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In the Pipeline: 6/19/13

June 19, 2013 by Leave a Comment

Say your prayers and do your penance, the end is coming. The Wall Street Journal (6/18/13) reports: “Consider the meaning in contemporary jargon of the famous carbon footprint that we all leave behind us. What is it, after all, if not the gaseous equivalent of Original Sin, of the stain that we inflict on our Mother Gaia by the simple fact of being present and breathing? We can all gauge the volume of our emissions, day after day, with the injunction to curtail them, just as children saying their catechisms are supposed to curtail their sins.”

 His Majesty may shout ‘forward’ towards Germany, but the Germams are shouting back go back. The Institute for Energy Research (6/19/13) reports: “While Obama looks to Berlin for guidance, German companies are looking to America for salvation. Ulrich Grillo, president of the Federation of German Industries, warned the government last week that rising energy costs would force German firms to flee to other countries, including the United States. Grillo credited the shale boom with making America a more attractive investment option. Amazingly, despite the talk of energiewende, Germany is building a large amount of coal-fired electricity generation. New coal-fired plants with a capacity of 5.3 gigawatts of electricity will come on line this year. In total, there are 10 new coal and lignite power plants currently under construction in Germany. While Germany talks about reducing carbon dioxide emissions, and provides large subsidies for renewables, the country is in fact expanding new coal resources, unlike the United States.”

 There has been no greater savior of rural America than the shale boom. The Weekly Standard 6/24/13 reports: “Today, Stanley is anything but quiet. There’s a nearly constant roar of diesel engines as tanker trucks haul oil barrels down Route 2. The Cenex gas station and truck stop in Stanley, once a lonely outpost for the occasional truck driver or farmer, is full of customers. Even on a rainy morning, the sound of power tools echoes from the new mid-rise hotel being constructed across the street. The Subway next door, only a few weeks old, has a line out the door by noon. The people waiting, young and old, chat with one another about job openings (“Hess is hiring in Tioga”), where they’re living (in a busted RV, at the Microtel), where they come from (every place from Louisiana to Alaska), and how they ended up in this forgotten corner of the country. Where there once was silence there’s now a hum.“

Until then these cuisinarts of the sky will continue…. The Telegraph (6/17/13) reports: “I wonder what it will take before the world truly wakes up to the horror, the corruption, the expense, the pointlessness, the total wrongness-in-every-way of the wind industry. My guess – and it will happen – is the decapitation, by a rogue turbine blade, of an innocent passer-by. Till then, though, we have photographs like this to send the mind boggling as to why anyone, anywhere can still be so purblind as to go on championing these bat-chomping, bird-slicing eco crucifixes.”

There’s presenting your argument and then there’s outright deception, we think this is the latter. This interactive map displays petrochemical accident in bright red and by default hides the plants with no reported accidents. Center for Effective Government (6/18/12) reports: “As you can see from the map, there are many facilities that have at least one of the listed chemicals on-site, and many of those facilities have had at least one accident. Find your community on our map. Examine the risk management plan for facilities near your home. And ask your local public officials if they’ve seen the plan.”

Filed Under: Blog, In the Pipeline Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

In the Pipeline: 6/18/13

June 19, 2013 by Leave a Comment

Putting your money where your mouth is seems to be harder than putting someone else’s money where your mouth is. The Institute for Energy Research (6/17/13) reports: “The data in this report clearly highlights the gap between stated values of consumers and the reality of their actions in the marketplace…Our report makes it clear that a customer’s willingness to pay for a Green Pricing Program is directly correlated with their ability to pay and afford the added cost, no matter how small, of a program which offers a consumer no immediate tangible benefit, in exchange for a promise of future environmental gain.”

Fisker wasn’t exactly good at business–they lost $35k per car they built. At least they stopped hemorrhaging by shutting down the production line. Reuters (6/17/13) reports: “Fisker’s latest piece of rolling sculpture is the comely Fisker Karma hybrid sports sedan — and it may meet an equally ugly end. The Dane’s startup, Fisker Automotive, hasn’t built a car in nearly a year. It fired most of its workforce, hired bankruptcy advisers and is seeking a buyer. Co-founder Henrik Fisker resigned in mid-March in a dispute with some of the directors. And despite raising $1.4 billion in private and public funds since its founding in 2007, the company is out of cash.”

His Majesty said he wanted to model our green energy program after Spain….And he’s doing it…just ask DOD. Reuters (6/17/13) reports: “Spain’s latest overhaul of its dysfunctional energy sector, due this month, will inflict pain on renewable power companies and utilities and force losses on banks and investors. Reform of the power sector, the fifth in as many years, is intended to eliminate a gap between the cost of producing energy and what consumers pay for it, which has built up a debt of 26 billion euros (22.0 billion pounds) over 13 years. That debt, which sits on the books of private utilities who paid the bill but is backed by taxpayers, has come under European Union scrutiny as Spain battles to keep its budget deficit in check.”

Easy Riders against Big Corn. The coalition is broadening. E&E News Hundreds of motorcyclists and classic car drivers are set to swarm the nation’s capitalWednesday morning, making laps around the U.S. Capitol and House and Senate office buildings. The drivers aren’t late stragglers to the nation’s Memorial Day festivities but rather opponents of gasoline containing 15 percent ethanol. They’re in town as part of the American Motorcyclist Association’s “E15 Fuel for Thought Lobby Day,” a daylong event that the trade group says will feature speeches from the Congressional Motorcycle Caucus and visits to lawmakers’ offices, along with the motorcycle ride.

 

 

Filed Under: Blog, In the Pipeline Tagged With: , , , , , ,

In the Pipeline: 6/17/13

June 17, 2013 by Leave a Comment

We have the resources, the capital, the innovators, and the technology, but do we have the policy?  Energy Guardian (6/17/13) reports: “The strength of the American manufacturing renaissance has become a hot debate topic, with some experts contending it is more hype than reality, especially as job growth remains slow in the industrial heartland. That skepticism is unwarranted, says American Fuel and Petrochemical Manufacturers President Charles T. Drevna. With the revolution in shale gas adding affordable energy to the U.S. economy, he sees domestic investment in his sector and others set to remain strong for years.”

How do you think Mckibben, Gore, and the rest travel? Washington Post (6/13/13) reports: “As if the nice meal and the on-demand movies and the fully reclining seats weren’t enough to infuriate the rest of us, first-class air travel is also ruining the environment. Or at least so says the World Bank in a new study estimating that the carbon footprint of a first-class airplane seat may be as much as nine times larger than an economy-class berth. A business-class ticket has three times the carbon footprint as economy.”

It’s only money. Granted, it’s not their money… The Telegraph (6/15/13) reports: “A new analysis of government and industry figures shows that wind turbine owners received £1.2billion in the form of a consumer subsidy, paid by a supplement on electricity bills last year. They employed 12,000 people, to produce an effective £100,000 subsidy on each job. The disclosure is potentially embarrassing for the wind industry, which claims it is an economically dynamic sector that creates jobs. It was described by critics as proof the sector was not economically viable, with one calling it evidence of “soft jobs” that depended on the taxpayer.”

Stack as many mandates and incentives up as you can, you still can’t get people to buy an inferior product they just don’t want. NBC (6/11/13) reports: “With signs that sales of its Chevrolet Volt battery car could be coming unplugged, General Motors is offering potential buyers as much as $5,000 in incentives – making it the latest maker to try to cut prices in a bid to boost lagging demand for electric vehicles. Whether the move will work remains to be seen, as GM has already trimmed the price on the Volt plug-in hybrid.”

Perhaps while traveling the Fatherland, His Majesty will see the real cost of following Merkel’s lead. Somehow we doubt it. The Daily Caller (6/14/13) reports: “Early in his first term, President Barack Obama held up Germany as a role model for green energy policy and combating global warming. However, following Berlin’s lead on green energy could lead to skyrocketing energy prices, say conservative groups. “At precisely the moment that Europe comes to a sobering recognition of its failed energy policies, the Obama administration is punch drunk on expensive green energy,” said Benjamin Cole, spokesman for the Institute for Energy Research.”

Filed Under: Blog, In the Pipeline Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

Beware of the Stealthy Carbon Tax

June 14, 2013 by Leave a Comment

The ironic thing in the debate over carbon policies is that opponents of massive new federal taxes and regulations don’t need to go to obscure websites or ideological Think Tanks to get their talking points. On the contrary, those of us who are very wary of giving the government more power over the entire energy sector (and hence economy itself) just need to quote verbatim from the supporters of such policies.

For example, the White House recently updated its estimate of the “social cost of carbon,” and showed that (for emissions in the year 2010) the number was either $11/ton, $33/ton, or $52/ton, depending on whether we discounted future damages (in the computer simulations of course) at a rate of 5%, 3%, or 2.5%. Such huge swings in this key input into federal policymaking should give everyone pause, as picking the correct “social discount rate” is hardly a matter of scientists in white lab coats objectively measuring Nature.

Moreover, this new update bumped up the estimates of the social cost of carbon from 2010 by a whopping 120% (for one calibration of the parameters). Finally, this bombshell announcement—which carries with it a change in “damage estimates” of at least $50 billion more per year, based on current US emissions—was released by the Obama Administration in a rule on microwave standards, with even supporters of the regulations scratching their heads.

For another example of proponents of a carbon tax showing just how dubious the whole project is, consider a recent piece in RealClearEnergy titled, “Why You Just May Come to Like a Carbon Tax.” Here’s one jaw-dropping excerpt: 

Enter the carbon tax. Besides its intended purpose of reducing carbon emissions, it is politically advantageous, in that it is a tax that is relatively hidden. If phased in over a decade, the annual increase in gas prices that would result would be less than the typical annual fluctuations we already observe. And its other manifestations are also somewhat less than obvious—power bills will go up, but they’ve been inexorably increasing since time immemorial, even in places that get most of their power via natural gas.

Now if the author, Ike Brannon, were advising members of Congress from coal states behind closed doors, the above commentary would be creepy but understandable. Yet he’s writing this in broad daylight, as one of several reasons that Americans should get behind a carbon tax? This is incomprehensible. In general, when it comes to tax policy as well as other areas of government, things should be as transparent as possible, so that the citizenry has an inkling of the impact of various measures. By praising a carbon tax for its ability to sneak past most of the public (who presumably don’t read RealClearEnergy), Mr. Brannon has decided that he knows better than they do.

In conclusion, when assessing the merits of a massive new federal tax and/or regulatory scheme that will drive up energy prices—by design—and do so in a way that is based on arbitrary parameter choices and that will bamboozle the public, we don’t need to consult “denier” websites. We can simply read what the proponents themselves are saying.

 

Filed Under: Emissions Standards, Facts, News, Products and Power, Threats Tagged With: , , ,

In the Pipeline: 6/14/13

June 14, 2013 by Leave a Comment

After all, we’re just on a big hamster wheel at the Obama administration’s service. Daily Caller (6/13/13) report: “The White House raised its estimates of the social cost of carbon dioxide emissions from $21 per metric ton to $35 per metric ton, but critics say that there is ‘little ‘science’ behind the whopping numbers.’… ‘The ‘social cost of carbon’ is a very malleable concept that can be inflated or deflated by turning certain wheels,’ Institute for Energy Research senior fellow Robert Murphy told The Daily Caller News Foundation.”

Congressman Cramer gets right to the point: this cost of carbon effort is about making energy more expensive. Congressman Cramer(6/12/13) reports: “Virtually overnight, every motor vehicle, coal-fired power plant, kitchen appliance, and any other activity or object which produces carbon has become 60% more undesirable in the eyes of the Obama Administration. This secretive change could open the floodgates for more EPA regulations, the costs of which will be passed onto working taxpayers in the form of higher costs for gasoline, electricity, and everything we produce, grow, and manufacture. North Dakotans currently enjoy the lowest price for both natural gas and electricity of any state. Instead of asking us how we do it, the Obama Administration is trying to dismantle it,” Cramer said.

You know someone is a complete bore when all they talk about is the weather, particularly when that person starts to become a weather expert. I think it’s safe to say the greenies are your worst cocktail-party-small-talk nightmare. Townhall (6/6/13) reports: “Another symptom of green obstructionism: widespread bark beetle infestations. The U.S. Forest Service itself reported last year: ‘During the last part of the 20th century, widespread treatments in lodgepole pine stands that would have created age class diversity, enhanced the vigor of remaining trees, and improved stand resiliency to drought or insect attack — such as timber harvest and thinning — lacked public acceptance. Proposals for such practices were routinely appealed and litigated, constraining the ability of the Forest Service to manage what had become large expanses of even-aged stands susceptible to a bark beetle outbreak.’”

It’d still be a scam even if they built an actual wind farm. Denver Post(6/13/13) reports: “A federal judge has sentenced a California man to two years in prison for his role in defrauding investors by promoting non-existent wind farm projects in Wyoming and South Dakota… U.S. District Judge Scott W. Skavdahl on Thursday also ordered that 55-year-old Joseph Richard Adams of Los Angeles share responsibility for restitution estimated at $4.5 million… Adams pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud last August, the first of the five defendants to plead guilty. The other four defendants are set for sentencing this summer before Skavdahl.”

The Europeans have finally realized that you don’t run faster by shooting yourself in the foot. Let’s see if His Majesty is able to gaze longingly into the Old World and pick this lesson up. USA Today (6/13/13) reports: “As the Department of Energy considers a loan guarantee for the Cape Wind Project in Massachusetts, it should learn from Europe’s failed wind energy experiments – and from its own troubled experiences with renewable energy projects… Germany and Spain are waking up to the inevitable truth about renewable energy, especially offshore wind. They are now realizing the projects cannot survive without subsidies and that they make energy much more expensive to households and businesses. In an age of austerity, they are a luxury even Germany, Europe’s economic powerhouse, cannot fully afford any more.”

On Wednesday, a large crew sent a letter to Speaker Boehner and Majority Leader Cantor calling for a Floor vote on Chairman Scalise’s resolution expressing the sense of the United States Congress that a carbon tax would be detrimental to the economy. View the letter here, and if you or an organization that you know of would like to join our growing ranks for these effort contact us at[email protected]. 

Tom Pyle, American Energy Alliance
Myron Ebell, Freedom Action
Phil Kerpen, American Commitment
William O’Keefe, George C. Marshall Institute
Lawson Bader, Competitive Enterprise Institute
Andrew Quinlan, Center for Freedom and Prosperity
Tim Phillips, Americans for Prosperity
Joe Bast, Heartland Institute
David Ridenour, National Center for Public Policy Research
Michael Needham, Heritage Action for America
Tom Schatz, Citizens Against Government Waste
Grover Norquist, Americans for Tax Reform
Sabrina Schaeffer, Independent Women’s Forum
Barrett E. Kidner, Caesar Rodney Institute
George Landrith, Frontiers of Freedom
Thomas A. Schatz, Citizens Against Government Waste
Bill Wilson, Americans for Limited Government
Wayne Brough, FreedomWorks
Rich Collins, Positive Growth Alliance
Craig Richardson, American Tradition Institute
The Honorable George Allen, American Energy Freedom Center

Finally, we thank one of our own, Johnny Russell. Johnny is leaving the AEA/IER family to find greener pastures, teaching history to high schoolers in Colorado. Thanks for your service Johnny, you will be missed.

Filed Under: Blog, In the Pipeline Tagged With: , , , , ,

In the Pipeline: 6/13/13

June 13, 2013 by Leave a Comment

If complete control of a market is called a monopoly, what do you call mandated control of a market…? The Renewable Fuel Standard. PoliticoPro (6/11/13) reports: Sen. Tom Coburn used the nomination hearing for Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs nominee Howard Shelanski to rip into EPA’s renewable fuels standard…“We’re going to see … two refineries in Oklahoma close within a year, year-and-half, because they cannot afford to buy the renewable fuel credits. So, we got a regulation out there that’s actually going to kill our ability to provide gasoline to the country even with an ethanol blend,” Coburn said at the hearing today… “It would take one adjustment to that regulation and all that’d go away and it won’t make any difference in the long-term in terms of our environmental consequences because we’re still going to have ethanol blended into our fuel,” he said, before asking Shelanski whether he had “any thoughts about that.”

On this issue, Jim Lankford is very solid. President Bush was not. That is all. NewsOK (6/12/13) reports: “FEDERAL renewable fuel mandates passed in 2005 and 2007 could create significant economic hardship, reducing citizens’ take-home pay without offsetting benefit… A recent U.S. House subcommittee hearing chaired by Rep. James Lankford, R-Oklahoma City, made clear the abundant flaws of the mandate. The Renewable Fuel Standard requires that 35 billion gallons of ethanol-equivalent biofuels and 1 billion gallons of biomass-based diesel be refined by 2022. However, those mandates were imposed when officials assumed that U.S. fuel consumption would continue increasing and that domestic oil production would account for a declining share of supply. Both assumptions were wrong.”

Just in case you were wondering what the reworked cost of carbon means. Bloomberg (6/12/13) reports: “And if Obama approves the pipeline, the higher carbon-cost estimate could to be a part of any lawsuit challenging the decision, according to Bill Snape, senior counsel for the Center for Biological Diversity… ‘It won’t be a game changer, but it would help’ in any legal challenge, he said. The increase in the estimate is being cheered by environmentalists as one small sign that President Barack Obama is going to make good on a pledge from his inaugural address to tackle global warming in the face of opposition from Republicans in Congress.”

Don’t miss it!! Resources for the Future (6/13) reports: “This seminar is part of “Considering a Carbon Tax,” a research initiative in RFF’s Center for Climate and Electricity Policy… RFF invites you to learn more about these modeling results in a special half-day seminar featuring distinguished researchers and experts. In the first session, RFF researchers Rob Williams, Richard Morgenstern, Jared Carbone, and Dallas Burtraw will share model results and describe carbon tax impacts across a range of revenue recycling scenarios. In the second session, experts from the research and policy communities (see below) will comment on the economics and the politics of the model’s results.”

U.S. oil production soars (except on federal lands). IER (6/10/13) reports: “The Energy Information Administration (EIA) just released its report, Sales of Fossil Fuels Produced on Federal and Indian Lands, FY 2003 Through FY 2012.[i] This report shows that total fossil fuel production on federal lands is at a ten year low, natural gas production on federal lands is also at a ten year low, and oil production on federal land fell in fiscal years 2011 and 2012 ending two years of increase in fiscal years 2009 and 2010. Specifically the new EIA report shows:”

We agree. The federal government should allow for more exploration of our deep seas. Washington Examiner (6/11/13) reports: “Cameron, who says he has ‘always had an affinity for the ocean,’ commissioned the manned (or “personed,” as Cameron pointedly noted, in deference to the many female oceanographers) submersible, which took seven years to build, and piloted it more than 35,000 feet below the ocean’s surface… ‘Sending a piloted vehicle down gets a lot more media and public attention,’ Cameron said at a Capitol Hill briefing. ‘I don’t have a degree in any of the sciences or in engineering, but I didn’t have a degree in filmmaking either, and that didn’t stop me.’… He told congressional staff members that he does not have a “specific call to action” on policy, but that it “boils down to funding” deep sea exploration. He and Dr. Susan Avery, director of Woods Hole, compared exploring the deeper ocean to exploring space — but said the former has been neglected in comparison.”

Filed Under: Blog, In the Pipeline

Free Market Coalition Urges Against Carbon Tax

June 12, 2013 by Leave a Comment

WASHINGTON D.C. – The American Energy Alliance was joined today by 19 other free market organizations in a joint letter to Speaker of the House John Boehner and House Majority Leader Eric Cantor urging a floor vote on the concurrent resolution, H. Con Res. 24, expressing the sense of Congress that a carbon tax would be detrimental to the United States economy. The coalition stands in adamant opposition to a carbon tax, as it will raise energy prices and put an unnecessary burden on the American people.

“A carbon tax would increase energy prices by design, exacerbating pain at the pump and raising the price of electricity and home heating fuels,” the letter states. “The poorest Americans would be hit the hardest because they spend the largest share of their income on energy. People on fixed incomes would take a terrible financial hit as they would be forced to pay more for energy.

“According to a recent study by the National Association of Manufacturers, under a popular carbon tax proposal, output could drop by as much as 15 percent in energy-intensive sectors of our economy and 7.7 percent in non-energy intensive sectors, destroying millions of jobs. Even the Europeans are moving away from deliberately making energy more expensive as the economic toll from their disastrous policies becomes clearer. The U.S. should learn from these failed policies, not embrace them.”

The other signatories of the letter are:

60 Plus Association
American Commitment
American Conservative Union
Americans for Limited Government
Americans for Prosperity
Americans for Tax Reform
American Tradition Institute
Caesar Rodney Institute
Competitive Enterprise Institute
FreedomWorks
Freedom Action
Frontiers of Freedom
George C. Marshall Institute
Heartland Institute
Heritage Action
Independent Women’s Forum
National Center for Public Policy Research
Positive Growth Alliance
Taxpayers Protection Alliance

To read the full text of the letter, click here (PDF).
To read the carbon tax study from the Institute for Energy Research, click here.

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Filed Under: Press Releases Tagged With: , ,

In the Pipeline: 6/12/13

June 12, 2013 by Leave a Comment

Is this guy still alive? I figured he drowned after his beach house was overtaken by rising seas. Politico (6/11/13) reports: “Former Vice President Al Gore lamented today that scientists “will not let us link record-breaking” tornadoes in Oklahoma and elsewhere to climate change because of inadequate record keeping on the twisters… ‘But when you put more energy into a system, it gets more energetic,’ Gore said at an environmental event in Washington hosted by Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse.”

Everyone loves to jump out in front of a parade. This time, we hope the marching band doesn’t slow down and leaves these goons in the dust. RedState (6/11/13) reports: “So after restricting the food supply, starving children, driving up your grocery bill and increasing the cost of fuel, was the government done yet? Of course not! Because now they want to expand it!… Unbelievably enough, Republicans are jumping on board… Not content with the destruction currently in the RFS Mandate’s wake, Reps. Pete Olson and Joe Barton (R-TX) are pushing HR. 1959 which would expand the RFS mandate to include natural gas based ethanol.”

I wonder how the NRDC would feel if it were routed through the neighborhoods of rich, white folks. Or, as the NRDC likes to call them, donors. Daily Caller (6/11/13) reports: “The rail project will be built in Wilmington, a suburb located near the ports. The Natural Resources Defense Council and other environmental groups, however, claim that the project targets LA minority communities… ‘The SCIG project typifies environmental racism,” David Pettit, director of the NRDC’s Southern California air program and urban program, said in a statement. “This project can be built away from where people live and children go to school, but the city of Los Angeles wants to put it in a low-income minority neighborhood because they think they can get away with it.’”

Again, what does it mean to “deny carbon”? Are we still talking about the same element on the periodic table? If these people want to have a serious debate about our energy future, they should first brush up on basic physics. Oh right… they don’t want to have a serious debate. E&ENews (6/11/13) reports: “‘Frankly, to be a carbon denier at this point in the development of the facts is to be one short step away from insane,’ he said. ‘You just can’t logically support that point of view.’… Whitehouse said the political tide appeared to be turning against members who dismiss climate concerns. Polls show that more Americans believe in climate change and support action on it. And he pointed to billionaire investor Tom Steyer’s involvement in the Massachusetts Democratic primary, which helped shift the race toward climate advocate Rep. Ed Markey and away from Rep. Stephen Lynch, who had voted in support of the Keystone XL oil pipeline.”

We already know that the Sierra Club doesn’t like human beings, but do they only like wolves, and not elk? What about chickens and cattle? The problem is that wolves in states like Wyoming, Montana, and Idaho are thriving unchecked, which leads to the less desirable policy of shoot, shovel, and shut up. At least now we can have a more open and honest discussion about hunting policies and resource management. Sierra Club (6/12/13) reports: “Wolves Thrown to the Dogs: On Friday, the Obama administration let us down, proposing to strip nearly all gray wolves of their Endangered Species Act protections. Delisting wolves now would turn back the clock on years of hard-won recovery work, and it could finish off this legendary species in the Lower 48 for good. We need your help.”

It’s hard to believe that this story was able to cut through all the noise. It’s a great read: “Please, frack beneath my farm”. NY Daily News (6/9/13) reports: “Being a farmer myself, I want to be clear: There is nothing in natural gas production that conflicts with the work we do. In fact, I am hard-pressed to see how utilizing the fertility of the space beneath our fields conflicts with being good stewards of the land above. I like to be consistent and rational, and no matter which way I look at this, it remains a win-win. Cleaner energy from below, crops from above… My family derives its livelihood from farming in upstate New York. Over the course of the past 25 years, we have milked cows, raised sheep and planted and harvested field crops. We have worked from sunrise to sunset, oftentimes seven days a week, all the time laboring to ensure our land is kept healthy and productive.”

Filed Under: Blog, In the Pipeline Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,

In the Pipeline: 6/11/13

June 11, 2013 by Leave a Comment

We mentioned the “social cost of carbon” last week, but here’s the full analysis. The Obama administration is quietly making it easier for their “benefit” numbers to go head to head against costs. IER (6/6/13) reports: “The very concept of the ‘social cost of carbon’ is not nearly as objective and scientific as, say, the charge on an electron. It is based on subjective human decisions as to which scenarios to include in the model, the discount rate to apply to future costs and benefits, and how to deal with uncertainty. Especially in light of the fact that these modeling choices keep pushing the official estimates up and up—more than doubling in some cases in just three years—one can’t help but wonder whether there is a desire to ease the case for political action at work. In any event, the public should realize just how ‘unsettled’ the economic side of the carbon debate is. The estimates keep bouncing around all over the place, and the estimates are driven by very controversial parameter choices, not objective assessments given by physicists and climatologists.”

Apparently, the New York Times did not get the memo that the science is settled. NYTimes (6/10/13) reports: “As unlikely as this may sound, we have lucked out in recent years when it comes to global warming… The rise in the surface temperature of earth has been markedly slower over the last 15 years than in the 20 years before that. And that lull in warming has occurred even as greenhouse gases have accumulated in the atmosphere at a record pace… The slowdown is a bit of a mystery to climate scientists. True, the basic theory that predicts a warming of the planet in response to human emissions does not suggest that warming should be smooth and continuous. To the contrary, in a climate system still dominated by natural variability, there is every reason to think the warming will proceed in fits and starts.”

Meet Tim Yeo. Tim is the Al Gore of the U.K. Tim is just getting started. Hold onto your wallets, blokes. MailOnline (6/9/13) reports: “Tim Yeo was challenged in an interview last week over his role as chairman of the Commons energy and climate change committee and his lucrative work with the green industry… A former environment minister, he airily dismissed any suggestion of a conflict of interest, even though last year alone he earned £140,000 from his commercial work, much of it to do with the booming business of green energy… ‘I think it’s hard for anyone to sustain the argument that what I’m doing is the result of financial interests. I will stand and fall by the judgment of my peers on the committee,’ he said.”

The bonds of kinships are being used by His Majesty’s court to wage war against the commoners. No wonder DOE’s stimulus babies turned out to be a little whacky… Energy Guardian (6/10/13) reports: “Energy Department officials and employees routinely seek paid internships for their children and relatives despite internal warnings against nepotism, the agency’s internal  watchdog reported Monday… ‘Despite the department’s ethics program and information regarding prohibited personnel practices, advocating for the selection of relatives appears to have become an open and widely accepted departmental practice,’ Inspector General Gregory H. Friedman wrote.”

This is why we fight for energy that real people can afford. The Economist (6/8/13) reports: “LIKE most Pakistanis Mohammad Hussain complains bitterly about the paltry few hours of electricity available each day during the sweltering summer. Life for the 43-year-old labourer, already pretty miserable in the Lahore slum where he lives, is more unbearable without a fan to cool him at night or a pump to guarantee water… Like many of his countrymen, he has never paid a rupee towards the cost of the dribble of electricity used by his wife and five children, who all live in a one-bedroom flat. Their building is illegally connected to the city’s power grid by a metal hook attached to a nearby electricity line.”

Filed Under: Blog, In the Pipeline Tagged With: , , , , , ,

In the Pipeline: 6/10/13

June 10, 2013 by Leave a Comment

Somewhere down the road, we might find ourselves switching back to PCs. You see, Apple used to be led by a man who was disturbed by the stifling impact of government on business and innovation in this country. Jobs was able to navigate this business environment and still build incredible value for all stakeholders. Today, Apple’s leadership is hiring Lisa Jackson to whitewash the company of the sin of success. Huffington Post (12/20/11) reports: “‘You’re headed for a one-term presidency,’ he told Obama at the start of their meeting, insisting that the administration needed to be more business-friendly. As an example, Jobs described the ease with which companies can build factories in China compared to the United States, where “regulations and unnecessary costs” make it difficult for them… Jobs also criticized America’s education system, saying it was ‘crippled by union work rules,’ noted Isaacson. ‘Until the teachers’ unions were broken, there was almost no hope for education reform.’ Jobs proposed allowing principals to hire and fire teachers based on merit, that schools stay open until 6 p.m. and that they be open 11 months a year.”

What’s the big deal? It’s not like we live in a free country or anything. Human Events (6/7/13) reports: “Another scandal in which the Obama Administration appears to have leaked confidential information for political purposes has reached the Senate.  The Washington Free Beacon reports on a bipartisan letter challenging the Environmental Protection Agency for releasing personal data on 80,000 farmers and livestock operations to environmentalist groups:”

What planet are these people living on? The bad guys worship “science”, yet here they are talking about energy as if the laws of physics are an outdated inconvenience. The Economist (6/7/13) reports: “Grid parity—when renewables are as cheap or cheaper than existing sources of energy—is within reach in America. The benefits will be immense. Public support for renewable energy remains high; wind and solar power are easily the most popular forms of energy in America (coal comes last). The politics, too, are less obvious than one might think. Many deep-red rural states such as South Dakota, Nebraska and Kansas rather like wind power. These states have enormous wind resources and even though many of their politicians are sceptical about climate change, they are keen on the wind industry (and the PTC). Wind power allows rural states to diversify their economies and bring well-paying jobs to locations with little else going for them.”

The greenies need the environment to be “under attack” in order to justify their existence. So it only makes sense that blocking Keystone XL will do more damage to the environment than allowing its construction, and that Europeans are burning “renewable” wood chips that have been imported from yours truly, America. This article pretty much sums it up: these people are wackos. National Review Online(6/6/13) reports: “The Euros could reduce emissions the way the good old U.S.A. is doing, by hydraulically fracturing deep shale for natural gas. That increases supply to the point that it displaces coal for electrical generation, which results in cheaper power and half the carbon dioxide emissions. They could, but the same nutsos who think that reducing their emissions will have a detectable effect on global temperature also think shale gas is yucky… Why won’t they go our way? Because the green world is stark, raving mad… Destroying the forest for the good of the environment is insane, right? So is shaking down auto companies that produce profits by selling cars rather than indulgences, and so is giving folks who buy $100,000 cars an average of $10,000 of taxpayer largesse.”

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