Biden Admin’s Sweeping New Rules Would Let Green Groups Lease Federal Land Away From Oil, Ranching thumbnail

Biden Admin’s Sweeping New Rules Would Let Green Groups Lease Federal Land Away From Oil, Ranching

/in , , , , , /by

By The Daily Caller

  • The U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) proposed sweeping new rules Thursday that authorize leasing federal land for conservation efforts similar to leases offered for mining, grazing and other projects.
  • While the move was broadly praised by environmental groups, it drew criticism from the Center for Biological Diversity for not going far enough, according to E&E News.
  • “There are so many overlays for conservation on BLM land, some of them in the law and some of them just made up administratively, that a lot of land has already been withdrawn,” Myron Ebell, at the free-market Competitive Enterprise Institute, told the Daily Caller News Foundation. 

The U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) proposed new rules Thursday that would allow public land to be leased for conservation efforts, among other major changes to promote land health.

The proposal would expand land-health standards to the entirety of the 245 million acres managed by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), prioritize the designation of Areas of Critical Environmental Concern (ACEC) and establish a leasing framework for private partners to perform climate restoration and mitigation efforts on public land, according to the DOI. The new rule would make proposed leases for conservation efforts a valid “use” of public land, similar to mining, ranching and other energy projects under the Federal Land Policy Management Act (FLPMA) of 1976, according to the BLM.

“It is our responsibility to use the best tools available to restore wildlife habitat, plan for smart development, and conserve the most important places for the benefit of the generations to come,” DOI Secretary Deb Haaland said in a statement.

Kathleen Sgamma, president of the Western Energy Alliance, an oil trade group, told Reuters she believed that it would be a “stretch” of the FLPMA to introduce conservation leases. This position was echoed by Myron Ebell, director of the Center for Energy and Environment at the free-market Competitive Enterprise Institute, who also argued that the BLM already had significant authority to limit land usage in an interview with the Daily Caller News Foundation.

“There are so many overlays for conservation on BLM land, some of them in the law and some of them just made up administratively, that a lot of land has already been withdrawn … from resource production, recreational access, grazing, timber … a lot of land is already being managed for conservation,” Ebell told the DCNF. He argued that some regions, particularly in the Intermountain West, depend on grazing as a conservation method and that this rule might make it more difficult to get a grazing lease.

“It feels to me like [the proposal] provides a broader authority for the federal government to take more land off the table for productive use, under the guise of conservation,” Jack Spencer, a senior research fellow at the Heritage Foundation’s Center for Energy, Climate and Environment, told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “One of the problems I see with this is that it is clearly a response to the president’s climate agenda.”

President Joe Biden recently drew criticism from environmental groups over his approval of the Willow Project, a massive oil drilling project in Alaska. The administration argued that its hands were tied to halt the project thanks to its initial approval by the Trump administration, and simultaneously designated 13 million acres of Alaskan federal land off-limits to drilling, despite its location in the Natural Petroleum Reserve-Alaska (NPR-A).

Though the BLM move was broadly praised by environmental groups, such as the Natural Resources Defense Council, Pew Charitable Trusts and Defenders of Wildlife, it drew criticism from the Center for Biological Diversity for not going far enough, according to E&E News. Randi Spivak, the organization’s public lands policy director, said the effort was akin to “rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic” and was a “missed opportunity” to handle the extinction and climate issues on public lands.

“The agency’s time would be better spent addressing the root problems of public lands degradation and protecting these treasured places for future generations,” Spivak told the outlet. “Instead of addressing destructive mining, fossil fuel extraction and grazing, this rule basically restates what’s already the law. Major improvements are needed.”

AUTHOR

JOHN HUGH DEMASTRI

Contributor.

RELATED ARTICLE: Biden Interior Secretary Won’t Say If She Prefers Oil From American Over Venezuela

EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

Biden’s World Bank Pick Calls For ‘Trillions’ In Climate Spending thumbnail

Biden’s World Bank Pick Calls For ‘Trillions’ In Climate Spending

/in , , , , , /by

By The Daily Caller

Ajay Banga, the former CEO of Mastercard that President Joe Biden has nominated to head the World Bank, told Axios Wednesday that both the bank and the private sector needed to spend “trillions” to combat both climate change and poverty.

Banga has been aggressively campaigning for the job, meeting with officials from 37 different governments in the past three weeks, Axios reported. The World Bank faces competing pressure from wealthy and developing countries over whether to focus on combating climate change or poverty mitigation, but Banga said he does not view the two goals as inherently opposed to one another.

“I think it’s a fallacious argument that says, either-or,” Banga said to Axios. “I have every intention of focusing the bank and its people on the idea that this is an intertwined challenge.”

The efforts to combat both climate change and poverty would cost “trillions of dollars a year” each, and the private sector would need to be a “constructive part of the solution,” Banga told Axios.

A group of developing nations including Russia, China and Iran signed a letter in February calling for the World Bank to “avoid measures” that might jeopardize its triple-A credit rating, the Financial Times reported. Banga said that the “only way” the World Bank can effectively combat climate change is if it maintains its triple-A rating, according to Axios.

Biden’s decision to nominate Banga, a former Wall Street executive with little background in climate issues, drew significant pushback from some environmentalists, who had been calling for a nominee that would aggressively tackle climate issues.

Banga was nominated after Trump appointee David Malpass — who is married to Daily Caller News Foundation president Adele Malpass — announced he would step down early from his role as the bank’s head on June 30.

AUTHOR

JOHN HUGH DEMASTRI

Contributor.

RELATED ARTICLES:

Major Banks Bend The Knee To Climate Activists, Accelerate Plans To Cut Coal Investments

Senate Votes To Overturn Expansive Biden Water Regulation

Left-Wing Climate Activists Targeted In Massive Email Hacking Campaign: REPORT

‘We Got No Return’: Sen. Rick Scott Rips Commerce Secretary For ‘Social Engineering’ In CHIPS Act

EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

House Passes Republicans’ Signature Energy Reform Bill thumbnail

House Passes Republicans’ Signature Energy Reform Bill

/in , , , , /by

By The Daily Caller

The House of Representatives passed Republicans’ signature energy package, the Lower Energy Costs Act, in a mostly party-line vote Thursday.

The legislation, introduced by House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, includes permitting reform and rolls back several executive orders that limit domestic energy production. Democratic Texas Reps. Vicente Gonzalez and Henry Cuellar, Maine Rep. Jared Golden, and Washington Rep. Marie Glusenkamp Perez voted with 221 Republicans in supporting the package. Pennsylvania Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick was the only Republican to oppose it.

225-204: The House passes the Lower Energy Costs Act, Republicans’ marquee energy bill.

Deemed H.R. 1, signifying its high priority for the House GOP, it would increase domestic fossil fuel production and repeal several climate provisions of the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act. pic.twitter.com/xGT5l5XAh1

— The Recount (@therecount) March 30, 2023

“What a great day this is for American families who have been struggling for too long under the weight of high prices, record-high inflation, all of the problems that President Biden has created, and especially for those people that have been frustrated to so long that President Biden has gone after American energy but yet gone all around the world and begged foreign dictators to get our energy from them,” Scalise said at a press conference held after the bill passed. “This has never been a question of whether or not we have oil or natural gas in the U.S. The question is, ‘where do we get it?’”

The Lower Energy Costs Act, which is not expected to pass the Senate, would resume construction of the Keystone XL pipeline, which Biden blocked on his first day in office. It also includes reforms of the National Environmental Policy Act and the Clean Water Act initially proposed by Democratic West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin in the 117th Congress that would speed up permitting for various projects.

The legislation would also prohibit foreign companies from mining on U.S. soil if those companies have documented histories of human rights violation. That provision is targeted at Chinese entities, many of which employ Uyghur slave labor.

AUTHOR

MICHAEL GINSBERG

Congressional correspondent.

RELATED ARTICLE: Will Democrats Screw Over Joe Manchin?

EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Cry Me an Atmospheric River thumbnail

Cry Me an Atmospheric River

/in , , , , /by

By The Daily Skirmish – Liberato.US

Last week, I began to tell you about the people cashing in on green mania, starting with the beneficiaries of federal money from the ideologically overcommitted Biden administration and green investors who have a vested financial interest in getting you to buy into the phony narrative of climate change.

Today, we pick up with environmental groups which, it has long been reported, are taking money from Russia and China to propagate climate change malarkey.  But the problem starts at home.  A new report documents that environmental groups in Massachusetts have taken over $4 million from wind energy developers which compromises their ability to accurately assess the threats offshore wind projects pose to the endangered North Atlantic Right Whale.

Another extreme funding event occurred when a Democrat-connected nonprofit gave $140,000 to a research firm to produce a study claiming ‘climate change misinformation’ mushroomed on Twitter after Elon Musk took over.  The research firm is the parent company of Fusion GPS which was behind the debunked Steele dossier in the Trump/Russia collusion hoax.  I’m not big on hired gun ‘studies’.

Another recent story shows that Mrs. Steve Jobs and another left-wing billionaire have been bankrolling Climate Imperative, a green energy nonprofit that has been working to ban gas stoves.  Climate Imperative has a billion dollar budget, enough to buy oodles of false messaging about natural gas and give grants to other groups working toward the same end.  Climate Imperative has a Chinese government official on its advisory board, someone who serves in the Chinese legislature and on a party-insider committee.  It is in China’s interest to move the U.S. away from reliable energy sources.

Journalists are also cashing in.  I’ve told you previously about some multi-million dollar climate journalism projects at the Associated Press and elsewhere. [Daily Skirmish – 9/30/22]  There are new details about the $8 million effort which enabled the Associated Press to hire 22 climate reporters.  Green energy investors are behind the push, including big left-wing foundations like the Rockefeller Foundation and the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation whose endowments are heavily invested in green energy companies.  These investors are paying the media to push the climate change narrative to keep their endowments growing.  None of this is disclosed in AP climate stories.

Journalists around the world are getting scholarships to report on biodiversity conferences.  The scholarships come from the Earth Journalism Network which is funded, by among other others – would you look at this: the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation.  Still more grants for climate journalists are available from the Pulitzer Center Rainforest Journalism Fund.  The fund is supported by the Norwegian International Climate and Forest Initiative (NICFI).  Norway is banking on green energy to meet its future energy needs, so it’s all-in on the Paris climate accord and the climate change narrative driving it.

The recent Los Angeles school strike was partly about cashing in on green mania.  The union demanded, among other things, the district adopt a socialist-backed plan to transform schools into ‘green’ social services hubs.  And, oh by the way, teachers should be paid more – more than the $115,000 a year they’re currently getting – to teach ‘climate literacy’ courses, among other things.

States, entire countries and the U.N. also want on board the green gravy train.  Wyoming’s Governor vetoed a bill that would have threatened a federally subsidized wind energy program in the state.  California apparently wants to spend taxpayer money to give college students $10,000 stipends for climate activism.  The U.N. is demanding billions of dollars to keep global warming at bay.  African countries and Egypt want trillions of dollars supposedly for ‘climate mitigation’.

So there you have the rundown on green grifters, people only in the climate change game for the money.  Remember to follow the money the next time you see screaming headlines about the climate or politicians crowing about how much taxpayer money they’re spending on climate change.  It’s just the Green Industrial Complex at work.

©Christopher Wright. All rights reserved.

Visit The Daily Skirmish and  Watch Eagle Headline News – 7:30am ET Weekdays

Tucson Is Heading Down the Path of Other Failing Leftist Cities with Its Climate Action Plan thumbnail

Tucson Is Heading Down the Path of Other Failing Leftist Cities with Its Climate Action Plan

/in , , , , /by

By AZ Free News

In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, multiple government officials seized the opportunity to grab more power. Perhaps chief among them were the Tucson city council and Mayor Regina Romero, who exploited the moment by declaring a “climate emergency.” Now, the city of Tucson has finalized its plan to solve this “climate emergency”—to the tune of an estimated $326 million. But it’s not just the cost that should concern you.

Tucson’s Climate Action Plan, titled “Tucson Resilient Together,” is ripe with Green New Deal mandates that are aimed at forcing citizens out of their cars, controlling their lives, and destroying the community. By 2050, they plan to force 40% of all people living in Tucson to commute by walking, cycling, taking public transportation, or “rolling” (whatever that means). And that’s just the start.

They actually spell out as part of their strategy that around 25% of people will be walking as their form of transportation by 2050. This is Tucson, Arizona, right? Have these people lived here during any of our summers? Who in their right mind would want to walk (or even cycle or “roll”) as a regular form of transportation when it’s 110 degrees outside?

But maybe they think they can force this to happen with another one of their strategies: putting people on road diets (which, by the way, was recently approved in a Scottsdale City Council meeting). In case you’re not familiar with this approach, road diets reduce the number of travel lanes and the width of the road to make room for other modes of transportation like bike lanes. They have been used in failed leftist cities like Portland, which should tell you all you need to know. And as you probably guessed by now, they will only increase traffic congestion.

Ah…but don’t worry dear citizen. All of this is done with your health and wellbeing in mind. After all, according to Tucson’s plan, you’re just a fat slob who drives too much, which has been resulting in higher absenteeism and loss of productivity. So, your government overlords are going to take care of you by forcing you out of your car and making you walk 150 minutes per week.

But for those who don’t plan on walking, be sure to send Mayor Romero and the Tucson city council a thank you note because they haven’t forgotten about you. As you should probably know by now, no “climate change plan” is complete without investing even more in public transportation. And Tucson has really outdone themselves this time. The massive increase in public transit will include hiring 900 people EACH YEAR to drive all of the buses for a total of 27,000 new full-time transit employees.

Currently, Tucson has a total of 420 bus drivers for their entire system. This increase would make the Tucson Transit Department the largest employer in Pima County. Given the fact that recent public transit reports indicate a significant decline in ridership since the COVID pandemic, this an absolutely absurd investment. And as crazy as all of this seems, the impact can’t be understated: this is now the governing planning document for the 2nd largest city in Arizona, where city staff will be working around the clock to implement their dream of a 15-minute city where cars will be phased out and everything you need will supposedly be available by foot, bike, or public transit. It’s obvious that they hate where we live and how we get around, and this is their solution. But just like with so many of these climate policies, don’t expect politicians or government bureaucrats to be doing any of this. They just want to force it on all of us regular folks.

*****
This article was published by AZ Free and is reproduced with permission.

TAKE ACTION

As we move through 2023 and into the next election cycle, The Prickly Pear will resume Take Action recommendations and information.

Berlin Voters Reject Bid to Become Climate Neutral by 2030 thumbnail

Berlin Voters Reject Bid to Become Climate Neutral by 2030

/in , , , , , , /by

By The Geller Report

Germany and the rest of the Europe has suffered the terrible consequence of the big climate hoax.

When reality meets the lie, it’s seismic.

Berlin Voters Balk at Fast-Tracking Climate Neutrality by 2030

By

Berlin voters balked at a plan to make the German capital climate-neutral by law by 2030, which would have put it 15 years ahead of Germany’s national target.

The referendum, which would have obligated the city-state’s government to enshrine the climate goal in law, failed after fewer than the required 607,000 voters voted in favor, according to the state election commissioner’s tally. About 2.4 million people were eligible.

The result leaves in place a non-binding goal of climate neutrality by 2045, which is in line with the rest of Germany.

Referendum organizers, a nonprofit initiative called Klimaneustart Berlin, argued that Berlin’s governing body is “acting far too hesitantly.”

Days earlier, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warned that time to stop global warming of more than 1.5C is running out.

Germany, which emits the most carbon dioxide among European countries, has lagged on its emissions goals and was most recently thrown off track by the energy crisis following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Read more.

Berliners vote down referendum on tighter climate goals

By 

BERLIN, March 26 (Reuters) – A referendum in Berlin on Sunday that would have bound the city to strive to be climate neutral by 2030 has failed, the city’s mayor Franziska Giffey said in a statement.

The measure would have forced the new conservative local government to invest heavily in renewable energy, building efficiency and public transport.

Had it passed, Berlin would have been one of the few major European cities with a legally binding goal to become carbon neutral in seven years.

The result “shows that the majority of Berliners also see that the demands of the referendum could not have been implemented – not even if they were cast into law,” Giffey said.

The European Union last year started a scheme to help 100 cities inside and outside of the bloc become climate neutral by 2030, but the scheme and the financial support it offers are not legally binding.

The referendum was a test of whether Germans, or at least Berliners, want Germany’s climate policy, which now aims to make Europe’s biggest economy carbon-neutral by 2045, to be more ambitious.

Read more.

AUTHOR

Pamela Geller

RELATED ARTCILES:

One Billion Gretas: Biden Regime Pledges Taxpayer Cash To Support Young Climate Pawns Abroad

Ford Burns Through Billions, Expects to Lose $12 Billion on Electric Vehicle Line

EDITORS NOTE: This Geller Report is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Whale Hell Looms in Massachusetts thumbnail

Whale Hell Looms in Massachusetts

/in , , , /by

By David Wojick

The first of the monster offshore wind arrays is ready to roll, with construction to begin in May. The acoustic hammering on the whales and other sea critters will now escalate from sonar survey blasting to the incredible noise of pile driving. Each huge wind tower sets on an enormous monopile that has to be driven into the sea floor.

The project bears the happy name Vineyard Wind but there is no vineyard. Here is how they put it: “Vineyard Wind is currently building the nation’s first utility-scale offshore wind energy project over 15 miles off the coast of Massachusetts.” There are 62 enormous wind towers, each among the world’s biggest at 13 MW. See https://www.vineyardwind.com.

For the incredible threat of pile driving noise see my https://www.cfact.org/2022/07/26/threat-to-endangered-whales-gets-louder/. Pile-driving noise can deafen, injure or even kill marine mammals. See for example https://www.arcticwwf.org/the-circle/stories/regulating-underwater-noise-during-pile-driving/ for a good discussion of the threat.

Apparently this does not matter because Vineyard is federally authorized to injure hundreds of whales and thousands of other marine mammals, especially dolphins.

See Table 1 at https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/action/incidental-take-authorization-vineyard-wind-1-llc-construction-vineyard-wind-offshore-wind for species specific take authorizations.

Here are the horrendous injury authorization numbers by group:

145 whales including 66 humpbacks and 20 right whales

6,040 dolphins

154 porpoises

851 seals

Of course these hellish damage limits are unenforceable, because the injuries occur out of sight underwater, but they show just how great the threat is. In fact they are merely estimates of the potential adverse effects.

The authorization numbers are derived basically as follows. First there is what is deemed a safe sound level. Using a sound propagation model they then estimate the area around the pile driving where the sound exceeds this safe level. They then use a species population density model over time to estimate the number of critters that will be exposed to unsafe sound. This number is used to derive an authorization number.

These are very crude estimates so the adverse impact numbers could easily be much greater. Population densities at a given place can vary greatly over time, for example.

From an engineering point of view the monopiles are amazing. Each is over 30 feet in diameter and several hundred feet long. They are driven so far and firmly into the sea floor that they hold a turbine-and-blades mounted tower hundreds of feet tall steady in major hurricane force winds (or that is the hope).

The pile driving forces have to be tremendous to get the piles that well imbedded, which is why there has to be so much impact noise. In this case the 13 MW turbines are much bigger than anything found in today’s big arrays around the world, where the biggest is just 9.5 MW. The forces involved should be at least that much bigger, so the driving noise might also be underestimated in the authorization numbers.

The potential damage to whales and other marine mammals is clearly huge, based on the official NOAA Fisheries impact authorization estimates. It is hard to see how this hell can be allowed under present laws, such as the Marine Mammal Protection Act and the Endangered Species Act.

Ironically the Vineyard Wind home page features a short video showing two whales swimming away. That come May these might be whales fleeing desperately, because they have been deafened by excruciating pile driving impact noise, seems not to have occurred to them.

*****
This article was published by CFACT and is reproduced with permission.

TAKE ACTION

As we move through 2023 and into the next election cycle, The Prickly Pear will resume Take Action recommendations and information.

AWED MEDIA BALANCED NEWS: We cover COVID to Climate, as well as Energy to Elections thumbnail

AWED MEDIA BALANCED NEWS: We cover COVID to Climate, as well as Energy to Elections

/in , , , , , /by

By John Droz, Jr.

Welcome! We cover COVID to Climate, as well as Energy to Elections.

Here is the link for this issue, so please share it on social media.

Bookmark or make Favorite the 2023, 2022, 2021 & 2020 Newsletter Archives.

Particularly note the ***asterisked*** items below.

— This Newsletter’s Articles, by Topic —

If You Only Have Time to Read a Few Select Articles:

*** Short video: Citizens For Sanity Ad

*** Take the Survey, and sign-up for ARC

*** The Parliamentary Motive Behind the J6 Fedsurrection

*** Where Is Occupy Silicon Valley?

*** Christian who escaped Chinese persecution warns US descending into ‘communist-style of governance’

*** New Report: The Key to Fixing the US Education System

*** The Fundamental Problem with Common Core Math

*** Is there such a thing as absolute truth / universal truth?

*** Do You Know How to Evaluate Truth Claims?

*** Nebraska county sets 3 miles as distancing requirements for wind turbines

*** Renewables are not Sustainable

*** Communities must have a say in local energy projects

*** Critically Thinking about Offshore Wind

*** Exploding the Cheap Offshore Wind Fantasy

*** ‘Take’ authorizations prove NOAA is lying about whale deaths

*** Holding the right people responsible for the global energy crisis

*** Heat pumps have become the eco fiasco of the decade

*** Holding the right people responsible for the global energy crisis

*** Challenging the NSTA’s Position Statement on Climate Change

*** Positive Weather News

*** The Looking Glass World of “Climate Injustice”

*** Natural Immunity is as Protective as COVID Jab

*** Florida Surgeon General declares mRNA COVID-19 vaccines have a “terrible safety profile”

*** Mistakes Were NOT Made: An Anthem for Justice

Education Related:

*** New Report: The Key to Fixing the US Education System

*** Challenging the NSTA’s Position Statement on Climate Change

*** The Fundamental Problem with Common Core Math

Short video: Father Guido Sarducci’s Five Minute University

How Common Core And Screen Overdoses Are Ruining American Kids’ Intelligence

Think About It: Critical Thinking

Study: The Benefits of Critical Thinking Skills and Techniques for Teaching these Skills in the Classroom for Quality Education

Greed Energy Economics:

*** Subsidized Green Jobs Killing 6x as many Real Jobs

Renewables cost to explode as Brussels plans to curb imports of Chinese green tech

Sticker shock awaits New Yorkers’ utility bills to fund renewables

Renewables (General):

*** Communities must have a say in local energy projects

*** California is Binging on Renewables — but Emissions Aren’t Falling

*** Renewables are not Sustainable

*** New Book: The Unpopular Truth about Electricity and the Future of Energy

NY’s Build Public Renewables Act Could Cut the Power

Greens refuse to discuss recycling renewables and restoring mining locations to pristine condition

Wind Energy — Offshore:

*** Critically Thinking about Offshore Wind

*** As Whales Wash Up Dead, Feds Push Forward With “Green” Energy

*** Exploding the Cheap Offshore Wind Fantasy

*** ‘Take’ authorizations prove NOAA is lying about whale deaths

*** Video of NJ Hearing 3-16-23: An Examination Into Offshore Wind Industrialization

The Latest Casualties of the Climate Change Industry in Denial

As turbines rise, small-scale fishermen have the most to lose

NOAA and Green Activists Condone Whale Sacrifice By Offshore Wind Industry

8 Dolphins Died in One Day Off NJ Coast, Potentially Linked to Offshore Wind

Another Dead Whale Washes Up – This Time In Ocean City, N.J.

H.Res. 239 regarding US Offshore Wind

Wind Energy — Other:

*** Nebraska county sets 3 miles as distancing requirements for wind turbines

*** Report: The Cost of Increasing Wind Power Capacity — A Reality Check

*** Study: Normalized Wind deaths surpass all other electricity sources (See Fig 2b)

South Africa’s largest wind farm will power coal mines

When Windmills Aren’t Green Enough

Illinois County Board votes no on wind project

Solar Energy:

Illinois town nixes solar desert

Biden’s Made-in-USA Mandate for Tax Credit Sparks Solar Dispute

Nuclear Energy:

*** Why Britain has big plans to join the rush for small modular reactors

Fossil Fuel Energy:

The Dark Money Behind The Gas Bans

Public Citizen Foundation Aims to Sue Us All Out of the Way

Electric Vehicles (EVs):

EV batteries lack reparability leading some insurers to junk whole cars after even minor collisions

Ford Says It Will Lose $3 Billion on EVs This Year

Misc Energy:

*** Holding the right people responsible for the global energy crisis

*** Heat pumps have become the eco fiasco of the decade

*** Countdown to New York’s Rendezvous with Energy Impossibility

Lessons Learned? Let’s Hope So

Africa will remain poor unless it uses more energy

Manmade Global Warming — Some Deceptions:

*** Positive Weather News

*** The Looking Glass World of “Climate Injustice”

*** Report: Net Zero could cost Americans more than $50 trillion

*** New Study: Atmospheric CO2 Residence Time is only 5 Years – Too Short to ‘Affect the Climate’

A simple reason why net zero is impossible

The Climate Emperor Is Now Naked

CO2 Reality vs. Narratives and Coverups on Social Media

Climate Hustlers Deceiving on Temperature Records: Top Astrophysicist

Manmade Global Warming — Misc:

*** Challenging the NSTA’s Position Statement on Climate Change

Scientists Discover Intense Heatwaves Lurking at The Bottom of The Ocean

EU climate agenda at risk after German pushback

Banks Facing Reality Ditch the Climate Foolishness!

The Global Warming Doomsday Religion is a Suicide Pact to Wreck Our Economy

US Election:

Election-Integrity.info (10 major election reports by our team of experts, plus much more!)

*** The Parliamentary Motive Behind the J6 Fedsurrection

Biden’s Sinister Plan to Rig the 2024 Election for Democrats

US Election — State Issues:

*** Ohio is the Sixth State to Leave ERIC — Who is Next?

Missouri follows other State in withdrawing from ERIC

NC Republicans Aim to Secure State’s Elections with Proposed ‘Zuckbucks’ Ban

Misc US Politics:

*** Take the Survey, and sign-up for ARC

*** Where Is Occupy Silicon Valley?

*** Short video: Citizens For Sanity Ad

*** Jonathan Turley: Manhattan DA’s Potential Case Against Trump ‘Legally Pathetic’

This Time, It’s the Ideology Stupid

Mike Pence Pandering To D.C. Media Is Pathetic And Disqualifying

The Govt May Stop Issuing Social Security Payments After the Debt Limit is Hit

New Book: Presidential Takedown — How the Plotted to Overthrow Trump

Societally US:

*** ESG Will Bankrupt You — Financially and Morally

*** Did Silicon Valley Bank Prioritize Social Justice Over Risk Management?

SVB, ESG, and Biden’s ERISA Rule

The Forced Medication of All Citizens

Why the Mental Health of Liberal Girls Sank First and Fastest

US Politics and Socialism:

*** Christian who escaped Chinese persecution warns US descending into ‘communist-style of governance’

“The Most Dangerous People In America Right Now”

Aiming at Occupying the World: “Young Global Leaders” in Action

Religion Related:

*** Is there such a thing as absolute truth / universal truth?

*** The Equitarian Church: Woke is not Like a Religion – It is One

Yes, Leftism Is a Religion: University Gives Greta Thunberg an Honorary Doctorate in Theology

Theologian Thunberg and the pseudo-religion

Pope Francis suggests he’ll review Catholic Church’s vow of celibacy for priests

Science:

*** Jordan Peterson Video: The Logic of Greeks and Judeo-Christian

*** Do You Know How to Evaluate Truth Claims?

Misc Matters:

*** New FEMA Flood Maps

Ukraine:

*** Pray for the safety of the Ukrainian people

*** A well-rated source to make a Ukraine donation

*** Latest Developments in Ukraine: March 25th

The Rubicon Crossed: The Energy World Turned Upside Down after the Ukraine War

COVID-19 — Injections:

*** Natural Immunity is as Protective as COVID Jab

*** Florida Surgeon General declares mRNA COVID-19 vaccines have a “terrible safety profile”

*** Doctors’ Group Says to Recall Vaccine

Why is Pfizer Terrified of this Woman?

Epidemic of Sudden Adult Deaths Finally Made News

COVID-19 — Misc:

*** A COVID lie that drove lockdown and the mRNA ‘vaccine’ experiment

*** How They Convinced Trump to Lock Down

*** Dr. Scott Atlas: America’s COVID Response Was Based on Lies

*** Mistakes Were NOT Made: An Anthem for Justice

A list of lawyers handling COVID cases

COVID-19 — Repeated Important Information:

My webpage (C19Science.info) with dozens of Science-based COVID-19 reports

*** World Council of Health: Early COVID-19 Treatment Guidelines

*** FLCCC Long COVID Treatment Protocol

*** COVID-19: What You Need To Know (Physicians for Informed Consent)

*** If you have received a COVID-19 injection, here’s how to Detox

*** Place Your US Order for Free At-Home COVID-19 Tests

Please use social media, etc. to pass on this Newsletter to other open-minded citizens…If you’d like to be added to (or unsubscribe from) the distribution of our popular, free, worldwide Media Balance Newsletter, simply send me an email saying that.

Note 1: We recommend reading the Newsletter on your computer, not your phone, as some documents (e.g., PDFs) are much easier to read on a large computer screen… We’ve tried to use common fonts, etc. to minimize display issues.

Note 2: For past Newsletter issues see the archives from: 2020 & 2021 & 2022 & 2023. To accommodate numerous requests received about prior articles over all thirteen plus years of the Newsletter, we’ve put this together — where you can search ALL prior issues, by year. For a background about how the Newsletter is put together, etc., please read this.

Note 3: See this extensive list of reasonable books on climate change. As a parallel effort, we have also put together a list of some good books related to industrial wind energy. Both topics are also extensively covered on my website: WiseEnergy.org.

Note 4: I am not an attorney or a physician, so no material appearing in any of the Newsletters (or any of my websites) should be construed as giving legal or medical advice. My recommendation has always been: consult a competent, licensed attorney when you are involved with legal issues, and consult a competent physician regarding medical matters.

Copyright © 2023; Alliance for Wise Energy Decisions (see WiseEnergy.org).

Ford Burns Through Billions, Expects to Lose $12 Billion on Electric Vehicle Line thumbnail

Ford Burns Through Billions, Expects to Lose $12 Billion on Electric Vehicle Line

/in , , , , , /by

By The Geller Report

Despite the losses, Ford continues to push forward and hopes to manufacture two million EVs a year by 2026 and hit an 8% profit margin for its EV division. The company is chasing Elon Musk’s Tesla for EV sales in the U.S. and remains far behind the electric car giant. Tesla, which started in 2003, lost money for ten years before finally turning a profit in 2013. Musk’s company made $12.6 billion in 2022, an impressive jump from $5.5 billion in 2021.

They don’t care. As long as the Democrats are running/ruining the economy with their environmental/climate garbage, it’s the American  taxpayer that will have to pay for this mess.

Ford Says It Will Lose $3 Billion on EVs This Year as It Touts Startup Mentality

Ford Motor Co. expects to lose about $3 billion on its electric-vehicle business this year, a reminder of how far traditional auto makers have to go in turning their EV portfolios profitable.

Ford disclosed the figure Thursday while outlining a new financial-reporting structure intended to give investors better insight into the performance of its three business units. Ford finance chief John Lawler described the EV division as a startup inside the 119-year-old company, and said it is normal for a fledgling business to rack up losses.

Ford shares were down about 1.3% in afternoon trading Thursday…

Read more.

Ford Projects Its EV Division Will Lose Billions This Year

The Ford Motor Company is going full throttle toward electric vehicle manufacturing, but that decision will cost the Michigan-based carmaker billions this year alone.

Ford said Thursday that it expects its EV division will lose $3 billion in 2023 as it pushes to produce more vehicles and build electric battery plants in Kentucky, Tennessee, and Michigan, The Financial Times reported. The carmaker wasn’t surprised by the massive loss of money as it views its EV division, known as Model e, as a “start-up.”

“Ford Model e is an EV start-up within Ford and, as everyone knows, EV start-ups lose money while they invest in capability, develop knowledge, build volume and gain share,” said John Lawler, Ford’s chief financial officer.

Despite the losses, Ford continues to push forward and hopes to manufacture two million EVs a year by 2026 and hit an 8% profit margin for its EV division. The company is chasing Elon Musk’s Tesla for EV sales in the U.S. and remains far behind the electric car giant. Tesla, which started in 2003, lost money for ten years before finally turning a profit in 2013. Musk’s company made $12.6 billion in 2022, an impressive jump from $5.5 billion in 2021.

Ford plans to explain its financials in more detail to investors and how it will stick to its goal of selling only zero-carbon emission vehicles by 2040, according to The Financial Times. Ford is relying on Ford Blue, its gas-powered vehicle production, to fund the carmaker’s transition to EVs.

Ford Blue is expected to rake in $7 billion this year, and the company’s commercial vehicles division, Ford Pro, is expected to double last year’s earnings to $6 billion this year. Lawler blamed spending on new battery plants and battery technology for the carmaker’s EV losses.

Last month, the carmaker was criticized for collaborating with a Chinese company to build a battery plant in Michigan. In its proposal, Ford said it would partner with the Chinese company Contemporary Amperex Technology on the plant that would employ 2,500 people when it begins production in 2026.

Virginia Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin withdrew his state from consideration for the new battery plant because of Ford’s partnership with the Chinese company. Michigan Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, however, has pushed for the battery plant to come to the Great Lakes State and celebrated Ford’s decision to build the plant in Michigan.

AUTHOR

Pamela Geller

RELATED ARTICLES:

EDITORS NOTE: This Geller Report is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Inflation Reduction? Dems’ Climate Spending Spree Could Cost $1.2 Trillion, Analysts Say thumbnail

Inflation Reduction? Dems’ Climate Spending Spree Could Cost $1.2 Trillion, Analysts Say

/in , , , , , , /by

By The Daily Caller

Democrats’ Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) could cost roughly $1.2 trillion in green energy subsidies, more than four times an initial government forecast of outlays, Bloomberg reported Thursday, citing analysts from Goldman Sachs.

The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) initially forecast that the law, a cornerstone of President Joe Biden’s efforts to decarbonize the U.S. economy, would cost the government $370 billion to boost investments in green technology, according to Bloomberg. Goldman Sachs’ findings mirror those of analytics firm Benchmark Mineral Intelligence, which reported in February that the estimated cost of battery manufacturing tax breaks would be roughly $136 billion over the next 10 years, more than four times the $30.6 billion estimated by the CBO.

“Early analysis of the IRA relied on unrealistic expectations to keep cost estimates down,” Heritage Foundation economist E.J. Antoni told the Daily Caller News Foundation in a statement. “As time has progressed and those rosy forecasts are pushed outside the realm of possibility, the real cost is becoming increasingly clear.”

Goldman analysts estimate that private companies, spurred by government benefits, will invest an additional $3 trillion, Bloomberg reported. Biden specifically called out “every single” Republican for siding with “special interests” over the American people in opposing the bill, in remarks made after he signed it into law in August.

The IRA offers a variety of tax credits and subsidies to wind, solar and battery production and encourages U.S.-based mining by linking battery subsidies to a requirement that at least 40% of all minerals are mined domestically or from certain allies. The bill also expanded a federal  loan program to support research and development of advanced batteries to be used in vehicles.

The massive climate bill would have an effect on inflation that was “statistically indistinguishable from zero,” according to a preliminary estimate made by the University of Pennsylvania Penn Wharton Budget Model made in July. President Joe Biden last August touted a letter signed by 120 economists, including some Nobel prize winners, which alleged that the bill would put “downward pressure” on inflation, based on a CBO estimate that the bill would cut government spending by $300 billion over 10 years, the Associated Press reported contemporaneously.

Then-House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy argued at the time that the bill would spend “half-a-trillion of your money,” building on “trillions in wasteful spending that caused runaway inflation” in an August debate on the bill.

“Passing this bill today means more expensive bills for Americans tomorrow. And anyone who says otherwise isn’t telling the truth,” McCarthy said. “Your pocketbook is their plan to fund more inflationary spending.”

The White House did not immediately respond to a DCNF request for comment.

AUTHOR

JOHN HUGH DEMASTRI

Contributor.

RELATED ARTICLE: Staggering Price Tag, Logistical Hurdles Make Biden’s Climate Agenda A ‘Fool’s Errand,’ Report Says

EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

‘Climate Homicide’: Paper in Harvard Env. Law Review calls for ‘prosecuting’ big U.S. oil firms for ‘climate deaths’ thumbnail

‘Climate Homicide’: Paper in Harvard Env. Law Review calls for ‘prosecuting’ big U.S. oil firms for ‘climate deaths’

/in , , , , , /by

By Marc Morano

The wacky world of climate change strikes again! Blaming fossil fuel companies for ‘climate homicide’ is all part of the plan to merge public health and climate change. We have already seen a doctor diagnose the first patient in the world as suffering form ‘climate change’ in 2021.

Of course, the reality is exactly the opposite. During the era of fear about ‘global warming,’ climate related deaths have dropped dramatically, proving that mankind has adapted to climate change by using the very oil and other fossil fuels that Harvard Law now wants to charge companies with murder over!

See: After 100 years of climate change, ‘climate-related deaths’ approach zero – Dropped by over 99% since 1920

Climate Homicide: Prosecuting Big Oil For Climate Deaths

Harvard Environmental Law Review, Vol. 48, No. 1, 2024

70 Pages Posted: 25 Jan 2023 Last revised: 24 Mar 2023

David Arkush

Public Citizen

Donald Braman

George Washington University – Law School; Justice Innovation Lab; DC Justice Lab

Date Written: January 23, 2023

Abstract

Prosecutors regularly bring homicide charges against individuals and corporations whose reckless or negligent acts or omissions cause unintentional deaths, as well as those whose misdemeanors or felonies cause unintentional deaths. Fossil fuel companies learned decades ago that what they produced, marketed, and sold would generate “globally catastrophic” climate change. Rather than alert the public and curtail their operations, they worked to deceive the public about these harms and to prevent regulation of their lethal conduct. They funded efforts to call sound science into doubt and to confuse their shareholders, consumers, and regulators. And they poured money into political campaigns to elect or install judges, legislators, and executive officials hostile to any litigation, regulation, or competition that might limit their profits. Today, the climate change that they forecast has already killed thousands of people in the United States, and it is expected to become increasingly lethal for the foreseeable future. Given the extreme lethality of the conduct and the awareness of the catastrophic risk on the part of fossil fuel companies, should they be charged with homicide? Could they be convicted? In answering these questions, this Article makes several contributions to our understanding of criminal law and the role it could play in combating crimes committed at a massive scale. It describes the doctrinal and social predicates of homicide prosecutions where corporate conduct endangers much or all of the public. It also identifies important advantages of homicide prosecutions relative to civil and regulatory remedies, and it details how and why prosecution for homicide may be the most effective legal remedy available in cases like this. Finally, it argues that, if our criminal legal system cannot focus more intently on climate crimes—and soon—we may leave future generations with significantly less for the law to protect.

Keywords: climate change, homicide, criminal law, prosecution, accountability, causation, fossil fuels, big oil, negligent homicide, manslaughter, murder, felony murder, misdemeanor manslaughter, fraud, RICO, racketeering, conspiracy, prosecutors, public benefit corporation, environmental crime

Suggested Citation:

Arkush, David and Braman, Donald, Climate Homicide: Prosecuting Big Oil For Climate Deaths (January 23, 2023). Harvard Environmental Law Review, Vol. 48, No. 1, 2024, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=4335779 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4335779

UK Guardian: Authors of paper accepted for publication in Harvard Environmental Law Review argue firms are ‘killing members of the public at an accelerating rate’

Climate Homicide: Prosecuting Big Oil For Climate Deaths – Harvard Environmental Law Review, Vol. 48, No. 1, 2024

‘Climate homicide’: Could Big Oil be sued for disaster deaths? ‘Prosecuting Big Oil for Climate Death’ urges new paper in the Harvard Environmental Law Review– The paper, “Climate Homicide: Prosecuting Big Oil for Climate Death” — written by Arkush and Donald Braman, an associate professor at George Washington University Law School — will be published next spring in the Harvard Environmental Law Review. “We concluded there aren’t really any legal or factual barriers to prosecution,” Arkush said.

See: B.C. doctor clinically diagnoses patient as suffering from ‘climate change’ – ‘Picked up his patient’s chart & penned in the words ‘climate change’ 

Morano: “We already have academics demanding that ‘climate change’ be added to death certificates as a cause of death.” 

See: Calls to add ‘climate change’ to death certificates – New study demands ‘climate change’ be added as ‘pre-existing condition’

By: Marc Morano – Climate Depot March 24, 2023 12:25 PM

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/mar/22/big-oil-companies-homicide-harvard-environmental-law-review

UK Guardian:

Authors of paper accepted for publication in Harvard Environmental Law Review argue firms are ‘killing members of the public at an accelerating rate’

Oil companies have come under increasing legal scrutiny and face allegations of defrauding investors, racketeering, and a wave of other lawsuits. But a new paper argues there’s another way to hold big oil accountable for climate damage: trying companies for homicide.

The striking and seemingly radical legal theory is laid out in a paper accepted for publication in the Harvard Environmental Law Review. In it, the authors argue fossil fuel companies “have not simply been lying to the public, they have been killing members of the public at an accelerating rate, and prosecutors should bring that crime to the public’s attention”. … The paper also argues that the case for climate homicide has been bolstered by attribution science, which seeks to ascertain how much the climate crisis has worsened individual extreme weather events. Some studies have even been able to attribute a specific number of extreme weather deaths to the climate crisis. The duo argue that this growing body of science is among the most powerful tools to prove that oil companies’ actions have more than met the standard for a prosecutor to bring a homicide case. Bringing homicide charges against oil companies for deaths caused by the climate crisis would be unprecedented, but corporations have been tried for homicide before. California prosecutors charged the utility PG&E with manslaughter for its role in the deadly Camp Fire that leveled the town of Paradise in 2018. And federal prosecutors charged BP with manslaughter following the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster. In both cases, the companies pleaded guilty and paid billions in fines and penalties.

Climate Homicide: Prosecuting Big Oil For Climate Deaths – Harvard Environmental Law Review, Vol. 48, No. 1, 2024

70 Pages Posted: 25 Jan 2023 Last revised: 24 Mar 2023

More on co-authors of paper David Arkush here and here.

‘Climate homicide’: Could Big Oil be sued for disaster deaths? ‘Prosecuting Big Oil for Climate Death’ urges new paper in the Harvard Environmental Law Review– The paper, “Climate Homicide: Prosecuting Big Oil for Climate Death” — written by Arkush and Donald Braman, an associate professor at George Washington University Law School — will be published next spring in the Harvard Environmental Law Review.

“We concluded there aren’t really any legal or factual barriers to prosecution,” Arkush said.

Tony Heller of Real Climate Science Debunks:

https://realclimatescience.com/2023/03/climate-homicide/

By Tony Heller

Death rates from natural disasters including “all geophysical, meteorological and climate events” are down 95% over the past century, and academics want to sue oil companies for deaths caused by meteorological events.

POLITICO Pro | Article | ‘Climate homicide’: Could Big Oil be sued for disaster deaths?

Natural Disasters Data Explorer – Our World in Data

Fossil fuels keep billions of people alive day to day around the world. They provide our heat, light, communications and transportation. They make it possible for trucks to bring food. People who want to ban fossil fuels are advocating genocide.

On March 23, 1913 “scores” of towns were wiped out by tornadoes in six states. Omaha was largely destroyed.

24 Mar 1913, Page 13 – Arizona Republic at Newspapers.com

23 Mar 1913, Page 9 – The Daily Deadwood Pioneer-Times at Newspapers.com

24 Mar 1913, 1 – Evening Times-Republican at Newspapers.com

©Climate Depot. All rights reserved.

CA Flood Victims Outraged Over Newsom’s Broken Aid Promises thumbnail

CA Flood Victims Outraged Over Newsom’s Broken Aid Promises

/in , , , , , /by

By Discover The Networks

Breitbart News reports that residents of Pajaro, California, a flooded community in Monterey County, are furious at Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) and President Joe Biden for failing to deliver the federal disaster aid that was promised earlier this month.

A levee that had not been improved in decades broke during storms and caused a large area of the Pajaro Valley, where many of the nation’s vegetables are grown, to be flooded. Newsom promised $42 million in relief aid — but it turned out that the aid had been signed into law years earlier by President Trump as part of coronavirus relief, and only $300,000 was available. Worse yet, the $300,000 was not specifically for flood relief, but was available in the form of $600 for farmworkers.

Relief workers vented their frustration last week at Newsom’s apparent broken promise.

Now, the situation is even worse, according to the San Jose Mercury News, as residents recall Newsom promising that the president had promised him “an ‘immediate response’” to the state’s request for a federal disaster declaration. But the state had not yet provided that response, because they had yet to identify 1,200 homes that had suffered major damage. Many of the residents of Pajaro are currently homeless.

The Mercury News reported:

“They let us down,” said Monterey County spokesperson Nicholas Pasculli. “We’re still waiting on the presidential emergency declaration that was promised to us over a week ago. Governor, please pick up the phone and call the president and ask him to have empathy for the suffering of people in Pajaro. Ask him to sign the declaration.”

[ … ]

When evacuation orders are lifted, residents won’t be going back to the same Pajaro they left. There is still no potable water or working sewer system in the town, and about 400 buildings — nearly half of those in the town — were damaged by the flooding, according to a preliminary damage assessment by CalFire.

Gavin Newsom

7 Known Connections

Accusing “Authoritarian” Republicans of Promoting “Grievance and Victimhood”

On January 5, 2023, Newsom used his second-term inaugural address at the California state Capitol to accuse Republicans of “promoting grievance and victimhood, in an attempt to erase so much of the progress you and I have witnessed in our lifetime.” He further charged that GOP leaders were now openly venting their “long-dormant authoritarian impulses” to “prey upon fear”; passing laws that “make it harder to vote and easier to buy illegal guns”; “selling regression as progress” while promoting a “rising tide of oppression”; and striving to “silence speech, fire teachers, kidnap migrants, subjugate women, attack the Special Olympics, and even demonize Mickey Mouse.”

To learn more about Gavin Newsom, click here.

EDITORS NOTE: This Discover the Networks column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Environmental Protection Shouldn’t Mean Economic Suicide thumbnail

Environmental Protection Shouldn’t Mean Economic Suicide

/in , , , , , , , /by

By Family Research Council

When I was in college in southern California many years ago, the smog could be overwhelming. Visibility was low and the sense of being closed-in by a layer of brownish-grey was ongoing. Then, one day it rained. The sky was actually blue and, to my great surprise, you could see the beautiful Sierra Nevada mountains in the distance.

In the ensuing 40-plus years, the United States has made great progress in its war against all manner of pollution. According to the Environmental Protection Agency, since the enactment of the Clean Air Act in 1970 through 2019, “the combined emissions of the six common pollutants (PM2.5 and PM10, SO2, NOx, VOCs, CO and Pb) dropped by 77 percent.” This has occurred even as energy consumption has remained at an almost constant level — despite growth in the population by about 100 million people.

The EPA also reports that “Compared to 1970 vehicle models, new cars, SUVs and pickup trucks are roughly 99 percent cleaner for common pollutants (hydrocarbons, carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides and particle emissions).” Additionally, the U.S. is increasingly using renewable energy sources. One example: From 2000 through 2018, the use of coal as an energy source fell from about 23% percent of our total energy portfolio to about 13 percent. Similarly, clean natural gas went from accounting for about 24% percent of our energy consumption to about 31%. Other renewable energy sources (nuclear, solar, etc.) are also increasing. And, generally, the industrialized nations of Europe are also making notable progress.

But America still needs oil. A lot of oil. We will continue to need oil for decades to come. That is, unless we want to commit economic suicide.

That seems not to concern people on the environmental Left, who are outraged that President Biden opened up a relatively small sliver of Alaska for drilling. ConocoPhillips will drill 199 wells at three sites in the Willow Project area, employing 3,500 people outright and, over the longer term, several hundred in permanent jobs.

Here’s the irony: While America once again engages in national agony over a modest oil drilling plan, China is laughing up its sleeve at our tortured efforts to reduce carbon emissions. Just last year, China opened roughly two new coal plants a week. As recent report explains, in 2022 China’s construction of coal power plants was “six times as large as that in all of the rest of the world combined.”

India is in much the same boat. “From 2001 to 2021, India installed 168 gigawatts of coal-fired generation, nearly double what it added in solar and wind power combined,” according to one study. While the subcontinental nation is making strides toward clean energy use, the reality is that “its electricity demand will grow up to 6% every year for the next decade.”

To be clear, I’m not suggesting that America abandon its commitment to cleaner sources of energy. Rather, we have to simply be honest: If we tie ourselves to extreme environmental standards while much of the rest of the world keeps employing fossil fuels at record rates, we will only hurt our ability to foster job creation here at home and our capacity to compete successfully in the global economy.

Economic transitions can be hard. Carriage makers were no doubt unhappy with the advent of the automobile. The issue before us is how rapidly we should move toward a “carbon-neutral” economy. Under the Biden administration, even American agriculture is a target. In a biting analysis, Heritage Foundation scholar Daren Bakst reports that at last year’s White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health, the administration advocated for policies that would “centrally plan how farmers produce food, what food farmers produce, and what food people eat.” The Biden plan “also appears far more concerned with environmental outcomes than efficiency, productivity, and affordability.”

As America moves toward “clean” energy, we should not do so to appease activists at the cost of jobs, prosperity, sound mining and farming policies, and our continued leadership in international markets. Our country does not exist in pristine isolation any more than the wind stops at our borders.

The only way we get a clean environment is if we have the resources to obtain it. The only way we have those resources is if we have a strong economy. And the only way we have a strong economy is if our laws and regulations make sense.

I love the memory of seeing mountains in the far distance. But I also like filling up my car’s gas tank affordably. We can have both economic growth and environmental health, but only if we also have a strong dose of national common sense.

AUTHOR

Rob Schwarzwalder

Rob Schwarzwalder is Senior Lecturer in Regent University’s Honors College.

RELATED ARTICLE: ‘A Lie’: Experts Denounce Biden Veto Preserving ESG Rule

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

‘Coordinated Effort’: Tucker Carlson Rips Corporate Media For Parroting Chinese ‘Propaganda’ On Climate Change thumbnail

‘Coordinated Effort’: Tucker Carlson Rips Corporate Media For Parroting Chinese ‘Propaganda’ On Climate Change

/in , , , , , /by

By The Daily Caller

Fox News host Tucker Carlson ripped the media Wednesday for parroting the United Nations’ newest report on climate change, which plays into China’s “coordinated effort” to hobble the United States economically.

“Let’s pretend for a second that our country had a news media that was interested in bringing you the news, not in lecturing you about your moral inferiority, you’re so bad, or lying to you in transparently obvious ways. January 6th was an insurrection, guys. Or even forcing you to repeat whatever childish slogan they’ve come up with,” Carlson, a co-founder of the Daily Caller News Foundation, said. “Vladimir Putin is a war criminal. Okay. Trans women are women. All right, say it or else. Let’s imagine we lived somewhere completely different, in a country where the media was obligated to tell you what was actually happening in the world and why it matters. What stories would we be talking about now if we lived in that country?”

The United Nations released a 36-page report Monday that called for “equity” and the use of “cultural values” and “Indigenous Knowledge” in combating climate change while advocating for “[r]edistributive policies … that shield the poor and vulnerable, social safety nets, equity, inclusion and just transitions.”

UN Secretary-General António Guterres called the report a “how-to guide to defuse the climate time-bomb,” which Carlson noted was repeated by multiple media outlets in some form.

“There’s still people in this country, for example, who seem to believe the so-called climate agenda is actually about the climate or the environment or the earth or something and not a coordinated effort by the government of China to hobble the U.S. and the West and take its place as leader of the world. Which of course is exactly what’s going on,” Carlson added later, after discussing China’s involvement in deals between Iran and Saudi Arabia and a trade partnership with Russia. “It’s pretty obvious when you think about it, but most people don’t get a chance to think about it because  propaganda is just too thick. It’s unceasing, it never ends.”

WATCH:

Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm said the United States could learn much from China on how to address climate change March 10. Former Secretary of State John Kerry, President Joe Biden’s climate change envoy, said that talks with China on climate issues have stalled since the downing of a spy balloon in February.

“If you took a look at the entire U.N.’s report, and actually we spent the entire day doing that, there are big differences in how they plan to solve global warming. This time the plan is much more explicit: Make the West, the United States primarily, but also western Europe, blow up its own economy while China, the fastest growing economy in the world, doesn’t have to do anything,” Carlson said.

China approved 168 new power plants fueled by coal in 2022, according to a report by the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA) and Global Energy Monitor (GEM) released Feb. 27. The country was responsible for more greenhouse gas emissions than any other country in 2019, the BBC reported.

“And in fact, they’re not doing anything. China is currently building two new coal plants every week. Every week,” Carlson said. “I’m not good at math but that’s like 104 a year. That’s a lot of coal plants. How many are we building a week? Zero. Pretty weird for a country committed to fighting climate change.”

AUTHOR

HAROLD HUTCHISON

Reporter.

RELATED ARTICLE: ‘We Are Not God’: Tucker Calls Out Democrats For Launching ‘Open War With Nature’

EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

Why Are There No EV Charging Stations at Interstate Rest Stops? Blame the Feds! thumbnail

Why Are There No EV Charging Stations at Interstate Rest Stops? Blame the Feds!

/in , , , , , /by

By Foundation for Economic Education (FEE)

Joe Biden’s $5 billion funding plan for electric vehicles failed to allow rest stops to offer charging stations, an Atlanta news station discovered.

When Georgia resident Anita Jefferson pulls her Tesla out of her garage each morning, she knows it’s fully charged and ready to go. But she told a local reporter her confidence disappears when she hits the interstate. Charging stations seem few and far between, even at places where you’d expect them to be, like rest stops.

“The one place you would want to travel and stop would be a state rest stop,” Jefferson told an Atlanta news station. “I want to get an answer as to why they’re not there.”

Jefferson got her answer from WXIA-TV Atlanta’s Verify team: There are no charging stations at rest stops because they are prohibited under a federal law—one that stretches all the way back to the Eisenhower administration.

In 1956, Ike signed into law a bill—the Federal-Aid Highway Act—that paved the way (pun intended) for the interstate highway system, which included rest areas at convenient locations.

While there were numerous problems with the legislation, a relatively minor one was that it created strict limits on what could be sold at these rest stops. Today, federal law limits commercial sales to only a few items (including lottery tickets), the Verify team found. When President Joe Biden rolled out a $5 billion funding plan for states to create EV charging stations, he neglected to carve out a commercial exemption for EVs.

“You would be paying for that energy,” Natalie Dale of the Georgia Department of Transportation told WXIA-TV Atlanta. “That would count as commercialized use of the right-of-way and therefore not allowed under current federal regulations.”

If you think this sounds like an inauspicious roll out to the massive federal EV program, you’re not wrong.

Allowing drivers to charge their EVs at convenient, familiar locations that already exist along interstate highways is a no-brainer—yet this simple idea eluded lawmakers in Washington, DC.

Unfortunately, it illustrates a much larger problem with the top-down blueprint central planners are using to create their EV charging station network.

“We have approved plans for all 50 States, Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia to help ensure that Americans in every part of the country…can be positioned to unlock the savings and benefits of electric vehicles,” Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said in a 2022 statement.

While it’s good the DOT isn’t trying to single-handedly map out the locations of thousands of EV charging stations across the country, there’s little reason to believe that state bureaucrats will be much more efficient. A review of state plans reveals a labyrinth of rules, regulations, and stakeholders dictating everything from the maximum distance of EV stations from highways and interstates to the types of charging equipment stations can use to the types of power capabilities charging stations must have.

The primary reason drivers enjoy the great convenience of gasoline stations across the country—there are some 145,000 of them today—is that they rely on market forces, not central planning. Each year hundreds of new filling stations are created, not because a bureaucrat identified the right location but because an entrepreneur saw an opportunity for profit.

Bureaucracy will never be able to match the efficiency of markets, which use millions of signals to reach decisions, and are constantly being corrected by market changes, all in the pursuit of serving customers and making a profit.

This, the economist Ludwig von Mises pointed out, is precisely the opposite of what bureaucrats do.

“A bureaucrat differs from a nonbureaucrat precisely because he is working in a field in which it is impossible to appraise the result of a man’s effort in terms of money,” Mises wrote in his seminal work Bureaucracy.

Just how burdensome these regulations will prove remains to be seen.

While some states will develop EV charging plans more amenable to market forces than others, all of them are likely to suffer to some extent because the push toward EVs itself has been top-down, driven by politicians trying to push consumers off of gas-powered vehicles.

What’s clear is that the bureaucratic structure of DOT’s charging station blueprint does not bode well for consumers. Charging technology and transportation are constantly evolving, and politicians and bureaucrats simply can’t respond to these changes as efficiently as markets.

So while there is much talk today that EV charging stations will soon outnumber gas stations, there’s reason to be skeptical of this claim—even with the government’s $5 billion spending spree.

There’s little reason to believe that state planners will create a framework with the proper incentive structure to meet the market’s needs. Bureaucrats and politicians lack both the knowledge and proper incentives to create a functional EV market.

If you doubt this, just ask Anita Jefferson, who can’t even charge her Tesla at rest stops—because of a federal law passed in 1956.

AUTHOR

Jon Miltimore

Jonathan Miltimore is the Managing Editor of FEE.org. (Follow him on Substack.) 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.

EDITORS NOTE: This FEE column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Dutch Farmers Fed Up With Climate Tyranny Win Shock Election Victory thumbnail

Dutch Farmers Fed Up With Climate Tyranny Win Shock Election Victory

/in , , , , , /by

By The Geller Report

Dutch farmer party BBB has become the single largest party. The country has spoken and Mark Rutte must drop the ridiculous nitrogen policy and stand down effective immediately.

The Farmer-Citizen Movement, or BoerBurgerBeweging (BBB), was established in 2019 in response to the Netherlands government’s plan to “fight climate change” by restricting food production and putting farmers out of business.

The BBB (farmers citizens movement) gained a staggering 17 seats and the ruling parties have suffered severe losses and won’t reach a majority – not even with the help of the Green Party + Labour.

Dutch Farmers Fed Up With Climate Rules Win Shock Victory Against Establishment

Netherland Farmers Protesting Climate Policies

By: Kate Hirzel, Daily Caller, March 16, 2023:

The Farmer-citizen movement (BBB) in the Netherlands appeared set to win 15 of the 75 Senate seats in the nation on Wednesday, celebrating a victory over climate activists who are seeking to buy out farms and cut down on livestock numbers of Dutch farmers.

The BBB or BoerBurgerBeweging, as the party is called in Dutch, started in 2019 and won one single Lower House seat in 2021. After the recent election, the BBB is now the third-largest political party in the Netherlands.

“Nobody can ignore us any longer,” BBB leader Caroline van der Plas told broadcaster Radio 1, Reuters reported. “Voters have spoken out very clearly against this government’s policies.”

The movement started after farmers began protesting against the government’s aims to cut nitrogen emissions in half by 2030. Some emissions come from the manure of cows, pigs and chickens.

The government plans to reduce livestock by a third, which forces 11,200 farmers to sell their land to the state and another 17,600 farmers to significantly reduce livestock. After the U.S., the Netherlands is the second-largest exporter of agricultural products in the world, according to Euro News

Netherlands… Dutch farmer party BBB has become the single largest party. The country has spoken and Mark Rutte must drop the ridiculous nitrogen policy and stand down effective immediately pic.twitter.com/61ShZ8cYPh

— Pelham (@Resist_05) March 16, 2023

Keep reading.

AUTHOR

Pamela Geller

RELATED ARTICLES:

German health minister admits COVID-19 vaccines are HARMFUL after previously claiming they’re “free of side effects”

U.S. Maternal Mortality Rate Hit 60-Year Peak in 2021

EDITORS NOTE: This Geller Report is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

Yes, Leftism Is a Religion: University Gives Greta Thunberg an Honorary Doctorate in Theology thumbnail

Yes, Leftism Is a Religion: University Gives Greta Thunberg an Honorary Doctorate in Theology

/in , , , /by

By Jihad Watch

For the Left, it works both ways. Last year, woke students at Duke Divinity School proclaimed that “God is queer,” and for Leftists, the reverse is also true: “queerness,” along with the rest of the Left’s agenda, including climate hysteria, the vaccines, race obsessions, and every other aspect of the Left’s obsessions, are for them a god. Leftism today is a religion, a sad and tatty substitute for genuine religion, but a religion nonetheless, an all-consuming preoccupation and a prism through which the devotee sees and understands all things. The University of Helsinki confirmed this anew on Monday by announcing that it was giving climate hysteric Greta Thunberg an honorary doctorate…in theology. As David Strom said over at HotAir, “Climate Change is a religion. We all know that.” Yes, and it’s just part of the Left’s worship.

Now, once one accepts the Greta mythology, the idea of her getting an honorary doctorate is not much of a step beyond what the believer has already swallowed. If someone actually thinks that Greta Thunberg is a precocious child who has been speaking her own thoughts and giving her own opinions, and that she actually has something of substance to contribute to the pressing issues of the day, then it’s no problem at all for a university to give her some kind of honorary degree in The ScienceÔ. Give her a degree in “climate science” or “atmospheric studies” or something. But instead, the wise Finns decided to give Greta a theology degree, and that’s telling. It’s out in the open now. At least at the University of Helsinki, they don’t seem to care if people realize that the Left is not about rationality and logical thought, but about false gods of their own imagining.

Nor are the solons of the University of Helsinki by any means the first Leftists to make a religion out of their delusions. Former (haha) House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Smirnoff) back in 2021 gave thanks to her god for his salvific sacrifice. No, not Jesus, silly. Did you really fall for that business about her being a Catholic? No, Pelosi prayed to her real savior: “Thank you, George Floyd, for sacrificing your life for justice.” A few months after that, Catholic University joined the cult by displayed a painting of George Floyd as Jesus.

Like climate change, George Floyd worship is just one aspect of the Left’s religion. New York Governor Kathy Hochul (D-Planned Parenthood) revealed in September 2021 that the COVID vaccines were a kind of sacrament: “I prayed a lot to God during this time, and you know what – God did answer our prayers. He made the smartest men and women, the scientists, the doctors, the researchers – he made them come up with a vaccine. That is from God to us and we must say, thank you, God. Thank you. And I wear my ‘vaccinated’ necklace all the time to say I’m vaccinated. All of you, yes, I know you’re vaccinated, you’re the smart ones, but you know there’s people out there who aren’t listening to God and what God wants.”

Leading the applause for the newly minted Doctor Greta, the high priestess of the climate change cult, will be the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), which even has a hymn for its climate change worship: “The Climate is Changing.” It’s about as cheerful as you might think: “The climate is changing! Creation cries out! / Your people face flooding and fire and drought.” Inspiring! Not to be outdone, climate idolaters at Union Theological Seminary have begun worshipping potted plants as a “liturgical response to our climate crisis.”

Amid all this, the surprise is not that the University of Helsinki is giving Greta a theology degree, but that they’re the first to do so. Union Theological Seminary and other hollowed-out formerly Christian institutions really dropped the ball on this one. It’s telling that it took a university in Finland to honor the priestess as she deserves: it illustrates yet again how supremely unwoke America is compared to Europe, especially Scandinavia, and how much work we have to do to catch up, so that the wrath of the climate gods will be turned away from us.

But in the meantime, they’ve confirmed it in Helsinki: Leftism is a religion, and Greta is its priestess and prophet. Who will be next to receive an honor theology degree from the University of Helsinki, and be thereby certified as a priest or priestess of the Left’s cult? Sam Brinton has got to be on the short list.

AUTHOR

ROBERT SPENCER

RELATED ARTICLE:

EDITORS NOTE:  This Jihad Watch column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

China Brokers a Surprising Mid-East Deal thumbnail

China Brokers a Surprising Mid-East Deal

/in , , , , /by

By Neland Nobel

We think a story of major importance has been buried by the news of bank runs in the US.  While not disputing the importance of the bank run stories (we’ve written on this ourselves), the implications of China brokering a deal between Saudi Arabia and Iran are very important.  The two warring nations have achieved some kind of change in relations brokered by China, which sees itself in the ascendency.

One of the first things to be noticed is that the parties concerned could not find the US to be a fair go-between to get the deal done.  That says volumes about the decline in influence in the Middle East under the Biden Presidency.

Tensions between China and the US are rising.  Confirmation of the origins of Covid in a Chinese lab (funded by the US), warnings to China about helping Russia in the war in Ukraine, issues of trade and reshoring, and the new aggressive military and diplomatic muscle China is displaying, all are a matter of record. All that said, these countries, one a supposed ally of the US, the other an enemy, chose to have China as their mediator.

Why would the parties go with the Chinese?  Saudi Arabia may have concluded that US flirtations with Iran indicated that Iran will be getting the nuclear bomb and the US would not be able to stop them.  Making a deal while you can, must have been at least one of their motives.

Biden’s constant contempt for autocracies leaves little room for countries that are, and maybe both Iran and Saudi Arabia felt more comfortable with a fellow tyrant.

Saudi Arabia has recently not answered Biden’s phone calls and has been further irritated by US attempts to prosecute high Saudi officials for the death of a journalist.  They also failed to respond to Biden’s request to increase oil production, all while the US tries desperately to destroy the oil industry.

Iran hates the “great Satan” and likely relishes sticking it to the US.

On an even a deeper level, Iran and Saudi Arabia both are major oil and gas producers and the US has basically said that it wishes to lead the world in making sure neither country has a future for its primary export.  The US has signaled that basically, it wants to put both countries out of business over the next 10 years.  Both countries want a place to export their energy production and the US is hostile to their energy and economic interests.

On the other hand, China is eager to buy energy from both countries, and builds coal plants at a record pace, all the while maintaining the fiction of being concerned about “climate change.”   When it comes to environmental hypocrisy, they have played the US and the ever-blundering John Kerry like a fiddle.  Then again, the fact that Kerry’s stepson and President Biden’s son Hunter have both been involved in China might go some distance in explaining this hypocrisy.

From the Chinese perspective, it is wonderful to dominate the production of windmills and solar panels, minerals for batteries, and at the same time build up their refining capacity for fossil fuels.  This gives them control of the energy situation, no matter how it evolves.  If “alternatives” are a great success, they are the primary supplier.  If they are a great flop, they literally will have the West of a barrel.

China has also wanted to wean itself off the US dollar system and has been working to expand the so-called BRICS nations into an alternative payment system.  They would love to get away from the “inordinate privilege” that the US maintained in the post-war era as the issuer of the reserve currency of the world.  Both Iran and Saudi Arabia want to join the new system.

If China can convince Saudi Arabia and Iran to sell oil in yuan, this also breaks the so-called “petrodollar.”

After the severing of convertibility to gold in 1971, the US sent envoys to Saudi Arabia that said if the Kingdom would only accept dollars in payments for oil, the US would protect the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.  This created an instant demand for dollars as it was the sole global currency needed by all nations to purchase vital energy.

But since the US has not stopped Iran from pursuing its goals in the region, and its pursuit of becoming a nuclear power,  Saudi Arabia may now feel they may not be able to rely on the US and therefore supporting the dollar in this way is no longer necessary or even helpful.  Saudi Arabia must keep huge quantities of dollars issued by a government that is dangerously managing its finances.  If they don’t get the military protection promised, they are not required to keep up their end of the bargain and take payment only in US dollars.

Without the artificial demand for dollars for settling oil payments, this reduces the demand not only for dollars but for US Treasury Bonds issued in dollars.

China has been sharply reducing its holding of dollars and Mid-East oil producers may now feel it is best to diversify both their currency and credit risk.

Finally, the US seized the foreign currency reserves of Russia, an ally of both China and Iran, and showed to the world that holding dollars in Western Banks is a risky deal.  Get crosswise with the US on any major level and the US can seize your accumulated reserves without any judicial process whatsoever.  This is another common interest among China and the oil producers of the region.  The US through its fiscal excesses, blundering foreign policy, and environmental zealotry, has done much to undermine dollar supremacy and China is more than happy to assist in our demise.

For the US, the loss of dollar supremacy will mean higher domestic inflation, and higher costs to finance our swelling deficits twin deficits.  Moreover, hostility by Democrats to US domestic energy production leaves us more vulnerable to Mideastern oil producers, especially if they ally with China and Russia.

A deal can only be made if the interests of each party are served.  They must have concluded that relying on the US is not a good thing for them and it is time for some diversification of their monetary, economic, and political risk.

For the US, this loss of influence could be a major event.  Destruction of the reserve status of the dollar and the concomitant demand for US Treasury bonds could be a much lower standard of living for the US and much higher debt finance costs.

The wild card is Israel, which cannot tolerate Iran becoming a nuclear power.  If Iran and Saudi Arabia kiss and makeup, it will be hard to unite a coalition against Iran.   Israel may not be able to use Saudi airspace if an attack on Iran is needed.  Israel does not have long-range strategic bombers and thus would require aerial refueling. Further, Israel’s primary ally is the US, and has been humiliated and lost credibility in the region.

But that simply is not enough for Biden.  He is actively supporting the Israeli domestic political opposition to Netanyahu’s judicial reforms and Democrats have openly involved themselves in Israeli politics for years, always on the side of the left-wing Labor Party.   Democrats only support left-wing governments in Israel and likely Iran and Saudi Arabia have taken note.

This Chinese-brokered rapprochement simply is another byproduct of a failing  Democrat administration.

These are just a few observations that can be made.  There are likely many other important implications that will reveal themselves over time.

Whatever this deal means, it likely means a much more difficult road ahead for the US and an existential threat to the survival of Israel.

China becomes a bigger player on the world scene and the US is weakened.  All these are thanks to one of the most corrupt and incompetent Administrations in recent history.

TAKE ACTION

As we move through 2023 and into the next election cycle, The Prickly Pear will resume Take Action recommendations and information.

Biden’s Energy Secretary Says ‘We Can All Learn From China’ On Climate Policy thumbnail

Biden’s Energy Secretary Says ‘We Can All Learn From China’ On Climate Policy

/in , , , , /by

By Harold Hutchison

Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm said Friday that everyone could “learn from” China when it came to climate policy while speaking at the South by Southwest festival.

China approved 168 new power plants fueled by coal in 2022, according to a report by the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA) and Global Energy Monitor (GEM) released Feb. 27. The country was responsible for more greenhouse gas emissions than any other country in 2019, the BBC reported.

“What we have been trying to do, what Secretary Kerry has been trying to do as the president’s climate envoy, is to get all of these countries to agree to very aggressive targets to be able to make sure that we don’t get climate — global warming happening over, you know, 1.5 degrees. And we — we have — you know, we’ve raised our hand, we said, we want to get to net zero by 2050,” Granholm said. “We are really pushing other countries to do the same.”

Former Secretary of State John Kerry, President Joe Biden’s climate change envoy, said that talks with China on climate issues have stalled since the downing of a spy balloon in February. Kerry has long pushed to keep talks with China going, despite its heavy use of coal and its nuclear weapons buildup.

The Biden administration has pushed for more electric vehicles and to phase out fossil fuels, which Biden promised to do during his 2020 presidential bid.

Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act into law in August, which included a tax credit for electric battery production. Despite Biden’s push for more electric vehicles, the Environmental Protection Agency made a determination Jan. 31 that would block the mining of 1.4 billion tons of copper, gold, molybdenum, silver and rhenium in Alaska in order to protect salmon.

“And no matter what country you’re a member of, the countries all are susceptible to pressure, to peer pressure, they don’t want to be the outlier — I mean, there’s a couple of countries that we know are outliers and don’t care — but — but, I think China has done — has been very sensitive, and has actually invested a lot in their solutions, to achieve their goals,” Granholm continued. “So we’re — we’re hopeful that, you know, we can all learn from what China is doing, but the amount of money that they’re investing in clean energy is actually you know, encouraging.”

*****
This article was published by The Daily Caller and is reproduced with permission.

TAKE ACTION

As we move through 2023 and into the next election cycle, The Prickly Pear will resume Take Action recommendations and information.

Climate Hysteria: An Obstacle for Clear Thinking thumbnail

Climate Hysteria: An Obstacle for Clear Thinking

/in , , , , /by

By Matthys van Raalten

People who are afraid that life on Earth is coming to an end, and they are many, want to completely overturn our lives. One could say: they want to have control over all aspects of our lives, they want sky high taxes, obedience to the government.

If you like a tasty steak once in a while, if you like to travel by airplane to foreign destinations, if you enjoy making a ride with your car, then in the future you will have a problem. That’s at least so, in case climate hysteria is not quelled.

Behind this mental disease is fear for life itself. Fear to go your own way in life and not bother your fellow men. People who suffer from climate hysteria, and have power, are in essence all fascists, that want to dominate others and force their fear on the whole society.

Psychiatrists should come together and develop a therapy to cure masses of people of the fear that life on Earth is coming to an end. I’m not a psychiatrist, and my message is just a drop of water on a boiling hot metal plate.

Godfather of Global Warming Criticizes Climate Change Hysteria

 Lorrie Goldstein – June 22, 2012

Two months ago, James Lovelock, the godfather of global warming, gave a startling interview to msnbc.com in which he acknowledged he had been unduly “alarmist” about climate change. The implications were extraordinary.

Lovelock is a world-renowned scientist and environmentalist whose Gaia theory — that the Earth operates as a single, living organism — has had a profound impact on the development of global warming theory.

Unlike many “environmentalists,” who have degrees in political science, Lovelock, until his recent retirement at age 92, was a much-honoured working scientist and academic.

His inventions have been used by NASA, among many other scientific organizations. Lovelock’s invention of the electron capture detector in 1957 first enabled scientists to measure CFCs (chlorofluorocarbons) and other pollutants in the atmosphere, leading, in many ways, to the birth of the modern environmental movement.

Having observed that global temperatures since the turn of the millennium have not gone up in the way computer-based climate models predicted, Lovelock acknowledged, “the problem is we don’t know what the climate is doing. We thought we knew 20 years ago.” Now, Lovelock has given a follow-up interview to the UK’s Guardian newspaper in which he delivers more bombshells sure to anger the global green movement, which for years worshipped his Gaia theory and apocalyptic predictions that billions would die from man-made climate change by the end of this century.

Lovelock still believes anthropogenic global warming is occurring and that mankind must lower its greenhouse gas emissions, but says it’s now clear the doomsday predictions, including his own (and Al Gore’s) were incorrect.

He responds to attacks on his revised views by noting that, unlike many climate scientists who fear a loss of government funding if they admit error, as a freelance scientist, he’s never been afraid to revise his theories in the face of new evidence. Indeed, that’s how science advances.

Among his observations to the Guardian:

(1) A long-time supporter of nuclear power as a way to lower greenhouse gas emissions, which has made him unpopular with environmentalists, Lovelock has now come out in favour of natural gas fracking (which environmentalists also oppose), as a low-polluting alternative to coal.

As Lovelock observes, “Gas is almost a give-away in the U.S. at the moment. They’ve gone for fracking in a big way. This is what makes me very cross with the greens for trying to knock it … Let’s be pragmatic and sensible and get Britain to switch everything to methane. We should be going mad on it.” (Kandeh Yumkella, co-head of a major United Nations program on sustainable energy, made similar arguments last week at a UN environmental conference in Rio de Janeiro, advocating the development of conventional and unconventional natural gas resources as a way to reduce deforestation and save millions of lives in the Third World.)

(2) Lovelock blasted greens for treating global warming like a religion.

“It just so happens that the green religion is now taking over from the Christian religion,” Lovelock observed. “I don’t think people have noticed that, but it’s got all the sort of terms that religions use … The greens use guilt. That just shows how religious greens are. You can’t win people round by saying they are guilty for putting (carbon dioxide) in the air.”

(3) Lovelock mocks the idea modern economies can be powered by wind turbines.

As he puts it, “so-called ‘sustainable development’ … is meaningless drivel … We rushed into renewable energy without any thought. The schemes are largely hopelessly inefficient and unpleasant. I personally can’t stand windmills at any price.”

(4) Finally, about claims “the science is settled” on global warming: “One thing that being a scientist has taught me is that you can never be certain about anything. You never know the truth. You can only approach it and hope to get a bit nearer to it each time. You iterate towards the truth. You don’t know it.”

Si vis Pacem para Bellum

©Matthys van Raalten. All rights reserved.

STAY INFORMED

Receive regular news, commentary, and analysis straight to your inbox.

POWERED BY

DrRichSwier.com | ThePricklyPear.org

As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases.