Connect with us

Canadian Energy Centre

COP28 should be the last COP

Published

12 months ago

18 minute read

From Energy Talking Points

CIP By Alex Epstein

COPs are immoral because they deprive billions of the energy they need to prosper. They should be replaced by energy freedom conferences.

Myth: UN COP climate conferences have been a force for good, but COP 28 must lead to far more “climate action.”

Truth: These conferences are immoral because they deprive billions of the energy they need to prosper.

They should be replaced by energy freedom conferences.

Introduction

  • The leadup to the COP 28 climate conference has had a consistent theme: previous COPs have done an okay job of restricting fossil fuels in the name of reducing greenhouse gas emissions, but this one needs to restrict fossil fuel use far faster so as to reach net-zero by 2050.

    This is 180° wrong.1 COP quotes

  • COP 28’s net-zero agenda—i.e., rapid elimination of fossil fuels—is unnecessary, and pursuing it faster would be catastrophic because
    1. Fossil fuels are making us far safer from climate.
    2. Even barely implementing COP’s net-zero agenda has been disastrous.

Fossil fuels are making us far safer from climate

The justification of COP 28’s net-zero agenda is that fossil fuel use is causing an escalating “climate crisis.”

But if we factor in fossil fuels’ many climate benefits and carefully weigh fossil fuels’ climate side-effects, the opposite is true.

  • Factoring in fossil fuels’ “climate mastery benefits”

    One huge benefit we get from fossil fuels is the ability to master climate danger—e.g., fossil-fueled cooling, heating, irrigation—which can potentially neutralize fossil fuels’ negative climate impacts.

  • Example of fossil-fueled climate mastery overwhelming negative impacts: Drought.

    Any contribution of rising CO2 to drought has been overwhelmed by fossil-fueled irrigation and crop transport, which have helped reduce drought deaths by more than 100 times over 100 years as CO2 levels have risen.2 Drought deaths

  • Even though we obviously need to factor in fossil fuels’ climate mastery benefits, our designated experts totally fail to do this.

    E.g., the UN IPCC’s multi-thousand-page reports totally omit fossil-fueled climate mastery! That’s like a polio report omitting the polio vaccine.

  • Carefully weighing fossil fuels’ climate side-effects

    With rising greenhouse gasses we must be even-handed, considering both negatives (more heatwaves) and positives (fewer cold deaths). And we must be precise, not equating some impact with huge impact.

  • Even though we obviously need to factor in both negative and positive impacts of rising CO2 with precision, most designated experts ignore big positives (e.g., global greening) while catastrophizing negatives (e.g., Gore portrays 20 feet sea level rise as imminent when extreme UN projections are 3 feet/100years).3
  • Every report you hear about fossil fuels having made climate more dangerous commits at least one of 2 fallacies: ignoring the enormous climate mastery benefits of fossil fuels or wildly exaggerating negative climate side-effects of fossil fuels. Here’s how the prestigious IPCC does both.4

    Alex Epstein – The IPCC’s perversion of science

    The IPCC's perversion of science

  • If we do factor in fossil fuels’ enormous climate mastery benefits and carefully weigh their climate side-effects, we find that fossil fuels are a tremendous climate net-positive and will remain so in the future.
  • Myth: We are more endangered than ever by climate because of fossil fuels’ CO2 emissions.

    Truth: We have a 98% decline in climate disaster deaths due to our enormous fossil-fueled climate mastery abilities: heating and cooling, infrastructure-building, irrigation, crop transport.5 Climate deaths

  • Myth: Climate-related disaster X shows that fossil fuels are making climate unlivable.

    Truth: If we look at trends, not anecdotes, the drastic decline in extreme weather deaths shows that fossil fuels have made our naturally dangerous climate more livable than ever.6 Storm deaths

  • Myth: Even if climate-related disaster deaths are down, climate-related damages are way up, pointing to a bankrupting climate future.

    Truth: Even though there are many incentives for climate damages to go up—prefs for riskier areas, government bailouts—GDP-adjusted damages are flat.7 Weather disaster losses

  • Myth: Even if we’re safe from climate now, we can expect future emissions to lead to disaster.

    Truth: Since today’s unprecedented safety exists after over 100 years of rising CO2, and with ~1° C warming, we should be skeptical that further CO2 rises will somehow overwhelm us.

  • Myth: Mainstream science shows that rising CO2 is an “existential threat” that will soon cause global catastrophe and then apocalypse.

    Truth: Mainstream science shows that rising CO2 levels will lead to levels of warming and other changes that we can master and flourish with.

  • Myth: Future warming is ominous because heat-related death is already such a catastrophic problem.

    Truth: Even though Earth has gotten 1°C warmer, far more people still die from cold than heat (even in India)! Near-term warming is expected to decrease temperature-related mortality.8 Heat and cold deaths

  • Myth: Future warming is ominous because it will be worst in hot areas.

    Truth: The mainstream view in climate science is that more warming will be concentrated in colder places (Northern latitudes) and at colder times (nighttime) and during colder seasons (winter). Good news.9 Temperature projections

  • Myth: Future warming will accelerate as CO2 levels rise.

    Truth: Mainstream science is unanimous that the “greenhouse effect” is a diminishing effect, with additional CO2 leading to less warning.

    Even IPCC’s most extreme, far-fetched scenarios show warming leveling off.10

  • Myth: We face catastrophically rapid sea level rises, which will destroy and submerge coastal cities.

    Truth: Extreme UN sea level rise projections are just 3 feet in 100 years. Future generations can master that. (We already have 100 million people living below high-tide sea level.)11 Sea level projections

  • Myth: Hurricane intensity is expected to get catastrophically higher as temperatures rise.

    Truth: Mainstream estimates say hurricanes will be less frequent and between 1-10% more intense at 2° C warming. This is not at all catastrophic if we continue our fossil-fueled climate mastery.12 Warming and hurricanes

  • Myth: Science says that if we hit 1.5 or 2° C warming since the 1800s we face catastrophe followed by apocalypse.

    Truth: The 1.5-2° C number is activist fiction. The mastery abilities that have made life far better through 1° C warming will continue to keep us safe.13

Even barely implementing the net-zero agenda has been disastrous.

While COP 28 leaders bemoan how slow their restriction of fossil fuel use in pursuit of net-zero has been, even “slow” restriction has caused a global energy crisis. “Aggressive climate action” = global catastrophe.

  • Myth: Net-zero policies are new and exciting.

    Truth: Net-zero policies have caused catastrophic energy shortages even with minuscule implementation. Just by slowing the growth of fossil fuel use, not even reducing it, they have caused global energy shortages advocates didn’t warn us of.

  • Minuscule net-zero policies causing huge problems:
    • US: frequent power shortages (and some disastrous blackouts) after shutting down fossil fuel power plants. E.g., CA
    • EU: deadly fossil fuel dependence after restricting domestic fossil fuel industry
    • Poor nations: can’t afford fuel due to global restrictions14 Bangladesh blackout
  • The “net-zero” movement, led by UN COPs, is the root cause of today’s energy crisis because it has restricted
    1. fossil fuel investment
    2. fossil fuel production
    3. fossil fuel transport

    This has artificially suppressed fossil fuel supply, leading to high prices and shortages.

  • Suppressing fossil fuel investment

    For fossil fuel energy to remain low-cost requires sufficient investment. But the COP-led net-zero movement has used government and private entities, often under the banner of “ESG,” to punish and suppress it—meaning less fossil fuel supply.15

  • Suppressing fossil fuel production

    For fossil fuel energy to remain low-cost for billions of people requires that producers be free to produce it all around the world.

    The COP-led net-zero movement has opposed it throughout the world, often successfully, increasing prices.16

  • Suppressing fossil fuel transport

    For fossil fuels to remain low-cost for billions of people we need to be able to easily transport them from where they are produced to where they are used. But the COP-led net-zero movement has opposed transportation around the world.17

  • The “net-zero” movement has rationalized its opposition to fossil fuel investment, production, and transport with claims that solar and wind could rapidly replace fossil fuels.

    This has obviously not happened. Despite huge solar and wind subsidies fossil fuel demand has increased.

  • Fossil fuels are a uniquely cost-effective source of energy, providing energy that’s low-cost, reliable, versatile, and scalable to billions of people.

    That’s why overall fossil fuel use is growing. E.g., China, despite its “net-zero” pledges, has 300 new coal plants in the pipeline.18 

  • There was never any reason to expect solar and wind to replace fossil fuels. The world needs far more energy—3 billion people still use less electricity than a US refrigerator—so there’s no reason to expect lower demand for any form of cost-effective energy, let alone ultra-versatile fossil fuels.19
  • Despite claims that solar and wind are rapidly replacing fossil fuels, they provide less than 5% of world energy—only electricity, ⅕ of energy—and, crucially, even that small percentage depends on huge subsidies and reliable (mostly fossil-fueled) power plants.20
  • Solar and wind’s basic problem is unreliability, to the point they can go near zero at any time. Thus they don’t replace reliable power, they parasitize it. This is why they need huge subsidies and why no grid is near 50% solar and wind without parasitism on reliable neighbors.21
  • The popular idea that we can use mostly or only solar and wind with sufficient battery backup is not being tried anywhere because it’s absurd. Batteries are so expensive that just 3 days of global backup using Elon Musk’s Megapacks would cost $570 trillion, about 6X global GDP!22 Tesla megapack costs
  • Scary fact: the “net-zero” movement has caused an energy crisis just by achieving a tiny fraction of its goals. While it has advocated rapidly reducing fossil fuel use, it has only succeeded globally at slowing the growth of fossil fuel use. And even that is catastrophic.
  • If just restricting the growth of fossil fuels in a world that needs far more energy is catastrophic, what would it mean to reduce CO2 emissions by the 50% many “climate emergency” advocates want by 2030 and the 100% they want by 2050?

    Global misery and premature death.

  • The net-zero movement led by COP is particularly dangerous to Africa and other poor regions.

    Consider: ⅓ of the world uses wood and animal dung for heating and cooking. 3 billion use less electricity than a typical American refrigerator.

    Only fossil fuels can provide the energy they need to develop.23 Use of primitive biomass

  • Every prosperous country has developed using fossil fuels.

    No poor country has been able to develop to the point of prosperity without massive fossil fuel use.

    The reason is that development requires energy, and fossil fuels are a uniquely cost-effective, including scalable, source of energy.

  • Africa is the world’s poorest region. Most Africans want rapid development and with it, prosperity.

    This is absolutely achievable. But only by using the proven practices every once-poor place has used to develop and prosper.

    One such practice is large-scale fossil fuel use.

  • In recent decades China and India have used large amounts of low-cost, reliable energy from fossil fuels to rapidly develop.

    Since 1980, India’s fossil fuel use has increased by >700% and China’s by >600%.

    India’s life expectancy increased by 17 years and China’s by 14!24 Development China & India

  • Fossil fuels are so uniquely good at providing low-cost, reliable energy for developing nations that even nations with little or no fossil fuel resources have used fossil fuels to develop and prosper. E.g. South Korea (83% fossil fuels), Japan (85% fossil fuels), Singapore (99% fossil fuels).25 Global FF use
  • The obvious path for African development and prosperity is to use fossil fuel whenever it’s the most cost-effective option, which is most of the time, and certainly to responsibly produce the significant fossil fuel resources that exist in Africa.

    Yet COP tells Africa to forego fossil fuels.

  • Given that every prosperous place on Earth has depended on and continues to depend on massive fossil fuel use, and that attempts to replace fossil fuels with solar and wind are failing, the push for Africa to adopt net-zero—aka fossil fuel elimination—is a death sentence for African development.

The alternative to the unnecessary and destructive COPs: energy freedom conferences

Instead of focusing on rapidly eliminating fossil fuel use, we should focus on rapidly liberating energy production and use of all kinds of energy via energy freedom policies.

  • What are “energy freedom policies”?

    Government actions to protect the ability of producers to produce all forms of energy and consumers to use all forms of energy, so long as they don’t engage in reasonably preventable pollution or endangerment of others.

  • Energy freedom policies include:
    • Protecting the freedom to develop fossil fuels and other forms of energy. E.g., deep geothermal development.
    • Protecting the freedom to use fossil fuels and all other forms of energy. E.g., decriminalizing nuclear.
  • Energy freedom policies are more likely to lead to long-term emissions reductions, because they accelerate the rate at which nuclear and other alternatives become globally cost-competitive. (The only moral and practical way to reduce global emissions.)26 China & India using coal
  • Fact: the 2 biggest instances of CO2 reduction have come from energy freedom policies:
    • Nuclear: Freedom led to cost-effective and scalable nuclear power until the “green” movement virtually criminalized it.
    • Gas: Freedom led to significant substitution of gas vs. coal.
  • Alternative energy policy has been dominated by the “green energy” movement, which is an outgrowth of the anti-development green movement. This movement is hostile to all development because of development’s impact on nature, and therefore is hostile to every form of cost-effective energy.
  • COP’ leaders’ enthusiastic support for solar and wind is phony. Just as they oppose fossil fuels, nuclear, and hydro for their impact, in practice they oppose the massive mining, construction, and transmission-line-building “green energy” requires.27
  • The obvious path forward for the world is energy freedom: the freedom to produce and use all cost-effective sources of energy—including, essentially, fossil fuels—which means rejecting all net-zero targets.

    We need courageous leaders who will withdraw from the Paris Agreement.

PS Here’s my friend Jusper Machogu’s message to COP.

Related Topics:

Todayville is a digital media and technology company. We profile unique stories and events in our community. Register and promote your community event for free.

Follow Author

More from this author
Addictions / 2 hours ago

Ontario to restrict Canadian government’s supervised drug sites, shift focus to helping addicts

Alberta / 5 hours ago

Alberta’s fiscal update projects budget surplus, but fiscal fortunes could quickly turn

Business / 7 hours ago

Trump’s government efficiency department plans to cut $500 Billion in unauthorized expenditures, including funding for Planned Parenthood

Canadian Energy Centre

Ignoring the global picture and making Canadians poorer: Energy and economic leaders on Ottawa’s oil and gas emissions cap

Published on November 13, 2024

By

From the Canadian Energy Centre

By Deborah Jaremko

The federal government’s draft rules to cap emissions – and by credible analysis, production – from Canada’s oil and gas sector will make Canadians poorer, won’t reduce world emissions, and are a “slap in the face” to Indigenous communities.

That’s the view of several leaders in energy and the economy calling out the negative consequences of Ottawa’s new regulations, which were announced on November 4.

Here’s a selection of what they have to say.

Goldy Hyder, CEO, Business Council of Canada

“At a time when Canada’s economy is stalling, imposing an oil and gas emissions cap will only make Canadians poorer. Strong climate action requires a strong economy. This cap will leave us with neither.”

Deborah Yedlin, CEO, Calgary Chamber of Commerce

“Canada would stand as the only country in the world to move forward with a self-imposed emissions cap.

“Given that our economic growth numbers have been underwhelming–and our per-person productivity lags that of the United States by $20,000, one would expect the government to be more focused on supporting sectors that are critical to economic growth rather than passing legislation that will compromise investment and hamper our growth prospects.

“…If the Canadian government wants to reduce emissions, it should follow the private sector’s lead – and strong track record – and withdraw the emissions cap.”

Stephen Buffalo, CEO, Indian Resources Council of Canada

“Over the past four decades, Canadian governments urged and promoted Indigenous peoples to engage in the natural resource economy. We were anxious to break our dependence on government and, even more, to exercise our treaty and Indigenous rights to build our own economies. We jumped in with far more enthusiasm and commitment than most Canadians appreciate.

“And now, in a bid to make Canada look ecologically virtuous on the world stage, the Liberal government imposed further restrictions on the oil and gas sector. This is happening as Indigenous engagement, employment and equity investment are growing and at a time when our communities have had their first taste of real and sustainable prosperity since the newcomers killed off all the buffalo. Thanks for nothing.”

Trevor Tombe, professor of economics, University of Calgary School of Public Policy

“[The emissions cap] is a wedge issue that’s going to be especially popular in Quebec. And I don’t think the [federal government’s] thinking goes much further than that.”

Kendall Dilling, president, Pathways Alliance

“A decrease in Canadian production has no impact on global demand – meaning another country’s oil will simply fill the void and the intended impact of the emissions cap is negated at a global level.

“An emissions cap gives industry less – not more – of the certainty needed to make long-term investments that create jobs, economic growth and tax revenues for all levels of government. It simply makes Canada less competitive.”

Michael Belenkie, CEO, Advantage Energy

“Canada’s emissions profile is not unusual. What’s unusual about Canada and our emissions is we seem to be the only exporting nation of the world that is willing to self-immolate. All we’re doing is we’re shutting ourselves down at our own expense and watching global emissions increase.”

Kevin Krausert, CEO and co-founder, Avatar Innovations

“The emissions cap risks delaying – if not derailing – a whole suite of emissions-reduction technology projects. The reason is simple: it has added yet another layer of uncertainty and complexity on already skinny investment decisions by weakening the most effective mechanism Canada has in place.

“…After nearly 15 years of experimenting in a complicated regulatory system, we’ve finally landed on one of the most globally effective and fungible carbon markets in the world in Alberta, called TIER.

“What the federal emissions cap has done is introduce uncertainty about the future of TIER. That’s because the cap has its own newly created cap-and-trade system. It takes TIER’s 15 years of experience and market knowledge and either duplicates functioning markets or creates a whole new market that may take another 15 years to get right.”

Dennis Darby, CEO, Canadian Manufacturers & Exporters

“The federal government’s announcement of a cap and trade on oil and gas emissions threatens Canada’s energy trade, economic interests, and national unity.”

Adam Legge, president, Business Council of Alberta

“The oil and gas emissions cap is a discriminatory and divisive policy proposal—the epitome of bad public policy. It will likely cap Canadian prosperity—billions of dollars and tens of thousands of jobs lost for no benefit, and the burden will be borne largely in one region and one sector.”

Lisa Baiton, CEO, Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers

“The result would be lower production, lower exports, fewer jobs, lower GDP and lower revenues to governments to fund critical infrastructure and social programs on which Canadians rely.”

Statement, Canadian Association of Energy Contractors

“The Trudeau government does not care about Canadian blue-collar, middle-class energy workers who rely on the industry to support their families. It does not care about small, medium and Indigenous energy service businesses that operate in rural and remote communities across Western Canada. And it certainly does not care about supporting our allies who are desperate for oil and gas from sources other than regimes such as Russia or Iran.”

Peter Tertzakian, executive director, ARC Energy Research Institute

“Focusing on a single sector while ignoring others is problematic because each tonne of emissions has the same impact on climate change, regardless of its source. It makes little sense to impose potentially higher economic burdens on one economic sector when you could reduce emissions elsewhere at a lower cost.”

Shannon Joseph, chair, Energy for a Secure Future

“Canada continues to pursue its climate policy in a vacuum, ignoring the big picture of global emissions. This places at risk our international interests, tens of thousands of good paying jobs and important progress on reconciliation.”

Adam Sweet, director for Western Canada, Clean Prosperity

“Layering on a new cap-and-trade system for oil and gas producers adds uncertainty and regulatory complexity that risks undermining investment in emissions reductions just as we’re getting close to landing significant new decarbonization projects here in Alberta.”

Continue Reading

Alberta

For second year in a row, Alberta oil and gas companies spend more than required on cleanup

Published on November 7, 2024

By

From the Canadian Energy Center

By Grady Semmens

$923 million spent cleaning up inactive wells, sites and pipelines in 2023

As a business owner, Ryan Smith values few things more than predictability when it comes to the oil and gas market and the demand for his company’s services.

That’s why knowing that next year in Alberta, the regulator requires at least $750 million worth of work cleaning up inactive oil and gas wells and other legacy energy infrastructure is tremendously helpful for the CEO of Calgary-based 360 Engineering & Environmental Consulting.

“Having a minimum spend in place for the province makes the market more predictable and consistent, which in turn helps our clients and our business plan for the future, which is a good thing,” says Smith, whose company has completed more than 5,000 site closure activities in Canada and internationally since 2015.

“Site closure has really emerged as a growth market over the last decade, especially in Western Canada where the regulatory systems for oil and gas are more advanced than anywhere else we are exposed to. It is an integral part of the energy lifecycle, and if it is done well it adds a lot of value to the industry.”

The Alberta Energy Regulator (AER) introduced an industry-wide minimum “closure” spending requirement in 2022, part of Alberta’s Inventory Reduction Program to accelerate the remediation of inactive oil and gas wells, facilities and pipelines across the province.

The mandatory quota determines the minimum level of work a company must conduct primarily to decommission and reclaim a proportion of its inactive inventory.

Inactive wells are defined as those that have not been used for six months or a year, depending on what they are being used for. When a company decides that they will not reactivate an inactive well they decommission it through a process called abandonment.

A well is considered successfully abandoned after it is cleaned, plugged with cement, cut to a minimum of one meter below the surface and covered with a vented cap. After abandonment comes remediation and reclamation, where the land around the well is returned to the equivalent of its original state.

The first two years under the new rules saw Alberta’s energy industry significantly exceed the minimum closure requirements.

In 2022, companies spent more than $696 million, about 65 per cent more than the initial threshold of $422 million. The AER increased the minimum spend to $700 million in 2023, which producers surpassed by 22 per cent with total expenditures of $923 million.

The 2024 minimum remains at $700 million, while in July the regulator announced that the minimum spend for 2025 was raised to $750 million.

This closure work does not include remediation of oil sands mining sites, which is handled under the Mine Financial Security Program, nor does it include the closure of orphan wells (wells without a legal owner) managed by the industry-funded Orphan Well Association.

Gurpreet Lail, CEO of Enserva, an industry association representing energy service companies, suppliers and manufacturers, says there was an initial rush of closure work when the quotas were first put in place, but activity has since become more even as companies develop long-term closure plans.

“A lot of the low-lying fruit has been taken care of, so now companies are working on more complex closure files that take more time and more money,” Lail says.

Facility owners say that Alberta’s rules provide direction for planning closure and remediation work, which in the past may have been put on hold due to the ups and downs of the oil and gas market.

“When commodity prices are up, everyone is focused on drilling more wells and when prices are down, budgets are strained for doing work that doesn’t bring in revenue. Having a minimum spend makes sure closure work happens every year and ensures there is longer-term progress,” says Deborah Borthwick, asset retirement coordinator for Birchcliff Energy, an oil and natural gas producer focused in Alberta.

Over the last few years, Birchcliff has budgeted more than $3 million for annual facility closure work, far above its required minimum spend.

The company completed 11 well abandonments and decommissioned 23 facilities and pipelines in 2022, according to its latest environmental, social and governance report.

Borthwick says having the closure quota for 2025 already set has allowed it to plan ahead and line up the necessary service companies well in advance for next year’s remediation work.

Continue Reading

Trending

X