Still Waiting For The Predictions To Come True

Over the last decade we have heard several times that drought was becoming a permanent situation in California due to climate change.

For example, this is a headline from August, 2021.

Source: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-08-12/california-drought-a-dry-season-is-turning-into-drought-era?leadSource=uverify%20wall

 

What is California dealing with now?

Torrential flooding due to massive amounts of rain.

Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2023/01/14/california-flooding-atmospheric-river/

The Washington Post reports that forecasters didn't see it coming and say it has prompted questions about the accuracy of seasonal predictions.

Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2023/01/15/california-seasonal-forecasts-noaa-missed/

Indeed.

If there are questions about the accuracy of seasonal predictions have much faith should there be in forecasts of those who tell us the world is going to end in 10 years unless we stop using fossil fuels?

That is particularly true when these zealots would have us abandon plentiful, reliable and affordable sources of energy for alternatives that are uncertain, unreliable and expensive.

This is not to mention the risk that abandoning these proven energy sources places on our prosperity and standard of living.

It is utter insanity when you look at other predictions that have been made by climate alarmists in the past.

No one has made more dire predictions about the effects of carbon emissions on the climate than Al Gore.

In 2006 Gore made his catastrophic climate change warnings into a movie, An Inconvenient Truth.

In that film Gore predicted that we had but ten years to get things right on earth or face catastrophe. He stated that our weather would get increasingly warmer. That our climate would become more severe with more hurricanes and tornadoes. And that by the summer of 2015 the Arctic sea would be ice-free.

I debunked all of these predictions with the actual facts in my post "An Inconvenient Truth +10" on the tenth anniversary of the release of the film.

We are now 17 years beyond when he made those claims.

This is a graphic of Arctic sea extent from this past July---seven years after Gore said it would be ice free.

Source: http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/2022/07/

There was actually more Arctic sea ice extent in the summer of 2022 than there was 15 years ago.

Al Gore is not alone.

Here in Great Thunberg in 2020 citing a study that says the Great Barrier Reef is threatened by climate change and has been halved in size over the last 25 years.

We then have this report two years later.

Source: https://reefbuilders.com/2022/08/06/great-barrier-reef-records-highest-hard-coral-cover-in-36-years/

Credit: https://twitter.com/tan123/status/1600467698890117120

That is a pretty big change in just two years.

What global climate initiative is responsible for that change?

I am not aware of any, are you?

In 1988 various climate change activists were predicting The Maldive Islands in the Indian Ocean would be underwater within 30 years.

In September 1988, the Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported a “gradual rise in average sea level is threatening to completely cover this Indian Ocean nation of 1196 small islands within the next 30 years,” based on predictions made by government officials.

Then-Environmental Affairs Director Hussein Shihab told AFP “an estimated rise of 20 to 30 centimetres in the next 20 to 40 years could be ‘catastrophic’ for most of the islands, which were no more than a metre above sea level.”

It hasn't happened.

In fact, The Maldives are thriving.

It has opened five new airports in the past few years.

Massive amounts of investment has been made by a number of luxury resort operators.

Did they do this believing they would soon be underwater?

Source: https://www.dreamingofmaldives.com/maldives-blog/category/maldives-hotels-and-resorts/maldives-new-resorts/

We also have the climate scientist in the UK who predicted in 2000 that within a few short years children in that country would no longer know what snow is.

Snow is starting to disappear from our lives. Sledges, snowmen, snowballs and the excitement of waking to find that the stuff has settled outside are all a rapidly diminishing part of Britain's culture, as warmer winters – which scientists are attributing to global climate change – produce not only fewer white Christmases, but fewer white Januaries and Februaries.

According to Dr David Viner, a senior research scientist at the climatic research unit of the University of East Anglia, within a few years winter snowfall will become "a very rare and exciting event". "Children just aren't going to know what snow is," he said.

What do we see happening in the UK recently?

 

Source: https://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/latest-news/uk-weather-maps-show-exactly-28959813

I am willing to concede that it is possible that the earth has been warming over the last several decades.

However, the planet is known to have warmed and cooled over the years. Even if the data shows it is warming, how do we know it is caused by man when you look at past history? We know there was an ice age. We also know the ice melted. How did it ice up? How did the ice melt? What proof is there that this is man-made?

Even if man-made carbon emissions have had a marginal impact on the climate how do we know that we can really do anything about it?

This is particularly true for those in the Western world.

Since 2000, Europe and the United States have reduced carbon emissions by 2.5 billion tonnes annually.

At the same time, China and India have increased carbon emissions by 9.7 billion tonnes.

It seems that the Western economies have been playing a loser's game for over 20 years.

It is also not going to get any better looking at where China and India are headed not to mention Africa and Latin America.

Affordable, efficient energy drives economic development. 

Energy and the economy are inextricably linked.

Fossil fuels have brought more people out of poverty than anything else in the history of mankind.

This chart shows the share of various sources of energy consumption since 1860. I thought it was interesting that muscle power still represented one-third of energy consumption in the world as late as 1950.

If you doubt there is a relationship between affordable, available energy and economic growth consider this chart that compares world GDP growth with energy consumption growth. 

Could there be a better correlation?

This chart was produced by Climate Scientist Mike Haseler who writes a blog named the Scottish Sceptic. Haseler points out that this relationship exists because GDP is the sum total of what humans produce. 

When muscle power was the prime energy source in the world we could produce very little. Firewood and domesticated animals improved our ability to produce. However, the introduction of energy sources like coal, oil and gas allowed us to greatly leverage our productive capacity. Compare the dramatic increase in GDP beginning around 1950 with the great increase in fossil fuels beginning at the same time in the charts above.

Haseler believes that green economics schemes that are proposed to "save the planet" will inevitably destroy the economy in the process. The only way to avoid that result is if the cost of the new energy inputs are more affordable than fossil fuels.

I am all for developing newer and better sustainable sources of energy. Count me as someone who would love to see a perpetual motion machine to power everything man needs on the planet.

I have great confidence that given free market economies and human ingenuity we will find better sources of energy to power our lives. This has been proven time and time again over the course of human history.

However, we have never voluntarily abandoned something that is accessible and affordable for something that is speculative and expensive.

Those in China, India, Africa and Central America understand that.

They are not going to abandon or ignore energy solutions that work and condemn their citizens to a life of poverty because someone in London, Oslo or Washington, D.C. is worried about carbon emissions and climate change.

If you have not seen this video of Konstantin Kisin addressing the Oxford Commons earlier this month I highly recommend it,

(Click here is the video below does not play in your browser) 7 minutes

Kisin does an excellent job of putting the focus where it needs to be on the subject of climate change.

If you believe that climate change is being caused by man the only answer is for man to develop more abundant, cleaner and cheaper sources of energy through technology and science. Nothing will be accomplished by attempting to lower our standard of living, prosperity or the opportunities of others to climb out of poverty. 

If we want to improve our situation it is going to require we work, build and create our future. It has always been that way. It will always be that way. That is a prediction I am confident will be proven true.

It is a point I have made more than once in these pages over the years.

In the meantime, I will keep looking for at least one prediction of the climate doomsayers to come true.