Face it: Global warming just myth

In a letter to the Herald on Feb. 23, Tracy Wax of Environment Illinois claims that "clean energy will recharge the economy" while providing "100 percent clean energy" and "bring America one important step closer to solving global warming." Unfortunately she is wrong on all counts. The so-called clean energy industry in the United States only exists because of taxpayer subsidies via tax credits and mandatory purchase requirements by conventional power companies. Without those two items the industry would not be viable since unit production costs, when all costs are included, are not competitive. If subsidized jobs in unprofitable businesses can "recharge" the economy why don't we all just go to work for the government where all jobs are taxpayer subsidized?

As for "100 percent clean energy" that is an impossible pipe dream unless by "clean" she means nuclear. If she is talking about wind then I refer her to two European studies that put the "100 percent clean energy" lie to rest. In Germany, a study by the grid operator Eon. Netz titled "Wind Power 2005" stated that when Germany's wind power goal of 25 percent is reached, 96 percent of that 25 percent would have to be backed up by conventional power, namely gas and coal. So according to Eon. Netz you don't get 100 percent clean power, you get 4 percent clean power with wind. This has been further confirmed by Germany's plan to build 26 more coal-fired plants despite their huge buildup of wind power.

In Great Britain, the Royal Academy of Engineers did a similar study and came up with "at least 90 percent" conventional backup. Both reports highlight the highly unpredictable and unreliable nature of wind power. Wind speeds less than 10 mph produce zero electricity and wind speeds less than 25 mph very little, and therefore grids must have gas/coal online at all times to provide consistent real-time backup power for the grid.

As for combating global warming one might ask "What global warming?" According to satellite measurements temperatures in 2008 were colder than 1980 and 1981. So despite hundreds of millions more cars on the road and thousands of more coal power plants being used than in 1980, the temperature is colder. Last winter China recorded its coldest winter in at least 50 years. Here in Chicago, this winter is 5 degrees below normal and the 10th coldest in 128 years. Ironically on Oct. 28 Great Britain's Parliament passed a law mandating reduced CO2 to combat global warming during the first snowstorm to hit London since 1934.

Finally, in December the U.S. Senate Environment Committee issued a 233-page report by 650 international scientists disputing the CO2 warming hypothesis. The argument that placing plant food (CO2) into the atmosphere causes dangerous global warming is scientifically unsupportable and the world will be better off when we admit it.

Bill Zettler

Mundelein