The Apollo Alliance, a coalition of environmentalists and labor unions, wants the federal government to spend $500 billion over 10 years to "build America's 21st century clean energy economy" and thereby "create more than five million high quality green-collar jobs." Barack Obama says he can accomplish the same goal for only $150 billion, which gives you a sense of how reliable these projections are.

More fundamentally, both the Apollo Alliance and Obama, who has liberally borrowed from its ideas, mistakenly treat the manpower required to reduce greenhouse gas emissions as a measure of success, when it should be viewed as a cost to be minimized. Obama's "green jobs" rhetoric is part of his strategy to conceal the enormous expense associated with his plan to "transform our entire economy" and "build a new economy that is powered by clean and secure energy."

Two California ballot measures that would have significantly increased the research funding and generation of renewable energy look almost certain to fail.

The first, Proposition 7, calls for an increase in renewable power by about 2% of electricity generation per year to eventually hit 40% by 2020 and 50% by 2025.

It would have cost up to $3.4 million in administrative costs per year and probably increased the cost of energy to the consumer in the short term.

With 86% of precincts reporting, 65% of votes on the measure were for the "no" campaign.

Currently, about 13% of California's power is generated by renewable sources, including solar and wind. The state has a goal of 20% of electricity from renewable sources by 2010, a target which is not expected to be met. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger supports a 33% renewables goal by 2020.

Opponents to Proposition 7 call the measure well-meaning but ill-conceived, and say it would constrict rather than expand renewable power generation in California.

Outspent 130 to 1, No on 10 Campaign Stops Oil Tycoon's Money Grab

The No on Proposition 10 campaign claims an early landslide victory as election night results from throughout California indicate a lopsided defeat of T Boone Pickens' ballot measure.

"California voters didn't fall for a Texas oil tycoon's $10 billion money grab, no matter how much he spent camouflaging it as green," stated Richard Holober, spokesman for the No on Prop 10 campaign, and Executive Director of the Consumer Federation of California. "Proposition 10 is the ultimate example of a wealthy special interest abusing the ballot initiative process to enrich itself. We built a coalition of major environmental, consumer, business, labor, taxpayer and civic organizations that triumphed over Prop 10's $23 million war chest. The defeat of Prop 10 sends a signal that California's ballot initiative process is not for sale to the highest bidder."

Environmental officials said on Tuesday they expect major legislative victories in the new Congress on climate control, chemical plant security, an EU-like chemicals controls bill and a new pollution tax on chemical producers.

As US citizens went to the polls on Tuesday to elect what is expected to be a much stronger Democrat majority in both the US House and Senate, environmental activists are already working up wish lists for key legislation they expect to get through the 111th Congress that will convene in January.

Those expectations are even more optimistic if, as election-day polling suggests, Illinois Democrat Senator Barack Obama wins the White House as the nation’s 44th president.

14 year-old victim of Al Gore's lies: "YES!!! My life can end now, I don’t care. I have met Al Gore, I need nothing else."

So, this kid got to meet The Profit of Doom. He went to climate camp. Now he's the "youngest trained presenter with The Climate Project". Having read his "About" page, he seems like a real smart, enthusiastic kid with a bright future - who has unfortunately been deceived by Al Gore et al.

I wonder if anyone has bothered to tell this kid that the earth has been cooling since he was 4 years old?

Source

EU member states are ready to grant automakers a three-year delay until 2015 to reduce the CO2 emissions of their new vehicles, in light
of the global economic crisis, negotiators said on Saturday.

During a meeting Friday of representatives of the 27 nations, "a consensus was reached" on pushing back the original 2012 deadline to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, one of the negotiators said.

Several colleagues confirmed his remarks, as European automakers grapple with bloated inventories and falling sales brought on by the credit crunch and a wider economic downturn.

The environmental target remains the same -- for new vehicles sold in the European Union to emit no more than a benchmark 130 grammes of CO2 per kilometre.

Andrew Tyrie

A Sussex politician has been attacked as a “flat earther” after he was one of just three MPs to vote against landmark legislation to tackle global warming.

Andrew Tyrie, Tory MP for Chichester, joined two of his party colleagues in opposing the Climate Change Bill as it passed its final Commons stage by an overwhelming 463 votes to 3.

Mr Tyrie has questioned the science behind concerns that greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide are increasing the earth’s temperature, threatening devastating floods and droughts.

His scepticism has left him isolated among Sussex politicians, with 12 of the county’s MPs voting for the Bill.

[H/T to Watts up with that?]  Web video depicts dead president warning climate change ‘threatens our very existence,’ claims ‘technology and renewable energy offers the last remaining hope.’

There’s something a little creepy about historical figures being brought back to life to promote climate change alarmism, but the over-the-top environmentalists at Greenpeace have no qualms with using it as a tactic.

A video posted on Greenpeace’s YouTube site portrays former President John F. Kennedy, who was assassinated Nov. 22, 1963, in Dallas, making a plea for environmental activism to save the planet from the perils of global warming.

“When man first walked upon the moon, it defined a generation,” Kennedy is depicted saying. “As this new millennium dawns, we face a greater challenge - climate change threatens our very existence. What further disasters will convince world leaders that the existing technology and renewable energy offers the last remaining hope for sustainable future?”

The EU hits roadblocks in its mission to impose stringent carbon dioxide emission goals on its member countries.

Tempers flared recently at a quarterly meeting of the European Council in Brussels over the EU's crusade to impose stringent limits on carbon emissions. Led by Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi and Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk, an open revolt of eight countries, enough for a voting bloc, sought to defend their national economies from the radical environmental programs backed by the EU hierarchy.

Berlusconi, speaking in opposition to the EU plan that was once favored by former Green Italian environment minister Pecoraro Scanio, argued:  “Our businesses are in absolutely no position at the moment to absorb the costs of the regulations that have been proposed.” Directing more anger at the Emissions Trading Scheme which is set to license via a bidding process carbon dioxide emissions in 2013, he said, “It is ridiculous that we are selling the right to pollute.”

Much of the blame is due to the government's century-long warfare on fire, a study says. House-cleaning blazes in remote areas should not be fought, researchers say.

Forest fires in the Sierra Nevada have grown larger, more frequent and more damaging in the last two decades, according to a study that suggests much of the blame rests with the government's century-long war on wildfire.

The study, published online this month in the journal Ecosystems, found that between 1984 and 2006, the proportion of burned areas where no trees survived increased, on average, to nearly 30%, from 17%.