New Study: Scientists Find ‘Recent UK Flooding Is Not Unprecedented’

The apparent increase in flooding witnessed over the last decade appears in consideration to the long-term flood record not to be unprecedented; whilst the period since 2000 has been considered as flood-rich, the period 1970–2000 is “flood poor”, which may partly explain why recent floods are often perceived as extreme events. The much publicised (popular media) apparent change in flood frequency since 2000 may reflect natural variability, as there appears to be no shift in long-term flood frequency. –Neil Macdonald and Heather Sangster (2017), Hydrology and Earth System Sciences 21: 1631-1650.

Well that wasn’t in the script was it? A couple of scientists working at the University of Liverpool have found that recent floods in the UK are not, contrary to received wisdom, anything exceptional at all. “But wait”, I hear you say: “Weren’t we told that flooding was going to get worse and that it was all down to global warming?” Indeed we were. One should always be careful about correlations, but the fact that the floods are not without precedent seems clear. So is it too much to ask the alarmists to now tone things down a bit? –Andrew Montford, GWPF Comment, 17 June 2017

Even Michael Gove’s enemies concede he is good at tackling vested interests. Even his friends concede he has a knack for making enemies in the process. In his new job as secretary of state for environment, food and rural affairs, if he is to achieve anything, he may have to do a lot of both. Mr Gove should demand that environmental policies are judged by their results, not their intentions. In fisheries, air pollution, tackling invasive species, reforming farm subsidies, wildlife conservation, badgers, landscape protection, genetically modified food and pesticides, what counts is not the size of the budget going in, the moral motive behind it, or the number of committees overseeing it — but whether it gets results. That should be the watchword of the new Defra secretary. –Matt Ridley, The Times, 19 June 2017

By focusing only on risks to carbon intensive assets, whilst ignoring the possibility that current climate policies may be creating malinvestment in renewable energy technologies, the Bank of England is failing in its statutory duty to identify and address risks to the resilience of the UK financial system. Judging from this document the Bank of England is failing in its statutory duty to identify and address threats to the financial stability of the United Kingdom. There is, no doubt, a real possibility that the policy driven commitment of capital resources to renewable energy generation is malinvestment that will have to be written off within a decade or two, but the Bank, which now writes as if it were part of the policy delivery mechanism, does not give any consideration to this “transition risk”. Regardless of how probable you think that risk, this omission is clearly a mistake. –John Constable, GWPF Energy, 18 July 2017

The Paris Accord marks the apotheosis, not of “globalism,” but of a particular version of globalism, which one should rather qualify as socialist. Indeed, let us recall the actual content of the Paris Agreement! What does it foresee? Essentially, two things: the drastic reduction of CO₂ emissions in the West, right away, with the possibility for states such as China – the world’s largest CO₂ emitter – to continue to increase emissions to 2030, with no requirement whatsoever to reduce emissions. The second essential component of “Paris” is the Green Fund, which provides for the transfer of $ 100 billion a year from the West to the rest of the world. “Paris” is therefore, first and foremost, the triumph of what was called “support for the Third World” in the 70s and 80s, that is to say, a massive and permanent transfer of wealth from the West to the rest of the world. –Drieu Godefridi, Contrepoints, 15 June 2017

The 24 million people in Australia generate 1.5 per cent of annual global human-induced CO2 emissions. USA emits 14 times and China emits 26 times more CO2 than Australia. Australia has 0.33 per cent of the global population. Our high standard of living, a landmass of 7,692,024 square kilometres with a sparse inland population and greenhouse gas-emitting livestock combined with the transport of livestock, food and mined products, long distances to cities and ports and the export of ores, coal, metals and food for 80 million people result in high per capita CO2 emissions. Australia’s exports of coal, iron ore and gas contributes to increasing the standard of living, longevity and health of billions of people in Asia. If Australia emits 1.5 per cent of global annual CO2 emissions, 3 per cent of the total annual global emissions are anthropogenic and the atmosphere contains 400 parts per million by volume of CO2, then one molecule in 6.6 million molecules in the atmosphere is CO2 emitted from humans in Australia. This molecule has an atmospheric life of about 7 years before it is removed from the atmosphere by natural sequestration into life and limey sediments. –Ian Plimer, The Spectator, Australia, 17 June 2017