‘Demonisation’ of oil & gas seen as misleading: Is CO2 the main culprit responsible for climate change or the sun?

Following the heatwaves that besieged the world this summer, the cause, climate change, seemed easy to determine and wheels were put into motion to intensify efforts to combat it by urging the globe to curb its emissions footprint. However, three new research papers challenge this remedy by pointing a potential finger at the changes in solar activity as the primary cause of climate change. Should we put all the blame for the climate crisis on the sun’s shoulders? Is human life really at risk by climate ideologues? Will net-zero efforts lead the world astray or will they help mitigate a climate disaster?

While many are of the opinion that there really is no one-size-fits-all approach to the energy transition challenges, they still mostly agree that a pivot to low-carbon sources of supply is the only way forward to combat the climate crisis. For some global organisations and energy players, this means that the world needs all energy sources it can get its hands on – including oil, natural gas, solar, wind, nuclear, and hydrogen – albeit with a lower carbon footprint. On the other hand, opponents of fossil fuels claim that renewables are the future and the only solution to the climate crisis.

Even though the worldwide energy price shocks, galvanised into action by the Ukraine crisis, prompted global governments’ dash for more gas and oil last year, the energy transition to low-carbon and renewable sources did not stop, as the outcries to ban new oil and gas projects from being developed are gaining ground along with calls to phase out fossil fuels altogether. This is illustrated by Tuvalu becoming the second nation-state to call for the development of a Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty in 2022 after it backed Vanuatu, which issued the same call a few months before.

In line with this, António Guterres, UN Secretary-General, recently said that transitioning to renewable energy was the key to securing humanity’s survival, as “without renewables, there can be no future.” The UN explains that renewable technologies such as wind and solar power are for the most part cheaper than fossil fuels, which it believes are the driving force behind climate change. As a result, the UN underscores that the world needs to prioritise the transformation to renewable energy and lists five ways to power this transition.

The first spot is reserved for the shifting of energy subsidies from fossil fuels to renewable energy, as fossil fuel subsidies are perceived to be “one of the biggest financial barriers hampering the world’s shift to renewable energy,” says the UN. This is in line with the UN Secretary-General’s calls for an end to all international public and private funding of fossil fuels, which he sees as one of the major contributors to global warming, calling any new investments in them “delusional.”

According to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), $5.9 trillion was spent on subsidising the fossil fuel industry in 2020 alone, covering subsidies, tax breaks, and health and environmental damages that were not priced into the initial cost of fossil fuels, which is roughly $11 billion a day. The UN is under the impression that shifting subsidies from fossil fuels to renewable energy will lead to a reduction in their use and contribute to sustainable economic growth.

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“All actors must come together to accelerate a just and equitable transition from fossil fuels to renewables, as we stop oil and gas expansion and funding and licensing for new coal, oil, and gas,” urged Guterres.

The second way of powering the green transition entails tripling investments in renewables, as it is believed that an estimated $4 trillion a year needs to be invested in renewable energy until 2030 to reach net-zero emissions by 2050. The UN elaborated that the investment in renewables will cost “significantly less” compared to subsidising fossil fuels while the reduction of pollution and climate impact could save the world up to $4.2 trillion per year by 2030.

While urging “all governments to prepare energy transition plans” and encouraging “CEOs of all oil and gas companies to be part of the solution,” the UN chief emphasised that “renewables are the only path to real energy security, stable power prices and sustainable employment opportunities.”

The third way to accelerate the transition process is to make renewable energy technology a global public good, which means it needs to be available to all and not just to the wealthy. To this end, efforts need to be undertaken to dismantle roadblocks to knowledge-sharing and the transfer of technology.

The UN highlights that technologies such as battery storage systems allow energy from renewables to be stored and released when people, communities, and businesses need power. When paired with renewable generators, battery storage technologies can provide electricity to isolated grids and off-grid communities in remote locations. To illustrate this point, the UN mentions India, Tanzania, and Vanuatu.

The fourth spot on the UN’s list of ways designed to power the energy transition to renewables is taken by the requirement to improve global access to renewable energy components and raw materials, as a robust supply of these is perceived to be “a game changer.” This encompasses the minerals required for building wind turbines, electricity networks and elements for producing electric vehicles.

The last place on this list is saved for levelling the playing field for renewable energy technologies not only through global cooperation and coordination but also by reforming domestic policy frameworks to streamline and fast-track renewable energy projects and catalyse private sector investments.

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The UN outlined: “Technology, capacity, and funds for renewable energy transition exist, but policies and processes must be introduced to reduce market risks to both enable and incentivise investment, while simultaneously preventing bottlenecks and red tape.

“Nationally determined contributions, or countries’ individual action plans to cut emissions and adapt to climate impacts, must set renewable energy targets that align with the goal of limiting the increase in global temperatures to 1.5°C (2.7°F) above pre-industrial levels. To achieve this, it is estimated that the share of renewables in global electricity generation must grow from 29 per cent today to 60 per cent by 2030.”

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While Guterres declared we are in an era of “global boiling,” CLINTEL issued “The Frozen Views of Climate of the IPCC“ in May 2023, which is its assessment of the latest reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Friends of Science Society claims that this shows there is no climate emergency and media and officials like Guterres have been “misleading the public” with statements like “Code red for humanity” when this is not what the IPCC Working Group I Physical Sciences report says.

There are climate scientists who do not believe that we need to extinguish fossil fuels as soon as possible. This seems like a difficult pill to swallow for some but Friends of Science Society – an independent group of earth, atmospheric and solar scientists, engineers, and citizens offering climate science insights – makes a reference to three new research papers, which show that the recent heatwaves are likely “predominantly naturally caused.”

Due to this research, Friends of Science Society underscores that “the net-zero targets and persistent demonisation of oil, natural gas and coal are misdirected, and large amounts of public funds are being wasted.” The group based its views on three research papers published this year. The first one is from Connolley et al (2023) and assesses Northern Hemisphere surface temperature trends since 1850, finding that it is not clear whether warming is human-caused, natural or a bit of both. 

The second one is Soon et al (2023) which examines the Northern Hemispheric land component of global surface temperatures since this is deemed to be the most data-rich component, finding that the urban heat island effect creates a significant bias effect in temperature measurements. 

While discussing the main Earth/Sun orbital changes, which “operate on very long time scales,” the paper points out: “In recent years, several researchers have noted that these long-term changes also lead to subtle regional shifts in seasonality on multidecadal to centennial timescales that are not insignificant and that these shifts are also influenced by the Earth/Moon orbit.

“Others suggest that much of the multidecadal temperature variability can indeed be explained in terms of natural ‘internal climate variability’ that current climate models do not appear to capture fully. This could comprise changes in oceanic and/or atmospheric circulations, cloud cover, or, more broadly, the net planetary albedo. Therefore, we also encourage more active investigation in the future into the possibilities of natural climate drivers other than TSI and volcanic forcings.”

The third research paper is Katata et al (2023), which finds that urbanisation bias could account for approximately 20 per cent of long-term warming and concludes that “users of both unhomogenised and homogenised temperature records should be very cautious about the problems of non-climatic biases.”

Based on this paper, multiple studies over the years warned that “at least some of the apparent long-term ‘warming’ in both global and/or regional temperature estimates could be an artefact of urbanisation bias. However, other studies have disputed this claim and argued urbanisation bias is a relatively minor issue.

“The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change chose the latter side of this dispute for its most recent Sixth Assessment Report (AR6) and argued that it is ‘unlikely’ that urbanisation bias accounts for more than 10 per cent of global LSAT trends (IPCC 2021), although conceding the problem might be larger for some regions, for example, eastern China. However, several studies disagree with this optimistic assessment.”

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With this research at the forefront, Friends of Science Society is calling upon people to “break free from climate tyranny” and follow “evidence over ideology.” The group’s recent video discusses the value of the scientific method as a means of finding useful knowledge.

As Greta Thunberg warms up the climate community for the march on 15 September 2023 to “End Fossil Fuels Now,” Friends of Science Society claims that abruptly phasing out fossil fuels at this point would cause the deaths of millions of people. Thunberg is holding up a sign with a statement from Guterres about “dangerous radicals,” referring to countries increasing fossil fuel production, which the UN chielf perceived to be “moral and economic madness.”

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Friends of Science Society states that this is not what the BRICS nations think and uses Prof. Samuel Furfari’s writing in Factuel to get its point across. In “The BRICS and CO₂ are reshuffling the geopolitical deck,” Furfari notes: “With 46 per cent of world consumption, the BRICS+ are major consumers of energy: 35 per cent of world oil, 36 per cent of natural gas and 72 per cent of coal. They hold 42 per cent of oil reserves, 50 per cent of gas reserves and even 40 per cent of coal reserves.

“Their energy future is therefore assured, which is clearly not the case for the EU, which finds itself isolated in this area because its privileged ally – the United States – also has its energy future assured, thanks to oil and to shale gas.”

Climate activists, demanding an end to fossil fuels, will dismiss energy security arguments in favour of burning more fossil fuels, especially any coming from the BRICS nations, due to this organisation being made of countries which control the biggest chunk of fossil fuels. However, this comes at the time when Patrick Brown, a climate scientist, reveals he distorted his research just to get published.

Brown revealed in an essay in The Free Press from 5 September 2023, that in order to get published in Nature, he distorted the facts about wildfire: “To put it bluntly, climate science has become less about understanding the complexities of the world and more about serving as a kind of Cassandra, urgently warning the public about the dangers of climate change. However understandable this instinct may be, it distorts a great deal of climate science research, misinforms the public, and most importantly, makes practical solutions more difficult to achieve.”

The complexities of the conundrum, which pits climate change actions and further fossil fuel developments against each other, are visible in Canada within a spat that has broken out between the Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment (CAPE) – funded for $492,000 by the McConnell Foundation for a climate campaign – and Indigenous entrepreneurs over the development of liquified natural gas (LNG).

While Friends of Science Society believes a piece in The Hill Times from 28 August 2023 has CAPE members attacking pro-LNG Indigenous groups as “unwitting” proxies for the fossil fuels industry, Melissa Mbarki, policy analyst with the Macdonald Laurier Institute writes in National Post on 2 September 2023 that “Trudeau’s net-zero policy violates UNDRIP, poverty reduction strategy; indigenous communities are developing energy to address their well-being, they should be heard.”

Back in June 2023, the Canadian government’s Justice Department issued its UNDRIP Action Plan which calls for a large-scale rewriting of all Canadian law to align with UNDRIP. However, Mbarki points out that Canada’s commitment to net-zero targets conflicts with its UNDRIP obligations and promises to enhance the lives of Indigenous people and have them lead economic activities like resource development. In light of this, Friends of Science Society says that net-zero is a “holy grail.“

Another plot twist for Canada comes with China’s accusations of “serious human rights violations against the Indigenous people.” This is seen as retaliation in response to an independent legal analysis released earlier this year by the Montreal-based Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights and a Washington-based think-tank due to a number of Canadian human rights experts contributing to the report, which concluded that China was committing an ongoing genocide against its Muslim minority population in Xinjiang.

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Regardless of these circumstances, Friends of Science Society notes that all these issues will be heightened this September, not only due to climate conferences and marches but also because the UN Special Rapporteur on Indigenous Human Rights is set to release a report about Canada at the UN Human Rights Council. The group believes that the outcome of the report may have a “significant” geopolitical impact on Canada, “turning it from a wannabe climate leader to a global pariah.”

After analysing these events, Friends of Science Society is adamant that the climate crisis platform is “rapidly collapsing.” Following – what it deems to be – “a thorough review” of a broad spectrum of literature on climate change, the group has concluded that the sun is the main driver of climate change, not carbon dioxide.

To justify its views, Friends of Science Society claims that CO2 is essential to life, as is the primary food necessary for plants to grow. The group outlines that CO2 has been “vilified as a pollutant because it is one of the results of burning anything that contains carbon which includes hydrocarbons, biofuels, wood and all other organic matter. Burning carbon-based material requires oxygen and results in CO2 and H2O. CO2 is no more a pollutant than water.”

“The surface temperature record is contaminated by the effects of urban development. Black soot aerosols have contributed to a portion of the recent warming. Two solar irradiance proxy reconstructions are shown. Note the low solar activity periods occurring during the Maunder Minimum (1645–1715, the Little Ice Age) and during the Dalton Minimum (1795–1825),” said Friends of Science Society.

Based on the group’s research, the graph shows a correlation between the solar irradiance and the Northern Hemisphere temperatures since 1600 with the temperatures to 1850 derived from proxy records. The temperature curve is from the surface temperature record from 1850 to 1980, and from the satellite lower troposphere record from 1980.

Friends of Science Society acknowledges that CO2 concentration in the atmosphere increased over the past 100 years primarily due to the increased use of fossil fuels. On the other hand, inferring that the increase in CO2 concentration caused the earth’s warming is “incorrect,” says the group while adding that “the Vostok Antarctica ice core measurements have demonstrated that temperature changes precede CO2 concentration changes by about 800 years.”

In addition, Friends of Science Society underscored: “No scientific proof that man-made CO2 causes significant global warming has been found by the IPCC even though they do their best to look for it. It is important to note that the IPCC was not created to evaluate the cause of climate change but to document that it is man-made.”

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While the theory about the sun being primarily at fault for global warming, if universally accepted, may extend the life of fossil fuels, the current energy trends show that oil and gas are still very much in play with natural gas at the heart of the ongoing whirlwind of activity in the energy sector, due to it being seen as the ideal candidate to bridge the supply gap in the transition from fossil fuels to renewables during the journey to net-zero.