By Dr. Roy Cordato
At the present time the North Carolina Legislative Commission on Climate Change - co-chaired by Rep. Pricey Harrison, D-Guilford, and John Garrou, lawyer, environmental activist, and husband of Sen. Linda Garrou, D-Forsyth - is considering a set of policy proposals that, if enacted, would dramatically reduce our freedoms and impact our prosperity. The alleged goal of these proposals is to change the climate a hundred or so years from now. The actual effect is to micromanage our lives today. If enacted, these mandates would, through regulations and taxes, attempt to tell the citizens of North Carolina:
• How we can travel and commute,
• Where we can live,
• The size homes we can live in,
• The amount of land we can live on,
• The size cars we can drive,
• How we can generate electricity,
• How much energy we can use,
• The kinds of appliances we can have in our homes,
• How we can light, heat, and cool our homes, and even
• How we can purchase automobile insurance.
And there is no evidence that these restrictions on our freedom, even if enacted by every country on the planet, will have any noticeable impact on the climate - not in 100 years, not in 200 years.
Let me point out that this list represents only a fraction of the 56 proposals that, if enacted, begin the process of remaking the lifestyles of North Carolinians in the image of environmental ideologues and extremists. As Al Gore has pointed out, the fight against global warming will require “a wrenching transformation of American society,” and as Barack Obama has warned (threatened?): “We can’t drive our SUVs and eat as much as we want and keep our homes on 72 degrees at all times”
This power grab is happening in the name of reducing atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide (CO2) and fighting global warming - a warming that, according to all temperature records, stopped about 10 years ago. That’s right, there’s been no net warming this decade. And for the last 60 years warming has occurred for less than a 25-year period from the mid-1970s to the late 1990s. The real “deniers” in this debate are those who ignore these facts.
Carbon dioxide is unlike other regulated emissions. First, it has no toxic effect on human beings, unlike real pollutants such as lead or carbon monoxide. But more importantly there is nothing that humans can do, including breathing, that does not involve emitting CO2, and its presence in the atmosphere is essential for all life on earth. Without it we die, the plants die, and the earth freezes over. And yet the environmental zealots in and out of government have propagandized us into calling this life-giving gas in our atmosphere a pollutant. Read more here.
Dr. Roy Cordato, Vice President for Research and Resident Scholar at the John Locke Foundation. See also this SPPI Analysis of the State Climate Action Plan and the reality of the climate of North Carolina, unbelieveably totally ignored by the activists pushing their plans on the good citizens of North Carolina.
By John Droz, SPPI Commentary
We can’t go far these days without being subjected to the plaintive pleas of “former oilman” TB Pickens. Its on TV, print media, the internet - you name it. “It’s time to stop America’s addiction to oil!” scream the incessant ads. We are importing over 70% of our oil. Wind power is the best way out of this mess.” is the message in these blurbs, and on the PickensPlan.com website. Is Mr. Pickens on to something? Has he reached new levels of altruism in paying for all this education of the public? Unfortunately, no on both counts.
To answer whether there is substance to this claim lets look at the facts. To begin with, only about 1.5% of the electricity produced in the US comes from oil. Another way to look at this would be that if 100% of our electricity came from wind power, then we would reduce our oil imports by only a trivial 1.5%. Still another perspective is that the US exports considerably more oil than is used for producing our electricity. But what about the other major claim on his website - that switching to natural gas to power our vehicles will save lots of oil? And what’s that got to do with wind? His sleight of hand connection is that he claims that wind power will free up more natural gas to be used for autos. Hmmm. But in his praises for the benefits of natural gas (e.g. on his website) he goes to lengths to emphasize that one of the main attractions of natural gas is that we have significant supplies of it (e.g. “twice the reserves of petroleum” and growing). Hmmm.
The obvious question is that if we have such supplies, then why do we need to do something to free up some of it? Why can’t there be a natural gas powered vehicle change over without any convoluted connection to wind power? And if he’s so big on gas over oil, why isn’t he proposing replacing the 1.5% of oil generated electricity, with gas instead of wind? Ahhh, the crux of the matter. In a recent interview, Mr. Pickens’ real motivation was finally extracted: he expects to make at least 25% profit from his Texas wind power venture! Oh, and while he is aggressively soliciting his wealthy neighbors to use their lands to erect thousands of wind turbine behemoths, he quite honestly admitted that there would be zero of these “ugly” beasts on his 68,000 acre spread. So much for personal sacrifices.
Oh, and TB is the founder of “Clean Energy,” a company focused on using natural gas to power vehicles. So, if we follow his second advisory, guess who stands to make BIG bucks? Sigh. Once again, not surprisingly, it’s all about the money. Our money. So, when Mr. P warns us about the “greatest transfer of wealth,” he is really saying that he wants in on the action. The point of his advertising spree is to encourage gullible citizens to get their congressmen to support the PTC (Production Tax Credit7) - the boondoggle legislation that enables him (and others) to pull off a 25% killing, while only making a featherweight contribution to our energy and emissions issues. Just say, “no.”
If Mr. Pickens genuinely wants to help us out of our energy mess, he should use his money and influence to advocate that we use scientific methodology to analyze the many choices
facing us. The winner(s) would be those alternatives that are: 1) scientifically sound, 2) financially viable on their own, and 3) environmentally friendly. Unfortunately wind power fails on all three counts. Until that time, all we have here is just another pied piper profiteer. Read whole story here.
UPDATE: McCain has surprised by picking Alaskan Governor Palin as running mate. A popular governor with approval ratings in the mid 80s compared to single digits for American congress and senate who are the other candidate choices. She has a strong position on energy, the most important issue in this election. See Glenn Beck videos on and with Governor Palin here.
Rumors circulated earlier this week that GOP presumptive presidential candidate Senator John McCain planned to select Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty as his vice presidential running mate. Pawlenty certainly talks a good shtick when it comes to free markets, low taxes, and limited government, but his views on climate change and energy policy are downright frightening. “We should not spend time on voices that say [climate change] is not real,” Pawlenty said even as new evidence surfaces almost daily that undermines the alarmist consensus. “We should have listened to President Carter” about energy policy, Pawlenty said. President Jimmy Carter, readers may recall, gave his infamous “malaise” speech (also known as the “Crisis of Confidence” speech) live on television on July 15, 1979. In it Carter blamed Americans for the problems in American society at that time. He told Americans they were too materialistic and greedy and that they needed to make do with less. He told Americans that turning down their thermostats and wearing sweaters indoors would help solve the nation’s problems. That was Jimmy Carter’s energy policy. The following analysis from SPPI of the Minnesota Climate and their Climate Action Plan shows how bad this VP choice would have been.
In May of 2007, Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty signed the “Next Generation Energy Act of 2007” which includes targets for statewide reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. The Act requires Minnesotans to reduce emissions to a level of 15% below 2005 levels by 2015, to a level at least 30% below 2005 levels by 2025, and to a level at least 80% below 2005 levels by 2050. To help advise him on how these restrictive goals could be reached, the Governor established the Minnesota Climate Change Advisory Group to develop a Climate Change Mitigation Action Plan.
Conspicuously missing from the Advisory Group’s objectives, however, are three other major areas of importance: 1) a careful review of the state’s climate history and its impacts with regard to how the state’s climate has changed and whether or not the changes bear any resemblance of changes expected from human-caused “global warming,” 2) a quantification of the impacts of the state’s emissions reductions efforts on the course of future climate change, either globally, regionally, or locally, and 3) an assessment of the impacts of any proposed greenhouse gas reduction measures on the state’s economy. In this report, we provide the analyses that should have been required of the Advisory Group.
The analysis shows a cessation of all of Minnesota’s CO2 emissions would result in a climatically-irrelevant and undetectable global temperature reduction by the year 2100 of less than three thousandths of a degree Celsius. This number is so low that it is effectively equivalent to zero. Results for sea-level rise are also negligible. SAIC found that by the year 2020, average annual household income in Minnesota would decline by $1,066 to $3,455 and by the year 2030 the decline would increase to between $4,497 and $8,201. The state would stand to lose between 22,000 and 34,000 jobs by 2020 and between 56,000 and 75,000 jobs by 2030. At the same time gas prices could increase by more than $5 a gallon by the year 2030 and the states’ Gross Domestic Product could decline by then by as much as $12.6 billion/yr. And all this economic hardship would come with absolutely no detectable impact on the course of future climate. This is the epitome of a scenario of all pain and no gain.
At least 337 Minnesota scientists have petitioned the US government that the UN’s human-caused global warming hypothesis is “without scientific validity and that governent action on the basis of this hypothesis would unnecessarily and counterproductively damage both human prosperity and the natural environment of the Earth.” They are joined by over 31,072 Americans with university degrees in science - including 9,021 PhDs. See full SPPI pdf here.
Pawlenty should have asked them for advice before commiting the hard-working, good people of Minnesota to a step backwards in time and a needless economic sacrifice.