Physicist and former CalTech provost Steven Koonin’s superb 2021 book, Unsettled? What Climate Science Tells Us, What It Doesn’t, and Why It Matters, busts many popular myths about climate change. Koonin is clear that global temperatures are indeed rising, and that some of this rise in temperatures is caused by human activity. But Koonin warns – and he marshals much data to justify his warnings – that what we really know about the details behind and beyond these large facts about climate change, and about efforts to arrest it, is surprisingly tentative. Indeed, such knowledge is often so skimpy as to be non-existent.

Our relatively meager amount of knowledge about climate change, as well as about the likely consequences of different policies to deal with it, is surprising not because of any recent discoveries that cast new-found doubt on what was once legitimately believed to be ample knowledge. No, our relatively meager amount of knowledge about climate matters has always been meager, yet this ‘meagerness’ has been consistently ignored by prominent politicians, journalists, and other ‘elite’ molders of public opinion.

A public frightened into believing that some collective calamity is in the offing is a public more eager for, or at least more docile in the face of, authoritarian efforts marketed as necessary to prevent the calamity.

With the turn of almost every page of Unsettled? I was struck by the ominous parallels between the mainstream narrative on the climate and the mainstream narrative on COVID. Pointing out such parallels wasn’t at all Koonin’s purpose; in fact, I suspect that he himself took no notice of these parallels. And, of course, I’d earlier been alerted by other writers to these parallels. But the length and reality of these parallels weren’t driven home to me until I’d read Koonin’s tract. Each and every one of the following attitudes – which I distill from my reading of Koonin’s book and from my immersion over the past 30 months in all things COVID – is prominent in matters of COVID as well as in matters of the climate.

Humanity is doomed to suffer gravely unless the government takes drastic, indeed, unprecedented corrective action and does so immediately!

Nothing – no other goal, aspiration, hope, or concern – nothing is as important as doing all that we can to reduce as much as is physically possible our exposure to the toxic substance that poses an existential threat to humanity! Therefore, there’s no need to account for the ‘costs’ and other collateral harms that might arise from drastic corrective action, for none of these costs and harms, even if they’re real, can possibly compare to the costs and harms that will befall us if we don’t take in full measure the prescribed drastic action!

The present emergency demands decisive interventions that are neither delayed nor diluted by trifling concerns, such as the sanctity of private property rights or the desire to avoid overreach by the government’s executive branch!

The problem is one that can be correctly diagnosed only by scientific experts. Fortunately, such a diagnosis has been confidently made. And so to save humanity we must put aside our petty individual self-interests and for the greater good do as we are instructed by the experts! Humanity’s very survival demands that we all obey the Science, for only the Science can light the path from a dark and dangerous today into a shining and safe tomorrow!

The Science reveals that there is one and only one path to our salvation. Everyone must follow the One Path! Those who insist on other paths would not only destroy themselves but all of humanity!

Fortunately, the Science is clear, complete, and settled! Therefore, anyone who challenges the Science – anyone who dares to challenge the prediction that catastrophe will occur unless the government overhauls society and the economy as instructed by the Science and the Scientists – is a slack-jawed ignoramus, a sociopathic apologist for plutocrats, or a dangerously benighted ideologue! And so there’s nothing to be gained by allowing these dissenting voices to speak! Indeed, dissenting voices must be silenced lest they lure the unsuspecting masses into a self-destructive skepticism of the Science!

To keep to a minimum the number of anti-social renegades who insist on acting contrary to the counsel of the Science, the Scientists and their champions in government and the media must, sad to say, routinely simplify or exaggerate – and occasionally, alas, even to falsify – the public messaging. Taking such liberties with the strict, literal truth is, of course, not to lie; only a rube would think it to be so. The taking of such liberties with the strict, literal truth furthers the higher Truth. Taking such liberties is a necessary means of promoting the greater good by ensuring that the noble masses, simple-minded creatures that they are, aren’t misled by pointless doubts and irrelevant nuances to behave self-destructively.

These parallels of public discussions about the climate and public discussions about COVID are indeed real and ominous.

The passage in Koonin’s book that, more than any other, drove home to me the reality of these ominous parallels appears on page 171:

Creating alarming headlines through highly uncertain projections of the future is one thing, but promoting the specter of climate-related deaths by distorting existing data is quite another. A 2019 article in Foreign Affairs by the Director-General of the World Health Organization, Tedros Ghebreyesus, was titled “Climate Change Is Already Killing Us.” Yet the text doesn’t deliver on the catchy title. Astoundingly, the article conflates deaths due to ambient and household air pollution (which cause an estimated 100 per 100,000 premature deaths each year, or about one-eighth of total deaths from all causes) with deaths due to human-induced climate change. The World Health Organization itself has said that indoor air pollution in poor countries – the result of cooking with wood and animal and crop waste – is the most serious environmental problem in the world, affecting up to three billion people. This is not the result of climate change. It’s the result of poverty. That pollution does indeed affect the climate … but pollution deaths aren’t caused by a changing climate; it’s the pollution itself that kills. Such brazen misinformation by the WHO’s leadership is particularly upsetting for its potential to diminish confidence in the organization’s public health mission.

Readers might recall that Dr. Ghebreyesus, seated in his high perch, has a habit of predicting calamity from COVID, even well into the virus’s decline in lethality. This dishonest or incompetent (I’m not sure which) performance by one of the world’s supposed leading public-health officials is, obviously, part of a longer pattern. The pattern is ominous.

Science is an especially sweet and nutritious fruit of the Enlightenment. But an even sweeter and more nutritious fruit is the recognition that truth – including, but not limited to, scientific truth – is only reliably approached without ever being absolutely and forever secured, and approached only through open inquiry, discussion, debate, and tolerance for dissenting opinions and perspectives.

Too many elite intellectuals and public officials today – and, I fear, also too many ordinary men and women – have lost sight of the fact that science and reason are tools for improving our understanding and for supplying us with some information that’s useful for making the complicated and inescapably value-laden trade-offs that, in this vale, we must make. The belief that science is a source of complete and godlike knowledge is not merely mistaken, it’s a toxic fuel of authoritarianism when it’s combined with the false understanding of social problems as being a science project to be ‘solved’ by persons in power.

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This article was published by AIER, American Institute for Economic Research, and is reproduced with permission.

While praising California’s decision to ban the sale of new gasoline-powered cars by 2035, Governor Gavin Newsom declared that this will require “100% of new car sales in California to be zero-emission vehicles” like “electric cars.” In reality, electric cars emit substantial amounts of pollutants and may be more harmful to the environment than conventional cars.

Toxic Pollution

The notion that electric vehicles are “zero-emission” is rooted in a deceptive narrative that ignores all pollutants which don’t come out of a tailpipe. Assessing the environmental impacts of energy technologies requires measuring all forms of pollution they emit over their entire lives, not a narrow slice of them. To do this, researchers perform “life cycle assessments” or LCAs. As explained by the Environmental Protection Agency, LCAs allow for:

“the estimation of the cumulative environmental impacts resulting from all stages in the product life cycle, often including impacts not considered in more traditional analyses (e.g., raw material extraction, material transportation, ultimate product disposal, etc.). By including the impacts throughout the product life cycle, LCA provides a comprehensive view of the environmental aspects of the product or process and a more accurate picture of the true environmental trade-offs in product and process selection.”

LCAs are subject to multiple levels of uncertainty, but an assessment published by the Journal of Cleaner Production in 2021 shatters the notion that electric cars are cleaner than conventional ones, much less “zero emission.” The LCA found that manufacturing, charging, operating, and disposing of electric vehicles produce more of every major category of pollutants than conventional cars. This includes:

“an increase in fine particulate matter formation (26%), human carcinogenic (20%) and non-carcinogenic toxicity (61%), terrestrial ecotoxicity (31%), freshwater ecotoxicity (39%), and marine ecotoxicity (41%) relative to petrol vehicles.”

Foreshadowing that result, a 2018 report by the European Environment Agency warned that studies on the “human toxicity impacts” of electric vehicles were “limited” and that electric cars “could be responsible for greater negative impacts” than conventional cars.

Similarly, a 2018 article in the journal Environmental Research Letters stated that a failure to account for the “environmental implications” of mining lithium to make batteries for electric cars “would directly counter the intent” of “incentivizing electric vehicle adoption” and “needs to be urgently addressed.”

The 2021 paper in the Journal of Cleaner Production has now addressed this issue, and it shows electric cars emit more toxic pollution than gasoline-powered cars. Yet, politicians who embraced the electric car agenda before comprehensive data was available continue to plow ahead in spite of the facts.

Local Pollution

Regardless of overall toxic emissions, the European Environment Agency points out that electric vehicles “potentially offer local air quality benefits” because pollution from their manufacturing, charging, and disposal is usually emitted away from densely populated areas.

Simply stated, switching to electric cars transfers pollution from urbanites in wealthy nations to poor countries that mine and manufacture their components and to communities with power plants and disposal sites. In the words of the 2021 paper in the Journal of Cleaner Production, this “transfer of environmental burdens” causes “workers and ecosystems in third countries” to be “exposed to higher rates of toxic substances.”

China dominates the global supply chains for green energy components not merely because of cheap labor but because they have lax environmental standards that tolerate the pollution these products create. Thus, China supplies 78% of the world’s solar cells, 80% of the world’s lithium-ion battery chemicals, and 73% of the world’s finished battery cells.

Highlighting the implications of “China’s role in supplying critical minerals for the global energy transition,” a 2022 study by the Brookings Institute found that “continued reliance on China” will “increase the risk that sourcing of critical minerals will cause or contribute to serious social or environmental harms.” It also documents that the U.S. and other wealthy nations have been unwilling to accept these harms on their own soils.

Even if Newsom disregards the health of poor and slave laborers in other nations, electric vehicles are still not “zero-emission” for the people of California. This is because electric vehicles emit pollutants from road, tire, and brake wear, and these forms of pollution are worse in electric vehicles than standard cars. Per a 2016 paper in the journal Atmospheric Environment, “Electric vehicles are 24% heavier than their conventional counterparts,” and this creates more “non-exhaust emissions” like “tire wear, brake wear, road surface wear and resuspension of road dust.”

Greenhouse Gases

Carbon dioxide (CO2) is the primary greenhouse gas emitted by human activity, and the 2021 paper in the Journal of Cleaner Production found that electric cars emit 48% less CO2 than gasoline-powered ones. Although this is lower, it is still far from “zero-emission.”

Moreover, a study published by the Ifo Institute of Germany in 2019 found that an electric Tesla Model 3 emits 11% to 28% more CO2 over its lifespan than a diesel Mercedes C220D. Again, LCAs are subject to uncertainty, and no single study is an end-all, but this clearly proves that electric vehicles are far from emission-free.

With no regard for those facts, Gavin Newsom asserts that “California now has a groundbreaking, world-leading plan to achieve 100% zero-emission vehicle sales” that will help “solve this climate crisis.”

Contrary to Newsom’s claim of a “climate crisis,” a wide array of environmental and human welfare measures related to climate change have stayed level or improved for more than three decades. This includes foliage productivity, extinction rates, forest cover, agricultural production, coastal flooding, rainfall and droughts, hurricanes, tornadoes, and extreme weather fatalities. These empirical facts refute more than 30 years of failed predictions by global warming alarmists.

Newsom then adds another layer of deception by stating that the plan reduces “dangerous carbon emissions” that “pollute our communities.” This misportrays CO2 as a toxic, dirty substance. In reality, it is an organic, colorless, non-carcinogenic gas that has no toxic effects on humans until concentrations exceed at least 6 times the level in Earth’s atmosphere.

Referring to CO2 as “carbon” is also unscientific. That’s because CO2 is not carbon, just like H2O (water) is not hydrogen. There are more than 10 million different carbon compounds, and calling CO2 “carbon” conflates this relatively innocuous gas with highly noxious substances like carbon monoxide and black carbon.

In summary, there is no reliable evidence that greenhouse gas reductions from electric cars will benefit anyone.

Consequences

Like Newsom, the California Air Resources Board boasts that “100% of new cars and light trucks sold in California will be zero-emission vehicles” by 2035. Assuming Newsom and the board members have at least a rudimentary knowledge of electric cars, calling them “zero-emission vehicles” is a lie.

A Google search reveals that journalists and many others are also using this inherently false phrase.

The harms of this deceit extend well beyond pollution. This is because electric cars are more costly than other options, and that’s why people rarely buy electric cars unless governments subsidize or mandate them. As documented by a 2021 paper in the journal Transport and Environment:

Mass market adoption of electric vehicles will likely require either that governments restrict the sale of gasoline-powered vehicles (as planned in some countries and California) or that BEVs [battery electric vehicles] become cost-competitive with gasoline-powered vehicles of similar size and styling.

Regardless of whether these additional costs are paid by consumers or taxpayers, they make people poorer because these expensive cars ultimately travel fewer miles for every dollar spent.

The same applies to other “clean energy” policies that are prevalent in California. This is a major reason why it has the highest electricity prices in the continental U.S., or 77% more than the national average.

Such policies that increase the costs of living have contributed to making California the state with the highest real poverty rate in the nation.

Despite its “green” agenda, California dominates the American Lung Association’s list of cities with the poorest air quality in America. In fact, the nation’s worst four cities for ozone pollution, the worst five cities for year-round particle pollution, and the worst two cities for short-term particle pollution are all in California.

There are certainly many other factors besides energy policies that have led to those dreadful outcomes in California, but lying to people deprives them of the opportunity to make informed decisions about the pros and cons of these policies.

James D. Agresti is the president of Just Facts, a research and educational institute dedicated to publishing rigorously documented facts about public policy issues.

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This article was published by Just Facts and is reproduced with permission.

The movement for creating systemic change in the economic system is growing. Traditionally, investments in entrepreneurial ventures were based on expectations for a favorable return given the risks involved. Businesses were expected to perform at their best to ensure shareholder value, and to do so they needed to cater to consumer needs, efficiently leverage resources, and effectively manage their operations.

Presently, however, businesses are expected to have a social impact – and it is this impact that is being positioned to matter most. More than production, more than consumption, and even more than shareholder value.

For-profits are increasingly embracing the concept of conscious capitalism and stakeholder integration, which the likes of John Mackey and Sir Richard Branson have not only championed but built movements around, calling on businesses to have a “Higher Purpose” and commit to creating a “better world”.

At face value, this sounds like not only a good thing but a strategic move given that consumer preference leans toward firms that aim to have a social impact rather than simply sell a product.

R. Edward Freeman, the proposed father of Stakeholder Theory, asserts that firms must align the interests of all stakeholders while doing what they can to avoid tradeoffs. His 1984 publication, Strategic Management: A Stakeholder Approach, spurred on a mission to transform business practices toward more noble pursuits.

From Villain to Social Guardian

In 1987, the World Business Academy was launched dedicated to the proposition that businesses can’t be trusted since the corporate realm was “behind every major problem.” A change needed to occur.

This negative notion of the impact of business attracted others to come up with their own stance on the matter. John Renesch coined the phrase “conscious capitalism,” John Elkington promoted the Triple Bottom Line – representing people, planet, and profit, and Michael Porter developed the concept of shared value, which proposes the meeting of a social need with a business model.

To be sure, many have stressed the role of business in society to be more than just about making money, and forms of corporate social responsibility (CSR) have both expanded and evolved in response.

When the concept of CSR first came about, it was applicable to larger firms that had the ability to utilize their wealth and success for giving back – by volunteering, giving to charities, and even partnering with NGOs. However, CSR is no longer about giving back, or even paying it forward – it is about engagement with social issues – and this is now expected of all firms.

The Push for SDGs and Rise of ESG

The pressure to ‘do good‘ is not only based on reputational concerns from private actors but derived from a broader, more politically charged global movement.

In 2000, the Millennium Summit took place in New York City at the United Nations, and was the largest gathering of world leaders at that time. The purpose of the Summit was to determine the ongoing role of the UN and propose new goals for creating a better world.

As a result of the Summit, public officials signed the Millennium Declaration, which outlined eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) to be achieved by 2015. And given that a primary focus for the UN was eradicating poverty, engaging with the financial sector became a crucial component.

At the bequest of the UN Secretary-General at that time, Kofi Annan, a study was commissioned to make the business case for corporate commitments to social initiatives, and in 2006 the UN called upon countries to become signatories to its Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI). For those who signed on to the PRI, the standards proposed required firms and capital markets to take part and do more for the global good.

After 2015, the MDGs morphed into the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and the PRI prompted the creation of ESG frameworks. Both the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB) and the World Economic Forum (WEF) promoted efforts for instituting “a globally accepted system for corporate disclosure” to track the progress of the SDGs and pressured financial firms to implement ESG metrics as proof for doing their part.

The adoption of ESG standards, however, is truly problematic given that value and virtue are difficult to measure and there will always be tradeoffs – whether Freeman likes it or not.

A troublesome matter for businesses serving societal goals rather than marketplace needs is the complexity of catering to all stakeholders at once, and the subjectivity of what is meant as being ‘good’ or when ‘good’ does or doesn’t apply.

For instance, prior to the pandemic, regulators aimed to limit the use of single-use plastics, but such stipulations were suspended in response to COVID-19 safety concerns. Recycling centers shut down and plastic production ramped up. This was what was needed, and therefore good for society.

The Real Problem with Rating Systems

Divergent interests and incentives create push-pull effects in the market, and while it is important to be aware of the impact and opportunity costs involved, it is also important to let market mechanisms play out. Instead, however, firms are being coerced to abide by assessments and compliance measures ,and this will only create bottlenecks for production processes over time given that anything new or different will need to first be approved or verified. And Branson’s booming B Corp movement and Mackey’s Conscious Capitalism cohort are aiding in this process.

Adhering to the on-high expectations from verifiers such as the B-Team, who claim that our “economic model is broken” despite the great advancements we can see before our eyes, is not only bad for business but bad for progress.

Experimentation and diversification, according to Ludvig Von Mises, are the best combination for advancement, and new product offerings are a benefit to society in and of themselves when firms act ethically and serve the wants and needs of consumers. However, innovative pursuits will likely be supplanted by incremental improvements which adhere to the standards of external dictates and will garner endorsement from appraisal agencies.

Businesses shouldn’t need a stamp of approval from a certifying agency, especially since sales will signal when something of worth is being offered, and if profits decline organizations must work to understand why. Nevertheless, attaining the B Lab logo or being a partner in the conscious capitalism campaign has a strong appeal for those looking to gain social capital and appease industry elites and political pundits – and these initiatives are not only gaining traction, they are joining forces.

The Rebranding of Business and Centralized Control

Just recently, the Imperative 21 Network was launched to “RESET” our economic system, and both the B Team and Conscious Capitalism are listed as two of the primary stewards for this initiative.

The Network represents “more than 70,000 businesses, 20 million employees, $6.6 trillion in revenue, and $15 trillion in assets under management” and the goal is “to shift the cultural narrative about the role of business and finance in society”. And the shift is certainly underway given that in 2019, the Business Roundtable, made up of a group of 180 CEO’s of America’s largest companies, declared that business must aim to improve the status of all stakeholders and play a larger role in society.

With all this in mind, it is no wonder ESG took a stronghold in the investment community, and it is unnerving to see how easily the business world succumbed to power players.

But what is more worrisome is the fact that certifying agencies and assessment measures inevitably embolden regulators. Take for example the organic agricultural sect, whereas the certifying bodies were initially self-regulated and self-certified, having been established by the farmers themselves. However, as sales increased for organically labeled foods, so too did the number of certification bodies involved. The emergence of various organic labeling schemes confused what each label stood for and, over time, it became necessary to address the processes of certification and establish a more standardized and regulated system.

And the same will likely be true for ESG. Right now, there are a diversity of ESG frameworks with fees ranging from thousands of dollars to several million, and credibility concerns are on the rise and generating interest from monitoring agencies.

Given that ESG was formulated within the UN system to further the UN’s SDGs and hold PRI signatories accountable, it seems rather clear which ESG framework will win out in the end – the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI). The GRI is partnered with the UN and was founded with assistance from the UN Environment Programme and, coincidentally, it is currently the most widely used framework (implemented by 73% of the world’s top 250 firms).

Therefore, it seems likely that any standardized framework will be based on the UN’s postulates when all is said and done, and this will have all transpired in front of our eyes and by use of our own pocketbooks.

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This article was published by AIER, American Institute for Economic Research, and is reproduced with permission.