Free Republic

Professor David J C MacKay tells The Register that he was first drawn into this field by the constant suggestion — from the BBC, parts of the government etc — that we can seriously impact our personal energy consumption by doing such things as turning our TVs off standby or unplugging our mobile-phone chargers. Anyone with even a slight grasp of energy units should know that this is madness. Skipping one bath saves a much energy as leaving your TV off standby for over six months. People who wash regularly, wear clean clothes, consume hot food or drink, use powered...

Pumping furiously on a foot treadle in the afternoon heat, six-year-old Sarju Ram is irrigating her impoverished family’s field, improving the crop and – without knowing it – helping environmentally sensitive holiday-makers assuage their guilt over long-haul flights to dream destinations. But Sarju and her four brothers and sisters working flat out in a clump of trees that provide scant shelter from the sun illustrate a growing argument over claims that British environmentalists’ efforts to curb greenhouse emissions are inadvertently fuelling an increase in child labour.

Companies and individuals rushing to go green have been spending millions on “carbon credit” projects that yield few if any environmental benefits. A Financial Times investigation has uncovered widespread failings in the new markets for greenhouse gases, suggesting some organisations are paying for emissions reductions that do not take place. Others are meanwhile making big profits from carbon trading for very small expenditure and in some cases for clean-ups that they would have made anyway. The growing political salience of environmental politics has sparked a “green gold rush”, which has seen a dramatic expansion in the number of businesses offering...

LeBron James is electing to have an enormous carbon footprint in the 35,440-square-foot home he is having built outside Akron, Ohio. No word yet whether James plans to buy environmental penance through the purchase of carbon offsets, the approach of Al Gore, the green movement's high priest who delivers his sermons from the don't-do-as-I-do, do-as-I-say pulpit. James is opting to indulge in his fantasies with his dream castle. It will come with a bowling alley, casino, theater, recording studio, barber shop, aquarium, sports bar, outdoor swimming pool and six-car garage. Why he left out a shopping mall is anyone's guess....

There are 2.5 grams of CO2 dissolved in each 16oz. bottle of soft drink. The average American drinks 43 gallons of soda pop a year. Therefore, every American releases over 400 grams of CO2 annually! Multiply that by 250 million Americans and we are talking a Hurricane Katrina of CO2 being released by Americans every year by flatus and belched gas! Al Gore has invented the carbon offset CO2 capture kit. Basically, each plastic bottle will come with a one way enema tip. When one empties one’s soda pop, he or she will immediately place the tip on the empty...

There's an elephant in global warming's living room that few in the mainstream media want to talk about: the creators of the carbon credit scheme are the ones cashing in on it. The two cherub like choirboys singing loudest in the Holier Than Thou Global Warming Cathedral are Maurice Strong and Al Gore. This duo has done more than anyone else to advance the alarmism of man-made global warming. With little media monitoring, both Strong and Gore are cashing in on the lucrative cottage industry known as man-made global warming. Strong is on the board of directors of the Chicago...

A new report on the carbon offset retail market shows that retail offset providers face several challenges in supplying credible, cost effective offsets to the market. After finding a price of £1.5 ton/CO2 per carbon credits in US, I was surprised to see prices in different carbon offset websites from different countries ranging from £2.50 up to £12.40 with an average of £5.10 tonne/CO2. In the Brisith case price ranges from £7.40 to £9.00 tonne/CO2 which I see ludicrous because this could mean that we British people pay more without making a real benefit on the environment. This make me...