Fanaticism Of The Apocalypse
As Europeans burn garbage to stay warm, climate activists step up the war on natural gas
"Some men just want to watch the world burn.”
— Alfred Pennyworth
In Europe, they’re burning garbage to stay warm. “It’s so bad this season that you can smell trash burning every day, which is completely new,” said the 35-year-old mother of three from Jablonna, Poland, near Warsaw. “Rarely can you smell a regular fuel. It’s scary to think what happens when it really gets cold.” The Polish government suspended quality regulations on coal burning for those who can still afford it; 60% of households no longer can. Because of all the garbage burning, the government may soon hand out masks so its residents don’t inhale toxic fumes. Said one of Poland’s most powerful politicians last month, “one needs to burn almost everything, except for tires and similarly harmful things.” The government estimates that 40,000 people died annually from premature deaths from air pollution before the current crisis.
Forests are being hammered. In Estonia and Finland, forests that had been set aside to capture carbon dioxide to reduce climate change are now being so heavily logged that they are net emitters. Hungary lifted conservation regulations so old-growth forests could be logged; it then banned the export of wood pellets. “People buy wood pellets thinking they’re the sustainable choice, but in reality, they’re driving the destruction of Europe’s last wild forests,” said one conservationist. Wood pellets prices have doubled even in nuclear-heavy France which, under pressure from Germany, and in the grip of renewable energy mania, had been shutting down its nuclear plants so rapidly that it had stopped properly maintaining them. Romania has been forced to cap the price of firewood, which had skyrocketed. Burning wood releases more greenhouse gas emissions than burning coal, something most experts finally acknowledge.
And Europe is returning to coal as quickly as it can. This year it increased thermal coal imports more than any other region. Coal imports increased by 36% more during the first eight months of 2022 than of 2021. Europe’s coal imports are today 10% of the global total. Germany’s imports of coal from South Africa increased eight-fold this year, which is ironic because, just one year ago, Germany gave South Africa $810 million in exchange for an agreement that South Africa not use coal. And at the United Nations climate change talks in Scotland less one year ago this month, the UN created a special CGI dinosaur to warn all nations, but particularly Africans, that they must not use fossil fuels, and instead do what Europe was doing and, supposedly, transitioning away from fossil fuels to renewables.
In response to this unfolding ecological horror show, Greta Thunberg, Greenpeace, WWF, Extinction Rebellion, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (AOC), Sierra Club, and the Natural Resources Defense Council have mobilized millions of people to take to the streets across the Western world to demand the building, continued operation, and re-start of shuttered nuclear plants; the expedited building of liquefied natural gas (LNG) import and export terminals in Europe and North America; and expanded natural gas production in North America; and the beginning of fracking in Europe. “The energy crisis and the climate crisis have the same solution!” shouted Thunberg to a cheering audience in Germany, many of whom had glued themselves to a nuclear plant at risk of premature closure. “We need to immediately expand the use of nuclear power and natural gas to prevent the burning of garbage, wood, and coal!” In response, Germany and Belgium announced the continued operation of nuclear plants and the re-starting of closed ones, and President Joe Biden and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced the expedited production of natural gas and LNG.
I’m kidding, of course. No, what climate activists have actually done is the exact opposite.