|
– |
‘I Feel Duped on Climate Change’ [Fritz Vahrenholt] is typical of someone who came of age during the student protest movement of the late 1960s, and who fought against the chemical industry’s toxic manufacturing plants in the 1970s. His party, Germany’s center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD), chose him as environment senator in the city-state of Hamburg, where he incurred the wrath of the environmental lobby by building a waste incineration plant, earning him the nickname « Feuerfritze » (Fire Fritz). He worked in industry after that, first for oil multinational Shell and then for wind turbine maker RePower, which he helped develop. Now, as the outgoing CEO of the renewable energy group RWE Innogy, he is about to embark on his next major battle. Vahrenholt: The fear mongers are still shaping the political debate. According to the German Advisory Council on Global Change, environmentally minded countries should forcibly bring about reduced consumption for the sake of protecting the climate. This takes us in the direction of an environmental dictatorship. And the fearmongering is also beginning to take effect. When I was in a restaurant recently, I overheard a woman at the next table telling her children that it’s wrong to eat an Argentine steak — because of the climate. That’s when I ask myself: How could we have come to this point? |
How could we have come to this point? Voilà la question qu’on devrait tous se poser…
Les conclusions de Vahrenhold sont très raisonnables (même si ses « faits » ne le sont pas toujours) et méritent d’être diffusées. Par exemple:
1. Concentrons-nous sur les polluants à effet de serre et laissons le C02 un peu plus tranquille.
2. Les effets du C02 sur la température sont réels mais 2 fois moins élevés que le prétend le GIEC.
3. Nous devrions importer moins de pétrole de pays totalitaires
Extraits de l’interview du 8 février 2012 présentée par le billet:
SPIEGEL: So, is it a mistake to concentrate exclusively on the reduction of carbon dioxide?
Vahrenholt: Yes. In addition to carbon dioxide, we also have black soot, for example. It creates 55 percent of the warming effect of CO2, but it could be filtered out with little effort within a few years, especially in emerging and developing countries. And, in doing so, we would achieve huge benefits for human health.
SPIEGEL: But aren’t you shooting yourself in the foot when you say that climate change isn’t really that bad? How do you intend to keep justifying emissions trading if you feel that greenhouse gases are irrelevant?
Vahrenholt: All I’m saying is that CO2 is a climate gas, but that its effect is only half as strong as the IPCC claims. Nevertheless, we still have to reduce CO2 emissions through worldwide emissions trading. And there are also other reasons to burn fewer fossil fuels. We don’t have that much coal, oil and gas left in the world, so we have to economize more. We also have to become less dependent on imports from totalitarian countries.
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,813814-2,00.html
How could we have come to this point? Voilà la question qu’on devrait tous se poser…
Quand la politique s’empare de la science. Je l’ai toujours dit. Aussitôt qu’ils ont sorti l’étude, les politiciens ce sont lancés là-dessus comme des petits chiens. Pourtant une démarche scientifique demande du temps et des vérifications. Le problème, maintenant, c’est que c’est la guerre aux subventions en science puisque ce n’est pas la main d’oeuvre et l’argent qui pleut. Difficile de voir des rendements immédiats avec la science.. et pourtant !