Katy Grimes: An auction tax is one of the proposed methods for allocating permits to California businesses and public agencies which are subject to the AB 32 cap and trade program under preparation by the California Air Resources Board.

AB 32 states that by the year 2020, the level of emissions of greenhouse gases in California must be reduced to the emissions levels in 1990.

CARB plans to hold auctions between cap and trade participants to determine the price of the permits for “pollution credits.”  Businesses will have to purchase permits equal to every ton of greenhouse gas emissions they generate.

In practice, these auction costs on businesses and agencies will function much like a direct tax, because in order to operate, they will be required to purchase these permits.

The first of these auctions will take place in only two days, on Aug. 30. However, this is just a dry run auction, with no money actually exchanging hands. The participants in the cap and trade auction are by invitation only.

Conditioning the media

The CARB held a webinar this morning for credentialed media “to familiarize them with the mechanics and purpose of the cap-and-trade practice auction.”

It was a fancy sounding process to familiarize journalists with internal CARB processes and procedures.

However, the more likely intent of the webinar was for CARB bureaucrats to appear as if they were being totally transparent as they embark on the first cap and trade carbon emissions auction… as if no one in the media will really notice that CARB is about to impose hefty taxes and 69 new regulations on California businesses, just for existing.

And CARB is going to do this through a new corporation, Western Climate Initiative, Inc., which incorporated in Delaware to undoubtedly avoid scrutiny under California’s open meeting laws.

Many energy experts say that cap and trade is an unacceptable method of reducing emissions. “CARB has never answered the fundamental question of why their economic analysis is so out of line with everybody else’s on the question of cap and trade impacts, nor even the impact of dramatic lower future energy prices, nor changes on fuel mix driven by simple economics,” Tom Tanton, wrote in May.

Tanton, an energy expert, is also a former principal policy advisor with the California Energy Commission, and has conducted extensive research regarding alternate fuels.

Tanton has been critical that alternative techniques for capturing energy efficiency improvements were never fully considered by CARB, and has repeatedly asked why CARB decided on regulations and mandates, rather than proposing to print a consumer catalog, and instead “rely on free market and rational behavior on the part of consumers to save themselves cash, and also saving the State the cost of enforcement.”

Actual impacts on California’s economy

Since the webinar produced nothing useful, I decided to review the many news stories I have written about CARB, and the impacts of implementing AB 32.

From a 2010 story, I wrote: “Tanton offers a few examples of what individual companies and public agencies would have to pay under a cap-and-trade program using 100 percent auctions at a price of $60 per ton:

* A California winery would pay $2.6 million a year for these AB 32 Auction Taxes or more than $26 million over ten years.

* The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power would pay $246 million a year for its electricity generation facilities in California alone.

* UCLA would pay nearly $11 million a year in AB 32 auction taxes.

Tanton explained the impact of the economic impact of AB 32 includes, but is not limited to:

An annual effective cost increase to the typical family of four to be $818 the first year growing to $2800 in 2020, if market clearing prices for permits are $60 dollars per ton. Those figures are $270 and $930 if permit prices are at $20, and as much as $2,720 to over $9,330 per family if prices clear at $200 per ton.

Annual job losses to the California Economy of 76,000 to 107,000 the first year, growing to perhaps 485,000 jobs in 2020, assuming a market clearing price of $60 per ton. These are net jobs losses, accounting for lost jobs and for jobs created by redirecting revenues collected from the auctions.

Procedure over reality

Keeping the media mired in procedure rather than focusing on the impacts of AB 32 implementation, is just a deflection from the fact that AB 32 will cost California residents and businesses a great deal of money, with negligible overall impact on the reduction of greenhouse gasses.

Lawmakers talk incessantly about the need for job creation and job retention in California–but that’s all it is.

This is what’s known as a scam.

By KATY GRIMES

A visit to California from Lord Christopher Monckton, 3rd Viscount Monckton of Brenchley, promised to be full of his telltale wit, knowledge and controversy, as well as plenty of science. Lord Monckton did not disappoint.

As California is on the verge of its first cap-and-trade carbon auction, Assemblywoman Shannon Grove, R-Bakersfield, invited Lord Monckton to address the Legislature, and arranged for him to make several presentations throughout California over the next few days.

Grove sent out invitations to each of the 120 state legislators, but only a handful of Republicans accepted to participate in the hearing. And only one Democrat attended the hearing — Sen. Rod Wright, D-Inglewood.

Monckton’s message is important as well as scientific: Most climate change science is bogus, and California can and should stop the quest for ending climate change on our own before the state’s economy is completely destroyed.  Monckton has consulted many governments around the world about climate change.

Mockton, together with Tom Tanton, a renewable energy expert and special consultant to the energy and technology industries, testified to a packed room in a special legislative hearing Wednesday on climate change and carbon trade. Tanton and Monckton gave an even more detailed presentation at an event later that evening.

New California Tax Scheme

I’ve had to sit through several years of legislative hearings lacking in science, facts and detail about the sources of climate change. After that, Monckton’s presentation about how the global warming hysteria began, how the data and science was altered and why they hysteria continues was fascinating and refreshing.

As California prepares for its first cap-and trade-auction in August, taxpayers and utility customers should all be concerned and not worry about being called “deniers.”

As I wrote in California Remedy For Eco-Guilt about AB 32’s implementation and upcoming cap-and-trade auctions, “Instead of providing affirmative plans to accomplish this feat, and answers to legislators’ questions, it became abundantly clear that no one in the state has a handle on the implementation of AB 32, the Global Warming Solution Act of 2006, or the potential repercussions from the vast law.”

Most notably, Tanton and Monckton warned taxpayers that, because Gov. Jerry Brown decided to monetize CO2 carbon emissions, and plans to tax utility customers, business owners and taxpayers for the emissions, the state stands to take in an extra $1 billion in revenues.

The new revenue stream is not new money coming into the state, but an additional $1 billion from the same old sources — businesses, manufacturers, utility customers, homeowners, property owners, automobile owners and taxpayers.

Overall, if California continues down the road of selling and trading carbon emission credits, it will cost the state $450 billion by 2020. Monckton found that even with $450 billion spent, the impact to curb total global emissions will be closde to nil — just 0.4 percent will have been abated.

Just the Science, Please

Monkton went through an elaborate presentation and showed the data, charts and graphs originally used by the United Nation International Panel on Climate Change, when it concluded that man-made global warming must be stopped. But Monckton found that the original science and data had been altered in order to further the agenda, and force the West to comply with the international rules. Monckton also showed the altered data, and the changes were staggering and obvious.

Tanton said that California is already the third best state in the United States in the carbon intensity of our economy. The United States is four times better than China, and better than the average of all other countries.

Even with this information, Tanton warned that cap-and-trade is going to come at a very high cost to Californians. Families will be forced to pay thousands of dollars more out of their budgets each year, and the state will lose more than 100,000 more jobs in 2012 — on top of the 650,000 manufacturing jobs lost since AB 32 was made law.

By 2020, California stands to lose more than 1 million more jobs, just because of the state’s climate change laws.

“This state grew because of manufacturing,” said Sen. Wright. “If we want a policy of no manufacturing, the we should tell the rest of the manufacturers, instead of bleeding them dry — tell them ‘you should get out.’”

A 2011 Rasmussen poll found that 69 per cent of 1,000 respondents believed it at least “somewhat likely” that climate scientists had falsified their research data to support the case for catastrophic human-caused global warming. Forty per cent of respondents said falsification of research data was “very likely.” Only 22 percent  responded that they were sure that climate scientists had not falsified data.

California Over-Regulation

California already suffers from over-regulation. Monckton and Tanton addressed California’s 40-year ban on most offshore drilling, despite the 15 billion barrels of oil available. Their concern, besides the decisions made on faulty and fraudulent science, is that California already suffers from record unemployment, high taxes and a $6 billion deficit, and is facing a potential unfunded pension meltdown.

According to Monckton and Tanton, adding more taxes onto the backs of business owners and utility customers will only cause the wealthy and more employers to flee California.

“Rich Californians are fleeing the state, taking their jobs with them,” said Monckton. “Intel says it will never build another plant here; Globalstar, Trizetto, and eEye fled in just one month; Boeing, Toyota, Apple, Facebook, and DirecTV have all fled,” said Monckton, referring to expansions by those companies, al though some of their headquarters remain here. “The wagons are heading east.”

Also Read: Democrats in the Legislature Chicken Out of Climate Debate With Lord Monckton

By JOHN SEILER

Californian’s school children might be performing 49th of 50 states on standardized tests. And they might graduate at only a 44 percent rate, as in Los Angeles.

But they’re going to get the best environmental indoctrination in the country.

This year, California began “implementing the State’s first-in-the-nation environmental curriculum,” as described by a California Environmental Protection Agency press release. It explained how Cal-EPA, not the California Department of Education or local school boards, was put in charge of developing environmental education in all public schools in California:

The California Environmental Protection Agency is responsible for the implementation of EEI [Environmental Education Initiative] pursuant to AB 1548 [in 2003] and AB 1721 [in 2005].  These landmark laws mandate the development of a unified education strategy to bring education about the environment into California’s primary and secondary schools. The 2003 law was sponsored by Heal the Bay, a non-profit environmental organization in Southern California, which has been an active partner in the EEI curriculum’s development.  Other current key partners include the California Department of Education, the State Board of Education and the California Natural Resources Agency.

So Heal the Bay sponsored legislation from which it now benefits. That’s an increasingly common occurrence in California and one which has made worse the state’s endemic budget problems.

The press release noted that Cal-EPA’s environmental curriculum first is being implemented in the Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District. It quoted actor-environmental activist Ed Begley Jr., who joined Cal-EPA, schools and other officials at a kick-off event for the curriculum:

As air quality, dependence on foreign oil and safe drinking water become issues of great importance in our lives, it’s essential that our students have some level of environmental literacy so they can have a chance of dealing  with them. The EEI Curriculum provides the tools to tackle those weighty matters. We need it now, more than ever.

At the same event, new Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson said:

With this innovative curriculum, California is leading in the greening of the future. We are also giving our students a head start in the new green jobs of tomorrow.

The statements show that the curriculum is not intended to teach students about the environment and science, but as indoctrination into environmentalism. It’s the pedagogical counterpart to AB 32, the Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006, and other environmental legislation.

Scientific method and falsification

One of mankind’s highest achievements is scientific method. Developed over the last millennium, it replaced guessing and superstition in science. Scientific method is crucial to any true scientific curriculum. Failing to include a proper scientific method in any science education, especially such a politicized field as environmental education, is a return to superstition.

Wikipedia explains:

A scientific theory hinges on empirical findings, and remains subject to falsification if new evidence is presented. That is, no theory is ever considered certain. Theories very rarely result in vast changes in human understanding.

“Falsification” is a key component. It means:

Falsifiability or refutability is the logical possibility that an assertion could be shown false by a particular observation or physical experiment. That something is “falsifiable” does not mean it is false; rather, it means that if the statement were false, then its falsehood could be demonstrated.

The claim “No human lives forever” is not falsifiable since it does not seem possible to prove wrong. In theory, one would have to observe a human living forever to falsify that claim. On the other hand, “All humans live forever” is falsifiable since the presentation of just one dead human could prove the statement wrong

Curriculum of Indoctrination

Cal-EPA’s new curriculum has been placed online. The Earth Science curriculum is here. In it, I found nothing about falsifiability. That is, I found nothing that said something like, If earth’s temperatures don’t increase to X degrees by the year 2020, then the theory of global warming is wrong.

Instead, the curriculum is pure indoctrination in environmental extremists’ alarmism about global warming and man-caused “climate change.”

Some examples from the Earth Sciences curriculum, “The Greenhouse Effect on Natural Systems,” Final Student Edition:

The global temperature has risen almost 2 degrees F (1.1 degrees C) in the last century. And the rate of warming is increasing.

Observing Climate Change in California

Changes in California’s own climate are in line with the warming trend in many other places. Our winter and spring temperatures have risen steadily in the last 50 years. [p.3]

Effects of Climate Change in California

…. If climate change continues, California could experience severe drought. Many fruit and nut trees would not produce good crops if they were exposed to extreme heat. [p. 4]

Page 5 shows a picture of trees burning brightly yellow and red. The words:

Earth’s warming trend could spark intense firestorms from the underbrush, destroying property and habitat. These fires also could cause the disappearance of plant and animal species in ecosystems already affected by human activity.

Overall, the curriculum depicts humans, especially Californians, as a blight upon the planet.

No footnotes are provided to any of the above statements. No “falsification” criteria are established. Opposing theories are not offered. Global-warming skeptics are not referenced. Nothing is provided so that students could Google the information and check things out for themselves.

One Point of View

“Any kind of new curriculum, including that on the environment, needs to include a balanced view representing all points,” Lance Izumi told me; he’s Koret Senior Fellow in Education Studies at the Pacific Research Institute, CalWatchDog.com’s parent institute. He added:

It should include all research, not just one point of view. Most green curricula emphasizes only one point of view. Think how this affects the school day. Many students, although not proficient in English and math, are taking this curriculum. Does it make sense to shoehorn an ideological agenda into the school day?

Unfortunately, when talking about environmental issues, environmental bureaucrats are not into including various points of view. But unless other points of view are included, it will be a detriment to our children, not a benefit.

Tom Tanton is president of T² & Associates and former principal advisor to the California Energy Commission. When I showed him the new environmental curriculum, he told me:

The lack of real science in the global warming curriculum is a travesty to kids everywhere because it reinforces a faux fatalism and fear mongering, and reduces individuals’ commitment to progress and optimism. Perhaps the worst parts are that the very essence of science is diminished by reliance on “consensus,” rather than disprovable hypothesis, and constant ad-hominen attacks on anybody who provides analyses that disprove the “accepted” hypothesis.

Science is not a popularity contest. Students need critical thinking skills to excel in science. Dispassionate evaluation of alternative theories should be encouraged, not prohibited. Students should learn that science is a living evolving thing, central to tripling of life spans and eliminating hunger and disease. They should not be taught that their contributions to science will place them in company of mankind’s enemies.

Stonewalled by Cal-EPA

For the month that I researched this article, I repeatedly called Cal-EPA’s press office. No one ever called me back, even though I pointed out that I worked for the Pacific Research Institute, the premier think tank on California policy.

However, someone in the Cal-EPA’s press office named Dominique — I never could get her full name — did make some comments in the course of taking my name down several times. She never said her comments were off the record, so I’m including them here. Apparently a low-level staffer, Dominique told me, “Obviously we are uninterested in what naysayers would say contrary to our method.”

Global-Warming Naysayers

It’s not the purpose of this investigation to go into the pros and cons of global warming.  However, the Climategate scandal broke in the fall of 2009.

As Andrew Bolt summarized the leaked emails in Climategate:

So the 1079 emails and 72 documents seem indeed evidence of a scandal involving most of the most prominent scientists pushing the man-made warming theory — a scandal that is one of the greatest in modern science. I’ve been adding some of the most astonishing in updates below — emails suggesting conspiracy, collusion in exaggerating warming data, possibly illegal destruction of embarrassing information, organised resistance to disclosure, manipulation of data, private admissions of flaws in their public claims and much more.

Except for the possible illegalities of the climategate scientists — there was no illegality by Cal-EPA in devising this curriculum — the mentality is the same groupthink, the same fear of being questioned by citizens, parents and students.

California Lysenkoism

The Cal-EPA’s indoctrination resembles Lysenkoism in the old Soviet Union. According to Wikipedia:

Lysenkoism is used colloquially to describe the manipulation or distortion of the scientific process as a way to reach a predetermined conclusion as dictated by an ideological bias, often related to social or political objectives….^[1]

The word is derived from a set of political and social campaigns in science and agriculture by the director of the Soviet Lenin All-Union Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Trofim Denisovich Lysenko and his followers, which began in the late 1920s and formally ended in 1964.

With California’s budget problems only getting worse, a good place to start cutting would be the California Lysenkoism of Cal-EPA’s Education and the Environment Initiative.