The Delusional Ambrose Evans-Pritchard
By Paul Homewood
The delusional Ambrose Evans-Pritchard still believes that the world is desperate to transition to green energy.
He is worried that if we open a new coking coal mine in Cumbria, we will fall behind other countries in the race for “clean” energy, countries, I suppose, like Germany who are demolishing a windfarm in order to dig for lignite!
Perhaps we should check back through the archives to see how some of his other prognostications fared.
For instance, he wrote this article in 2015, just after the Paris Agreement:
.
Whether or not you accept the hypothesis of man-made global warming is irrelevant. The Chinese Academy and the Politburo do accept it. So does President Xi Jinping, who spent his Cultural Revolution carting coal in the mining region of Shaanxi. This political fact is tectonic for the global fossil industry and the economics of energy.
Until last Saturday, it was an article of faith among Western climate sceptics and some in the fossil industry that China would never sign up to the COP21 accord in Paris or accept the "ratchet" of five-year reviews.
They have since fallen back to a second argument, claiming that the deal is meaningless because China will not sacrifice coal-driven growth to please the West, and without China the accord unravels since it now emits as much CO2 as the US and Europe combined.
This political judgment was perhaps plausible three or four years ago in the dying days of the Hu Jintao era. Today it is clutching at straws.
Coal, oil and gas companies and their investors should assume that China’s leaders meant what they said in Paris, and therefore that the balance of political power in the world has swung towards drastic reductions in fossil fuel use, and that negative net CO2 emissions by 2070 is on the cards.
China invested $90bn in renewable energy last year and is already the superpower of low-carbon industries. It installed more solar in the first quarter than currently exists in France.
China installed a record 23 gigawatts (GW) of windpower in 2014.
Well, how did that go down, Ambrose?
.
BP Energy Review
Since Paris, China’s emissions of CO2 have been going up faster then ever, and are now 14% higher.
The five-year review, COP26, came and went, and China still refuse to actually commit to any reductions in emissions; they even vetoed calls for the phase-out of coal power to be included in the COP26 agreement.
But surely, I hear you ask, all of this renewable energy they are investing in is soon going to displace fossil fuels. Sadly, AEP misled you!
BP Energy Review
The billions invested in wind and solar have barely made a dent in China’s overall energy mix. They still only account for 6% of total energy consumption.
I have no idea whether Xi is worried about climate change or not.
But the facts don’t lie. China know that they cannot run their economy on wind and solar power, and fossil fuels will remain the main source of energy for decades to come.
China has only one priority, and that’s economic growth.
If AEP has not worked that out yet, maybe the Telegraph should replace him with somebody less gullible.
Comments are closed.
NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT 
Maybe the editor of the Telegraph could benefit from a copy of your posting?
Paul, with you 100%. Get A E-P to read Francis Menton’s essay on the numbers behind using hydrogen instead of coking coal in steel making. Published by WUWT and totally convincing. Just forwarded it to the D Tel letters editor to pass on to A E-P in the hope he might read and learn…
Please could you provide a link to that as I’ve not been able to find it on WUWT?
Thanks
Try “The impossibility of bridging…” from the Manhatten Contrarian and on WUWT in last two days; written by Francis Menton. Hope that is enough…
Thanks for the replies but we seem to be at cross-purposes. I had read that article which is all about the economics of green hydrogen as a storage medium for “excess” renewable generation. I did not spot any mention of the relative economics of hydrogen vs coking coal in steelmaking…..?
You could always try plugging “relative economics of hydrogen vs coking coal in steelmaking” into your search engine, Mike.
It gives 277,000 results in Google!
Greentards cannot learn. Much like sociopaths.
Yep – got that right..
Cannot, or more likely do not want too?
“It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.”
Upton Sinclair
There is none so blind as those who will not see
When the history of all this madness is written, AEP will provide an excellent case study about what following a cult can do to your brain. Still to his day, when he stays away from any aspect of climate science or net zero energy transition etc, he comes across as thoughtful, analytical and often very knowledgeable. His understanding of general macro-economics is not trivial. Of course you may not always agree with him – some things will always be matters of opinion – but his experience and understanding shines out and he writes well.
As soon as the memes noted above come into view, however, all this is thrown straight out of the window and he rants ridiculously with religious zeal about how all our lives have to change, and will change, for us to achieve nirvana and save the planet. All the forms of analysis and research that he would otherwise have engaged in are bypassed in his quest to educate us on net zero and the evils of fossil fuels in particular.
Future psychologists will find his type of split personality quite fascinating.
That’s what I have been saying now w.r.t both climate change and COVID. They are both shining historical examples of ‘groupthink’ in action. We need new anti-groupthink laws, processes and guidelines.
Yes, I’ve often pondered his seemingly schizophrenic views. He’s fairly balanced and sometimes even sensible on economics etc., but his deluded rantings on CC seem to be getting worse as ever more fossil fuel is used globally.
Science? Don’t give me your stinking smelly Science.
I love Politics, the more authoritarian the better.
Govern me harder Politics!
“The Chinese Academy and the Politburo do accept it.”
That must be why the Chinese are building coal burning plant as fast as they can, of course!
China have it right: there is no real evidence of any AGW based climate problem. It is a fiction of the computer models and their advocates. Tuvalu and Mauritius should be under water now if the sea levels had risen as forecast in 1992: there is no measurable change in their land area or perimeters despite sea levels continuing their slow rise from the LIA minimum. China are playing with us all and Europe’s “precautionary principal” took the wrong precautions.
I seem to remember that at COP26 China merely promised to “aim” to get to carbon neutrality by some future date. Climate guys embellished that to upgrade the “aim” to a “commitment” which it never was. And so they carried on doing what they do which is far below what is deemed necessary as outlined here.
https://climateactiontracker.org/countries/china/
I’ve suspected for a long time that China knows the truth and planted Maurice Strong in to the UN to form the IPCC. Strong was a lifelong socialist, if not a Marxist who eventually fled to China to avoid a financial scandal. The aim was of course to weaken Western economies by convincing the go Net Zero or something like it. I bet the Chinese can’t believe how well their plan is working.
I’ve got no proof of this but it all fits what we are seeing.
“I bet the Chinese can’t believe how well their plan is working.”
… the Chinese always play the long game !
Yes. Wasn’t it Mao who was asked his view on the success (or otherwise) of the French Revolution and replied that it was too soon to tell?!
Or Napoleon’s dictum, “never interrupt your enemy when he’s making a mistake”, of course.
I don’t know whether we should be angry with AEP for his enthusiastic support for all things Green or feel sorry for him as he truly believes in AGW, catastrophic climate change and presumably the mass extinctions etc that will follow if the world doesn’t stop using fossil fuels. So as a true believer he has to delude himself into thinking that windmills and solar can be a replacement for proper energy sources. His fundamental belief requires him to believe in green hydrogen and compressed air storage for when the wind doesn’t blow – anything to obviate the use of fossil fuels including no doubt unicorns and fairies.
” Whether or not you accept the hypothesis of man-made global warming is irrelevant.”
The use of word “hypothesis” by Evans-Pritchard is a step in the right direction, does he therefore understand and recognise that there is no proof that humans are responsible for dangerous climate change?
Evans-Pritchard is implying that there is no proof that humans are responsible for even the smallest amount of “global warming” i.e. it’s just an hypothesis.
I doubt anyone thinks evil Xi Jinping is by any measure an idiot.
Unlike AEP who likes to demonstrate his idiocy.
Perhaps not intentionally evil.
There are many others, in positions of authority, who spout the same arguments as AEP. Mark Carney, John Kerry, Zac Goldsmith etc etc. These people have long successful careers, and are presumably intelligent, so why do they go along with demonising fossil fuels, when the consequences are just so frightening.
It can only be a conspiracy, possibly engineered by WEF, who knows?
I don’t think there is a correlation between successful careers and intelligence, just look at the public sector where serial failures keep on getting well paid cushy jobs.
The Telegraph has gone downhill since Chris Evans became Editor and no doubt he is supporting AEP’s climate nonsense. I don’t think common sense and accuracy on the Climate issue will return till Evans goes.
That picture, in the article, really does look like a Wind Farm, with all those windmills growing, until they get to the right height, to be picked and placed in the North Sea, to generate all that free Electricity!
Surely the photo is false. I thought windmills have to be about 1200m apart to work correctly. I think the term “farm” should never be used for solar and wind developments. They are industrial and should be called solar/wind power stations.
An alternative view, Alan, is they it is correct to call solar and windmill installations “farms”. Why? Because their main purpose is to farm government/taxpayer subsidies. Indeed, it is doubtful that any one would be built around the UK without the subsidies.
A E-P is an odd ‘un. He’s very clear on how crooked the EU in Brussels is. He was very clear on corruption in Washington in the 90s. Yet he insists on taking the CAGW scam at face value.
Without a solid foundation in Physics, Chemistry and a smattering of Business Sense, the relevant basics laws become just someone else’s opinion.
Reblogged this on Climate Collections.
You could not make it up…thank you