The man dubbed the “King of Climate Porn” achieved notoriety at the turn of the decade as the architect of the Foot and Mouth holocaust – which unnecessarily slaughtered seven million animals, and cost the country billions of pounds. But King astonished observers by saying something sensible last week – and he promises to do so again tonight.

Speaking at the British Association’s Science Week, King will say that the Greenies’ anti-science superstitions are causing unnecessary suffering in Africa. King blames “anti-poverty” campaigners, aid agencies and environmental activists for keeping modern farming techniques and bio-technology out of Africa. King tells the Times today:

“The suffering within [Africa], I believe, is largely driven by attitudes developed in the West which are somewhat anti-science, anti-technology – attitudes that lead towards organic farming, for example, attitudes that lead against the use of genetic technology for crops that could deal with increased salinity in the water, that can deal with flooding for rice crops, that can deal with drought resistance.”

King wonders why recent productivity revolutions in agriculture, which have been such a success in Asia and India, have not been implemented in Africa on the same scale. He concludes that the blame lies not with Africans, but with Western “do-gooders” who prefer Africans to remain picturesque and dirt poor.

An example he cites is the attempts of eco-campaigners Friends of the Earth to keep drought-resistant crops out of Africa.

He has a point.

“Where once there were ambitions for people in the third world to enjoy Western standards of living, now the voice of the voiceless instead celebrates the primitive lifestyles that the world’s poorest people suffer,” wrote Ben Pile and Stuart Blackman recently in a scathing critique of the charity Oxfam, called Backwards to the future.

Indeed, and the same middle-class superstitions that endeavour to keep Wi-Fi out of schools are used to justify keeping biotechnology out of Africa.

For example, Friends of the Earth continues to argue that modern seed technologies should not be used to make agriculture easier and more productive for poor farmers – even when this causes more ecological damage than the new technology. FoE’s most recent campaign against biotech means that subsistence farmers must continue to use seeds that require more fertiliser than GM varieties, and which need environmentally-destructive tilling.

Whatever it is that motivates these self-styled “Greens”, it isn’t a concern for the environment. Nor, despite claims to the contrary, is there any valid concern of “over-population”. The UN estimates global population growth to peak in the 2040s at 7.87bn, then decline, assuming modest development is permitted to continue. Not only does economic development mean fewer people, but it means less suffering: those fewer people are much happier.

Clearly, we can easily generate enough food to feed everyone on the planet and we have the means to ensure there’s less human suffering. Some people want that to happen – and some don’t. You’ll find many nursing their Malthusian or Eugenics prejudices under the banner of Greenery in the former camp – but it’s a refreshing surprise to find King in the latter camp, or at least edging away from the Greens’ death cult.

©Situation Publishing 2008.

Spare a thought for anyone on the Environment beat at the Guardian newspaper. It must be like working for Pravda during the Breznhev era. There, as the economy became ever more dysfunctional, reporters were obliged to pump out ever more absurd stories saluting record productivity and efficiency records. The triumph over capitalism was imminent!

A different time and a different place: but at the Graun, the ideology is “Climate Change” – and the number of narratives permissible is similarly narrow, and rigidly defined from the top. For as regular readers of the paper will know, the climate can only change in one direction: for the worse. Apocalypse is imminent!

It’s in this context you should spare a thought for David Adam, the newspaper’s environment correspondent. He certainly has our sympathies. With hurricane Gustav set to devastate New Orleans, Adam was tasked with the job of showing how it’s all down to Global Warming.
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British-born physicist Freeman Dyson has revealed three “heresies”, two of which challenge the current scientific orthodoxy that anthropogenic carbon causes climate change.

“The fuss about global warming is grossly exaggerated,” writes Dyson in his new book Many Colored Glass: Reflections on the Place of Life in the Universe, published on Wednesday.

He pours scorn on “the holy brotherhood of climate model experts and the crowd of deluded citizens who believe the numbers predicted by the computer models”.

“I have studied the climate models and I know what they can do. The models solve the equations of fluid dynamics, and they do a very good job of describing the fluid motions of the atmosphere and the oceans. They do a very poor job of describing the clouds, the dust, the chemistry, and the biology of fields and farms and forests,” writes Dyson.

Biomass holds the key to carbon, he writes – leaving us to infer that he thinks the human contribution is negligible. Overall, Dyson issues a plea for more scientific research into the behaviour of the planet’s biomass.

“Many of the basic processes of planetary ecology are poorly understood. They must be better understood before we can reach an accurate diagnosis of the present condition of our planet,” he says.
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Bureaucrats at the American Physical Society (APS) have issued a curious warning to their members about an article in one of their own publications. Don’t read this, they say – we don’t agree with it. But what is it about the piece that is so terrible, that like Medusa, it could make men go blind?

It’s an article that examines the calculation central to climate models. As the editor of the APS’s newsletter American Physics Jeffrey Marque explains, the global warming debate must be re-opened:

“There is a considerable presence within the scientific community of people who do not agree with the IPCC conclusion that anthropogenic CO2 emissions are very probably likely to be primarily responsible for the global warming that has occurred since the Industrial Revolution. Since the correctness or fallacy of that conclusion has immense implications for public policy and for the future of the biosphere, we thought it appropriate to present a debate within the pages of P&S concerning that conclusion.”

American Physics invited both believers and sceptics to submit articles, and has published a submission by Viscount Monckton questioning the core calculation of the greenhouse gas theory: climate sensitivity. The believers are represented by two physicists from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, who state that:

“Basic atmospheric models clearly predict that additional greenhouse gasses will raise the temperature of Earth. To argue otherwise, one must prove a physical mechanism that gives a reasonable alternative cause of warming. This has not been done. Sunspot and temperature correlations do not prove causality.”

But within a few days, Monckton’s piece carried a health warning: in bright red ink:

The following article has not undergone any scientific peer review. Its conclusions are in disagreement with the overwhelming opinion of the world scientific community. The Council of the American Physical Society disagrees with this article’s conclusions.

Not so much Medusa, then, as Nanny telling the children what not to think.

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Who would have guessed that in 2008, a pledge to give British people flushing toilets would be a shock vote winner?

The Conservatives this week promised to scrap the Government’s plans for 15 “eco towns” which will potentially house 100,000 people. These have been heralded as a new era in design, but you need to take a closer look at both the theory and practice to see the full, grim picture.

Firstly, it’s clear that “design goal” is enforcing patterns of behavior on people.

“What are the responsibilities we each must share in return for the freedoms we enjoy?” asked Town and Country Planning Association chief David Lock last year when introducing a report. Lock and his quango are advising the Government on the initiative. What does he mean? He means freedoms you previously enjoyed have been clawed back.

Almost every aspect of life in the eco towns is minutely regulated. The streets are too small to drive around, and if you must drive the mandatory speed limit is 15mph. Planners are particularly excited about installing eco toilets that don’t flush. Because flushing is “the worst thing ever devised by modern man,” (according to one advocate), compost toilets may be mandatory. You won’t have a choice.

We took a look at one candidate loo, and the description gives us a whiff of this fragrant, low carbon future:

“The dry fecal matter is captured by a built-in teflon-coated bowl with a turning mechanism and is ‘flushed’ into wheeled bins in the buildings’ basements. ‘Flushing’ uses sawdust, dispensed from the back of the toilet, instead of water.”

Lovely.

Residents will also be required to pay a fine, mooted at around £2 ($4), each time they leave the town.

So these are really detention centres – with behaviour set down in advance by the Carbon Cult. Residents will not be able to vote on whether they want to have flushing toilets.

Another clue that they’re about punishment emerged this spring, when ministers described them as “healthy towns”. The eco-camps will aim to tackle obesity by encouraging lots of walking about, said Health minister Alan Johnson in April.

And being confined to such a grim existence means the end of social mobility. Forget about advancing along the precarious housing ladder. The houses will be far more expensive than they should be, because they’re saddled with fashionable but useless totems of Greenery such as “micro generation” turbines, that can’t even power a light bulb.

Nowhere in the glossy brochures that describe “what makes eco towns different” is employment mentioned. The new settlements are remote – several are on disused airfields – and “will become the eco-slums of the future if they are built without regards to where residents can get jobs or training,” the LGA’s Simon Milton has predicted.

Low resource use developments don’t have to be miserable – but with the eco towns, this is the whole point. Marry old-fashioned paternalism (where the proles should be grateful for what they get ) to the Carbon Cult’s misanthropy (where being alive is a sin) and what else do you get, but a boring, smelly slum? This time, by design.

Carbon Cult sickos are under fire for an interactive website that tells children they should die because they emit CO2.

The Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s “Planet Slayer” site invites young children to take a “greenhouse gas quiz”, asking them “how big a pig are you?”. At the end of the quiz, the pig explodes, and ABC tells children at “what age you should die at so you don’t use more than your fair share of Earth’s resources!”

It’s one of a number of interactive features that “Get the dirt on greenhouse without the guilt trips. No lectures. No multinational-bashing (well, maybe a little…). Just fun and games and the answers to all your enviro-dilemas,” ABC claims.

The site is aimed at 9-year olds. However even a “virtuous” rating (e.g. not owning a car and recycling) is outweighed by eating meat, or spending an average Aussie income – with the result that many 9-year olds are being told they’ve already outstayed their environmentally-compliant stay on the planet.

“Do you think it’s appropriate that the ABC … depict people who are average Australians as massive overweight ugly pigs, oozing slime from their mouths, and then to have these pigs blow up in a mass of blood and guts?” asked Senator Mitch Fifield in the Herald-Sun.

The state-sponsored broadcaster (why is that not a surprise?) defended the morbid quiz, with ABC managing director Mark Scott insisting “the site was not designed to offend certain quarters of the community but to engage children in environmental issues.”

Which is eco-speak for frighten them witless. However, as the excellent science blog Watts Up With That points out, the site clearly breaches Australian broadcasting guidelines on “harmful or disturbing” content.

Meanwhile, the site’s designers are revelling in the controversy:

“Thank God for outraged senators – you can’t buy publicity like that,” PlanetSlayer’s “creative director” Bernie Hobbs crowed to the New York Post.

So how, according to ABC, does one appease the vengeful Death God, Gaia?
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Environment Minister Hilary Benn again rebuffed calls this week for WW2-style energy rationing to return to the UK. He was responding to a Select Committee report urging ministers to issue 45 million Britons with an energy trading “credit card” – a mammoth techno-bureaucratic exercise costing several billions of pounds a year to operate.

What’s interesting is how the normal parliamentary business was turned upside down.

Usually, it’s ministers who propose batty and unworkable legislation, and fail to cost it, while select committees are supposed to scrutinize the proposals: picking apart the logic and bogus cost estimates. But in this case the select committee in question – the “Environmental Audit Committee” – is positively evangelical about a return to rationing. Perhaps not surprisingly, ministers are wary of committing electoral suicide, or at least, not in quite such an obvious fashion.

Benn said his department DEFRA had made its own enquiry, which unlike the watchdog’s investigation, included costs. A rationing scheme would cost between £700m and £2bn to set up, he said, and between £1bn and £2bn a year to operate he said.

“In essence it is ahead of its time,” the minister said Tuesday. “The cost of implementing it would be quite high and there are a lot of practical problems to be overcome.” Front bench Tories are equally wary.

So what are the MPs proposing?

The ration, or “personal carbon allowance” or PCA, is a measure of an individual’s energy usage, either at home or traveling. Such usage is capped, and “further emissions rights will simply not be available,” the Committee says. You may choose between a holiday, and turning on the heating. Points win prizes, however, and frugal individuals would be rewarded financially from the creation of an internal market.
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It looks like Al Gore is going to need every cent of the $300m war chest he’s amassed for climate persuasion. Americans polled by Gallup for ‘Earth Day’ value “traditional”, bottom-up environmental issues such as pollution and conservation as being more worrying than Global Warming. Remarkably, the level of concern about greenhouse gas emissions has barely wavered in a generation. Recklessness, or Huck Finn-style American common sense?

A third of Americans think “Global Warming” is a serious concern – a figure that’s effectively unchanged since 1990, when the question was first asked. Ominously for the climate doom-mongers, it ranks 10th on a list of 12 environmental issues. OK, so what are Americans worried about?

Water pollution issues are three of the top four areas of concern, with over 80 per cent of people registering serious concern. Waste contamination comes third, and the loss of natural habitat for wildlife fifth, with 77 per cent expressing concern. Then there’s rainforests (69 per cent), bio-diversity (68 per cent). Greenhouse emissions come in 10th – above urban sprawl and acid rain.

And when’s the last time you ever heard anyone mention acid rain?
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Bullying bloggers are no strangers to online media – especially when they’re Single Issue Fanatics (SIF). “They’re deeply emotional, they’re bullies, and they often don’t get out enough,” the BBC’s Adam Curtis noted here last year. This week, campaigner Jo Abbess is boasting about how she browbeat the BBC into modifying a story about Global Warming. The BBC has defended the changes to its story.

Abbess swung into action on Friday after the BBC’s Roger Harrabin reported comments by World Meteorological Organisation secretary general Michel Jarraud. In a story titled “Global temperatures ‘to decrease’”, Harrabin wrote:

“The World Meteorological Organisation’s secretary-general, Michel Jarraud, told the BBC it was likely that La Niña would continue into the summer. This would mean global temperatures have not risen since 1998, prompting some to question climate change theory.”

La Niña is the cooling phase of what’s called the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO), which affects the sea surface in the central and eastern Equatorial Pacific. Niña alternates with El Nino, which raises temperatures. We’re entering the Niña phase. Global temperatures have been static from their 1998 peak, when El Nino peaked.

It’s nicely illustrated by this graph:

Which also shows how foolish it is to extrapolate anything from short-term trends.

The plateau in temperature this century was acknowledged by IPCC chief Dr Rajendra Pachauri back in January.

Abbess fired off an email titled “Correction Demanded: ‘Global temperatures ‘to decrease’”. She argued that anyone who doubts the scientific orthodoxy is not qualified to hold an opinion.

“Several networks exist that question whether global warming has peaked, but they contain very few actual scientists, and the scientists that they do contain are not climate scientists so have no expertise in this area.”

Harrabin initially stood firm.

“No correction is needed. If the secy-gen of the WMO tells me that global temperatures will decrease, that’s what we will report”, replied the envy-corry of the beeby-weebie.

But our keyboard warrior fired back:

“Personally, I think it is highly irresponsible to play into the hands of the sceptics/skeptics who continually promote the idea that ‘global warming finished in 1998′, when that is so patently not true.

“Please do not do a disservice to your readership by leaving the door open to doubt about that.”

Harrabin began to wilt, promising to take on the doubters.

“We can’t ignore the fact that sceptics have jumped on the lack of increase since 1998. It is appearing reguarly now in general media. Best to tackle this – and explain it, which is what we have done.”

Abbess fired back again:

“When you are on the Tube in London, I expect that occasionally you glance a headline as sometime turns the page, and you thinkg [sic] ‘Really?’ or ‘Wow !’ You don’t read the whole article, you just get the headline.

“It would be better if you did not quote the sceptics. Their voice is heard everywhere, on every channel.

[Even the BBC? - astonished ed]

They are deliberately obstructing the emergence of the truth. I would ask : please reserve the main BBC Online channel for emerging truth.”

[Our emphasis]

Abbess was worried about the consequences of Harrabin’s report. People might think The Wrong Thoughts. She spelled it out:

“A lot of people will read the first few paragraphs of what you say, and not read the rest, and (a) Dismiss your writing as it seems you have been manipulated by the sceptics or (b) Jump on it with glee and email their mates and say “See! Global Warming has stopped !”

And she signed off with a threat:

“I am about to send your comments to others for their contribution, unless you request I do not. They are likely to want to post your comments on forums/fora, so please indicate if you do not want this to happen. You may appear in an unfavourable light because it could be said that you have had your head turned by the sceptics.”

That means career suicide at the Beeb. Enough already, replied Harrabin.

“Have a look in 10 minutes and tell me you are happier. We have changed headline and more.”

The headline was changed to the bizarre “Global warming ‘dips this year’” and the paragraph removed.

A dip in warming? Isn’t that like, er… cooling?

The offending paragraph was modified to read:

“But this year’s temperatures would still be way above the average – and we would soon exceed the record year of 1998 because of global warming induced by greenhouse gases.”

And we now learn:

“A minority of scientists question whether this means global warming has peaked and argue the Earth has proved more resilient to greenhouse gases than predicted.”

We offered our congratulations to Ms Abbess, but she has not responded to our request for a comment. (You can read her victory statement here or (here if that’s unobtainable).

BBC sources confirmed the authenticity of the correspondence.

The BBC provided us with this statement:

“A minor change was made to the ‘Global temperatures “to decrease”‘ piece on our website to better reflect the science. A few people including the report’s authors, the World Meteorlogical Organisation, pointed out to us that the earlier version had been ambiguous.”

[readers' emails in response to this article are here]

Move over Thom Yorke – there’s another candidate for Britain’s most miserable and mean-spirited millionaire. This week, fantasy book author Philip Pullman will join Radiohead’s ginger whinger in calling for wartime austerity measures and top-down social control.

Demanding strict state-controlled energy rationing, Pullman says in a new book:

“This is a crisis as big as war and you couldn’t trade your ration book in the wartime. You were allowed three ounces of butter a week, or whatever, and that was it. And this is what it should be like with carbon. None of this carbon trading. We should have a fixed limit and if you use it all up in October, then tough, you shiver for the rest of the year.”

Sounds fun. But then Pullman reveals why he’s wearing a rose-tinted spyglass:

“My childhood was formed during the austerity years after the war. So I still feel influenced by that. Curious, isn’t it, how we were much healthier as a nation after the war when the rationing was on?”

Ah, yes. Those glory days when tuberculosis and syphilis were rampant, penicillin was rare, very few males over the age of 30 still had their own teeth, and life expectancy was ten years shorter than it is today!
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