We should be grateful to the voters of Uxbridge. They have posed the main parties some important questions about environmental policies ā even though the one most in question was in pursuit of the admirable aim of cleaner air. Many voters objected strongly to imposing a heavy charge on the owners of older vehicles, trying to force them off the road at a time of cost of living pressures. It is not a good look to undermine the precarious budgets of those who need to use an older car or van to earn a living at a time of high inflation. By definition, they cannot afford the newer greener vehicles that the Mayor of London insists on, leaving him defending a policy of cars for the better off only.
This result will lead to a wider rethink of green issues. The Government does need to reconsider some of its policies undertaken in the name of net zero. It has listened to those of us who pointed out its former policy of leaving more of our domestic gas and oil in the ground will increase world CO2 output in a self-defeating zealotry.
And for as long as most people have gas boilers at home and industry fires its factories with fossil fuels, our choice is not to use less of them. It is: do we import more or produce more ourselves? Importing gas in LNG form generates more than twice as much CO 2 as piping our own gas to users, thanks to the energy it takes to liquify, ship and convert back. Some say that the cost can be several times as much CO 2. Far better then to pipe our own gas and spare the CO2. It also is far better in every other way. We get more better paid jobs at home, far more tax revenue from taxing the production and a big saving on the balance of payments. Another net zero idea which produces more CO2 is to spend UK grant money on stopping farmers in the UK growing food or rearing animals, only then to import the food instead. All those extra lorry miles and shipping routes burn more diesel in transport. And once again we lose the jobs, the investment and the tax revenues at home whilst adding to our balance of payments deficit. It is time to spend the grant money on investing in more automated and modern home food production instead.
The UK imposes the highest carbon tax and most penal emissions trading of the main economies. This makes such UK industries as steel and ceramics uncompetitive here. Government is then forced to hand some of the tax back as subsidy. Furthermore, there is the loss of more UK capacity, leading to more imports of high energy based products. This, too, can often increase total world CO2, given the extra fossil fuel consumed in long distance transport. We may also be importing from factories and furnaces abroad that generate more CO2 from their processes.
The way to net zero requires many more people to change their heating from gas to electricity, more electricity to come from renewables, more transport to be electric and more people to eat less meat. All this requires innovation and new products. Voters cannot afford some of the current green options, if they think they are inferior to what they already have.
So if the UK persists with the idea of banning new gas boilers as early as 2025, people will not be persuaded that heat pumps are cheap enough or good enough. They will make do with their old gas boiler. If the Government stops the sale of new petrol and diesel cars in the UK in 2030 before the other main car producing countries do, we will face early collapse of our car industry. Customers will want to buy nearly new imported petrol and diesel vehicles from countries that have not banned their sale.
The UK could help to find new products that work and are sensibly priced. Our innovative businesses, entrepreneurs and academics should be encouraged to do so. Government can use research grants, low business taxes and pro-innovation policies to resolve the difficulties. It makes little sense to plough on with taxes and bans that clobber our jobs and tax revenues whilst increasing world CO2 as we become ever more dependent on imports.
Government also needs to review its often speculative or poorly directed spending on net zero projects. Unresolved questions such as whether electric heating or hydrogen heating will prove more effective need answers that worldwide research and development can help determine. The Government should not think these can all be sorted by its grants and directions, given the scale and complexity of the task. It needs the best of large company research and entrepreneurial flair worldwide to drive a successful revolution. Government has not had to tax, ban and subsidise people into using mobile phones and laptops. Where is the iPad of the domestic heating world or the Beetle of the electric car ranges? That is the crucial consumer challenge on the road to net zero. More UK imports will make things worse, not better.
July 27, 2023
Good morning.
ULEZ is a smoke screen for nationwide road pricing – end of ! There have been numerous reports of cameras outside of London going up.
We know that governments, usually through ‘False Flag’ groups, organisations and individuals, put out scare stories that require and / or legitimise the need for government action. Call it, ‘The power of fear’. ULEZ, CCZ, Climate Change, the SCAMDEMIC and even terrorism are all used as conduits for more power and government control of our lives. They are NEVER about what they claim to be about.
As Mayor Khan revenues, or shall we say desire to spend more than he can collect, have shrunk so has the need for a greater and greater tax take. But greed has finally got the better of them and one the very wealthy and middle class have been rinsed for all they are worth, it then comes down on to the ‘little people’ to start to have shoulder the burden.
The rich can afford a new Ā£100,000 plus BEV. Due to government Benefit in Kind rules it makes sense for them to do it. So they are unaffected by ULEZ. The poor however who are priced out of the BEV market and could not hope to benefit from government subsidies and tax advantages are being forced to pay.
All this reminds me of of the days following the Bolshevik Revolution, or power grab as it really was, when the party elite drove around in Rolls Royce’s. And what of Mayor Khan’s mode of transport ? A five litre, armoured plated gas guzzler. Says it all.
July 27, 2023
1984 in 2023
July 27, 2023
Sunak made clear GB will not be more competitive than neighbours ie EU. He has separated N.Ireland from GB- his party has allowed and condoned his actions. His Windsor sell out makes sure GB is tied firmly to EU. The level playing fields are nothing of the sort, they make sure GB acts in lockstep to EU.
JR and his colleagues have the answer in their hands and choose to keep remainers Sunak and Hunt in charge. Minor griping from the sidelines, to win votes, does not wash. Again we see Farage take on the left wing establishment while peep squeak conservatives remain silent behind Sunakās and Hunt.
July 27, 2023
Agreed Mark B.
All for a future climate catastrophe that there is no scientific basis for. A complete and utter fraud, on the back of which the already super rich will make shed loads of money, to add to the fortunes acquired during the Covid scam.
July 27, 2023
Absolutely. No one except narcissistic elites who suffer from being vulnerable to feeling virtuous believes this nonsense.
The public can see straight through it.
Everything is life has its upside and downside. The downside of being a leader is you are vulnerable to feeling virtuous.
July 27, 2023
With regards to those ULEZ cameras going up still, in outer London; my husband wrote to our council yesterday and got a swift response. Khan is using 1999 legislation to over-rule those councils who have refused him permission to erect the ULEZ infrastructure!
Looking at it, every single road will be impossible to move around without being filmed!
July 27, 2023
This is basic common sense.
It is also basic common sense to give as much help as possible to innovative business/individuals for the good of the nation.
We don’t do that and I seem to recall it being an irritation to my parents that we would let our best go abroad rather than invest in them. A long term plan for decline???
At this point in time everything seems geared around making short term gains here, while filling the coffers of others elsewhere and doing the bidding of global organisations.
Both Cons. and Labour keep telling of the wonderful abundant and high paid jobs everyone will have under their net zero revolution. As things stand at present and with the people in politics at present, I truly don’t believe many British will see the benefit, it will be another excuse to bring in ‘talent’.
July 27, 2023
Even vaguely sensible and competent MPs and Ministers shouldn’t need to be told any of this. Most of it is basic common sense.
But back in 2008 the Westminster Uni-Party closed ranks to impose their lunatic policies on us with almost no debate and virtually no dissent. And since then the Not-a-Conservative-Government has propagandised enthusiastically on so-called “green” issues and announced one ludicrous “green” policy after another – to financially penalise citizens who don’t conform to the Eco Lunacy.
“Our” Environmental Policy is controlled by the EU. Under the appalling Deal the Not-a-Conservative-Party forced on us, we are obliged to comply with EU Environmental Regulations. And then the Civil Service and Environment Agency Gold Plate and over-interpret them.
So for a start, removing the Gold-plating. Then stop the “green” propaganda and coercion. And finally, tell the BBC that the $cience is most definitely not settled and it is required, in its Charter, to impartially present both sides of an argument, not propagandise for one side.
July 27, 2023
But those MPs, Ministers and Government haven’t, since the invention of the climate change committee, changed direction on net-zero, hasn’t repealed any related law or regulation, hasn’t slowed or stop any plan to stop the banning of petrol cars and gas boilers …..make no mistake they’re going hell for leather to be the net-zero world leader
July 27, 2023
+++
Agree.
Itās as if they missed out on the āgrown upā stage of life.
July 27, 2023
Why do they want world (EU & UN) accolade before their own voters
July 27, 2023
++
Follow the money, honey?
July 27, 2023
@Donna +1 Thank you
July 27, 2023
Your article underlines that public sector decision makers a) tend to be problem creators rather than problem solvers, b) do not assess the impact of their decisions on the UK’s resilience, and c) lack any confidence in scientists and entrepreneurs to develop new solutions to problems.
An entertaining example of a solution being developed to address methane generated by ruminants can be found on https://www.londonstockexchange.com/news-article/WYN/dancing-with-daffodils-project/16054155
July 27, 2023
+1
Allister Heath today:-
Cut out the cancer of woke capitalism before it obliterates Britain for good
NatWest has exposed the disastrous takeover of big business by incompetent, Left-wing apparatchiks.
Indeed, plus the take over of the Tory Party by the same incompetent socialists.
Shoplifting up 30% in a year I read too? This the result of police inaction and even their active encouragement and zero real deterrents for these criminals. Not so good for food inflation. Also a vast increase in door step thefts of mail order deliveries and in crime in general. Ever more taxes, ever more costs of crime and dire and non existent public services.
July 27, 2023
‘even though the one most in question was in pursuit of the admirable aim of cleaner air’
ULEZ is not about ‘cleaner air’ or protecting the public from ‘polluting emissions’ which of course is illegal under current legislation. It is a revenue raising exercise and more sinister the first stage in the State’s assault on freedom of movement. Please correct fine Sir. Thanks
July 27, 2023
Dom
“ULEZ is not about cleaner air..”
Agreed, because you can pollute as much as you like, and as many times as you like, if you can afford to.
Likewise the motor industry was improving emissions from ICE cars years before ULEZ was even introduced or thought of.
It is a money grab, pure and simple.
Of course we all would like to breathe clean air, but traffic stopping and starting at chicanes, speed humps, traffic lights, low use traffic areas (diversions) and crawling along at 20mph in low gear makes for higher emissions.
Once again the motor industry has developed stop – start engines to try and counter such waste, but again to no avail.
Then just to complicate matters further, different areas have different rules and exemptions, which makes planning an unknown route essential to try and avoid transgression.
July 27, 2023
Correct – Even the governments own data states that our air is cleaner now, than its ever been …how far can they push that line, and why aren’t the government/defra publishing those reports in the social media to counter the ULEZ debate (maybe they like the control & revenue of ULEZ)
July 27, 2023
”Today : Low levels of air pollution are expected across the whole of the UK today, due to air originating from the Atlantic. ” https://uk-air.defra.gov.uk/
July 27, 2023
Theyāve hidden the data showing 1970-1999 in the national archives, but Iāve managed to locate the government link here (the data they donāt want the people to know) https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/ukgwa/20210216021725/https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/emissions-of-air-pollutants/emissions-of-air-pollutants-in-the-uk-1970-to-2018-summary
The graphs show, year on year, our air getting less polluted and cleaner
July 27, 2023
@DOM – Battery EVās are big and heavy, even baby ones are heavier than full size ICE cars.
As they donāt do engine breaking as with ICEās they have to rely on physical brakes, these introduce nasty, lung damaging particulates into the atmosphere at a far greater rate due to their enormous extra weight.
Then add in Heavy car, more tyre wear, even more particulates.
Traffic flow then swirls these particulates around leading to more pollution.
How does the ULEZ reduce these?
July 27, 2023
ULEZ only effects the small trader and the poor who can’t afford a new Ā£40k EV nor the ULEZ daily charge
July 27, 2023
@glen cullen – I asume that falls into line with Conservative Government being against enterprise, preferring to import as much as possible. Even when that means they will use/squander UK Taxpayers money to reinforce the policy
July 28, 2023
EVās use battery regeneration when braking which considerably lessens the effects you raise.
July 27, 2023
This article makes so much sense that a blind man wearing a blindfold can see the stupidity of the governmentās contradictory Net Zero policies.
July 27, 2023
Spot on Les Brooks, you’re correct the they’re the governments policies – can anyone remember voting for them (the last election was on a single issue ‘brexit’)
July 27, 2023
āA freighter carrying nearly 3,000 cars catches fire in the North Sea and a crew member is killedā (questions if EVs caused this Ed)
NOBEL LAUREATE: āCLIMATE SCIENCE HAS METASTASIZED INTO MASSIVE SHOCK-JOURNALISTIC PSEUDOSCIENCEā
Dr. John F. Clauser, joint recipient of the 2022 Nobel Prize in Physics, has criticized the climate emergency narrative calling it āa dangerous corruption of science that threatens the worldās economy and the well-being of billions of people.ā
He is surely quite right but already being cancelled.
The best heating system we have available currently in the UK is surely natural gas plus local fracking of it. This will easily get us to when we achieve controlled fusion.
Keeping your old car a bit longer is more sensible than causing a new EV to be built. Heat-pumps rarely make veru little sense in the UK too expensive to fit and maintain. Plus we do not even have the grid or the low carbon electricity to power them. Also electricity costs three times what natural gas does anyway as so much heat is wasted at the power station and in transmission. Should CO2 quite wrongly concern you.
July 27, 2023
āUnsafe, ineffective, dangerous and for the young and those who had had Covid already never even neededā When does the gross criminal negligence investigation start please?
New Peer-Reviewed Study Finds 1-in-35 Booster Recipients Had Vaccine-Associated Myocardial Injury. See Dr John Campbell videos. I personally know 4 people just in my friends families one needed serious ablation surgery.
July 27, 2023
The right question, LL, but who would carry out the investigation? Not Dr John Campbell, unfortunately. It would be fine upstanding establishment figures, who at the time went along with the lockdown/vaccine narrative themselves. How ready would they be to admit they were fooled?
July 27, 2023
++++
The only alternative to ICE vehicles on offer being highly dangerous ( apparently) EVs in conjunction with the jabs is a win, win for the wealthy few.
Not only does it mean fewer, if any vehicles on the road but also ( in both cases) fewer folk to moan about the situation.
We are but battery hens to the mighty!
July 27, 2023
But still no decision on the Rosebank oil field. It will require approval from the department for ‘energy security and net zero’, as it’s called. Is Grant Shapps going to decide in favour, following what he said on taking on the Secretary of State post? After all, his primary concern, he said, was energy security. Or is net-zero fanatic Chris Skidmore still running the show? We’ll see.
July 27, 2023
@Clough – My understanding is he and his department are import only Zealots, creating pollution ouside of the UK causeing pollution to import it, is less damaging to the World.
July 27, 2023
Indeed, total madness. Exporting our manufacturing to import our fossil energy that we could produce more cleanly ourselves. Importing the same manufactured goods we exported to the Far East who produce them using fossil fuel power stations. They obviously have a different atmosphere to us or a reduced carbon bogy gas footprint, just like our Government’s policy of reducing our carbon emissions by mass immigration. We need REFORM.
July 27, 2023
The whole Net Zero fantasy is based on fundamental misconceptions – that CO2 is some kind of global temperature control, that anthropogenic CO2 is the dominant source. Both are false, anthropogenic CO2 is only around 3-5% of annual CO2, and the change in global temperature is almost entirely a consequence of natural processes.
Consequently, the government should as a matter of urgency, repeal the 2008 Climate Act, and all subsequent legislation and statuary instruments, and terminate all “green” subsidies and taxes. Let all generators of electricity operate on a level playing field of only accepting grid connections from sources able to guarantee 95%+ availability across annual timeframes, and taking the least costly first, and get nuclear in place as a matter of priority for the base load. Let buyers of cars and vans have a free choice of motive power – ICE, EV, hydrogen etc (and change VED to be based on vehicle weight to sensibly reflect damage to roads), similarly for domestic heating.
Only this way will we have any realistic chance of saving the UK economy.
July 27, 2023
+many
July 27, 2023
‘The way to net zero requires many more people to . . . eat less meat.’
Sir John, it’s the quality of the meat which is key. Meat from grass-fed animals, especially locally reared animals that have not had to travel far to the slaughterhouse, is good for us – another way to support our farmers too.
Anyone interested might like to look up Dr. Malcolm Kendrick, GP and heart specialist, and read his take on this. He has done extensive research (and explains it in an accessible and entertaining way) on how saturated fat which naturally occurs in nutrient-dense foods such as animal products, can be safely included in the diet.
For example, he ends one explanation in his blog with:
‘Please now write out one hundred times:
Saturated fat does not cause cardiovascular disease
Saturated fat does not cause cardiovascular disease
Saturated fat does not cause cardiovascular disease rpt x 97.’
July 27, 2023
Climate Crisis nonsense bad, CO2 Good and essential, repeat again and again.
July 27, 2023
+many
July 27, 2023
Absolutely right Mary M. Read Graham Harvey āThe Carbon Fieldsā and āGrass Fed Nationā and Dr Zoe Harcombe on the importance of meat in the diet. So much misinformation being peddled by those with vested interests.
July 27, 2023
+1
July 27, 2023
All this madness to save 1% of .045% of Earths atmosphere. Meanwhile China/Germany/USA/India continue to pump out vast amounts of CO2 over 50% of the total.
July 27, 2023
You mention āthe admirable aim of cleaner airā but the air in the UK is about as clean as it can be. Yes there are a few areas where this is not the case such as parts of the South Circular Road, but there could be low cost local solutions for the minority of people affected there, not nationwide Net Zero. None of what you are recommending is actually necessary. Itās such a shame you didnāt say āour emissions are already 50% of the 1990 level itās time for the eco enthusiasts to call for the major emitters to do the same if thatās what they believe in. We are a tiny island in the global climate. Further economically damaging emissions reductions will make no difference whatsoever to the global climateā.
July 27, 2023
If indeed carbon is an issue (and it is more likely to be the sun’s activity) then then answer is to stop importing so much tat from abroad and to apply tariffs commensurate with the amount of carbon created to any imports we do allow.
Our impact as a country is minimal so to make any impact we must penalise others not ourselves.
July 27, 2023
Stop importing PEOPLE as well, it is called Man-Made Climate change for a reason, each person uses the planets resources, and pollution, and waste of some type or another is the inevitable end result.
July 27, 2023
+++. I refuse to take Net Stupid seriously while the politicians are facilitating this greatest factor in increasing carbon footprint.
July 27, 2023
The government is giving the impression of a drunk staggering around trying to get the key in the door. Wants to open it but no idea if right door or correct key. Incoherent unconnected actions and statements giving the impression of utter incompetence.
Once again driven by politics, on the hook of a particular date and lacking the courage to formulate a pushback strategy.
As usual without a thought about true cost or the need for business to have some kind of certainty to make investment decisions.
Ministers knowing nothing moving every 18/24 months, special advisers with zero life experience and generalist civil servants again on a merry go round.
With their obsession for tax, subsidy, interference, we have no chance.
July 27, 2023
excellent first 3 sentences….
July 27, 2023
Really? How so?
Only if the price of electricity per kw/hr becomes the same as gas. Even with the recent gas price increases, electricity is still many times the price of gas. As an MP you wonāt be bothered by this but the vast majority of people cannot afford Ā£6k a year to heat their homes.
Where I live in West Dorset I estimate that half the cars are between 10 and 20 years old. Many people here run old cars because they canāt afford newer ones. How will this work when cars are all electric? If you can only afford Ā£5k for a 10 year old car, youāll be looking at buying something which will need a new battery costing Ā£10k. You seem determined to drive poor people off the roads.
July 27, 2023
The government will do none of what you suggest because they are following the instructions of others.
Anyone with an iota of common sense would do as you say but this goes against the UN and WEF instructions to de industrialise the west in favour of the BRICs.
July 27, 2023
People have shown that they don’t want Net Zero, so why is it still being rammed down our throats?
July 27, 2023
Correct – the greens are never voted for, so why are we following their policies
July 28, 2023
Because the “Greens” are powerful in Germany. Germany controls the EU; a German heads the WEF.
“Our” green policies have been imposed by the EU and Gold-Plated by Whitehall and Westminster, with May and Johnson primarily responsible for the latter.
July 27, 2023
Iām not sure that is right. I think most people have bought the āclimate catastropheā hook, line and sinker.
If we had PR I think that the Greens + Lib Dems would get close to half the votes. The reason many people donāt vote Green (or Reform, for that matter) now is because our voting system makes such a vote pointless. That said, it doesnāt stop me voting Green. My reason for voting Green is to keep the envoy on the political agenda. And it seems to be working.
July 27, 2023
Out of touch and soon out of government.
So much has slipped that we’ll need an army of Farages to clear the stables.
No Ā£5 million salaries, golden goodbyes or Damehoods. Just out in the cold like the people who have been harmed for so long by these crap ideologues.
July 27, 2023
Agreed100% SJS
July 27, 2023
Unfortunately almost all politicians have been captured by the Climate change lobby and haven’t woken up and smelt the coffee. Despite Uxbridge, Starmer is still supporting Khan and his extension to the ULEZ and only this morning Labour again put that idiot Miliband on the BBC to spout his usual climate change rubbish. Miliband needs to be moved out of the shadow cabinet, or into a brief where he can do no harm. Secretary of State for Wales ? Only then will we believe that Labour will be at all likely to ditch their ruinous Net Zero policies.
As for the Conservatives, despite mutterings, there have been no moves to soften the line. That might be because heatwaves and fires in Greece are currently in the news. What happens at the Conservative conference will be an important indicator of whether there is likey to be any change real of policy.
The minimum progress necessary needs to be :
A postponement of the end of IC engined cars to 2040 to allow for more research and development of Hydrogen fuel cells. The infrastructure for this we already know will be essential to replace diesel in trucks, so why not use it for cars as well. At a stroke, Hydrogen removes all the disadvantages of battery EVs.
A rethink on home heating. It is going to be prohibitively difficult and expensive to insulate many older homes and without a huge increase in insulation, heat pumps cannot be effective. Also, they are far too expensive other than for new homes, and even then, I doubt their effectiveness. A cost effective alternative that can warm our homes as effectively and cheaply as a gas boiler has got to be found.
July 27, 2023
Grant Shapps wrote to Sadiq Khan in August 2022 demanding the expansion of the ULEZ scheme (making TfL funding contingent on it) ā¦you need to start being honest about the Tory āgreenā policy
July 27, 2023
In my post above, I accused almost all politicians of being committed to climate change action.
That certainly included Grant Shapps and many other Conservatives. The only positive thing I can say about the Conservatives is that every opposition party wants to faster and further towards Net Zero than they do.
July 28, 2023
+1 Sunakās Gov. could easily stop ULEZ but chooses not to.
July 27, 2023
The suggestions are high in quality and value, with good reasoning. However, shouldnāt the government itself have foreseen what needed doing and started acting for the better instead of having to be pushed hard just to do something sensible?
July 27, 2023
Good morning Sir John
Why do we need to go āGreenā?
All sensible Climate Scientists such as Tony Heller who has historical records going back well over a century and Piers Corbyn, Jeremyās older and wiser brother
We need more CO2 because itās a plant nutrient, commercial growers pump it into their Polytunnels to increase their yield.
I have several excellent books on the subject
Apocalypse Never. Michael Shellenberger
Confessions of a Greenpeace Dropout. Patrick Moore
The Real Global Warming Disaster. Christopher Booker
Eco-Fascism. James Delingpole
Several years ago our Council declared a Climate Emergency, I phoned to enquire why and I was told that the UN had declared it, I told them that they were also calling for the elimination of a certain State bordering the Mediterranean Sea and was that now official council policy
The trouble is that thereās no tax to be made from following the Status Quo
July 27, 2023
‘The trouble is that thereās no tax to be made from following the Status Quo’
I beg to differ:
Status Quo…’Whatever you want’ 1979
Whatever you want
Whatever you like
Whatever you say
You pay your money
You take your choice
Whatever you need
Whatever you use
Whatever you win
Whatever you lose
You’re showing off
You’re showing out
You look for trouble
Turn around, give me a shout
I take it all
You squeeze me dry
And now today
You couldn’t even say goodbye
Reply Indeed one o& the most bizarre effects of trying to go toElectric vehicles is it destroys huge tax revenues on petrol and diesel transport
July 27, 2023
Reply-Reply
Do not worry John we will all be paying per road mile travelled in due course, no matter what you drive, it is as clear as the nose on your face.
All those camera’s are going up for a reason, not just for speeding, and congestion.
Of course I expect that any charge will be on top of all the existing usual taxes, and certainly not instead of !
The Government have form on this sort of double treble, quadruple taxation, so why should they worry about any more.
Travel will eventually be a luxury that fewer can afford.
July 27, 2023
Brave New World
July 27, 2023
reply to reply ….Well said Sir John. A Government that spends, mostly on ill-fated wasteful subjects, really ought to be sticking with the generation of taxes that most of the population have grown to accept as justified.
Perhaps a new tax designed to hit the heavier cars, being the EVs, will at some stage be introduced?
July 27, 2023
Reply to reply
Sir John, itās a way of enforcing 15 minute cities, if anyone has been foolish enough to have fitted a smart meter your electricity supply can be switched off remotely
And EVās will be taxed, Khan is bringing in road pricing
The capacity of the grid would have to be doubled and the amounts of lithium, copper and other rare minerals are finite
What about the children in the Congo who are virtually slaves and are required to mine the Lithium?
Thatās a response to Micky
The government requires the taxpayer to subsidise the installation of charging points but petrol stations arenāt subsidised
July 27, 2023
That of course should have read Mickey Taking
July 27, 2023
@Lester +100
Spot on.
The real experts mentioned have real science behind them
July 27, 2023
The Governments of the world only fund Climate change /global warming believers. They sack or refuse to make grants to sceptics. Let us pray…………..we get some sense in due course. It will take a mountain of humble pie. The recent heat in Europe is caused by the jet stream which in due course is driven by……….the Sun and its intensity. Who’d of thunk it.
July 27, 2023
The jet stream is a feature on a rotating planet where there is a gradient in the deposition of energy between its polar and equatorial regions, ie warm equator and cold poles.
The largest the gradient the more confined the jet stream. When that temperature gradient decreases the intensity of the jet decreases and it is likely to become more sinuous and can possibly ālockā itself (āstanding or stationary (atmospheric) waves (or eddies)) which creates the conditions for the development of āheat domesā or persistent rain events over several days.
Thatās atmospheric dynamics, maybe not introductory 101 but module three or four.
Obviously the sun and the tilting of the Earth provides the gradient in the deposition of solar energy between poles and equator and its seasonal changes, but the reduction in this poles-equator gradient (due to CO2-albedo positive feedback effect, ie the higher latitudes in the Northern hemisphere having less and less permanent sea-ice, and therefore absorbing more solar radiation, having slightly warmer polar ocean temperature) is the main driver of the changes we presently see.
July 27, 2023
It’s a fact we have always have less sea ice at the poles between ice ages. Therefore sea levels rise in between. We are not yet clever enough to understand the science behind the many variables and timeframes that cause this. I think we can reasonably assume that the last ice age at over 20000 years ago wasn’t ended by man made global warming. The subsequent rise in sea levels created the Great Lakes in America and created the English Channel. Still not evidence that CO2 is the bogy gas but nice copy and paste H.
July 27, 2023
It would require the Earth to stop revolving for the jet stream to stop.
July 28, 2023
Changes at the end of the ice ages took thousands of years. The Heinrich Stadial 1 is thought to have encompassed the period 18,900 – 14,400 years ago. What is seen now several orders of magnitude faster.
Solar activity? Over the Sunās 11-year cycle the total solar radiation varies by 0.1% (1360-1362 W/m^2) and thatās the fastest variation. All other ācyclesā are at least 40 times slower (400-year sunspot-related cycle that gave the Maunder Minimum, 2400-year Hallstatt cycle).
July 28, 2023
Do you think I said that the jet stream would stop? Are you one thinking that Net Zero means no CO2 in the atmosphere?
July 28, 2023
Yes and no.
July 30, 2023
Thanks, TA.
July 28, 2023
+1
July 27, 2023
When and if gas boilers are banned will the mains gas supply just be turned off? Or will gas fires still be graciously permitted?
Why did they spend all that time and money noisily and with max disruption removing old metal gas pipes and putting in those plastic (!) yellow ones? Were they for hydrogen?
July 27, 2023
I thought the tweets at the side were current.
Only just looked at the dates!
July 27, 2023
Artificial intelligence playing up again with a ghost in the system
July 27, 2023
There is no climate emergency. World temperature has increased just over 1degC since 1880, during which time world health has improved exponentially along with food production, prosperity, technology and longevity. The increase in world population is proof of all these improvements and to manās brilliant ingenuity. Carbon Dioxide however, is effectively, a trace element but vital for all plant life and indeed our very survival on earth. The imposition of unachievable arbitrary targets whether banning new ICEās or Gas Boilers or indeed 2050 for āNet Zeroā is completely unnecessary as it adversely affects millions of working people and their families. Furthermore, these āvirtuousā efforts by the UK will have zero impact on overall world temperature. There has been insufficient honest consultation about Climate issues and Net Zero, which is precisely why people are pushing back against the ātargetsā. The BBC are far and away the worse offender, refusing to accept any debate or alternative perspective. Professor Steve Koonin, President Obamaās Scientific Advisor, has written, the science of Climate Change is certainly NOT āSettledā. Many of his scientific colleagues worldwide agree with him. We have time to allow technology and ingenuity to be developed to enable us to effectively and economically decarbonise on a worldwide basis. The headlong rush towards an arbitrary 2050 target by our Government will certainly fail: we need a major rethink.
July 27, 2023
The government’s main policy is bringing about the end of our nation. Net Zero (the destruction of the economy), open borders (limitless immigration) and the ending of free speech are the means of doing this. A sign is the government bending over backwards to keep us in reality in the European Union. And consider the injection of the gene-altering materials, the fundamental level on which to attack a population (deaths up, births down, intelligence down, disease skyrocketing). We have quite a problem.
July 27, 2023
Yet the people keep voting for them. Aren’t they the ones who are mad?
July 27, 2023
After 3 strikes and you are out, doesn’t that concept count for anything anymore?
July 28, 2023
DA – It does not matter which party you vote for as they are not in control . They all take their orders from the Globalist UK NWO Establishment. Nothing will happen until our whole system of government is changed. Change is Coming and PANIC will ensue.
July 27, 2023
Heat pumps?
With c.20% of households being flats, heat pumps are not possible. Similarly the terraced houses with fronts onto the street and having no outside space to which a pump can be fitted.
Back to storage heaters then and immersion heated water tanks for hot water.
July 27, 2023
Also, the can’t get an EV cable up to the 5th floor of flats
July 27, 2023
Yes, they’ve bungled a bit there Bingle. It was reported that heat pumps definitely need hot water tanks as the heat pump will only supply relatively tepid water which could contain harmful bacteria.
July 27, 2023
But, as ever so much waste.
Money
Time
Quality of many worried lives
A thousand years of wisdom and experience
And in the case of this latest charadeā¦ the efforts of countless wise, dead heroes. Inventors, philosophers and those who helped build the world we knew and loved.
Such a shame that now so many should suffer for the greed and idiocy of those who have shoehorned themselves undeservedly into positions of power.
July 27, 2023
Have you been watching the Nobel Laureate (Physics 2022) winner Dr. John Clauser, on youtube titled āāwhen will the politicians listen ā another greenā debunking net-zero ….he’s soon to be cancelled
July 27, 2023
A total scam! We breath in oxygen and breath out co2. Trees and plants use co2 and give us oxygen ā balance! Man is too small to change that. People are being fraudulently influenced by evil people. Live and let live!
July 27, 2023
‘Man too small to change that’?
Are you aware of deforestation in the Amazon?
July 28, 2023
And the thousands of trees the SNP have felled in Scotland – to make space for windmills!
Mad; mad as a box of frogs.
July 28, 2023
Frogs in boiling water, maybe?
July 27, 2023
I have sympathy with a Nett Zero aim of a much healthier population, though there are other unrelated factors necessary to achieve it. I find the evangelical and fanatical approach to achieving it utterly stupid. It is a lawyers path that thinks that by passing laws and making mission statements utopia will prevail. Nonsense, you use science plus engineering to produce marketable solutions. I would add that were the citizens of the UK to revert to a prehistoric existence it would not make one iota of difference to the state of the World. Climate change is an historical fact over millions of years. If man in the UK is nudging it, the front rows of China, India, and Indonesia are shoving it over the line.
I am much more concerned with the capture of our institution by a Marxist cabal of controllers outside the democracy we supposedly live in. They are out to destroy lives for their own gain, be they the management of banks, bent lawyers, the civil service, or any other grubby entity that thinks its greed for power or wealth takes prescedence over the people. If Rishi is half awake he must be delighted with all these elector winning targets that Nigel, The Daily Mail, and GB News are popping up for him like a flush of grouse.
July 27, 2023
Drafting a statutory instrument to impose a 50% tarriff on such imports would be the work of a moment – or the work of a fortnight at the Deptartment of Transport.
Wouldn’t it be fun if the Reform party stood on a platform of abolishing all net zero targets?
July 27, 2023
Read their policies on their web, you might be pleasantly surprised!
July 27, 2023
climate change is real but our contribution to it is minimal. We cannot influence China. We need to get off polluting energy as its making people ill.
How about more wave wind and a geothermal link from Iceland? How about ground source? How about sharing heat gain from modern buildings. My sons new build building is unbearably hot even in winter.
July 27, 2023
There is no climate emergency caused by anthropogenic burning of fossil fuels.
The co-winner of the 2022 Nobel Physics prize, Dr. John Clauser, has called the climate emergency āa dangerous corruption of science that threatens the worldās economy and the well-being of billions of peopleā.
Initiated by the communists, aided and abetted by capitalist grifters, the unilateral and unnecessary Net Zero āsolutionā is deigned to destroy the westās economies and democracy because It is impossible to achieve and its attempted implementation can only be brought about through communist style draconian measures.
It is already evident that the communists pursuing Net Zero are already in place in our Parliament, financial institutions/banks, Civil Service, quangos, regulators, charities, judiciary, institutions, the BBC and the educational establishment though their deeds and their attempted curbing of free speech wherever possible.
Looking at the history of the 20th century it is obvious as to where communism will eventually lead and it should be noted that the CAGW activists do not require Net Zero to apply to communist countries. Neither do they advocate nuclear power, the only low CO2 emission energy source which is affordable, reliable and abundant.
July 27, 2023
+1 Strange that we get the UN secretary general on all the news channel proclaiming that the world is boiling ā¦.but the eminent Nobel prise winner Dr. John Clauser, zilch
July 27, 2023
conspiracy too silence objectors
July 27, 2023
āleaving him defending a policy of cars for the better off onlyā and as the Owners of Vauxhall has said putting them at the mercy of having to buy cars from what I guess is his beloved China.
July 27, 2023
its more fundamental than just the costs of expensive anti pollution measures here, the extra costs it adds to business here, and the consequence that we just import from, or subcontract to, other countries where these costs are far lower, and they have a far higher tolerance for pollution.
its other costs like the costs of safety we force into businesses here. which again other countries do without, and so can operate far more cheaply. so often it becomes far too expensive to operate here and instead we just import from countries running with far fewer of these costs.
or the costs of intellectual property, we force businesses here to pay licence fees due, and copyright fees due. many competitor nations dont bother paying these dues, so are able to produce their output far more cheaply than we can. so we end up importing their output, and shutting our businesses here.
we need to figure out how we compete with all of this going on, just focussing on Financial Services is not the answer.
The problem with using commodity priced labour here, and not the highest quality, is that it shows the world that we are not worth a price premium for our goods and services. It shows them that they may as well buy direct from lower cost base lower quality countries. The problem with being infiltrated with masses of people who get to know, and pass on, our best intellectual property to other countries is that it allows other countries to produce the same goods and services, and undermines our leading position, and destroys our ability to charge premium prices.
As an economy trying to sell to the world at commodity prices this country has no chance, our electricity is too expensive, our safety kit costs too much, our anti-pollution kit costs too much, our following copyright and patent etc laws costs a lot, and we are competing with countries which have none of these costs. We cannot compete on price, we have to compete on quality, innovation, newer tech, better support, etc.
The political and ruling classes donāt seem to have a vision for how the country pays its way in the world. They have priced all but the most specialised manufacturing out of business here. They have done deals with, say, India where we have given lots of work visas and in exchange they supposedly opened up their financial services market to our companies, this simply has not worked, repeatedly, mainly because the Indian consumers are very patriotic and want to buy from local insurance companies. And the Indian side of these negotiations is always far better switched on and playing the game than the British side.
Then we have the whole free market in the world debate. Where we are competing with countries without our high cost of electricity (mainly green taxes), our strict expensive to follow anti-pollution and safety regime, our adherence to intellectual property laws. We have outsourced our manufacturing, and our pollution, to other countries, and done nothing to improve net world pollution. Our own shop floor workforces have often invented leading techniques, but the multi-nationals and the imported workforces, have let these leak abroad to undercut this country.
July 27, 2023
The big rethink first is the pursuance of exporting UK jobs therefore the UK economy. Everything this Conservative Government and the wider Political Class have suggested to date damages the UK first. They forget they are alone in this race on this great big planet of ours in sacrificing the safety, security and the economy of a Country to reduce as yet unproven problem.
At best estimates if there is a situation to be solved the UK accounts for just 0.04% of it ā wrecking the UK economy will not reduce the situation for the other 99% of the Planet.
If at sometime there is evidence to suggest things need to be addressed, the UK would have lost its economy and as a result the money to address a brave new future.
No one can name one other Country that is sacrificing its economy and people first.
July 27, 2023
On the same theme as ‘soaking’ consumers:
There has been an angry reaction to British Gas reporting record half-year profits as millions of households continue to struggle to pay for energy costs. British Gas reported profits of Ā£969m after price cap rises allowed it to make more money from household bills.
Regulator Ofgem said the bumper profits were a “one-off” due to the changes.
But poverty campaigners said the profits “are a further sign of Britain’s broken energy system”.
About half of the profit was due to the changes to the price cap made by the energy regulator. Ofgem had raised the allowance suppliers can claim from household bills to make up for costs incurred during the pandemic.
Simon Francis, coordinator of the End Fuel Poverty Coalition, said: “At a time when household energy debt is spiralling to record levels and energy bills remain double what they were just a few years ago, the profits posted will be greeted with disbelief by those struggling through the crisis.
“There will of course be questions about how these profits were made, but the reality is that energy firms are operating on a playing field set by the government.”
09.34
July 27, 2023
āThe UK imposes the highest carbon tax and most penal emissions trading of the main economiesā then encourages importation from the highest polluters by the most polluting methods.
Export jobs and the economy this is the New Conservative Government way.
July 28, 2023
+1 seem job exporting and economic harm is indeed the Tory agenda.
July 27, 2023
Where’s the freedom of choice, how about letting market-forces and competition rule
Go-Green & Ban the alternative = Social Engineering
If ‘green’ is the direction that people want, (1) why aren’t they voting green and (2) why aren’t they buying green products and why of life (without subsidy & ban)
Your tory government is a disgrace to democracy and the will of the people
July 27, 2023
āThe Government does need to reconsider some of its policiesā.
Was there ever a truer word spoken? But how did we manage to wind up with such asinine policies? Oh yes, they came from the Gone Socialist Party, formerly known as the Conservative Party. Itās simply too late for them to make amends now to save themselves from well deserved obliteration at the next election. Certainly after their massively disappointing performance they need a period in the political wilderness to reflect upon their folly, not to say such spineless crass stupidity.
July 27, 2023
It is a sad commentary on the competence of MPs, the government and the civil service that you find it necessary to keep repeating the obvious solutions to the needs of the day. Until there are the fundamental changes you describe the UK will continue its inexorable slide to third world status. If the powers that be persist in current policies, the day will arrive when the UK will look like Cuba – full of 50 year old bangers held together by string and sealing wax because no one can afford anything else. Fortunately for me, I will not be around to see that day.
July 27, 2023
@David Andrews +1
July 27, 2023
āThe Government does need to reconsider some of its policiesā Boris Johnson introduced these onto the UK as a Race, a Race he and his Government wanted to win.
We still have the Boris Johnson Cabinet, the Boris Johnson Government, they are still engaged in the race.
They of course will win, no other Country in this great big World of ours wanted to sacrifice their economies, damage their citizens on something so bizarre as a race to the bottom.
This Conservative Government wanted to be a leader in all the new industries that would be created. While the Conservative Government introduced tax after tax to fund these industries, they are actual far away from the UK so are contributing to alternative tax domains.
The UK taxpayer is now the worlds taxpayer. Taxpayer money directed to this nonsensical project has finished up of off shore, UK Industry and Enterprise has been excluded. So the banner for this Conservative Government should read āNo New UK Industry hereā
This Conservative Government, should listen to the silly left wing zealot across the pond. Taxpayers fund big projects, but only if they are US based. Logic, tax in one end does finish up as tax to contribute to the strength and welfare of the whole down the line. The Conservative Government way is lets rob the UK taxpayer and send it to fund alternate tax domains at the expense of our own.
July 27, 2023
Sir John – Bingo! Well spoken.
July 27, 2023
But the Conservative chap formerly known as Gummer says we must act now, not tomorrow, as a climate report claims that in 36 years and 5 months time extreme temperatures in the UK will become the norm.
One has to presume that both he and his family no longer eat beef burgers as some climate “specialists” say *beef production remains the biggest source of greenhouse gases”.
July 27, 2023
He gave his son a beef burger during the foot and mouth outbreak some years ago to prove the meats safety. Climate change wasn’t invented then I suppose.
July 28, 2023
Was it not in relation to BSE?
July 28, 2023
correct.
July 27, 2023
UN Secreatary General declares today an era of ‘global boiling’ ……quick send them more money, quick increase taxes, quick remove all freedoms & democracy – the united nations has spoken
July 27, 2023
100% agree …with every word. It’s actually called common sense, thanks, John.
July 27, 2023
The key to good environmental policy is conservation i.e. cutting waste.
Whether that is the dealng with the madness of producing packaging that will be thrown away after a few days after use or pumping heat into the air.
Solving these issues will also reduce costs.
The centralists/Marxists/Socilaists have failed miserably with their “green” ideas because they are based on top-down dictats, regulation and propoganda.
They need to leave space for the market to solve this issue allowing consumers to choose products and services that will be good for the environment, not because they have been forced to but because they want to.
The Conservatives need to get rid of the Soclialists in their party so they can deal with this issue properly.
July 27, 2023
Both major parties crave the authority that winning an election gives them, but they only respond to us when they see that vote slipping away. The rest of the time they follow the agenda laid down for them.
As more people come to realize the real science behind net-zero and covid, the more the parties will have to fight back by giving concessions to us.
The only way for us the voters to win is to increase pressure on the establishment and parliament, by shouting the truth far and wide, that alleged climate change and covid have been blown out of all proportion in order that more and more controls and oppression can be applied to the great people of this country.
We know the ultimate aims of the globalists – they have been spelled out by the UN, the WEF and even our own government – It is time more people became of these aims.
July 27, 2023
As far as Green Energy is concerned we are only a small drop in the ocean . If China and the the USA make huge changes then it makes sense for us to adopt tough measures . There is no doubt that the Earth is suffering from different extremes and a concerted approach from all is the only way to balance things out but , on our own , we are a minute meaningless .
July 27, 2023
What an abundance of common sense in the comments and piece above by JR. Trouble is that nobody will listen. As the saying goes follow the money.
July 27, 2023
money or Global Oligarchs or International order apparatchiks?
July 27, 2023
Your party’s narrow win in Uxbridge actually represents a win for the ULEZ as more votes were for parties supporting it than against it. And it is disingenuous at best to claim that the Tories as a party won because of opposition to ULEZ when Grant Shapps (remember him, Tory minister) wrote to Sadiq Khan insisting on its expansion. Your candidate exploited misinformation (I’ve heard of Tesla owners thinking they would be charged) and a frankly abysmal Labour campaign to scrape in.
July 27, 2023
+1
July 27, 2023
Congratulations Sir John! I read recently that the uninspiring Grant Shapps is now saying that we need to max out our gas and oil reserves rather than stupidly import LNG to maintain energy security. No credit to you given despite your shouting this common sense to the brain dead for a long time now. Your perseverance is admirable.
July 27, 2023
+1
July 27, 2023
How about a Royal Commission to investigate, over a maximum of one year, the extent our institutions have become or contain corruption.
The banks are now an obvious target. Their customer cancellation policy, the savings/loans differential policy. Their targeted bankrupting of businesses by calling in loans recently granted so that they can steal the assets. A new form of asset stripping. So what is the responsibility of the BoE and FCA in this situation. Judged by their absense, are they complicit.
Solicitors gaming the assylum system for great profit. Apart from the criminality of it, what has the SolicItors Regulatory Authority (SRA) done to stop it. Having seen film of the solicitors caught en flagrante, are the SRA suffering from what I would term Rotherham Syndrome.
I suspect that the deeper we dig the more we will find. As I said earlier, what a wonderful opportunity for Rishi to show the electorate that he is doing something.
July 27, 2023
How about a referendum on net-zero
July 28, 2023
Agri – The Whole system is corrupt.
July 27, 2023
Road fund licence (car tax), Ā£290 for a 1.6 petrol, Ā£30 for a 2.0 diesel and Ā£0 for an EV, all using the same roads, all satisfy the emissions test of MOT, all used the same amount of time ā¦.the 1.6 is 20 years old, the 2.0 is 4 years old, the EV is 4 years old, whereās the equity in that
July 27, 2023
I had a 17 plate 1.5 diesel, the roadtax on that car was zero.
July 27, 2023
Price differential = Social engineering …..next they’ll be charging a different price for your fuel depending on engine size or if you voted brexit
July 27, 2023
Do our PM, Chancellor, Cabinet & MPs really need to be told what basic common sense is? It seems they do, so what calibre of people are they? Don’t they think, ask questions, research before making decisions that will seriously affect the UK & its people?
Net Zero is a massive fraud & increasingly people are waking up to it.
If the PM & Chancellor wake up there is a massive opportunity to win the next General Election by cutting the cost of government, by reducing taxes significantly, by abandoning NZ, in other words by listening to the people, instead of trying to control them!
July 27, 2023
If they do possess commonsense then one has to wonder why do they do the opposite so often?
July 27, 2023
Why should the consumers be āsoakedā when we are told that green energy is 9 times cheaper than fossil fuels?
Sir Keir Starmerās response on 08/09/2022 to the PMās announcement on energy prices :
āNew wind and solar power are now nine times cheaper than gas. I want to repeat that. 9 teams cheaper.ā
https://policymogul.com/key-updates/24558/keir-starmer-s-response-to-the-prime-minister-s-announcement-on-energy-prices
July 27, 2023
@Original Richard – And in the UK version of Privatisation everyone pays the same regardless of source. The UK open free market of Consumer Choice that causes competition and competitive pricing is just a dream. Government manipulation sees to that.
July 27, 2023
There is a significant statistical deviation between the data of the current interglacial and the data of previous interglacials. That would be an understatement.
One cause is the anomaly of the Younger Dryas cooling event of some twelve and a half thousand years ago. This is of crucial importance – it did after all signify global cataclysm and major extinction events. These events may have radically altered the trajectory of the current intetglacial. Predictions based on past interglacial data, and assuming uniformity, could be rendered null and void. We may be much closer to, or even at, the maximum extent of warming.
If true, the next global alarm may be Global Freezing. May have to start pumping CO2 into the atmosphere to try to warm up a bit. Now that really would be ironic.
July 27, 2023
G :
Except that Happer & Wijngaarden have shown that increasing the CO2 levels does not lead to increased warming because of the IR saturation effect.
If we’re heading for another ice age, which really would be a real climate disaster/emergency compared to today’s global warming, and a distinct possibility, then increasing CO2 will simply help plants to grow.
However, the ice of the last ice age extended to 37 degrees north latitude and hence covered all of Europe and half the USA.
July 28, 2023
@ Original Richard
Absolutely agree that CO2 is a complete red herring. Happer is very clear Just trying to make a bit of an ironic joke.
As for the next ice age, I think that will be the least of our problems, especially when you consider the evidence that is emerging about the cause of the Younger Dryas.
July 27, 2023
This toy government is a clear & present danger to the conservative voter, democracy and our way of life ….we’ll soon have a labour party in charge due to their mad policies
July 27, 2023
toy or Tory – I agree it is not always obvious.
July 27, 2023
I would suggest that this conservative government now self-identifies as ātoyā government
July 27, 2023
We are ruled by people with no knowledge of science; they make laws which harm us all in pursuit of the unnecessary, the undesirable and the unattainable.
When will politicians for example pay attention to someone like Dr John Clauser, Physics Nobel Laureate who has now produced a satisfactory explanation of the major driving force of the Earth’s climate; it does not CO2 at all.
In other words when will politicians shut up once and for all about CO2 and climate change when they simply don’t know what they are talking about.
July 27, 2023
forthurst :
It would appear that a 16 year old girl carries more weight with politicians than a Physics Nobel Laureate who will never be allowed to appear on the BBC.
It is very easy to find on etc ed
July 27, 2023
Agree
July 27, 2023
Dear Sir John. Why is there no debate in this country about the huge number of companies and individuals buying throwaway fashion and other forms of cheap goods made in China that are then having to be shipped over to UK, causing large emissions not jus from the manufacturing process but from the shipping. There should be a larger debate about people buying more from the UK/Europe, and buying things that last, as these ‘externalities’ are not being taken into account at all. If the demand for Chinese tat was reduced from the West, I assume it could have a material impact on CO2 emissions.
July 28, 2023
The Chinese tat is designed to be cheap, massed produced without European or US safeguards, and ensures repeat production with a short lifespan. The West has allowed the tactic to defeat their own industries when tarriffs might have levelled the filed.
July 27, 2023
Frightening Tony Blair appears to be agreeing with all the commentators here, the UK citizen is not the problem they are just singled out for punishment
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2023/07/27/spare-public-huge-burden-of-net-zero-says-tony-blair/
July 27, 2023
@Ian B
Sir Tony said: āDonāt ask us to do a huge amount when frankly whatever we do in Britain is not really going to impact climate change.
āThe number one issue today ā and this is where Britain could play a part ā is how do you finance the energy transition?
July 28, 2023
John, I think the short answer is NO!
Please oppose all of this [fake] green nonsense which is bad in every way. The current Energy Bill has a number of articles in it which give unprecedented powers to the secretary of state to decide what to mandate on a regional or national basis, when, how far reaching it is and what the penalties on households and businesses will be for not complying.
Without going through the whole awful legislative proposal here are a few points linked to your article above
Costs to home owners and landlords.
Part 10 ENERGY PERFORMANCE ON PREMISES Article 246 Ā and 248
These articles and indeed Part 10 as a whole is of concern to me as a private home owner and landlord.Ā I do not want ever more stringent restrictions on heating, heat loss and energy use within a building being forced upon me. These will undoubtedly create more capital investment costs, most likely increase the maintenance schedule and costs and possibly require use of a more costly fuel source ie electricity rather than natural gas. Further, A248 indicates that civil sanctions (fines) may be applied for non-compliance.Ā
I object to the Secretary of State being at liberty to impose restrictions or obligations at will, that will create costs and burdens on people. Can this section be removed or limited to commercial buildings please within the statute?Ā
Part 4: Low-Carbon Heat Scheme Article 144Ā
This article allows for the mandating the targets for abandonment of fossil fuels used to heat our homes (ārelevant heating appliancesā) by the Secretary of State, which I object to on principle.
I read this article to mean that we cannot guarantee to continue to use natural gas, coal, wood, oil etc to heat our homes if your area becomes part of the scheme.Ā The article is deliberately woolly with this regards.
Article 153Implies that there will be a conversion of the existing natural gas network to a hydrogen one. There will be notice given, but no democratic voice from the town as to whether people want the hassle and costs associated with being disconnected from gas and reconnected to hydrogen. Why not give a town the vote. Also what grants will people be given for decommissioning perfectly good boilers to have to buy new hydrogen ones.
The whole Net Zero philosophy of taking away cheap, abundant, reliable forms of heat and power to impose changes in infrastructure and equipment in industry, national infrastructure, small businesses and the home for the supposedly virtuous result of trying to emit no CO2 and supposedly change the weather in some distant future. It is as unvirtuous as it gets the climate claims are not backed up by proper science, the engineering and economics of the change are also not backed up by free market thinking or reasonable assessments by free-thinking unshackled experts. Everyone is muzzled and forced to go along with this stuff to the detriment of us all. The sooner we remove all this regulation, market distortions and compulsions and return to a free market of ideas and return to promoting rather than destroying fossil fuel infrastructure the better for us, our children and grandchildren.
July 29, 2023
The year ‘2025’ for the possible ban of new gas boilers is hopefully a typo and it should be 2035.