[PassedOut]

Here's another reason that the US election is important: The world is racing to stop climate change. But the math still doesn’t add up

Quote

This is the logic behind the inescapable emissions “gap”: If we want to hold global warming to 1.5 C, we need to be emitting only 38.8 gigatons of carbon dioxide equivalents by the year 2030. For 2 degrees C, there’s only slightly more leeway — 41.8 gigatons.

The promises countries have made under the Paris agreement don’t remotely get there — at best, they’d have us at about 53.4 billion tons in 2030. The emissions gap is therefore between 12 and 14 gigatons per year if you want to keep the planet at 2 degrees, and between 15 and 17 gigatons per year for 1.5 degrees, says UNEP.

“When you think that one gigaton is the equivalent of taking all European vehicles off the road for one year, and the gap is between 12 and 14 gigatons, you see what the scale of the problem is,” explains McGlade.

Thus, we’re way off course with very little time to turn things around. The world’s current promises, says UNEP, would allow the planet to warm by about 3 degrees C above pre-industrial levels.

And by the way: even these numbers for keeping warming below 1.5 or 2 degrees tend to assume something that many scientists think is dubious. They tend to rely on the assumption that we’ll bust through our carbon budgets but somehow get a second chance later in the century, once we create technologies that can somehow withdraw carbon dioxide out of the air again. These scenarios often have the world removing net amounts carbon dioxide from the atmosphere after 2050, rather than putting more there. It’s far from clear that will actually happen, at least at the scale that would be required.

Clinton understands this, but Trump is clueless.

[Zelandakh]

Sorry PassedOut but the sensitivity estimates are not nearly good enough to give such exact figures. For one thing, it depends on exactly when the emissions occur - 38.8 gigatons now might give 1.5 degrees of warming by 2030 but 38.8 gigatons in 2029 certainly would not. It is numbers like this that gives GW scientists a bad name.

Of course, reading more closely I note that the report does not say that the warming itself has to occur before 2030. If they merely mean the equilibrium sensitivity then the 2030 date is highly misleading due to the time lag from the oceans. Either way, not exactly a stellar example to give to the forums, more of an AIU-style piece from the opposite side.

Whether either of them understand that much of what is written on the subject is not worth the paper it is written on (or the cost of the data bandwidth since much goes through the internet) I could not say. But I daresay both have advisors on the subject that come at it from a partisan and highly biased viewpoint.

[PassedOut]

World on track for 3C of warming under current global climate pledges, warns UN

Quote

The commitments made by governments on climate change will lead to dangerous levels of global warming because they are incommensurate with the growth of greenhouse gas emissions, according to a new report.

The United Nations Environment Programme (Unep) said that pledges put forward to cut emissions would see temperatures rise by 3C above pre-industrial levels, far above the the 2C of the Paris climate agreement, which comes into force on Friday.

At least a quarter must be cut from emissions by the end of the next decade, compared with current trends, the UN said.

The report found that emissions by 2030 were likely to reach about 54 to 56 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent a year, a long way astray of the 42 gigatonnes a year likely to be the level at which warming exceeds 2C.

Erik Solheim, chief of Unep, said the world was “moving in the right direction” on reducing greenhouse gas emissions and tackling climate change, but that measures should be taken urgently to avoid the need for much more drastic cuts in emissions in future. “If we don’t start taking additional action now, we will grieve over the avoidable human tragedy.”

He warned in particular that people would start being displaced from their homes by the effects of climate change, suffering from drought, hunger, disease and conflicts arising from these afflictions. Mass migration as a result of climate change is hard to separate from other causes of migration, but is predicted to become a much greater problem.

This year is “locked in” to be the hottest on record, according to Nasa, eclipsing last year’s record heat, and may show the way to future temperature rises and their accompanying problems.

Of course the predictions are not exact, and no one has that expectation. But the trend -- and the risk -- is clear. I have three sons and a granddaughter. I want the US to work with the rest of the world to reduce these emissions.

[Al_U_Card]

You would leave your children destitute to try and control the weather?

With observational climate sensitivities in the 1.1 C / doubling range and cloud effects being ignored by all the lovely (read inaccurate) GCMs used for these "projections", save your money to help those kids pay all the taxes that you are signing them up to pay for your commitments.

[PassedOut]

 Al_U_Card, on 2016-November-03, 15:05, said:

You would leave your children destitute to try and control the weather?

That's the sort of alarmist nonsense believed only by pants-pissers with no head for business.

If you'll notice, Trump is campaigning on a massive return to fiscal irresponsibility -- catering to the same free-lunch crowd who voted for G. W. Bush. Should Trump win (and he might) our kids and grandkids will have carry the burden for both his fiscal irresponsibility and environmental irresponsibility.

[Al_U_Card]

 PassedOut, on 2016-November-03, 16:53, said:

That's the sort of alarmist nonsense believed only by pants-pissers with no head for business.

If you'll notice, Trump is campaigning on a massive return to fiscal irresponsibility -- catering to the same free-lunch crowd who voted for G. W. Bush. Should Trump win (and he might) our kids and grandkids will have carry the burden for both his fiscal irresponsibility and environmental irresponsibility.

How many trillions of dollars are needed to mitigate all of the immediate (oh noes!, we are approaching global temperatures not seen since Roman times...) sequestration/decarbonization pipe dreams? TOO MANY! And that is at present value, impoverishing future generations with debt burdens that only a plutocrat could appreciate.
Geological forces play the major role in CO2 generation/sequestration and current warming is no exception. During the little ice age, the oceans sucked up CO2 and they are gradually releasing it except during La Nina cooling phases. Let's get going on real problems like hunger and disease (reduced during benevolent warmer climes) and put those climate science grants to work in something other than wonky computer models and the ever-strident studies that they invent to try to make you piss your pants.

[Kaitlyn S]

 hrothgar, on 2010-November-12, 13:54, said:

Believe it or not, you have stumbled onto the only (non-intuitive) banned topic on the Watercooler...

All Climate Change threads are redirected to dev\null

A less than prophetic statement - this thread is now 142 pages

[Winstonm]

 Kaitlyn S, on 2016-November-04, 09:11, said:

A less than prophetic statement - this thread is now 142 pages

You were not around back then and are missing about 2 years worth of context that preceded Richard's post. Not everything is as black and white as you seem to think.

[Al_U_Card]

Political climate change?

[Zelandakh]

 Al_U_Card, on 2016-November-08, 22:41, said:

Political climate change?

Some people lived through it in the 30s. I doubt there are many that share your desire for a repeat.

[onoway]

 Al_U_Card, on 2016-November-04, 07:26, said:

Let's get going on real problems like hunger and disease (reduced during benevolent warmer climes) and put those climate science grants to work in something other than wonky computer models and the ever-strident studies that they invent to try to make you piss your pants.

Well you should consider that whatever the climate, water is needed to grow anything and presently we are desertifying the world at an alarming rate, thanks to deforestation and monocropping chem/industrial ag, neither of which was occurring in previous history. For the last 20 or so years at least, the US is depending on aquifers which are holding water from possibly thousands of years ago and they are not being replenished.

What is happening is not "computer models" wonky or not, this is people having to change because the water simply isn't there anymore. We are largely stripping the earths' ability to cycle it properly. Rain which hits the ground and immediately evaporates because it is landing on bare hard dirt is of no use to plant or animal. This is what is happening. Or floods because the rain can't be absorbed fast enough by compacted soil so it just runs off into storm sewers or wherever instead of being soaked deep into the ground to recharge the aquifers.

The push to have pipelines running all over the place also doesn't help because sooner or later they WILL leak and then even the water you DO have isn't useful anymore.

The knowledge of how to "fix" all of this is available and it's both relatively simple and cheap, but it doesn't cater to the business model of the chem companies. And it certainly doesn't involve clearcutting forests to grow palm oil, which is of questionable health benefit in any case, especially when refined. But the longer we resist making those changes, the harder and more expensive it will be.

[Al_U_Card]

I concur. Dealing with real problems is a start. Water availability and utility is a need that the human race cannot do without. Being able to assess the actual situations as opposed to simulated ones can steer us in the right direction. Most of the projections of imminent and long-term doom come from those same computer models that predict...errr project...much warmer conditions. They fail to consider the greening of the biosphere by the increase in CO2 which also makes plants more drought tolerant. Are we doing that (even inadvertently)? Or is nature releasing more CO2 because we are in a slight warming trend over the last couple of centuries? The last 5000 years or so have been a slow descent back towards an ice age. Paleohistory indicates that within a dozen or so lifetimes, we may be living in a much colder, ice-covered world. Making it there to see that involves fixing our current problems and every cent that we waste on fruitless endeavors (COP 1-20 anyone???) impedes our progress.
Economic prosperity reduces our need to survive adversity and allows us to concentrate on improving our situation. Whether we do that or not depends on our political will to make the hard choices and then constantly check that they are leading us in the right direction.

[y66]

From the Rockerfeller Family Fund vs Exxon in the New York review of Books:

Quote

Earlier this year our organization, the Rockefeller Family Fund (RFF), announced that it would divest its holdings in fossil fuel companies. We mean to do this gradually, but in a public statement we singled out ExxonMobil for immediate divestment because of its “morally reprehensible conduct.”1 For over a quarter-century the company tried to deceive policymakers and the public about the realities of climate change, protecting its profits at the cost of immense damage to life on this planet.

Our criticism carries a certain historical irony. John D. Rockefeller founded Standard Oil, and ExxonMobil is Standard Oil’s largest direct descendant. In a sense we were turning against the company where most of the Rockefeller family’s wealth was created. (Other members of the Rockefeller family have been trying to get ExxonMobil to change its behavior for over a decade.) Approached by some reporters for comment, an ExxonMobil spokesman replied, “It’s not surprising that they’re divesting from the company since they’re already funding a conspiracy against us.”2

What we had funded was an investigative journalism project. With help from other public charities and foundations, including the Rockefeller Brothers Fund (RBF), we paid for a team of independent reporters from Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism to try to determine what Exxon and other US oil companies had really known about climate science, and when. Such an investigation seemed promising because Exxon, in particular, has been a leader of the movement to deny the facts of climate change.3 Often working indirectly through front groups, it sponsored many of the scientists and think tanks that have sought to obfuscate the scientific consensus about the changing climate, and it participated in those efforts through its paid advertisements and the statements of its executives.

It seemed to us, however, that for business reasons, a company as sophisticated and successful as Exxon would have needed to know the difference between its own propaganda and scientific reality. If it turned out that Exxon and other oil companies had recognized the validity of climate science even while they were funding the climate denial movement, that would, we thought, help the public understand how artificially manufactured and disingenuous the “debate” over climate change has always been. In turn, we hoped this understanding would build support for strong policies addressing the crisis of global warming.

Indeed, the Columbia reporters learned that Exxon had understood and accepted the validity of climate science long before embarking on its denial campaign, and in the fall of 2015 they published their discoveries in The Los Angeles Timess.4 Around the same time, another team of reporters from the website InsideClimate News began publishing the results of similar research.5 (The RFF has made grants to InsideClimate News, and the RBF has been one of its most significant funders, but we didn’t know they were engaged in this project.) The reporting by these two different groups was complementary, each confirming and adding to the other’s findings.

Following publication of these articles, New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman began investigating whether ExxonMobil had committed fraud by failing to disclose many of the business risks of climate change to its shareholders despite evidence that it understood those risks internally. Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey soon followed Schneiderman with her own investigation, as did the AGs of California and the Virgin Islands, and thirteen more state AGs announced that they were considering investigations.

Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton each called for a federal investigation of ExxonMobil by the Department of Justice. Secretary of State John Kerry compared Exxon’s deceptions to the tobacco industry’s long denial of the danger of smoking, predicting that, if the allegations were true, Exxon might eventually have to pay billions of dollars in damages “in what I would imagine would be one of the largest class-action lawsuits in history.”6 Most recently, in August, the Securities and Exchange Commission began investigating the way ExxonMobil values its assets, given the world’s growing commitment to reducing carbon emissions. An article in The Wall Street Journal observed that this “could have far-reaching consequences for the oil and gas industry.”7

We didn’t expect ExxonMobil to admit that it had been at fault. It is one of the largest companies in the world—indeed, if its revenues are compared to the gross domestic products of nations, it has one of the world’s larger economies, bigger than Austria’s, for example, or Thailand’s8—and it has a reputation for unusual determination in promoting its self-interest.9 One way or another, we expected it to fight back—most likely, we thought, by proxy, through its surrogates in the right-wing press and in Congress.

Sure enough, various bloggers have been calling for “the Rockefellers”10 to be prosecuted by the government for “conspiracy” against Exxon under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act.11 (Such lines of attack are being tested and refined, and we expect they will soon be repeated in journals with broader readership.) And in May, Texas Republican Lamar Smith, the chair of the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, sent a letter to the RFF and seven other NGOs (including the RBF, 350.org, Greenpeace, and the Union of Concerned Scientists),12 as well as all seventeen AGs who said they might investigate ExxonMobil. He accused us of engaging in “a coordinated effort to deprive companies, nonprofit organizations, and scientists of their First Amendment rights and ability to fund and conduct scientific research free from intimidation and threats of prosecution,” and demanded that we turn over to him all private correspondence between any of the recipients of his letter relating to any potential climate change investigation. When we all refused, twice, to surrender any such correspondence, Smith subpoenaed Schneiderman, Healey, and all eight NGOs for the same documents.

We will answer Smith’s accusations against us presently. In order to explain ourselves, however, we first have to explain what Exxon knew about climate change, and when—and what, despite that knowledge, Exxon did: the morally reprehensible conduct that prompted our actions in the first place.

[y66]

Double post deleted

[onoway]

Trump may or may not believe in climate change but apparently he ( or at least his lawyers) is using climate change as a reason why he ought to be allowed to build a wall across the beach at his golf course in Ireland, or so I read in an Irish newspaper article the other day. Like everywhere else he goes, he has divided the village between those who want the work and those who are dismayed not only because it will spoil a beach known as a tourist attraction but also because if other engineers are right, the effects of any large storm will then get diverted onto the village. Lovely man.

[Al_U_Card]

From Judith Curry's take on John Tierney has written a stunningly insightful piece in the City Journal Magazine:


Scientists try to avoid confirmation bias by exposing their work to peer review by critics with different views, but it’s increasingly difficult for liberals to find such critics. Academics have traditionally leaned left politically, and many fields have essentially become monocultures, especially in the social sciences, where Democrats now outnumber Republicans by at least 8 to 1. The lopsided ratio has led to another well-documented phenomenon: people’s beliefs become more extreme when they’re surrounded by like-minded colleagues. They come to assume that their opinions are not only the norm but also the truth, . . creating what Jonathan Haidt calls a “tribal-moral community” with its own “sacred values” about what’s worth studying and what’s taboo.

Conservatives have been variously pathologized as unethical, antisocial, and irrational simply because they don’t share beliefs that seem self-evident to liberals.

The combination of all these pressures from the Left has repeatedly skewed science over the past half-century.

And that brings us to the second great threat from the Left: its long tradition of mixing science and politics. To conservatives, the fundamental problem with the Left is what Friedrich Hayek called the fatal conceit: the delusion that experts are wise enough to redesign society. Conservatives distrust central planners, preferring to rely on traditional institutions that protect individuals’ “natural rights” against the power of the state. Leftists have much more confidence in experts and the state.

For his part, Holdren has served for the past eight years as the science advisor to President Obama, a position from which he laments that Americans don’t take his warnings on climate change seriously. He doesn’t seem to realize that public skepticism has a lot to do with the dismal track record of himself and his fellow environmentalists. There’s always an apocalypse requiring the expansion of state power.

President Obama promotes his green agenda by announcing that “the debate is settled,” and he denounces “climate deniers” by claiming that 97 percent of scientists believe that global warming is dangerous. His statements are false. While the greenhouse effect is undeniably real, and while most scientists agree that there has been a rise in global temperatures caused in some part by human emissions of carbon dioxide, no one knows how much more warming will occur this century or whether it will be dangerous.

The long-term risks are certainly worth studying, but no matter whose predictions you trust, climate science provides no justification for Obama’s green agenda—or anyone else’s agenda. Even if it were somehow proved that high-end estimates for future global warming are accurate, that wouldn’t imply that Greens have the right practical solution for reducing carbon emissions—or that we even need to reduce those emissions. Policies for dealing with global warming vary according to political beliefs, economic assumptions, social priorities, and moral principles. Would regulating carbon dioxide stifle economic growth and give too much power to the state? Is it moral to impose sacrifices on poor people to keep temperatures a little cooler for their descendants, who will presumably be many times richer? Are there more important problems to address first? These aren’t questions with scientifically correct answers.

Yet many climate researchers are passing off their political opinions as science, just as Obama does, and they’re even using that absurdly unscientific term “denier” as if they were priests guarding some eternal truth. Science advances by continually challenging and testing hypotheses, but the modern Left has become obsessed with silencing heretics. In a letter to Attorney General Loretta Lynch last year, 20 climate scientists urged her to use federal racketeering laws to prosecute corporations and think tanks that have “deceived the American people about the risks of climate change.” Similar assaults on free speech are endorsed in the Democratic Party’s 2016 platform, which calls for prosecution of companies that make “misleading” statements about “the scientific reality of climate change.”

The most vocal critics of climate dogma are a half-dozen think tanks that together spend less than $15 million annually on environmental issues. The half-dozen major green groups spend more than $500 million, and the federal government spends $10 billion on climate research and technology to reduce emissions. Add it up, and it’s clear that scientists face tremendous pressure to support the “consensus” on reducing carbon emissions, as Judith Curry, a climatologist at Georgia Tech, testified last year at a Senate hearing.

“This pressure comes not only from politicians but also from federal funding agencies, universities and professional societies, and scientists themselves who are green activists,” Curry said. “This advocacy extends to the professional societies that publish journals and organize conferences. Policy advocacy, combined with understating the uncertainties, risks destroying science’s reputation for honesty and objectivity—without which scientists become regarded as merely another lobbyist group.”

To preserve their integrity, scientists should avoid politics and embrace the skeptical rigor that their profession requires. They need to start welcoming conservatives and others who will spot their biases and violate their taboos. Making these changes won’t be easy, but the first step is simple: stop pretending that the threats to science are coming from the Right. Look in the other direction—or in the mirror.

[jonottawa]

Continuing the discussion from the Trumpenthread:

Why did the environmental movement drop the issue of overpopulation?

"“First, governments must acknowledge the problem and declare their commitment to ending population growth; this commitment should also include an end to immigration.”"

"The Sierra Club, for example, in 1969 urged “the people of the United States to abandon population growth as a pattern and goal; to commit themselves to limit the total population of the United States in order to achieve a balance between population and resources; and to achieve a stable population no later than the year 1990.”"

So PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE do me a favor and STOP PRETENDING TO CARE ABOUT CLIMATE CHANGE or the ENVIRONMENT if you're not addressing 3rd world overpopulation! Don't be this guy:



https://en.wikipedia...eetlight_effect

TIA

[Al_U_Card]

While pollution issues are serious and need to be addressed adequately (remember the Cayuga river fires in Ohio or Love canal etc.?) the enviro-scare movement has a horrible track record for predicting imminent doom. From Ehrlich to Holdren (one of Ehrlich's students IIRC) DDT, the Ozone problem, famine and even over-population and resource depletion have never amounted to serious issues. Demographic and regional population issues are, however, in need of attention. Climate change (ugh! is anything less scientific than that particular moniker?) is just the latest boy (activist) crying (pay me to keep you safe from the) wolf.

[jonottawa]

I'm not sure if the people who are claiming that 3rd world overpopulation is a trivial problem (or not a problem at all) are just being politically correct, or deliberately obtuse, or what. But anyway, let's do a hypothetical:

In Year 1, there are 2 countries A & B. They are identical. They both have 10M people and same resources/area etc. They contribute equally to global warming & environmental damage.

Country A promotes a sustainable economy & sets ~zero population growth as one of its goals.

Country B has the cancer cell (or Ponzi scheme, if you prefer) growth model.

In Year 50, Country A now has 10M people. They (overwhelmingly) are prosperous & happy. The government consistently balances the budget. There is high social trust. There is almost no crime. The mainstream media is honest, fairly presents both sides of contentious issues, & acts as a valuable independent check on the government. Each generation feels that they are slightly better off than their parents were. Jobs, housing, access to medical care & resources are plentiful. Post-secondary education is inexpensive & spots are awarded based on MERIT. Their air and waterways are clean. And those who don't or can't work are well taken care of because they are SO FEW IN NUMBER. If lack of work becomes an issue (unlikely as the population ages,) the hours in a workweek for government employees can always be reduced (say from 40 to 35.) There is a generous (scaled) EITC for low-wage jobs so that people WANT TO DO many of the necessary jobs that 'nobody wants to do' & to provide a strong incentive for people to work (a full-time worker always outearns a non-worker.) They don't obsess about their carbon footprints because they've done the RESPONSIBLE thing by limiting their population growth. Their per capita carbon usage is 50% higher than country B's. So they do 15M carbonks to the Earth's climate change model. By not artificially capping carbon output per capita, their industries are more competitive, helping to offset the disadvantage that their lack of child or slave labor creates.

In Year 50, Country B has 60M people. They (mostly) aren't so prosperous or happy. The government permanently runs large deficits. Special interests from various factions perpetually squabble over government largesse. Crime is a serious problem. The mainstream media is a (almost completely) one-sided propaganda arm of corporate and partisan interests. Each generation sees a little bit less opportunity and prosperity than their parents had. Jobs, housing, medical care & resources are scarce. There's a lot of pollution & poverty. The infrastructure (roads, bridges, etc.) is crumbling under the weight of the population & the lack of resources for maintenance. Most jobs that are available pay poverty wages & are unpleasant. The government of Country B imports scads of immigrants from 3rd world countries to do many of those jobs (and turns a blind eye to the hordes of non citizens entering the country illegally, willing to work in the black market for even less than minimum wage,) banking on the votes those people will give them in the future. This drives down wages for those jobs even further & leads many 'working class' citizens of Country B to turn to drugs (both illegal & legally prescribed,) hopelessness & despair, forever leaving the workforce & becoming dependent on the social safety net (itself crumbling under the unsustainable weight.)

The greedy corporations in Country B are happy because they get to privatize the profits that plentiful cheap labor provides and socialize the huge costs of these immigrants & non-citizens living in the country illegally. The few good jobs are allocated primarily based on gender/race/sexual orientation & on a willingness to unquestioningly parrot Big Brother's overriding narrative: “Multiculturalism is our strength.” Any deviation from the party line is met with social ostracism & is often career-ending. Country B does 60M carbonks to the Earth's climate change model, 4 times as much as Country A. But they look down their nose at & try to Climate-shame Country A, whose citizens have a 50% higher carbon footprint per capita.

Now you can argue until you're blue in the face that Country B is the optimal approach or that Country A's residents should feel guilty for using 50% more carbon per capita than Country B. Or that Country A is racist. Or that societies where 'values' like illegitimacy, hedonism, equality of outcome & lawlessness are promoted turn out better than societies where they value marriage, family, equality of opportunity & respect for the law. Or that you don't recognize (a close facsimile of) Country B in the world you see out your window. Or that Western countries didn't look a LOT like Country A (perhaps absent a few easily managed 'tweaks') 50 or 60 years ago. But I'm not buying.

(Speaking of not buying, I'm not materialistic. Unlike some in this forum, I don't see buying cheap junk made by child labor in a toxic cloud of pollution in China that will end up in a landfill in <5 years as a desirable social good. I have never owned a smartphone (unlike most of these 'refugees') or a flat-screen TV. My one computer is a 3.5 year old laptop.)

As for Green technology, my understanding (please correct me if I'm wrong) is that most (the vast majority?) of the 'Green' 'businesses' that received subsidies from the Obama administration (presumably as a reward for campaign donations in most cases?) have (predictably) gone bankrupt. Many of the so-called 'Green' technologies are themselves TERRIBLE for the environment (toxic batteries, etc.)

YOU can have faith that there will be a super-Green breakthrough (like cold fusion or something) where electricity will be free, plentiful & cause no environmental harm, but until that breakthrough happens, let's do the responsible thing & plan for it NOT happening. Let's stop being Country B. Let's emulate Country A. And let's help 3rd world countries eventually (but ASAP) become Country A too, not by poaching from their (often incredibly shallow) talent pool (making it harder for them to advance,) or, conversely, by taking their poorest & least skilled into our own populations (dramatically increasing our OWN national carbon footprints, rewarding bad behavior, & creating a de facto lottery system where a few souls reap unearned windfalls while the vast majority get nothing) but by rewarding them for making good decisions (and withholding those rewards if they make bad ones.)

[PassedOut]

 jonottawa, on 2016-November-26, 10:49, said:

As for Green technology, my understanding (please correct me if I'm wrong) is that most (the vast majority?) of the 'Green' 'businesses' that received subsidies from the Obama administration (presumably as a reward for campaign donations in most cases?) have (predictably) gone bankrupt.

That's fake information.

Obama Has Done More for Clean Energy Than You Think

Quote

The Great Recession enabled bold steps to seed a clean-energy revolution
...

The program has made a profit of nearly $1 billion in interest payments to the U.S Treasury to date. At least $5 billion more is expected over the next few decades as loans are paid back. That compares with $780 million in losses to date, the bulk of which is accounted for by the $535 million loaned to Solyndra. And more money could be made if the program were to ever sell its group of loans rather than managing them for the next few decades.

Already, Tesla has repaid its $465-million loan nine years early, thanks to the innovative financing terms devised in its deal, part of $3.5 billion in loans that have already been repaid. Such advanced vehicle loans, for projects like Ford's EcoBoost engine, will help achieve the Obama administration's higher fuel-efficiency standard. Combined, these fuel-efficiency technologies are expected to help save some 600 million metric tons of CO2 per year compared with existing vehicles. Elsewhere, 1366 Technologies, another loan recipient, may yet make silicon photovoltaics even cheaper with its new, less wasteful manufacturing technique. And wind turbines produce electricity at a price that is now competitive with burning fossil fuels.