what does it say in your 101 climate skeptics manual ?

lee wrote on Oct 2^nd, 2018 at 11:03am:


Even if he could you'd just get out your climate skeptics 101 excuse book to refute it as usual.

Yeah, it's a waste of time providing links to this "lee" person because he doesn't read them, ignores the obvious and continues his frothy-mouthed denialist lunacy.

Why should I cast pearls before swine?

The Department of Environment and Energy quietly released a concerning report while everyone was preoccupied with AFL and NRL. This marks Australia’s 15th quarter of consecutive increased annual emissions.

The release of six-month-old, record-breaking greenhouse gas figures late last Friday was met with cynicism, outrage, and a solid shot at spin over the weekend. More importantly, it caps off four consecutive years of emission increases and exposes any pretense that Australia will meet its climate obligations.

In the lead-up to the weekend’s AFL and NRL grand finals, and coinciding with the banking royal commission’s interim report, the Department of Environment and Energy released a quarterly emissions report demonstrating a 1.3% annual increase to March 2018.

For critics, the timing is suspicious. Just last week, the Climate Council were calling out the government’s six-month delay and, pointing to other releases timed around Christmas Eve, acting CEO Dr Martin Rice painted Friday’s report as a “cynical attempt to avoid scrutiny”.

But timing aside, the fact is Australia increased its total output by 6.8 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (Mt CO2-e) from March 2017 to 2018. It’s Australia’s 15th quarter of consecutive increased annual emissions and, excluding unreliable land use data, proof of Australia’s highest recorded level of carbon output at 536.7 Mt CO2-e.

At a time when places like the UK are down to 1890s levels, this result raises questions about how long Australia can go without a carbon price. Though this was implemented for just two years (2012-14), we know it helped decrease total emissions (1.4% in that final, second full year).

Our latest annual jump can mostly be attributed to Australia’s expansion in gas exports and production, which pushed our fourth largest sector (fugitive emissions) up by 13.7%. Australia also saw by a 2.1% increase in our second largest polluter (transport) and a 4.1% jump in our third (stationary energy excluding electricity, i.e. heating).

This was all offset by a 4.3% decline in Australia’s largest polluter, electricity emissions, and thanks largely to reduced demand, Hazelwood’s 2017 closure, and the growth of renewable energy.

For more on that point, Prime Minister Scott Morrison told Insiders on Sunday that Australia has “hit the threshold point, where the investments make sense, increasingly, without subsidies”.

“We still have large-scale and the small-scale RET [Renewable Energy Target] policies in place, we still have the Clean Energy Finance Corporation, and we still have the Emissions Reduction Fund for the period that it’s currently for.”

Morrison, it needs to be said, does a strong job emphasising the 28-year-per-capita low, and is correct in putting much of this electricity progress down to the 2020 Renewable Energy Target, CEFC and sheer economics. But it’s more difficult to claim credit for it. Add in state and territory action (including South Australia’s new Liberal government), and we have four success stories the federal government either had nothing to do with, tried to kill, actively undermined, or just announced they will let die in 2020.

There’s also Morrison’s assurance that, with a climate policy vacuum and plan to end the RET, Australia will meet its 2030 Paris target of a 26% reduction on 2005 levels at “a canter”, and admission that “none of us are Nostradamus in this”. Crikey has sought clarification on the former point, but has not received comment before deadline.

Both of these statements fly in the face of work done by the Australia Institute, NDEVR Environmental, ClimateWorks Australia, the United Nations, and the Australian government, with the Department of Environment and Energy projecting last year that, under current policies, our 2021-2030 emissions reduction task will be missed by 868-934 MtCO₂e.

The Climate Council’s Martin Rice tells Crikey that even Australia’s 26% commitment is “woefully inadequate and is not aligned with what science says is necessary to effectively tackle climate change”.

Scott Morrison has addressed these concerns over targets in relation to Labor — and will likely do so more frequently as election season approaches. “Labor has a 45% emissions reduction target, we all know what that will do,” he said. “It will put up electricity prices by $1400 for every household in the country.”

Does that stack up? A recent Frontier Economics report found Australian households will experience savings leading to 2030 where policy remains business as usual or moves to 26%, 45%, and 65% targets, with “45%” exceeding “business as usual” prices by roughly 0.02%.

So emissions are below 2006? Scary.

And still Australia is a net carbon sink.

'People choose and pick their figures': PM

After the report was uploaded to a government website, the office of Ms Price sent out a media release with the subject line: "Australia on track to meet emissions targets" and headlined "emissions intensity at lowest levels for 28 years".

The release did not mention emissions had gone up, but instead focused on comparing the current figures to those from 2005 and 2000 — years when emissions were higher than they are now.

It also focused on emissions per head of population, which have declined.

Two days later, Prime Minister Scott Morrison was asked about the emissions data on the ABC's Insiders.

"I know people will want to use that one figure and ignore the fact that emissions per capita are at the lowest level in 28 years," he said.

"So people choose and pick their figures to make their political arguments. We're going to meet those in a canter, our 26 per cent target."

But the documents released under FOI laws show the "key points" highlighted by the experts at the Department of Environment and delivered to the Minister also focused almost exclusively on the rising emissions.

Ms O'Shanassy said the total figure was the only one that mattered.

"The climate doesn't care if you're pumping out less pollution per population or relative to GDP," she said.

Is Australian on track to meet Paris deal?

On Insiders, Mr Morrison repeated his earlier claim Australia was on track to meet its commitment made at the Paris summit to reduce emissions to 26 per cent below 2005 levels by 2030, "in a canter".

"All of the issues are pointing to that outcome so I'm comfortable with our 26 per cent," he said.

He was reiterating comments earlier in the month made on the ABC's 7.30 program.

"What we're seeing though is a business-as-usual approach, a technology-driven approach, which will see us, I think, more than meet our targets out to 2030," Mr Morrison said.

That view is at odds with the Government's official projections, last updated in December 2017, which show under business as usual, emissions will increase steadily all the way to 2030.

"Emissions are rising and there's no national plan to turn it around," Ms O'Shanassy said.

"It doesn't take a rocket scientist to know that if we don't have a plan, we're not going to meet our emission target.

"They're kicking the can down the road for the next government but in doing so they're putting lives at risk because climate change is dangerous."

Ms Price's spokesman said: "The 2017 review of climate change policy said Australia has the right mix of polices and improvements in technology.

"The Government's policies are scalable and will enable Australia to meet the 2030 target."

yeh but you don't understand, we are still a carbon sink according to lees 101 skeptics excuse manual