Lima Climate Conference: It Takes a Village to Demonstrate the Failure

The real failure of the Lima Climate Conference is encapsulated in the fine print of one of the conference reports.  I do not mean the failure by the political agents of change to effect any substantive agreement limiting carbon emissions – by which is meant an agreement to limit the use of fossil fuels to produce energy – I do mean the utter failure to stop and realise what an agreement to curtail fossil fuel use would have meant.

That failure is encapsulated in this short report describing the conference’s set-up:

The talks are taking place in a vast temporary village constructed on the site of the Peruvian military headquarters.
    Organisers rejected powering the village with solar panels on the grounds they were too unreliable, while efforts to hook the site up to the national grid – which is half-fed by renewable energy – failed due to technical problems… [Instead] the conference has remained overtly reliant on fossil fuels, in the form of diesel generators. [Emphasis mine.]

That, in microcosm, is the problem facing the entire planet if fossil fuels are made illegal: Powering the village with solar panels was  too unreliable. Instead the conference has remained overtly reliant on fossil fuels, in the form of diesel generators.

You might say that it takes a village to make the point that affects the whole world: that so-called renewable energy is not only too unreliable to rely on, it is both too premature and too wrong to force human industry worldwide to abandon a reliable form of energy production for one that can’t even power this temporary ant’s nest.

Because human civilisation desperately needs to keep the reliable energy it has, and to keep producing more of it. Human ingenuity does not take a clean planet and make it dirty; it takes a take a naturally dirty environment and makes it clean -- a naturally dangerous climate and makes it safer.

The sun and wind are intermittent, unreliable fuels that always need backup from a reliable source of energy — usually fossil fuels; and, fossil fuels are the key to improving the quality of life for billions of people in the developing world. Calls to “get off fossil fuels” are calls to degrade the lives of innocent people who merely want the same opportunities we enjoy in the West.

So-called renewable energy is neither reliable nor economically sustainable – nor even workable without reliable fossil fuel generation when wind and sun are not around. If the world’s greatest apostles for renewable energy still can’t make it work reliably, then isn’t it a bit premature (not mention immoral) to demand the billions of people be forced to switch?

RELATED READING:

• “So, what did we get out of the LIMA conference other than a big carbon footprint? It depends on who is reporting it, but nothing comes to mind.”
  So, what did we get out of the LIMA conference other than a big carbon footprint?  - Bob Greene, JUNK SCIENCE
• “Warmists slam ‘lacklustre’ Lima climate deal: ‘Little scientific relevancy…half-baked…bare minimum… political expediency won’”
  Observers slam 'lackluster' Lima climate deal – YAHOO NEWS
• “Press coverage has been along predictable lines. There is one aspect that goes unsaid: almost everyone notes how each of the COPs result in an utter failure. Christopher Booker notes for example how every conference throws up as a ‘breakthrough’,  ‘a meaningless document that commits no one to anything.’
      “However we need to be reminded – this is the best thing that can happen. It is a ‘failure’ for the UN climate mechanism sure but it is the world saved for another year.”
  Is Lima a Failure – SHUB NIGGURATH CLIMATE
• “Two weeks ago, the New York Times warned that humankind faces “extinction” unless the international community reached a diplomatic breakthrough at the 20th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in Lima Peru. Despite these dire stakes, the Lima climate confab wrapped up this weekend  with yet another empty agreement—thereby dooming human civilization, if the Grey Lady is to be believed—and not a single Sunday network news talk show gave any airtime to COP-20. Indeed, nary a single powerhouse roundtable even mentioned climate change. Thus, it would seem that networks give as little priority to climate change as do American voters. This is why opposition to climate change mitigation policies is healthily bipartisan in the U.S. Congress.”
  Weekend Media Roundup: COP-20 Ignored by Sunday Talkies, North Dakota Oil Regulations, and Video of Greenpeace Activists Damaging World Heritage Site – William Yeatman, GLOBAL WARMING.ORG
• “’'Negotiators and Secretary General continue to ignore scientists and public opinion. ‘Climate change negotiators in Lima, Peru seemed oblivious to the findings of the UN’s ongoing My World survey about what the people of the world really want the agency to focus on,’ said Tom Harris, executive director of the …  International Climate Science Coalition (ICSC). ‘The seven million people polled so far indicate that, in comparison with issues such as education, health care, jobs, and energy, they care very little about climate change.’
      “’Perhaps most out of touch with reality is the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon himself who on Wednesday asserted that climate change remains his ‘top priority’,’ continued Harris.
      “ICSC chief science advisor, Professor Bob Carter, former Head of the Department of Earth Sciences at James Cook University in Australia explained, ‘That ‘action taken on climate change’ rates dead last among the 16 priorities the public wants to see action on is not surprising.  They understand that the remote possibility of human activity contributing to climate problems decades from now is unimportant in comparison with the very real problems faced by the world’s poor today.’”
  Time For the U.N. to Get Out of Climate Change: U.N. Should Concentrate on What People Want -  Tom Harris, Executive Director, INERNATIONAL CLIMATE SCIENCE COALITION
• “Despite millions in subsidies and government loans, solar power is projected to remain a tiny portion of overall electricity generation in the U.S., according to Energy Department figures… Federal, state and local subsidy regimes and green energy mandates have helped the solar industry grow in the last few years…
      “Ivanpah, the world’s largest concentrated solar plant, uses 173,500 heliostat mirrors to reflect sunlight onto centralized towers. The sunlight heats up water in the towers which turns into steam to generate electricity. The project … was given a $1.6 billion loan by the Obama administration …
      “But Ivanpah has not lived up to its expectations. Not even a year after it began operations, the project’s owners have asked the federal government for a $539 million grant to help pay back its federal loan.
      “Apparently, Ivanpah has only been generating about one-quarter of the energy it was said it could produce. Why? Because the sun hasn’t been shining as much as studies predicted it would. Because of the lack of sun, the plant has had to increase its use of natural gas to heat up its water towers…”
  Solar Energy Will Produce Less Than One Percent Of US Power In 2015 – Michael Bastasch, DAILY CALLER.

[Hat tips Climate Depot, Watts Up With That]