Poland must fight German-French attempts to prevent shale gas exploration

Poland must not let this smiling former activist prevent its energy future!

One must hope that the Polish EU Presidency succeeds in its two central goals: blocking all attempts to impose EU-level regulation of the shale gas industry, and opposing any tightening of EU´s carbon emission targets.

Kash Burchett, energy analyst at Datamonitor, describes the challenges ahead for Poland:

The other defining feature of the Polish rotating presidency will be staunch opposition to EU-level regulation of the nascent European shale gas sector, notably the practice of hydraulic fracturing (the process by which shale gas is recovered from the ground). Calls to regulate (or even ban) hydraulic fracturing have gained surprising momentum surprisingly quickly in recent months. France has imposed an indefinite moratorium on its shale gas projects following a sudden surge in public opposition to hydraulic fracturing, amid fears of water table contamination (seeFrance: 18 April 2011:). This prompted a fierce rebuke from the Polish energy establishment (including Poland's state-owned oil and gas company, Polskie Gornictwo Naftowe i Gazownictwo SA--PGNiG), which sees the country's potentially significant shale gas reserves as a way out of dependence on Russia for gas imports (seePoland: 13 May 2011:).
Yet despite Poland's warnings to the EU against meddling in internal energy policy, consensus in the headquarters in Brussels behind hydraulic fracturing legislation appears to be growing. In particular, an influential member of the European parliament (MEP) Jo Leinen is said to be preparing a new "Energy Quality Directive" that would mean fuels with adverse environmental impacts--such as shale gas and oil from tar sands--were stringently regulated within the EU. The German Social Democratic Party MEP chairs the EU parliamentary body that oversees environmental regulation and thus holds the power to bring forward proposals on new laws.
Polish policymakers can be expected to oppose any such moves tooth and nail. Although coal is set to continue to dominate the Polish generation mix in the near term the government clearly expects shale gas to alter the energy landscape radically in the next decade. Conventional gas production in Poland is negligible and although the Swinoujscie LNG terminal on the Baltic Coast will add 5 bcm of import capacity from 2014, increased gas demand from industry and residencies will still imply increased reliance on Russian gas imports--anathema to policymakers. Consequently, the Polish government has sought to promote the development of domestic unconventional reserves and is bullish on the expected timeline for domestic production.
Indeed, a minister suggested recently that research and development should qualify as a project of European interest, arguing shale development would be crucial to Europe's future energy security of supply, especially in the wake of a stalled European nuclear renaissance (seePoland: 9 May 2011:). This reveals how Poland's support for shale will manifest itself in its rotating presidential policy: drawing attention to Europe's increasing reliance on Russian gas imports. Despite a relative rapprochement in Russo-Polish energy relations in recent months, the government can still be expected to use its time at the Council's helm to talk up the collective risks of dependence on Russian energy exports, as a means to justify implicitly shale gas development irrespective of potential environmental costs.

Read the entire article here

Indeed, the German socialist Jo Leinen is doing his best in order to prevent Poland and Europe in general from getting rid of the dependence on Russian energy. The real reason why Leinen is against Polish and other European shale gas exploration is that he wants to block anything that would be a threat to the Russian-German Nord Stream gas pipeline. The Chairman of the board of Nord Stream (picked by Vladimir Putin), former chancellor Gerhard Schröder, is an old supporter of Leinen´s, already from the time (1981) when "container-Jo" climbed a container in order to coordinate a violent anti-nuclear power protest action. When charges were raised against Leinen in a German court, his influential socialist friend Gerard Schröder came to his help. The charges were later dropped.

Now it is payback time for Leinen; the Putin-Schröder pipeline - with former Stasi spy Matthias Warnig as CEO - must not be allowed to fail, even at the expense of  Europe´s energy security and the enormous Polisch economic interests. 

The danger is that Germany, which for the time being is controlled by green enviro-fundamentalists, and France, which wants to sell nuclear electricity to the soon almost "powerless" Germany, will try to force the European Union to make shale gas exploration de facto impossible.

The Polish government - and other sensible governments in Europe - must not let Leinen and the shady Russian-German-(French) axis stop the shale gas revolution in Europe. No price should be too high for Poland on this matter - not even membership in the EU! 

And there is an added bonus for those who believe in human caused global warming: shale gas is an excellent choice with regard to the environment, too.

PS

Here is another recent example of Jo Leinen´s radical socialist agenda:

The establishment of a world parliament elected by the world’s population was proposed at an event

at the World Social Forum in Dakar, Senegal. “A democratic and representative world parliament would be

an institution with unprecedented political legitimacy. It is needed to bring globalization under democratic

MAY 2011 World Federalist Movement - Canada

www.worldfederalistscanada.org

If there is a "world parliament", then clearly there must be a "world government", too! The next step for Leinen is probably to call for a global revolution in order to achieve this dream of his. Leinen and other former activists (like former maoist José Barroso) should be stopped before they ruin what is left of a functioning Europe!

control,” explained Jo Leinen, one of the speakers at the event

Global parliament urged at World Social Forum

"Rent-a-roof" solar panels - another renewable energy scam exposed

´three quarters of solar panel salesmen used "dodgy sales tactics" and misled customers on potential savings´

The world of renewable energy has already for years been associated with half truths, misleading marketing, scams and outright criminal activities. The Telegraph has now exposed the latest scam:

 Solar panels 'save just £70 a year'

The benefits of solar panels have been called into question after the Energy Savings Trust (EST) reduced the estimated saving on electricity bills to just £70 a year.

The EST had previously estimated the savings to households at around £120 annually, but after trials carried out by the government-funded Carbon Trust, the energy advice group amended its estimates.

The admission will be a blow to the growing number of "rent-a-roof" schemes, where households receive free solar panels in return for savings on their electricity bill. However, as many of these schemes lock households into a 25-year contract, many householders are expected to be reluctant to take part for such paltry savings.

Under "rent-a-roof" schemes, the company that installs the panels, which typically cost around £14,000, keeps the income generated from selling the surplus energy back to the grid via the Government's feed-in tariff (FIT) scheme – typically earning more than £1,000 each year.

Launched last year, the FIT scheme means that home owners who install solar panels will receive money for any energy that is generated at home. Payments are index-linked for 25 years and at present generate 41.3p for every kilowatt hour produced by the system, plus an additional 3p per kWh as an "export tariff".

With free solar panel installations, the company that owns the panels will receive the income from the generation and export tariffs from your panels, while the homeowner will benefit from reduced energy bills.

----
The news comes after a Which? investigation found that three quarters of solar panel salesmen used "dodgy sales tactics" and misled customers on potential savings. In an undercover investigation, the consumer group found that 75pc of companies overestimated how much energy the solar panels would produce and most of them underestimated how long it would take for the system to pay for itself.
Which? found that the Government's rules to work out energy output did not take into account key factors such as where people live.

Read the entire article here

The Energy Choices website has some additional information about the "rent-a-roof" scam:

Back in April 2010, Which? warned consumers after conducting an undercover investigation.
The consumer champion accused some rent-a-roof companies of mis-selling and said that over 70% of the solar panel installers had overstated the potential savings of having panels fitted.
At the time, Peter Vicary-Smith, chief executive at Which?, said: “Most of the firms in our investigation behaved like true cowboys - they promised huge savings that bore no relation to reality, and some really piled pressure on the homeowner to sign up immediately or risk losing a one-off ‘special offer’.”

PS

Usually customers are not properly told about additional administration charges which make the "saving" even less. The companies which install the panels will of course take almost all of the profit. They can take advantage of the govenment´s highly dubious "feed in tariff" scheme, which guarantees installers 41,3 p per kilowatt-hour of electricity generated by the solar panels. Without these "feed in tariffs" - subsidised by the taxpayers - nobody would be able to make any money from solar power.  All this madness in the name of non-existent human caused climate change!

American professors: Newspapers should not try to be objective on global warming

The Reuters news agency continues its climate change crusade. This time they have given two European warmist newspaper editors, Dutch Peter Vandermeersch and Belgian Wouter Verschelden, an opportunity to praise European media and criticize US media for being too friendly to opponents of the climate change orthodoxy:

For Peter Vandermeersch, editor-in chief at the traditionally conservative daily NRC Handelsblad in Rotterdam, The Netherlands, there is no debate about climate change.
"Absolutely, that's a given," he said. "The conviction has grown that climate change does exist, and that humans play a major role in how it evolves."
"There's almost no discussion about it," agreed Wouter Verschelden, editor-in-chief at the progressive daily De Morgen in Brussels, Belgium. "The nonbelievers have been marginalized, and they aren't taken seriously anymore. We don't have to convince our readers anymore of the fact that there is climate change, and that it's caused by humans."


According to Vandermeersch and Verschelden, who are both alumni of Columbia University's vaunted Journalism School in New York, American news media still make the mistake of giving climate skeptics a disproportionate voice and perpetuating a debate that has long been settled among scientists.
"In a sense, you're lying to your readers," says Verschelden. "You're creating a 'he said, she said' story, and looking for an argument that just doesn't always exist."

It has apparently not been difficult for the writer, Tom Vandyck, to get hold of two alarmist professors, who wholeheartedly share the the view of these European climate change believers:

the Europeans' position has merit, says Max Boykoff, a professor at the University of Colorado's Center for Science and Technology Policy Research in Boulder, who has done extensive research on the issue.
"Within the top U.S. daily print media there has been this reliance on the journalistic norm of balanced reporting that worked to the detriment of accurately reporting whether or not humans contribute to climate change," he said. "I found over in the U.K. press, that hasn't been as much of an influence — in fact, that they’ve been reporting it quite accurately."
"I think the objectivity standard that U.S. newspapers apply has probably outlived its usefulness on this particular issue," said Mark Neuzil, a professor of environmental communication at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, Minnesota. "At some point you're not being a decent and good journalist when you're giving equal weight when 97 percent say one thing, and 3 percent say the other, unless you point that out really clearly."

Read the entire article here

The two naive Dutch and Belgian editors are, of course, typical representatives of the politically correct, often anti-American views of many mainstream European dailies. And the two American professors are shining examples of what´s wrong with the academic establishment in the US today. All four have a very strong common denominator: utter stupidity. They just do not know what they are talking about.

If you want to send professor Boykoff a message, he can be reached here:
boykoff@colorado.edu

Neuzil can be reached here:
mrneuzil@stthomas.edu

The new Greenpeace yacht afloat - at least for the time being

Greenpeace´s new €23 million  "don´t call it a yacht" Rainbow Warrior III has gone afloat in Germany. Among the greenie cultists present, was "longtime Greenpeace crew member" Rien Achtenberg, who seems to have gone into a state of extacy at the event:

"As I walked into the ship construction hall, and saw the new Rainbow Warrior standing outside, beyond the partly opened door on a high platform, I felt a shiver of emotion and felt immensely proud and impressed by her - and Greenpeace as an organisation. She looked shiny and new (of course) in her familiar green paint, the dove and the rainbow all carefully already painted on her hull".

And maybe not without a reason, because Achtenberg´s successors on board the new yacht will enjoy the comfort of a luxury yacht. Here are some of the amenities the sailing cultists will be able to enjoy while on board:

"One of the more insistent requirements, particularly from long-term crew members with the scent of old voyages to the Arctic or up the Amazon still vivid, was for a shower in each double cabin, as opposed to the scant communal facilities that had characterised previous boats.
Keen attention was also paid to ... the galley facilities" (= a gourmet kitchen)

(Of course the single cabins also have a private bathroom)

And this is how Greenpeace describes the beds for the crew:

"Not content with a bed these activists will also have a mattress to lie on! It does make sleeping a lot more comfortable and the days of lying in a hammock smoking ciragarettes and talking about the war are long gone"

It is easy to believe what Greenpeace says; the price of one mattress is 300 euros (about 440 USD). You can still "buy" these luxurious mattresses for the crew here, if you think it´s a great idea that these cultists should sleep well while on board.

And, of course, when the greenies are not out e.g. harassing legal oil exploration workers, they can relax by watching Al Gore´s films on 900 euro (1300 USD) 46 inch HD flat screen TVs.

A number of the yacht´s interior details appear to be somewhat less expensive  - toilet roll holders e.g. cost only 10 euros. Cheap imports from China or Vietnam (hopefully not made by children)?

Of course, the ships more warship-like features are state of the art:

the advanced technology that will drop smaller inflatable speedboats from its sides at record speed for the quickest possible advance or getaway; the helicopter pad that can be created on deck; the below-deck radio room with its reinforced door built to allow at least 30 minutes transmission time in the event of the ship being boarded – as it has been in the past – by SAS-style commandos wielding axes

Maybe the "activists" need the advertised 75 euro "camouflage jackets" when they go hiding into the radio room?

Below deck the ship will house one of the most sophisticated communications operations anywhere on the ocean.

Read the entire article here

PS
In order to uphold the overall  level of luxury on board, a Michelin star chef to head the galley operation would appear to be the obvious choice. Gone are the days when activists could survive for weeks on "Babu´s palak paneer things"!

Merkel´s agenda today: "A dance to the music of the enviro-fundamentalists"

 

Merkel´s agenda today: A dance to the music of the enviro-fundamentalists

There were great expectations, in Germany and internationally, when Angela Merkel took over as Chancellor of Europe´s most powerful country. However, things did not turn out so well for Frau Merkel: A growing number of  Germans - as well as international observers - are frustrated with her lack of leadership. The main source of frustration is probably Merkel´s total cave in to the "green" enviro-fundamentalists, who now appear to have taken over Germany.

One of  Merkel´s former supporters, conservative essayist Cora Stephan, a regular contributor to Die Welt and the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, finally lost her patience with the Chancellor, and wrote a book "Angela Merkel. Ein Irrtum" (Angela MerkelA Mistake), which has been quite well received and reached the top lists for political books in Germany.

P. Gosselin describes what Stephan has to say about Merkel´s top climate change adviser:

Ms Stephan is concerned about Schellnhuber’s extreme views and has good reason for that. She begins by quoting Schellnhuber on freedom of science and democracy:

Core questions such as these, and questions on human rights, deserve a place in the Constitution. That would mean there would be judges who would vote against the majority when it is right to do so in regards to our constitutional consensus. This would require a very few ethical elites.”

Stephan puts Schellnhuber’s dictator-speak in plain language:

On the subject of climate change, democracy has to be switched off in favor of control by ethical elitists because most people are too removed from the long-term future (and its possibly dying children with whom Schellnhuber likes to threaten us.”

Schellnhuber claims that a few select elites (like his bozos at the PIK) can see 100+ years into the future and to assess the impacts that our actions today will have. The guy is way beyond megalomania. Either we do as he tells us, or millions of future children will die. (Ironically, much of what Schellnhuber proposes means millions of children would be denied birth, so I’m not sure how unborn lives could be saved).
Ms Stephan calls Schellnhuber’s type of climate activism an attempt at creating an “above the law state of emergency”, and involves a new climate religion operated by “high priests”:

The new religion promises the Last Judgement already today – that is we endeavour one last huge and dramatic effort to save humanity from a well-deserved downfall. As is the case with other religions, the best is repentance, humility and self-restriction – preferably through emission payments without end.”

Unfortunately, Merkel appears to be deaf to the growing criticism. During the weekend she was again busy preaching the climate change agenda for a group other climate religion believers in Berlin:

"We are determined to move forward boldly," she said, noting that the current voluntary reductions of carbon dioxide were insufficient. Climate-damaging emissions were a worrying development and talks had so far been progressing at a snail's pace, Merkel said.

Top Australian climatologist: Extreme weather NOT caused by global warming

Another eminent climate scientist, Australian professor Neville Nicholls, has confirmed that the extreme weather events of the last few years were NOT caused by global warming:

CANBERRA, July 4 (Xinhua) -- The remarkable weather extremes of the past decade were not directly caused by global warming, President of the Australian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society Professor Neville Nicholls said on Monday.
Professor Nicholls, who is one of Australia's most eminent climate scientists, said such extremes as the heat wave in Victoria of Australia that accompanied the Black Saturday bushfires, similar heat in Pakistan and Russia, and the devastating tornado ripped through parts of the U.S. earlier this year are, in many cases, unprecedented in modern times.
However, he said that global warming should not be blamed for these events.
"Whenever these things happen, people ask 'was it caused by global warming?' The short answer is no," Professor Nicholls told the International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics (IUGG) conference in Melbourne on Monday.
"They were all caused by well-known and reasonably well- understood weather and climate events, even with some predictability."

However, professor  Nicholls would proably have put his career at risk, had he not made this required bow to the climate change religion:

While global warming does not cause the weird weather, Professor Nicholls acknowledges its part in making some of the extreme weather more severe.
"Global warming doesn't produce these events, however, it's pretty hard to avoid the conclusion that global warming has exacerbated the frequency and the intensity of these heat waves," Prof. Nicholls, who is also a Monash University professorial fellow, said

Read the entire article here

Strauss-Kahn is no contemporary Casanova

Strauss-Kahn is definitely not a contemporary Casanova

In France people seem to think that Dominique Strauss-Kahn still has a political future:

Despite all this, a poll published by Harris Interactive on Sunday showed a majority of 49 percent of French people now approved of Strauss-Kahn returning to politics, with 45 percent opposed.

Read the entire article here

Important people in the French socialist party now even talk about the possibility of a Strauss-Kahn candidacy in the forthcoming presidential elections. It appears that DSK is now looked upon as some kind of a contemporary Casanova in his native country.
However, the French socialists might do well to think twice about his candidacy. Strauss-Kahn is neither a Casanova, nor a very honorable man, if what the New York Post writes is true:

Multiple versions have emerged of what happened next, but nobody disputes that the 32-year-old maid performed oral sex on the Frenchman known as "the Great Seducer."
Sources now tell The Post that when the two were finished, the woman demanded cash from Strauss-Kahn -- but he refused to pay.

If this socialist could afford a $3000 a night suit (courtesy of his rich wife) in a luxury New York hotel, he should have been able to pay the maid for the sex he bought.

EU climate change inquisition in action: Polish heretic repents

An auto-da-fé  was the ritual of public penance of condemned heretics and apostates that took place when the Portuguese (or Spanish) Inquisition had decided their punishment, followed by the execution by the civil authorities of the sentences imposed. This time the Portuguese Grand Inquisitor J.M. Barroso did not have to impose the most severe punishment on the Polish heretic J. Lewandowski

(image by wikipedia)

The high priests of the climate global warming cult did not waste any time in silencing a prominent Polish heretic, who had dared to question one of its holiest dogmas.
The accelerated process started a few of days ago with the Dutch jesuit Joris den Blanken demanding immediate and forceful action against the EU budget commissioner Janusz Lewandowski:  

"The commissioner should fully explain himself," Joris den Blanken a Greenpeace spokesman told the EurActiv website. "If not, the consequences for his role in the European Commission should be considered."

Based on the report from den Blanken, the council of the Brussels high priests issued a strong warning to the heretic, and demanded an immediate public apology.

Today the accused Lewandowski issued the following statement on his website:

In order to clarify misunderstandings, built on unauthorised quotations, taken out of context, here is my true position on the question of climate change:

• I acknowledge the fact that the overwhelming majority of scientific studies confirm the phenomenon of global warming.
• I have never said that climate change is not taking place neither that man made emissions are not contributing to this phenomenon.
• As a member of the College of Commissioners I fully subscribe to the Europe 2020 strategy, to its environmental goals as well as to the agreed CO2 reduction targets. I see it as my responsibility to ensure adequate funding in support of the Europe 2020 strategy in all its aspects in the EU budget.
• I do strongly believe that the success in efforts to stop climate change would depend on the concerted international actions including the biggest global emitters of CO2.

This was the original heresy:

"There is a view breaking through that the theory of coal-generated power as the main culprit of global warming is seriously in doubt"."Moreover, more and more often there is a question mark put over global warming as such."

Janusz Lewandowski
(in Polish magazine Novy Przemysl, May 2011)

PS

As can be seen, not so much has changed in Europe since the first Inquisition .....
In the case of this heretic, the inquisitors did not actually have to work very hard in order to get him to repent. The word from Brussels is however, that should the crime be repeated by Lewandowski or any other Commission heretics, a much more severe punishment is to be imposed.