[On the Inuit and fossil fuels]

The front yard of the average Inuit home will contain several snowmobiles, some of them working, some of them being repaired, some in a state of despair. There will also be a few quad bikes, and, if the resident works for the government or one of the town’s big companies, they will have a late model truck or SUV parked in the driveway. Mounted on a wooden stand next to their modest bungalow will be a steel tank containing diesel that slowly drips into their furnace and keeps them warm.

...My view of them has changed from innocent victims of southern development who are waiting for the south to help them to being our partners in creating this whole mess, and hopefully our partners in solving it.

This realisation came to me at a house party in Tuktoyaktuk when a young man who loved hunting and life on the land said without reservation that Arctic oil and gas exploration was a great thing for him and his people. It meant jobs, more money and training opportunities. And in the south we’re wringing our hands over how oil exploration will ruin their pristine and romantic lives on the land.
...they want the comforts of fossil fuel and modern convenience too, even as they see its negative side effects.

Cap-and-conceal

The Obama administration just blew the whistle on . . . itself: The Treasury Department has reported that Team Obama’s claims about the “nominal” costs of its cap-and-trade bill aren’t really so nominal, after all.

And Team Obama knew it all along.

It’s All CO2! It’s All AGW! « The Unbearable Nakedness of CLIMATE CHANGE

It is one of the biggest tragedies of the AGW consensus: we could have in a month a 10-year worldwide plan to physically eliminate all human emissions of soot at a relatively minor cost…look instead how many person-years are being wasted for a Copenhagen deal that everybody well knows it will be ineffectual and costly at best.

But what can we do? After all…It’s all CO2! It’s all AGW!

John Kerry: If You Enjoyed This Year’s Recession, Just Wait for Cap and Trade » The Foundry

Cap and trade will drive up energy prices so high to force people to use less energy. Consumers will drive less, fly less and companies will pump out less CO2 because people will buy less. But people still need to drive their cars and turn on their lights. All cap and trade does is force people to spend more to use less. The trade off for reduced carbon dioxide emissions is reduced economic activity.