China Scales Back Shale Projects Oil & Shale Producers Sound Retreat From China

Benny Peiser's Global Warming Policy Foundation Reports
 

The Most Expensive PR Campaign In History Is Failing Miserably, by David Harsanyi, The Federalist, 26 March 2015

If you want to understand why so many Democrats believe it’s okay to circumvent Congress and let international agreements dictate environmental policies—well, other than their newfound respect for monocracy—you don’t have to look much farther than the new poll by Gallup. 

Since 1989, there’s been no significant change in the public’s concern level over global warming. To put this in perspective, note that the most expensive public-relations campaign in history — one that includes most governmental agencies, a long list of welfare-sucking corporations, the public school system, the universities, an infinite parade of celebrities, think tanks, well-funded environmental groups and an entire major political party — has, over the past 25 years or so, increased the number of Democrats who “worry greatly” about global warming by a mere four percentage points. And considering the absurd amount of media this crusade continues to garner, its ineffectiveness is doubly amazing.  

During this era, they’ve gone from gentle nudging to stern warnings, to fearmongering, to conflating the predictive abilities of scientists with science itself, to launching ugly campaigns to shame and shut down anyone who deviates from liberal orthodoxy—which includes not only the existence of anthropogenic global warming, but an entire ideological framework that supposedly “addresses” the problem…… So if you haven’t been able to win over the public over in 25 years of intense political and cultural pressure, you are probably down to two options: You can revisit your strategy, open debate to a wide range of ideas, accept that your excited rhetoric works on a narrow band of the Americans (in any useful political sense), and live with the reality that most people have no interest in surrendering prosperity. Or, you can try to force people to do what you want.

Democrats, it seems, are going to give the latter another try.....To Read More....
 

China switches from polluting coal to cleaner shale gas (sic). --Carole Nahkle, World Review, 26 September 2014
 

China Scales Back Shale Projects - China National Offshore Oil Corp (Cnooc) has decided to shelve its shale gas project in Anhui province in the latest sign that the shale gas revolution that transformed the US energy industry is unlikely to replicate itself in China. Chinese and international oil companies are cutting spending following a steep slide in crude prices over the past year, and expensive shale projects are begin targeted. Cnooc joins larger Chinese firm PetroChina, which has already sharply scaled back on shale project in Sichuan province that it was developing with Royal Dutch Shell. --Lucy Hornby Financial Times, 27 March 2015

Oil & Shale Producers Sound Retreat From China - Global oil companies are unwinding some big bets they made on China—and that is bad news for the Chinese companies, which need their know-how. Falling oil prices have forced oil bosses to slash planned investments that now look less likely to provide good returns. Projects in China, often expensive and geologically risky, are high on the list of those to be cut. Royal Dutch Shell PLC is scaling back investment in China shale exploration after several years of costly challenges. --Brian Spegele, The Wall Street Journal, 27 March 2015

India Rises As Coal Importer, May Overtake China Soon - The tides of the world’s seaborne coal trade are shifting rapidly as top consumer China seeks to rely more on domestic output while cutting its use of the polluting energy source. India, the world’s second-largest coal consumer, is stepping into the breach, pulling in more coal cargoes amid a price slump. India’s coal imports could rise by more than 8% this year to 170 million metric tons, research firm Wood Mackenzie estimates, putting them almost on a par with those of China, which imported 207 million tons last year. --Biman Mukherji, The Wall Street Journal, 27 March 2015

College-Educated Republicans Most Sceptical Of Global Warming - Republicans with higher levels of education are more likely than those in their parties with less education to say that the seriousness of global warming is “generally exaggerated.” Seventy-four percent of Republicans with a college degree say it is exaggerated, compared with 57% of those with high school education or less saying the same. Democrats are much less likely in general to say that the seriousness of global warming is exaggerated. College graduates who are Republicans are actually more likely than college graduates who are Democrats to say they understand a great deal about the issue, but well-educated Republicans find this understanding leads them in a different direction than it does Democrats.
--Gallup, 26 March 2015