What an increasingly wonderful world

For years, environmentalists have campaigned for children to study global warming as a subject rather than simply as a part of geography. Their wish has now been granted in England with a new GCSE in natural history, starting from 2025. We know nothing yet about the syllabus but it’s quite the opportunity to ask what our planet’s problems really are, and how effective the net-zero agenda is as a solution.

Outside the Paris climate conference center, organizers have erected a ‘Wind Tree’ (Arbre a Vent) which produces electricity using the power of the breeze. In doing so, they have summed up exactly what is wrong with the conference.

The tree will only produce 3,500 kWh per year and it costs about €25,000. So, at a production price of about 7 cents per kWh , it will take 89 years to make up just the capital cost. Or put differently, the cost is 300% more expensive than even traditional wind power, which still struggles without subsidies.

COPENHAGEN – Imagine that over the next 70 or 80 years, a giant port city – say, Tokyo – found itself engulfed by sea levels rising as much as 15 feet or more. Millions of inhabitants would be imperiled, along with trillions of dollars worth of infrastructure. This awful prospect is exactly the sort of thing global-warming evangelists like Al Gore have in mind when they warn that we must take “large-scale, preventive measures to protect human civilization as we know it.” The rhetoric may sound extreme, but with so much hanging in the balance, surely it’s justified.