KEVIN MOONEY: Biden Admin’s New Climate Rules Could Mean Big Payday For His Buddies, Burden For American Businesses thumbnail

KEVIN MOONEY: Biden Admin’s New Climate Rules Could Mean Big Payday For His Buddies, Burden For American Businesses

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By The Daily Caller

In a setback for former government officials and attorneys poised to cash in on proposed climate disclosure rules, the Securities and Exchange Commission continued to kick the ball down the road last year.

Many of the objections raised in public comments revolve around so-called Scope 3 emissions that are not directly produced by companies and instead result from what occurs “upstream” and “downstream” of a company’s activities. That’s a problem because if the SEC rule is finalized the commission would effectively extend its jurisdiction to include private companies that transact business with public firms registered with the SEC.

There’s a strong case to be made that under this scenario the commission would be overstepping its authority, which would help to explain why the SEC has continuously slow-walked its proposal.

But there’s additional intrigue involving a somewhat unheralded “carbon accounting” firm equipped with specialized software known as Persefoni that could also gum up the works. The for-profit outfit founded in 2020 has managed to recruit several high-ranking SEC officials who all had a hand in crafting the climate rules first introduced in March 2022.

These include Allison Herren Lee, a former acting chair of the SEC, Kristina Wyatt, who served as the SEC’s senior counsel for climate and environmental, social, and corporate government (ESG), and Emily Pierce who served as the SEC’s assistant director in the Office of International Affairs.

The SEC estimates that it will cost anywhere from $460,000 to $640,000 for companies to comply with the new rules during the first year they are in operation. Given the complexity involved in tracking Scope 3 emissions, it’s not too difficult to imagine how Persefoni stands to benefit financially from software and accounting services specifically tailored for this purpose.

In fact, that appears to have been the plan right from the get-go. Influence Watch describes how the accounting firm and environmental activists joined forces to have substantial input on the disclosure rules. Moreover, Persefoni is prominently mentioned throughout the SEC proposal. But it’s not just carbon accountants who stand to benefit at the expense of companies that fall within the purview of the SEC.

Dan Kish, a senior fellow at the Institute for Energy Research, a Washington-based nonprofit, sees a potential “big payday for law firms” attached to the SEC’s supply chain reporting mandates.

“This is all about expanding the size and scope of government,” he said in an interview. “Lawyers can get involved with a class action lawsuit and they’ll say this particular company didn’t properly report their emissions. You can expect the lawyers to take a huge chunk from these suits. This gets into very gray areas about how a company can be expected to account for every single item along the supply chain.”

Kish continued:

“You’ll have lawyers intervening supposedly to protect the public interest, but they’ll be raking in all kinds of cash. The process doesn’t stop here since the law firms will then dump campaign contributions into the coffers of the people pushing these policies.”

The SEC’s actions can be viewed as just one small part of President Biden’s “whole-of-government effort” to push climate initiatives at the expense of taxpayers and energy producers.

Companies in the energy-intensive states, such as Pennsylvania, will likely feel a greater financial burden, explained Gordon Tomb, a senior fellow with Commonwealth Foundation, a free market think tank headquartered in Harrisburg, explained. (RELATED: DAVID BLACKMON: Left-Wing Billionaires Have A New Plan Up Their Sleeves In War On Fossil Fuels)

“Pennsylvania is the second largest net supplier of energy to other states and the largest exporter of electricity to other states,” Tomb said. “As such, private companies supporting enterprises that emit carbon dioxide in the production of energy number at least in the hundreds and their employees in the many thousands. Imposing costs artificially constructed to advance a quasi-religious climate ideology and create ways for the politically connected to make money without producing a benefit is viciously economically destructive.”

Ultimately, it’s up to Congress to reign in overreaching executive agencies. Last June, House Oversight Committee Chair James Comer, (R-K.Y.) and Senate Banking Committee ranking member Tim Scott (R-S.C.) sent a joint letter to the SEC seeking information and documentation providing insight into the commission’s relationship with Persefoni and environmental activist groups. That’s an encouraging sign, but hardly sufficient for the potential victims of burdensome new regulations.

AUTHOR

KEVIN MOONEY

Kevin Mooney is the Senior Investigative Reporter at the Commonwealth Foundation, Pennsylvania’s free-market think tank, and writes for several national publications. Twitter: @KevinMooneyDC.

The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the Daily Caller News Foundation.

RELATED ARTICLE:

FRANK LASEE: Biden’s Energy Policy Is Tailor-Made To Crush The Middle Class

GROVER NORQUIST: Biden Enables Freeloading On American Innovation

POSTS ON X:

Australian broadcaster, Alan Jones, utterly schools a panel of climate zealots on the reality of the #ClimateScam.

“CO2 is 0.04% of the atmosphere, and human beings are responsible for 3% of that 0.04%… It’s like saying: ‘There’s a granule of sugar on the Harbour Bridge. Clean… pic.twitter.com/ngJFpFyRVk

— Wide Awake Media (@wideawake_media) January 13, 2024

The people who want to regulate “the science” don’t even understand the very basics of science. Apocalyptic climate change is a scam religion and big money… nothing else. It’s the equivalent of human sacrifice to the gods. #ClimateScam pic.twitter.com/1kaRFrRzYz

— Douglas Karr (@douglaskarr) January 12, 2024

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.

Name the Enemy: Globalists. What do they want? Everything thumbnail

Name the Enemy: Globalists. What do they want? Everything

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By Karen Schoen

I think I am beginning to dislike the word “Sustainable” . I think it is the most overused words in the past 3 years. Everything we touch or do, all products, actions must be sustainable. Yet does anyone know what Sustainable ,means`. according to the dictionary sustainable means: able to be maintained at a certain rate or level. According to Gro Harlem Bruntland, author of Our Common Future, Globalist friend of Globalist Hillary Clinton, “Sustainable Developments means development of society that meets the needs of the present society without compromising the needs of future society to meet their own needs.”

In simple terms Sustainable means CONTROL! 

In this controlled society there will be no growth, no innovation, no creation. You will do nothing without Government approval.

All activity will be regulated by a consensus of unelected Globalists who think they have the right to control you. They use the Precautionary Principal determining the worst case scenario on the computer and regulate as if it were true. They never take into consideration the genius of man in solving problems because they do not want problems solved. They lie and get the low information populace to believe they are taking action without scientific certainty to save future generations from scarcity of resources often screaming that without these restrictions, the planet will be destroyed by climate change. They restrict, catch shares, oil, water, coal, food, mobility Globalists lie so you will believe they must

NATIONALIZE EVERYTHING for the common good. In reality they are just a bunch of grifters determined to steal everything we own. We will own nothing and they will be happy.  

As Globalists must change mindset of Americans into do more for less. They intend to accomplish this through the Implementation and monitoring using  TECHNOLOGY by Digitalizing ID, Money, Surveillance Cameras, Vaccine Passports, Smart Meters while forcing people to live in SMART 15 minute cities.

Everything must be watched, shared, monitored for usage. You will be monitored for your consumption patterns and if you use too much you will be shut off. Smart Meters, Smart Grids, Red light Cameras, Social Credits, Vaccine Passport and Digital money will keep you in line with their program. S=Surveillance, M=Monitoring, A= Analysis, R=Reporting, T=Technology

” For the Globalists, the point isn’t to improve the world, the point is to control it, and control you. ” Mark Keenan. Read and share Mark’s article: Decoding the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDG’s): Indoctrinating Your Children into the New Fake Sustainable World. Order.. https://www.globalresearch.ca/decoding-un-sustainable-development-goals-indoctrinating-children-new-fake-sustainable-world-order/5843937?doing_wp_cron=1705028520.7377040386199951171875

This will never happen in America you say. Sorry wrong answer. It is already here. By lying and paying off elected officials, Globalist were able to get businesses to be their enforcer. They called fascism Public Private Partnerships (P3s).  Gov Rick Scott brought P3s to Florida. How did that work?

The Globalists wanted to redistribute the wealth of the middle class to themselves and their friends.  So they began to outlaw products that were perfectly fine but they didn’t control and were not making money from.  All of a sudden the inexpensive incandescent made in America light bulb was not sustainable. It had to be replaced by the CFL (compact fluorescent light bulb) Never mind that the CFL was filled with mercury and harmful to the environment if broken and were 3 times as expensive. But they were made in China in companies owned by Globalists.

Globalists hate competition so only favored companies who followed Globalist regulations would get government contracts. PPPs began replacing small family owned American companies. Covid  insured that many small companies went under while regulations are finishing the rest. Today it is almost impossible for a small business to make money. That is the idea.

None for thee and all for me should be the motto of the Globalists. Nothing is more in your face than the lies about beef. In Ireland ranchers were told to kill 1/3 of their herd because cows expel methane gas and that is harming the planet. All over the globe the cry is save the planet, kill the cows. What will happen if this is ever done?  People will starve which is the idea.  Less People, Less Problems. So what will the Globalists eat?  Will they eat bugs?  Don’t count on it. Today we learned that Mark Zuckerberg is raising a herd of “high quality beef” on his ranch in Hawaii. https://finance.yahoo.com/news/mark-zuckerberg-embarking-most-delicious-112603039.html?fr=yhssrp_catchall

For a clear understanding of how you are being fleeced you this is a MUST SEE documentary The Great Taking  https://rumble.com/v3yptkd-the-great-taking-documentary.html   You must prepare.

All is not grim if we act. Globalists can not handle the truth. The world is waking up and all over populists are winning elections. Will it be easy? NO. It took Globalists a long time to get this much control. They will not go away without a fight. But the truth will win.

How do you spot a Globalist? They are in both parties. Its very easy. Just ask your candidate what MAGA means.  Ask them what kind of government does America have? If they say a democracy, say next. If they say a Republic ask them what is the difference between a democracy and a republic. There is only one way to save America that is – with hard work. Are you up to it? Did you share? Contact your legislator? Did you get 5?

Did you comment to the SEC about the NAC?

Did you Call your legislator Send them an email, tweet, phone call. Tell them Close the Border or Close the government

See MTG Hearing on the Covid Vaccine, then call your legislator and tell them NO to the WHO.

©2024. All rights reserved.

TAKE ACTION

Florida: Stop Article V a.k.a. Con-Con CON: ACT NOW: Con-Con resolutions HCR 693 and HCR 703 have passed to next committee 1/11. Tell your legislator NO to Con-Con CON

Education Bills Florida Citizens Alliance

Bills: https://goflca.org/agenda/2024-bill-assessment/

Florida legislature is trying to cut the HOPE scholarship giving a scholarship for students to get out of Public School if bullied. Sign the petition.https://flcactioncenter.org/petition/please-don-t-lose-hope

Defend Florida, https://defendflorida.org/

These Election Integrity Bills need sponsors :  HB135 – Voter Registration Applications

HB 671 Ballot Boxes

HB 359 – Voting Systems

SB 190 – Ballot Boxes

VIDEO: This is what the don’t want you to know about the ‘Climate Agenda’ — Tucker interviews Dr. Willie Soon thumbnail

VIDEO: This is what the don’t want you to know about the ‘Climate Agenda’ — Tucker interviews Dr. Willie Soon

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By Dr. Rich Swier

QUESTION: What is the climate agenda all about?

ANSWER: Control of our lives.

Dr. Willie Soon’s interview by Tucker Carlson

In December 2023, CERES-Science co-founder, Dr. Willie Soon, was invited to talk to Tucker Carlson about energy policy, climate change and approaches to science.

The full interview covered a lot of topics and lasted 48 minutes.

WATCH: This is what the don’t want you to know about the ‘Climate Agenda’

The CERES Team reported,

Dr. Soon’s comments on the discussion of the origin of fossil fuels

In the first part of the interview, Tucker Carlson asked Dr. Soon some questions about the possibility that hydrocarbons (gas, oil and coal) could be produced “abiogenically” as opposed to requiring a biological source.

Gas, oil and coal are commonly referred to as “fossil fuels”. The term is based on the concept that all of these hydrocarbons where formed millions of years ago when prehistoric plants and animals died and were gradually buried by layers of rock. That is, they are supposedly all formed from the compression of biological “fossils” that became buried under ground for millions of years.

Dr. Soon was pointing out that there is considerable evidence that this is not the only way that hydrocarbons can be produced:

  • For example, in a 2009 paper in Nature Geoscience, Kolesnikov and colleagues showed that under very high pressures and temperatures, methane gas can be converted into short-chained hydrocarbons (https://doi.org/10.1038/ngeo591).
  • Another example they discussed was the fact that liquid methane and small-chained hydrocarbons are found in Saturn’s moon, Titan – see Mastrogiuseppe and colleagues (2019), Nature Astronomy; https://doi.org/10.1038/s41550-019-0714-2; Hayes (2016). Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Sciences. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-earth-060115-012247.
  • Meanwhile, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons have also been found in Titan’s atmosphere – see Zhao and colleagues (2018), Nature Astronomy, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41550-018-0585-y.
  • They also mentioned that multiple chlorinated hydrocarbons have been identified on Mars by the Curiosity rover – see Freissinet and colleagues (2015), Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets, https://doi.org/10.1002/2014JE004737.
  • Finally, several studies have suggested that PAHs (Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons) can also be formed in interstellar space (i.e., deep space in between stars). E.g., Dorian S. N. Parker and colleagues (2011), Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1113827108.

But what does all of this mean?

From Dr. Soon’s perspective, it means we should be careful not to assume all of the hydrocarbons on Earth are “fossil fuels”. We do not yet know what percentage of the Earth’s hydrocarbons were formed from biological fossils and what percentage were formed from non-biological (“abiogenic”) processes.

However, it should be stressed that this does not necessarily mean that our accessible hydrocarbon reserves are limitless. As Dr. Soon pointed out the conditions Kolesnikov and colleagues (2009) showed could produce hydrocarbons abiogenically occur very deep underground – at least 50-100 miles. In contrast, the deepest oil or gas drill so far have only been 6 to 8 miles deep.

Dr. Soon also pointed out that current drills are not able to extract 100% of the oil and gas in the reserves – as the oil or gas is extracted, the pressure required to extract more becomes greater until it eventually becomes impractical to remove (with current technology, including fracking).

So, in terms of practical gas, oil and coal exploration, arguably it does not make much difference how the hydrocarbons in the known reserves were produced. Moreover, most coal, oil and gas companies spend considerable financial resources in the exploration of new reserves. This shows that from an economic perspective, the companies that are most heavily invested in the existing reserves are actively seeking new potential sites to drill.

On the other hand, as Dr. Soon later discussed, the widespread debates over “limited resources” and “renewable energies” are often non-scientific and unrealistic.

©2024. CERES Team. All rights reserved.

Liberal Foundations Poured Tens Of Millions Of Dollars Into Influential Environmental Org Tied To Chinese Government thumbnail

Liberal Foundations Poured Tens Of Millions Of Dollars Into Influential Environmental Org Tied To Chinese Government

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By The Daily Caller

Major U.S.-based liberal charitable foundations have donated millions of dollars to Energy Foundation China (EFC), a San Francisco-based environmental nonprofit with deep ties to the Chinese government.

U.S.-based liberal charities, such as the Hewlett Foundation and nonprofits managed by left-wing dark money consultancy Arabella Advisors, have poured over $100 million into EFC since 2020, according to a Daily Caller News Foundation review of tax filings and foundation grant databases. EFC uses those funds to bankroll U.S.-based climate activists and to support the development of clean energy in China.

EFC has close ties to the Chinese state; at least nine members of the organization’s leadership and senior staff have previously held positions in China’s government, with one described in a Tsinghua University press release as an “outstanding [Chinese] Communist Party member.”

EFC spent more than $52 million funding green projects and organizations in the United States and China in 2022, according to tax forms.

EFC funds several of the U.S.-based organizations that have played a role in influencing the Biden administration’s climate agenda. American groups funded by EFC have, among other things, opposed the development of new oil drilling sites and promoted renewable energy technologies, like solar panels.

Green Cash

Liberal foundations have poured millions into EFC over the last four years, specifically for climate and energy programs in China, tax documents and grant databases show.

EFC had been a program under the Energy Foundation before breaking off and becoming an independent legal entity in 2019, according to its website. Prior to 2019, grants from charitable foundations to EFC were made out to the Energy Foundation and earmarked for EFC.

The Packard Foundation, Hewlett Foundation and MacArthur Foundation, all major players in American environmental activism, were some of EFC’s largest donors, representing almost 40% of the over $217.1 million the group raised between 2020 and 2022.

The MacArthur Foundation and the Hewlett Foundation donated at least $6 million and $67 million to EFC, respectively, between 2020 and 2023. The Packard Foundation, meanwhile, has donated about $19.3 million to the organization since 2020, according to its grant database.

Likewise, senior employees of the MacArthur Foundation, the Packard Foundation and the Hewlett Foundation hold seats on EFC’s board of directors.

The MacArthur Foundation gave EFC $2 million between 2020 and 2021 to help “China transition to a sustainable energy future,” according to its tax filings.

The Hewlett Foundation, meanwhile, paid out grants explicitly to fund EFC’s pro-Chinese government activities.

The Energy Foundation, which housed EFC at the time, received $8.4 million from the Hewlett Foundation in 2016 in part to fund EFC’s efforts to support the “climate implementation goals for China’s 13th Five-Year Plan.”

China’s Five-Year plan is formulated by the CCP and “sets forth China’s strategic intentions and defines its major objectives” for a five year period, according to the Chinese government.

Furthermore, the Rockefeller Brothers Fund gave EFC $200,000 in 2021 to support “low carbon transportation planning in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao greater bay area.” Rockefeller Brothers spent $200,000 bankrolling a similar project in 2019.

EFC’s donors, while funding the organization’s China-based activities, also served as major backers of domestic liberal activists. The Packard, Hewlett and MacArthur foundations, for instance, have poured millions of dollars into Planned Parenthood and other pro-abortion groups, according to tax filings.

The Energy Foundation’s activities in China also attracted significant support from entities tied to the Democratic Party.

The Heising-Simons Foundation, a California-based family charity founded by Democratic megadonors Liz Simons and Mark Heising. The foundation gave $925,000 to the Energy Foundation for its Chinese operations in 2017 and about $2.3 million in 2018, when EFC was still part of the Energy Foundation, according to tax forms.

Simons and Heising have donated nearly $10 million to Democrats and members of Congress who caucus with the Democrats since 2020, campaign finance records show.

Windward Fund and Hopewell Fund, nonprofits managed by the Democrat-aligned consultancy Arabella Advisors, supported EFC to the tune of nearly $2.5 million between 2020 and 2022, according to tax filings.

Several of the funds managed by Arabella Advisors are “dark money” organizations that are not required to disclose their donors and direct the bulk of their grants to left-wing and Democrat-aligned groups. Hopewell and Windward disclose their donors, however Hopewll received funds from Sixteen Thirty Fund, an organization in Arabella’s network that does not disclose donors, according to tax forms.

“Windward Fund recognizes that the climate crisis is a global challenge,” the organization said in a statement to the DCNF.

The Packard Foundation, Heising Simons Foundation, Hopewell Fund, MacArthur Foundation, Rockefeller Brothers Fund and Hewlett Foundation did not respond to the DCNF’s requests for comment.

The China Connection

Former Chinese government officials have an outsized presence among EFC’s leadership and senior staff.

Zhang Hongjun, who is on EFC’s board of directors, was an official in China’s National Environmental Protection Agency and a legislative director in China’s National People’s Congress, focusing on environmental laws, according to EFC’s website.

The National People’s Congress (NPC) is “the highest organ of State power in China,” according to its website. The NPC operates under the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and leaders of the NPC’s standing committee, a powerful subset of the NPC, are “invariably influential members of the CCP and leaders of major mass organizations,” according to the Congressional-Executive Commission on China.

He Kebin, another board member, was a representative in the Beijing Municipal People’s Congress in 2018, according to Sina, a Chinese-language media outlet. The Beijing Municipal People’s Congress works under the direct leadership of the CCP in implementing policy and providing services in China’s capital city, according to a report published by the mayor of Beijing in January 2023.

A group of universities in Beijing awarded Kebin the title of “outstanding member of the [Chinese] communist party” at a celebration marking the 99th anniversary of the CCP, according to a press release from Tsinghua University.

Several board members, including Kebin and Hongjun, are listed as council members on the China Council for International Cooperation on Environment and Development’s (CCICED) website. CCICED was founded in 1992 with the approval of the Chinese government and advises the Chinese government on environmental policy and development, according to the organization’s website.

CCICED reports to the Chinese government’s State Council and its executive committee is staffed by several high-ranking Chinese government officials, according to the organization’s website.

CCICED Chairman Ding Xuexiang is the top-ranking vice premier of the People’s Republic of China and a member of the CCP’s Politburo Standing Committee, a seven-person Chinese government body headed by General Secretary Xi Jinping.

Other EFC board members are listed as special advisors for CCICED, including Shenyu Belsky, Hongpeng Lei and EFC President Zou Ji.

Zou Ji formerly served as deputy director general of China’s state-run National Center for Climate Change Strategy and International Cooperation, and he was a key player in China’s delegation to the Paris Climate Accords in 2015, according to his bio on EFC’s website.

EFC paid Ji almost $500,000 in 2021 for his work as the group’s president and CEO, according to the organization’s 2021 tax filing. Board members Kebin and Hongjun drew compensation of $6,000 and $4,500, respectively, according to the 2021 filing.

EFC’s Senior Program Director of Strategic Communications Hui Jing formerly worked at the state-run National Natural Science Foundation of China, and Lan Yu, a program officer for EFC’s Low Carbon Economic Growth initiative, previously served in China’s finance and environmental ministries, according to their respective bios on EFC’s website.

Xin Liu, who leads EFC’s environmental management division, formerly served as a senior official in the Beijing Municipal Environmental Protection Bureau, and Ping He, who is the program director of EFC’s industry program, worked at the state-run Chinese Academy of Sciences for almost a decade, according to EFC’s website.

While the organization’s tax forms say it’s based in San Francisco, EFC also has an office in Beijing, which, according to the group’s website, is “registered with the Beijing Municipal Public Security Bureau and supervised by the National Development and Reform Commission of China.”

The National Development and Reform Commission of China (NDRC) is a Chinese government agency that exists to “formulate and implement strategies on national economic and social development” and create “strategies, plans and policies for utilizing foreign capital,” according to the NDRC’s website. The commission also is involved with the Chinese military as it “undertake[s] specific tasks of the National Defense Mobilization Committee,” according to its website.

Additionally, EFC disclosed a payment of nearly $400,000 for “consulting services” to the state-run China News Service on its 2020 tax forms.

The State Department designated China News Service as a foreign mission in 2020, meaning that it was found to be effectively controlled by the Chinese government.

‘China’s Ambitious Climate Vision’

Among other things, EFC says its goals are to improve China’s transportation system, to help the communist country achieve clean economic growth and to promote “China’s ambitious climate vision.” EFC aimed to assist China in becoming “the world leader in clean energy production, consumption, and investment, by 2030,” according to an archived version of the organization’s webpage

“Communist China is our enemy, and their ‘green energy’ policies are based on slave and child labor, government subsidies and trade abuses,” Florida Republican Senator Rick Scott told the DCNF.

EFC has also funneled large sums of money into influential, left-of-center environmental groups in the U.S.

Domestic climate groups, like the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and the Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI), received millions from EFC between 2020 and 2022.

RMI, a nonprofit dedicated to “working to accelerate the clean energy transition,” was behind a study cited by Consumer Product Safety Commissioner Richard Trumka Jr.’s decision to consider a ban on gas stoves, which attracted significant controversy.

The Colorado-based organization also partnered with the Chinese government to produce a report advising a transition away from oil and gas. EFC was also involved in producing that report.

White House officials have met privately with leaders of RMI, Fox News Digital reported.

EFC gave about $1.8 million to RMI between 2020 and 2022, tax forms show.

NRDC, meanwhile, received about $700,000 from EFC between 2020 and 2022, according to tax forms.

NRDC describes itself as the “first national environmental advocacy group to focus on legal action.” NRDC has opposed expanded oil drilling in the United States, power plants that run on coal, mining projects and the Keystone XL oil pipeline.

NRDC also has close ties to the Biden administration.

Gina McCarthy, NRDC’s former president, served as the White House’s national climate advisor from 2021 to 2022, Fox reported. The organization’s current president, Manish Bapna, has attended at least two White House meetings and the NRDC regularly communicates with Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry’s office, Fox reported.

“There are those, foremost among them, John Kerry, but there are many others who believe the existential challenge of our time … is climate change, and therefore we must have a more cooperative relationship with China,” House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party Chairman Mike Gallagher told the DCNF.

“That’s nonsense. We need to get realistic before it’s too late. Thinking that Xi Jinping cares about the documents that are signed at [the United Nations Climate Change Conference] is naïve, utopian nonsense. It reflects a profound misunderstanding of how the geopolitical world works.”

NRDC and RMI both have offices in China.

EFC has provided funding to RMI and NRDC’s Chinese programs, though grants to those organizations on EFC’s most recent publicly-available tax forms are earmarked for “education and analysis” operations with no mention of China.

RMI employs a number of former Chinese government officials through its China program. Ting Li, Minhui Gao, Kaidi Guo, Qiyu Liu and Qian Sun are among the RMI staffers who formerly held posts in the Chinese government.

EFC did not respond to the DCNF’s request for comment.

AUTHORS

ROBERT SCHMAD AND PHILIP LENCZYCKI

Contributors.

RELATED ARTICLE: Biden Admin Doubles Down On Climate Cooperation With China As Xi’s Economy Goes On Coal Binge

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.

New Report Highlights Green Failure In Europe And Warns America thumbnail

New Report Highlights Green Failure In Europe And Warns America

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By Editors of CFACT

Editors’ Note: You may think that these are national and international issues only. They are not.  Your selection of who serves on the Arizona Corporation Commission is critical. In our Federal system, thankfully, still, some of these decisions are made on a state level. Arizona does not want to follow California or Europe in matters of energy. We need inexpensive and reliable nuclear and natural gas-fired utility plants. Be sure you back Conservative Republicans who do not buy into the “green agenda.” Do not assume, however, because they are Republicans that they fully understand these issues. Some do, and some don’t, and some are RINOs. 

As one digests Rupert Darwall’s latest report for the RealClear Foundation, the well-known quote from Spanish philosopher George Santayana might ring through the mind: “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”

Anyone looking to combat the activists pushing a ‘net zero’ agenda here in the U.S. would be wise to read Darwall’s piece entitled “The Folly of Climate Leadership.”

The analysis tells the story of Great Britain heeding the cries for decarbonization, starting when Parliament wrote an 80% decrease in emissions target into law in 2008. They raised it to 100% – or “net zero” – in 2019. The results have clearly been catastrophic.

Since decarbonization efforts commenced, Britain’s economy has grown at half the rate it did from 1990-2008. According to a research study from noted British economic historian Nicholas Crafts, that’s the second-worst period of British peacetime growth since 1780.

In addition to the economic malaise, British energy prices have skyrocketed, and Britons are now concerned with how to survive the effect of those costs on their wallets as they look to heat and power their homes and businesses, travel for work and pleasure, and live life as best they can.

The differences between British energy costs and those here in the U.S. are staggering: Britons paid an average of $228 per megawatt-hour (MWh) for electricity generated from coal in 2022, whereas Americans paid an average of $27 per MWh. For natural gas, 2022 saw Britons paying $251 per MWh versus American consumers averaging $61 per MWh for their power.

Darwall’s report also highlights the effects of unchecked and anti-market-driven government investment in ‘green’ energy on grid reliability, as intermittent production from wind and solar – coupled with a lack of utility-grade energy storage – dropped electricity generated per gigawatt of capacity falling 28% since 2009.

The same arguments that have crippled Britain’s economy are now being used by the Biden Administration here at home, with zealots in Cabinet-level positions – including Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm, Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, and EPA Director Michael Regan – pushing the message from their bully pulpits.

The recent – and completely misnamed – Inflation Reduction Act passed by Congress provided the zealots with nearly $400 billion to dole out to supportive organizations and start-ups to jump-start our nation’s push for ‘net zero.’ Those dollars – doled out with few oversights or performance metrics attached in many cases – have produced very few wins in the last year unless a win is measured in keeping political cronies happy and rich.

Consider: wind energy projects in Nebraska, Colorado, Rhode Island, Connecticut, and New Jersey were scrapped last year, even after untold millions of federal dollars went to their developers. Over 100 solar companies went bankrupt, and solar projects from California to Florida were shuttered in the middle of their development. Battery storage – a key component to offsetting the intermittency of wind and solar – also saw projects stalled, along with at least one lawsuit filed against a storage company when its solution failed.

Despite the perils of ‘green’ energy dependence shown throughout Europe, the eco-left continues to double down on ridding America of traditional energy sources. Supporting those efforts are ideologue billionaires who continue to fund net-zero initiatives.

Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg has given well over $1 billion of his personal wealth to the Sierra Club to fund its “Beyond Coal” and “Beyond Carbon” campaigns. Designed to rid the U.S. of every coal-fired power plant by 2030, the Sierra Club/Bloomberg partnership has succeeded in shutting down nearly two-thirds of the plants to date, with most of the remaining in rural locations, including my home state of Alaska, where alternatives to existing coal plants in the state’s interior don’t readily exist. Without coal, countless Alaskans would have their livelihoods – and very lives – threatened during our long, dark, and sub-zero-temperature winters.

With activists entrenched in government bureaucracy, zealots running government agencies, and rich men (and women) funding these efforts, only those educated in historical failures of decarbonization – and willing to stand up and fight back against the climate warriors – stand a chance of helping stem the attacks. Darwall’s study should be required reading for anyone looking to build a fortress in their state against job-killing, family-harming decarbonization efforts.

*****

This article was published at CFACT, Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow, and is reproduced with permission.

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Global Warming Nonsense Is Everywhere

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By Neland Nobel

Picking through my scrambled eggs while reading The Wall Street Journal is not my best habit.  But, there could be worse.  I could be reading the New York Times. 

What caught my attention was an ad for the San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance.  It pictures a mommy and baby polar bear with the banner headline:  “Without You There’s No THEM”.  The follow-up text reads: “The world’s most extraordinary wildlife are relying on us to survive.  Thank you for becoming a friend.”

Maybe the final tagline should be, “Thank you for becoming a dupe.”

This is a good example of what could be called emotional manipulation through misinformation.  It strikes the emotional chord so necessary to strum when getting people to part with their money.  But unfortunately, it repeats a falsehood that brings society to some disastrous policy positions.

Let’s take a moment to take this ad apart.

The first assumption is that polar bears are dying off and your dollars are necessary for zoos to breed them.  Is this true?

Ok, so they lied.  But perpetrating this lie is not only misleading from an ethical standpoint (they are lying to get your money), it feeds into the broader argument that school children have been fed since Al Gore became a documentary producer.  You know the argument:  man causes CO2 to rise, which causes global warming, which causes polar ice flows to shrink, which kills off all the beautiful polar bears and endangers all of us with rising sea levels.

We will point out that the beauty of a polar bear is entirely subjective.  They look quite nice on the pages of National Geographic but harp seals might have a different perspective.

To be fair the ad does not mention CO2, but we suspect the authors know you have been taught to make the connection so it can go unstated and thus save room for pecuniary postering.

As for the sea ice, or lack thereof, the data shows no correlation with CO2 levels and that the level of Arctic ice has been steady for about the last 17 years. Since both Norway and Finland just reported the coldest temperatures since 1917, we expect the ice to be growing.

So, it would seem the notion that the polar bear population is declining and must be saved by zoos, is fallacious. Therefore, the implication that the non-existent decline in polar bear populations is correlated to the non-existent decline in the ice pack, can certainly be challenged. Neither event can be correlated with CO2 levels.

But parting with your money voluntarily, which is a renewable resource, is different than parting with your freedom or your wealth by force.  One can’t begrudge those who earned their money the right to give to the cause of their choice, even on false assumptions.

What is of concern is the repetition of falsehoods endangers our freedom, wealth, and standard of living.  It really doesn’t matter if the repetition is to raise money or consciousness. It promotes a falsehood that has public policy implications.

The environmental movement has moved from controlling things like pollution in air and water to a worldwide attempt to regulate temperatures a degree and a half a century from now by invading most areas of private choice.  Among these areas are: where you live, what vehicles you may or may not drive, and how electric power is generated.  It now extends to the types of light bulbs, washers, dryers, and leaf blowers you may wish to own.  They want to restrict our travel and put us into environmental ghettos, like 15-minute cities.  They don’t like modern agriculture and want to take control of our food supply, a truly frightening development.

As with Covid, if there is an “emergency”, the Left is perfectly willing to suppress free speech to ensure their agenda is not challenged.  If you don’t wear a mask or get vaccinated, you are a threat to your fellow man.  You don’t have a “right” to harm others.  The same kind of argument is being used about the global warming crisis. They use the word “denier” to equate skeptics with those who deny the holocaust.  They contend the science “is settled” and any challenge threatens the public. It is important to know that there is no such thing as “settled science”. By its very nature, science is never settled. The purpose of scientific investigation from the earliest recorded times is the advancement of scientific frontiers and the correction, enhancement and advancement of scientific explanations of the natural world. When the term “it is settled science” is thrust at you, it pure rhetorical bullying and should be called out as such.

This movement extends from the UN, to the nation-state, all the way down to the elementary school around the corner from you. The environmental agenda is everywhere.

Now it is likely the people placing the ad are well-meaning. But lying for a good cause is still lying. Moreover, non-profits and corporations that go on to peddle global warming lies help condition the population to accept the socialistic top-down controls actively promoted by the environmentalist Left. 

You must believe this is a crisis or you would not be willing to give up both your wealth and your freedom.

Everywhere from zoo promotion to food packaging, one sees the promotion of the environmental global warming agenda.  Participating in a falsehood to make one feel good or to make others feel good, is bad even if the objective is both laudable and perhaps unnecessary.

Recently, John Christy, Director of the Earth System Science Center, was quoted in the Epoch Times saying: ” CO2 is portrayed now as the cause of damaging extreme weather. Our research indicates these extremes are not becoming more intense or frequent.  CO2 cannot be the cause of something not occurring.”

Patrick Moore, a Canadian scientist and Founder of Greenpeace, was somewhat blunter in the same article: “The whole thing is a total scam. There is actually no scientific evidence that CO2 is responsible for climate change.”

Given the agenda being pushed our way, the most likely thing to die off soon is not the polar bears. It is our freedom. Unfortunately, freedom cannot be saved by a zoo.

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I Must Be Getting Over The Target [A Reality Check on Climate Change] thumbnail

I Must Be Getting Over The Target [A Reality Check on Climate Change]

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By Joe Bastardi

I guess someone on the other side finally took notice of what I have been trying to show for nearly a year now about volcanoes.

It’s a “fact” check on my ideas on the increase in geothermal input as a prime driver of the warming, That input warms the oceans. I am writing this in a way that even the “fact checkers” can understand instead of just getting opinions from people whose livelihoods depend on this whole charade continuing.

So here we go again.

The massive volcano ripped the veil of their ideas in half. They are gawking at the “warmth” of the planet, the sudden spike. Is it not clear that the combination of that volcano with its tremendous input of water vapor and the El Nino is leading to this? Hello Macfly. Have you looked at the increase in Water vapor (WV)? Do you know the increase over the last 30 years from oceanic warming has been about .75 grams/kg, which at the global temperature accounts for about a 1F rise, precisely what we are seeing?

This makes sense. This volcano, unlike Pinatubo which led to cooling due to increased aerosols over the tropics reducing incoming Solar radiation, had much more of a discharge of water vapor. The fact checkers should understand that the lower the temperature, the greater the correlation to a rise in water vapor. Do they? So by quantifying water vapor, we can then use saturation mixing ratio charts (that’s what meteorologists use) to see what rise is taking place. This site actually does that:

https://climate4you.com/

It shows that the peak-to-peak amount of WV since 1990 has increased about .75g/kg and at global temperatures somewhere in the upper 50s does correlate to the observed rise.

From the decades from the ’50s through the ’90s, while CO2 increased at the same pace it is now,

?

There was no virtually no change in the Sea Surface Temperature (SST) around the planet.

1951-1960

1981-1990

A very important factor since the oceans are the source of water vapor (and CO2 also). As the oceans warm, they release more. Try opening a can of soda, leave it to sit for a day, and warm to room temperature. It goes flat. Where does it go? Into the air. Again, we are writing this so the fact-checkers can understand.

But why would CO2 cause the oceans to warm? Its back radiative properties, which are the heart of the CO2 theory of warming, not the so-called heat-trapping gas (it’s still too small to do that), only penetrate the top MM o2 of the oceans. So why would it warm the ocean?

It doesn’t.  The oceans warm the air, not the other way around.

Now, what do you think would happen (for the fact-checkers) if you have essentially an equilibrium and then a new input is introduced? Mainly geothermal warming. (Think of a pot of water on a stove, and you turn on the heat.)

How good is that fit?

?

Key to all this is the increase  PRECEDED, not followed, as CO2 does, the rise. It points the finger squarely at the cause.

Now, suppose this buildup is occurring. What happens naturally when it becomes too much for the system? Well, it has to have a release. These are the strong El Ninos.

When they go off, large amounts of water vapor are put into the air. There is a step up in temperature. It is clearly shown.

Now let us show you how this affects the global weather pattern. Since all this warming is occurring, the atmosphere tries to fight back with La Ninas. These are not so much cooling but delaying the warming in an attempt to establish a new equilibrium.

That is Le Cheteliars Principle 101.

Presto, the multivariate ENSO index shows that since the Super Nino of 1997, we are mostly in a La Nina base state (huge for forecasters to know btw). But La Nina, in a case where there is a constant added input of heat from geothermal sources, is not a cooling agent except against the rise; it tries to reestablish equilibrium, hence the step-up function of temperatures is explained.

Take this El Nino. It will be gone by the summer of next year. Good to know. In fact, it is why I am already predicting a hurricane season from hell. Another story for another time.

But you can see the logical progression and linkage here. It is not rocket science, which is likely a big problem to people who wish to make you think it is so complex that there is no way you can figure it out, so you rely on the experts.

But think about this: If I am right, so what? If it is not about climate and weather, it is not going to stop the stampede that is out of the barn. If I am wrong, so what? I am not out to save the planet. I am out to show all the information and then, yes, give a conclusion. Am I right? I BELIEVE SO. But I don’t know. You can only know after the answer is in, and it most certainly is not.

Here is the other thing. I am not on TV anymore, if you notice. I am not writing a book a year. No sweat off my brow. So, I am not out to get attention. I am out to nail weather forecasts for anyone who wants them, and that requires adjusting ideas for the warmth, no matter what the cause. The money is not on my side of the debate. The Green movement is such that the government, under the guise of the Inflation Reduction Act, is force-feeding money into one answer. Now we have a 20k Climate Corps being proposed. Nice, eh? The Germans had their youth corp and brown shirts. Under Biden, we have 87k new IRS agents and an army of green shirts. What possible good does it do me to stand in the way of that? When it is that far gone, it is over.

But let us get this straight. I am being hammered by people who can’t even tell you what the Net Zero destructions of our energy base would save as far as temperature to the planet (in a time that is known as a climate optimum, not a climate emergency) vs a guy that shows you what he is doing, lays out his reasoning and linkage, and offers his conclusion. I don’t hide what I am looking at. And you are seeing what I am looking at. Contrast that with some of the hiding of data or “reanalyzing” it in the opposite camp.

Think of the fate of people who, if it turns out I am right, would blow their whole missive out of the water. If I am not, makes no difference to me. I still have to figure out what these changes do with the weather, even if it’s the man in the moon who is doing it. It is of no economic benefit to me to be right. For them, it is everything and more. Not only follow the money but follow your God.

They are essentially asking the question, who are you going to believe, us or your lying eyes?

In the meantime, we have had a cold, stormy winter out for a forecast for months in the face of plenty of varying opinions, so I will retreat into my weather bunker and continue to do what I am truly made to do.

While I believe that kind of winter is coming, I won’t know right or wrong till spring. Like so many things, it’s not settled.

*****

This article was published by CFACT, The Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow and is reproduced with permission.

Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons

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A Short ESG Guide: Economic Problems

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By Paul Mueller

The Environmental, Social, and Governance movement has wrapped itself in the garb of justice. It is just as much a moral crusade as it is an economic, social, or political one, with the unfortunate effect that those who criticize ESG can easily be sidelined and dismissed as reactionary, selfish, or worse. Be that as it may, I would be remiss not to raise a host of problems that arise from the pursuit of ESG goals.

For the sake of clarity and brevity, I’ll tackle ESG problems in three separate columns. This column will discuss economic problems that arise from pursuing ESG goals. The next will explore political problems with the implementation and application of ESG criteria. A third will question the moral status of ESG itself as a matter of justice, compassion, virtue, and freedom. These are deep waters, so I must ask the reader’s pardon, as with all the columns in my series, if anything that follows seems rushed or oversimplified.

Costs and (Un)Feasibility of Carbon Offsets

The environmental component clearly has the biggest economic implications. When it comes to “net zero” pledges and the use of renewable energy, pursuing ESG creates massive costs for society and ultimately has limited feasibility, even if it were to be embraced by everyone. Let’s consider the cost of carbon offsets first.

Many companies, from Microsoft to Nestle to Hess, plan to achieve their net-zero goals in part by purchasing carbon offsets. No single carbon offset method dominates the scene. Heirloom Carbon sequesters carbon from limestone, and then uses the limestone to pull carbon out of the air. Other companies bury biodegradable materials that would release greenhouse gas emissions while decomposing. And of course, you still have the old-fashioned method of planting trees or preserving forests.

But these activities are costly. Hundreds of millions of dollars that belong to shareholders are being diverted to the carbon-offset market. Research, labor, and other resources that could be used to produce goods and services people want are being used to dig holes and fill them up, or to prop up relatively untested technology. And to what end? For these carbon sequestration activities to really impact global CO2 emissions, their scale would have to be far greater — hundreds of billions of dollars annually. Rerouting that kind of capital on an annual basis has immense opportunity costs. Furthermore, there are growing concerns about widespread fraud in carbon-offset markets.

Alternative Energy Woes

More important than the direct cost of pursuing net-zero through carbon offsets is the limited feasibility of phasing out fossil fuels entirely. The main forms of renewable energy being championed currently are wind and solar. Yet wind turbines and solar panels rely on fossil fuels, not only for energy and transportation but for some of the very materials in the product. The importance of petrochemicals has often been overlooked, but can hardly be overstated. 

Even if 80 to 90 percent of electricity were being generated from renewable sources, there would still be significant demand for fossil fuels to create plastics, fertilizer, asphalt, and much more. How will we phase out petrochemicals? Eventually, people will know that many “environmentally-conscious” or biodegradable alternatives to plastics (such as paper bags), actually use significant resources to produce and are not necessarily better for the environment. The most feasible renewable energy source is nuclear.

One of the ironies behind the economic costs of moving to renewable energy (and products), is that poor countries are often hurt the most because they can least afford to pay unnecessarily high prices for energy and everything else. The current approach to mitigating climate change — government subsidies, tax credits, and mandates — guarantees inefficiency and waste. No one knows which technologies and which companies will be most effective. As a result, government subsidies are just as likely to go to “bad apples” as to good ones. Not only that, but feedback on the productivity and effectiveness of recipients of government largess will be slow and convoluted — allowing unproductive companies to continue operating for years. In a competitive free-market system, prices, profit, and loss would cause the most productive firms to receive more dollars while unproductive firms go out of business.

Principal-Agent Problems

There are economic problems with the Social and Governance criteria too. First, the whole ESG framework is obviously superfluous when companies are obligated to advance the interests of shareholders. Managers and directors have a duty to pursue expanding the bottom line — which also entails considering and curtailing risk. In as much as ESG thinking improves risk mitigation, it will be widely adopted voluntarily. But parts of ESG that don’t help mitigate risk will be ignored by companies unless they are required to take note of them.

Economists all the way back to Adam Smith have talked about the principal-agent problems involved in the corporate business structure. The agents (management) act on behalf of the principals, (owners/shareholders). But what is to prevent the agents from using the assets of the company to benefit themselves and their friends? Boards are created to oversee managers and, in most cases, shareholders can vote to fire managers or board members. But even beyond that, shareholders are protected by law from corruption or theft by managers.

Social and governance criteria, in as much as they push “stakeholder capitalism,” make the principal-agent problems unmanageable. By creating many more “principals” (stakeholders) with divergent, often conflicting, interests, managers actually can’t act in the interest of principals even if they want to, because no single interest exists. What’s more, managers can now pursue whatever they want, so long as they can find a relevant stakeholder group whose interests align with theirs.

Potential Paths Forward

Here are three alternative ideas to ESG that we should consider:

  • International development, not international aid: The countries most impacted by climate change, according to many environmental groups, tend to be poorer and less-developed. Instead of pushing costly and inefficient energy and manufacturing policies, the international community should advocate greater economic development through more open international trade, rule of law, and free markets.
  • Nuclear, not wind or solar: The only renewable energy source that can scale to the levels modern growing economies need while leaving a small environmental carbon footprint is nuclear. Renewable energy proponents should be throwing all their support into making it cheaper, easier, and safer to build nuclear power plants around the world.
  • Adaptation to climate change, not prevention: The number of people killed by natural disasters declines as countries become wealthier. A strategy of economic development that supports technological development is better than the incredibly costly and unfeasible approach of prevention.

The economic costs of ESG should not be ignored — they are pervasive and large. Although many different factors are involved, it’s likely not a coincidence that the economic output of Europe, which has pushed ESG longer and harder than anywhere else, only grew 11 percent from 2010 to 2022, while the US saw economic growth of over 66 percent over the same period.

*****

This article was published by AIER, American Institute of Economic Research, and is reproduced with permission.

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We Can’t Let Fossil Fuels Die Because They Keep Us Alive

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By Daniel Turner

It is not just cars and leaf blowers, stoves, or even air conditioning. What is at stake is much deeper: human dignity.

This is my first Christmas without my dad. As hard as it is for me and my siblings, it’s harder still for our mother, who is having her first Christmas since 1963 without him. Dad’s days in the hospital and subsequent death ushered in a wave of emotions, memories, and ponderings about heaven, sin, salvation, and for me, fossil fuels.

The last item in that list may sound strange, but let me explain. As an advocate for the energy industry, work follows me everywhere, and I love it because I love what I do. But fossil fuels are not just my life, they are life-giving and life-sustaining.

After his heart attack, Dad had a cardiac catheterization to assess the damage to his coronary artery. A hollow, plastic tube was inserted through the groin. Then, guided by the doctor, it traveled through the blood vessels, sending back data and information. In this procedure, the plastics are made of oil. The needle is forged to the finest of points by heat produced from coal. The medicines used to prevent infection are petrochemicals likely made from natural gas. Right there: fossil fuels.  

A stent was also implanted to keep the blood flowing in a collapsed artery — thinner than human hair, hollow, nontoxic, noncorrosive, flexible, and 100 percent made from oil.  

Medicines, IV bags, disposable gloves, hand sanitizer, the port in his arm, the numerous beeping machines — in every corner of Dad’s hospital room were products of abundant natural resources, which professionals deploy daily to save lives and heal patients. And we take it for granted.

Those advocating for a “green transition” never tell us what the plan is to make needles and bedpans once we “phase out” of fossil fuels. What is the replacement plan for plastic, rubber, cement, steel, and the millions of products they create?

Wind and solar make electricity — albeit inefficient, unreliable, intermittent, and expensive. But fossil fuels do so much more, and the Biden administration and environmental leftists pretend to ignore it. For example, the Biden administration passed the so-called Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, which threw over a trillion tax dollars at, among other things, “rebuild[ing] crumbling road [sic] and bridges.” But at the same time, a government agency, the Environmental Protection Agency, is restricting the very oil, gas, and coal needed to accomplish this.

Clearly, Transportation Secretary Buttigieg and EPA Administrator Regan need to sit down and talk.

Every call to eliminate fossil fuels is a call to slowly, incrementally raise the price of all these products making them cost-prohibitive for the masses. Yes, cement and steel are vital to our economy and our quality of life, but so are the millions of affordable, daily-life products like laundry detergent and aspirin.

I always carry a handkerchief (because my dad did), but most people prefer disposable tissues.  When fossil fuels are gone, tissues are gone. Disposable diapers are gone. Yoga mats and plastic water bottles are gone. Do climate change activist suburban moms know that? Do you think Starbucks can survive without fossil fuels? What about that salad from Whole Foods in a plastic container or even the plastic packaging for meat and produce? Cologne, deodorant, perfume, bathroom cleansers, Swiffer pads, paper towels — sure, that mom may think disposable products are “bad for the Earth,” but a lack of hygiene is far worse for her and her family.

Perhaps I thought these things sitting in Dad’s hospital room to distract myself from the heartache. Perhaps I think these things because it is my job. Either way, I know the world is not ready for fossil fuels to lose this battle. It is not just cars and leaf blowers, stoves, or even air conditioning. What is at stake is much deeper: human dignity — a dignity that elevates us above the harshness of nature and cruelty of illness or allows us to cleanse ourselves from the sweat of labor.

We do not talk about the “then what” after fossil fuels are eliminated. But I assure you, life as we know it would be absolutely, categorically impossible without them.

Petrochemicals and a team of amazing doctors at Northshore Hospital did everything to save my dad, but God called him home. Fossil fuels kept him alive long enough for me to say goodbye.

I will work every day to keep them around for the sake of our lives.

*****

This article was published by The Federalist and is reproduced with permission.

Image Credit: Pixabay

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DAVID BLACKMON: The One Simple Reason Electric Vehicles Are Doomed To Fail thumbnail

DAVID BLACKMON: The One Simple Reason Electric Vehicles Are Doomed To Fail

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By The Daily Caller

In a story that seems to be becoming increasingly common as time goes on, The Western Journal reported this week about a Canadian EV owner experiencing some massive sticker shock over the cost of replacing the damaged battery in his electric vehicle.

Now, those of us who have always driven internal combustion engine (ICE) cars have at one time or another been faced with big repair bills for some of those vehicles. I can remember spending $4,000 on a new radiator for a 10-year-old Infiniti QX 50 with 220,000 miles on it that I just couldn’t bear to part with several years back. I did finally retire that wonderful vehicle when faced with the prospect of a $6,000 tag for a rebuilt transmission.

So, all cars will eventually cost you or your insurance company big money to repair — no one is saying that’s unique to EVs. But where EVs are concerned, it’s the magnitude of the price for replacing a damaged or worn-out battery that is often quite eye-popping.

I wrote a story in September about a fellow in the U.S. deciding to junk his paid-off EV when he got an estimate of $30k to replace his battery. We now see frequent reports that auto insurance companies are charging higher rates for EVs than for comparable ICE cars due in large part to this extravagant battery replacement cost.

If you think that $30,000 is extravagant, well, get ready, because it apparently isn’t even close to the worst-case scenario. Per the Western Journal, a Canadian man, Kyle Hsu, paid roughly $55,000 Canadian ($41,583 US) in 2022 to buy a brand new Hyundai IONIQ 5. But, less than a year later, Mr. Hsu was involved in what seemed to be a minor accident resulting in superficial damage to his beautiful EV.

Unfortunately for Hsu, it turned out that the battery protector cover on his car’s undercarriage was warped, a problem that could in certain instances cause the battery to explode. This meant that he would have to replace his car’s battery pack in addition to fixing its structural damage. Hsu says he was shocked when the estimate to replace the battery came in at $61,000 Canadian, or about $46,000 in US dollars. That’s almost $6,000 more than he paid for the car when he purchased it brand new.

Even worse, because the damage was caused by an accident, the bill was not covered by the car’s warranty, leaving Hsu with the alternative of filing a claim with his insurance carrier. But the resulting insurance implications were enormous, with Mr. Hsu facing a rate increase of up to 50% if he filed the claim. His only other choice would be to foot the repair bill himself and now have over $87,000 US dollars invested in a $41,000 car.

This is insane. This is not sustainable. The EV industry simply cannot have stories like this one popping up with increasing frequency and hope to sustain growing demand for its products.

When you combine horror stories like this one with:

  • range anxiety that pops up any time the weather isn’t perfect;
  • the lack of charging infrastructure;
  • the unreliability of the infrastructure that does exist;
  • the non-recyclability of the battery materials;
  • the increasing restrictions on charging due to the massive load EVs place on the grid;
  • and all the other significant issues EV makers have yet to address,

You see an industry that is almost doomed to failure before it really gets up and running.

I frequently remind readers that EVs have been around since the 1880s. They are not a new idea in any sense of that word. If they were really the answer to displacing ICE cars at societal scale, it seems likely they would have already done so. What we see popping up with increasing frequency now in the form of stories like this one are simply manifestations of the reasons why that has not already happened.

EVs today are what they have always been: A niche product, a luxury item suitable to fill discreet purposes for the upper 5% or so elites in any society. The technology simply is not there yet to make them anything more than that.

AUTHOR

DAVID BLACKMON

David Blackmon is an energy writer and consultant based in Texas. He spent 40 years in the oil and gas business, where he specialized in public policy and communications.

The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the Daily Caller News Foundation.

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‘Tremendously Damaging’: Here’s The Most Aggressive Restrictions Biden’s EPA Pushed On Americans In 2023 thumbnail

‘Tremendously Damaging’: Here’s The Most Aggressive Restrictions Biden’s EPA Pushed On Americans In 2023

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By The Daily Caller

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) pushed several aggressive climate regulations in 2023 that could seriously harm the American economy, energy policy experts told the Daily Caller News Foundation.

The agency proposed or finalized rules that would spur the electric vehicle (EV) transition, decrease power grid reliability by imposing costly restrictions on power plants, tighten air quality standards and more in 2023. Under the Biden administration, the EPA has made considerable efforts to further regulations that would nominally help to counter climate change, often at the expense of the American economy, energy policy experts told the DCNF.

“The EPA took a disturbing trend to a new level in 2023: a willingness to use its regulatory power to kill off industries, dictate or influence what businesses can operate and limit what goods and services are available to the public,” Daren Bakst, the director of the Competitive Enterprise Institute’s Center for Energy and Environment, told the DCNF. “Congress never envisioned the agency’s authorized regulatory power would be used as a tool for the agency to engage in central planning, reshape industries and limit consumer choice.”

The “Clean Power Plan 2.0″

The EPA’s May proposal to slash greenhouse gas emissions from power plants would require fossil fuel-fired generation facilities to adopt expensive developing technologies, such as carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) and hydrogen blending, in order to come into compliance over the coming decades. If finalized in its current form, the regulations— which the EPA contends are legal under the auspices of the Clean Air Act— would significantly raise the chances of blackouts in a massive swath of the Midwest while imposing costs to stakeholders totaling nearly $250 billion, according to analysis conducted by the Center of the American Experiment (CAE).

Power the Future, an energy advocacy organization, dubbed the proposal the “Clean Power Plan 2.0” in a November report because of its strong resemblance to the Obama administration’s “Clean Power Plan” proposal, which the Supreme Court struck down in its landmark decision in West Virginia v. EPAin 2022.

The EPA is moving forward with the proposal, despite the North American Electric Reliability Corporation and a key official for the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission warning that the premature retirement of fossil fuel-fired baseload generation and increased reliance on intermittent green energy, like wind and solar, threatens future grid reliability.

“The proposed rule does not require that plants go offline,” an EPA spokesperson told the DCNF in August. “The proposed rule would require plants to install proven technology to abate greenhouse gas emissions. The proposal provides owners and operators of power plants with ample lead time and substantial compliance flexibilities, allowing power companies and grid operators to make sound long-term planning and investment decisions, and supporting the power sector’s ability to continue delivering reliable and affordable electricity.”

However, CAE and one of its leading grid experts, Isaac Orr, are not convinced.

The agency “does not appear to have the expertise necessary to enact such a sweeping regulation on the American power sector,” CAE wrote in its August comments in response to the agency’s proposal.

“This is the regulatory equivalent of studying the structural integrity of the top floor of a 100-story building without doing so for the preceding 99 floors,” Orr told the DCNF.

Tailpipe Emissions Standards

In April, the agency unveiled its proposal for new tailpipe emissions standards in an effort to curb emissions attributable to transportation. The proposed standards would be historically stringent if finalized and they would effectively mandate that 67% of all light-duty vehicles sold after model year 2032 are EVs, according to the EPA.

Under the proposed rules, 46% of medium-duty vehicle sales and 25% of heavy-duty sales will be EVs, according to the agency’s projections.

The proposal could be “tremendously damaging for the American people,” Diana Furchtgott-Roth, the director of the Heritage Foundation’s Center for Energy, Climate and Environment, told the DCNF. “The reason the agency is pushing these rules is because Congress would never pass these as laws … this rule would be very damaging for Americans and get rid of an iconic means of transportation.”

The administration has spent billions to facilitate its ambitious EV push, and other agencies, such as the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, have promulgated their own similar rules as well. Despite these efforts, the American EV market is on tenuous footing: consumer demand is not growing as rapidly as anticipated, companies are losing large sums of money on their EV product lines, auto executives are starting to back away from short-term EV production targets and the nation’s EV charging infrastructure remains inconsistent and unevenly distributed across the country.

Notably, the House passed a bill that would effectively nullify the proposal earlier in December by a bipartisan vote, but it is unlikely to make it through the Senate, and the White House has suggested that President Joe Biden will veto the bill if it lands on his desk, according to The Hill.

Fine Particulate Pollution Standards

In January, the EPA proposed to tighten the existing National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) for fine particulate pollution (PM 2.5) in order “to better protect communities, including those most overburdened by pollution,” the agency announced in a press release.

More than 70 industrial executives penned a letter to White House Chief of Staff Jeff Zients warning him that it could lead to massive swaths of the nation falling out of compliance with the rule, which would in turn choke economic development and complicate key goals of Biden’s own green industrial agenda, according to its text.

The states that would be most directly impacted by a finalized PM 2.5 NAAQS update would be Texas, California, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Georgia, Nevada, Arizona and Illinois, according to the letter’s text.

“PM 2.5 is the most demonstrable science fraud going on at the EPA,” Steve Milloy, a senior legal fellow for the Energy and Environment Legal Institute, previously told the DCNF. “There is more than enough scientific research to demonstrate that what EPA is doing here is fraud, and it is really a testament to the corruption of the scientific community.”

If finalized, the proposal would kill jobs and put the EPA in a position to deny local economies the right to develop, because states that can not comply with the tightened standards would have to receive approval from the agency to develop new industrial factories and power facilities, Milloy told the DCNF.

The EPA projects that the policy would generate up to $43 billion in net health benefits in 2032, as well as prevent 4,200 premature deaths per year and restore 270,000 lost workdays per year by reducing the current standard of allowable fine particle pollution by up to 25%.

Waters of the United States

In January, the agency proposed a regulation that would define the “Waters of the United States” (WOTUS) under the EPA’s regulatory purview as “navigable waters” to include lands containing small streams and wetlands. A federal court blocked the January proposal in April, finding that the 24 states that sued the agency had “persuasively shown that the new 2023 Rule poses a threat to their sovereign rights and amounts to irreparable harm.”

Then, in May, the Supreme Court limited the EPA’s authority under the Clean Water Act — which it had cited as the enabling statute for the January proposal — in its decision in Sackett v. EPA, a case brought by a couple whom the EPA tried to stop from constructing a house on their land in Idaho.

In August, the agency “finalized amendments to its January rule, which are just a half-hearted and incomplete set of corrections to try and fix the flawed rule,” Bakst told the DCNF. “These amendments don’t properly comply with the Sackett opinion and fail to provide needed clarity to implement the opinion. And they did so without seeking public comment.”

The EPA exhibited a “complete disregard for private property owners and the rule of law” in its proceedings pursuant to WOTUS regulation in 2023, Bakst told the DCNF.

Neither the EPA nor the White House responded immediately to a request for comment.

AUTHOR

NICK POPE

Contributor.

RELATED ARTICLE: EPA Bureaucrats Can Rake In Six-Figure Salaries While Mostly Working From Home, Report Finds

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.

Authoritarian? Conservatives Want to Restore the Constitution. The Left Can’t Handle It. thumbnail

Authoritarian? Conservatives Want to Restore the Constitution. The Left Can’t Handle It.

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By Tyler O’Neil

The Constitution created three branches in the federal government: the legislature to make the laws, the executive branch to enforce the laws, and the judiciary to settle disputes about the laws. Yet the federal government we know and very much do not love doesn’t operate the way the Constitution says it should.

Instead, unelected bureaucrats write more rules than Congress does, the president cannot fire bureaucrats who oppose his efforts to keep his promises to the people, and the Supreme Court has unilaterally rewritten the Constitution on issues like abortion, same-sex marriage, and gender ideology.

Conservatives have launched many efforts to restore the federal government to the way the Constitution says it should work, but the Left has increasingly demonized those efforts as backward, racist, or—more recently—a form of authoritarianism.

In The New York Times, Maggie Haberman wrote: “Why a Second Trump Presidency May Be More Radical Than His First.” Among other things, Haberman warned that former President Donald Trump, were he to win the presidential election next year, “would seek to expand presidential power in myriad ways—concentrating greater authority over the executive branch in the White House, ending the independence of agencies Congress set up to operate outside of presidential control and reducing civil service protections to make it easier to fire and replace tens of thousands of government workers.”

Haberman seems not to remember how Trump’s administration fought against him in unjustified ways, operating as a “deep state” to prevent him from fulfilling his campaign promises. Preventing the executive branch from operating in this way is not a form of authoritarianism but an effort to bring bureaucrats back under the control of the voters’ elected representatives.

Trump’s Agenda 47 and Project 2025, a conservative movement project led by The Heritage Foundation, aim to empower a conservative president to fire executive branch workers who would oppose the president’s goals. (The Daily Signal is The Heritage Foundation’s news outlet.)

Another key conservative reform, the Regulations from the Executive in Need of Scrutiny Act, or REINS Act, would require Congress to pass regulations that would significantly impact the U.S. economy.

President Joe Biden’s White House pledged to veto the REINS Act if Congress were to pass it. The Office of Management and Budget said the act “would undermine agencies’ efforts by inserting into the regulatory process an unwieldy, unnecessary, and time-consuming hurdle that would prevent implementation of critical safeguards that protect public safety, grow our economy, and advance the public interest.”

While the Left frames these conservative reforms as “authoritarian,” Biden tried to cancel up to $20,000 in student debt for certain borrowers, with the stroke of his pen. The Education Department estimated that this would cost $305 billion in the next 10 years. Had the Supreme Court not ruled the plan unconstitutional, the student loan bailout would have inflated college costs, hindered economic growth, rewarded increasingly woke universities, and benefitted upper-income earners at the expense of those who didn’t go to college or who paid off their loans.

Biden has made similarly unilateral moves to push his transgender orthodoxy and his climate alarmist agenda. Ironically, the president faces his own kind of “deep state,” bureaucrats who are opposing his pro-Israel rhetoric.

Meanwhile, the Left has orchestrated a campaign to delegitimize the Supreme Court, with outfits like ProPublica targeting justices such as Clarence Thomas.

The Left has attacked Thomas in part because the court’s majority now supports originalism, the view that the Supreme Court should uphold the original public meaning of the Constitution, as opposed to reinterpreting the text to achieve the Left’s goals.

Originalism grew as a reaction to the court’s decisions in cases such as Roe v. Wade (1973) and Obergefell v. Hodges (2015), which twisted passages in the Constitution out of recognition to create new rights that the Founders and those who later amended the Constitution at the time of the 14th Amendment would have opposed.

Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., unwittingly revealed why the Left opposes originalism. He tweeted in 2020, “Originalism is racist. Originalism is sexist. Originalism is homophobic. Originalism is just a fancy word for discrimination.”

Markey’s problem isn’t Originalism—it’s that he isn’t willing to get his efforts opposing “racism,” “sexism,” “homophobia,” and “discrimination” through Congress, the body that makes law, according to the Constitution. He’d rather have the Supreme Court dictate his preferred agenda, and he opposes the good-government reforms that make it harder for nine unelected judges to create new laws.

The Left’s attacks on the Supreme Court represent an obnoxious tantrum after the nation’s highest court has—at least for now—rejected its old modus operandi of writing the Left’s agenda into the Constitution. Now, the court increasingly calls balls and strikes, in ways that frustrate both sides of the aisle but more closely represent the Founders’ vision.

Efforts to rein in the deep state and encourage Congress to make laws, rather than passing off that duty to bureaucrats, echo the originalist movement in the judiciary. These reforms aren’t aimed at authoritarianism or gumming up the works—they’re aimed at making the federal government more accountable to the people once again.

*****

This article was published by Daily Signal 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.

New York City’s Climate Policies Could Make Life Even More ‘Unaffordable’ For The Middle Class thumbnail

New York City’s Climate Policies Could Make Life Even More ‘Unaffordable’ For The Middle Class

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By The Daily Caller

New York City is moving forward with several climate policies which are likely to make everyday life even more costly for the middle class in one of the country’s most expensive cities.

The city is aiming to slash its greenhouse gas emissions by 80% come 2050, push a sweeping building electrification mandate known as Local Law 97 and impose an automobile traffic congestion fee, each of which will increase the costs of living or working in the nation’s largest city, especially for the middle class, energy and New York policy experts told the Daily Caller News Foundation. Queens, Brooklyn and Manhattan each already rank within the 15 most expensive places to live in the U.S., according to an analysis conducted by CNBC.

“The city is wealthy because, somewhere out there, people are producing energy, food, clothing and so on, and people are trading all of that in New York,” Dan Kish, a senior fellow for the Institute for Energy Research, told the DCNF. The city’s emissions target “will make things more expensive and drive people away to places like Florida,” he added.

The New York Times Editorial Board Applauds Green New Deal https://t.co/F1AyhjcM2R pic.twitter.com/GUhCORVOfM

— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) February 25, 2019

That flight of capital would shrink the tax base, thereby straining the city’s finances further, Kish told the DCNF. “People without the means, working people, do not have the opportunity to just pack up and leave,” Kish told the DCNF. “But it’s easy if you’re Mike Bloomberg.”

Local Law 97, meanwhile, is poised to impose emissions standards that approximately 50,000 buildings in New York City will have to meet starting in 2024, with additional restrictions imposed starting in 2030, according to The New York Times.

Some buildings are easier to retrofit with the appropriate wiring and equipment necessary to comply than others, and a large share of the high costs incurred by landlords and building owners for coming into compliance will almost certainly be passed on to residents, Jane Menton, a mother who lives in a Queens co-op and has led a grassroots effort to fight against Local Law 97, told the DCNF.

“Progressives in Queens, Manhattan and Brooklyn are so afraid to go against the narrative that this rule is a climate solution… but it’s unaffordable to convert buildings to electric so they won’t convert to comply with the rule, they will just pay fines which will then allow the city to use the money to plug gaps in the budget,” Menton told the DCNF. “The same politicians and advocates who claim to care about the city’s working class wrote a law that will push them out of their homes… functionally, this law is just a carbon tax on the middle class.”

Notably, other cities, such as Boston, have pushed for similar building electrification policies to fight climate change, and the Biden administration has spent hundreds of millions of dollars to help state and municipal governments pursue policies that “decarbonize” buildings as well.

The New York City congestion pricing tax is promulgated by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), which is technically not an agency operating under the auspices of the municipal government.

Congestion pricing is meant to reduce emissions and air pollution by charging drivers fees to enter certain sections of the city. Specifically, the MTA has proposed to charge passenger cars $15 and trucks as much as $36 to be able to enter a large swath of Manhattan, according to local outlet NBC 4.

However, the proposal may not significantly reduce the amount of traffic that piles up on the city’s roadways, potentially even increasing the amount of congestion in areas like the Bronx, according to the New York Post. Qualifying low-income drivers who register with the appropriate authorities could also receive a 50% discount on the charges after their first ten trips into the relevant area of Manhattan, according to local digital news outlet northjersey.com

“Congestion pricing should be viewed primarily as a revenue action to cover the MTA’s indefensibly high capital costs,” Ken Girardin, director of research for the Empire Center, a New York-focused think tank, told the DCNF. “As to congestion itself, policymakers have declined to do basic things like enforce parking rules or dial back the parking permits given to public employees or other policy changes that would take cars off lower Manhattan roads because those aren’t things you can borrow money against.”

The policy would also make life more expensive for people who do not live in the city but make the commute each day to go to work, according to Politico. Notably, politicians in London, the U.K’s largest metropolis, have attempted a similar scheme, which Republican New York City Councilman Joseph Borelli of Staten Island described as “a complete disaster” and an “abject failure” when discussing New York’s forthcoming version of the scheme in January.

“If all of New York state went ‘net-zero’ today, United Nations climate modeling indicates that a mere 0.0023° F of global warming would be avoided by 2050. That is far from measurable, much less significant. So nothing would be accomplished,” Steve Milloy, a senior legal fellow for the Energy and Environment Legal Institute, told the DCNF. Businesses will stay in NYC and play along with the climate agenda, including high taxes, as long as costs can be passed on to locals. When profitability stops, businesses will leave… The costs of the climate agenda are regressive. Poorer people will feel them first.”

The offices of Democratic New York City Mayor Eric Adams and the MTA did not respond immediately to the DCNF’s request for comment.

AUTHOR

NICK POPE

Contributor.

RELATED ARTICLES:

This Populous Blue State Has A Green Energy Mandate. Experts Say It Threatens Grid Reliability

Fresh Off Their Alaska Failure, The Eco-Left Has Its Sights Set On A New Gas Project

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.

Investors Are Turning On A Key Pillar Of Biden’s Climate Agenda thumbnail

Investors Are Turning On A Key Pillar Of Biden’s Climate Agenda

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By The Daily Caller

Investors are backing off of electric vehicle (EV) charging companies, a key player in the Biden administration’s wider climate agenda, The Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday.

Major companies in the industry— including ChargePoint, EVgo and Blink Charging— have seen their stock prices tumble over the past year as investors worry about their profitability, a sign of potential trouble for an industry that the White House is counting on to reach its aggressive longer-term EV targets, according to the WSJ. The administration has set aside billions of dollars to boost the industry, which it will need to thrive in order to develop a nationwide network of charging stations.

ChargePoint’s stock price is down 74% in 2023, while EVgo and Blink Charging have seen their shares lose 21% and 67% of their value, respectively, according to the WSJ.

Buttigieg says you don’t have to worry about gas prices if you buy an electric vehicle…someone should remind him how out of touch he sounds pic.twitter.com/tiJVkl7wB3

— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) March 7, 2022

ChargePoint, which the administration has touted in the recent past, is also currently subject to a class action lawsuit that alleges company executives engaged in securities fraud by making misleading statements that unduly inflated the firm’s share price.

“I think the investor class has grown weary of the industry’s lack of profitability,” Blink Charging’s CEO Brendan Jones told the WSJ. EV charging companies once received lofty valuations from investors, Jones told the WSJ.

The Biden administration spent $7.5 billion in the bipartisan infrastructure law to help build out a nationwide network of 500,000 charging stations in order to help reach its goal of having 50% of all new car sales be EVs by 2030. McKinsey, a leading consulting firm, has estimated that there will need to be about 1.5 million public chargers installed by 2030 if that target is to be achieved, according to the WSJ. At present, there are nearly 160,000 public chargers available at approximately 60,000 locations nationwide.

EV charging companies are generally struggling to turn a profit right now, but they expect to attain profitability within the next year or two, according to the WSJ. However, the wider EV industry is lagging despite the Biden administration’s efforts to support it, and charging companies find themselves in a difficult bind: more consumers need to switch to EVs to help these companies improve their performance, but consumers may be hesitant to do so if the reliability of the nation’s charging infrastructure remains inconsistent.

Currently, the vast majority of charging infrastructure is concentrated in more densely populated coastal areas as opposed to more rural areas of the country, according to the Department of Energy (DOE).

ChargePoint, EVgo, Blink Charging and the White House did not respond immediately to requests for comment.

AUTHOR

NICK POPE

Contributor.

RELATED ARTICLE: EXCLUSIVE: Sen. Ernst Is Pulling The Plug On Biden’s Electric Vehicle Charging Initiative

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.

Big Wind Closes Out The Year With One Of Its Biggest Defeats Ever thumbnail

Big Wind Closes Out The Year With One Of Its Biggest Defeats Ever

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By The Daily Caller

A federal judge sided with a Native American tribe in a dispute with a major wind developer on Wednesday, handing a massive defeat to the wind industry to end 2023.

U.S. Court of International Trade Judge Jennifer Choe-Groves ordered Enel, a major green energy company based in Rome with an American presence, to tear down an enormous wind farm that the firm had constructed in Osage County, Oklahoma, over the consistent protest of the Osage tribe who live in the area, according to the Tulsa World. The ruling is a huge victory for the Osage tribe, who opposed the project because of its location relative to burial sites and the ecological damage inflicted upon eagles by the massive turbines, and a stark defeat for Enel, which is now staring down hundreds of millions of dollars in decommissioning charges.

The wind farm had been the subject of a lengthy legal battle between the Osage Nation and the developer, spanning back to 2011, when the tribe filed a lawsuit in federal court alleging that the development illegally deprived the tribe of access to the mineral deposits beneath the site of the project, according to the Tulsa World. The project featured 84 turbines, as well as required equipment like transmission lines and weather towers, spread over 8,400 acres of land that Choe-Groves asserted was leased illegally and to the detriment of the tribe’s sovereignty.

Biden’s Climate Bill Boosted An Offshore Wind Giant, But His Economy Brought It To The Brink https://t.co/AF7SPT2FNu

— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) November 3, 2023

There will be a trial for damages following Choe-Groves’ ruling, according to the Tulsa World.

Notably, Enel states on its website that it exhibits “an unmatched commitment to sustainability and a just and inclusive energy transition for all.” Paolo Romanacci, who is the head of Enel Green Power North America, also serves as the director for the American Clean Power Association, a green energy trade group that has spent millions of dollars lobbying the federal government to advance the interests of the green energy industry, according to data from Open Secrets.

The ordered deconstruction of 84 wind turbines is “unprecedented,” according to Robert Bryce, an energy sector expert who also keeps track of local rejections of major renewable energy projects across the country. Bryce estimates that the company stood to reap tens of millions of taxpayer dollars in subsidies for the project, a dynamic which he considers at least partially responsible for the firm’s insistence to continue building and operating the project despite the persistent objections of the tribe.

“I hope no other tribe has to do what we had to do,” Osage Minerals Council Chairman Everett Waller told the Tulsa World, referencing the tribe’s long legal battle against the project. “This is a win not only for the Osage Minerals Council; this is a win for Indian Country. There are a lot of smaller tribes that couldn’t have battled this long, but that’s why we’re Osages. We’re here, and this is our homeland, and we are going to protect it at all costs.”

Enel did not respond immediately to a request for comment.

AUTHOR

NICK POPE

Contributor.

RELATED ARTICLE: ‘Green Colonialism’: Biden Admin Clashes With Native American Activists Over Lithium Mine

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.

My Response to an AGW Political Scientist thumbnail

My Response to an AGW Political Scientist

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By John Droz, Jr.

Climate Change proponents and real Science are often at odds.

Periodically I’ll republish something I wrote prior to my Substack starting, that is currently relevant, In this case, a few years ago I was asked to write a commentary about the appropriateness of industrial wind energy for the Adirondack Park in upstate NY (the largest protected geographic area in continental US). Here it is… That quickly resulted in a well-known local college professor’s (a climate alarmist) attack… My public response to him is below. (FYI, I never heard back from him again.)…

I was rather surprised to see the Adirondack Almanac piece by Professor Curt Stager, for several reasons. For example: a) I have had multiple polite exchanges with Curt in the past, and he never said any of these things directly to me, b) his commentary included multiple misdirections, and c) that he would so openly disavow real Science.

I find item “c” the most surprising and disconcerting. Carefully consider this superior quote from Curt eight years ago (I bolded the most important parts):

“Scientists are human beings who reflect a diversity of opinions and attitudes.  Of course, most of us are fed up with this ridiculous situation, so it’s not surprising that you hear from so many who express those concerns.  I’m fed up, too, but I’m also not alone in my preferences for refraining from “aggressive activist stances.”   I do so because I value Science itself more than any individual topic that it addresses.

“I consider Science to be one of the most valuable inventions of human civilization, and I recognize how precious and vulnerable to corruption it is as one who believes in objective reality, the fallibility of human perception, and the need for objective methods of seeking truth. I also recognize that public trust in Science itself depends heavily upon trust in the objectivity of those who pursue it.  We must walk a fine line between defending truth and trying to force it on other people, and I personally choose to take a cautious approach in walking that line.”

This is a well-phrased, important statement — and I would agree with every bolded word. However, since that time Curt has apparently been radicalized. As his Adirondack Almanac commentary indicates he appears to have abandoned his earlier commitment to his profession, and has proudly become a card-carrying political science activist.

To properly respond to all the monkeyshines in his Adirondack Almanac article would take longer than the space allowed here, so I’ll just address some of them. Hopefully discerning readers can then extrapolate the rest on their own…

What we are discussing here is called “Anthropogenic Global Warming” (AGW). Basically, that is the belief that catastrophic global warming is caused almost exclusively by man-made influences (e.g., burning fossil fuels).

The gist of the problem is that Curt has chosen to impale himself on the horns of a dilemma. On the one hand, he wants us to believe that his opinions about AGW are based on real Science — but on the other hand, he doesn’t want to be burdened by the constraints of following the protocols of real Science!  Put another way, his comments show a clear distinction between genuine science and political science. Consider some examples:

#1 — If two professional scientists have a disagreement, each one politely puts forth the best empirical (i.e., real-world) evidence that they believe supports their case. At no time does one disparage the other’s motivations, past associations, beliefs, mother-in-law, etc. — as those are irrelevant to the discussion at hand. If Curt was so confident in the scientific proof of his claims, why would he waste a single word of his space-limited op-ed to deprecate me? That is a political tactic, outside the realm of real Science.

#2 — Curt then inaccurately asserts that the only people competent enough to assess the validity of the AGW matter, are “truly qualified climate scientists.” Whether the AGW hypothesis is true or not rests on the Scientific validity of its proponents’ claims. Any competent scientist can see whether other scientists (in their field or otherwise), have followed Scientific Protocol… Interestingly Curt undermines his own assertion (that AGW is the exclusive realm of climate scientists) by citing “physics” (i.e., my field) as the basis for some of his AGW claims.

#3 — Curt mischaracterizes a Scientific hypothesis by disparagingly calling it “mere guesswork.” Here’s a reasonable definition:

“The formulation and testing of a hypothesis is part of the Scientific Method — the approach scientists use when attempting to understand and test ideas about natural phenomena. The generation of a hypothesis is a creative process, based on existing scientific knowledge, intuition, or experience. The two primary features of a scientific hypothesis are falsifiability and testability.”

OK, now we understand that, here is the really important part: what does it take for a scientific hypothesis to become a scientific theory, the next step up the ladder? According to UC Berkeley:

“Theories, are broad explanations for a wide range of phenomena. They are concise, coherent, systematic, predictive, and broadly applicable…. and has proven itself in thousands of experiments and observational studies.”

However, in this case, the Global Warming promoters have simply decreed that their AGW hypothesis has been elevated to the level of a Scientific theory — but without adhering to the necessary scientific protocol! Such proclamations are the tactics of activists and political scientists — not real scientists.

#4 — Professor Stager knows this very well but is averse to admitting that the AGW matter is a hypothesis — as he does not want to comply with most of the traditional burdensome Scientific methodology. Why not?

Some of the excuses put forward by AGW advocates, are: a) it’s too time-consuming, b) AGW is too complicated to be analyzed by traditional Science, c) AGW is not falsifiable (see above), and d) the traditional science methodology casts significant doubt on the AGW hypothesis.  In other words, Curt is saying let’s skip over all this annoying Science stuff, and cut to the chase. Again, that is the perspective of a political science person: let’s get on to changing policies!

#5 — The AGW hypothesis is almost entirely based on computer models. But computer models are not something magic: they are the results of data plus numerous assumptions by people.

But if AGW is too complicated to be analyzed by traditional Science, how is it that certain individuals are able to accurately decipher what data is pertinent and exactly how it all inter-relates? Rephrased: if accurately assessing the validity and results of AGW is too complicated for traditional Science, then it is also too complicated for computer models. BTW, real scientists focus on empirical data. Political scientists prefer computer models as it is child’s play to manipulate them (without citizens being aware), so that any desired outcome can be generated…

#6 — Unfortunately, Curt did not acknowledge that we have HUGE gaps of knowledge in our understanding of climate.

For example, the AGW matter appears to rest on a very basic equation: the global CO2 balance. On one side are “CO2 Sources” which are either natural or man-made. On the other side are “CO2 Sinks” which are mostly natural. When the Sources exceed the Sinks, we have a resultant net CO2 increase. One of several problems is that as much as 30% of the Sinks side of the equation is not well understood.  How accurate can computer models be when there is such a substantial unknown involved? Real scientists are very clear about exactly what we know and do not know. Political scientists, on the other hand, glaze over the unknowns.

#7 — There are multiple references to “peer-review” in Curt’s commentary. Two comments about those. First, it’s puzzling that Curt fails to inform readers that there are some 2000 peer-reviewed papers that contest his AGW position (e.g., see here). A real scientist objectively presents both sides of any dispute. (Note Curt’s quote about that at the beginning!) A political scientist solely promotes his own agenda, pretending that there is no other reasonable conclusion than theirs.

#8 — Second, the intention of his “peer-review” insertions is to convince the casual reader that Science has put its imprimatur on Curt’s AGW hypothesis. That is not so. What laypeople need to know is that the peer-review process has NOTHING to do with ascertaining the validity of any study’s conclusions. For example, in the peer-review process, NO ONE repeats any experiment done in a study, to verify the results.

To get a better picture of what peer-review is all about, carefully read the statement made by one of the major players in the peer-review process, the editor of the world-renown medical journal, the Lancet:

“The mistake, of course, is to have thought that peer-review was any more than a crude means of discovering the acceptability — not the validity — of a new finding.

“Editors and scientists alike insist on the pivotal importance of peer-review. We portray peer-review to the public as a quasi-sacred process that helps to make science our most objective truth teller.

“But we know that the system of peer-review is biased, unjust, unaccountable, incomplete, easily fixed, often insulting, usually ignorant, occasionally foolish, and frequently wrong.”

In other words, references to peer-review to support one’s claims are based on the premise that the reader is not educated about peer-review realities. This is a strategy used by political scientists: to take advantage of what citizens don’t understand, to promote their own objectives and policies.

#9 — Along the same line are Curt’s references to “consensus.” Oh dear!  If Curt has irrefutable Science to support his AGW hypothesis, why would he waste time by talking about such unscientific matters as consensus? Look closely at the Scientific Method. Is there anything there about consensus? NO!

What is also indisputable is that there have been numerous cases in the past where the consensus of what scientists believed, was subsequently proven to be wrong. Real scientists are well aware of that reality, so they would never — ever — try to justify their hypothesis by referencing other scientists’ opinions. On the other hand, political science is all about getting a consensus.

#10—Despite his 1300± word commentary, Curt didn’t actually address the primary points I made in my earlier Adirondack Explorer article. Instead, he waxed eloquently on AGW — which was not the topic I was asked to write about. Renewable energy in the Adirondack Park was my assignment. He didn’t say anything about that! Have you ever noticed that when a politician is asked a question they don’t like, they smoothly change the topic? That’s another stark difference between real Science and political science.

#11—Curt’s remarks about skepticism are also interesting. He understands that skepticism is the hallmark of a real scientist — so he makes sure to point out that he once was an AGW skeptic. Although I couldn’t find any AGW skeptical papers he wrote during that time, I’m willing to take his word for it. However, his position is now that he has been satisfied, why isn’t everyone else?  Indeed.

If he had put forth a learned position: a) that followed the conventions of real Science, b) that honestly acknowledged how much we don’t know about AGW, c) without ad hominems, d) without references to such unscientific matters such as consensus, and e) without making false implications about the veracity of peer-review — then we could see that he was making a strong case based on real Science. Instead, we got a political science response, which does not inspire confidence.

#12—It’s quite clear from all this that the AGW issue is not really about CO2. Instead, this is just a convenient vehicle for those who want to radically alter our American way of life — to literally convert us to an agrarian, Marxist society. Don’t take my word for it, but just closely examine the elements (and consequences) of the Green New Deal, which is just a trial balloon for what’s really the agenda being promoted here.

The bottom line is that Curt and other similar advocates, want us to fork over $100± Trillion dollars: a) to accept their AGW hypothesis when they have not bothered to follow traditional Science protocols, and b) to implement “solutions” (like industrial wind energy) that are scientifically unproven.  What could possibly go wrong?

PS — A profoundly important problem that is going on here, is that real Science itself is under attack by anti-American progressives. For example, see this earlier commentary for just one part of what is transpiring.

©2023. John Droz, Jr. All rights reserved.

Green Firm That Advised SEC On Proposed Emissions Rule Sold Carbon Credits From Chinese Region Known For Slave Labor thumbnail

Green Firm That Advised SEC On Proposed Emissions Rule Sold Carbon Credits From Chinese Region Known For Slave Labor

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By The Daily Caller

The Biden administration’s plan to impose climate disclosure requirements on the financial sector draws on the input of a green consultancy that sold carbon credits derived from China’s Xinjiang province, according to a Daily Caller News Foundation review of public documents.

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is set to release its final climate disclosure rule in the coming months, and the agency’s proposed rulemaking documents cite the Swiss-based climate consultancy South Pole multiple times. Likewise, the SEC spoke with a high-ranking South Pole employee about the rule after the firm had sold carbon credits generated in a region of China known for forced labor.

South Pole touts itself as “[striving] for a world where businesses, governments and communities make climate action the new normal.” In a November piece, the investigative group Follow the Money reported that South Pole sold carbon offset credits derived from projects in Xinjiang, China, the epicenter of the Chinese Communist Party’s repressive campaign against Uyghur Muslims.

“Given the specious, often clearly fraudulent nature of the carbon credits rubric in general, can anyone be surprised about South Pole’s apparent scam? If our media establishment were doing its job, the carbon credits grift would rank as one of the major scandals of our time,” David Blackmon, a 40-year veteran of the American oil and gas industry who now regularly consults and writes about the energy sector, told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “The fact that the Biden SEC would rely on these apparent grifters so strongly as support for a major, economically destructive regulatory action is unsurprising, and just in keeping with the overall gaslighting character of the Biden regime.”

Biden claims we are on track to achieve our Paris Agreement goal of reducing carbon emissions by 2030: pic.twitter.com/k9sz8sqXCY

— Daily Caller (@DailyCaller) November 11, 2022

South Pole is cited several times in the SEC’s disclosure proposal, and the company’s director of sustainable finance, Rebecca Self, joined a January 2022 call with SEC staff to discuss the potential costs of reporting climate-related risks and statistics, according to a publicly available SEC memorandum.

South Pole sold carbon offset credits derived from Xinjiang for several years, stopping in 2021, according to Follow the Money. South Pole would buy the credits from their Chinese partner for less than one euro each, and then resold them to clients like Spotify, British Petroleum and the European Youth Parliament for more than four euros apiece.

The carbon market allows companies to buy and sell carbon credits that nominally offset emissions generated in their operations. “Carbon credits are measurable, verifiable emission reductions from certified climate action projects,” according to South Pole’s own definition.

It is important to note that it is unclear whether any of the operations that formed the basis for South Pole’s credits had any exposure to forced Uyghur labor, according to Follow the Money. However, the ubiquity of forced labor in the region during the time that the company was selling the credits certainly raised those risks above typical risk levels seen elsewhere in the world.

Within the first few years after its founding in 2006, the firm identified Xinjiang’s cotton fields as a potential source for carbon credits, according to Follow the Money. The region’s cotton farmers, many of whom are Uyghurs, would typically burn the twigs and sticks created as a harvesting byproduct on the fields, leave them to rot or collect and dump them elsewhere.

Rather than wasting those twigs, South Pole realized that they had potential value as offsets if they could be converted into fuel at a Chinese biomass plant, according to Follow the Money. This realization reportedly became the basis for the firm’s Xinjiang-derived carbon credits. The company has drawn scrutiny for its operations in other parts of the world beyond China as well.

South Pole is alleged to have sold credits derived from its landmark Kariba Forest Protection project in Zimbabwe, despite knowing that the Kariba project may have only actually produced one-third of the offsets the company claimed to the public, according to a separate investigation conducted by Follow the Money.

If the SEC’s March 2022 proposal is finalized in its current form, the SEC would require publicly-traded corporations to disclose climate-related risks to their businesses in financial filings. Additionally, the SEC’s proposal would require companies to disclose the greenhouse gas emissions directly caused by their operations, those generated by the energy and electricity they use to power their operations and indirect emissions produced in companies’ upstream and downstream supply chains.

Scores of congressional Democrats have urged the SEC and the agency’s chairman, Gary Gensler, to swiftly adopt the disclosure standards. However, many corporate interests, including BlackRock CEO Larry Fink, have reportedly pushed back against the rule as proposed, and reports have surfaced suggesting that the agency may water down the proposal when it moves to finalize the rules sometime in early 2024 after several delays.

The SEC, South Pole and the White House did not respond immediately to the DCNF’s requests for comment.

AUTHOR

NICK POPE

Contributor.

RELATED ARTICLE: ‘Power Grab’: As California Closes In On A Sweeping Emissions Law, Biden’s SEC Could Roll Out Its Own Version

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.

Chinese Communist Party Linked To Funding Climate Activists In The U.S. and U.K. thumbnail

Chinese Communist Party Linked To Funding Climate Activists In The U.S. and U.K.

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By Thomas Catenacci, Joe Schoffstall

Editors’ Note: Most of us are aware that the CCP has been actively bribing US politicians and gifting money to Confucius centers at universities, but may not be aware of how they operate with NGOs and fund the “environmental movement.” Their activity in environmental matters makes little sense because if they were concerned about emissions, they would simply change their policies at home.  No, their activities in this regard are to weaken the US and make us more dependent on them for critical minerals and energy infrastructure like solar panels, windmills, and other technologies they dominate.

The Chinese Communist Party just wants to save the Earth, right?

Even though China is the largest single user of fossil fuels on Earth, for some reason, The Energy Foundation China — an NGO dedicated to worrying about carbon emissions — spent nearly $4 million working on reducing US emissions instead of Sino ones. They also spent some undisclosed amount helping the Grantham Research Institute in London last year. So we have donors in a developing country giving generously to the US and UK because the rich first world is too poor to fund their own environmental philanthropy groups, right?

The Energy Foundation China (EFC) generously wants to help the US phase out coal and electrify their cars. But that’s just the nice political power that the CCP is (the kind that also builds fortified islands in shipping lanes):

CCP-Tied Group is Quietly Fueling US-Based Climate Initiatives: Tax Filings

A climate-focused nonprofit with significant operations in Beijing has wired millions of dollars to fund climate initiatives and environmental groups in the U.S., according to tax filings first obtained by Fox News Digital.

While the Energy Foundation’s financial filings indicate that the group is technically headquartered in San Francisco, a Fox News Digital review determined that the majority of its operations are conducted in China with a staff that boasts extensive ties to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Its recently filed tax form shows the group, which refers to itself as “Energy Foundation China,” contributed $3.8 million to initiatives in the U.S. like phasing out coal and electrifying the transportation sector.

The Fox authors list several examples of how the EFC spends its money on climate policy activism. For example, the Chinese group gave $375,000 to the Natural Resources Defence Council (NRDC) — a non-profit in the US that files legal challenges to stop oil pipelines, drilling, coal plants, and other mining activities. The head of the NRDC says they get no money from China and protests that the Energy Foundation is based in San Francisco, but the Fox authors explain that not only does the group lease office facilities in Beijing, but their CEO and President used to be the deputy director general of China’s National Centre for Climate Change Strategy. The program director of the EFC’s “industry program” spent eight years at the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

The US Energy Foundation gave birth to the Energy Foundation China.

The Fox News article could have explained the relationship between the Energy Foundation and the Energy Foundation China. They are separate now, but for twenty years, they were one and the same.

According to InfluenceWatch, the large, original Energy Foundation was set up in the US in 1991. Later, in 1999, the Packard Foundation helped to set up Energy Foundation China. In 2019, the Chinese branch officially split from the larger US group, except it based its headquarters in San Francisco, too (which seems odd if they are trying to influence China).

The parent US “Energy Foundation” is so huge it gave an amazing 52 million dollars (US) to groups around the world last year. Ponder that somehow, the Energy Foundation China was fully enmeshed as a part of that giant machine from 1999 to 2019.

‘A quintessential “pass-through” for donors…’

InfluenceWatch notes that way back in 2014, a US Senate committee already felt the Energy Foundation was a conduit for donors to funnel money to left-wing activism without being easily traced:

A July 2014 report by the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works’ Republicans called the Energy Foundation “a quintessential example of a pass-through” for donors who want to fund left-wing environmentalist activism while avoiding accountability for traceable connections to activist groups. The report also stated that the foundation, which cannot support political campaigns directly, transfers money to other groups that can, thanks to loopholes in the tax code.

More profits and power for China

China controls the rare metals market, builds wind turbines, solar panels, and now also the EVs. Obviously, on a purely self-serving business level, the CCP would be crazy if they weren’t amplifying Green fantasia in the West in order to sabotage the competition. And the idea of undermining energy security and the general industrial power base of the West might also appeal to CCP leaders. And hypothetically, if it did, what would stop it from happening — investigative reporting from The ABC or the BBC? Not likely.

*****

This article was published by CFACT,  Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow, and is reproduced with permission.

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DAVID BLACKMON: Biden Admin’s Latest Offshore Lease Proves The Political Class Shouldn’t Make Energy Decisions For Us thumbnail

DAVID BLACKMON: Biden Admin’s Latest Offshore Lease Proves The Political Class Shouldn’t Make Energy Decisions For Us

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By The Daily Caller

Barely a week after its representatives committed the United States to a COP28 agreement pledging to “transition away” from fossil fuels – oil, natural gas and coal – the Biden government held its first significant auction of offshore leases in the Gulf of Mexico Wednesday. It was not just any old lease sale, mind you, but the most massive one since 2015 with more than 72 million acres up for lease.

The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) reports that the government collected a total of $382 million in lease bonuses from an array of “big oil” companies, including Chevron, Shell, Hess (soon to become Chevron via merger), Anadarko (already a part of Oxy via a 2019 merger), Equinor and Repsol. Obviously, the Biden administration’s long refusal to hold a real lease sale in the Gulf had resulted in pent-up demand for new development acreage among the large, well-capitalized companies that are capable of investing billions of dollars in exploration for new deep-sea resources.

In a statement, Erik Milito, president of the National Ocean Industries Association (NOIA), emphasized the importance of maintaining an active program for offshore lease sales in U.S. waters. “Today signifies a critical point in American energy policy,” Milito said. “The U.S. offshore oil and gas industry is stepping up and making the investments vital to enhance our energy, economic, and national security for decades to come. However, the offshore industry’s commitment to American energy security and affordability comes at a time of significant and unnecessary uncertainty. Without Congressional intervention, this is the final lease sale until at least 2025.”

Of course, 2025 will be the year in which the next presidential administration begins. If it is a continuation of the Biden presidency – or that of another Democrat – then we can anticipate the new 5-year plan for offshore leasing introduced on December 15 will reign. That plan envisions the holding of just three offshore lease sales from 2024 through 2029. That is fewer sales than Barack Obama’s administration held in any single year, and a tiny fraction of the 47 sales envisioned by the 5-year plan adopted during the Trump administration.

Milito and NOIA clearly view the Biden plan as wholly inadequate to sustain a vital and healthy offshore industry into the future. “In our forward-thinking industry, securing new lease blocks is vital for exploring and developing resources crucial to the U.S. economy,” Milito said. “Additional offshore acreage is necessary to sustain and expand energy production in a region known for among the lowest carbon intensity barrels globally.”

That last point about carbon intensity should be a major consideration in any U.S. administration that is concerned about emissions. Despite all the grand fantasies discussed at global conferences like COP28 and the annual World Economic Forum meetings, the reality is that the world is going to need more and more oil and natural gas in the coming decades to sustain a modern society. That oil can either be produced in places like the U.S., with its strong regulatory system limiting carbon and methane emissions, or in places like the west coast of Africa or other developing regions with comparatively primitive regulatory structures.

Sadly, though, the politics surrounding climate alarmism, in which well-funded climate activist groups pour billions into Democratic political campaigns, dictate that any Democratic presidency must assume a hostile public posture toward industries that produce or use fossil fuels. Wednesday’s lease sale in fact happened only thanks to a series of court orders forcing the Biden Interior Department’s hand. Otherwise, Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, herself a lifelong opponent of oil and gas drilling, would have without any doubt continued to find ways to delay it through at least the end of Biden’s first term.

The just-adopted plan to hold just three additional sales across the coming six years is absurd on its face and would inevitably result in a shrinking U.S. offshore energy sector. “Without annual opportunities for investment here in the U.S., the investment necessary to fuel the U.S. and global economies will simply shift to other parts of the world, including regions with potentially lower environmental standards and higher emissions,” Milito said.

This is all about hardcore partisan politics, and it exemplifies one more reason why the political class is the very worst class in any society to be put in charge of making energy-related decisions for the rest of us.

AUTHOR

DAVID BLACKMON

David Blackmon is an energy writer and consultant based in Texas. He spent 40 years in the oil and gas business, where he specialized in public policy and communications.

The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the Daily Caller News Foundation.

RELATED ARTICLE:DAVID BLACKMON: This Agency Is Scrambling To Adjust Its Absurd ‘Peak Oil’ Predictions

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Glad to see Republicans waking up to go on offense. Now they have to actually deliver. https://t.co/HAKLreXkRw

— Jenna Ellis (@JennaEllisEsq) December 24, 2023

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.

A Higher Education Embarrassment: Brown University Offshore Wind Report is a Disgrace thumbnail

A Higher Education Embarrassment: Brown University Offshore Wind Report is a Disgrace

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By John Droz, Jr.

Last week I received an email from an editor of a national media outlet, asking for my comments on a Brown University Report regarding offshore wind energy. I found that this was put out by CDL self-described as: “The Climate and Development Lab is a student-faculty think tank informing a more just, equitable and effective climate change policy.”

Note: even though I was “prominently mentioned” in this report (16 times!), no one from CDL/Brown bothered to contact me to verify what they wrote about me was accurate. Not surprisingly, most of it was irrelevant, misleading, or false. Their likely defense is that they just copied what they found on the Internet. Clearly, double-checking would be an unreasonable burden. Worse it might reveal that some of their underlying, unscientific narrative might crumble.

Not surprisingly, this report is rife with errors of omission and commission — way too many to go into in a commentary of this length. To keep this digestible, let’s just briefly look at the assignment itself…

It appears that the Brown Pied Piper professor instructed the children to do something like this:

  1. Get the names of all the main US people opposed to offshore wind.
  2. Guess who they connect with regarding offshore wind.
  3. Speculate about any funding involved, and where it may come from.
  4. Cast aspersions willy-nilly, to try to undermine their credibility.

The first question is: let’s say the neophytes do a competent job fulfilling the oracle’s commands: What then? What meaningful bearing on the offshore wind energy issue would this have? None. Zip. Nada.

A second question is: did the high priest direct his acolytes to do a similar report about offshore wind proponents? Not surprisingly, there is no evidence of that. Does that sound “just and equitable”?

I’m only a physicist, but if these were my students, an assignment I’d give them on this topic would be:

  1. Get the names of all the main US people opposed to offshore wind.
  2. Carefully document each of their objections to offshore wind (e.g., mine are here).
  3. Equitably assess the merits of each of their objections.
  4. Comprehensively and objectively determine whether offshore wind is a net societal benefit.

Now the students would be: a) producing a report that has real value, b) getting educated about a national energy issue, and c) learning how to separate the wheat from the chaff. Such an assignment is designed to undermine cognitive dissonance and confirmation bias — rather than reinforce these (i.e., what this “report” does).

Put another way, in my recommendation the students would actually be doing Critical Thinking about the offshore wind issue — whereas there was zero Critical Thinking in the CDL/Brown assignment they were subjected to.

As readers know I’m extremely concerned that our education system is annually producing millions of non-critical thinking lemmings (e.g., see my Education Report). This sad story is just one of many solid pieces of evidence that this is continuing to happen.

P.S. — I sent the Big Cheese and his entourage a polite but pointed email about this travesty. So far no response.

©2023. John Droz, Jr.. All rights reserved.

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