that outdoor wood boilers will produce more than 20% of wood-burning emissions by 2017. A related suit was filed by the environmental group EarthJustice.
Did EPA require a motivational incentive to tighten its restrictions? Sure, about as much as Br’er Rabbit needed to persuade Br’er Fox to throw him into the briar patch. This is but another example of EPA and other government agencies working with activist environmental groups to sue and settle on claims that afford leverage to enact new regulations which they lack statutory authority to otherwise accomplish.
“Sue and Settle” practices, sometimes referred to as “friendly lawsuits,” are cozy deals through which far-left radical environmental groups file lawsuits against federal agencies wherein court-ordered “consent decrees” are issued based upon a prearranged settlement agreement they collaboratively craft together in advance behind closed doors. Then, rather than allowing the entire process to play out, the agency being sued settles the lawsuit by agreeing to move forward with the requested action both they and the litigants want.
And who pays for this litigation? All too often we taxpayers are put on the hook for legal fees of both colluding parties. According to a 2011 GAO report, this amounted to millions of dollars awarded to environmental organizations for EPA litigations between 1995 and 2010. Three “Big Green” groups received 41% of this payback, with Earthjustice accounting for 30% ($4,655,425). Two other organizations with histories of lobbying for regulations EPA wants while also receiving agency fundIng are the American Lung Association (ALA) and the Sierra Club.
In addition, the Department of Justice forked over at least $43 million of our money defending the EPA in court between 1998 and 2010. This didn’t include money spent by the EPA for its legal costs in connection with those ripoffs, because the EPA doesn’t keep track of its attorneys’ time on a case-by-case basis.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce has concluded that Sue and Settle rulemaking is responsible for many of EPA’s “most controversial, economically significant regulations that have plagued the business community for the past few years.” Included are regulations on power plants, refineries, mining operations, cement plants, chemical manufacturers, and a host of other industries. Such consent decree-based rulemaking enables EPA to argue to Congress: “The court made us do it.”
Directing special attention to these congressional end run practices, Louisiana Senator David Vitter, top Republican on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, has launched an investigation. Last year he asked his Louisiana Attorney General Buddy Caldwell to join with AG’s of 13 other states who filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) seeking all correspondence between EPA and a list of 80 environmental, labor union, and public interest organizations that have been party to litigation since the start of the Obama Administration.
Other concerned and impacted parties have little influence over such court procedures and decisions. While the environmental group is given a seat at the table, outsiders who are most impacted are excluded, with no opportunity to object to the settlements. No public notice about the settlement is released until the agreement is filed in court...after the damage has been done.
In a letter to Caldwell, Senator Vitter wrote: “The collusion between federal bureaucrats and the organizations entering consent agreements under a shroud of secrecy represents the antithesis of a transparent government, and your participation in the FOIA request will help Louisianans understand the process by which these settlements were reached.”
Fewer citizens would challenge the EPA’s regulatory determinations were it not for its lack of accountability and transparency in accomplishing through a renegade pattern of actions what they cannot achieve through democratic legislative processes.
A recent example sets unachievable CO2 emission limits for new power plants. As I reported in my January 14 column, a group within the EPA’s own Science Advisory Board (SAB) determined that the studies upon which that regulation was based had never been responsibly peer reviewed, and that there was no evidence that those limits can be accomplished using available technology.
Compared with huge consequences of the EPA’s regulatory war on coal, the fuel source that provides more than 40% of America’s electricity, a clamp-down on humble residential wood-burning stoves and future water heaters may seem to many people as a merely a trifling or inconsequential matter. That is, unless it happens to significantly affect your personal life.
As a Washington Times editorial emphasized, the ban is of great concern to many families in cold remote off-grid locations. It noted, for example, that “Alaska’s 663,000 square miles is mostly forestland, offering residents and abundant source of affordable firewood. When county officials floated a plan to regulate the burning of wood, residents were understandably inflamed.”
Quoting Representative Tammie Wilson speaking to the Associated Press, the Times reported: “Everyone wants clean air. We just want to make sure that we can also heat our homes.” Wilson continued: “Rather than fret over the EPA’s computer-model-based warning about the dangers of inhaling soot from wood smoke, residents have more pressing concerns on their minds as the immediate risk of freezing when the mercury plunges.”
And speaking of theoretical computer model-based warnings, where’s that global warming when we really need it?
See more HERE.
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Jay Lehr, Ph.D., science director for the Heartland Institute, and one of the nation’s most respected and widely cited experts on air and water quality, climate change, and biotechnology, broke ground in revealing his comprehensive plan to reform the EPA in his remarks as a Keynote breakfast speaker at Heartland’s recent International Conference on Climate Change held in Las Vegas from July 7- 9. Jay Lehr, Ph.D. introduced a legislative plan to replace the United States Environmental Protection Agency with a Committee of the Whole of the State Environmental Protection Agencies, utilizing a phased five-year transition period. See the detailed plan here.
Broadcast live streaming video on Ustream
Voters strongly believe the debate about global warming is not over yet and reject the decision by some news organizations to ban comments from those who deny that global warming is a problem.
Only 20% of Likely U.S. Voters believe the scientific debate about global warming is over, according to the latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey. Sixty-three percent (63%) disagree and say the debate about global warming is not over. Seventeen percent (17%) are not sure. (To see survey question wording, click here.)
Forty-eight percent (48%) of voters think there is still significant disagreement within the scientific community over global warming, while 35% believe scientists generally agree on the subject.
The BBC has announced a new policy banning comments from those who deny global warming, a policy already practiced by the Los Angeles Times and several other media organizations. But 60% of voters oppose the decision by some news organizations to ban global warming skeptics. Only 19% favor such a ban, while slightly more (21%) are undecided.
But then 42% believe the media already makes global warming appear to be worse than it really is. Twenty percent (20%) say the media makes global warming appear better than it really is, while 22% say they present an accurate picture. Sixteen percent (16%) are not sure.
Still, this is an improvement from February 2009 when 54% thought the media makes global warming appear worse than it is. Unchanged, however, are the 21% who say the media presents an accurate picture.
The survey of 1,000 Likely Voters was conducted on July 7-8, 2014 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. Field work for all Rasmussen Reports surveys is conducted by Pulse Opinion Research, LLC. See methodology.
Consistent with earlier polling is the finding that 60% of voters consider global warming a serious problem, with 37% who describe it as a Very Serious one. Thirty-five percent (35%) disagree and don’t believe global warming is that serious a problem, with 14% who say it is Not At All Serious.
But even among those voters who consider global warming a Very Serious problem, 57% say the debate is not yet over. These voters by a 49% to 34% margin also oppose the decision by some news organizations to ban global warming skeptics.
The older the voter, generally speaking, the more likely they are to believe that the debate about global warming is not over.
Most voters across all demographic categories say the debate is not over. Most also oppose the decision by some media outlets to ban global warming critics.
Men and those over 40 are more skeptical of the media’s coverage of global warming than women and younger voters are.
Sixty-four percent (64%) of Republicans and a plurality (45%) of voters not affiliated with either major political party believe the media makes global warming appear to be worse than it really is. Just 22% of Democrats agree. But Democrats also believe much more strongly than the others that global warming is a serious problem.
Twenty-seven percent (27%) of voters in President Obama’s party think the scientific debate about global warming is over, a view shared by only 12% of GOP voters and 16% of unaffiliateds.
Sixty-seven percent (67%) of all voters say they have been following recent news reports about global warming at least somewhat closely, with 33% who are following Very Closely.
Because congressional Republicans oppose most of the initiatives he has proposed, the president has signaled that he is prepared to take whatever actions he can alone to deal with a problem he attributes largely to certain human activities. However, just 30% of voters think the president should take action alone if necessary to deal with global warming. Twice as many (59%) say the federal government should only do what the president and Congress jointly agree on.
While most voters have expressed concern about global warming for years, only 41% are willing to pay more in taxes or in utility costs to generate cleaner energy and fight global warming. That includes 23% who are willing to pay no more than $100 extra a year.
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Meanwhile the NRDC tells skeptics to give it up here. The NYT told how the most heavily funded econazi group in the NRDC and they not surprisingly claim they provided the blueprint for the deadly Obama Climate Action Plan.
Since its founding in 1970, the Natural Resources Defense Council has not sought the public profile of activist organizations like Greenpeace, but it has piled up a string of substantial legal and policy victories.
Its annual budget of about $120 million is far higher than that of most environmental groups, in part because of board members like Mr. DiCaprio and Mr. Redford, who are the attractions at lavish fund-raising galas for studio heads and Silicon Valley magnates. In a typical event in 2011, guests at the Malibu home of Ron Meyer, now the vice chairman of NBCUniversal, sipped Champagne and watched surfers paddle out to form a peace sign in the Pacific Ocean. The event raised $2.6 million.
The council’s fund-raising office in New York has also found big donors in the business world, including at Google and Goldman Sachs.
Sorry NRDC America we will continue to fight your activism and lies and the EPA which announced onerous plans to heavily fine you (say $70k) garnish your wages without court approval for anything you may do YOUR property that an EPA appointed bureaucrat finds is not acceptable to him/her. This might include putting in a pond on your land, perhaps removing a stand of trees, etc.
Newsbusters reports the liberal media is unwilling to make the George Soros/NRDC connection.
The liberal media love to hate the Koch Brothers but are far less enthusiastic about connecting George Soros’ billions to liberal policies.
On July 6, Coral Davenport of The New York Times revealed that the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) new regulations on power plant emissions were largely inspired by the work of environmental activists at the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC). The broadcast networks have not mentioned the NRDC connection to the new regulations, and even the Times ignored that liberal mega-donor Soros has bankrolled the NRDC.
The Times called the EPA regulations “a remarkable victory for the National Resources Defense Council” for developing the “novel” framework that the EPA would adopt, but they also failed to mention the more than $1.7 million in Soros-funding the group received since 2004 ($1,771,893).
On June 1, the EPA unveiled drastic limits on carbon emissions, mandating steep emission cuts within 16 years. While emission limits weren’t a new idea, the EPA plan “sets different limits for each state and allows states the flexibility to meet the standards by picking from a menu of policy options,” according to Davenport.
Davenport traced this innovation back to a specific 110-page proposal, written by two lawyers, David Doniger and David Hawkins, and energy policy expert, Daniel Lashof. All three individuals work with the NRDC, though Lashof only advises the organization since he joined left-wing billionaire donor Tom Steyer’s Next Gen Climate America in March. In February, Steyer pledged $100 million to pressure politicians on climate issues.
Few media outlets covered the Times’ revelations about NRDC’s involvement. None of the broadcast news programs brought it up. In fact, ABC, CBS and NBC news programs have ignored the EPA regulations since June 2.
Print media was not much better. While the Daily Mail (UK) reported on Davenport’s findings, few other news outlets joined in. The Hill and the National Journal both published brief pieces on EPA official’s response denying that the NRDC had any remarkable influence. None of that coverage brought up Soros’ donations to the NRDC.
Of course, both the networks and print media have been incredibly biased while pushing the EPA’s regulations. While discussing the plan, which CBS called “groundbreaking,” on June 2, 85 percent of the coverage completely ignored the economic impact. Additionally, an examination of major U.S. newspapers found that 90 percent of their editorial pages supported or ignored the EPA’s scheme.
Australian Climate Skeptic Blog
“Climate is and always has been variable. The only constant about climate is change; it changes continually.” ~Professor Tim Patterson
Perhaps the most frustrating aspect of the science of climate change is the lack of any real substance in attempts to justify the hypothesis ~Professor Stewart Franks
A lie told often enough becomes the truth. (Link)
FRIDAY, JULY 4, 2014
Be skeptical. But when you get proof, accept proof.
ACS put the above quote into google and got 682 hits. It is attributed to Michael Specter.
Michael Specter (born 1955) is an American journalist who has been a staff writer, focusing on science and technology, and global public health at The New Yorker since September 1998.
He has also written for The Washington Post and The New York Times. In 2009, Michael Specter authored a book titled Denialism: How Irrational Thinking Hinders Scientific Progress, Harms the Planet, and Threatens Our Lives described by Amazon:
In Denialism, New Yorker staff writer Michael Specter reveals that Americans have come to mistrust institutions and especially the institution of science more today than ever before. For centuries, the general view had been that science is neither good nor bad- that it merely supplies information and that new information is always beneficial. Now, science is viewed as a political constituency that isn’t always in our best interest. (bold added)
His book seems not to cover the man-made global warming debate, however the non-science of the “consensus” scientists has surely contributed greatly to the the public’s mistrust of the scientific community.
The “consensus” scientists have (inter-alia):
1. pushed a false consensus - a political, non-scientific term;
2. suppressed data sharing, also non-scientific;
3. suppressed dissenting papers;
4. tried to get journal editors fired;
5. ignored the temperature hiatus;
6. fudged temperature data;
7. intimidated broadcasters;
8. hid behind a technicality to avoid sharing data;
9. released the fraudulent hockey stick graph;
10. claimed “The climate of the future is what we make it...”
11. Eliminated records with negative correlation....etc...etc…
On Michael Specter’s quote, FQTQ note:
That quote by Michael Specter is brilliant for describing what true skepticism should be. In the media machine today, the term “skeptic” is often applied to people who accept pseudoscience because they are “skeptical” of mainstream science: “vaccine skeptics,” “climate skeptics,” “pharmaceutical skeptics,” and so on. The term gives these people (and other similar groups) a bit too much credit. Generally, they are ignoring proof and evidence. Michael Mann, a climate scientist from Pennsylvania State University, summarized it best when he said, “Denying mainstream science based on flimsy, invalid, and too-often agenda-driven critiques of science is not skepticism at all. It is contrarianism… or denial.”
A true skeptic is willing to look at all of the scientific evidence available and is willing to analyze it without bias. When the evidence says something, a skeptic can accept the outcome before them...until new evidence is presented.
Looking at the scientific “proof and evidence” available, rather than FQTQ’s ‘pseudoscience,’ we can see that the rise in atmospheric Carbon Dioxide follows the rise in global temperature (
After temperatures rise, on average it takes 800 years before carbon starts to move. The extraordinary thing is that the lag is well accepted by climatologists, yet virtually unknown outside these circles. The fact that temperature leads is not controversial. It’s relevance is debated.
While it only needs once, the Man Made Global Warming (AGW) hypothesis has been falsified many times. As Einstein said: “No amount of experimentation can ever prove me right; a single experiment can prove me wrong.”
Googling “AGW falsified” brings up 536 results including:
AGW - a falsified hypothesis - http://tiny.cc/7g8fix
Man Made Global Warming Falsified - http://tiny.cc/xn8fix
The Scientific Method - AGW Falsified - http://tiny.cc/aq8fix
AGW Falsified: NOAA Long Wave Radiation Data - http://tiny.cc/3t8fix
AGW Falsified by Real Data: http://tiny.cc/018fix
Jeff Davis, on GlobalClimateScam.com writes
When future generations try to understand how the world got carried away around the end of the 20th century by the panic over global warming, few things will amaze them more than the part played in stoking up the scare by the fiddling of official temperature data. There was already much evidence of this seven years ago, when I was writing my history of the scare, The Real Global Warming Disaster. But now another damning example has been uncovered by Steven Goddard’s US blog Real Science, showing how shamelessly manipulated has been one of the world’s most influential climate records, the graph of US surface temperature records published by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). (See also WUWT.)
So, the Climate Sceptics, the Global Warming Realists are skeptical. But when they get proof, they accept proof. Now it is up to the alarmists, the Global Warming Nazis to accept the proof. Time to put the hoax and the billions in grant money behind them
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Regarding eco-religion, Crichton nails it:
Today, one of the most powerful religions in the Western World is environmentalism. Environmentalism seems to be the religion of choice for urban atheists. Why do I say it’s a religion? Well, just look at the beliefs. If you look carefully, you see that environmentalism is in fact a perfect 21st century remapping of traditional Judeo-Christian beliefs and myths.
There’s an initial Eden, a paradise, a state of grace and unity with nature, there’s a fall from grace into a state of pollution as a result of eating from the tree of knowledge, and as a result of our actions there is a judgment day coming for us all. We are all energy sinners, doomed to die unless we seek salvation, which is now called sustainability.
Sustainability is salvation in the church of the environment. Just as organic food is its communion, that pesticide-free wafer that the right people, with the right beliefs, imbibe.
Michael Crichton
San Francisco
September 15, 2003