Montana Public Service Commission holds Climate Review April 8, 2024, UPDATE
by Dr. Ed Berry
If you agree with me, please file a comment with the Montana Public Service Commission (PSC) no later than today, April 12, 2024, 5 pm MDT.
I ask this because virtually everyone in the PSC and everyone who testified at the hearing assumed the Petition is about the climate issues in “II. Factual Support for Petition,” whereas the Petition is really about “IV. Proposed Rule.”
Your message should be that you are “FOR” the Montana Environmental Information Center’s Petition for Adoption of New Rule and Declarations Pertaining to the Commission’s Consideration of the Adverse Climate Impacts of Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Docket 2024.03.028.
The Petition proposes the PSC adopt a New Rule to CONSIDER the “adverse climate impacts of greenhouse gas emissions.” The “Factual Support for Petition” is not part of the Petition’s rule.
Therefore, I recommend the PSC adopt the New Rule, even though I disagree with the “Factual Support for Petition,” because adoption would let the PSC control the “consideration” of “adverse climate impacts.”
This would let the PSC to do its own review of climate impacts, and a true review will show there are NO adverse climate impacts of greenhouse gas emissions.”
The Proposed Rule is a gift from heaven for the PSC. The Petition will let the PSC checkmate the Petitioners. It will let the PSC overpower the result of Held v Montana, where Montana’s traitor AG took the Plaintiffs’ side on climate.
If the PSC denies the Petition, they will empower the Plaintiffs, who I predict would file a lawsuit against the PSC for refusing to “consider” the “adverse impacts of greenhouse gas emissions.” Such a lawsuit would last years and cost the PSC a lot of money, and the PSC would lose.
Please see my explanation in my PDF below that I submitted to the PSC.
INSTRUCTIONS to submit your comment
- Go to Home (mt.gov) / Documents and Proceedings / Comment on a Proceeding.
- Continue as Guest.
- Click “+” icon / New / Public Comment
- Docket Number: 2024.03.028
- Position Select “For”
- Add comment as text less than 8000 characters.
Why I had a problem at the hearing
An hour before the hearing began, I discussed my concern with the PSC staff. They agreed I was a proponent. The person who sets the hearing agenda told me the chairperson would call me to speak right after the four who introduced their petition. I did not know that the chairperson for the hearing never got the memo.
To make matters worse for me, I could not hear anything the chairperson said because, even with hearing aids, I cannot hear very well. To me, it was like her microphone was turned off.
So, when I went to the podium to speak, I did not realize that everyone else in the room, including the chairperson, thought I should speak as an opponent later in the afternoon because everyone knows I am an opponent of the “Factual Support for the Petition.”
Here is the follow-up document I submitted to the PSC on April 10 that explains why I am a proponent.
Here is my pre-hearing written comment that I posted on April 6:
Here is the Petition:
Reading your articles and my own copy of your book Climate Miracle was a natural response to my interest in climate science. My interest in climate science was a natural response to my questioning of the policies of our politicians which damage our prosperity and way of life and do little or nothing to improve the natural world. These policies I now see as hysteria without allowing independent debate and fear mongering with of the ideas of crisis and emergency due to an unfounded predicted human induced climate Armageddon. Is it any wonder that so many suspect a hidden motive when questioning the money being made by the ‘green agenda’, the funding process for ‘science’, and the control being imposed upon people?
In my life of now over seventy years I have not witnessed catastrophic change in climate. Perhaps my short life here should be referred to as weather but nevertheless, no increased rain, heat, storms or floods. Of course with regard to temperature then that can rationally be viewed as a benefit for agriculture, human health, and natural diversity, a benefit that would be welcomed if it were true.
In the time of my interest I have never read any work so compelling as yours Mr Berry. This presentation to the MPS Commission is not too bogged down with the physics or mathematics and states the case in clear and simple language.
The following history of settlement in North America is an inspiring and relevant context for the present day predictions of doom. You attack no-one but state the science as it stands, applying common sense and sanity.
Everybody near enough lives for one 66/70 year sun cycle, we get off the sine wave at roughly the stage as we got on, this is why we do not detect any change from start to finish.
Dr. Ed
In part 2 you quote Held about their “Climate Events” and assert that they made no connection to a cause. I recommend putting “Climate Events” in quotes or further explaining that it is a meaningless term used repeatedly throughout the trial even by their experts. Smokey days are not a climate event. A rapid change in a 30 year trend that continues for 30 years could be called a climate event. The Younger Dryas was a climate event.
In the last paragraph of part 7 you state “We have proved H1 and H2 are false.”
My first reaction was “I missed that part”. You might consider rewording it to indicate clearly that this presentation proves H1 and H2 are false.
Dear Dave,
Thank you for your careful reading and suggestions. I updated this document as you suggested.
Ed
You state:
“The Held v Montana trial, which ended on June 20, 2023, will go down in history as the trial where Montana Republicans joined the Democrats to censor climate truth, support climate fiction, and indoctrinate Montana and its children in climate alarmism.”
I think all references to Politics and the 2 parties should be removed from a science-based argument.
My name is Keith Ehlert. I am an engineering geologist with advanced degrees in geology. I have published over 20 peer-reviewed scientific research papers on geology and engineering geology. Most of the papers I published are based on new discoveries I made in geology. I am informing you of this not to brag (I have gotten beyond the age of having to brag many years ago) but to verify I can perform legitimate scientific research.
I have been researching the issue of global warming (climate change to be “politically correct”) for over 17 years and I completely agree with your findings and the information you present.
I have been giving Power Point seminars on the subject of global warming for many years to various organizations such as private companies, veteran organizations (VFW, American Legion), Rotary Clubs, etc. etc. free of charge. I do not charge for my seminars. I do it to inform the public of the true aspects of the global warming issue and how it has become a non-scientific strictly political-driven issue with hidden political agendas.
My seminars include a lot of scientific information pertaining to natural causes of climate change, how the Earth’s climate has changed in the geologic past, why carbon dioxide cannot be the driver of climate change, etc. etc. My seminars have been well received and numerous questions I get after the seminar include “why haven’t the media informed the public of this?”
Additionally, many members of the audience become essentially shocked at what I have presented and at first cannot believe it but after I answer some of the numerous questions, I get from the audience they then begin to accept what I have presented.
I am telling you all this because the bottom line is I have found that if the information I present is a little too complex to the point the audience does not completely understand it, they tend not to believe it…in general they tend to not accept with they do not understand.
Based on my experience, it is my opinion the way in which you present some of the information may be a little too complex for the audience to completely understand. I have given your book to several of my non-scientist friends and after they read the book they come back with questions and ask me to explain what you mean by this or that and ask me to interpret some of the diagrams.
I highly respect you and your work and am glad you are doing what you are doing. If you do not agree with my comment, please just ignore it. Thanks for all your work.
Excellent Argument — This “Global Warming / Climate Change” Non-Existent Consensus and Phony “Political Science Hoax” must not be allowed to stand or to become legal precedence in the USA!
Remember the declaration by American Scientists: The 2015 Global Warming Petition Project (i.e., the Oregon Petition) and ‘The 2015 NIPCC (Non-Governmental IPCC) Report on Scientific Consensus: “Why Scientists Disagree About Global Warming” by esteemed scientists: Craig D. Idso, Robert M. Carter and Fred Singer which clearly supports your rebuttal presentation and the dishonesty of the UN IPCC and Montana Defendent’s unsupported claims.
The 2015 Global Warming Petition Project (i.e., the Oregon Petition) is a statement about the causes and consequences of climate change signed by 31,478 American Scientists.
Many more thousands of Scientists worldwide agree that the, specious Man-Made Climate Change (AGW) Theory tenuously-based on Greenhouse Gases (e.g., CO2 & Methane) has been determined to be Falsified and is continued to be promoted as a hoax to intimidate the public and coerce their vote and support.
“Why Scientists Disagree About Global Warming – The Non-Governmental International Panel
on Climate Change (NIPCC) Report” — Pg. 27 of this 2015 book lists the Oregon Petition statement shown below.
31,478 Highly-Qualified American Scientists (9,021 with Ph.D. degrees) Certify that the AGW Theory’s Hypothesis and Assumptions about CO2 are scientifically invalid.
Their Global Warming Petition to the United States Government Statement Reads:
“We urge the United States government to reject the global warming agreement that was written in Kyoto, Japan in December, 1997, and any other similar proposals. The proposed limits on greenhouse gases would harm the environment, hinder the advance of science and technology, and damage the health and welfare of mankind.”
There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other greenhouse gases is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth’s atmosphere and disruption of the Earth’s climate.
Moreover, there is substantial scientific evidence that increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide produce many beneficial effects upon the natural plant and animal environments of the Earth.”
Good luck tomorrow.
HANSEN DOWNPLAYS FOSSIL FUELS
A leading scientist considered to have been instrumental in sparking serious debate over global warming suggested in August 2000 that emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) from burning fossil fuels were not the main culprit in global warming, and that the world should have focused on reducing other pollutants, such as chlorofluorocarbons and nitrogen oxides (NOx) to reduce the global warming. Below: James Hansen arrested for heading a protest against pollutants.
Dr James Hansen from the National Aeronautic & Space Administration’s Centre for Climate Systems Research had argued that those other pollutants-and not CO2 from burning oil and coal-are the real culprits in global warming.
Hansen added that reducing those emissions instead of CO2 would eliminate many of the political hurdles that slow efforts to curb global warming. “We argue that global warming in recent decades has been driven mainly by non-CO2 greenhouse gases such as chlorofluorocarbons and (NOx), not by fossil fuel burning”, he said.
It seems patently absurd to spend $trillions and $trillions of dollars based solely upon a hypothesis which has no “proof” (i.e., experimental validation) and, in fact, cannot be tested experimentally. That would require the ability to alter atmospheric CO2 at will , alternating high and low levels over many years and observing any change in climate while correcting for any and all other factors which might affect climate (many of which are likely unknown at this time).
Those $trillions would be better spent on improving/saving billions of lives with adequate sanitation, clean water, medical care, education, birth control methods, housing, food, safety, etc., etc.
Eventually, the attempts to eliminate fossil fuels and replace them with so-called “green energy” (which is actually not green at all, considering all of the toxic materials required for batteries and solar panels, replacing natural habitats with thousands of acres of solar panels and wind farms, damage to marine life from off-shore wind farms, landfills filling up with non-recyclable fiberglass turbine blades, etc.) will prove to have been a colossal and tragic waste of our limited resources. Of course it will be a massive financial killing for those who invest in this “green energy” boondoggle. But then loads of money seems to drive everything.
As I remember the scientific method facts were accepted (the sun rises in the east) and the theories as to why could and should be debated. It seems strange that we are accepting an unproven hypothesis about CO2 when all the prior theories disprove spontaneous production of energy.
It is truly amazing to see how far an unproven supposition can infiltrate . Once the government started dishing out grants, all common sense left the building. It’s an easy one for me: there is no data to support human caused climate change and there are no witches in Salem.
I would like to recommend that, in the future, you bring an assistant with you to help with logistics and process issues. I’m sure a local Montana citizen (possibly of considerable political influence or legal skill) could easily be recruited. There is no way you should have to handle this alone if you have hearing issues.