Robert Bryce of Austin, Texas, as he himself will tell you, is a reformed Leftie/greenie. The solar array he installed on his roof was a bust, and he followed the logic of energy density to conclude that wind, solar, water, crops, plants, and wood would not allow energy to be mankind’s master resource.

And as did Julian Simon in his day, Bryce looks at the data and science before he makes up his mind. And like Simon, he changed his mind away from neo-Malthusian notions of resource depletion and climate pessimism.

Energy Views

Bryce’s views took shape on the oil/transportation side with Gusher of Lies: The Dangerous Delusions of “Energy Independence” (2008) and on electricity with Power Hungry: The Myths of ‘Green’ Energy and the Real Fuels of the Future (2010).…

“Wind turbines are manufactured out of oil and gas, transported using oil and gas, are extremely intensive on landscapes (the cement plugs are mammoth and often require cement factories to be built nearby in order to accommodate chains of turbines in construction), are well known to cause harm to human health when sited too near (some expert physicians suggest 10 mile setbacks), and the international bird and bat kills annually are respectively estimated at eight million and sixteen million.”

Dear Honourable Premier Alward, and Honourable Minister of Energy, Mr. Leonard

Congratulations on the release of the New Brunswick Energy Blueprint.

There are many encouraging features to this thoughtful document, and it is easy to see that a generally balanced, sensible and sensitive approach has been achieved, after consulting many experts.…

[Ed. note: This is Bradley’s final statement to: “This house believes that subsidising renewable energy is a good way to wean the world off fossil fuels.” After nine days and thousands of votes cast from around the world, the opposition is polling very close.]

“A reliable and affordable supply of energy is absolutely critical to maintaining and expanding economic prosperity where such prosperity already exists and to creating it where it does not.” – John Holdren (2000)

“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 (2011)

Energy density (think energy efficiency) is the most important concept for the House Proposition.…

“… the total is 0.00476°C (0.0086°F) of global warming avoided by the California cap-and-trade program for reducing greenhouse gas emissions out to the year 2050. Such numbers strain the limits of detectability within our current observing systems, not to mention environmental significance.”

With the California Air Resource Board’s (CARB) recent announcement that they have finalized their greenhouse gas cap and trade regulations, California becomes the first state to have, according to the CARB’s chairperson Mary Nichols, “done something important” on the issue of climate change.

Ms. Nichols couldn’t be further from the truth. While CARB may have done “something important” for many things in California (not all of which may prove positive), climate change isn’t one of them.

If the emissions targets under the CARB cap and trade program as it is scheduled to the year 2020 are met, the total amount of global temperature rise that would be avoided amounts to 0.00015°C (or for those who prefer English units, 0.00027°F).…