The annual James Hannam climate change debate

[fortigurn]

Sept 16, 2012 15:44:21 GMT James Hannam said:

On the money, NASA spend $1.5 billion a year on earth science, which of which a large chunk is climatology.

You're equivocating. The claim of yours we're investigating is that massively more money is being spent upholding what you call 'the orthodoxy' than is being spent to generate AGW skepticsm.

The fact is however, the organizations you cite are not spending money to uphold what you call 'the orthodoxy'. They are spending money to gather and analyze data, regardless of whether that data and the conclusions drawn from it supports 'the orthodoxy', the scientific consensus on AGW.

In addition, much of the money spent by organizations you identify as supporting 'the orthodoxy', is spent cross-checking, examining, and verifying scientific hypotheses and conclusions concerning AGW; everything is analyzed critically, by multiple independent sources specifically attempting to falsify the conclusions drawn. That is science.

None of the organizations you cite are giving money to scientists on the condition that they come up with reports supporting the consensus view on AGW. In contrast, organizations such as the Heartland Institute are giving money to scientists on the condition that they come up with reports intended to generate skepticism and doubt about the consensus on AGW. They are not spending money on having those reports cross-checked by independent sources, or subjected to falsification procedures, and most of the time they are avoiding peer review by selective publication. That is propaganda.

So no money is being spent specifically to prop up 'the orthodoxy', and those organizations you identify as supporting 'the orthodoxy' actively support procedures critical of the conclusions drawn, aimed at verifying and falsifying them through multiple independent peer review.

In contrast, millions has been spent with the specific view of generating skepticism and doubt concerning the existing scientific consensus, whilst avoiding peer review, critical examination, and standard falsification procedures.

[James Hannam]

Sept 16, 2012 20:36:37 GMT ignorantianescia said:

For the complete picture, those subsidies should be compared to non-renewable energy subsidies. I don't know to what degree fossil fuels are subsidised in the UK, though, but here in the Netherlands fossil fuels got over €5 milliard in subsidies or discounts in 2010, which is more than durable power received (which varies but was €1,5 milliard for 2010). So in the Netherlands, fossil fuels received more state support than durable energy.

(By the way, the source I used for the price of wind power (on good locations, note) being comparable to power from fossil fuels is Energy Science by Andrews and Jelley.)

According to this there are no fossil fuel subsidies In the UK but greens like to pretend there are.

Are you sure there are subsidies for fossil fuels in the Netherlands? It seems quite an odd thing for the government to do.

blogs.telegraph.co.uk/finance/timworstall/100017772/are-the-green-energy-mob-lying-about-their-tax-breaks-or-just-ignorant/

J

[sankari]

Sept 17, 2012 5:59:42 GMT James Hannam said:

According to this there are no fossil fuel subsidies In the UK but greens like to pretend there are.

That's not actually what Worstall says. He certainly admits that such subsidies exist, but claims they are smaller than those granted to renewables:

My example today is a remarkable claim that despite the billions sprayed at anyone who can even say "green energy" it's true that fossil fuels get greater subsidies than renewables. But only on a global level: in the UK it's entirely false.

Notice the careful use of language: he is saying that in the UK, fossil fuel subsidies are lower than those granted to renewables.

He constructs his case by selectively choosing certain subsidies (while ignoring all the others) and claiming they should not be defined as subsidies. It's a largely semantic argument.

Worstall is responding to this article by Duncan Clark, which is far more detailed and better argued:

Public subsidies for the development of wind power in the UK are dwarfed by the tax breaks enjoyed by fossil fuels, a new Guardian analysis has revealed.

Financial support for fledgling renewable energy industries has increasingly come under attack in recent months, but the new data shows that the older industries benefit to a far greater extent.

Gas, oil and coal prices were subsidised by £3.63bn in 2010, according to data from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, whereas offshore and onshore wind received £0.7bn in the year from April 2010.

All renewables in the UK benefited from £1.4bn over the same period, according to data from the Department of Energy and Climate Change (Decc).

...

The Treasury was unable to provide figures for the tax relief and other subsidies enjoyed by fossil fuels, but the OECD data is described as "very robust" by subsidies expert Peter Wooders, who worked for British Gas and is now at the International Institute for Sustainable Development.

...

No comprehensive analysis of subsidies provided to each energy technology exists with, for example, no data on the cost of subsidising red diesel, used in agriculture and industry by about 70p a litre (about 50%) or on export credit guarantees given to British companies who have recently ventured into deep-sea oil drilling off Brazil and coal mining in Siberia.

Other subsidies include the millions of pounds of free coal given each year to former British Coal miners and their families, a scheme that has cost almost £1bn since 1994 and is not expected to end until 2064.

(Source).

The long list of taxpayer-funded handouts, rebates and other benefits for the UK's fossil fuel industry are counted as subsidies by the UK government, the IEA, and the OECD. It seems the only person who doesn't consider them subsidies is Tim Worstall.

[James Hannam]

I had a look at the OECD report.

Aside from a few historic schemes, the £3bn isn't made up of subsidies.

The biggest number by far is the reduced rate of VAT on domestic fuel. This rate applies to all fuel whether renewable or not. So it isn't a subsidy on fossil fuels. To call it that is certainly dishonest (and I note the OECD does not).

I remember the bitter political fight over VAT on domestic fuel. Norman Lamont tried to bring it in at full rate in the early 1990s as part of the global warming agenda. The other parties cried blue murder and in the end only the first step to the full rate happened. Then, in his first budget, Gordon Brown cut the rate further to the current 5%.

The entire left, including in the Greens, were against increasing VAT on domestic fuel. For the Guardian (which campaigned vociforously against the increase) and Greens/Reds today to accuse the UK of subsidising fossil fuels because of a policy they brought in or urged themselves shows a depth of political hypocracy that almost beggers belief.

Sankari (who may not be a Brit) is probably unaware of all this. But to be clear, even disregarding the history, a subsidy is when the government hands cash out. A tax that effects all kinds of energy equally is not a subsidy. Allowing reduced rates of petroleum revenue tax (for developing new fields) and fuel duty (like red deisel) for certain purposes when neither of these taxes effect renewables at all, is also not a subsidy.

By the way, yes CSIRO covers all science. They don't tell us in their budget how much goes on climate change and it wou;ld be nice to know. But they do say A$32 million goes on "outreach". Or propaganda as you would call it if you don't agree with what they are saying....

Best wishes

James

Edit to add: It was Ken Clarke rather than Normal Lamont who was the Conservative Chancellor to introduce VAT on domestic fuel.

[fortigurn]

Sept 17, 2012 11:54:18 GMT James Hannam said:

By the way, yes CSIRO covers all science. They don't tell us in their budget how much goes on climate change and it wou;ld be nice to know. But they do say A$32 million goes on "outreach". Or propaganda as you would call it if you don't agree with what they are saying....

Calling it propaganda just because we disagreed with it wouldn't be intellectually honest, so we wouldn't call it that.

[ignorantianescia]

The source for the €5.8 milliard figure in 2010 is a Dutch report by Ecofys and CE Delft. Most of the subsidies are indeed rebates lower tax or excise rates or exemptions, especially from excise for kerosine and ship fuel, in other words subsidies. Another big fish is a lower tax rate for large electricity users (in the Netherlands, taxation on energy is degressive). The link can be found at the bottom of this page: jaarverslag2011.eneco.nl/resultaten/oplossen/ecofys

Using actually handing over cash as a definition for subsidy is a very narrow definition. Paying (partially) for certain activities from tax funds, either directly or indirectly (lower tax rates, exemption or rebates), is a more common one.

[James Hannam]

I cannot speak for the system in the Netherlands, but:

If there is a supertax that only relates to fossil fuels, a rebate on that tax for certain purposes is not a subsidy for fossil fuels. This is the positon for reliefs from Fuel Duty and Petroleum Revenue Tax.

If there is a tax that applies equally to all fuels, the rate of that tax applied to all fuels is not a subsidy for fossil fuels. This is the position for VAT on domestic fuel.

If there was a tax that was paid by all, but fossil fuels got a special exemption, that would be a subsidy as it is cash in hand for the fossil fuels compared to others. This is not the position for the UK examples I cited but may be the case for the Netherlands (I can't quite tell from the post).

By the way, is a milliard a million or a billion?

Best wishes

James

On propaganda, we need a new irregular verb:

I explain; you (s) argue; he/she/it pontificates; we are right; you (pl) are dissembling; they can be trusted about as far as we can throw them.

[ignorantianescia]

The interventions are all specific as far as I can judge, though some have an effect on both durable and non-durable energy (though that is not explicitly mentioned, calculating it in Excel shows that these effects are included by the authors).

Yes, milliard (long scale) is the same as billion in short scale. I'll use short scale for clarity.

Here is a table of the subsidies affecting energy usage, totalling 4.6 billion euros, of which 4.4 billion benefit non-durable energy and roughly 200 million euros (recalculating resulted in 222 million) benefit durable energy.

Type of intervention	Size of intervention in millions of euros
Fuel excise, exemption for kerosine	1695
Energy tax, lowered tax rates for gas consumption by large-scale users	1499
Fuel excise, exemption for ship transport	440
Energy tax, lowered tax rates for electricity consumption by large-scale users	252
Fuel excise, lowered rates for red diesel	236
Fuel excise, lowered rates for LPG	223
Energy tax, exemptions for energy-intensive industries	88
Temporary measures for insulated glazing	43
Energy tax, rebate for churches and non-profit organisations	34
Vehicle tax, zero tax rate for very efficient vehicles	34
Subsidies for the introduction of energy innovations (for greenhouses)	28
Temporary measures for durable heating for realised buildings	27
VAT, lowered tax rates for insulation	13
Energy tax, exemptions for energy-intensive industries	8
Subsidies for energy counsel for house owners	7
Investment measures for energy saving	5
Subsidies for environmental technology	4
Subsidies to lower the connection costs to the electricity grid for heat pump owners	2

Subsidies to energy production total to 2.7 billion euros, roughly 1.4 billion going to non-durable (mostly fossil energy, nuclear fission is hardly subsidised) and about 1.3 billion euros are available for durable energy. There's no table in the report, only a diagram.

So that is a total of 7.3 billion euros, with 5.8 billion for non-durable and 1.5 billion to durable energy sources.

[ignorantianescia]

For anybody who might be interested, an analysis of several studies by the German environmental agency, das Umweltbundesamt, has been published in August. The article is in German, but an English web article mentioning some findings can be found here.