What do "Green" Hydrogen and Cucumbers have in common?

 

I've been seriously skeptical about public money going into the Everwind green hydrogen project in Point Tupper ever since the appearance of the first smiling photo op of our premier with subsidy seeking friends and all the associated hype of promising to make us "world class." .A goal of being "good enough" is sufficiently ambitious. I'll cheer when we get there.  Then came our premier's recent secret meetings with a super rich investor looking for an assortment of perks including "provincial environmental approvals and a wide range of changes to regulatory and export policies."  (Halifax Examiner, Nov 12, 2024)

 

There are a number of sites* that describe the science and list the pros and cons of producing green hydrogen, and the spectrum of  “brown,” “grey,” “blue” and “green” hydrogen. It is more complicated than regular solar and wind projects which can be "smaller," more flexible and requiring less new infrastructure. And why on earth we would aim to produce it to ship to Germany is something that eludes common sense. If there is one thing I know about physics, it is that the farther you transport energy, the less efficient it becomes. I hearken back to that classic book Small Is Beautiful: A Study of Economics as If People Mattered by E. F.  Schumacher.

 

Now I see the plot thickening - with cornstarch as my mother would say:

https://www.halifaxexaminer.ca/environment/john-risley-jumps-on-the-green-hydrogen-subsidy-bandwagon/#N3

Having lived in Newfoundland through the Sprung Greenhouse fiasco, I was especially intrigued by the following commentary by Angela Antle, a reliable St. John's journalist.

"I smell cucumbers   Billionaire-owned World Energy GH2 is off green hydrogen and floating the idea of energy-hungry data centres"
https://theindependent.ca/commentary/i-smell-cucumber 

 

It ain't easy being green. How quickly our leaders seem willing to shell out tax dollars without getting into the hard questions.

 

 

* eg to list a few
What is green hydrogen, and how green is it, anyway? Buzz about green hydrogen heating up in N.S. as companies clamber to get on board  ·

          Frances Willick   CBC News · Posted: Dec 11, 2021

          https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/nova-scotia/green-hydrogen-what-is-it-how-green-is-it-1.6587802 

Hydrogen hype: climate solution or dead-end highway? 
         David Suzuki with contributions from Senior Editor and Writer Ian Hanington   Aug 15, 1921
         https://davidsuzuki.org/story/hydrogen-hype-climate-solution-or-dead-end-highway/

We cancelled the Chronicle Herald today

Dear Editor

Today's edition was the final straw. Our local paper, founded in 1874, has been seriously compromised ever since PostMedia took over.  Like so many, it had been facing an uphill battle for real journalism for years. The Opinion Page today was Beyond Inappropriate for our local paper. Why inflict upon Nova Scotians a long commentary, replete with wild speculations and accusations, written, no less, by a genuine "foreign agitator," J.D. Tuccille, an Arizona writer, who calls himself a "political scribbler with a deep concern about personal freedom," is planning to vote for Trump and contributes libertarian rants to the National Post.

I dare to hope you included the piece by local writer Fred Honsberger in an effort to "balance" against the one foisted upon you, no doubt, by the Mother Ship, but neither belongs in a local Canadian paper today of all days. In the US, you are not supposed to campaign on election day.

We have enough concerns of our own. There is more than enough US election opinion elsewhere. Clearly the Chronicle Herald has been sold to The Devil* aka Chatham Asset Management. We do not want a single penny of our money supporting this right wing US media empire. Googling these chaps was "interesting"  J.D. Tuccille, Anthony Melchiorr,  Larry Buchalter. 

It's straight out of "Succession."  

 

If you care to read the Commentary that was our last straw, I can actually put the link in here without Meta cancelling it.
"My reluctant vote for Donald Trump"

*    About The Devil  for inquiring minds the article has the links and citations

From Wikipedia    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chatham_Asset_Management

 

 Chatham Asset Management LLC is an American hedge fund, founded by Anthony Melchiorre in 2000, with a large foothold in newspapers and tabloids, headquartered in Chatham Borough, New Jersey, United States. The company holds a controlling interest in Postmedia, A360media, McClatchy, and RR Donnelley. Chatham's key principal is Larry Buchalter.

According to a 2018 article in Fortune, Chatham is known for its close ties to the Republican Party. Chatham has a reputation for hard-edged business tactics. In 2016, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority opened a review of Seaport Global Securities that included an examination of its relationship with Chatham.

In 2023, Chatham and Melchiorre were charged by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission with 'improper trading of certain fixed income securities.', in relation to client trades of AMI stock. They agreed to pay over $19.3 million collectively in fines.

Acquisition of Postmedia Network Canada Corp

In October 2016, the New Jersey hedge fund Chatham Asset Management quietly acquired a two-thirds controlling stake in Postmedia, Canada's largest newspaper chain, by exchanging debt owed to them for the majority ownership When Chatham acquired majority shares in Postmedia Network, even some of Postmedia employees, were not aware of the change in ownership. Postmedia's financial news platform described its debt restructuring making mention of Chatham as one of the investors.  According to Postmedia Network's 2020 Financial Report, as of November 30, 2019, Chatham, an American media conglomerate which also owns American Media, Inc. owned 62,313,749, or 66%, of Postmedia's shares, which challenged the assumption that PostMedia was Canadian controlled. According to the New York Times, since acquiring Postmedia, Chatham reduced the workforce, closed newspapers across Canada, decreased salaries and benefits, and consolidated editorial operations.