The bipolar personality of the electricity chapters in the UK's renewable energy consultation document is more than simply the kind of literary tic often associated with government reports written by multiple authors. It vividly illustrates a deep conflict in the government's policy objectives between meeting commitments made to the European Union concerning 2020 targets for renewables and fostering the vision for competitive electricity markets pioneered by the UK in the 1990s. Lurking in the background is the centrality which the London carbon market is expected to play in preventing catastrophic climate change.

Because the Green Energy War has to date been driven by a proverbial coalition of the willing -- only the growing number of climate jihadis and the somewhat smaller sect of renewables zealouts see the subject as determinative of mankind's fate -- government commitments, with some notable exceptions, have been long on rhetoric and imagery and short on tangible performance. "You say you want a revolution," the esteemed British energy analyst, John Lennon, might say -- "well, you know, we're all doing what we can."

Wading into one of the most self-regarding political cultures on the planet, Dr. Rajendra Pachauri, chairman of the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, last week injected a small bit of perspective into California's celebration of the release of the "Draft Scoping Plan" for implementation of its heralded "Global Climate Solutions Act."