Lomborg : german politicians are fooling themselves about the efficacy of renewables

 Another scathing account of Dane Björn Lomborg with Germany's energy policy. In an article for germany newspaper WELT he works out that Germany's measures to reduce CO2 are mostly ill-considered, useless, expensive and moreover strain emerging economies:

In a rational world, climate policy would be about finding the most cost-effective policy for the very real problem of global warming. But in the real world, many climate policy measures seem to be more about making us feel morally superior than using scarce resources effectively to have a noticeable impact.

Every spring, the lighting at the Brandenburg Gate, as well as on millions of buildings around the world - including the Eiffel Tower, the Sydney Opera House and the Empire State Building - is switched off for an hour under the campaign name "Earth Hour". The idea behind it is to jointly set an example for climate protection. But if you get people to turn off the lights for an hour, it doesn't have a noticeable effect on the climate. And if people light a few candles instead, that actually increases the net emissions.

Danish author: The myths of renewable energies

 Danish author Björn Lomborg of think tank Copenhagen Consensus Center considers renewable energies an eyewash. Neither are they low in price nor do they contribute to halt the climate change. He develops some interesting arguments in german newspaper WELT:

Are Renewable Energies Competitive? We hear constantly that wind and solar energy are conquering the world. They are free and - we are told - cheaper than fossil fuels. But why is Germany spending 18 billion euros this year on subsidizing solar and wind energy? In the current discussion about renewable energy, a little is actually true and a lot is misleading.

Technically speaking, it's true that an extra kilowatt-hour of electricity generated by the cheapest and most effective new wind and solar systems is cheaper than fossil fuels. In Germany, according to the Fraunhofer Institute, these best-case technologies generate an average of one kilowatt hour of electricity for 5.2 cents for solar and 6.1 cents for wind energy. Compared to the average price of a new lignite power station that produces a kilowatt hour for 6.3 cents, it seems absolutely logical to build more and more wind and solar systems.