rictownsend

A large tree trunk has been uncovered beneath a glacier in the Alps, dated to around 6,000 years ago. The species is Swiss stone pine. Today, trees of that type cannot grow at that altitude because it is far too cold. This means that when that tree was alive, the climate there had to be warmer than today. 6,000 years ago aligns with the Holocene climate optimum, a time when temperatures were far higher than now, even with far less atmospheric CO2. Earth's climate is cyclical and Mother Nature self-regulates. Narratives of doom serve political aims, not reality.

After years of pushing wind and solar, BlackRock's Larry Fink now admits forcing economies onto intermittent power was a mistake. We need dispatchable power, he says, or risk energy shortages." That admission comes after grids have already been weakened though, after bills have already surged, and after energy security has long been eroded. Then there's Bill Gates. In 2019, Gates said he had divested from fossil fuels, but his filings show otherwise. In 2024, the Gates Foundation Trust held hundreds of millions of dollars in fossil fuel companies, its largest exposure in years. Today, the companies backed by Gates emit more CO2 annually than Russia, Japan and Germany combined. Like Fink, Gates has conceded that reliable energy is indispensable, and that he no longer considers global warming an existential threat. The timing of this backtracking isn't a coincidence. It comes as the elites envision a new golden control method: artificial intelligence. AI data centers require enormous energy inputs that intermittent renewables simply cannot provide. Wind and solar were imposed on economies, but they are not good enough for AI data centers. When elite infrastructure is at stake, dispatchable power suddenly matters. Climate change has served its purpose though: increased control and a massive wealth transfer. Now comes the next power play.

Europe calls biomass clean energy, but the reality is brutal. To power its green transition, the EU is burning millions of tons of wood pellets every year, shipped in from the US and Canada. Europe is cutting down forests halfway around the world, grinding them into pellets and shipping them across the Atlantic to burn in its power stations. Unsurprisingly, the total emissions here are higher than simply burning coal, according to peer-reviewed studies by the EU's own scientific advisors. But countries like the UK, Denmark and the Netherlands do it anyway, because it technically counts as zero carbon emissions.

Major wind turbine manufacturers have been hit by an asbestos scandal. At Australia's $4 billion Golden Plains wind farm, testing on turbines has come back positive. Units are now quarantined and the manufacturer, based in Denmark, is launching global checks across its supply chain. Serious environmental concerns are mounting. Wind blades can't be recycled, not economically or at scale. So tens of thousands of tons of blades are dumped every year, buried in pits with endless more coming as first-generation turbines hit their end of life (which is typically just 15 years). An industry sold as clean is leaving mountains of toxic waste that can't be recycled.