New Zealand

Methane Warming Exaggerated by 400%

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By Barry Brill – Re-Blogged From WUWT

The IPCC’s AR5 estimated the global warming caused by a tonne of livestock methane would be 28 times that of a tonne of carbon dioxide. New research destroys that estimate.

The war on meat has been gathering pace amongst our Western elites. The Economist makes a detailed case for “plant-based food” in the interests of quelling climate change –

The FAO calculates that cattle generate up to two-thirds of the greenhouse gases from livestock, and are the world’s fifth largest source of methane. If cows were a country, the United Herds of Earth would be the planet’s third largest greenhouse-gas emitter.

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Tilting at Windmills – a Brief Update

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By Andi May – Re-Blogged From WUWT

About this time last year, I wrote a light-hearted review of New Zealand’s love affair with Wind Generation.

Since then I’ve become interested in seeing just how effective these things really are. Where I live adjacent to a string of Turbines, we get some pretty impressive winds – 150Kph is not that unusual. But we also get days of complete calm – usually at times when electricity demand is at its highest.

Nonetheless, our green-biased Government elected just over a year ago are still pushing so-called renewables as the way of the future. Interestingly New Zealand already produces more than 80% of its energy from Renewables, with Geothermal and Hydro way ahead of Wind.

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Housing Bubble Is Popping Right Now

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By Adam Taggart – Re-Blogged From Silver Phoenix

As we’ve been tracking here at PeakProsperity.com, the housing market is starting to look quite ill.

After the central bank-driven Grand Reflation following the Great Financial Crisis, home prices are now beginning to nose over from their new bubble-highs.

Has the Housing Bust 2.0 begun? If so, how bad could things get? And what steps should those looking to pick up values at much lower prices in the future be taking?

This week we talk with citizen journalist Ben Jones, property manager and publisher of TheHousingBubbleBlog — where he tracks the latest headlines and developments in the housing market.

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New Zealand Bans Offshore Gas and Oil Exploration

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By Eric Worrall – Re-Blogged From http://www.WattsUpWithThat.com

The New Zealand government has banned offshore oil and gas exploration as part of its 30 year quest for 100% climate purity.

New Zealand bans all new offshore oil exploration as part of ‘carbon-neutral future’

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Consumers In Surprising Places Are Borrowing Like Crazy

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By John Rubino – Re-Blogged From Dollar Collapse

The Money Bubble is inflating at different speeds in different places. But apparently no culture is immune:

Household Debt Sees Quiet Boom Across the Globe

(Wall Street Journal) – A decade after the global financial crisis, household debts are considered by many to be a problem of the past after having come down in the U.S., U.K. and many parts of the euro area.

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Asia’s Dilemma: China’s Butter, or America’s Guns?

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By Rodger Baker – Re-Blogged From Strafor 

Flying into Singapore’s Changi Airport, one is struck by the fleet of ships lined up off shore, the tendrils of a global trade network squeezing through the narrow Malacca Strait. Singapore is the hub, the connector between the Indian Ocean, South China Sea and Pacific. Since the late 1970s, with little exception, trade has amounted to some 300 percent of Singapore’s total gross domestic product, with exports making up between 150 and 230 percent of GDP. Singapore is the product of global trade, and the thriving multiethnic city-state can trace its trade role back centuries.

Trade is the lifeblood of the Asia-Pacific, and even as nationalism rises, the region still sees a globalized world as a greater reward than risk. (RODGER BAKER)

Enhance Prosperity And Improve Health: Slash Regulations

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By Steven H Hanke – Re-Blogged From http://www.Silver-Phoenix500.com

Productivity and economic growth continue to surprise on the downside in most countries. While there is a great deal of handwringing over the so-called productivity puzzle, little attention is given to the real elixir: freer markets and more competition. Indeed, the policy tide is moving in the opposite direction in most places.

To get a grip on the productivity puzzle, let’s lift a page from the late Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan, who once said, “You’re entitled to your own opinions, but you’re not entitled to your own facts.” Yes. There is nothing better than a hard look at empirical evidence to see if it supports those who espouse freer markets or those who embrace the regulatory state as models to enhance our prosperity and health.

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