Are Cap’n’Trade and a National RPS Dead?
Temperature trends, Climategate, Copenhagen, IPCC falsification, and now the Massachusetts Revolution. Cap-and-trade is dead, the political pundits say. So much for the inevitability argument that I heard from my colleagues during the Enron years (“come on Rob, get out in front of it and shape it!”) as well as the science-is-settled that has been the Word of God in the conventional wisdom on climate change.
But what about a scaled back energy/climate bill with the key provision of a federal renewables mandate? Has the ‘Massachusetts Revolution’ killed that too?
We will soon find out. But one thing can be certain: Americans from coast-to-coast and border-to-border are going to look more closely at wind power, and I do not believe they are going to like what they see. (Enron, anyone?) Witness the growing complaints from the grass roots—including in-the-trenches real environmentalists—that industrial wind is intrusive, costly, and unreliable.
As an indication of the grass roots revolution against wind, consider the summary I received recently from Glenn Schleede on the activities of a group call[ed] the Industrial Wind Action. Schleede, a longtime voice in the wilderness on the problems of wind, said this in his note:
Ladies & Gentlemen
Here’s a recent newsletter-summary of recent articles on wind energy.
Perhaps you, too, have noticed that the negative environmental, energy and economic impacts of wind energy are totally ignored by the people on the payroll of the US DOE’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (DOE-EERE), the DOE’s National “Laboratories” (particularly, NREL and LBNL), EPA, and Interior.
Since these folks are totally dependent on taxpayer dollars for their jobs, one might think they would be somewhat objective and responsive to the public interest—but perhaps they think that they have a higher calling.
. . .
—Glenn Schleede
Schleede is a veteran of Washington energy politics for more than 40 years, having worked for the Atomic Energy Commission, the Ford White House, the National Coal Association, New England Energy, and the Reagan administration’s Office of Management and Budget. He’s a long-time, and perceptive, critic of the U.S. push for wind power, and its various subsidies.
The Obama administration has focused on the opposition to its health care plan. But is the administration watching and listening to the “Environmental Tea Party” on climate controls?
They had better. Energy is the master resource and second only to health care as a percentage of the national economy. The masses want and expect affordable, reliable energy for their homes, businesses, and vehicles.
—Robert L. Bradley Jr. is founder and chairman of the Institute for Energy Research, based in Houston, Texas. He is a long-term observer of energy policy and its relation to the environment. Bradley is the author of Oil, Gas, and Government: The U.S. Experience. He was the chief speech writer for Enron COE Key Lay (and frequent internal critic) prior the that company’s historic collapse. This commentary is reprinted from his Master Resource