HYPOCRISY of Fossil Fuel Moral Policing : Germany’s Coal Love and the Blacklisting of Australia

The Uniper HELE (High Energy Low Emission) coal-power plant Datteln 4. Photographer: Marcel Kusch/picture alliance via Getty Images


We get a tax credit if we build a lot of wind farms.
That’s the only reason to build them.
They don’t make sense without the tax credit.

–– Warren Buffett

Renewable energy technologies simply won’t work;
we need a fundamentally different approach.”

–– Top Google engineers

Suggesting that renewables will let us phase rapidly off fossil fuels
in the United States, China, India, or the world as a whole
is almost the equivalent of believing in the Easter Bunny and Tooth Fairy.

–– James Hansen
(The Godfather of AGW alarmism / former NASA climate chief)

Vijay Jayaraj is a Research Contributor for the Cornwall Alliance for the Stewardship of Creation and resides in Bengaluru, India. He received his M.Sc in Environmental Science from the University of East Anglia (UEA), England. His first hand experience of the controversy within the climate fraternity came when he was a graduate student at UEA, which also houses the Climatic Research Unit – the heart of the Climategate scandal in 2009. (Climategate: Emails leaked from personal accounts of alarmist climate scientists revealed their attempts to deliberately exaggerate the warming rate in the 20th century).

His subsequent journey in understanding the reality of the climatic system made him espouse the position of climate realism, a position that views climate in terms of the real-world climate measurements (that shows no signs of dangerous increase) and not through the lenses of faulty forecasts that predict a climate apocalypse. He advocates for the use of fossil fuels in developing countries, the very same energy sources that lifted the Western society out of poverty in the last two centuries.

In this exclusive op-ed written for Climatism blog, Vijay illustrates the brazen hypocrisy of the climate-obsessed Western mainstream media, vilifying conservative leaders such as Australia’s PM Scott Morrison for supporting fossil fuels and coal, while remaining silent on – ‘green’ energy darling of the Left – Angela Merkel’s ramping up of coal-fired power stations in order to negate the disastrous economic and environmental fallout from her countries disastrous 500 billion Euro (failed) Energiewende experiment.

From a perspective of humanity, Vijay highlights the deadly importance of utilising cheap, reliable fossil fuels in order to lift billions of people in developing countries out of abject poverty by allowing an estimated 1.3 billion of them to experience actual electricity. According to the Washington Post, “around the world, 1.3 billion people lack access to electricity. More than 600 million are in sub-Saharan Africa, and more than 300 million are in India alone.” 

As well, Vijay recognises the undeniable need for advanced societies to maintain their use of cheap, reliable and clean fossil fuel technologies, such as HELE, in order to maintain economic wealth, keep the lights on, as well to maintain environmental health. After all, the greatest threat to the environment is not affluence, it is poverty. The border between Haiti and Dominican Republic, a fine example. See : UN Carbon Regime Would Devastate Humanity And The Environment

DISASTER divided : Two countries, one island, life-and-death differences


Mainstream Media’s Hypocrisy of Blacklisting Australia

By Vijay Jayaraj

In 2020 alone, German Chancellor Angela Merkel approved the use of six supercritical HELE coal fire-powered stations in the country. 

As a stage when the Paris agreement conveners are looking up to Germany to represent itself as a leader in emission reduction, the opening up of coal plants comes across as a slap in the face of the agreement between Berlin and Paris. 

When a nation like Germany, touted as the global leader in ‘clean’ energy, can open up new coal plants, why can’t economies like Australia do the same? 

Why are the left and the greenies branding Australia as a “fossil badboy”? Are only leftists and developed European nations entitled to reliable and affordable power from fossil fuels?

Germany Chancellor and Fossil Hypocrisy

Germany is a leading economy, not just in Europe, but in the world. But that status is under threat as the country’s political leadership is struggling with its obsession for “clean” energy and the increasing pressure to provide energy access at an affordable rate. 

Though being touted as the global leader in renewable energy, the country failed miserably in fulfilling its emission reduction targets during recent years and made headlines across the globe for its failure. Despite setting aside $580 billion in expenses to transform its energy systems away from fossil, the country could not achieve its own emission reduction targets. 

This year, the country’s premier Merkel went a step further to upgrade her dismal record in keeping promises and embraced fossil fuels. 

Unable to meet the growing energy needs, she had no option but to approve the activation of six state-of-the-art HELE supercritical coal-fired power stations in Germany’s Datteln, Lünen, Hamburg, Stade, and Schkopau.

State-of-the-art HELE supercritical coal-fired power stations in Germany’s Datteln

Surprisingly, the chancellor did not go through the same treatment that some of her counterparts in other parts of the world are going through for embracing fossil fuels!

Mocking Australia’s Coal Embrace is Heights of Hypocrisy

In contrast to the treatment Merkel enjoys in the global mainstream media, Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison has been the subject of ridicule for his open embrace of fossil fuels, especially coal. 

The global mainstream media’s treatment of the Australian PM is nothing but blatant hypocrisy! While leaders like Angela Merkel are allowed to use fossils, those like Morrison are ridiculed for doing the same. 

In fact, the hypocrisy becomes more intense when considers the total CO2 emissions from different countries so far! Australia is ranked 16th but Germany is ranked 6th. China, who are currently being praised for their announcement of carbon neutrality target, stands number one in the ranking for total CO2 emissions. 

Make no mistake, CO2 emission is not a bad thing! But the fact that the leftist’s mainstream media chose to blacklist few political leaders while allow others to run scot-free exposes their hypocrisy. 

Media Morphing the Importance of Australian Coal as Evil

Moreover, the leftists seldom care about the lives of millions in Asia who directly depend on Australian coal. Though countries like India and China have abundant coal reserves, they still depend on Australian coal to meet domestic energy needs.

In addition to fueling their energy plants, Australian coal—which is a cleaner form of black anthracite coal—is the preferred fuel in their steel plants. Australian coal production increase is partly induced by the soaring export demands from developing nations like India and China, and even developed economies like Japan.

In 2019, Australia’s total coal export was valued at $64 billion, with Japan alone buying $17 billion worth of coal. China bought coal worth $13.7 billion and India $10.5 billion. Ironically, the host of Paris agreement, France, took in $0.6 billion worth of coal from Australia in 2019. 

In fact, the energy sectors of these coal import countries are highly sensitive to disruptions in supply of Australian coal. This was evident recently when a ban on import of Australian coal—due to the on-going political tensions between China and Australia—plunged thousands of homes into darkness in China. 

Institute of Public Affairs in India estimates that Australian coal could help 82 million Indians access electricity. In a nation where hundreds of millions are yet to experience uninterrupted power supply, Australian coal supply could be vital. 

And it is not just the foreign economies that benefit from Australian coal. Coal is mined in every state in Australia and it is one of the country’s economic lifeline. In 2019, It was responsible for 56% of the nation’s electricity requirements. 

Estimates indicate that the Australian economy has been strongly supported by 9,100 million tonnes of black coal and about 2,300 million tonnes of brown coal since the 1700s. Mining and resources have been a key contributor to Australia’s economic growth, according to 2019 National Accounts data by the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

Instead of broadcasting actual benefit of superior grade Australian coal in Asia Pacific, the liberal mainstream media has branded Australia’s coal sector as evil and cast Prime Minister Morrison as the villain in their anti-fossil propaganda drama. To rub salt on the wound, they’ve cast climate hypocrites in Europe as climate saviors. 

If the CO2 emissions are the real concern—to the climate alarmists—then they must actually promote Australian coal and clean coal technology like the HELE supercritical coal technology that emit 30 percent less CO2. 

Rather, the failure of support for high grade Australian coal and the HELE technology has revealed the alarmist’s and left’s unwillingness to the rising cost of energy prices from renewables or the huge financial burden non-fossil technologies are having on the economies and the industries which act as their backbone.

Author: Vijay Jayaraj is an environmental researcher and commentator on climate and energy issues globally. He graduated with a Master’s in Environmental Science from the University of East Anglia, which was home to the infamous Climategate scandal. 


Related :

ENERGIEWENDE-Fail Related :



Leave a Reply

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

Gravatar
WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. Log Out /  Change )

Google photo

You are commenting using your Google account. Log Out /  Change )

Twitter picture

You are commenting using your Twitter account. Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. Log Out /  Change )

Connecting to %s

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.