Saturday, October 13, 2018

BWorld 258, Corrupted science to justify renewables cronyism

* This is my article in BusinessWorld last Thursday, October 11, 2018.


In a letter “Response to ‘Cheap, stable electricity vs climate alarmism’” published in BusinessWorld yesterday, Oct. 10 2018, Mr. Eddie O’Connor of wind-solar lobby wrote the following weird claims:

1. “Our species emerged over 3 million years when there was a stable quantity of CO2 in the atmosphere, and this was the figure up until industrialization: 270 parts per million.”

This is corruption and distortion of earth science. Earth’s climate history is one of natural warming-cooling cycles since the planet was born some 4.6 billion years ago. In a paper by Davis, W.J. (2017), “The relationship between atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration and global temperature for the last 425 million years,” Climate 5: 76; doi: 10.3390/cli5040076, this chart shows that atmospheric CO2 levels were up to 400 to 600 ppm some 325 to 450 million years ago and it was characterized by global cooling.


2. “Since 1998 we have trapped the energy of 2,667,000,000 Hiroshima bombs in the atmosphere.”

This is pure alarmism and Frankensteinism, inventing own data to scare the public unless they accept the renewables cronyism agenda.

From the “Global Temperature Report: September 2018” by the Univ. of Alabama in Huntsville (UAH), global average lower tropospheric temperature, Dr. Cristy and Dr. Spencer summarized the data:

“Globally, the coolest September in the last 10 years. Global climate trend since Dec. 1 1978: +0.13 C per decade. September Temperatures (preliminary): Global composite temp.: +0.14 C (+0.25 °F) above seasonal average (departure from average 1981-2010). Northern Hemisphere +0.15 C (+0.27°F), Southern Hemisphere +0.14 C (+0.25 °F), Tropics +0.24 C (+0.43 °F).” (http://www.drroyspencer.com/2018/10/uah-global-temperature-update-for-september-2018-0-14-deg-c/)

Planet Earth is currently experiencing declining temperature in the lower troposphere, data are collected by NASA satellites 24/7.

3. “Mr. Oplas didn’t talk about the price of coal-generated electricity… CIA estimates that the cost of electricity coming from coal-fired … station is $9.2 cents per unit… my company bid $4.1 cents per unit… Solar came in at a price of $2.92 cents per unit.”

Game, if wind-solar are indeed that cheap, then will the lobby agree to (a) abolish the priority and mandatory dispatch of wind-solar to the grid, and (b) abolish the feed-in-tariff (FIT) scheme of guaranteed high price for wind-solar, other variable REs for 20 years?


Solar price of P9/kWh at P54/US$ is not 2.9 cents but 17 cents/kWh. Wind price of P8.5/kWh at P54/$ is not 4.1 cents but 16 cents/kWh.

The FIT-Allowance in our monthly electricity bill has been rising from 4 centavos/kWh in 2015 to 12.40 in 2016, 18.30 in 2017, and 25.32 centavos /kWh starting June 2018 billing. This is to cover under-recoveries in 2017 alone.

4. “Mr. Oplas is associating himself with an invite-only conference where there will be no challenge to his views.”

Ignorance of the private event. That Stratbase-ADRi forum last Sept. 27 has four speakers, Sen. Sherwin Gatchalian, Dir. Mario Marasigan of DOE, Dr. Raul Fabella of EPDP and UPSE, and Atty. Saturnino Juan of IEMOP. I was not a speaker, I was only one of three reactors, and about one-fifth of the audience were media people.

5. “Let us choose a public auditorium and let us have a debate on energy policy in the Philippines.”

Sure. One projector each, charts vs charts, tables vs tables, with an independent referee who will cut off over-talking and hysterical speaker/s. Let the jokers and inventors of fake energy data be exposed.

Meanwhile, the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC), an independent organization founded in 2003 to fact-check the work of the UN on climate change has released this week the “Summary for Policymakers of Climate Change Reconsidered II: Fossil Fuels.”

In that report, 117 scientists, economists, and other experts show that “Fossil fuels deliver affordable, plentiful, and reliable energy that is closely associated with human development. There is a strong positive relationship between low energy prices and economic prosperity. Wind and solar power are incapable of delivering the affordable, plentiful, and reliable energy that is delivered by fossil fuels.”


Bienvenido S. Oplas, Jr. is the president of Minimal Government Thinkers.
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