“All new news is old news happening to new people”

The foregoing is a quote of Malcolm Muggeridge an English journalist famous for bringing the Mother Teresa story to world attention. My belief is the quote is appropriate to amplify how eco-warriors have continued their pursuit of what they once labelled “global warming”, but the world didn’t warm!  Because it didn’t warm, they changed the overriding message to “climate change” which most sane people in the world would easily agree has been happening during their lifetime and for tens or hundreds of thousands of years.

The following article and chart below was written and posted on the web almost eleven years ago and the message contained in it hasn’t changed materially other then it’s full-on amplification here in Canada and around the world because people fail to see; it is really old news! 

My hope is to expand on the activities of those in the below article through further research in an update that falls directly in line with what Malcolm Muggeridge so aptly delineated in his quote.

Stay tuned but read the following and see if you agree with the quote and remember the below article well be 11 years old next month so it’s old news!

Bruce Lourie’s Spider Web Grows and catches more Prey and Tax Dollars

An article I wrote in May 2012 identified the extent of Bruce Lourie’s reach into the world of climate change/renewable energy through a plethora of charities, not-for-profit and for-profit entities that he founded or where he exerts influence. This was elaborated on with a follow-up article that looked at  three of the companies he founded and attempted to trace some of the millions of taxpayer dollars that have found their way to those three. Included with the latter was a spider web that attempted to trace the connections and the money flow.

This piece will look at two more of the Lourie creations which are; The Sustainability Network and the Canadian Environmental Grantmakers Network (CEGN).

Reviewing the Sustainability Network’s website is an exercise in trying to define what they are trying to accomplish. The focus becomes somewhat clearer after reading what they see as their mission referred to as: “ Our mission is to enrich Canadian environmental leaders and non-profit organizations through programs, services and support that help them increase their capacity to lead, manage and strategize.” …and, “We are about sustaining the organizations that work on sustainability.”

So from all appearances, the Sustainability Network, who have received almost $1 million dollars from the Trillium Foundation (where Lourie sat as a Director) work with our tax dollars to sustain sustainable organizations. The inference is that the organizations that expect us to lead “sustainable” lives, can’t even sustain themselves. The Network also received support from the Ivey Foundation (Lourie is the President), Salamander Foundation (an Ivey affiliated foundation) and several other Foundations including Suncor Energy Foundation. It is ironic that the “renewable energy” crowd continually rant that the anti-wind and solar groups are funded by big oil, but they willingly take money from big oil while fighting further oilsands projects and the building of pipelines. Strange bedfellows!

The Sustainability Network has also received grants from Tides Canada, the Oak Foundation, the Catherine Donnelly Fund several other private foundations and a “Certified “B” Corp” referred to as “green living”. For those unfamiliar with Certified “B” corporations check out the MaRS Discovery District. A Certified “B” corporation is reportedly a business corporation that uses its powers to “solve social and environmental problems”. It operates somewhere between a for-profit and a not-for-profit is the way the writer interprets the gobbledygook. “B” corporations are an import from the US where they are seeking special tax status from municipal, state and federal governments. Green Living has an Advisory Board that includes; A. Heintzman of the Premier’s recently announced Clean Energy Task Force, Rick Smith who is on the same task force and the Executive Director of Environmental Defence, Geoff Cape of Evergreen, Bob Oliver of Pollution Probe, Dr. Moole of David Suzuki Foundation and Tim Gray of the Ivey Foundation.

The Sustainability Network is a charity, but you are hard pressed to find that out through a visit to their website as they don’t even appear to have a “donate” button. As a registered charity sustaining yourself through grants must allow you to preach to others how to go about doing the same and turns the CRA’s governance of charitable institutions into a joke. Those “strange bedfellows” (ENGOs & Oil Companies) mentioned above become stranger still if one looks at the Clean Air Renewable Energy Coalition (CAREC) originally founded by Suncor and the Pembina Institution in 2000. The member list now includes; Friends of the Earth, Pollution Probe, World Wildlife Fund, Toronto Environmental Alliance and many of the oil companies and renewable energy developers as well as OPG and Toronto Hydro. The objective of the organization is defined as; “Clean Air Renewable Energy Coalition is a group of corporate and environmental non-governmental organizations (ENGOs) formed to accelerate the development of Canada’s renewable energy industry.” and defines its target as: “The coalition has been most targeted on, and influential at, the Federal level of government in Canada by advocating measures to narrow the gap (writer’s emphasis) between the price of “green power” and the price of “conventional power”.

On the latter point the ENGOs have been very effective in Ontario, simply by convincing the Liberal Government to drive up the price of electricity by paying above market rates to those industrial wind and solar developers that are represented on CAREC’s membership list.

The offices for the Sustainability Network are located at 215 Spadina Ave. Toronto which is coincidentally the same address as Tides Canada’s Toronto office and until recently also the home of another Lourie creation, the Canadian Environmental Grantmakers Network.

The latter Lourie creation, CEGN has as its mission; “To expand the scope and effectiveness of grantmaking in support of the Canadian environment.” and noted that the need for the network grew out of issues that reputedly are of a cross-border nature as the following attempts to explain: “There is growing interest on the part of American grantmakers in support to Canadian environmental issues and organizations.” If one, then looks at the membership list of CEGN it becomes obvious that foreign grantmakers and Canadian taxpayer owned foundations and other public sector organizations make up a large portion of the 59 members. There are 11 public sector entities such as the Ontario Power Authority, Trillium Foundation, Toronto Atmospheric Fund, Friends of the Greenbelt, etc. listed as members along with at least 7 US Foundations including several mentioned in Vivian Krause’s many articles in the Financial Post and on her website. Those include the Oak Foundation ($426,000 grant to Environmental Defence, $218,000 to the Sierra Club, $98,000 to OSEA, $87,000 to Pollution Probe and $1.4 million to Tides Canada), The Bullitt Foundation, the Wilburforce Foundation, etc. The Canadian members include three of the Ivey related foundations and in addition; Tides Canada, Suncor Energy Fund, the Shell Environmental Fund and the Canadian Boreal Initiative (not a foundation).

Another interesting aspect of the CEGN website is that they thank their “sustaining” members “whose very generous support of CEGN is much appreciated” and one of those on that list is the Trillium Foundation where Lourie sat as a Director for many years. One would think that with the hundreds of millions of dollars represented by the “private” foundations that are members of CEGN that they wouldn’t need to go cap in hand to a taxpayer owned institution for a grant, but they did and also got Trillium Foundation to become a sustaining member. One would also wonder at the wisdom of those dealing with the CEGN application at Trillium when confronted with the request for a grant. Environmentalists apparently are perhaps not concerned that the funds they take away for their own purpose might actually go to a truly worthy cause.

CEGN commissioned Tyler Hamilton, Editor in Chief of Corporate Knights and occasional writer for the Toronto Star to complete a paper titled: “How to Accelerate Canada’s Transition to a Green Economy and the Role for Philanthropy”. In the process of preparing this “Building Bridges” paper the author reportedly interviewed 11 Canadian “Thought Leaders” including Don Drummond, former Chief Economist of TD Bank, Jim Stanford, Economist with the CAW, Marlo Raynolds, Executive Director of Pembina, Preston Manning and several others. Leafing through the report is an interesting exercise to see how statements can be used in a fashion that decidedly puts these “Thought Leaders” in the environmental camp. The author’s conclusions identify the need to educate the unknowing public when it comes to climate change. Others reading this might conclude some of these “Thought Leaders” were suggesting a form of “brainwashing” which brings to mind the “thought police” of George Orwell’s book, 1984.

 The one summary in the paper that caught my eye was the one that stated; “be more creative with the use of public money”! As a taxpayer and ratepayer in Ontario my view is that the ENGOs have been extremely creative and continue to be. They all seem determined to tank the rest of the Canadian economy as they have effectively done in Ontario and along the way have used tax dollars and foreign grants to further their cause. To gain some idea of the creative ability of Mr. Lourie one only has to view the attached spider web of his connections and see how those connections work in conjunction with the money flows from taxpayers and foundations.

Reading “About the Author” of this paper was amusing as near the end of the list of his accomplishments; the point is made that Mr. Hamilton is now an adjunct professor at York University’s Faculty of Environmental Studies. Any of us following the craziness that is now labelled “climate change” or “renewable energy” is aware that York is the main breeding ground for the bulk of our self professed environmental experts including Bruce Lourie.

It is ironic that the taxpayers are picking up most of the costs to train the next generation of environmental “thought police”.

Parker Gallant, June 30, 2012

PS: One of the original posts of the above can be found at the following website and contains many of the links to the aforementioned parties! Hey Ontario!……..wanna know who’s getting your money?………..Not Health Care!!!! | The Big Green Lie (wordpress.com)

Tracking the Evolution of Greenhouse Gas Emissions

Back on December 14, 1996 when Terence Corcoran was a journalist for the Globe and Mail’s Report on Business (ROB) section they published an article he wrote titled “Just say no to Rio target”. Twenty-six years later it is worth re-reading the article bearing in mind the continuing and unfolding debacle it started the developed countries on shortly after the Rio Earth Summit of 1992!

Here it is:

“ROB Column The Globe and Mail TERENCE CORCORAN December 14, 1996, 

Just say no to Rio target

CANADA will not meet the greenhouse gas emissions target agreed to at the Rio Earth Summit of 1992. Thank goodness. If Ottawa and the provinces had tried to force us to live up to the unreal energy consumption target former prime minister Brian Mulroney signed on to four years ago during a Green binge, the Canadian economy would be in bad shape today.

To meet the target, Canada would have to reduce carbon emissions to 1990 levels by the year 2000. According to the latest sophisticated computer simulations and forecasts — which are invariably wrong, by the way — Canadian industries and consumers will emit about 500 megatons of carbon in the year 2000, about 9 per cent more than we did in 1990. To meet the targets, therefore, Canada would have to cut energy use by about 10 per cent, a $20-billion economic hit that would significantly lower growth  and employment.

Not meeting the target is, in any case, almost totally irrelevant. Canada is not, as Environment Minister Sergio Marchi said the other day, “behind the eight ball” over the target — unless we insist on shooting it at ourselves. Regardless of the spin put on the target by environment ministers and writers, the target will not and should not be met for several powerful reasons. In the first place, the summit agreement is not legally binding. We can just say no. The targets never had any legitimacy in Canada anyway.

The Rio Summit was an orgy of ultra vires agreement-signing and back-room politicking by thousands of bureaucrats and special interest groups. No Canadian other than lobbyists and envirocrats ever saw the Framework Convention on Climate Change that supposedly commits Canada to reduce carbon emissions by the year 2000. No public support was sought for the accord, no parliamentary hearings were held, nobody knew what the agreement meant, nobody even knew the thing had been signed.

No wonder Ottawa and the provinces can’t get Canadians to go along with the carbon taxes and other drastic measures proposed over the years. Most Canadians probably also suspect that the targets are arbitrary, and of no significance to the scientific problem they’re intended to resolve. As author Gregg Easterbrook said in A Moment on the Earth: “Will the goal of the treaty, stabilization of carbon emissions at the 1990 level, prevent global warming? The answer is: Not a snowball’s chance in, well, Alberta, should the warming occur.”

Note that last phrase: “Should the warming occur” is still the operative cautionary principle surrounding global warming. Despite the reams of material and reports, the scientific basis for predicting that human energy consumption will cause a significant increase in temperature, or that temperature increases are necessarily bad for human life, remains highly uncertain. But even if we assume the worst, that warming is something that should raise a global call for action, it makes little sense to load a country like Canada with major regulatory burdens and growth-hindering taxes. Canada’s share of the world’s energy market is minuscule by any measure that’s reasonably proportionate to the greenhouse gas problem.

Greens and envirocrats often make Canada look like a pollution hell by citing per capita energy consumption figures. For example, in 1995, Canadian per capita production of carbon dioxide was 4.4 tonnes, third highest in the world behind Australia and the United States. But there are many reasons for this, including our cold climate, heavy production of primary resources and secondary goods, and vast geography.

Another faulty measure of Canada’s role is the country’s share of energy production as a percentage of the global total: 2.2 per cent. The U.S. share is 25 per cent, China’s 13 per cent, France’s 1.7 per cent. However, this raw measure is also inadequate because it fails to take into account Canada’s geographic scale. Any proper assessment of Canada’s role in the global economy would have to incorporate the fact that Canada’s geographic land and air mass is massive.

A more accurate indicator of Canada’s relative role would be a measure based on the ratio of emissions to national air mass. Compared with other countries — France, the United States or just about any other nation — Canada’s share of world emissions as a proportion of total geography would be insignificant.Even if greenhouse warming is a looming crisis, assigning Canada emission reduction targets that are identical to other countries turns Canada into a sacrificial lamb to global environmentalism. Canada’s 30 million people could stop living tomorrow, and the trend of greenhouse warming would not change.”

Letter to the Editor December 20, 1996

Shortly after the article appeared Jack Gibbons, (current Chair of the OCAA) sent a letter to the Globe and Mail which they posted. Anyone following my blog and posts over the past number of years are aware of Gibbons push to shut down electricity generation from fossil and nuclear fuel in Ontario and replace it with unreliable and intermittent wind and solar.  The following is the Gibbons letter:

“Toronto — According to Terence Corcoran, if Canada stabilizes its carbon dioxide emissions, our gross national product and our unemployment rate will rise (Just Say No To Rio Target — Dec. 14).

Fortunately for our planet’s life support systems and future generations, Mr. Corcoran is wrong.

Numerous studies have shown that there is not a tradeoff between substantial reductions in carbon dioxide emissions and economic growth. For example, the Ontario Carbon Dioxide Collaborative recently developed a strategy to reduce Ontario’s carbon dioxide emissions by 20 per cent by the year 2005 and reduce the energy costs of Ontario’s residential, commercial and industrial consumers.

According to the collaborative’s report, these dual objectives can be achieved by fuel switching from coal and oil to natural gas and by increasing our economy’s energy efficiency.

Canadian Institute for Environmental Law and Policy.”

At this point it is worth a brief look at where Canada is today (2020 stats) versus 1996 in respect to total and per capita emissions. The Government of Canada post of emissions is only to the end of 2020 and notes they were 672 megatonnes and if one examines their chart it suggests in 1996, they were at the same level.  On a per capita basis however, they declined as the 1996 Census indicated Canada’s population was 28.8 million whereas in 2020 the population level had increased to 38.1 million.  Doing the math suggests Canada has reduced emissions by 24.5% on a per capita basis.

Greenhouse gas emissions, Canada, 1990 to 2020

If we look at China’s emissions over that same time frame they have increased from 3,503 megatonnes in 1996 to 10,668 megatonnes in 2020 for an increase of 7,165 megatonnes or 204.5%. Total global emissions in 2020 were 34,810 megatonnes so China’s emissions in 2020 represented 30.6% of global emissions but back in 1996 they represented only 14.5%.

As Canada has increased its “Annual Canadian Crude Oil Production by Crude Oil Type” from 1996 daily production of 2,000 barrels per day to 4,687 barrels per day for an increase of 134% it would suggest our emissions should have shown a massive increase but they haven’t!

Perhaps it’s time our inane political leaders under Justin Trudeau and his minion, Jagmeet Singh, stop doing what they are trying to do to destroy the Canadian economy!

UN doomsday scenario more bogus fearmongering

I was on 960 AM this morning on the Marc Patrone show and we discussed the release of the UNIPCC’s latest release forecasting more doom and gloom coming to us via “climate change”. This forecast is similiar to all the prior ones going back to the formation of the UN Environment Programme when Maurice Strong was the Programme Director and released the 1972 report. We covered a fair amount of ground and talked a short while about “tree planting” in Canada related to Trudeau’s promise to Greta Thunberg in 2019 that Canada would plant two billion trees. You can tune in on the podcast for August 10, 2021 starting at 48:13 up to 1:05:58 here:

Podcasts

For those who subscribe to NEWSTALK CANADA you can listen here:

https://newstalkcanada.com/?page_id=2527

Net-Zero by 2050 Seems Destined to Reference Money Left to Buy Food for Most of Canada’s Population

Robert Hornung, CEO of CanREA (Canadian Renewable Energy Association), recently finished a three-part series about the wonders of wind, solar and storage and indications (based on his verbiage) are; he is delighted with how the Trudeau led government are committed to achieving “net-zero” emissions by 2050.  The final sentence in his last article “Cape diem, Canada” tells the reader: “We have a fleeting opportunity to avert a catastrophe for our children and grandchildren. We need to seize it. Today.”  As one can imagine Hornung believes the world can be saved from the “changing climate” which he tells us is causing events showing: “our permafrost is melting, our coastal sea levels are rising, our snow-cover patterns are changing, and our weather is becoming more extreme, with floods, droughts, and intense storms on the rise.”  As one would expect he says the foregoing can be stopped as our electricity needs “can easily be supplied by Canada’s massive untapped renewable energy resources”.

All Canadians should realize we are now all being asked/told to relive what Ontarians were told by the McGuinty led government back in 2009 when they ushered in the GEA (Green Energy Act). The GEA caused electricity rates to more than double due to the push for renewable wind and solar generation. Ratepayers and taxpayers in the rest of Canada should take Hornung’s gloomy prognostications and concern themselves about the “net-zero” aspirations he exudes!

Hornung goes further and touts “A Healthy Environment and a Healthy Economy,” the report released by Jonathon Wilkinson, Minister of the Environment and Climate Change (MECC) in December 2020 bringing us the $170/tonne carbon-tax.  Hornung also seemed enamoured by another report from the Canadian Institute for Climate Choices whom I devoted four articles to in early 2020.  The CICC was a creation of Wilkinson’s predecessor Catherine McKenna using $20 million of our tax dollars.  The report Hornung referenced from the CICC is “Canada’s Net Zero Future” and it is 132 pages full of the fabrications Wilkinson and his boss, PM Trudeau, presumably ordered!  Doing a word search in the report for “net-zero” provides only 14 hits but one for “net zero” (without the hyphen) provides 588 hits. The word “tax” only appears twice-ie: 2 mentions, and it’s not in respect to the $170/tonne carbon-tax as it is referred to as a “carbon price”!

The report breaks down the various existing “safe bets” and possible “wild card” technologies that will purportedly allow us to meet Canada’s 2030 and 2050 emissions reduction targets. The “safe bets” include renewables such as wind, solar, biomass, hydro and also include storage (battery) and nuclear and of course transformation of our transportation modes via conversion of personal vehicles to EV. The report claims using those technologies along with increased insulation and heat pumps for buildings limited carbon capture, etc. etc. will easily allow us to meet the emissions reductions by 2030.  The “wild card” technologies include hydrogen, CCUS (carbon capture, utilization and sequestration), direct air capture, small modular reactors and a myriad of other technologies including changing our diet to consume less meat and dairy products and those will allow us to reach net-zero emissions by 2050.

Naturally they reference the UNIPCC (United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) several time as well as the UNFCCC (UN Framework Convention on Climate Change) in a favourable fashion as well as utilizing their reports to augment their views and recommendations.

The report also uses scary references and their reputed costs such as suggesting air pollution causes 20,000 annual deaths in Canada: “Harmful air pollutants that increase the risk of disease and premature death—pollutants such as particulate matter and ground-level ozone—are common by-products of GHG emissions. Globally, air pollution represents the single largest environmental threat to human health, according to the World Health Organization (2016), and it also takes a significant economic toll. In Canada, estimates suggest that air pollution kills around 20,000 Canadians annually, with more than 17,000 of those deaths attributable to fossil fuel use (Lelieveld et al., 2020). The direct welfare costs of fine particulate matter and ground-level ozone in Canada is estimated at as much as $46 billion per year (IISD, 2017), while Health Canada (2019a) estimates the total annual economic damage to public health from air pollution is approximately $114 billion.”  I should note Health Canada’s recent report echoed the same scary stuff and used the same reference perhaps to prepare us for the next pandemic and accompanying lock-downs.

Needless to say, the CICC report suggests the move to lower levels of carbon emissions coupled with the recommendations on using “safe bets” and evolving “wild card” technologies will not only help to reduce “global warming” and presumably reduce air pollution; but it will also reduce our expenditure on energy as a share of income. 

We should view the graph above, suggesting energy expenditures as a share of income will drop as pure unadulterated fabrication!  Not even the Ontario Liberal Government during the McGuinty/Wynne era promised our electricity costs would drop due to the adoption of clean energy from wind and solar.  They suggested rates would increase one percent (1%) but Ontario’s ratepayers and taxpayers know we were lied to and the actual cost increase was well over 100% and we must live with that for 10 more years!  One should doubt the CICC report has provided us with anything close to actual outcomes!

Some of those at the CICC, such as Bruce Lourie patted themselves on the back for being instrumental in getting the Ontario Liberals to buy into the renewable energy push. He and others* have played a big role in getting the CICC established and have continued to successfully push their agenda.

We should all suspect the Hornung forecast of the “catastrophe for our children and grandchildren” will be related to the unaffordable costs of just trying to survive a Canadian winter with those “baseboard”** electric heaters the CICC sees in our future!

*Rick Smith, a Lourie cohort has just been named as the new President of CICC

**Reminds me of the early sixties adds about how we could “live better electrically”.

The Federation of Canadian Municipalities want more tax dollars to mitigate Climate Change

The FCM recently released a report titled “Building Back Better together“ which closely mimics messages included in The Speech from the Throne. “Building Back Better”, which was the heading on page 16 of the Throne Speech, is just one example.

The FCM’s report states: “Municipalities are on the front lines of new climate extremes, making the most of tools available to protect homes, businesses and communities. The federal Disaster Mitigation and Adaptation Fund (DMAF) has been key, but the $2B available for 2018–2028 is already almost fully committed.”  The municipalities have blown through the $2B handed to them by us taxpayers and now want more—a lot more! The report goes on to note: “Municipalities are increasingly setting ambitious climate targets and leading on reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. With cities and communities influencing half of all emissions, scaling up local action is key to achieving net-zero emissions by 2050.” The latter clearly indicates municipal politicians are fully on-board with the “Green Recovery” Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his minions are planning!

The FCM’s report lists their climate change programs (several)  including the Green Municipal Fund (GMF) and the $950 million they received from the 2019 Federal budget for that program.

The FCM’s Wish List for “climate change”

Based on the “Building Back Better together” report, the FCM seeks more tax dollars including: “$2.7 billion in federal grant funding will support replacing half the 14,000 diesel buses currently on the road with fully electric or other ZEV models by 2030”, “$350 million over three years—for eligible capital costs for inter-city and regional mobility services across the country”, “$2.5 to $5 billion of economic recovery funding directly to the municipal sector to help communities finance and scale proven climate change mitigation and resilience solutions” and “by doubling the proposed new federal investment in DMAF to $2 billion”! 

To top off their demand they also want the GTF (Gas Tax Fund) doubled so they annually receive $4.4 billion.

They apparently don’t understand the hypocrisy of the foregoing in view of their stand to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050 and the conversion of their fleet of buses to EV!  Where will the money come from if we are all driving EV in 2050?  In total, and only related to the issue of “climate change”, the FCMs are collectively asking the Trudeau led government for over $10 billion in additional funding and billions more for other objectives.  Apparently, they believe that even though last week’s fiscal update suggested Canada will have an annual deficit of $400 billion, there is still lots of room for more funding.  Should their ask fall on deaf ears, home owners and businesses can expect huge realty tax increases and/or services to be slashed?  If Vancouver is an example; realty taxes may climb 12% as they are reputedly “staring down the barrel of a pandemic-driven deficit” and forced to use $57 million of reserve funds to keep tax increases at 5%. Presumably other municipalities across the country are “staring down” that same barrel! One should realize those pleading on behalf of the FCM are principally “elected” municipal politicians who apparently believe, they deserve more tax dollars.  They want handouts while supporting the crippling of the oil and gas sector who have supplied a huge portion of past handouts!

How ironic!   

Municipal Chief Administrative Officer’s (CAO) view of climate change is a smaller issue

Examining the CAO’s (also titled as; County Administrator, City Manager and Town Manager) views versus municipal politicians’ views is an interesting exercise. The CAO is charged with delivering what his political master instructs him/her to do though bylaws, orders in council, etc. etc. 

Strategy Corporation (SC) conduct annual surveys of CAOs and the most recent one for 2019 highlights significant differences from elected councillors, mayors, etc. and what they consider important.

The survey (NB) ranks the CAOs concerns and they differ considerably from those touted in the FCM report and one should note; this was before the Covid-19 pandemic arrived! After conducting the survey SC analyses them and presents their “Perspective” such as the following on “Climate Change Plans”.

SC’s Perspective: “In terms of the details of the Climate Change Plans, CAOs highlighted that a practical approach must be taken because of the operational and funding parameters and limitations. A focus on improving existing infrastructure is one of the highest priorities.

SC also obtain CAO comments and those on “climate change” vary widely as the following two denote:

“We hired a climate change coordinator two years ago. Plan is being coordinated with key stakeholder groups” and a conflicting one stating;

“We don’t have any plan, and it has not been a discussion point or a priority.”

In terms of ranking the concerns of CAOs, SC asked the question: “What are the top three things keeping you up at night?”.  The response from 100% was “Fiscal Sustainability”. Less than a quarter of the CAO participants ticked the box for “Environment/Climate Change”.  What that suggests is the municipal bureaucrats are not sold on the panic outcries of their superiors; those elected municipal leaders!

The question is; who should taxpayers support and the answer should be obvious!

NB: Please note the survey was only conducted in Ontario and focused on CAOs from “upper” tier and “lower” tier (Northern Ontario) municipalities so relates to those selected municipalities and one province, however, this writer is reasonably certain surveying CAOs from other provinces, etc. would produce similar outcomes.

The Canadian Institute for Climate Choices should “fact check”

Back in 1989 (thirty-one years ago) Noel Brown, a senior UN environmental official told the Associated Press “entire nations could be wiped off the face of the Earth by rising sea levels if the global warming trend is not reversed by the year 2000.” Brown noted the Maldives would be under water as the oceans would rise by three feet. While the Maldives weren’t mentioned in the recent report from the Canadian Institute for Climate Choices (CICC), “rising sea levels” were; as one of, “the main hazards and conditions on the way to 2050.”

The year 2000 has come and gone but to the best of my knowledge no nations have disappeared due to rising sea levels. The Maldives recently announced they are opening four new airports in the current year.  The lack of them being under water however, hasn’t deterred the numerous “experts” involved with the CICC.  Higher sea level concerns for Atlantic Canada and BC were also included in the report by the Canadian Council of Academies (CCA) in their July 2019 report; the forerunner of the CICC’s report.  As pointed out in an earlier article CCA’s disclaimer under “Conclusions” saw them opting out of everything forecast in their report.  Despite the opt out position taken by the CCA the media only focused on the disastrous message.  Reuters noted the CCA report was a follow up to one from Minister McKenna’s ministry and reported:  “Canada’s unique geographic, environmental, and social identity shapes the hazards that it faces and its exposure to climate-related risks,” Eric M. Meslin, president and CEO of the CCA, said in the press release.”

Returning to the issue of “flooding” the CICC’s report on page 19 touts the Netherlands for their leading-edge ability to control flooding “even though a quarter of the country is below sea level.”  What those “experts” failed to note is “The low-lying Netherlands has been fighting back water for more than 1,000 years, when farmers built the first dykes.“  A search turned up an article confirming “flooding” in the Netherlands is not a recent event caused by the effects C0 2 on the atmosphere or melting artic ice!

The CICC’s report also highlighted severe flooding in Thailand in 2011 as if it was a one-off event.They ignored the probable cause which had nothing to do with “climate change”!  Had they looked back to 1942 they would have discovered a more severe flood and a YouTube video  highlighting the damage before “global warming”, the “climate crisis” or “increased emissions” was even a concept. Again, a simple search on the web by the CICC “experts” would have generated information as to why the 2011 flood occurred. One they may have found was a report by Richard Meehan, a civil engineer and adjunct faculty at Stanford University.  Mr. Meehan’s biography notes he “began his career designing and building irrigation and flood control works in Thailand in the 1960s”.

Mr. Meehan’s report notes: “Though monetary damages in the 2011 flood were unprecedented, the flood itself was not an extreme natural event, hydrological statistics variously suggesting a 30 to 75 year return period for a similar flood.”  The report states the reason for the monetary damages was essentially because “of poorly drained swampy lands on the lower Chao Phraya floodplain, including vast tracts of former swamps and riceland now occupied by very large industrial “estates” (or industrial parks in western terms), each the size of a city and home to hundreds of modern manufacturing plants developed in the 1970s and after.”  The message is clear: don’t build homes or industries in flood prone areas or at some point in the future the damages from a flood will be costly to you and/or your insurer!

The Charting our Course report does sprinkle in some benefits to “global warming” such as: “parts of Canada could benefit from warmer temperatures. Warmer winters could, for example, result in fewer cold-related deaths and illnesses and lower heating costs for households and businesses. Warmer temperatures in spring, summer, and fall could also open new tourism opportunities that previously did not exist.”

The following paragraph in the report however dispels those benefits by stating: “any benefits in a high-emissions scenario are likely temporary and short-lived. Benefits diminish as extreme climate events become more common and intense. Fewer deaths due to extreme cold are offset by more deaths from extreme heat*. Savings in heating bills are offset by increased use of air-conditioners in the summer.

It is interesting the word “likely” is used as it signals the 79 “experts” spending $20 million of our tax dollars are not really convinced those “high-emissions” will actually cause the damages they profess!

Despite the foregoing our senses should tell us the “experts” will ultimately recommend we need much higher carbon taxes to save the world from the likely “climate crisis”.

They might change their mind if they actually did proper research and “fact checked” their conclusions!

*Debunked in:  The Canadian Institute for Climate Choices is “Charting our Course”

The Canadian Institute for Climate Choices says it louder

Should one read a report titled; “Canada’s Top Climate Change Risks” issued July 2019 by the “Expert Panel” on “Climate Change Risks and Adaptation Potential” you would probably think the “Charting our Course” report recently issued by the Canadian Institute for Climate Choices (CICC) was an update but it wasn’t!  What a comparison of the two reports highlight is words spoken by the former Minister of the Environment and Climate Change, Catherine McKenna, who said: “if you repeat it, if you say it louder, if that is your talking point, people will totally believe it,”.  The latest CICC report exemplifies her quote and us taxpayers have provided the CICC with $20 million to ensure we “totally believe it”!

How many times can you flog a dead horse?

The first report’s “Expert Panel” are part of the “Canadian Council of Academies”. The council, launched in 2002, has managed to survive on $45 million of our tax dollars for the past 18 years. They are required to produce five reports annually when directed by the Federal Government.  Their report on Canada’s climate change risks came about as a result of a direction from the Treasury Board of Canada.  Seven (7) individuals on CCA’s “expert panel” and “workshop participants” are a part of CICC’s “expert” group and another eight (8) of those experts at the CICC were also cited as references in the CCA’s report.  One of those was Blair Feltmate, Chair of the Intact Centre at Waterloo University. Needless to say, both reports lean heavily on the insurance industries information about how “climate change” has increased insurance claims.  Catastrophes are forecast in both reports and similar comparisons are made to past events blaming them on “climate change”. The latter includes the Fort McMurray wildfires with estimated insurance claims of $1.4 billion. The CBC reported on the fire stating: “Provincial wildfire investigators have established that the fire was most likely the result of “human activity.”

On page 2 of the CCA’s report they have a map of Canada and have highlighted 10 of “Canada’s Top Climate Change Risks” and one of them is: “Lower Great Lakes water levels, affecting shipping, hydropower production, and recreation”.  As noted above the CCA report was published in July 2019 two years after Ontarians were told Lake Ontario had just experienced a “100-year flood”. Even worse flooding occurred in 2019 setting new records.  Apparently the “experts” involved in preparing the report failed to absorb the well-publicized news at that time and said nothing about “Plan 2014”!

Akin to the foregoing, CCA’s report contained statements such as: “Houses located in a floodplain, for instance, face greater risk due to their heightened exposure.”  Hardly enlightening news!

As if to excuse the diatribe spewed by the CCA expert’s report, their “Conclusions” had this to say:

“Assessments of the risks posed by climate change are subject to many sources of uncertainty. Climate projections and modelling results provide an envelope of possible futures associated with different GHG emissions trajectories, but the exact path of global emissions and the full implications for the climate, combined with other natural and anthropogenic processes, remain unknown.”

The CCA report therefore concludes with total disclosure they have no faith in anything contained in the prior 59 pages of their report.  Perhaps this is why former Minister McKenna took the next step to create the Canadian Institute for Climate Change and handed them $20 million of our tax dollars for a report supporting her views.

She obviously wanted her minions to “say it louder”!

Stay tuned for more.