CFACT constantly speaks pro-energy truth to green anti-energy propaganda.
Any given day you’ll catch CFACT’s team on TV, the web, social media, radio, movies… you name it.
Institutional leftism has grown so prevalent, it takes an unrelenting voice of reason, creatively utilizing media of all kinds to compete and win through.
Unrelenting is a fine word to describe CFACT.
Watch Marc Morano, the force behind our award-winning Climate Depot news and information service, take to the screen to debunk myths about EV’s and China on Centerpoint TV.
Hear me take on Biden’s outrageous “30×30” land grab on VCY America Radio.
Listen to Gabriella Hoffman expose the absurdity of banning Canadian imports of game birds on her District of Conservation Podcast.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-09-08 18:52:442022-09-08 18:52:44CFACT Brings ‘Energy Reality’ to Television, Radio, Social Media and in Movies!
In an interview with Breitbart News, Marine veteran Stuart Scheller, who demanded accountability from senior military leaders over the botched Afghanistan withdrawal, slammed Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley for being focused on “white rage” rather than fighting wars.
Milley, during a House hearing in June 2021, defended military cadets learning about Critical Race Theory and said he wanted to “learn about ‘white rage,’” using a term used by critical race theorists. Two months later, the military had to conduct a chaotic and hasty withdrawal from Afghanistan that ended in the tragic deaths of 13 service members and more than 100 Afghan civilians.
“Obviously our leaders have the wrong focus. I mean, Lloyd Austin, came into office while the Russians were staging on the border of Ukraine. We were trying to withdraw from one of the longest wars in American history. And after 100 days in office, he said he did problem framing and decided COVID was the biggest threat to the DoD followed by extremism. Like obviously his priorities are skewed,” Scheller told Breitbart News.
“And so I go back to what we were just talking about where fighting should be the focus at all times. And obviously you need a Secretary of Defense to manage that. And Mark Milley is the same thing, not only ‘white rage,’ he’s talking about climate control,” he said. “‘Hey, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, like your job is to advise on military policy winning wars like climate control is not in your wheelhouse.’”
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-09-07 19:51:372022-09-07 19:51:37Marine Vet to Milley: Your Job is to Win Wars, Not Fight Climate Change
From California to France to Japan and beyond, nuclear power is all the rage suddenly.
The Wall Street Journal recently reported that California Gov. Gavin Newsom was spearheading an eleventh-hour effort to pass legislation to extend a lifeline to Diablo Canyon, a 2,250-megawatt nuclear plant that supplies some 8 percent of the energy produced in the Golden State.
Under pressure from lawmakers and environmental activists, the Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) agreed in 2016 to decommission Diablo when its operating licenses expire in 2024 and 2025. But in light of the recent energy policy environment, California lawmakers had second thoughts.
On the very final day of the legislative session, lawmakers passed a bill that will extend the plant five more years.
This is a sharp turn for Newsom, who had long intimated that the Diablo Canyon plant should be closed.
“I just don’t see that this plant is going to survive beyond 2024, 2025. I just don’t see that,” Newsom said while running for governor in 2016. “And there is a compelling argument as to why it shouldn’t.”
Nuclear Is in Again
California is hardly alone in giving nuclear power a second look.
Belgium is one of several European nations looking to extend set-to-expire licenses to keep nuclear plants operational. France, meanwhile, has proposed building up to 14 new nuclear plants in the coming years. Japan, which shuttered its nuclear reactors following the 2011 Fukushima crisis, now wants to restart up to nine reactors. Meanwhile, Morning Brewreports that the UK, Poland, and the Czech Republic are all unfurling plans to build new nuclear reactors.
Nuclear power is suddenly in again, and it’s not hard to see why. Natural gas prices have skyrocketed globally. In the United States, natural gas prices recently hit a 14-year high, but that’s nothing compared to Europe, where they recently hit an all-time high and are the equivalent of $600/barrel oil prices.
This has sent shockwaves throughout Europe, where businesses are reporting five-fold year-over-year price increases.
There is now little debate that Europe is in the middle of a full-blown energy crisis, in no small part because the nations pursued a “green” energy agenda that shifted from domestic production (especially in fossil fuels and nuclear power) and led to a reliance on natural gas imports from Russia, which have been disrupted by the invasion of Ukraine and Russian geopolitics.
8% of California’s Electricity Gone?
The situation in California is different than that in Europe, but there is also a clear reason the state is second-guessing its decision to shut down its single largest power station—namely, its battered energy grid.
California grid operators last week warned of blackouts and encouraged citizens to “set thermostats to 78 degrees or higher, avoid using large appliances and charging electric vehicles, and turn off unnecessary lights.”
This is nothing new in California, which has an extensive history of blackouts even though it has one of the lowest per capita energy consumption rates in the country (largely due to its mild climate).
The reason for this isn’t complicated. California is seen as a green energy success story, and in some ways it is. Earlier this year, on one mild May day, California produced enough renewable electricity to meet 103 percent of demand, setting a new record.
The problem is some of these energy sources are intermittent. On most days renewable energy production falls well short of consumer demand, which is why roughly half of California’s electricity is still produced by natural gas—which is getting quite expensive as noted above.
But the real problem is energy supply.
California’s energy grid is already stretched, which means that suddenly aborting nuclear power is a recipe for disaster. As even progressive California lawmakers concede, Diablo Canyon generates more than 8 percent of all of California’s electricity, and accounts for 17 percent of carbon-free production.
If you think California’s blackout problem is bad now—and it most certainly is—try abruptly losing 18,000 GW·hrs of electricity annually and see what happens … after adding a million more electric vehicles to the economy, all of which must be charged with electricity, when the state’s ban on gas-powered vehicles goes into effect.
The Lesson
As NPR notes, the twist over Diablo Canyon is noteworthy because the Golden State is the birthplace of the anti-nuclear movement in the United States. Environmentalists for years have opposed nuclear power, “primarily from fears about nuclear waste and potential accidents as well as its association with nuclear weapons.”
As Fukushima shows, these fears are not entirely unfounded. Nuclear accidents do occur (albeit rarely). Nuclear plants do create radioactive waste. There are clear tradeoffs to nuclear energy.
Where environmentalists go wrong, however, is to think tradeoffs are unique to nuclear power and fossil fuels. The fact is ,all energy production comes with tradeoffs, and proponents of so-called “green energy” have a nasty habit of overlooking these tradeoffs.
Your neighbor with a “green means go” sign in his yard might point out that your F-150 guzzles a gallon of gasoline for every 25 road miles, but he probably ignores that it took tens of thousands of pounds of CO2 emissions to produce the battery that charges his Tesla. (And don’t even tell him where the cobalt in the battery comes from.)
Your aunt might proudly talk about the new solar panels on her roof, but probably doesn’t know that even on utility scale solar power has a carbon footprint higher than nuclear power, or that solar panels produce literally tons of toxic waste.
Your niece at Columbia might talk about how important it is to become a “zero emission” economy. But she probably doesn’t realize the environmental costs, let alone the economic ones, of getting there—which include mining 34 million metric tons of copper, 50 million tons of zinc, 40 million tons of lead, 5 billion tons of iron, and 160 million tons of aluminum (give or take).
The point is clear: all energy production comes with tradeoffs. Many might believe that politicians are uniquely capable of weighing the pros and cons of energy tradeoffs, but both economics and our own eyes reveal this is untrue.
Facing what many environmentalists say is a climate apocalypse, did it make sense for European governments to scrap nuclear plants—one of the cleanest forms of energy in existence—and important fossil fuels from Russia, a country hostile to freedom and historically inclined toward authoritarianism?
Similarly, did it make sense for California to scrap nuclear power in its quest to become a “100 percent zero-emission” economy?
Clearly the answer to these questions is no. The reality is politicians do not have any special knowledge when it comes to deciding which tradeoffs make the most sense, which might explain why a world abundant in energy is suddenly facing an energy crisis unlike any it’s seen in generations.
So while we should be grateful that so many politicians, environmentalists, and countries are finally recognizing the benefits of nuclear power, we should also be asking why we gave them such broad power in the first place.
Jonathan Miltimore is the Managing Editor of FEE.org. His writing/reporting has been the subject of articles in TIME magazine, The Wall Street Journal, CNN, Forbes, Fox News, and the Star Tribune. Bylines: Newsweek, The Washington Times, MSN.com, The Washington Examiner, The Daily Caller, The Federalist, the Epoch Times.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-09-05 15:51:212022-09-05 15:51:21Why Nuclear Power Is [Quietly] Making a Big Comeback All Around the World
In 2019 GM retired the Chevy Volt to make way for its successor, the more compact but fully electric Chevy Bolt. We recently received a copy of an estimate from Roger Dean Chevrolet, located in Cape Coral, Florida, to replace the battery in a Chevy Volt (VIN: 101RB6E4XCU113962) that has on its odometer 70,489 miles. Using an average of 12,000 miles driven per year we estimated that this Volt was purchased in 2017.
Here are the costs to replace the battery:
Labor $1,200
Parts $26,887.97
Misc. $41.50
Tax $$1,712.68
TOTAL: $29,842.15
QUESTION:Do we really need all electric vehicles, at all?
ANSWER: Let’s look at the numbers to answer this question.
All electric cars depreciate faster than internal combustion engine, i.e. gas-powered, cars. The most significant vehicle depreciation typically occurs after purchase and within the first three years. According to an iSeeCars study, EV owners can expect 52 percent depreciation in the first three years.
Add to this an iSeeCars August 23rd, 2022 all electric care pricing article by Julie Blackley who reported,
Electric car prices went up 54.3% in July from last year compared to 10.1% for conventional/internal combustion cars.
Used car prices remain elevated in the wake of the global microchip shortage, but they began to level off in the second half of 2022. However, according to iSeeCars’ recent analysis, over the same period prices for electric cars continued to increase significantly. In July, electric car prices saw an increase of 54.3% from the same month last year while gas-powered cars were up just 10.1%.
iSeeCars analyzed the prices of over 13.8 million 1-5 year old used cars sold between January and July of 2021 and 2022 to determine the price growth of electric cars compared to conventional fuel vehicles.
“Until recently, mainstream electric vehicles typically depreciated rapidly due to improvements in battery technology and a lack of demand in the secondary market,” said iSeeCars Executive Analyst Karl Brauer. “However, soaring gas prices, improvements in public charging infrastructure, and a lack of inventory for new EVs have led to soaring demand for used electric vehicles.”
We also reported on how Biden and his administration actually caused the soaring gas prices and inflation.
Add to this a September 2nd, 2022 The Daily Skirmish article which reported,
Going somewhere for the holiday weekend? Not if you live in California and drive an electric vehicle, you’re not. California issued an emergency alert asking people not to charge their EVs because the power grid can’t handle the demand. This from a state that is moving to ban the sale of gas-powered vehicles. So how’s this going to work when the internal combustion engine is gone, natural gas appliances are banned, and everyone has to rely on electricity for getting around, heating their homes, and washing their clothes. The short answer is: it’s not. The numbers don’t add up. But that’s the bright green energy future into which your insane leaders want to take you.
Here’s one thing that will happen in that future. Everyone will have smart meters and the government will simply order the power cut off whenever it feels like it. Don’t believe me? It’s already happening. How did you like the story out of Denver this week, where 22,000 households were locked out of their thermostats and couldn’t adjust their air conditioning when it got hot? No car, no A/C, no appliances, whenever the government decides it’s time to control your behavior.
We also reported that the electricity needed to charge one all electric vehicle is the equivalent of running four (4) total home air conditioning systems.
The Climate Crisis Myth
The Biden administration has used the myth of a climate crisis to push for massive funding to go all electric. Not just cars and trucks but also doing away with the use of all fossil fuels. Despite the fact that the world uses fossil fuels to produce 84% of its electrical power.
President Joe Biden took a step toward his goal of slashing greenhouse gas emissions on Thursday [August 5, 2021] with an executive order aimed at making half of all new vehicles sold in 2030 electric, a move made with backing from the biggest U.S. automakers. The administration also proposed new vehicle emissions standards that would cut pollution through 2026, starting with a 10% stringency increase in the 2023 model year. [Emphasis added]
In keeping with President Biden’s commitment to build out a national network of 500,000 electric vehicle (EV) chargers by 2030, the U.S. Departments of Transportation and Energy today announced all 50 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico have submitted EV infrastructure deployment plans as required under the National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) Formula Program established and funded by President Biden’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. These plans are required to unlock the first round of the $5 billion of Bipartisan Infrastructure Law formula funding available over 5 years to help states accelerate the important work of building out the national EV charging network and making electric vehicle charging accessible to all Americans. The on-time submission of every single plan demonstrates the widespread commitment from states to build out EV charging infrastructure to help accelerate the adoption of electric vehicles, create good jobs, and combat the climate crisis.
Led by a Nobel Prize laureate, more than 1,100 scientists and scholars have signed a document declaring climate science is based more on personal beliefs and political agendas than sound, rigorous science.
The World Climate Declaration states climate science “should be less political, while climate policies should be more scientific.”
“Scientists should openly address uncertainties and exaggerations in their predictions of global warming, while politicians should dispassionately count the real costs as well as the imagined benefits of their policy measures,” the declaration reads.
The declaration was organized by Climate Intelligence, an independent policy foundation founded in 2019 by Dutch emeritus professor of geophysics Guus Berkhout and Dutch science journalist Marcel Crok.
America will continue to go down the green brick road to deal with a Mythological Climate Agenda which will inextricably lead to an Economic Armageddon.
Biden’s goal is to turn America into Newsom’s California. Biden has gone full woke and Americans are going broke (penniless, moneyless, bankrupt, insolvent, poor, poverty-stricken).
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-09-04 13:51:402022-09-04 13:51:40Replacement cost of a Chevrolet Volt Battery $29,842.15 but it gets worse, much worse!
We are watching the villainous Left deindustrialize our societies, under the guise of climate nonsense. All while they fly around the world in private jets, which emit far more green-house gasses into the atmosphere. The Green Movement is a total assault on capitalism, our freedom, and our entire way of life. It’s implementation will cause significant economic decline and instability in countries throughout the world. Furthermore, if this movement is not stopped, you can expect massive instability in your cities and your towns, and your communities in the years ahead.
I warned Europe of the danger of relying on Russian energy while restricting their own production.
The Biden Administration needs to end its war on American energy, or we could face the same dangerous result.
Green energy policies in Europe designed to rapidly shift the continent away from fossil fuel dependence have contributed to soaring power prices in the region.
The European benchmark index measuring future electricity prices increased to a record $993 per megawatt hour (MWh) on Monday, days after prices in France and Germany surged 25%, according to European Energy Exchange data compiled by Bloomberg. By comparison, the average price of electricity in the U.S. hit $129 per MWh in June, federal data showed.
The energy crisis has forced consumers to cut back on power consumption, industrial production declines and energy rationing across the continent. The European Union Council (EU) scheduled an emergency meeting of EU energy ministers slated for next week in response to the market conditions.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-09-03 11:51:562022-09-03 11:51:56Experts Blame Green Energy Policies for Europe’s Full-Scale Energy Crisis: ‘A warning to the U.S.’
Going somewhere for the holiday weekend? Not if you live in California and drive an electric vehicle, you’re not. California issued an emergency alert asking people not to charge their EVs because the power grid can’t handle the demand. This from a state that is moving to ban the sale of gas-powered vehicles. So how’s this going to work when the internal combustion engine is gone, natural gas appliances are banned, and everyone has to rely on electricity for getting around, heating their homes, and washing their clothes. The short answer is: it’s not. The numbers don’t add up. But that’s the bright green energy future into which your insane leaders want to take you.
Here’s one thing that will happen in that future. Everyone will have smart meters and the government will simply order the power cut off whenever it feels like it. Don’t believe me? It’s already happening. How did you like the story out of Denver this week, where 22,000 households were locked out of their thermostats and couldn’t adjust their air conditioning when it got hot? No car, no A/C, no appliances, whenever the government decides it’s time to control your behavior.
Colorado and California are among the states that have adopted green energy mandates. Hate to break it to you, folks, but green energy is just not up to the job. The numbers don’t add up. That’s why Illinois is already looking for ways to adjust its green energy mandates and escape the trap. They figure they can’t attract business to the state without being able to demonstrate they will have reliable energy supplies in the future. That’s the first sensible thing I’ve heard out of Illinois politicians for a long time.
Since I’m the skunk at the garden party, let me ask this: What is all this sackcloth and ashes supposed to accomplish? If I were a cynic, I would say the goal is wealth and power for a tiny elite that is personally heavily invested in green energy stocks, something I’ve reported on before. I could also say it’s about controlling the people, reducing their standard of living to make them poor, cutting America down to size in the world, waging Marxist war on capitalism, putting the globalists in control of your happiness, and degrowth and depopulation.
I’ve heard all these things and they sound plausible to me. But let’s take the entire exercise at face value, shall we? Leaving fossil fuels in the ground and making the transition to green energy will stop climate change and keep the planet from burning up, right?
There’s only one problem. Over 1,100 scientists and professionals from around the world just signed a declaration stating in no uncertain terms there is no climate emergency. “Climate science should be less political, while climate policies should be more scientific,” they said. “Scientists should openly address uncertainties and exaggerations in their predictions of global warming.” So, anyone who tells you ‘the science is settled’ and the planet is burning up is lying to you for their own selfish purposes. There are real costs to green energy policies, the scientists went on, and the cure – getting rid of fossil fuels – will be worse than the disease. They criticize the unfounded beliefs that dominate media narratives and call for getting back to real science.
Emergency directives and smart meter shut-offs aside, let’s suppose you do manage to get your EV out of your garage this weekend. You have some other things to worry about. Your EV could explode at any moment. Hyundai and Kia just issued warnings. They recommend parking your EV outside so it doesn’t burn your house down. The town in Connecticut with the electric bus fire this summer has gone back to diesel-powered buses.
If you’re on the road, good luck finding a charging station, and hope it works when you find one. A police department in England is finding its EVs can’t reach some emergencies because the emergencies are too far away and the batteries run down before they can get there. In 2019, a police officer in California could not pursue a suspect because the officer’s EV ran down. The suspect got away.
If you’re driving an EV because you feel guilty about damaging the environment with fossil fuels, here’s something else to feel guilty about: pulling lithium out of the ground for your EV battery generates lots of carbon emissions, toxic wastewater, and other environmental damage. Indigenous peoples and governments in Latin America are wising up to this and are moving to clamp down on lithium mining. How will the numbers add up when more people in producing areas revolt?
Don’t get me wrong. I’m all for progress. I had halogens for years, but I love my LED lamps. But here’s what I’m not for: chasing unicorns and rainbows, turning everything upside down just because some people take it on faith the planet is burning up. And I’m not for blindly pursuing supposed solutions without ever giving a thought to what they will really cost or what new problems they will create. And I’m not for financially self-interested government officials telling us we have to ‘press the accelerator’ on the green energy transition when the numbers obviously don’t add up. I’m not for the inmates running the asylum. Take your romanticism and shove it! Get real and keep your hands off my thermostat and my life. Kapish?
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-09-02 10:52:132022-09-02 10:52:13Romancing The All Electric Vehicle
We have been warning that subsidizing and mandating the use of green energy and eliminating all fossil fuels is going a wrong and dangerous direction for America.
We have been proven right because of the warm summer of August 2022.
We have argued that using all forms of energy effectively and efficiently provides cheap and reliable power to America’s economy and Americans. This includes the use of nuclear, coal, natural gas, oil, hydroelectric fuels. These sources of cheap and reliable power sources are critical in fueling the American economy, our homes, businesses, farms and our nation.
America is facing a warm summer, which is a naturally occurring cycle. You know: Summer, Fall, Winter and Spring.
A warm summer shouldn’t be a threat to our electrical grid system but it is.
A long, intense wave of excessive heat is hitting much of the Western United States for the next week.
[ … ]
Across California, temperatures are expected to be more than 10 degrees above normal, warns the organization that manages the flow of much of the state’s electricity.
“During a Flex Alert, consumers are urged to reduce energy use from 4-9 p.m. when the system is most stressed because demand for electricity remains high and there is less solar energy available,” the organization said. “The top three conservation actions are to set thermostats to 78 degrees or higher, avoid using large appliances and charging electric vehicles, and turn off unnecessary lights.”
Lowering the strain on the grid will help hold off more drastic measures, the organization said, including the possibility of rotating blackouts. [Emphasis added]
Currently, as Dr. Mills points out oil, natural gas and coal provide 84% of all the worlds energy.
Watch this May 28th, 2022 video published in NewsVoice.se video What Impact do Wind Turbines have on the Environment and our Health?Aga Wilson speaks to Alexander Pohl, a former investor an insider, and engineer. Aga and Alexander talk about the impact that wind turbines have on nature and our health. Are they really effective and why are they being pushed so aggressively? They get into the United Nations development goals and the upcoming 50+ meeting in Stockholm that has not been noticed by mainstream media.
Alexander predicts the green world order and what that may implicate in the near future.
With heatwaves being reported worldwide, leading to wildfires and other environmental concerns, at least one energy sector is getting attention for its major producing potential – solar power. But with solar panels collecting energy from the sun’s radiation, the world’s overheating may (unexpectedly) be of little benefit to solar power production.
[ … ]
As the world heats up, people may think that more sun will bring more solar energy, even if it has been negative for many other reasons. But soaring temperatures may be hindering solar power production as solar panels work optimally at around 25oC and start becoming less efficient when the heat goes above this. And even if the heat does not hamper solar production, it is also doing little to help it.
[ … ]
Of course, when there’s sun there’s solar power. But because of the way solar panels work, they become slightly less efficient, by around 0.5 percent, for any degree over or under 25oC.This means that peak production periods in much of the world often happen in cooler spring months rather than during the summer.
Solar power becomes less efficient as the temperature rises. I a heat wave, as is being experienced today in California this inefficiency had lead to Flex Alerts in California. This is expected but something that most people who go green either weren’t told and don’t know are were told and don’t care.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-09-01 11:51:252022-09-01 11:51:25Why California’s Green Power Grid Is Collapsing
CFACT’s @Gabriella Hoffman traverses the Grand Canyon State, exploring Agua Fria national monument, Horseshoe Bend, and of course, the Grand Canyon. Along the way, she talks to various stakeholders giving their take on whether Arizona needs more national monuments, or is the federal government mismanaging what they already have? Find out on the tenth installment of Conservation Nation!
The Left loves to preach an environmental message of doom and gloom – and their solution is always more government control.
You and I know that taxing and regulating something to death doesn’t make it better. As Ronald Reagan famously quipped about the government’s thinking: “If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.”
That doesn’t work for the economy, and it doesn’t work for our environment.
That’s why CFACT teamed up with Gabriella Hoffman to sponsor a YouTube series called Conservation Nation. Rather than lecturing you and making you feel guilty about your environmental sins, Conservation Nation showcases real conservation and stewardship work being done by people all over America.
In the most recent installment of this series, Hoffman travels to Arizona, the Grand Canyon State, to visit Agua Fria National Monument, Horseshoe Bend, and of course, the Grand Canyon. While road tripping from place to place, Hoffman speaks with various stakeholders about the controversial issue of national monuments.
While many in government and the media claim we need more and more national monument designations to preserve our lands, those who live in and hunt and use these lands every day say just slapping a national monument designation on something can cause way more problems than it solves.
Check out the new episode, share it with a friend, and let’s vicariously go on a road trip through the Grand Canyon State together!
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-09-01 10:51:582022-09-01 10:51:58Conservation Nation: Motoring through the Grand Canyon State
“No one is in charge” of protecting America’s electrical grid, Biden Homeland Security Advisor Dr. Liz Sherwood-Randall told CBS News’ 60 Minutes, during a recent short segment regarding the vulnerability of America’s most critical of critical infrastructures. Sherwood-Randall added that the federal government has no ability to mandate utility companies implement security improvements to the national electric grid.
One of the most troubling aspects of the 60 Minutes segment is that it only scratches the surface of the grid’s vulnerabilities. In reality, the U.S. government has known about these vulnerabilities for more than five decades. The government’s own reports highlighted the cyber insecurity of the critical electric infrastructure since at least 2003; geomagnetic disturbance (GMD) threats since at least 1990; the vulnerability of the electric grid to physical threats since at least 1981; and the danger posed by electromagnetic pulse (EMP) threats since at least 1972.
Indeed, the CBS News segment was nearly identical to a previous version which aired exactly six months prior, in February, and featured an expose on the professional assault on a major electrical substation near San Jose that nearly blacked out Silicon Valley, San Francisco in 2013.
Despite consistent recommendations to the Biden Administration and to Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm and her advisory board, the White House appears to have done nothing to remedy this glaring problem during the six months that have passed between CBS’ two episodes.
If anything, the Administration has put the electric grid at greater risk over the past two years. On his first day in office, Biden suspended Executive Order 13920 (securing the U.S. bulk-power system) which declared “a national emergency with respect to the threat to the United States bulk power system,” and warned “that foreign adversaries are increasingly creating and exploiting vulnerabilities in the United States bulk-power system.”
President Trump issued E.O. 13920 in response to the discovery in 2019 of hardware back doors built into Chinese-made transformers that are critical to the grid’s operations. According to Latham Saddler, the former Director of Intelligence Programs at the National Security Council in Trump Administration, “they found hardware that was put into that that had the ability for somebody in China to switch it off.”
One of the experts featured in the 60 Minutes episodes was retired U.S. Army Command Sergeant Major Michael Mabee, who has researched and documented the threat posed by Chinese-manufactured transformers. Mabee has found more than 300 Chinese transformers in the U.S. grid as of last August and the reversal of E.O. 13920 guarantees many more are on the way. Hopefully, CBS will have the courage to air a future segment highlighting this problem.
E.O 13920 was intended to remedy supply chain vulnerabilities because regulators for the bulk power system – The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) and the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) –refuse to create or enforce effective regulations with respect to the supply chain and cybersecurity.
Ultimately, neither the government nor the utility industry will accept responsibility for fixing vulnerabilities to the grid until they get the sense that the American people demand it. For example, government and industry forced wind and solar generation upon the grid based on an assumption that these are good for the environment and that Americans want more “clean” power generation. The perception that Americans demand “clean energy” created an environment where policymakers felt compelled to spend taxpayer and ratepayer monies to massively subsidize these forms of power generation.
Currently, there is very little demand by the American people to secure the grid due to an overall
lack of awareness about the its vulnerabilities or the reasons these weaknesses persist – namely effective lobbying by the utility industry to avoid government regulation.
For this reason, two film-makers have set out to shine light on this glaring issue. David Womick is producing The Black Sky Event docuseries, featuring short but thorough segments on each of the threat vectors to the grid.
David Tice recently launched “Grid Down, Power Up”, narrated by actor Dennis Quaid and gives viewers the ability to “participate” by sharing the film with others and by taking action to contact the grid’s regulators and our elected officials.
Fortunately, this is a fixable problem and states don’t have to wait for Washington. But not even state or local leaders will act if they don’t recognize the gravity of the problem. Therefore, it’s up to the people – citizens across the nation – to get smart on the issue and get involved.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-08-30 19:51:592022-08-30 19:51:5960 Minutes Highlights Vulnerabilities of the Electric Grid and Biden Administration Inaction
Bonner R. Cohen, Ph. D., is a senior policy analyst with CFACT, where he focuses on natural resources, energy, property rights, and geopolitical developments. Articles by Dr. Cohen have appeared in The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Investor’s Business Daily, The New York Post, The Washington Examiner, The Washington Times, The Hill, The Epoch Times, The Philadelphia Inquirer, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Miami Herald, and dozens of other newspapers around the country. He has been interviewed on Fox News, Fox Business Network, CNN, NBC News, NPR, BBC, BBC Worldwide Television, N24 (German-language news network), and scores of radio stations in the U.S. and Canada. He has testified before the U.S. Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, the U.S. Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, the U.S. House Judiciary Committee, and the U.S. House Natural Resources Committee. Dr. Cohen has addressed conferences in the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, and Bangladesh. He has a B.A. from the University of Georgia and a Ph. D. – summa cum laude – from the University of Munich.
CFACT Senior Science Analyst Jay Lehr has authored more than 1,000 magazine and journal articles and 36 books. Jay’s new book A Hitchhikers Journey Through Climate Change written with Teri Ciccone is now available on Kindle and Amazon.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-08-28 16:51:332022-08-28 16:51:33What Is Really Behind The Climate Agenda?
California instituted a new regulation on Thursday that will ban the sale of gas-powered vehicles by 2035; the rule, which was permitted by the Biden administration, could accelerate the nationwide transition to electric cars.
“I don’t think Congress gave that authority to California, specifically to set their own standards for greenhouse gases,” former Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Andrew Wheeler told the Daily Caller News Foundation.
“Blue states will follow California’s lead and hand manufacturers a mandate to make only EVs, regardless of what is economically or physically possible,” Steve Milloy, a member of former President Donald Trump’s EPA transition team, told the DCNF.
California has passed a new regulation that will ban the sale of gas-powered vehicles; the new emissions rule, which was permitted by the Biden administration, will have wide-ranging effects beyond California and could accelerate the nationwide transition to electric cars.
California’s Air Resources Board (CARB) finalized a rule Thursday that will outlaw the sale of gas-fueled cars by 2035. The law may push an increasing number of states to adopt similar rules and force Americans to exclusively buy electric vehicles (EVs) as numerous Democrat-run states such as New York, Massachusetts and Maryland routinely adopt California’s “clean car” standards, according to data from the Maryland Department of the Environment.
President Joe Biden’s Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) restored California’s Clean Air Act waiver in March, which gave the state legal authority to set its strict vehicle emissions standards, according to a press release. The Trump administration formally revoked the waiver in September 2019, stating that California did not need specific emissions standards as the environmental problems caused by emissions were not unique to the state.
“During the Trump administration, we tried to codify and articulate that California did not have the authority to set greenhouse gas standards,” former EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “I don’t think Congress gave that authority to California, specifically to set their own standards for greenhouse gases.”
Furthermore, 17 Republican attorneys general filed a lawsuit in May against the EPA after it reinstated California’s waiver, according to legal filings.
“This leaves California with a slice of its sovereign authority that Congress withdraws from every other state,” West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey told the DCNF about the EPA’s ruling. “The EPA cannot selectively waive the Act’s preemption for California alone because that favoritism violates the states’ equal sovereignty.”
Moreover, the attorneys general argue that California’s waiver puts a “burden of compliance on auto-manufacturers” as automakers will have to cater to both California’s new rules and the mainline federal regulations, according to legal documents.
The state’s ban will require 100% of new cars sold in California, the country’s largest auto market, to be free of fossil fuel emissions by 2035. Interim targets also require 35% of vehicles sold in the state by 2026 to produce zero emissions, rising to 68% by 2030.
“It’s 100% by 2035, but it’s 35% by 2026, California has between 11% and 13% EVs as its total share of cars,” Wheeler said. “It’s unrealistic … they can’t get to 35% EVs by 2026 let alone 68% by 2030.”
California hopes to enforce this rule through a mandate which could penalize automakers up to $20,000 per vehicle if they fail to meet the state’s sales quotas, a CARB spokesman told the DCNF.
“The California ban represents an irresponsible and likely illegal approach to rulemaking, given the highly integrated interstate nature of the auto industry, one national standard is extremely important,” Mandy Gunasekara, former chief of staff of the EPA, told the DCNF. “California is attempting to create a legally dubious workaround where vehicle standards are set by liberal politics instead of technical realities.”
The 14 Democrat-led states, including California, make up roughly a third of the U.S. auto market, according to NPR.
“Blue states will follow California’s lead and hand manufacturers a mandate to make only EVs, regardless of what is economically or physically possible,” Steve Milloy, a member of former President Donald Trump’s EPA transition team, told the DCNF. “You’re going to force people to buy a more expensive car that will last half the time.”
The average price of a new electric car is approximately $66,000, according to Kelley Blue Book.
“If automakers are only making electric cars because of the rule and government subsidies, then there won’t be any gas cars on the market,” Milloy stated.
The EPA also reinstated and enhanced an Obama-era federal fuel regulation in December 2021 that is less strict than California’s proposed standards, stating that passenger cars must have a fuel economy of 55 mpg by 2026, up from the current 40 mpg, according to an EPA regulatory update. Both the California and government regulations will support the Biden administration’s aggressive climate agenda, which seeks to phase out fossil fuels and promote “clean energy” technologies.
“It’s being done for PR purposes … the electricity infrastructure isn’t there and it’s not anticipated to be there,” Wheeler stated. “Nobody in the electricity industry will tell you that they will be able to power a state fleet consisting of only EVs by 2035.”
The average number of EVs sold in the U.S. was roughly 607,000 in 2021 while the total number of cars purchased was about 3.34 million, according to Statista.
Newsom’s office and the EPA did not immediately respond to the DCNF’s request for comment.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-08-28 16:51:322022-08-28 16:51:32Biden Admin Handed California The Power To Mandate EVs Nationwide
“I want to testify today about what I believe is a planetary emergency—a crisis that threatens the survival of our civilization and the habitability of the Earth. Just six weeks ago, the scientific community, in its strongest statement to date, confirmed that the evidence of warming is `unequivocal.’ Global warming is real and human activity is the main cause. The consequences are mainly negative and headed toward catastrophic, unless we act.” — Statement of Hon. Al Gore, Former Vice President of the United States and Former Senator from the State of Tennessee on March 21, 2007.
Fifteen years and six months ago Al Gore appeared before the Committee on Environment and Public Works and said if something is not done immediately then the “survival of our civilization and the habitability of the Earth” are unequivocally headed towards a “catastrophe.”
This struck fear into the hearts and minds of many Americans and began the concerted effort by environmentalists to “go green.” Now we have the Biden—Manchin Green New Deal as the law of the land.
QUESTION: How is that working out to save our civilization and the habitability of the earth?
ANSWER: It doesn’t work but cost a lot to implement!
We recently reported on how the Biden administration sent federal agents to a farm in Bird-in-Hand, Pennsylvania to demand all green farmer Amos Miller stop selling his all green, organic, healthy foods to his 4,000+ customers.
We reported,
Amos Miller has been farming for 25 years. No electricity, no fertilizer, and no gasoline. He has tremendously impressive crop yields using only the only the oldest of methods, totally organic.
The U.S. Marshall Service raided this farm under the guise of ‘not using GMO drugs’ to raise their vegetables and livestock.
Isn’t what going green means? Don’t environmentalists, conservationists, people who want to save the planet want? How about those who want to eat healthy foods produced without steroids and other drugs or using genetic engineering?
Watch: Will organic Amish farmer bend a knee to the government?
Green New Deal—Costs a Lot of Green
As Biden’s armed agents attack a farmer in Bird-in-Hand, Pennsylvania legislators in California, i.e. political fanatics of going green, have decided to stop all sales of new internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles.
On Thursday [August 25th, 2022], California’s Air Resources Board voted in favor of banning the sale of new gas-powered vehicles by 2035. All new cars, trucks, and SUVs will be required to run on electricity (32% of which is presently generated by natural gas in the state) or hydrogen. This comes as a result of Democrat Gov. Gavin Newsom’s 2020 directive prompting regulators to pursue such a policy. It is unclear, however, whether the state’s electric grid will be prepared for the transition.
[ … ]
As of January 2022, California had 837,887 light-duty electric vehicles (i.e. battery electric, plug-in hybrid, and fuel cell). It presently has 1,943 medium- and heavy-duty electric vehicles. The state plans to have 1.5 million zero-emissions vehicles on its roads by 2025 and at least 5 million on its roads and by 2030.
Senior energy analyst at the Union of Concerned Scientists Mike Jacobs told Yahoo Finance, “The use of an electric vehicle is like adding one or two air conditioners to your residence in terms of its energy increase.”
According to Brouwer, “If we try to move in this direction and only use battery electric vehicles, we will fail. … The grid cannot charge every single transportation application.” He recommended that California also invest in fuel-cell electric vehicles.
Whether it be a fuel-cell or a battery electric vehicle, investment in the grid is believed to be necessary to accommodate the charge needed for that additional “air conditioner.”
The Bottom Line
Going green is based upon the myth that mankind must suffer in order to save the planet.
Watch as Dan Ball and Alex Epstein explain what California’s vote to ban gasoline driven car sales by 2035 really means for we the people.
Californians are already facing an energy crisis and it will only get worse as more and more all electric vehicles are sold.
The cost of going green is shelling out more green by government and individuals. Going green is killing Californians and the Biden—Manchin Green New Deal will destroy our economy.
This is government fraud, waste and abuse from the California State House to the White House.
Gird your loins for more and more green to be taken out of your pockets to further the go green myths.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-08-28 16:51:312022-08-28 16:51:31FRAUD, WASTE AND ABUSE: Joe Biden and Joe Manchin’s Green New Deal—Costs a Lot of Green
“I didn’t know that, according to Black Lives Matter, the climate discriminates against blacks! Is the climate now a ‘white supremacist global movement’ created by God?” — Dr. Rich Swier
Here we see the ‘intersectionality’ of every loathsome fraud and ludicrous hoax the left has rammed down the throat of the American people. Once a lie, a fraud, is accepted as ‘conventional wisdom’, the most absurd, irrational, and preposterous edicts and policies will follow.
Watch your taxpayer dollars flow into the race hustlers’ coffers.
The Movement for Black Lives launched a new climate change initiative Thursday, uniting more than 200 Black environmental leaders and organizations nationwide who have pledged to find equitable climate solutions centering on Black Americans and communities.
The Black Hive initiative builds on the movement’s 2021 Red, Black, and Green New Deal and reintroduces its Black Climate Mandate that outlines the urgency for a Black climate agenda and investment in equitable strategies that protect Black Americans specifically.
The announcement, first shared with The Associated Press, comes in the wake of a Supreme Court decision limiting the Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from power plants and the recent passage of the Inflation Reduction Act.
[….]
“The climate crisis is happening because of corporate greed, government negligence, the divestment of solutions and the investment into the harmful institutions like the fossil fuel industry, that are harming our people,” said Valencia Gunder, national co-lead of The Black Hive. “It’s time for America to address the anti-Black racism that happens here.”
Gunder said she’s already seen the impacts of climate change in her home state of Florida. She’s been doing climate justice work in communities, focusing on the impacts of rising seas, residential displacement, and housing and food security issues. She said farmers in South Florida have told her they’ve started to see saltwater intrusion damaging crops.
“The climate crisis is probably the most important issue that we can work on,” Gunder said. “If we do not hurry up and pay attention and get to resiliency, I believe that we’re going to start seeing more destruction, more harm or death, more illness.”
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-08-27 15:51:312022-08-27 15:51:31NEWEST CLIMATE MYTH: Black Lives Movement Launches ‘Climate Initiative’ Centering on Black Americans
Greta Thunberg first came into the public light in 2018 when she started a school strike on climate in front of the Swedish parliament.
March 15th saw enthusiastic worldwide school student protests inspired by passionate appeals from 16-year-old Swedish school girl-turned-global-leader Greta Thunberg. Thunberg first came into the public light last year when she started a school strike on climate in front of the Swedish parliament. She rose to worldwide fame in January when she addressed the audience at the World Economic Forum in Davos.
Predictably, a lot of the reactions from those who are skeptical of climate change alarmism seem to focus on Thunberg’s age. Even Bjorn Lomborg seems to have alluded to her in his remark about how the predominant narrative about climate change makes children scared.
I disagree with this perspective. I believe that 16-year-olds have as much intellectual capacity as legal adults to understand the issues related to climate change and the potential measures that could be taken to mitigate it. However, if 16-year-olds desire to seriously contribute to important political debates, they should, like anyone else, do it without engaging in demagoguery and scaremongering.
It is here that Greta Thunberg—in spite of all her genuine sincerity and passion—has failed spectacularly and made the legions of her fans, as well as people who may face the consequences of the panicky measures she advocates, a great disservice.
False Sense of Urgency
To get a taste of the content of Thunberg’s preachings, let us consider her recent remarks to European Union President Jean-Claude Juncker:
We have to focus every inch of our being on climate change. Because if we fail to do so then all our achievements and progress have been for nothing. […] According to the IPCC report, we are about 11 years away from being in the position where we set off an irreversible chain reaction beyond human control. To avoid that, unprecedented changes in all aspects of society need to have taken place within this coming decade.
There is no place for nuance here, no trace of uncertainty, no appeal to actual facts or pragmatics of politics—only the demand for total commitment and sacrifice because the absolute urgency of our predicament is supposed to be self-evident since none other than IPCC purportedly said so.
I would wager that it would be pointless to ask Thunberg any serious questions about the actual science underlying the climate change issue—to ask her how much the Earth has warmed so far since 1979 compared to computer model predictions; that the bulk of the recent warming occurred during the El Niño stages of the ENSO climate oscillation; or whether she is aware that the doubling of CO2 can only in itself cause only about 1°C of warming and that to postulate alarmist scenarios one needs to postulate uncertain positive feedbacks, whereas, in reality, the net feedback may be zero or negative; that a lot more people die from cold temperatures than from hot ones and that it is not extreme cold temperatures that are the most deadly; that increased CO2 concentrations are good for plant life, and so on.
Let us focus on an easier issue and ask whether the latest IPCC report even in the (as usual) distorted summary for policymakers says anything remotely similar to Thunberg’s 11-years-left-till-Apocalypse-unless-we-act claim. Unsurprisingly, the summary—biased as it is in favor of alarm—says no such thing. Thunberg seems to be wildly misinterpreting the statement on page 6 of the summary that “global warming is likely to reach 1.5°C between 2030 (till which date 11 years remain) and 2052 if it continues to increase at the current rate.” There is no implication in the summary that this extent of warming may cause catastrophic planetary consequences.
Even if we take what Thunberg claims about the inevitable impacts of an unaddressed climate change at face value, she does not appear to be cognizant that the only viable way of reducing CO2 emissions is switching to nuclear power. Writing for that famous den of climate change deniers, MIT Technology Review, last July, James Temple cited an estimate that if even California, with its abundant sunshine, were to switch to 100 percent renewables, that would make the price per megawatt-hour skyrocket to $1612.
Instead, we hear from her the usual platitudes that massive emissions reductions should be made immediately using renewable energy sources. Added to this are calls to abandon the focus on competition and focus on equity as if that clearly had anything to do with climate change or handling it.
Fanaticism Is Not Heroism
We must also reflect on the fact that Thunberg is considered by many people to be a global hero. She has even been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. But is it really brave or enlightened to advocate a cause that has long enjoyed the status of conventional wisdom? To which one can only sadly hear widely disseminated public objections from the likes of President Trump, who is admittedly as clueless on the issue as the most religious alarmists are and who does not care about the outrage his remarks can cause?
It is sad if this is what is taken for Nobel-worthy heroism these days. Countless Venezuelans, for instance, risk their freedom, health, and lives every day, protesting against the Maduro regime that has lost any semblance of connection to reality and plunged the formerly richest country in Latin America into the literal darkness of the pre-industrial age. It is people like them who should be invited to global fora to tell their tale. Them, not a girl from one of the richest and most comfortable countries on Earth who is in too much of a panic because she cannot make herself actually read up on the actual science about climate change and the real state of the potential solutions.
The real problem with the climate change activist sensation Greta Thunberg is not that she is 16 years old. Rather, it is that she is a clueless fanatic who is considered brave and enlightened for promoting a cause that almost everyone agrees with without any study or reflection. And it is the duty of anyone who does not want clueless fanaticism to determine policies affecting billions to call it out as such.
Daniil Gorbatenko is a free-market economist living in Aix-en-Provence, France. He obtained his PhD in economics from Aix-Marseille University in 2018.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-08-25 14:51:152022-08-25 14:51:15The Real Problem with Greta Thunberg Is Not Her Age
E. Calvin Beisner, Ph.D., Founder and National Spokesman of The Cornwall Alliance for the Stewardship of Creation, www.CornwallAlliance.org, author of over a dozen books and over a thousand articles, former associate professor of historical theology and social ethics at Knox Theological Seminary and of interdisciplinary studies at Covenant College.
Jeanette Ward for Wyoming came to Casper, Wyoming a political refugee from fascist Illinois. She served there (2015-2019) as a School Board Member on the largest elected school board in Illinois (U-46), she defended parental rights against the transgender mob, politically biased textbooks, and race hustlers. She publicly exposed a fellow board member who said the American Flag was “nothing more than toilet paper” to her and who said Jeanette was the “21st century brand of the KKK”. Jeanette ran for State Senate in Illinois in 2020 and learned first-hand how the left converted the Covid scam into a weapon for institutionalized election theft. Losing a previously +9 Republican district by about 1700 votes, Jeanette lost VBM (vote by mail) in just ONE of the four counties in my district by roughly 8000 votes, where the clerk for that county didn’t bother to verify any of those VBM signatures. The straw that broke the camel’s back for her family was when one of her family’s high-school daughters was threatened with out-of-school suspension for not wearing a mask. She’s PRO-LIFE, PRO-FREEDOM, PRO-2nd AMENDMENT, and PRO-FAMILY.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-08-24 14:52:402022-08-24 14:52:40PODCAST: Misleading Infographic about Climate Change and Wildfires
Europe’s attempted transition to so-called “Green” energy has been a massive fail.
Wind and solar have proven too inefficient and unreliable to meet the continent’s needs, leaving it dependent on fossil fuels from, of all places, Russia.
Now, with Russian supplies partially cut off, Europe faces what French President Macron called, “the end of abundance.”
The folks handling President Biden’s energy policy have learned nothing. They remain fully determined to force America into the same energy mistakes Europe made.
Meanwhile, autocracies such as China and Russia, and emerging economies such as India, are basing their energy economies on the efficiency of fossil fuels and nuclear. China’s greenhouse gas emissions now exceed those of the entire rest of the developed world, COMBINED!
CFACT’s team of energy scholars have done their usual thorough and compelling job of exposing the Left’s energy incompetence in a series of fact-filled articles at CFACT.org.
David Wojick delved deep into the inherent flaws in the so-called “Inflation Reduction Act” (IRA), saying: “The Democrats writing the IRA decided that since tax credit subsidies do a good job of promoting renewables and electric vehicles, they should do more. They should promote things like union wages, mining and manufacturing, which have nothing to do with climate.
“Think of it as social engineering squared. In the vernacular this is called ‘mission creep.’ A program designed to do one thing tries to do something very different, often unsuccessfully.”
Bonner Cohen, meanwhile, exposed the roadblocks popping up in local communities for Biden’s “incredible transition” to renewables. Cohen writes: “President Biden’s ‘incredible transition’ to what he assures us will be a clean-energy future is not going down well with residents and public officials in south-central Idaho, who are up in arms over a proposed wind power project that will have as many as 400 giant turbines marring the picturesque countryside.
“Commissioners in Lincoln and Minidoka counties on August 15th independently adopted resolutions opposing the project that would go up on 73,000 acres of federal land under the jurisdiction of the Interior Department’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM).”
The free world’s energy economy is too important to subjugate it to Left-wing groupthink.
The Climate Intelligence CLINTEL.com website states:
Climate science should be less political, while climate policies should be more scientific. In particular, scientists should emphasize that their modeling output is not the result of magic: computer models are human-made. What comes out is fully dependent on what theoreticians and programmers have put in: hypotheses, assumptions, relationships, parameterizations, stability constraints, etc. Unfortunately, in mainstream climate science most of this input is undeclared.
To believe the outcome of a climate model is to believe what the model makers have put in. This is precisely the problem of today’s climate discussion to which climate models are central. Climate science has degenerated into a discussion based on beliefs, not on sound self-critical science. We should free ourselves from the naïve belief in immature climate models. In future, climate research must give significantly more emphasis to empirical science.
There is no climate emergency
A global network of over 1100 scientists and professionals has prepared this urgent message. Climate science should be less political, while climate policies should be more scientific. Scientists should openly address uncertainties and exaggerations in their predictions of global warming, while politicians should dispassionately count the real costs as well as the imagined benefits of their policy measures.
Natural as well as anthropogenic factors cause warming
The geological archive reveals that Earth’s climate has varied as long as the planet has existed, with natural cold and warm phases. The Little Ice Age ended as recently as 1850. Therefore, it is no surprise that we now are experiencing a period of warming.
Warming is far slower than predicted
The world has warmed significantly less than predicted by IPCC on the basis of modeled anthropogenic forcing. The gap between the real world and the modeled world tells us that we are far from understanding climate change.
Climate policy relies on inadequate models
Climate models have many shortcomings and are not remotely plausible as global policy tools. They blow up the effect of greenhouse gases such as CO2. In addition, they ignore the fact that enriching the atmosphere with CO2 is beneficial.
CO2 is plant food, the basis of all life on Earth
CO2 is not a pollutant. It is essential to all life on Earth. Photosynthesis is a blessing. More CO2 is beneficial for nature, greening the Earth: additional CO2 in the air has promoted growth in global plant biomass. It is also good for agriculture, increasing the yields of crops worldwide.
Global warming has not increased natural disasters
There is no statistical evidence that global warming is intensifying hurricanes, floods, droughts and suchlike natural disasters, or making them more frequent. However, there is ample evidence that CO2-mitigation measures are as damaging as they are costly.
Climate policy must respect scientific and economic realities
There is no climate emergency. Therefore, there is no cause for panic and alarm. We strongly oppose the harmful and unrealistic net-zero CO2 policy proposed for 2050. If better approaches emerge, and they certainly will, we have ample time to reflect and re-adapt. The aim of global policy should be ‘prosperity for all’ by providing reliable and affordable energy at all times. In a prosperous society men and women are well educated, birthrates are low and people care about their environment.
Epilogue
The World Climate Declaration (WCD) has brought a large variety of competent scientists together from all over the world*. The considerable knowledge and experience of this group is indispensable in reaching a balanced, dispassionate and competent view of climate change.
From now onward the group is going to function as “Global Climate Intelligence Group”. The CLINTEL Group will give solicited and unsolicited advice on climate change and energy transition to governments and companies worldwide.
* It is not the number of experts but the quality of arguments that counts.
NOBEL LAUREATE PROFESSOR IVAR GIAEVER NORWAY/USA PROFESSOR GUUS BERKHOUT / THE NETHERLANDS DR. CORNELIS LE PAIR / THE NETHERLANDS PROFESSOR REYNALD DU BERGER / FRENCH SPEAKING CANADA BARRY BRILL / NEW ZEALAND VIV FORBES / AUSTRALIA PROFESSOR JEFFREY FOSS † / ENGLISH SPEAKING CANADA JENS MORTON HANSEN / DENMARK PROFESSOR LÁSZIÓ SZARKA / HUNGARY PROFESSOR SEOK SOON PARK / SOUTH KOREA PROFESSOR JAN-ERIK SOLHEIM / NORWAY SOTIRIS KAMENOPOULOS / GREECE FERDINAND MEEUS / DUTCH SPEAKING BELGIUM PROFESSOR RICHARD LINDZEN / USA HENRI A. MASSON / FRENCH SPEAKING BELGIUM PROFESSOR INGEMAR NORDIN / SWEDEN JIM O’BRIEN / REPUBLIC OF IRELAND PROFESSOR IAN PLIMER / AUSTRALIA DOUGLAS POLLOCK / CHILE DR. BLANCA PARGA LANDA / SPAIN PROFESSOR ALBERTO PRESTININZI / ITALY PROFESSOR BENOÎT RITTAUD / FRANCE DR. THIAGO MAIA / BRAZIL PROFESSOR FRITZ VAHRENHOLT / GERMANY THE VISCOUNT MONCKTON OF BRENCHLEY / UNITED KINGDOM DUŠAN BIŽIĆ / CROATIA, BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA, SERBIA AND MONTE NEGRO
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-08-19 17:51:422022-08-19 17:51:42WORLD CLIMATE DELCARATION: There Is No Climate Emergency!
It’s been a bad stretch for the phony climate change narrative, lately.
A new report shows 96 percent of NOAA’s temperature stations don’t meet the agency’s own placement standards. They are deliberately placed near urban areas in order to overstate average temperatures, leading to the now-routine bogus claims we’re having the ‘hottest year on record’.
Someone pointed out the inconvenient truth that NASA has recognized over the years that the biggest factor affecting temperature and climate is the sun, specifically, variations in the earth’s solar orbit. Fly too close to the sun, and things get a little warmer, whodathunkit.
Those disappearing coral reefs in Australia? Well, guess what – they’ve rebounded to record levels. Environmentalists routinely tell you the sky is falling and the coral reefs are disappearing, but neither is true.
The climatistas prattle on about extreme weather events, but the fact of the matter is that the number of climate-related deaths has dropped by 99 percent since 1920 and is now approaching zero – except for storm chasers, of course. Oh, by the way, the number of tropical cyclones has dropped 13 percent since pre-industrial times, a new study found. Sorry to rain on your anti-growth parade.
The climate change crowd is deceiving you when it claims extreme weather is increasing and climate change is to blame. It turns out that the U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change – IPCC – recently changed its methods, producing an increase in extreme weather events on paper but not in the real world. “(T)he latest IPCC report has introduced novel ‘attribution’ statistics and now insists that things are getting worse. It’s yet another case of scientists trying to scare the public into compliance,” a recent paper said.
So-called experts say sea levels are rising, but photos show they’re not, and the satellite data underlying the sea level rise claim has not been vetted for satellite altitude which makes all the difference in the method used.
Greenies hyperventilate about the water level at Lake Powell being down 94 feet since 2000 and blame evaporation from hotter temperatures, but it is government policies that produced the drop. The original plan was to hold back water in wet years to make up for dry years, but the government now releases more water than originally planned in wet years, leaving no cushion. You can’t blame that on climate change – or maybe you can, if you’re dishonest.
Similarly, it is government policies that are producing the increasing wildfire problem in the West. Litigation under environmental laws and environmental reviews have delayed thinning and controlled burns. Some controlled burns are being done, stupidly, in windy conditions. So look to forest management, not climate change, if you’re sincerely interested in finding the culprit instead of just demagoguing the issue.
California and Germany are finding out that alternative energy isn’t all sunshine and lollipops. Faced with electricity shortages from pursuing green energy policies, both are moving toward increasing reliance on their fossil fuel and nuclear power plants.
If you’re pinning your hopes the planet won’t burn up on the new climate bill Joe Biden is signing today, you might want to reconsider. If you use U.N. climate models and everything in the bill goes swimmingly, the average temperature of the earth in the year 2100 will be 61.972 degrees instead of 62.0 degrees, best case. I’m so relieved, and I’m so glad we’re spending $739 billion dollars to achieve a drop of 0.028 degrees. Lollipop, anyone?
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-08-16 15:51:182022-08-16 15:51:18Driving Stakes in the Heart of the Phony Climate Change Narrative
The Green Movement is a total assault on capitalism, freedom, and our entire way of life by the Far Left global elites. It’s implementation will cause significant economic decline in countries throughout the world. Furthermore, if this movement is not stopped, you can expect massive instability in your cities and your towns, and your communities in the years ahead.
“An unpleasant surprise to the ingenuity and resilience of the international Far Left in its environmental assault upon capitalism has been the venality, cowardice, and invertebrate tactical stupidity of much of the corporate world.” – @ConradMBlackhttps://t.co/vSryieyV4N
Germany’s economy will lose more than 260 billion euros ($265 billion) in added value by 2030 due to the Ukraine war and high energy prices, spelling negative effects for the labor market, according to a study by the Institute for Employment Research (IAB).
In comparison with expectations for a peaceful Europe, Germany’s price-adjusted gross domestic product (GDP) will be 1.7% lower next year and there will be about 240,000 fewer people in employment, said the study published on Tuesday.
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-08-15 13:52:172022-08-15 13:52:17Germany To Lose $265 billion By 2030 Due To Green Energy Hoax
The so-called ‘Inflation Reduction Act’ passed by the Senate contains $250 billion in Energy Department loan guarantees for, among other things, renewable energy. This should scare the bejeezus out of anybody who remembers the Solyndra green energy scandal during the Obama administration overseen by none other than Joe Biden.
The scandal resulted in $2.25 billion taxpayer dollars lost and a hundred criminal investigations. The centerpiece of the scandal was the disastrous $535 million loan guarantee to Solyndra which went bankrupt. Many other companies went bankrupt as well, like electric car maker Fisker Automotive which received a $529 million dollar loan to build a factory in Delaware, of all places. Hmm, wonder how Delaware got selected. Battery maker A123 went bankrupt after getting $250 million in stimulus money. Then there was the Crescent Dunes thermal solar power plant in Nevada which got almost a billion dollars in federal financing, but never reached its energy output targets, and went bankrupt in 2014.
Strict controls were promised for the loan guarantee program but, instead, we got good old-fashioned graft and corruption dressed up in a shiny new eco-friendly coat. Now we can expect a new round of companies to go bankrupt because they’re ill-conceived and have to turn to government for funding after finding no one in private financing will touch them.
The government loan office is already back in business. In May, the Energy Department announced a $500 million loan guarantee for a hydrogen storage facility in Utah, the first clean energy loan guarantee since 2014. But federal spending on fanciful environmental projects never really stopped. For example, $5.5 billion in funding for electric public transit vehicles was announced in March. Too bad about that electric bus that caught fire and burned up in Connecticut in July. The taxpayers got smoked on that one.
You can already catch whiffs of corruption in federal energy project spending under the Biden administration. A Biden mega-donor got a $500 million government loan to build a solar company in India. The federal agency involved has a history of prioritizing politically connected projects backed by huge political contributors. Joe Biden’s choice to head the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission is all in for Biden’s green energy push and with good reason. He spent years lobbying for a company that is behind an offshore wind farm backed by the administration. A Democrat congressman from Illinois pushed for $273 billion in ‘tax credits for clean energy’ without disclosing his ownership interest in an alternative energy company that stood to benefit from the subsidies.
A top deputy for Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm pushed several policy recommendations from an energy storage industry lobbying group she used to work for. Granholm herself comes from the green energy swamp, being a big investor in a green energy company until ethics rules forced her to sell her stake for a cool $1.6 million profit.
So, what we have here is a new Solyndra Corruption Act handing a bunch of green energy cronies a huge new pile of federal money with which to enrich their friends in the green energy swamp. Expect prior patterns from the Solyndra scandal to hold. Expect more green energy companies to gorge themselves on government dough and go bankrupt. Expect taxpayers to lose billions more, and expect some of the loot to end up in the pockets of Biden cronies. We know this is going to happen and a lot more of our money will go down the drain. The only question is, how much are we going to be scammed out of this time?
https://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.png00DrRichSwier.comhttps://libertyfirst.org/wp-content/uploads/logo_v6_225x110.pngDrRichSwier.com2022-08-10 18:51:332022-08-10 18:51:33Make Solyndra Great Again — Inflation Reduction Act’s $250 Billion for Renewable Energy
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