Something we've been saying for so long I start to bore myself.
It's time to name (can't shame, they have no shame) the enablers of the massive long con China is running.
From the financiers backing Chinese coal to the lobbyists to the useful idiots to the UNocrats and the International Emissions Trading Association, to China's handmaidens in the American media, they are nothing but a bunch of liars and thieves enablers, apologists and grifters. Supergrifters. The time is long past when they deserve any attention at all and frankly, if I had my druthers, they would be dealt with the way the IRA dealt with Supergrasses. Not that we have any love for the IRA.
And from the hedge fund influenced Washington Free Beacon, June 24:
How a Liberal Think Tank Did China’s Bidding on Climate ChangeEverything CAP thought it knew about coal in China was wrong
In 2017, the Center for American Progress (CAP) released a report praising China's "truly impressive" shift away from coal. The report came after the liberal think tank's energy experts met with Chinese government officials to "find out what is really happening" with the communist nation's emissions trajectory. China's leaders, those experts concluded, had made the "strategic choice" to crack down on coal-fired power and "grab the clean energy bull by the horns."
Fast forward four years, and the opposite has occurred. In the months following CAP's visit to China, the country began rapidly growing its coal power capacity as government officials prioritized economic growth over "intermittent and unstable" renewable energy sources. The think tank has since acknowledged this trend, debunking its own report—and the Chinese regime's promises—in the process.
CAP often holds "staff research trips" to China to work with organizations in the country, including the China-U.S. Exchange Foundation (CUSEF), a registered foreign agent backed by the Chinese Communist Party's foreign influence arm. While the think tank says it has taken no money from CUSEF, the Chinese group paid CAP founder John Podesta nearly $900,000 to lobby Congress from 2015 to 2017 through his now-defunct public affairs firm, the Podesta Group.
Shortly after CAP released its report, Beijing repeatedly loosened its restrictions on coal projects from 2017 to 2019, sparking a mad dash to build new power plants. China's coal consumption went on to reach a record high in 2020, and the expansion isn't slowing down anytime soon. The nation is now in the process of constructing an additional 246 gigawatts of coal power—nearly six times Germany's entire coal fleet, according to a Global Energy Monitor briefing.
CAP acknowledged China's "deeply concerning" expansion of coal power in a 2021 assessment, noting that the trend contradicts "many expert opinions that China's economic growth had already decoupled from coal consumption." The think tank, however, did not cite its own experts.
CAP's 2017 report also touted China's efforts to shut down old, inefficient power plants in exchange for "next-generation clean coal," an "integral" part of the government's plan to "overdeliver" on its emissions reduction commitments. By 2020, the think tank contended, "all coal-fired units nationwide" would be "shut down" if they didn't achieve the increased emissions standards.
That, too, did not come to fruition. Beijing has made numerous exceptions to the policy, even going as far as reopening shuttered coal plants to deal with heating shortages. CAP conceded in May that "incremental gains in coal plant efficiency are not enough to significantly change China's emissions trajectory"—a direct contradiction of its 2017 report.
Heritage senior policy analyst Katie Tubb said China has not been "forthright or honest" when releasing emissions data and questioned the notion that the Chinese government's climate rhetoric should be trusted.
"China has every political incentive to tell one story and to do otherwise," Tubb said. "We've seen evidence of that over and over again, and not just on the climate issue."
CAP did not return a request for comment....
....MORE
I don't care if they are Republican or Democrat, if you see a pig at the climate change trough, they have to be called out.
Related:
China Does Not Plan To Stop Burning Coal
"Report: China emissions exceed all developed nations combined"
"China has ‘no other choice’ but to rely on coal power for now, official says"
China's Electricity Derived From Thermal (coal, oil, etc) Up 21.1% Q1 2021 vs. Q1 2020
One of our sources said the growth in thermal plant capacity* (not production) in 2020 was 38.4 gigawatts. This is the equivalent of adding a large (1,000 megawatt) coal plant every nine days. Every nine days.
Continuing that trend, coal plant capacity additions just in the first quarter of 2021 were 10,600 megawatts....
See also March 18's "China Energy Stats and Policy"
"China's new coal power plant capacity in 2020 more than three times rest of world's"
"China generated 53% of the world’s total coal-fired power in 2020"
Follow-up: Just How Much Coal Fired Power Is China Currently Planning/Building?"
And many, many more. Just call us your little ray of institutional memory sunshine on this stuff.
