IESO Creates and Promotes Hybrid Electricity Generation-What could go wrong?

Who knew?

IESO recently claimed by simply combining very old technology mankind would create hybrid electricity generation! 

The foregoing was stated recently by IESO in their September report “Enabling Foundational Hybrid Facility Models in the IESO-Administered Markets ”.  One example cited by IESO in the 46 page report, says combining batteries (invented in 1800 by Italian physicist Alessandro Volta) with electricity generated by wind turbines (created by Professor James Blyth in 1887) is “hybrid” generation.  The following from the report states: “Expiring wind and solar contracts along with declining technology costs for battery storage is expected to drive hybrid facility development over the next decade.”

It appears to be similar to mating horses and donkeys to create mules.  Considering how long batteries and wind generated electricity have been around perhaps IESO should name this new “hybrid” they claim now exists in Ontario?  The words “double-dealing” and or “chicanery” added to wind/battery or solar/battery would be a good descriptive for these hybrids!   

The foregoing implies IWT (industrial wind turbines) and solar with FIT (feed in tariff) contacts brought to us in Ontario by the McGuinty/Wynne governments will be renewed as long as battery storage is added by the owners. One should wonder if the Ontario Minister of Energy, Todd Smith has been played by Mark Carney, Vice Chair of Brookfield? A Brookfield subsidiary recently proposed a $300 million 161 MW (megawatts) battery storage unit that will reputedly contain four hours (644 MWh) of dispatchable energy and those batteries will be charged in the middle of the night and dispatched during the day when demand is high.  The benefit to Brookfield will translate to selling the power when the HOEP (hourly Ontario energy prices) market price is high while downloading it when prices are low. 

What looks to be somewhat confusing about this “hybrid” issue is the Energy Minister’s letter of August 23, 2022 wherein he states:  “I am pleased to see that through the first Medium-Term RFP (MT1 RFP) our government’s approach of competitive procurements has secured supply at a cost about 30 per cent lower than previous contracts.” It one believes he was referencing IWT contracts which are paid $135/MWh that would reduce the price for grid accepted wind to $94.50/MWh without including what we are also paying for “curtailed” generation of $120/MWh! 

Interestingly enough it appears the “30 per cent lower” quote from the Ministry letter is related to comments in the 46 page September 2022 report from IESO titled:  “Enabling Foundational Hybrid Facility Models in the IESO-Administered Markets”! The IESO report has the following two sentences: “Post-market renewal, there will be a locational marginal price (LMP) for the storage injecting resource and another LMP for the storage withdrawing resource. The LMP values may be different for the two (2) resources (e.g., $20/MW for the storage withdrawing resource and $21/MW for the storage injecting resource).”

The question becomes; had IESO negotiated the additional payment(s) with the IWT owners and made the Minister aware of the agreement reached before he penned his letter as it infers; due to the date of his letter proceeding the IESO report by one month?

Despite the foregoing question it seems interesting that the two additional payments added to the 30% reduction would bring the total cost of wind generation to $135.50 ($94.50+$20.00+21.00=$135.50).  The other question is whether the IWT owners can pick and choose when to sell their stored energy and if they will be allowed to choose hours when the HOEP market price is higher than the guaranteed price?

Another very recent announcement from Capital Power in Windsor suggests Ontario’s natural gas fired plants are keen to get in on the “battery” storage action as the September 21, 2022 article in the CBC suggests.  Capital Power is proposing to add a 40 MW battery storage unit particularly as IESO has forecast “demand in southwestern Ontario as a whole is expected to double over five years to about 2,000 megawatts”.  The article highlights a report from Power Advisory which amusingly recommends the City of Windsor ironically investigate “importing power from Michigan” whom the EIA (US Energy Information System) note in 2021 got their largest share (32%) of electricity from coal generation.

One of the principal reasons for the IESO projected demand increase is; “the announcement of the $4.9-billion Stellantis-LG Energy Solution electric vehicle battery plant, a massive facility slated to open in 2024.” The press releases from the Provincial and the Federal Governments don’t disclose how much taxpayers will be providing as the Federal Press Release notes: “Details of this agreement are subject to commercial confidentiality and cannot be disclosed at this time”.  Needless to say we taxpayers should expect government grants will be several hundred million of our tax dollars! Both press releases tout the wonders of converting from manufacturing ICE to EV automobiles in line with PM Trudeau and his minions seeking to achieve his target of “100% zero-emission vehicle (ZEV) sales by 2035”. The only announcement about grants was from the City of Windsor who have committed $68 million with the help of a $45 million loan from Infrastructure Ontario an Ontario taxpayer owned entity.

As IESO and the Federal, Provincial and Municipal governments here in Canada continue the push for batteries to be manufactured in Ontario and to also provide electricity it is interesting to note California has similar targets as those proposed by our various government bodies. Very recently PG&E (Pacific Gas & Electric) experienced yet another major battery fire at a large battery storage unit (182.5 MW) and that plant has now been shut down indefinitely!  

From the above summary of ongoing events here in Ontario and elsewhere it seems, in the minds of our bureaucrats and politicians charged with running our energy system (whose objectives should be reliable power), their view is:

“everything old is new again”!

OCAF is bringing Holger Dalkman from Germany to speak to City of Ottawa Officials and Others

The excitement in Ottawa often keeps locals up at night but we should be pretty sure an upcoming event hosted by OCAF (Ottawa Climate Action Fund) will be nothing like a “truck convoy” with honking horns. Despite it’s more quiet nature it should cause excitement for other reasons! Let’s see why?

OCAF is Hosting an Event

OCAF was founded with $21.7 million of our tax dollars and endorsed by now retired MP, Catherine McKenna and MP Seamus O’Regan at their opening ceremony on May 14, 2021. The ceremony itself was hosted by none other than Diana Fox Carney (wife of Mark Carney), an acclaimed eco-warrior.

Just before OCAF was founded the City of Ottawa’s council (presumably smitten by the ruling Liberal Party) passed a plan (Energy Evolution) to reach “net-zero” emissions by 2050. The plan encompasses erecting 700 industrial wind turbines with a capacity of 3,218 MW and 1,060 MW of rooftop solar. The “plan” appears to have been generated by none other than Pollution Probe rather than the bureaucrats within the municipality.  That in itself seems very strange!

It appears the latest planned event by OCAF is aimed at Ottawa’s transportation and transit sector and they are bringing in a speaker from Germany to deliver the message outlined in the event title which is: Avoid, Shift, Improve: How can international best practices accelerate low-carbon, resilient transportation in Ottawa?

The invited guest speaker is Holger Dalkman whose LinkedIn profile claims he is the “CEO and Founder of Sustain 2030” (an extensive search of “Sustain 2030” on Google turned up nothing) and holds a Masters degree in geography! In searching his name, it appears he has had numerous appearances including with the WEF (World Economic Forum) the UN and many other organizations pushing the “climate-change” agenda. His forte according to his profile is “twenty years of experience working in the field of mobility, cities, sustainability and climate change”. 

It appears his presentation will be related to the transit and transportation system in the City of Ottawa. Perhaps he will recommend banning all trucks unless they are electric powered ones (sans horns).  He may also express delight that OC Transpo is on the path to converting all their buses to battery-powered ones but the foregoing is simply speculation on my part!

If an Ottawa citizen steps back and looks at how well Germany has done with its push to reduce “climate change” and push for “net-zero” emissions they might have second thoughts about Dalkman’s speech and recommendations.

Germany has one of the highest costs of electricity in the world as well as an extremely high cost for home heating.  A March 16, 2022 article stated “A new 5,000 kWh annual supply contract costs an average of 2,098 euros, or 42 cents/kWh, 23% more than in December”. To contrast that with Ontario the average annual household consumption is 9,000 kWh and the average price is about 15 cents/kWh.  It is also worth noting the “42 cents/kWh” is U.S. currency so the Canadian equivalent is about 56 cents/kWh! Germany’s households (half are heated with naturals gas) are also paying dearly for natural gas as it has been affected by the Russia/Ukraine war and are now facing annual heating costs of well over U.S. $4,000/annually.

One should presume many millions of households in Germany are currently experiencing energy poverty*.

The first question asked of Dalkman during the Q. and A. session after his presentation should be; how many of the 41 million German households are currently experiencing “energy poverty” and what has caused it? 

No doubt he will get all choked up as he ponders how to answer that question while continuing to push the “net-zero” target!

*The common denominator for “energy poverty” is 10% or more of household income goes to pay for those two staples of heat and electricity.

 

 

 

                                                                                                                                  

Net-Zero Looking like a No-Go by 2050 Part 2

Part 1 examined several events related to the global “climate change” push and the damage being caused to livelihoods in the U.S., Europe and Canada.  The news was bleak but a couple of the articles signaled the fallout may be having an effect on how politicians may react to more bad news and that voters may rebel. 

Part 2 will look at other global events that will surely cause more handwringing amongst those politicians!

The transition to green energy and the missing warming

Lets’ start with a recent report from a German Scientist, Fritz Vahrenholt, who describes himself as “a scientific reviewer of the IPCC report (The renewable energy section, not the section on climate science), and says that it was his first view of the report that caused him to become skeptical of climate change.”

The review of his report notes the climb of “CO2 emissions” and their increased air concentration over the past 30 years and the warming over that timeframe.  It then points out that the AMO (Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation) has increased since 1980 but is now weakening suggesting a cooling stage of 20-40 years will occur and added to a weakening solar radiation concludes; “further significant warming beyond 1.5 degrees is unlikely in the next 30 years.”  The review also notes a “halted decline in Artic Sea ice” as noted by “European Copernicus program in March”.  This leads to the conclusion; this is good news and suggests: “Wouldn’t it be time for climate researchers to bring these trends to the attention of politicians and the public? After all, politicians are currently readjusting the priorities of energy supply. While until last year’s price explosion and the aftermath of the Ukraine war it was apparently taken for granted that climate impacts would be the sole determining factor for energy policy, we are all now being made aware of the importance of security of supply and price trends.”  We can only hope the foregoing news is actually brought to the attention of the politicians and they listen rather than always accepting the dire forecasts of the eco-warriors.

Canada’s oil and gas workers don’t need a forced ‘just transition

The captioned headline and the article from May 10th in the Niagara Independent should be a “must read” by every Canadian politician.  The article enunciates the importance of Canada’s oil and gas sector and how the demand for oil and gas not only creates jobs for hundreds of thousands of workers but also generates billions of tax dollars that pay for “roads, schools and hospitals”.  It goes on to note “Global demand for both oil and natural gas is firmly back near pre-pandemic levels and rising, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration” and questions the need for the “Just Transition” pushed by the current Trudeau led government!  The article points out “Canada can be the world’s oil and gas supplier of choice, providing customers reliable, responsible energy that is committed to emissions reduction and environmental excellence.”  The article points out world energy consumption will grow and Canada should be ready to step up to provide it.

It is so far not apparent the current government will back off their “Just Transition” concept but they should note the UK plans to classify “natural gas” as green and drilling for it is “environmentally sustainable” as noted in a post in Part 1 of this series.

India going gangbusters on coal — tosses green rules, & wants to reopen 100 old mines

It is becoming more apparent that while countries like Canada are led by politicians who have subscribed to the UNIPCC’s push to eliminate fossil fuels there are still some politicians around the world who are more concerned with their citizen’s well-being!  This is evident with India who did not step up at COP-26 to demands they should reduce their dependence on fossil fuels and didn’t accede to the wishes of people like Mark Carney. A recent article noted “India needs a billion tons of coal a year, and digs up about 770 million tons. Suddenly the plan is to increase that to 1.2 billion tons “in the next two years” and if that means opening 100 old mines and throwing away the green tape, so be it.” India depends on fossil fuels for 70% of their power generation and recently experienced increased demand due to the end of Covid restrictions and hot temperatures causing power demand to rise resulting in power outages. Increasing coal mining will allow them to reboot those coal plants that have experienced a shortage of fuel.

It is good to see some politicians around the world feel their citizens deserve reliable power and are not caught up in what the unelected Mark Carney’s or Bloomberg’s of the world tell them to do.       

US to Ease Sanctions on Venezuela, Enabling Cargoes to Europe  

As a Canadian it seemed very strange that the U.S. Government under President Biden recently decided to ease sanctions on Venezuela allowing them to ship oil to Europe and perhaps even the USA based on an article in the Financial Post last week.  Is this the same President who cancelled the Keystone pipeline during his first day in office that would have carried Canadian crude oil to the US?  The article suggests Venezuela oil may even be allowed to go to the US; “While Chevron currently isn’t allowed to drill for or export oil from Venezuela, the resumption of talks with state-owned PDVSA paves the way for the San Ramon, California-based company to obtain a new license allowing it to resume operations. It also signals that Venezuelan oil may be coming to the U.S., one person said.”

We should assume our Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau didn’t jump on that news and call Biden to get him to reverse his decision to allow the Keystone pipeline. Trudeau and his minions like the Minister of Environment and Climate Change, Steven Guilbeault, are determined to stop all Canadian fossil fuel from being extracted and sold around the globe.

Huge fire erupts at bus garage with vehicles alight and reports of an ‘explosion’

A bus garage hosting TfL (Transport for London) electric double decker buses erupted in flames yesterday and included an explosion which can be seen on a video.  The cause of the fire is under investigation but as a result TfL has removed 108 electric London buses from service due to the concern it could be an issue with the battery.  There have been similar incidences elsewhere with another one having recently occurred in Paris, France near the end of April and their transit authority suspended the use of 149 electric buses. Apparently this was the second one occurring as another electric bus had caught fire earlier in April. 

We have heard from the elites of the world as well as our politicians that we should stop consuming fossil fuels and use public transit but hopefully this isn’t what they had in mind but based on the travelling habits of our PM, Trudeau perhaps it is as he never takes public transit?

Conclusion

The developed world’s politicians seem to have embraced the dire and criticized reports from the UNIPCC along with the hues and cries from the many unqualified ENGO (environmental non-government organizations).  Couple that with the further embrace of those IPCC reports by the main stream media and it sure appears “actual science” is ignored! 

Perhaps some of these recent events will light up the minds of the reporter’s aka journalists and the general public will get the truth instead of the “disinformation” we are being fed!

ESG is Fully Endorsed by Public Sector Pension Plans

The Beatles song “Revolution” lyrics should be required reading for all the “woke” generation pushing the “net-zero” concept. When discovering something recently it brought to mind the words of that classic!  Pre-chorus 3 even had the following words: “But if you go carrying pictures of Chairman Mao You ain’t going to make it with anyone anyhow“!  

The ESG Revolution

We often discover, after it happens and behind the scenes; bureaucrats (federal, provincial and municipal) support politicians advocating for what they perceive as beneficial to them and do so, without regard for taxpayers obligated to pay the price for their indulgence.

Such was the case when unbeknown to most of us taxpayers those bureaucrats got together via eight publicly supported pension plans  (PPP) and in a press release dated November 25, 2020 united for a cause advocated by the Federal Liberal Party. The cause was their undated agreement to push for ESG (environmental, social and governance) factors when investing our taxpayer dollars (federal and provincial) in any future investments for the benefit of their member’s pensions.

What the foregoing meant was; those “PPP” agreed to impose ESG standards on publicly traded and private companies.  The impact would be on those companies ability to attract PPP as either shareholders or lenders for debt raising via bond issues, etc.  Those public sector pension plans at the time of the signing of the agreement held $1.6 trillion in assets which was close to what Canada’s GDP (gross domestic product) was in 2020 at US $1.57 trillion. A reflection on the power they hold over us lowly taxpayers!  The agreement is not only undated and mind boggling but also not in tune with most taxpayers as to how they should allocate our tax dollars that created their $1.6 trillion value.

The full text of the short but “undated” and compelling agreement follows:

“Companies and investors must put sustainability and inclusive growth at the centre of economic recovery

COVID-19 continues to impose a huge toll on our daily lives, impacting families, businesses, public institutions and civil society worldwide. The pandemic and other tragic events of 2020 have revealed pre-existing business strengths and shortcomings with respect to social inequity, including systemic racism and environmental threats.

It is imperative we rebuild our economies in ways that create greater systemic resiliency and inclusive growth. The time to act is now, and each of us has a role to play. We call on companies and investment partners to help drive lasting change by placing sustainability at the centre of their planning, operations and reporting.

As CEOs of Canada’s eight largest pension plan investment managers, representing $1.6 trillion in assets under management, we are committed to creating more sustainable and inclusive growth by integrating environmental, social and governance (ESG) factors into our strategies and investment decisions. It is not only the right thing to do, it is an integral part of our duty to contributors and beneficiaries. Doing this will unlock opportunities and mitigate risks, supporting our mandates to deliver long-term risk-adjusted returns.

To deliver on our mandates, we require increased transparency from companies. How companies identify and address issues such as diversity and inclusion, human capital, board effectiveness and climate change can significantly contribute to value creation or erosion. Companies have an obligation to disclose their material business risks and opportunities to financial markets and should provide financially relevant, comparable and decision-useful information. While we recognize companies face a myriad of disclosure frameworks and requests, it is vital that they report relevant ESG data in a standardized way.

We ask that companies measure and disclose their performance on material, industry-relevant ESG factors by leveraging the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB) standards and the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) framework to further standardize ESG-related reporting. While the SASB standards focus broadly on industry-relevant sustainability reporting, the TCFD framework calls for climate-specific disclosures across several reporting pillars (governance, strategy, risk, and metrics and targets). Both are useful to investors and informative to companies working to frame their ESG reporting.

We are confident the ability to successfully address and adapt to these 21st-century business risks and opportunities is a distinguishing feature of great companies. While for many this will require greater ambition than in the past, we believe companies demonstrating ESG-astute practices and disclosure will outperform over the long-term.

For our part, we continue to strengthen our own ESG disclosure and integration practices, and allocate capital to investments best placed to deliver long-term sustainable value creation.

Inspired by this historic opportunity to help confront the most urgent challenges facing our global community, we ask others committed to our vision to join us on this journey towards a more sustainable future.“   

The eight CEOs who signed the agreement represented the following public pension plans:

Alberta Investment Management Corporation, British Columbia Investment Management Corporation, Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec, Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, Healthcare of Ontario Pension Plan, Ontario Municipal Employees Retirement System, Ontario Teachers Pension Plan and the Public Sector Pension Investment Board!

The reference to SASB and TCFD in the agreement suggests these two UN inspired creations from a 2004 letter sent by Secretary General Koffi Annan to 50 CEOs of major financial institutions have completely revised the way we have been measuring financial performance over the centuries. It suggests 2 + 2 no longer equals 4!  To pretend companies will become “great” by adopting ESG factors flies in the face of all logic. The “E” (environmental) in ESG is what the Mark Carney, Michael Bloomberg political fans and eco-warriors have focused on and if the punishment of the middle and lower classes continues under their direction and the politicians they have influenced, we should expect:

As the Beatles opined “You say you want a revolution”!

NB: The Washington based “Institute for Pension Fund Integrity” in a report concluded: “Although there are over $20 trillion in ESG assets under management, it lacks a standardized definition under which all firms can unite and under which regulators can address legitimate concerns.“  

Who Pretends to Save us From Climate Change and the Pandemic?

An article in the Financial Post on December 30, 2021 signaled the bloom may be off the rose in respect to the market price of renewable energy firms. While the article points to the drop in value of stocks in the European travel and tourism sector in 2021, they note green renewable energy stocks fared much worse with values dropping despite the Stoxx market hovering at record highs.

Vestas Wind Systems, the world’s largest manufacturer of industrial wind turbines saw their stock price fall by a third and for Siemens Gamesa Renewable their stock price fell by 37 per cent. The world’s largest offshore wind farm company Orsted A/S saw their market price fall 33 per cent. Despite the drop in the price of their shares however, they still trade at a high P/E (price/earnings) ratio.

Price Earnings Ratio “The P/E ratio is calculated by dividing the market value price per share by the company’s earnings per share. Earnings per share (EPS) is the amount of a company’s profit allocated to each outstanding share of a company’s common stock“                                                                                     

To put the foregoing in context Vestas P/E ratio is currently 32.9 meaning it would take that number of years before they generated the total EPS at their current market price. For Orsted A/S the P/E ratio is 44.2 and in Siemens case it doesn’t apply as they lost money in their latest reporting period.

Another “green” associated company whose stock market price has reached astronomical levels is Tesla the electric vehicle manufacturer. An article in the NY Times in late October stated the following:

“Tesla is worth more than virtually every other major carmaker in the world combined. Analysts are squarely of two minds about its current level. In the bull camp: Daniel Ives of Wedbush Securities, who tweeted yesterday, “Tesla hitting $1 trillion is just for starters.” In the bear camp: Craig Irwin of Roth Capital Partners, who wrote in a client note last week that Tesla’s stock — which then traded at 173 times next year’s earnings — was “egregiously overvalued.“  Based on the foregoing “bear camp” prophecy it is easy to understand why Elon Musk reportedly “offloaded US$16.4 billion worth of shares since early November.“ What is also surprising is that Tesla’s bond rating is still in the junk category at BB+!

With politicians from all of the developed world countries pushing to eliminate ICE (internal combustion engines) sales and endorsing EV (electric vehicle) sales however, they have directly impacted the price of Tesla’s shares. Their efforts to free the world of emissions from the transportation sector has made Musk the richest man in the world. Pretty sure he appreciates the work of the UNIPCC bureaucrats, eco-warriors and the “woke” politicians who helped him get to that pedestal!

What about the Covid-19 pandemic?

 The other issue that surfaced just two years ago in the form of a “pandemic” has also presumably made rich people richer.  As one example it’s worth noting Moderna’s stock price on March 1, 2020 was US$29.95 and now is US$234.70 for a gain of almost 700%.  Pfizer Inc’s stock was trading at US$30.97 per share back on March 1, 2020 as the pandemic lockdowns hit and its current price is US$56.74 share so has almost doubled in less than 2 years.

Both the Moderna and Pfizer Covid-19 vaccines obviously played a hand in their increasing stock market value particularly as they are fully endorsed by the CDC (Center for Disease Control) whose spokesperson seems to be Dr. Anthony Fauci. Fauci presses the need to be vaccinated and get booster shots.  He is the Chief Medical Advisor to the President so since the pandemic arrived, he has reached a position of power that is no doubt, the envy of every other bureaucrat in the USA and elsewhere.

Who owns Moderna, Pfizer and Tesla?

It is an interesting exercise to quickly look at some of the major shareholders of both Moderna, Pfizer and Tesla and it is fascinating to discover the names amongst the “top ten” shareholders. Those in the top 10 list of shareholders for Tesla, Moderna and Pfizer include BlackRock, SSgA (State Street Global Advisors) and Vanguard.  Fidelity Management are among the 10 largest shareholders of both Moderna and Tesla.

 At this point it is worth knowing all four of the above “asset managers” are co-incidentally also members of the Net Zero Asset Managers Initiative which happens to be an outgrowth of GFANZ (Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero).  GFANZ is where Mark Carney, former Governor of the Bank of England is the Chair and Michael Bloomberg is Co-chair. Larry Fink, Chairman and CEO of BlackRock is also listed as a Principal of GFANZ!   

Surely the foregoing connections are all co-incidental and those entities, the rich and famous guiding them and represented under the GFANZ umbrella are simply out to save the world from “climate change” while protecting us “commoners” from the perils of both that happening and the pandemic that arrived two years ago!

Someone is making money from both of the concepts of “climate change” (formerly referred to as “global warming”) and the Covid-19 pandemic and based on the above cursory review it would appear to be many of those amongst the elites and super rich.

Perhaps some of the less naïve politicians around the world are also benefitting too but that would require some serious investigation into the possible “conflict of interest” issues they are supposed to abstain from once they are elected!

ESG appears to be the acronym for Economic Spurious Gibberish

The term “environmental social and governance” (ESG) appears to be a concept developed by Ivo Knoepfel of the University of Zurich via his paper “Who Cares Wins”. The paper led those who claim mankind is responsible for “climate change” to advocate the use of ESG terminology to further their “net-zero” by 2050 target! Interestingly, a recent referendum held in Switzerland related to the plan to reach net-zero emissions by 2050 was rejected by Swiss voters so their politicians will have to back away from their signature to the “Paris Agreement”.

The hypocrisy of those recognized as the “super rich” or the “elites” of the world pushing the “net-zero” emissions by 2050 and the need to audit ESG commitment(s) by all corporations is mind-blowing!

The foregoing was recently highlighted by the world’s largest asset manager BlackRock and one of Canada’s largest, namely Brookfield! 

An article in the FP highlighted their hypocrisy, with the headline: “Brookfield, BlackRock bids for Saudi Aramco pipeline underscore an ESG dilemma”. Both of these institutions have pushed the “climate change” agenda and the focus to reach net-zero, so one wonders; why are they competitively bidding to acquire a gas pipeline and how would it allow them to achieve their purported end goal?

To reiterate the latter point it is noteworthy to be aware that Larry Fink, founder of BlackRock in his annual letter to CEO’s in 2021 stated:  “we believe all companies – including BlackRock – must begin to address the transition to net zero today. We are taking a number of steps to help investors prepare their portfolios for a net zero world, including capturing opportunities created by the net zero transition.“

Likewise if one looks at the claim made by Mark Carney (Vice Chair of Brookfield), after his appointment, he went on to say publicly: “The reason we’re net zero is that we have this enormous renewables business,” he said, and thus “all the avoided emissions that come with that offset existing investments in entities that emit carbon.“  The media pushback on his remark forced him to admit it was a false claim.

Both Larry Fink and Mark Carney are members of the Board of Trustees of the WEF (World Economic Forum) and Klaus Schaub, WEF’s founder, states you won’t be allowed to join the WEF unless the company or organization you represent have committed to achieve net-zero by 2050 or sooner!

Past and Present Brookfield Actions

Brookfield’s history goes back to 1899 but we will look at only a few of their activities in the past decade. Let’s start with their purchase in October 2012 of Enwave Energy for C$480 million owned jointly by the City of Toronto and OMERS (Ontario Municipal Employees Retirement System) at that time.  Enwave was, and still is, a district energy system provider, meaning they don’t generate greenhouse gases as the energy is geothermal (includes lake water) to heat and cool buildings.

Fast forward by almost 9 years to February 2021 and Brookfield announced they sold Enwave for US$4.1 billion (C$5.1 billion) to Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan and Australian firm IFM Investors (each owning 50%) and presumably celebrated a very nice return on their original investment.  What is sadly amusing about this buying and selling occurrence is that one Government of Ontario pension plan (OMERS) sold their position back in 2012 for a fraction of what another Government of Ontario pension plan (OTPP) purchased it for in 2021. 

To make taxpayers more upset, back in 2019 former Minister of the Environment, Catherine McKenna handed Enwave $10 million of our tax dollars saying this partnership will help create jobs and help tackle climate change in a “smarter way.“   

Just days ago, the (CIB) Canada Infrastructure Bank, (created in June 2017 to provide up to $35 billion to support infrastructure projects) issued a press release stating:  “The CIB is committing $600 million to the project which allows Enwave to accelerate and scale the build-out of its district energy systems.” The press release is vague in that it doesn’t indicate if it is an investment or a loan agreement. Either event will simply see tax dollars flying out the door while the Government increases our deficit and borrows the money they claim is for the good of the planet. The CIB now falls under the purview of Minister Dominic LeBlanc who in the past was singled out by Canada’s ethics commissioner when he “broke conflict of interest rules when he awarded a lucrative Arctic surf clam license to a company linked to his wife’s cousin.“

So, one should wonder, what did Brookfield do with that US$4.1 billion to assist them in their push to get to net-zero their Vice Chair Mark Carney, surely emphasized?  We don’t really know, but:

Brookfield wound up competing with Pembina Pipeline Co. for the purchase of Inter Pipeline and they won with a hostile takeover offer by outbidding Pembina with an accepted offer of C$8.6 billion.  One should surely wonder how that will assist Brookfield in getting to the “net-zero” target and how it fits with their 63 page ESG report for 2020?

The CEO’s letter within Brookfield’s ESG report contained the following:

“Within our ESG initiatives, we are directing our efforts to the transition to a net zero carbon economy. This transition will affect virtually every business in every country, and we are fully committed to doing our part to decarbonize. In March 2021, we took an important step as part of our commitment to achieving net zero throughout our business: becoming a signatory to the Net Zero Asset Managers (NZAM) initiative.”

One should wonder with the foregoing ESG initiative why would Brookfield purchase a pipeline and pursue another one in the middle east in competition with BlackRock (another NZAM member)?

From all appearances ESG, ie: “Economic Spurious Gibberish“ is the acronym for the heading in this article and has nothing to do with “environmental social and governance” they pretend it does!

Catching my Eye—Tragedies related to Climate Change

It is becoming evident the “climate change” push to achieve “net-zero” is causing lots of problems around the world but they appear to have nothing to do with an increase in floods, heat deaths, hurricanes, wildfires, harm to reefs, melting Antarctic or Arctic ice! 

The “sky is falling” referenced by politicians, bureaucrats and eco-warriors at COP 26 claiming it’s caused by emissions, instead, appears to be caused by their push to reach that “net-zero” emissions target!

Some recent examples:

Because electric buses catch fire easily, many German cities are taking the expensive electric buses out of service.

A recent article stated: “Lower Saxony is right at the forefront when it comes to electric bus transport. In June, however, a major fire broke out in a bus depot in Hanover in the Mittelfeld district, in which the fire destroyed nine vehicles belonging to the Üstra transport company. Cause: The battery of an electric bus had caught fire.“  In Stuttgart another electric bus fire noted 25 vehicles were destroyed by fire.

One should assume those transit* bus fires would result in major insurance claims but those insurance companies, if members of Mark Carney’s GFANZ (Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net-Zero) creation, with their $130 trillion in assets, will blame the event on “climate change”!

Maine voters reject $10 billion Hydro-Quebec deal; Legault says project will go ahead                                       

Hydro-Quebec got hit with a shock when a referendum in Maine rejected completion of a major transmission line passing through the state to reach Massachusetts. Hydro-Quebec signed a long-term supply agreement with Massachusetts to supply “clean hydro electric power” to replace some coal fired generation.  Those eco-warriors in Maine pushing to stop the transmission line argued; “environmentalists say that hydropower isn’t as low-carbon as it seems, between the building of dams and the decomposition of vegetation underwater in flooded areas, which creates some greenhouse gases. They’d prefer a turn to other clean energy sources, like wind.“  Premier Legault who was attending COP 26 said “Nothing is certain in life, but I am confident it will happen“. 

Sometimes it’s comforting to see politicians who have firmly committed to “net-zero” as Premier Legault has, get beaten up by those same eco-warriors they were intent on winning over for their votes!

Volvo says emissions from making EVs can be 70% higher than petrol models – and claims it can take up to 9 YEARS of driving before they become greener

It is interesting to note Volvo, back in March 2021, committed to being fully electric by 2030 recently stated: “greenhouse gas emissions during production of the electric vehicle are nearly 70 per cent higher than a petrol model, which is mainly due to the carbon intensity of battery and steel production, as well as from the increased share of aluminium in the plug-in car.“  This article went on to say; “at current global electricity mix, it needs to be driven almost 70k miles – 9 years based on average UK mileage – to offset its higher production emissions“  Volvo goes on to suggest if the batteries are charged** with “green energy” the emission offset will occur at 30k miles. Most EV manufacturers are now required to warranty battery life for 5 to 8 years meaning at some point shortly after, those batteries will reach their “end of life”, with a replacement cost of USD $5K to $15K each. 

What Volvo don’t say is about recycling those batteries. Dr. Paul Anderson of the University of Birmingham when queried about the percentage of recycled lithium-ion batteries stated: “the value everyone quotes is about 5%,” says Dr Anderson. “In some parts of the world it’s considerably less.“ Lots of taxpayer dollars are being expended to try and find a way to increasing that miserly 5% but because of the toxic nature of many of the hazardous materials they “have an inconvenient tendency to explode if disassembled incorrectly.”

From all appearances it seems the move to “green” the economies of the world through “electrification” of everything is not what the eco-warriors and the politicians they have converted to their beliefs, will find to be an easy task.

Perhaps those politicians know but don’t care as they will not be in power when the proverbial s##t hits the fan! 

*Those fires should alert some Ontario municipalities like Ottawa and Toronto, as well as the Province of Quebec to future problems should they electrify their transit and school bus fleets as planned; but don’t count on it!

**Cold climates affect EV batteries negatively causing them to be recharged more frequently.

The Canadian Institute of Climate Choices want us to Sink not Swim

Surely it was purely coincidental the CICC (Canadian Institute of Climate Choices) released their report titled: “Global climate policy acceleration means sink-or-swim decade for Canada’s economy” on the same, pre-announced day, Commissioner Steve Allan’s Alberta Inquiry into anti-Alberta energy campaigns was released!  Or was it?

Both of the foregoing reports were released on October 21, 2021 and while the Allan report was about 700 pages the CICC report was a meagre 122 pages.  The latter however, was full of disaster warnings about “climate change” and suggested “fossil fuels” were being replaced with wind and solar.  The CICC report went so far as to compliment China (the world’s largest emitter of CO 2) for being “an early leader in electric vehicles and solar technology”. The Allan Report (657 pages) was oblique in accusing Canadian environmental groups of using foreign funding to curtail and end fossil fuel generation. The foregoing  was concluded despite an independent report from Deloitte’s noting; “Total foreign funding, therefore, of “Canadian-based environmental initiatives” was $1.28 billion for the period 2003-2019.”  Apparently “climate change” activism is not a sin or a crime despite its probable outcome to create energy poverty.

Looking specifically at the CICC, “sink or swim” report one should note it is truly meant to scare the reader by suggesting if Canada doesn’t move to “net-zero” emissions we are in big trouble.  Specifically, their report states: “Around 2,000 workers have been affected by coal power closures, whereas over 880,000 people work in the transition-vulnerable sectors identified in Figure 18.” Figure 18 (page 59), discloses those workers who are reputedly at risk of losing their employment are in a variety of jobs including those in many of the areas at which Canada excels such as: oil and gas extraction, emissions intensive manufacturing, mining and quarrying, transportation equipment manufacturing and support for mining and oil and gas extraction! Needless to say, the forecast of those 880,000 job losses caught the media’s attention.

The CICC report in “picture terms” lays out the potential impacts in a chart (Figure 1) on page 6 by using a forecast from Central Bankslabelled as,“NGFS” (Network for Greening the Financial System).  The NGFS was launched by 8 founding central banks, under the leadership of Banque de France‘s governor François Villeroy de Galhau, the Dutch Central Bank‘s Frank Elderson and the Bank of England‘s former governor Mark Carney.” It should come as no surprise Mark Carney was actively involved in its formation. Their membership now contains 95 central banks The data, needless to say, is scary as without adoption of “net-zero” by 2050, in non-adapting countries, GDP is projected to fall by over 10% from current levels. CICC commissioned Planetrics (a Mckinsey & Company subsidiary), an international climate-risk analytics company, to stress test Canadian publicly traded companies and companies with Canadian operations. Apparently CICC with close to 100 reputed taxpayer supported “experts” was unable to perform that exercise.

At this point it is important to note the CICC was a creation of the now retired Catherine McKenna, former Federal Minister of the Environment and Climate Change. The CICC was created with $20 million taxpayer dollars and loaded its staff, Board of Directors, expert panels and advisory council with a myriad of eco-warriors mainly dependent on government largesse. Those eco-warriors seem intent on decimating Canada’s economic wellbeing via their actions in support of our current government and ending our dependence on fossil fuels.

Needless to say, we should believe the release of the CICC report to coincide with the Allan report was meant to offset its release.  The damning information in the Allan report only confirmed how Canadian environmental groups accepted foreign contributions to push the narrative—Canadian production of coal, oil and gas must cease!  One need look no further, then note, the current President of CICC is Rick Smith who spent 9 years at Environmental Defence pushing the “climate change” agenda. Failing that belief, perhaps the word came down from Jonathan Wilkinson, Minister of the Environment and Climate Change or his Chief of Staff, Marlo Raynolds whose past relationship with Rick Smith demonstrates serious collaboration between Pembina and Environmental Defence via the Strathmere Group.  

Both Raynolds and Smith signed the Strathmere Goup’s “Declarations” jointly and one of those clearly was:

“Declare a moratorium on expansion of tar sands development and halt further approval of infrastructure that would lock us into using dirty liquid fuels from sources such as tar sands, oil shale and liquid coal.”

We should be confident the release of the CICC’s “sink or swim” report on the same day as the Steven Allan Inquiry was planned to ensure the main stream media focused on the forecasted loss of those 880,000 jobs that will occur should Canada not commit to “net-zero”!

Collaboration between CICC and those in political power clearly reflects their intentions to harm Canada’s economy!

Interesting Observations here at Home and Elsewhere Before COP 26

The past few days have again shown the world the negative effects of trying to control “climate change” associated with stemming the oft cited UNIPCC scary forecast of a 1.5 degree of warming.

Ontario Comes First in Subsidizing Energy Costs

On October 19,2021, Ontario’s FAO (Financial Accountability Office) released a report titled “Home Energy Spending in Ontario: Income and Regional Distribution”. It is an interesting report and tells us how the Provincial government; ie: taxpayers, subsidized residential electricity and heating costs over the 2019 year. The report breaks down the cost of residential electricity and heating costs in five sectors by both geography and income and tells us the costs of those subsidies.  We should suspect the taxpayer cost has increased significantly since the end of 2019 due to the Covid-19 pandemic and on and off again lock-downs. We should also recognize those costs were brought to us by the well-over 100% increase in electricity costs ratepayers experienced as the McGuinty/Wynne government brought us the GEA (Green Energy Act).  The FAO’s estimate for the subsidies in 2019 for the electricity sector was a cost to taxpayers of $3.5 billion. The report as noted highlights spending on those necessities of life in five regions and one of them is “Eastern Ontario”.  One sentence in the report stood out as it was about the Eastern Ontario region where they experience the highest “income per household” and the highest “average home energy spending”!  The sentence referencing a portion of that region stated: “High household incomes and large dwelling sizes, particularly in the Ottawa-Gatineau area, drive high energy use in the Eastern region.” That should come as no surprise as the area is loaded with highly paid bureaucrats and politicians.  It is also the region where local politicians want to spend $57.4 billion to achieve “net-zero” emissions by 2050 for Ottawa only.  Hopefully they are not looking for any contributions to their plans from the rest of Ontario’s ratepayers or taxpayers.

How will UK PM Boris Johnson Dance for the Eco-Warriors at COP 26

A short article from “Oil Price” titled “UK Grid Relies For 62 Percent On Fossil Fuels For Its Energy” should be a shocker to PM Johnson with COP 26 mere days away and energy prices skyrocketing in the UK and Europe. Natural gas prices, in particular, have reportedly risen by over 400%. The captioned article noted electricity generated by natural gas represented the bulk (60%) of the 62% with coal generation representing the other 2%!  Another recent article in CNBC stated; “Rising gas prices aren’t a problem unique to Britain. In recent weeks, governments in Spain, Italy, Greece, and France have taken drastic actions to minimize its impact on consumers.” One should wonder how those representing the various governments will react to the thousands of Eco-warriors attending COP 26 in Glasgow who will insist on firm commitments to achieve the “net-zero” target to reputedly save the world from the dreaded “climate change” event. The developing world countries attending COP 26 will also be looking for handouts to help them get to net-zero.  The developed world countries, from whom they seek the trillions of dollars will be hamstrung as any funds they may have been prepared to commit are disappearing into the abyss to support their own citizens due to the climb in fossil fuel energy.

Just more bad news that Johnson will have to deal with!

Pledges by Banks to Cut Funding for Drilling of Oil and Gas in the Arctic and elsewhere Contain Loopholes

Less than a week ago Mark Carney, former Governor of the Bank of England convinced the “Big Six” Canadian banks to join his NZBA (Net-Zero Banking Alliance) mere days before the launch of COP 26 in Glasgow, Scotland.  The six Canadian banks brought the total number in the “alliance” to 81 representing 36 countries and US$58 trillion in assets. This would suggest many banks in many countries have not kowtowed to Carney or the UN despite the forecasted climate catastrophe. The signatory banks of the “alliance” reputedly agree to align their lending and investment activities to achieve net-zero targets by 2050 as well as set intermediate target reductions by 2030.

Needless to say, the eco-warriors such as Greenpeace weren’t satisfied!  Keith Stewart, senior energy strategist with Greenpeace Canada, said Canadian banks have to do more than join the alliance. “The world is accelerating toward a zero-carbon economy and Canadian banks are still playing catch up. Until they commit to a near-term phasing out of all financial support for fossil fuels and to fully respect Indigenous rights, they will still be part of the problem.”

The foregoing pitch by Greenpeace was also the subject of another article about “alliance” member banks lending to corporations involved in Artic oil and gas drilling as environmentalists and some asset managers (115 investment firms with assets under management of US$4.2 trillion) noted they want more action.  Apparently, banks are not specifically lending to Artic projects but do lend directly to corporations who then may use some or all of the funds for Artic related oil and gas exploration and extraction.

Somehow, I doubt the politicians in those two Artic countries of Russia (12.4 million b/d) and Norway (2 million b/d) who produce oil and gas have any intention of instructing their banks to stop providing the cash required to either fund new developments or provide the working capital needed to continue their generation.

We should believe the Mark Carney(val) and its push to get more members of NZBA will become harder as his support of UN efforts to reach net-zero by 2050 will cripple their economies much as it has in many of the European countries along with Canada.

LMDC Pushback and China’s Power Crises Impacts Global Economy

Well, as the expression goes; “the shxt has hit the fan” as India’s environment minister “said the delayed climate action and lack of leadership from developed countries have increased the cost of mitigation and adaptation in developing countries, and jointly flagged how “calling all countries to adopt ‘net-zero’ target by 2050 is inequitable.” What he was emitting (writer’s interpretation) at a meeting of the LMDC (like-minded developing countries) including China, Pakistan, etc. in Bolivia was: they won’t be bullied into any commitments at COP 26 to reduce emissions without the developed world handing them billions or trillions of dollars more.  With many of the developed economies suffering from declines in their GDP and climbing inflation it also seems unlikely they will commit to increase the promised $100 billion for developing countries.

As if to make matters worse in both developing and developed countries the global spikes in the cost of fossil fuel energy and its current limited supply has caused blackouts.  Interestingly those blackout events have affected developed countries who outsourced much of their manufacturing base and now are faced with shortages in obtaining supplies they are dependent on.  That has resulted in higher inflation, unemployment, reduced GDP, economic support for their workers and increased taxpayer debt.

The foregoing spells more bad news for the upcoming COP 26 conference in Glasgow, and reinvigorates additional screaming from the eco-warriors. 

One has to wonder will this cause the demise of the premise that CO 2 emissions will cause the world to collapse and force the eco-warriors to find a real job?   Only time will tell!

Mark Carney Got One Thing Right But Seems Wrong About His Other Preaching’s

Recently I received Steven E. Koonin’s book “Unsettled” in which he eloquently analysis the 2018 UNIPCC report that served the eco-warriors with some scary scenarios they amplified in their push to stop the world from consuming fossil fuels.  Fossil fuels have served the world in a meaningful way by reducing poverty and climate induced deaths and those issues are highlighted in Koonin’s book with facts.  He is not overly critical of the actual results reported by the scientists who produced the report but castigates the media and politicians for their apparent overzealous approach inferring mankind will perish should we continue to emit CO 2.

Amusingly he does cast aspersions on Mark Carney highlighting him as “the single most influential figure in driving investors and financial institutions around the world to focus on changes in climate and human influences on it.”  Koonin first paints Carney as an outstanding central banker but than clearly highlights one of his faulty claims about the future as it applies to climate change with the verbiage; “it’s surprising that someone with a PhD in economics and experience with the unpredictability of financial markets and economies as a whole doesn’t show a greater respect for the perils of prediction-and more caution in depending upon models.”  

The take from yours truly in respect to Carney was much more critical in a recent article I penned but, having no concerns about offending fellow humans pushing to destroy our economy allows yours truly to point out their fallacies in a less gentle way!

Below is the full text of Koonin’s criticism of Mark Carney as it appeared in my hard copy.  I recommend you take a couple of minutes to read what he had to say and note; it is a reflection on all the other “climate change” issues he opines on.  He calls everyone out with facts, and I would encourage all to acquire and read this excellent book to dispel any false beliefs you may have.                                    

Unsettled by Steven E. Koonin

The following was selected from pages 145 to 147

“Mark Carney, former head of Canada’s central bank and later head of the Bank of England, is probably the single most influential figure in driving investors and financial institutions around the world to focus on changes in climate and human influences on it. A learned man, with a PhD in economics from Oxford University, he has been an outstanding central banker. Carney is now the United Nations’ Special Envoy on Climate Action and Finance. He is also a UK advisor for the 26^th annual UN Conference of Parties (COP26), a follow-on to the 2015 Paris climate conference that’s due to take place in Glasgow, Scotland, during November 2021.  So it’s important to pay close attention to what he says.

                In a 2015 speech just before the Paris conference, speaking as governor of the Bank of England, Carney laid out many aspects of “the insurance response to climate change.” Extreme weather costs insurance companies a lot of money, so perhaps it is no wonder that his appeal included a warning about flooding:

Despite winter 2014 being England’s wettest since the time of King George; III; forecasts suggest we can expect at least a further 10% increase in rainfall during future winters.

To support that assertion, he cited Britain’s Met Office “research into climate observations, projections, and impacts,” These were model forecasts for the next five years, so you might expect they’d be more accurate than those attempting to project climate fifty years out. Let’s turn to the data and see.

                Figure 7.13 shows the observed winter precipitation (December through February) in England and Wales up through 2020; it’s one of the longest instrumental weather series available, beginning in 1766.  The average rainfall looks pretty constant over decades from 1780 to 1870 and again from 1920 to the present.  A shift occurred somewhere over the fifty years in between, when human influences on the global climate were quite negligible.

                Carney was correct that 2014 was a record wet winter (455.5 mm or 17.9 inches), and it was indeed the “wettest since the time of King George,” since George III’s reign lasted until 1820. But the Met Office models Carney cited back in 2014 all turned out to be dead wrong. Rainfall during the six winters after 2014 was well in context with the previous century, and it averaged 278 mm, 39 percent less than the 2014 record and nowhere near the “at least” 500 mm implied by the predicted increase. And a Met Office analysis published in 2018 found that the largest source of variability in UK extreme rainfalls during the winter months was the North Atlantic Oscillation mode of natural variability not a changing climate.

                Of course Carney could take refuge in his speech’s subjunctive “forecasts suggest” and the indeterminate hedging of “future winters.” Nevertheless, it’s surprising that someone with a PhD in economics and experience with the unpredictability of financial markets and economies as a whole doesn’t show a greater respect for the perils of prediction-and more caution in depending upon models.”