Author Topic: Energy Politics & Science  (Read 652820 times)

DougMacG

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Electric bus won't work in Oslo
« Reply #1250 on: December 14, 2023, 05:37:57 PM »

Body-by-Guinness

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AFL-CIO Impedes Blow Jobs
« Reply #1251 on: December 15, 2023, 07:57:24 PM »
 :-D Or that’s one way of looking at it.

Another is when the Biden admin has to chose between green energy and bowing before the union, they make the more obsequious choice.

https://wattsupwiththat.com/2023/12/15/100-year-old-union-backed-law-among-snags-derailing-bidens-green-energy-agenda/?fbclid=IwAR2Ifg_XBajR-UudMA0kZIzOK079JJLMIvU2bl2Y8DFdhfxnbAnDiSi-0zY
« Last Edit: December 15, 2023, 08:00:26 PM by Body-by-Guinness »

ccp

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Re: Energy Politics & Science
« Reply #1252 on: December 15, 2023, 08:50:40 PM »
I am looking at these things and wondering how long they will last before they fall apart.

Crafty_Dog

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Re: Energy Politics & Science
« Reply #1253 on: December 16, 2023, 06:29:43 AM »
As David Gordon would say "Prepare to have (y)our assumptions shattered!"

Body-by-Guinness

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Coal Consumption High and Rising
« Reply #1254 on: December 17, 2023, 04:40:53 PM »
The Greenies run their mouths about those rotten hydrocarbons, and do whatever they can to increase the cost of their use, but if they were succeeding coal use would be diminishing rather than rising. At the end of the day the ones they impact the most are the poorest among us. Their mothers must be proud:

https://joannenova.com.au/2023/12/more-coal-burned-on-earth-in-2023-than-ever-before-in-human-history/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=more-coal-burned-on-earth-in-2023-than-ever-before-in-human-history :-D

Crafty_Dog

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WT: Fracking to reopen in PA after pollution of water
« Reply #1255 on: December 27, 2023, 03:33:05 AM »
PENNSYLVANIA

Driller set to frack again after ban over alleged pollution of water supply

BY MICHAEL RUBINKAM ASSOCIATED PRESS

A year after pleading no contest to criminal charges, one of Pennsylvania’s leading natural gas companies is poised to drill and frack in the rural community where it was banned for a dozen years for polluting the water supply.

Coterra Energy Inc. has won permission from state environmental regulators to drill 11 gas wells underneath Dimock Township, in the state’s northeastern corner — the sweet spot of the largest natural gas field in the United States, according to well permit records reviewed by The Associated Press.

Billions of dollars’ worth of natural gas, now locked in shale rock deep underground, awaits Coterra’s drilling rigs.

Some landowners, long shut out of royalties because of the state’s lengthy moratorium, can’t wait for the Houston-based drilling giant to resume production in Dimock. Other residents dread the industry’s return. They worry about truck traffic, noise and the threat of new contamination.

Coterra has not set a date for the resumption of drilling. A company spokesperson, George Stark, said “Coterra is committed to safe and responsible operations wherever we work.” Under its deal with the state, the driller agreed to monitor drinking water supplies within 3,000 feet of the new gas wells and take other steps designed to mitigate risk.

Dimock, a tiny crossroads 15 miles south of the New York state line in northeastern Pennsylvania, became ground zero in a national debate over fracking — the extraction technique that spurred a boom in U.S. oil and gas drilling — after residents began reporting that methane and drilling chemicals in the water were making them sick.

A state investigation concluded that faulty gas wells drilled by Coterra’s corporate predecessor, Cabot Oil & Gas, had allowed methane to leak uncontrolled into the community’s aquifer. Cabot was banned from Dimock in 2010 after regulators accused the company of failing to keep its promise to restore or replace the water supply.

An Emmy Award-winning documentary, “Gasland,” showed residents lighting their tap water on fire.

After years of litigation and a grand jury inquiry that resulted in criminal charges, the company pleaded no contest to a misdemeanor count Nov. 29, 2022.

Under a plea agreement, Coterra agreed to foot the bill for a $16 million public water system to supply 20 homes whose water wells had been damaged, and to pay for temporary treatment systems for those who want them.

But for some residents, elation about the water line turned to anger when they learned the Department of Environmental Protection had quietly lifted its long-term moratorium on gas production in Dimock. State officials have denied that Coterra pleaded no contest in exchange for being allowed to drill, but residents such as Victoria Switzer said they felt deceived.

“I have seen how justice played out here, and it’s not justice,” said Ms. Switzer, whose well was among those found to be contaminated, and who has not had a drink from her kitchen faucet since 2009.

Coterra remains prohibited from drilling inside the 9-squaremile moratorium area itself. The company plans to start the wells outside of Dimock and drill horizontally underneath the community. Some of the planned wells will be nearly 5 miles long and well over a mile deep, snaking under the land of more than 80 individual property owners, according to permit records.

The landowners are sitting on a gas gusher. Dimock’s natural gas could be worth $2.5 billion to $3.8 billion, according to Terry Engelder, a retired Penn State geologist whose 2008 calculation of enormous reserves in the vast Marcellus Shale natural gas field helped spur a drilling frenzy in Pennsylvania.

The area’s state representative, Jonathan Fritz, said an overwhelming number of his constituents favor natural gas drilling, an important economic engine in a county where farming, logging and bluestone quarrying were primary industries.

A Coterra subsidiary is the No. 1 employer in Susquehanna County, a mountainous region with a population of 38,000.

“Natural gas development has been a godsend,” Mr. Fritz said. The residents of Dimock, he said, “were harmed, they did realize a hardship, but I believe they have been made whole.”


Body-by-Guinness

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The Death of Climate Catastrophism
« Reply #1257 on: January 10, 2024, 09:26:13 AM »
This piece explores how the energy needs of emerging nations combined with Russia and China's utter disregard for sky-is-falling predictions and the edicts that are then spun off effectively kill the sundry agreements based on catastrophic claims:

https://archive.ph/8AZCl

Body-by-Guinness

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Hertz Dumps ⅓ of its EV Fleet
« Reply #1258 on: January 12, 2024, 03:21:12 PM »
Wait, they are costly, expensive to maintain, take too long to charge (assuming you can find a charging station), and customers don't want to drive them? Who knew...?

https://legalinsurrection.com/2024/01/hertz-selling-20000-electric-vehicles-for-gas-powered-cars/?utm_source=feedly&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=hertz-selling-20000-electric-vehicles-for-gas-powered-cars

Crafty_Dog

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Re: Energy Politics & Science
« Reply #1259 on: January 12, 2024, 04:05:40 PM »
and cost LOTS more to fix after accidents.

DougMacG

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Re: Energy Politics & Science
« Reply #1260 on: January 12, 2024, 06:18:25 PM »
Wait, they are costly, expensive to maintain, take too long to charge (assuming you can find a charging station), and customers don't want to drive them? Who knew...?

and cost LOTS more to fix after accidents.

Apparently, with higher insurance rates, they cost more to fix even if you never have an accident.

https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/insurance/tesla-insurance
« Last Edit: January 12, 2024, 06:26:58 PM by DougMacG »

Body-by-Guinness

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Training Judges to Dispense Environmental Serfdom
« Reply #1261 on: January 20, 2024, 03:58:31 PM »
Lookie here, left wing org sponsors conferences, symposia, and such judges are brought to to “learn” about environmental issues:

https://the-pipeline.org/indoctrinating-judges-on-climate-change/?fbclid=IwAR3vhO0uZw-YrDnY7qUlM0N_Pr3quXunaeqgM3S0oN47kPTOK6YMis5JyMU

ccp

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The Chevron doctrine
« Reply #1262 on: January 20, 2024, 04:53:20 PM »
https://www.eli.org/law-environmental-protection

Don't see George or son Michael Soros names identified on their website .... :-P

from their website on the Chevron vs. Fisherman case before SCOTUS.

My understanding is this is a big deal that will affect the power of bureaucracies vs legislatures.
(if I understand it correctly)

Indications are thus that the deciding votes will be up to Barrett and Roberts.
Of course the leftists on the Court want to keep it and maintain the bureaucrats power (especially most bureaucrats are libs)
while Alito, Thomas, Kavanaugh, and  Gorsuch seem to want to limit the doctrine or reverse it and Barrett and Roberts appear the wild cards on the fence.

Justice Kagan worries about a reversal of the doctrine will open up the floodgates of anti-bureaucracy lawsuits but OTOH I am thinking without this check unelected bureaucrats are almost free to do as they please. 












Crafty_Dog

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Re: Energy Politics & Science
« Reply #1264 on: January 25, 2024, 05:20:52 AM »
That might have fit better in the Globalism thread  :-D

Hope I'm not getting on your nerves with his; I do realize we have a ton of threads but I do believe that some discipline in thread coherency really helps this forum be a resource for finding our way through the flotsam of cyberspace and the Controligarchs' efforts to manipulate how we think.

Body-by-Guinness

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Re: Energy Politics & Science
« Reply #1265 on: January 25, 2024, 07:26:47 AM »
That might have fit better in the Globalism thread  :-D

Hope I'm not getting on your nerves with his; I do realize we have a ton of threads but I do believe that some discipline in thread coherency really helps this forum be a resource for finding our way through the flotsam of cyberspace and the Controligarchs' efforts to manipulate how we think.

I'm happy to do what I can and do search thread titles using the main topic of the piece as the search term and then dropping the results in the most germane result. With that said, I've several issues:

• Rote memory. I don't have any, which means I don't have a catalog in my head of many of the topics. I remember some that I post to often, but many simply aren't in the ol' mental card catalog. I'm one of those folks that always has 8 balls in the air (what I lack in rote memory I more than make up with my ability to keep those balls from dropping) with the downside being I frequently don't have time to do any deep digging as I'm doing a quick driveby upon encountering an interesting piece.

• Notifications. They seem to be an all-or-nothing affair on this board. It's difficult to describe how many needless, irrelevant, and redundant notifications I get through the course of a day. I might be going to bid on a ~$10 million contract soon; those chummed waters, for instance, bring every vendor in the biz my way by every communication mode imaginable, including those too small to handle the contract among other non-starters. Bottom line, I don't have notifications turned on here as a sanity preservation measure and hence often miss thread suggestions until the next time I'm in said thread.

• Topic organization. My brain seeks to impose rhyme and reason on things, endlessly searches for patterns, or otherwise deal with my nonexistent rote capabilities by instead finding underlying consistencies and using them as a guidepost. Alas, some topics here defy that technique as they are either so broad or so amorphous that everything connoted by the thread label is a candidate to be placed there. Some that consistently flummox my admittedly different drummer synapses include:

"Money, the Fed, Banking, Monetary Policy, Dollar, bitcoin, crypto, Gold/Silver." What involving economics COULDN'T go there?
"The Goolag, Facebook, Youtube, Amazon, Twitter, Gov censorship via Tech Octopus." Everything online PLUS the government hand in it? Way too broad for me to handle, at least consistently and to your standards.
"Antifa-BLM, SJW warriors, gender warriors, victimhood, cancel culture, satanism." I can almost handle this one but ... satanism? So all things "Progressive" and occult go here?
"Homeland Security, Border, sabotage of energy, transportation, environment." I feel like I'm taking an SAT or something: which terms don't belong in this series?
"US-China (& Japan, South China Sea-- Taiwan, Vietnam, Philippines, etc)." So can only US interactions with the countries listed be placed here or can say a Vietnam piece or Japan/Philippines piece live here too?

And so on.

All day long I deal with nitpicky higher ed types that do so as they don't think a given policy should apply to them, and now feel like I'm channeling 'em, much to my shame. And hey, I realize this is an organic place that has evolved over time via the input of numerous users, making some sort of universal cataloging or whatever more than a daunting task, one that would gum up most other folks were a topic they know well to change name. In a lot of ways I think this is a tool problem; SimpleMachines ought to allow tags so that they can be added to posts that cross jurisdictional boundaries and thus achieve your goal of making this forum a resource that indeed was one of the reasons I started posting here way back in the day. Alas, current tools such as Feedly and various clip-boarding apps handle that desire better for me, so my posting here is less to be able to find it again and more of a "hmm, neat piece worth sharing with folks I hold in high regard" deal for me.

With all that said, I suspect I'll do better moving forward as my gray matter gets a handle on underlying patterns and such, but in the interim I trust you understand that I don't drop things where I drop them to cause confusion, but rather as a result of confusion where my admittedly odd way of taking in the world is concerned.
« Last Edit: January 25, 2024, 08:58:21 AM by Body-by-Guinness »

ccp

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Re: Energy Politics & Science
« Reply #1266 on: January 25, 2024, 07:49:28 AM »
BBG

I feel your points.

I have been posting and reading the forum for must be near 20 yrs now so I have learned the different threads along the way otherwise I would also have a hard time figuring out which thread to use as the most apropriate one.

The "search" for a particular thread that I recall but cannot find often does not find the right thread for me either.

I am not sure how to improve this function though.

Some threads have been duplicated along the way as well or have overlap topics.
At this point it would be like trying to streamline the encyclopedia.

Body-by-Guinness

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Energy Policy Keystone
« Reply #1267 on: January 25, 2024, 12:08:51 PM »
Piece tracks Biden admin policy choices and compares them to what then happened to gas prices:

https://realclimatescience.com/2024/01/three-years-of-joe-biden/#gsc.tab=0


Body-by-Guinness

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RIP EVs?
« Reply #1269 on: January 27, 2024, 04:50:44 PM »

Crafty_Dog

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WSJ: Biden and Tik Tok energy policy
« Reply #1270 on: January 28, 2024, 05:28:54 AM »
Biden and the TikTok Anti-LNG Crusade
His ‘pause’ on export permits may be his most destructive climate act—damaging to the economy at home and U.S. influence abroad.
By
The Editorial Board
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Jan. 26, 2024 5:52 pm ET


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Americans received a preview of a second Biden term on Friday when the President halted permits for new liquefied natural gas (LNG) export projects. Climate politics has become the tail wagging this Administration’s economic, national security and foreign policy. President Biden isn’t running for re-election. Climate lobbyist Bill McKibben and his TikTok army are.


“This pause on new LNG approvals sees the climate crisis for what it is: the existential threat of our time,” Mr. Biden said. “We will heed the calls of young people and frontline communities who are using their voices to demand action from those with the power to act.” Didn’t he campaign in 2020 by promising to be the adult in the room?

Now he’s letting TikTokers dictate U.S. policy. Press reports say Biden adviser John Podesta pushed for the “pause”—which tees up an outright ban—after TikTokers and Mr. McKibben made stopping LNG exports a cause celebre. Mr. Biden’s advisers at the White House even met with a TikTok climate “influencer.” The Administration hopes its climate gesture will boost the President’s flagging political support among young people.

Who cares about the real-world impact, or the signal to allies and adversaries that the U.S. isn’t a reliable partner? Europe and Asia should plan to import their gas from Qatar, Russia or even Iran. Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin now know they can exploit the Administration’s climate obsession to undermine U.S. interests.

During the pause, the Energy Department will conduct an environmental and economic review of LNG exports. “Today, we have an evolving understanding of the market need for LNG, the long-term supply of LNG, and the perilous impacts of methane on our planet” and “pollution from new export facilities,” the White House statement says.

Mr. Biden’s views sure have evolved. As Vice President, he boasted about the benefits of U.S. LNG exports. “The United States is now a net [gas] exporter,” he proclaimed at the 2016 CAF conference. “There are even greater opportunities to supply the energy needs of our partners in Latin America and around the world.”

He was right. Global demand for natural gas is expected to increase 46% by 2050 as countries industrialize and shift from coal. Most developing Asian economies still rely on coal for power, including India (71%), Indonesia (59%), Vietnam (57%) and the Philippines (55%). Global coal exports and power generation last year hit a record.

China was the biggest coal importer, followed by India, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan. Demand for LNG has outstripped supply especially as Europe tries to wean itself from Russian gas. A Bangladesh energy official complained last year that Asian countries couldn’t buy gas because of skyrocketing prices. Instead, they burned coal. How will this be good for the climate?

The climate lobby also doesn’t care that some 2.3 billion people in the world still cook with open fires or stoves that burn heavily-polluting wood, coal, biomass or kerosene. Developing countries want and need gas to escape poverty, which is another reason demand for LNG is expected to exceed supply for decades.

Hence, Russia, Iran and Qatar are expanding their export capacities. By the way, Russia last year supplied Europe with almost as much gas as the U.S. The White House says its pause won’t jeopardize supply to Europe, but energy officials across the pond disagree. Germany accounted for a third or more of the contracted capacity of a large planned Gulf Coast LNG project.

Nobody in the White House seems to understand that countries sign long-term contracts years in advance so they can plan their energy infrastructure and needs. They won’t build new gas plants or import terminals without supply locked in—or they will turn to more reliable sources. Russia now looks like a more reliable energy source than the U.S.

Much of the supply from LNG projects in the works is slated for Asia. They would strengthen U.S. relationships and influence in the region to counter China. Xi Jinping no doubt is elated by the Administration’s pause, which will do more damage to U.S. strategic interests than blocking the Keystone XL pipeline.

***
Re-election imperatives have partly restrained the President’s attack on fossil fuels in his first term, but don’t expect the same in a second. Recall how the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission in early 2022 backtracked on a plan to conduct greenhouse-gas analyses for natural gas pipelines and export projects after West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin raised a ruckus.

But Mr. Manchin is retiring, and Mr. Biden won’t need to worry about him in a second term. Nor will he have to heed voters in states such as Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin. Mr. McKibben will lead a no-holds-barred children’s crusade against fossil fuels. Is Mr. Biden trying to give Americans another reason to vote for Donald Trump?

Body-by-Guinness

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Fantasy, Tyranny, & the Green Embrace Thereof
« Reply #1271 on: January 28, 2024, 08:37:52 PM »
Good overview of green energy issues, outcomes (higher cost!), and the nitwittery posing as science seeking to create a green stampede:

https://wattsupwiththat.com/2024/01/27/climate-and-energy-fantasy-and-tyranny/

Crafty_Dog

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WSJ: Sen. Kennedy of LA vs. Biden on LNG
« Reply #1272 on: January 29, 2024, 07:07:15 PM »
I’ll Fight Back Against Biden’s LNG Pause
I plan to block every State and Energy department nominee until he relents.
By John Kennedy
Jan. 29, 2024 6:09 pm ET




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LNG tanker in Cameron Parish, La., April 14, 2022. PHOTO: STAFF/REUTERS
The Biden administration has announced a pause on every new and pending permit for liquefied natural gas export terminals in the U.S., including several in Louisiana.

The White House claims this is necessary because the Energy Department based its permit reviews on five-year-old data. Here’s the truth: Climate warriors want President Biden to destroy America’s fossil-fuel industry, but he doesn’t want to pull the trigger himself. By withholding permits, the president can scare away investors, bleed these projects of capital, and claim to have clean hands if the terminals close.

OPINION: POTOMAC WATCH
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Joe Biden's Dilemma on Natural Gas Exports


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Any way you look at it, Mr. Biden’s blockade is bad for America. Consider the Calcasieu Pass 2 export terminal in Cameron Parish, La. Once completed, it will be the country’s largest terminal. Nixing its permit would jeopardize $20 billion in investments for U.S. industry and kill thousands of good jobs in my state.

There is no environmental justification for killing these jobs. Natural gas is the reason America leads the world in carbon-emission reductions. From 2005 through 2019 natural gas drove a 32% reduction in American carbon emissions while creating 1.4 million manufacturing jobs and ensuring that families paid half as much to heat their homes. Apparently, whichever TikTok influencer convinced the Biden administration to ban LNG permits forgot to mention that side of the natural-gas ledger.

Natural gas is also a key to several of the Biden administration’s other environmental pet projects. Electric cars? They plug into an electrical grid powered by natural gas. Wind turbines and solar panels? Natural gas provides a reliable backstop so folks don’t face blackouts when the wind doesn’t blow and the sun doesn’t shine. That’s why the European Commission recognizes natural gas as a sustainable energy source.

Americans will suffer because of Mr. Biden’s attack on natural gas, and so will our allies. When war broke out in Ukraine, the president promised our friends in Europe and elsewhere that they could depend on the U.S. to keep natural gas flowing. Unless his administration plans to run a pipeline through the mid-Atlantic ridge, liquefying natural gas and transporting it on tankers is the only way Washington can fulfill its promises. Our allies shouldn’t have to rely on Russia, Iran and China to keep the lights on.

In a recent letter, I warned Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm that her proposed pause on LNG export permits is an unjustifiably bad policy. The Biden administration listened to the climate influencers instead and tried to bury this foolish ban in a Friday news dump.

Until Mr. Biden drops this battle against American energy, I’m going to block every nominee he tries to place at the State and Energy departments. Like the Terminator, I’ll be back again and again to stop his nominees and remind the world that he’s intentionally killing jobs and threatening our national security to placate confused climate extremists.

Mr. Kennedy, a Republican, is a U.S. senator from Louisiana.

Body-by-Guinness

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A Tantrum Masquerading as a Policy Deliberation
« Reply #1273 on: January 30, 2024, 04:38:40 PM »
Fine indictment of Biden’s recent LNG edict. Lots of useful tables/graphics at the link:

Biden’s 'Pause' on LNG Exports Is Impulsive and Destructive
US LNG pause impacts industry
•Cato @ Liberty / by Travis Fisher / January 30, 2024 at 12:01PM
Travis Fisher

LNG tanker
On January 26, the Biden administration announced it would pause new approvals of liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports. The official news followed several leaked stories—including one prominent article by The New York Times—that triggered criticism from LNG supporters and praise from climate activists.

The announcement appears to be a concession to the “keep it in the ground” movement and the 65 federal lawmakers who asked for the policy change in November 2023. However, some pragmatic progressives see the pause as misguided: “The urgency of the energy transition cannot excuse counterproductive purity tests,” wrote Elan Sykes and Neel Brown of the Progressive Policy Institute.

From the libertarian perspective, the pause is unwise energy policy, an encroachment on free trade, and a continuation of the Biden administration’s use of uncertainty as a political weapon against energy suppliers. Let’s dig in.

What Is Changing, Exactly?

LNG is the liquefied version of natural gas (mostly methane, CH4). Shippers cool the gas to approximately negative 260 degrees Fahrenheit to make it a liquid that is portable via tanker ships. International trade in LNG has spiked in part because of the abundant natural gas resources in the United States, which were enabled by technological improvements in unconventional production from shale formations.

The United States did not export significant quantities of LNG until about 2015, so one might say the industry is in uncharted waters. The aggressive growth in LNG exports (particularly relative to historic levels of imports) can be seen in the graph below.

Liquefied natural gas imports and exports, 1985-2022
(Source.)

Although the large quantities of exports are new, the legal apparatus is not. Specifically, under the Natural Gas Act (NGA), the Department of Energy (DOE) must approve any import or export of natural gas. Congress passed the NGA in 1938, so the statute predates the organization of the DOE itself, which was formed by Congress in 1977 by the DOE Organization Act.

Before the DOE was established the responsibilities in this section of the NGA were carried out by the Federal Power Commission (renamed in 1977 to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission or FERC). Now the two agencies each regulate different parts of the LNG industry. DOE explains their roles as follows:

The NGA directs DOE to evaluate applications to export LNG to non‐​FTA [Free Trade Agreement] countries. … Typically, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) has jurisdiction over the siting, construction, and operation of LNG export facilities in the US In these cases, FERC leads the environmental impact assessments of proposed projects consistent with the National Environmental Policy Act, and DOE is typically a cooperating agency as part of these reviews. Obtaining a DOE authorization to export LNG to non‐​FTA countries is an important step for most projects in their path toward financing and construction.

The Biden administration said the DOE will now scrutinize applications to export LNG through the lens of climate change and other factors in determining whether additional US LNG exports are in the public interest. The White House stated:

The current economic and environmental analyses DOE uses to underpin its LNG export authorizations are roughly five years old and no longer adequately account for considerations like potential energy cost increases for American consumers and manufacturers beyond current authorizations or the latest assessment of the impact of greenhouse gas emissions. Today, we have an evolving understanding of the market need for LNG, the long‐​term supply of LNG, and the perilous impacts of methane on our planet.

The DOE has never denied an LNG export application, so this is a big shift in public policy.

Who Carries the Burden of Proof?

The rise of low‐​cost natural gas production in the United States—combined with high prices and resource constraints in other parts of the world—means US producers can profitably refrigerate, ship, and deliver gas to other countries. In contrast to other energy resources that require mandates and subsidies, LNG exports merely require approval from the federal government. All the government has to do is get out of the way.

The text of the NGA establishes approval as the default position. The statute says the DOE “shall” issue an order approving a project “unless, after opportunity for hearing, it finds that the proposed exportation or importation will not be consistent with the public interest.” Hence a pause to further consider new factors is the wrong posture—LNG approvals should continue until and unless DOE makes a new finding that LNG exports are inconsistent with the public interest. Ideally, of course, the government shouldn’t have the power to bar energy exports in peacetime.

There is a case to be made on either side of the climate debate regarding LNG.

Supporters of LNG exports cite the lower CO2 emissions of natural gas combustion over coal. By exporting natural gas and displacing the use of coal globally, the argument goes, the United States can help other countries reduce their CO2 emissions. We have certainly seen coal‐​to‐​gas switching bring down emissions in the United States.

Opponents of LNG exports, however, argue that the energy required to cool and transport natural gas—not to mention leakage of uncombusted methane, itself a potent greenhouse gas—makes it little better for climate change than burning coal.

The Administration’s Action is Arbitrary and Capricious

As experts debate the net impact of natural gas exports on factors like global climate change, the structure of the NGA indicates that approvals should move forward while the DOE deliberates. In July 2023, the DOE rejected a petition by environmental groups to do precisely what it now accepts—to undertake a blanket review of its LNG policy.

In fact, the DOE’s rejection notes in the first sentence of the document that the Administrative Procedure Act (APA) provides that each agency “shall give an interested person the right to petition for the issuance, amendment, or repeal of a rule.” The DOE’s new policy of a “pause” runs afoul of the APA and deprives interested parties the ability to challenge it before it goes into effect.

The new stated policy of a pause is especially capricious—meaning impulsive or unpredictable—given how the DOE responded to the environmental petitioners just six months ago:

After carefully considering Petitioners’ request, DOE is denying the Rulemaking Petition. As discussed below, DOE has reasonably exercised its discretion to implement its LNG export program through a combined approach of individual adjudications and export‐​focused regulatory actions, rather than a single rulemaking of broad applicability. DOE‘s existing LNG export regulatory program is responsive to Petitioners’ principal concerns—namely because, since 2013, DOE has, in fact, established a decision‐​making process under NGA section 3(a) that “respond to the complex issues raised by LNG export and appropriately serve the Natural Gas Act,” as Petitioners request. (emphasis in original)

How can the DOE now claim that it does not need to go through a formal rulemaking process in reversing course and implementing a new LNG approval regime? Even the environmental groups that want the DOE to shut down LNG exports should agree that their petition for a new rulemaking was the appropriate vehicle for enacting new policy.

Further, in the event of an administrative policy change at DOE that rises to the level of national significance—I think an indefinite LNG export pause qualifies—the Supreme Court’s “Major Questions Doctrine” should come into play. As the Congressional Review Service summarized the doctrine, “if an agency seeks to decide an issue of major national significance, its action must be supported by clear congressional authorization.” (emphasis in original) Did Congress give the DOE clear authorization to deny LNG export applications based on the factors DOE now finds important?

Political Uncertainty as Punishment

We have already seen the playbook of capricious policy in action. In February 2022, FERC issued new policy statements “providing guidance for future consideration of natural gas projects by the Commission.” The policy change—which suggested that an unspecified level of climate mitigation would be necessary to serve the public interest and receive FERC approval of gas pipeline projects—injected enormous uncertainty into the pipeline approval process.

The concept of the February 2022 policy statement was also the subject of a series of rebuttals (prebuttals?) by Commissioner Bernard McNamee, who argued forcefully beginning in 2019 that “the commission does not have the authority under the NGA or [the National Environmental Policy Act] to deny a pipeline certificate application based on the environmental effects of the upstream production or downstream use of natural gas nor does the commission have the authority to unilaterally establish measures to mitigate” emissions.

Ultimately, FERC withdrew its proposal after receiving blistering blowback from members of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee (ENR). Senator Joe Manchin (D‑WV), ENR chairman, said FERC was “constructing additional road blocks that further delay building out the energy infrastructure our country desperately needs.” Delay is the practical impact of political uncertainty.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) appears to be using the same strategy. Last year, the EPA proposed in its power plant rulemaking to mandate two unproven technologies—green hydrogen and carbon capture—for new or reconstructed power plants to meet greenhouse gas emission targets. The EPA proposed that “affected sources that commenced construction or reconstruction after May 23, 2023” would need to meet the requirements of the final rule.

The electricity generation industry remains in the middle of the uncertainty caused by the EPA’s unworkable proposal. For any new or reconstructed natural gas‐​fired power plant (affected source) subject to EPA’s new standard, a company can construct the unit today and be held—at some future date—to a standard that does not yet exist and may be impossible.

Given the recent track records at DOE, FERC, and EPA, crippling uncertainty is beginning to look like the aim of energy policy rather than an unfortunate side effect.

LNG Export Pause Offers a Lesson in Economic Thinking

The White House listed “potential energy cost increases for American consumers and manufacturers” as one justification for the LNG pause. It is true that, in the very short term, an announcement that the federal government will forcibly restrict the export of natural gas would likely cause its domestic price to fall. But, as French economist Frederic Bastiat implored, we should attempt to foresee long‐​term impacts. Bastiat wrote:

There is only one difference between a bad economist and a good one: the bad economist confines himself to the visible effect; the good economist takes into account both the effect that can be seen and those effects that must be foreseen.

Yet this difference is tremendous; for it almost always happens that when the immediate consequence is favorable, the later consequences are disastrous, and vice versa. Whence it follows that the bad economist pursues a small present good that will be followed by a great evil to come, while the good economist pursues a great good to come, at the risk of a small present evil.

Restricting the sale of LNG abroad would send ripple effects up the supply chain, blunting incentives to explore for more natural gas and to produce what’s already been found. Advocates of thwarting the global natural gas trade—and of hoarding domestic natural gas—are focused on temporary, short‐​term impacts to commodity prices and ignoring long‐​term impacts to natural gas supply infrastructure.

Whose Gas Is It Anyway?

Economics aside, what business does the federal government have in dictating the direction of an industry that delivers a product that so many people find valuable? Advances in directional drilling and hydraulic fracturing technology (commonly referred to as “fracking”) allowed American firms to produce astonishing amounts of useful energy from hydrocarbons trapped over a mile deep in rock formations. (Turn useless, 6,000-foot-deep rock into electricity? Yes, please.)

People here and abroad want to use that energy. Natural gas is a valuable resource—we use it not just to fuel power plants but to cook food, heat homes, and fabricate a dizzying array of plastics, fibers, and even medicines. Natural gas liquids like propane and ethane are especially useful as a material feedstock but also have energy‐​related applications.

The DOE, EPA, and FERC may try to stifle the progress of the natural gas industry in the name of climate change (or industry protectionism), but the demand for energy will always be there. Globally, energy consumption continues to increase, as shown below.

Increase in global energy use 1900-2022
(Source.)

The challenge to meet growing demand should be exciting because energy consumption reflects the increasing living standards of countless millions (hopefully billions) across the globe. The US Energy Information Administration stated in its 2023 International Energy Outlook: “as incomes and population rise over time, energy consumption increases as more people can afford to drive, use commercial services, demand goods, and control building temperatures.”

For the hundreds of millions of people worldwide who still lack access to electricity, LNG exports could be the difference between dark and light.

https://www.cato.org/blog/bidens-pause-lng-exports-impulsive-destructive

DougMacG

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Gas prices rising (in an election year)
« Reply #1274 on: February 01, 2024, 05:04:07 PM »
https://www.startribune.com/twin-cities-gas-prices-float-near-3-mark-expected-to-keep-rising/600340292/

What is he going to do, take more from the Reserve?

Why are gas prices going up in winter?  Probably increased government consumption.  Also, constraints on production.

Body-by-Guinness

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Re: Gas prices rising (in an election year)
« Reply #1275 on: February 01, 2024, 05:30:01 PM »
https://www.startribune.com/twin-cities-gas-prices-float-near-3-mark-expected-to-keep-rising/600340292/

What is he going to do, take more from the Reserve?

Why are gas prices going up in winter?  Probably increased government consumption.  Also, constraints on production.

Not to mention the signal Biden is sending to the market with his LNG antics. Is it a shot across Abbott’s bow, a bone thrown to environmentalists, or a case of a leopard (one that belongs in a memory ward) showing its true spots?

Body-by-Guinness

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Volvo Quits Making EVs, Stock Jumps
« Reply #1276 on: February 03, 2024, 09:35:19 AM »
Well this leaves me sniggering:

Volvo, An Early Electric Car Adopter, Cuts Off Funding For Its EV Affiliate
Move follows other retrenchments by big automakers as sentiment turns against EVs

Follow the WSJ in Apple News
STOCKHOLM—Volvo Car said it won’t provide further funding to Polestar, the electric-car maker it created with Volvo’s Chinese owner Geely—the latest EV retrenchment by the global auto industry.
The auto industry’s pivot to electric vehicles has been rocked by setbacks this year, just as a flood of new battery-powered models is hitting showrooms.

Earlier this week, French automaker Renault said it has decided to cancel the initial public offering of its electric-car unit Ampere. Ford, meanwhile, has slashed production of its electric F-150 Lightning, a pickup truck that has generated major buzz since its launch. Rental-car firm Hertz has said it was dumping about one-third of its EV rental car fleet, replacing the cars with gas-engine vehicles.
Also earlier this week, Tesla—the world’s most valuable automaker—warned of notably lower growth this year. Data earlier this year has shown a slowdown in EV sales growth in the U.S., automakers delaying or cutting back on plans and anxiety rising among dealership owners.
In a sign of investor unease about automakers’ march toward an EV future, Volvo shares surged more than 20% Thursday on its decision to cut off funding to Polestar.

Volvo and Geely founded Polestar as a stand-alone EV maker, separate from Volvo’s substantial in-house effort to go electric. Through a special-purpose acquisition company merger, the two listed it on Nasdaq in 2022. Polestar shares have fallen 83% since then.
Analysts have highlighted how Volvo’s 48% stake in Polestar has been a drag on its resources, with the company struggling with losses amid the slow consumer uptake of electric vehicles and the increasingly competitive market, tapping Volvo for around $1 billion in financing while the company works through a turnaround plan.

The company’s Polestar stake impaired its group EPS by around 1.9 Swedish kronor (18 cents) in 2023, UBS analyst David Lesne said in a note. This compares to Volvo Car group EPS of SEK4.4 for the year.

Volvo said Thursday it will extend the repayment period for the existing convertible loan by 18 months to the end of 2028. But it said it would be concentrating its financial resources on Volvo’s own needs from now on.

The company said it was also evaluating a potential adjustment to its shareholding in Polestar, including a possible distribution of shares to Volvo Cars’ shareholders, including Geely.

If it decides to distribute its stake to shareholders, Geely would become a significant new shareholder.

The Chinese auto group said in a statement that it will continue to provide full operational and financial support to Polestar as an independent exclusive brand going forward. That support wouldn’t require a reduction of its shareholding in Volvo Car, it added.
Volvo Car Chief Executive, Jim Rowan, said on a call after outlining the news that a separation from Polestar is a natural evolution and that now is the right time to consider reducing its shareholding, and for Polestar to look for alternative funding.

Meanwhile, Volvo posted a rise in fourth-quarter revenue, driven by higher volumes and said it expects the growth rate in retail sales to increase this year as long as there are no major disruptions.

Net profit attributable to shareholders rose to 3.11 billion Swedish kronor ($299.2 million) from SEK2.46 billion a year earlier, as revenue rose 4% to SEK109.44 billion.

Analysts polled by FactSet had projected a net profit of SEK4 billion on revenue of SEK108.35 billion.

“We remain firm on our ambition to report an EBIT margin above 8% for 2026, and now do so based on expected revenues between SEK550 billion-SEK600 billion,” Rowan said.

“By the end of 2026, this calculates to a revenue compound annual growth rate of 11%-15% from 2023 to 2026.”
In terms of total 2024 retail deliveries, Volvo aims for a higher year-over-year growth rate than in 2023.

Write to Dominic Chopping at dominic.chopping@wsj.com
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ccp

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screw EVs
« Reply #1277 on: February 03, 2024, 09:43:56 AM »
if Trump wins time to invest
in EOG, LNG and CVX or Oke?

thoughts?

If Biden wins sell GM ?


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Body-by-Guinness

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A Pair of Dems Against Biden’s LNG Posturing
« Reply #1280 on: February 08, 2024, 04:48:07 AM »
Pair of Dem congresscritters take issue with Biden’s LNG antics he's slung at Abbott.

Biden's LNG decision will make it harder to reach our climate goals
The Hill News / by Mary Landrieu and Tim Ryan / February 08, 2024 at 07:38AM

China is orchestrating a massive investment in solar and wind power to meet its growing energy needs, installing as much renewable energy capacity as the rest of the world combined, six years ahead of schedule.

However, this impressive success story masks an ugly truth: Without natural gas as a foundation, this renewable power is inextricably linked with rapidly expanding coal-burning in order to ensure grid reliability, which is creating more harm than good for our climate.

China quadrupled permits for new coal power plants in 2022, building six times more than all other countries. It now burns more coal than the rest of the world combined. Although China is the most disturbing example, the use of coal is expanding across developing countries in Asia, including India — which also, despite its push for renewables, will be heavily reliant on coal for the next several decades. Coal today accounts for 44 percent of global emissions, with nearly 70 percent coming from two countries, China and India. Even Germany, which Europe’s leader on renewable power installation, is turning its coal-fired plants back on to restore grid reliability in the absence of sufficient natural gas supply because of the war in Ukraine.

As Democrats supporting President Biden, we are aligned with the imperative to reverse climate change quickly with bold action, including ramping up investments in renewables and clean energy. The Inflation Reduction Act funds vital technologies such as carbon capture, rare earth mineral production, and hydrogen, which will all be critical to moving toward net-zero carbon emissions. That work has to happen now to reach scale in the years ahead.

But low-carbon natural gas must be part of the equation too, both here at home and exported abroad. That’s why Biden’s recent actions to halt LNG approvals is so disappointing.

Bipartisan energy leaders in Congress understand what’s at stake, as 30 of them traveled to COP28 in Dubai. At a recent summit at the Capitol following their trip, Democrats and Republicans, business, labor and renewable power leaders, have all identified the need to address permitting reform and get back to building energy infrastructure for both renewables and natural gas.

We’ve shared this sentiment with the Biden administration, including the critical role American natural gas exports must play to move the world off coal and provide our allies abroad with secure energy, so they aren’t instead forced to rely on hostile leaders. In fact, during this administration, American natural gas exports have largely been credited with stopping Putin’s attempts to bend European economies to his will. They have also helped Europe's economies stave off crippling price increases.

The U.S. was once heavily reliant on coal, too, right up until 2005. But the growth of U.S. natural gas production and power plant conversions away from coal have helped us lead the world in emissions reductions — accounting for nearly 60 percent of US carbon emission reductions over the last 15 years. And while there is still work to do on methane, the natural gas industry is answering the call, certifying their gas to beat strict methane standards, investing in satellite tracking, and collaborating with the United Nations Methane Partnership.

Shrill and impractical voices in this debate have long blatantly ignored these realities, dishonestly attempting to force a false binary choice of renewables or fossil fuels upon a complex debate over geopolitics, economics, and climate. Young people absorbing their misinformation need to understand the future risks of the policies they are advocating.

They will even claim that natural gas is worse than coal, despite the fact that natural gas emits 50 percent less carbon dioxide than coal. If they had their way in ending natural gas use, many economies, including the U.S. would need to burn more and more coal to keep the lights on — moving us backward on climate — no matter how many wind and solar panels we install.

The value of natural gas is backed up by leading and trusted scientific experts like former Obama administration Energy Secretary Ernie Moniz, who has said natural gas should be viewed “as a multi-decadal, critical component of the energy transition.” One recent study found that simply converting the top 5 percent of the world’s dirtiest power plants to natural gas would cut electric sector global emissions by 30 percent.

So what are we waiting for, and how can we meet the challenge?

The answer is not to stop natural gas buildouts here in the U.S., but to expand energy infrastructure, meeting growing demand at home to ensure a solid foundation that supports the scaling up of renewables, and moving this secure, cleaner fuel overseas to cut coal emissions abroad.

It's time for radically practical thinking about the urgent challenges we face on energy and climate, from both Democrats and Republicans. From our time serving with him in Washington, we know Biden to be the type of leader capable of this.

We urge his administration to rethink this counterproductive policy, which not only sets back our climate agenda, but also undermines his strong record of rebuilding American jobs and manufacturing.

Mary Landrieu (D-La.) served in the U.S. Senate from 1997 to 2015. Tim Ryan (D-Ohio) represented Ohio's 13th congressional district from 2003 to 2023. The two are co-chairs of Natural Allies for a Clean Energy Future.

https://thehill.com/opinion/energy-environment/4453275-bidens-lng-decision-will-make-it-harder-to-reach-our-climate-goals/
« Last Edit: February 08, 2024, 09:47:47 AM by Body-by-Guinness »

DougMacG

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Re: A Pair of Dems Against Biden’s LNG Posturing
« Reply #1281 on: February 08, 2024, 07:16:25 AM »
Good for them for speaking out and speaking truth. Moderate Democrats without a party or a state, both are former elected officials.

In their last Senate elections Mary Landrieu was defeated in the 2014 Louisiana runoff election to Republican opponent Congressman Bill Cassidy 56% to 44%.  In 2022, Tim Ryan lost to Republican JD Vance in Ohio by 6 points.  Tim Ryan was the most reasonable voice in the 2020 Democratic Presidential race and gained zero traction.  Their party would like to ban your grandfather's Oldsmobile.

Tim Ryan would make a good 'no-labels' candidate.

Question, is their (former?) party listening?  No.  The Dem Party is doing exactly the opposite of the common sense they advocate.

We need energy when the sun is down and when the wind is calm.  We need energy just to build and transport the solar and wind infrastructure around the globe. We need fossil fuel energy, of which natural gas is the cleanest.  We need more power on the grid to support the transportation and heating sectors BEFORE we switch it all over.  We need to export clean energy or the rest of the world will find less clean alternatives.  But no.  Not unless you vote all of them out and the other team in.

Natural gas replacing coal is what lowered our emissions, they point out.  It happened because of fracking.  It happened under Obama, no thanks to him.  It happened because of American ingenuity and because of long term, risk-based investments (some dare to call it capitalism).

Long term investments are not made when you say you will end that industry in 5-6 years.

What they write is all true but mostly we should be pursuing nuclear.  Not mentioned because they are pursuing one interest.  Instead of half the carbon emissions of coal, nuclear power has no carbon emissions.  For the most part, (almost) all the base energy should be nuclear and all the on-demand energy should be natural gas.  Solar and wind can lower those demands but electrical demands aren't going lower as we try to electrify everything.

"China is burning more coal than the rest of the world combined", and we are still subsidizing them and leaving them out of our meaningless 'climate agreements'.  If Leftist climatists were serious, they would be strong on sanctions and trade with China, but they aren't.  If you build it in China, it is dirtier than if you build it here.

No mention of pipelines like the one that Joe Biden cancelled in his first minute in office.  What is the safest way to move oil and natural gas?  Pipelines.  To mention it is to criticize Biden, and their is an appeal to Biden and his handlers.

"We’ve shared this sentiment with the Biden administration..."   - to no avail.  The other party (R) already agrees with them, and now holds their seats.

A vote for today's Democratic Party is a vote against your own energy and economy, and food, and they aren't making the environment any cleaner with what they are doing to us.

The fastest path to a better environment, including reducing levels of CO2, is to focus on prosperity.  China and India are using too much coal because they are still developing economies, and following them will be the rest of the developing world.  Only economies of prosperity can afford the cleanest solutions , a lesson learned when we discovered the filth of East Germany as compared with the west.  Command economies (cf. China) aren't cleaner. 

Why are doing all these things to put freedom and prosperity and a cleaner environment further out of reach?
« Last Edit: February 08, 2024, 09:00:10 AM by DougMacG »

Body-by-Guinness

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Body-by-Guinness

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Biden Paid Not to Take the LNG View….
« Reply #1283 on: March 04, 2024, 07:48:26 PM »
Hmm, ever so curious: several left leaning, anti-energy foundations and such donate to Biden and … Biden puts LNG exports on hiatus. Just a coincidence, just like all the other money associated with the “Biden brand.”

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/energy-and-environment/2895813/biden-left-wing-climate-activists-halt-lng-exports/?fbclid=IwAR13rpntjEfCDAwLFM60vN4GC-PyCVonr-Xfp4m3nWBfqRB8J0h0sR2w1nI

DougMacG

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Energy Politics & Science, Solar and Wind Not Reliable, John Stossel
« Reply #1284 on: March 05, 2024, 09:44:37 AM »
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pNS7Qojr1JQ

We already know most of this, but please watch and share. 5 minutes.

I like solar and wind power.  Everyone should have some form of backup.  But remove the subsidies. Remove the mandates.  Let the alternatives compete freely.

For one thing, the subsidies have been a massive wealth shift from poor to rich.

And still, no one mentions nuclear.  Round the clock.  Carbon free.

Crafty_Dog

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Kill the whales and the birds of prey! :-D
« Reply #1285 on: March 05, 2024, 10:20:36 AM »
"I like , , , wind power." 


DougMacG

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Re: Kill the whales and the birds of prey! :-D
« Reply #1286 on: March 05, 2024, 10:55:45 AM »
"I like , , , wind power."

Touche!   :-D

I was thinking - wind power - more like this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qMLD8KlkQeI
Warning, you might want to stop watching at the 2:40 mark.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O4rdb_2TTf4

Speaking of birds of prey, we portaged my catamaran into the Boundary Waters 'Canoe Area' some years ago, a million acres non-motorized,
now against federal law to bring in a sailboat, and bald eagles came to see what was up...


Body-by-Guinness

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Qatar Earns Windfall Due to Biden’s LNG Pause
« Reply #1288 on: March 06, 2024, 12:29:59 AM »
I would love to hear administration Deep Thinkers justify Biden’s LNG policy and explain how it serves US interests. And given the Biden Brand’s business model I wonder if any back channel funds are involved:

https://freebeacon.com/energy/hamas-sheltering-qatar-cashes-in-on-biden-natural-gas-pause/?fbclid=IwAR1NezWAGrzRlaK56uLBcJScRjJxEXeFSLckeaswdx8bxh7cYUwmHa1bMxs

DougMacG

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Re: Qatar Earns Windfall Due to Biden’s LNG Pause
« Reply #1289 on: March 06, 2024, 06:48:58 AM »
Isn't this another case of Biden funding terrorism?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qatar_and_state-sponsored_terrorism#:~:text=In%20a%20press%20conference%20on,countries%20to%20continue%20their%20blockade.

And it's not really 'indirectly' either. If true, it's a direct result.

Obama-Biden already paid for the October 7th war on Israel with plane loads of cash phone to the world's number one state sponsor of terror.

Reminds me of Robert Gates saying Biden was wrong on every major foreign policy decision going back to the previous century.

I get it that Biden is a moron and that his advisors are wrong headed on policy, but I don't get what rank and file Democratic voters are thinking. Is this really what you want? We don't want to be an exporter of clean energy, while the third world burns more and more coal?

He's trying to 'improve' domestic energy production by shrinking their market?

And what is a 'pause', an executive order pause? Didn't we once learn that a federal law originates in the house, goes to the Senate and then to the president for his signature? None of that happened but this is a law?

If it was for National Security purposes, we just saw it backfired.

If it is somehow tied to a war effort led by our Commander in chief, I don't recall Congress declaring war, on anyone lately.

Lawless laws.

Like the capital gains tax on inflation. It never went through Congress but you go to jail if you don't pay it.
« Last Edit: March 06, 2024, 07:00:39 AM by DougMacG »

Body-by-Guinness

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Transforming America Into a Pre-Industrial Society
« Reply #1290 on: March 13, 2024, 09:11:15 AM »
The Green Lobby and their fellow travelers so consistently seek to limit American energy production on so many fronts it's difficult to include anything other than they are seeking to reduce us to some form of agrarian or even hunter/gatherer society, with all sorts of reductions in population size likely viewed as a feature rather than a bug, particularly by any enemies funding these misguided efforts. In this instance the transformers hung from every power pole in the nation are targeted:

https://legalinsurrection.com/2024/03/energy-department-poised-to-zap-nations-electrical-transformers-which-are-already-in-short-supply/?utm_source=feedly&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=energy-department-poised-to-zap-nations-electrical-transformers-which-are-already-in-short-supply

Body-by-Guinness

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Trillions Lost: Green Boondoggles' True Cost
« Reply #1291 on: March 27, 2024, 05:59:08 AM »
"Green" projects and other "climate" efforts are salted through every government budget at every level:

The most egregious theft of collective wealth and well-being -- and it is flat-out theft -- is the churn on “alternative” forms of energy production. Senator Tommy Tuberville of Alabama said last week in an interview with Steve Bannon that the U.S. has spent some $7 trillion over budget in the last three years, and 25 percent of that went to "climate change" projects. They are all like Solyndra, massively subsidized and within a decade, massive failures. "The investors take a tax loss," said Tuberville, "then move onto the next effort where they again loot the public." This is salted through all the investment banks, retirement accounts. It represents all putative growth.

In June of 2023, the Department of Energy admitted that it had allocated $1.3 trillion for "clean energy" investment support since 2020, and that spending rose 25 percent from 2021-23. This is a fraction of what was really spent. Further, this money is not only based in debt, thus raising inflation, but it is also raising energy prices. It is the principal reason that almost 25 percent of us, according to economist Peter St. Onge, have been forced to choose between heat and food this winter.

What a choice.

Seventy-five percent of $7 trillion is $1,750,000,000, in an annual gift to the rich. The World Economic Forum projects that climate spending in the U.S. will triple over the next ten years. Biden's "climate" budget is $5.7 trillion. Triple that to $20 trillion. No wonder the market is booming. The U.S. has pledged another half a trillion in “low carbon electricity” under this year’s Paris Climate Accord. And further:

Among all measures tracked since 2020, direct incentives for manufacturers aimed at bolstering domestic manufacturing of "clean" energy now total to around $90 billion.
Since the start of the global energy crisis, governments have also allocated $900 billion to short-term consumer affordability measures, additional to pre-existing support programs and subsidies. Around 30 percent of this "affordability" spending has been announced in the past six months, and despite calls to better target households and industries most in need, only 25 percent of affordability measures are targeted towards low-income households and most-impacted industries.

Much of this last $900 billion is direct subsidy to the wealthy in annual subsidies for clean energy. This is again, annual subsidy, so look at the last twenty years. President Obama started this program, therefore, we are looking at a $10 - $ 20 trillion gift to the rich since the Lightbringer took office. What is not counted in these budgets are the losses that accrue from the failure of "green energy" projects, which is the taxpayer's loss.

Last year, investors in Spain's green energy collapse took the government to court to claw back subsidies from a dead industry in a country with a debt 400 percent larger than GDP. No wonder millions on the street want to outlaw socialism. As is clear from Spain,  when the government runs out of money the first thing to go is the subsidy to green energy, after which the enterprise fails immediately.

In my neck of the Canadian woods, you can install a solar system for $20,000, and get a 25 percent subsidy, as does the installer whose business the government created via “free” “investment.” I live in a rain forest. Which means solar is not available during winter rains and not needed during the summers. Recently everyone with a few extra bucks has taken up the government offer to install heat pumps, also subsidized by between 50 percent and 75 percent. Rain forests mean hydro power, which is essentially, greenhouse-gas-free, and the most inexpensive "fuel," but an almost-free heat pump? Again win/win for the upper-middle-class because no one in Canada’s increasingly massive working class can afford it.

Solyndra? Never heard of it!

This model was invented by politicians in power. The first person to notice it was Peter Schweizer; in Throw Them All Out, he details the billionaire investors who funded Obama and who were cashed out via various solar and wind projects. Hundreds of billions of dollars went missing on Obama’s various "clean energy" projects.

This year, every government department is “investing” in clean energy, vis, a quick Google search, will show. Pages and pages of boastful press releases follow. Every agency is in on the boondoggle. NOAA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and the U.S. Patent and Trade Mark Office have signed a collaborative agreement to advance climate technology. Putting aside the fact that "climate change" is neither imminent nor dangerous, the government should not be creating patents. Innovation should be carried out by the private market, where there are controls.

As we discovered during Covid, government patents on both the virus and the vaccine were not subjected to court challenge, double blind testing, or feasibility. There is no number attached to NOAA's "initiative," but this is representative of ten thousand such projects salted through every government bureau. All that money is wasted. Wind and solar and the various battery projects have not managed to support the electrical grid in any substantial way, hovering, on average, around 4 percent. Despite this mind-boggling waste of money, in September last year former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg pledged another $500 billion to shutter the equivalent of 40 percent total electricity use of nine states, including California, Florida, New York, Illinois and Texas.

What has been the result of trillions of public money shunted into “clean” “green” “energy” on the actual energy grid? Robert Bryce, an acknowledged expert, shows that it is failing. A speech he gave at the winter meeting of the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners showed astonishing, across-the-board failure in every metric you can imagine.

"Climate Policy" is considered the most significant risk. As Bryce describes, "green energy" has meant Europe is deindustrializing, Ford lost $64,731 for every EV it sold, and the IEA states that global coal use will hit another new record of 8.5 billion tons. Coal use increased 35 percent in last summer’s heat wave. Wind dropped by 21 percent.

Climate policy breaks everything. It breaks communities, it encourages widespread theft of public money, it starves productive work and manufacturing, it has punched down on the less advantaged, and it is destroying the fabric of our lives. And for what?

Elizabeth Nickson was trained as a reporter at the London bureau of Time Magazine. She became European Bureau Chief of LIFE magazine in its last years of monthly publication, and during that time, acquired the rights to Nelson Mandela’s memoir before he was released from Robben Island. She went on to write for Harper’s Magazine, the Guardian, the Observer, the Independent, the Sunday Telegraph, the Sunday Times Magazine, the Telegraph, the Globe and Mail and the National Post. Her first book The Monkey Puzzle Tree was an investigation of the CIA MKULTRA mind control program and was published by Bloomsbury and Knopf Canada. Her next book, Eco-Fascists, How Radical Environmentalists Are Destroying Our Natural Heritage, was a look at how environmentalism, badly practiced, is destroying the rural economy and rural culture in the U.S. and all over the world. It was published by Adam Bellow at Harper Collins US. You can subscribe to her Substack at elizabethnickson.substack.com/

https://the-pipeline.org/how-green-projects-are-looting-the-treasury/

Body-by-Guinness

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Banks Backing Away Slowly from "Decarbonisation"
« Reply #1292 on: March 28, 2024, 12:36:28 PM »
Can't happen fast enough:

Bankers are retreating from decarbonisation as reality sinks in

Johnathan Pearce (London) · Economics, Business & Globalization · Environment

From a Bloomberg article entitled UBS Banker’s Frustration Exposes Cracks in World of Climate Finance

The article makes it clear that banks are struggling to deliver on credible “decarbonisation” financial policy and remain profitable concerns. Considering how Western taxpayers spent billions bailing out banks more than a decade ago, it would be extraordinary if banks were to deliberately restrict their earnings streams through going full “dark green”.

More:

“Banks are living and lending on planet earth, not planet NGFS,” Berkey told the group in an impassioned speech, alluding to the Network for Greening the Financial System, a collection of central bankers that creates model scenarios for how the energy transition may evolve. Details of what transpired at the meeting hosted by the Financial Stability Board — a coordinator of global regulations — came from people who were in the room but asked not to be named discussing private talks. Berkey confirmed his participation, declining to say more.

The UBS banker’s outburst, which got little pushback from those present, exposes the cracks emerging in a multitrillion-dollar transition finance project, and taps into what’s rapidly becoming one of the most contentious issues in the global banking industry. In private, senior bankers in sustainable finance divisions in London, New York, Toronto and Paris grumble about unrealistic expectations from regulators, civil society and climate activists around the industry’s role in getting the planet to net zero.

“Outburst” – translation – telling it like it is.

The standoff that’s brewing is setting the stage for a showdown at the heart of the ESG movement, where environmental, social and governance considerations are being pitted against old-fashioned capitalism.

Not really “old fashioned capitalism”. Just “capitalism”. We had more than a decade of ultra-low interest rates via quantitative easing. During this period, the business case for eliminating fossil fuels and powering a modern economy via solar, wind and happy thoughts appeared viable. With interest rates at their more normal long-term levels, some of the more fanciful projections don’t add up. This is called “reality”. Capitalism, which hinges around private property rights, voluntary exchange, and the desire to maximise the use of scarce resources that have alternative uses, is based on reality. Elsewhere, the article alludes to how capitalism produces “negative externalities” (carbon emissions) that must be controlled. What the article doesn’t stop to consider is that there are “positive externalities” from a prosperous world: more resources to fix problems, more wealth, higher living standards, more resilience, etc. (This is the broad thesis of the excellent book by Alex Epstein, Fossil Future, which totally debunks the alarmist case. See this video also featuring Epstein and Bryan Caplan, among others.)

Banks that had enthusiastically committed to align their entire operations with net zero goals are having second thoughts as the real-world ramifications of acting on those pledges become painfully apparent.

That’s what happens when you sign up to something that appears fashionable. Ditto with DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion, or, as I read the other day, “Didn’t earn it”).

Some of the world’s biggest lenders, including Deutsche Bank AG, HSBC Holdings Plc and Bank of America Corp., are adding caveats to their restrictions on financing coal, the planet’s most-polluting energy source.

Very wise.

BlackRock Inc. Chief Executive Officer Larry Fink says he has stopped using the term ESG and emphasized the world’s largest asset manager’s work with energy firms in a letter to investors this week. The firm has scaled back its participation in international climate investing alliances.

Fink is now more likely to focus on the imminent retirement crisis of the US and the developed world. Some of that has been brought around as birthrates have fallen. But hang on a minute, I thought having kids was bad for the Earth?

It is tough being green, isn’t it?

https://www.samizdata.net/2024/03/bankers-are-retreating-from-esg/

Crafty_Dog

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WSJ: Green Energy makes us vulnerable to cyber attack
« Reply #1293 on: April 01, 2024, 04:07:16 AM »
How Green Energy Makes Us Vulnerable to Cyberattack
EVs and other digital-controlled products open extra access to the grid, which enemies can exploit.
Allysia Finley
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Allysia Finley
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March 31, 2024 2:26 pm ET

China launches an amphibious attack on Taiwan. The U.S. responds with a missile attack to sink Chinese ships. Within minutes, California is plunged into darkness, followed by New York and Washington. Electric trucks around America start crashing into other vehicles.

This may seem far-fetched, but government climate policies are making it easier for the Chinese Communist Party to wage a multifront cyberattack. Even the Biden administration is raising alarms about how malign actors could exploit electric vehicles, chargers and rooftop solar systems to wreak havoc on the homeland.

So-called distributed energy systems provide an increasing number of entry points to the grid. An academic study last November modeled a case in which a remote attacker commandeered public EV chargers to create electric frequency distortions that led to a systemwide blackout in Manhattan.

“Such attacks will become feasible by 2030 with increased EV adoption,” the authors warned. President Biden hopes to install 500,000 public EV chargers by 2030. That’s 500,000 potential bots America’s enemies could turn into weapons to take down the grid.

Rooftop solar and renewable generators are similarly vulnerable. A 2022 Energy Department cybersecurity briefing noted that distributed renewable generators could be more vulnerable than fossil-fuel and nuclear plants to cyberattacks because “their output is highly configurable in unique and powerful ways” and “software-driven and digital-controlled.”

“As more solar is installed and inverters become more advanced, this risk grows,” the Energy Department warns. If a solar inverter’s “software isn’t updated and secure, its data could be intercepted and manipulated. An attacker could also embed code in an inverter that could spread malware into the larger power system.” Notably, Chinese companies including Huawei—whose telecom equipment the U.S. has blacklisted for national-security reasons—dominate the global solar-inverter market.

EVs present their own risks. New cars are equipped with high-tech software that improves navigation, fuel efficiency and safety. EVs additionally connect to the grid when they charge and are controlled by software systems that can be updated remotely. Tesla has been able to increase a vehicle’s battery range and power input simply with a remote software update.

Many Chinese EVs are even more advanced than those coming off U.S. assembly lines. They can alert drivers when a traffic light is about to turn green and trigger flashing lights or audible warnings if a driver appears to be getting drowsy.

But these systems rely on sensors, facial recognition and microphones that can collect sensitive information. Vehicles can record audio and video, as well as gather intel about the driver’s identity, finances and contacts if his phone is connected by Bluetooth. If the idea of the government using “smart cars” to surveil and control society sounds Orwellian, welcome to the People’s Republic of China.

The Associated Press reported in 2018 that China was requiring automakers operating in the country, including foreign-owned companies like Tesla, to transmit real-time data on drivers of “alternative energy vehicles” to government monitoring centers. Here’s betting Chinese mandarins don’t want this data only to nab speeders.

Enter the Commerce Department, which in March launched a national-security investigation into vehicles that connect to the grid and other critical infrastructure and that are designed, developed or manufactured by foreign adversaries. “Connected vehicles from China could collect sensitive data about our citizens and our infrastructure and send this data back to the People’s Republic of China,” Mr. Biden warned as he ordered the probe. “These vehicles could be remotely accessed or disabled.”

Pervasive data sharing of sensitive information, the Commerce Department warns, reflects the Chinese government’s “broader approach to co-opting private companies—one that raises significant concerns about how the PRC government might exploit the growing presence” of Chinese-made vehicles in foreign markets.

Chinese electric passenger cars haven’t penetrated the U.S. market in part because of 25% tariffs. American consumers also haven’t warmed to EVs. But businesses and governments are spending hundreds of millions of dollars to electrify their fleets to meet their CO2 emissions goals. Many are now turning to Chinese EV manufacturer BYD.

BYD ranked as California’s top seller of electric trucks in 2022 and second in buses, mostly used by public-transit agencies, ports and airports. A congressional investigation this year revealed suspicious cellular modems in Chinese cranes at U.S. ports. Don’t think Chinese electric trucks pose the same risks?

You don’t have to be paranoid to wonder whether Beijing has egged on the West’s climate obsession because Chinese leaders view green technology as a tool they can exploit. Some of the technology’s national-security risks can probably be mitigated, but not when the government is putting the pedal to the metal.

Crafty_Dog

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WSJ: The Stupidity is Strong with EV Mandate
« Reply #1294 on: April 01, 2024, 05:52:07 AM »
Second of the day:

Biden’s Order: Let There Be Electric Trucks
EPA’s latest EV mandate is the most costly and fanciful to date.
By The Editorial Board
Updated March 31, 2024 5:43 pm ET


The Environmental Protection Agency chose Good Friday to roll out its burdensome electric truck mandate, no doubt so fewer people notice. Biden officials well know the damage they are doing, but the damage in the name of climate change is the point.

EPA’s new emissions standards for heavy-duty trucks will effectively require that electric semi-trucks make up an increasing share of manufacturer sales from 2027 through 2032, similar to its recent rule for passenger cars. The difference is that the truck mandate is even more costly and fanciful.

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EVs make up less than 1% of U.S. heavy-duty truck sales, and nearly all are in California, which heavily subsidizes and mandates their purchase. EPA’s rule will require electric models to account for 60% of new urban delivery trucks and 25% of long-haul tractor sales by 2032. The harm is predictable in return for no climate benefit.

***
Start with the fact that no electric long-haul tractors are currently in mass production. Most electric trucks can’t go more than 170 miles on a charge. Electric semis require bigger and heavier batteries, which means they must carry lighter loads to avoid damaging roads. Fleet operators will have to use more trucks to transport the same amount of goods.

This will increase vehicle congestion, especially around ports and distribution centers. EPA says its rule will reduce pollution in “environmental justice” communities near major truck freight routes. But more traffic will result in more pollution. Electric trucks also generate more soot from their wear and tear on roads and vehicle braking.

Power generation and transmission will have to massively expand to support millions of new “zero-emission” trucks. An electric semi consumes about seven times as much electricity on a single charge as a typical home does in a day. Truck charging depots can draw as much power from the grid as small cities.

By 2030 electric trucks are projected to consume about 11% of California’s electricity. The additional power to fuel electric trucks won’t come from renewables, which can’t be built fast enough to meet demand. Most trucks will recharge at night when solar isn’t available since drivers don’t want to waste prime daylight driving hours.

Some 1.4 million chargers will have to be installed by 2032 to achieve the EPA’s mandate, about 15,000 a month. This will require major grid upgrades when there are shortages of critical components such as transformers. It could take three to eight years to develop transmission and substations in many places to support truck chargers.

Truckers estimate the EPA rule will cost utilities $370 billion to upgrade their networks. On top of that, truckers will have to invest $620 billion in their own charging infrastructure. This doesn’t include the cost of electric trucks, which are typically two to three times more expensive than diesel cabs.

Replacing diesel trucks with electric will cost the industry tens of billion dollars each year. Truckers will pass on these costs to customers—meaning U.S. manufacturers and retailers—which will ultimately pass them on to Americans in higher prices. This is President Biden’s trickle-down economics.

EPA says its big-rig quotas are feasible because the Inflation Reduction Act and 2021 infrastructure law include hundreds of billions of dollars in subsidies for EVs. This includes a 30% tax credit for charging stations, $40,000 tax credit for commercial EVs, and a tax credit for battery manufacturing that can offset more than a third of the cost.

IRA tax credits for electric trucks aren’t conditioned on the source of battery material, so expect most to come from China. By the way, China’s BYD was California’s top-selling electric truck maker in 2022. Biden officials say Chinese green-technology manufacturers are flooding the U.S. market, but their mandates and subsidies are the reason.

Cue U.S. truck manufacturers, which are pleading for more handouts. “The EPA’s new heavy-duty emissions rule is challenging,” Ford said on Friday, noting they will require more “incentives and public investment.” So the Administration uses subsidies to justify a burdensome mandate, which then causes companies to lobby for more subsidies. What a racket.

Here’s another one: EPA projects its rule will “avoid” one billion metric tons in CO2 emissions from 2027 through 2055—about as much as emissions from China and India rose last year alone. The truck mandate will do nothing to reduce global temperatures.

ccp

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BYD Chinese auto maker
« Reply #1295 on: April 01, 2024, 05:59:01 AM »
https://www.byd.com/us

I advise refuse ALL cookies and don't search too much of the site  :wink:

Body-by-Guinness

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The Folly of the LNG “Pause”
« Reply #1296 on: April 03, 2024, 06:13:57 PM »
A Biden policy that doesn’t survive scrutiny on any level:

https://wattsupwiththat.com/2024/04/03/the-incredible-dumbness-of-bidens-war-on-lng/

Crafty_Dog

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Speaking of which
« Reply #1297 on: April 04, 2024, 05:09:35 AM »
FO

(3) AIRBNB WARNS ABOUT POSSIBLE SUMMER UTILITY OUTAGES: Property rental broker Airbnb sent out an email revising its “Major Disruptive Events Policy” to cover “foreseeable weather events” that result in government travel restrictions or major utility outages.

“North American electricity supply has become practically inseparable from the natural gas supply chain,” North American Reliability Corporation (NERC) Director of Reliability Assessment and System Analysis John Moura said.

Why It Matters: The NERC has increasingly warned over the last three years about power shortages and possible blackouts during the high-demand summer season. Declining power generation capacity due to liquid natural gas (LNG) and coal power plant closures and long-term LNG supply constraints will very likely increase U.S. power shortages in the long term. – R.C.

Body-by-Guinness

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Junk Science in Support of Junk Science
« Reply #1298 on: April 04, 2024, 12:33:19 PM »
When speaking of damage done by "extreme weather," an alarmist dog whistle meant to connote a carbon culprit, they breathless hypesters rarely note that both inflation and population concentration increases can also more than explain increased insurance payouts for weather events. This piece notes the unshared, oft changed, and irreproducable data has problems beyond inflationary and other pressures:

EXCLUSIVE: ‘Blatant Violations’: Watchdog Challenges Key Data Used By Biden Admin To Push Sweeping Climate Agenda

President Biden Delivers Remarks On His Administration's Efforts To Combat Climate Change
(Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)
Daily Caller News Foundation logo

NICK POPE
CONTRIBUTOR
April 03, 2024

A government watchdog group has filed a complaint with the Biden administration over its use of a dataset frequently used to push its climate agenda.

Protect the Public’s Trust (PPT) filed the complaint with the Commerce Department over the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) “Billions Project” dataset, which purports to keep track of natural [and climate] disasters that have caused at least $1 billion in damages going back to 1980. The billion-dollar disasters (BDD) data — cited frequently by the Biden administration to insinuate that climate change is intensifying and justify sweeping green policies — is based on opaque data derived from questionable accounting practices, PPT alleges in the complaint.

“American families and businesses continue to struggle with persistently high inflation, which many attribute in large part to the energy policies and government spending of the current administration. The idea that blatant violations of scientific integrity could be underlying the rationale for these policies should concern every American,” Michael Chamberlain, PPT’s director, told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “Unfortunately, this is far from an isolated incident. The Biden Administration came into office pledging that its decision making would be grounded in the highest-quality science, but all too often has failed to live up to those promises.” (RELATED: The Entire Push To Halt New Natural Gas Exports Traces Back To One Ivy League Prof And His Shaky Study)

The complaint was filed with the Commerce Department, as NOAA operates under its auspices, Chamberlain told the DCNF.

PPT’s complaint alleges that NOAA does not adequately disclose its sources and methods for compiling the BDD dataset, adds and removes BDD events from the dataset without providing its rationale for doing so and produces cost estimates that are sometimes significantly different than those generated by more conventional accounting procedures.

While NOAA states that it develops its BDD data from more than a dozen sources, the agency does not disclose those sources for specific events or show how it calculates loss estimates from those sources, PPT’s complaint alleges.

The complaint further alleges that NOAA’s accounting methods are opaque and “produce suspect results.”

For example, when Hurricane Idalia took aim at Florida in 2023, NOAA initially projected that the storm would cause about $2.5 billion worth of damages before insured losses ultimately came in at about $310 million, according to PPT’s complaint, which cites the Florida Office of Insurance Regulation for that figure. Nevertheless, NOAA subsequently marked up its estimate for how much damage the storm caused to $3.5 billion, a discrepancy for which NOAA provided no explanation, PPT alleges in its complaint.

NOAA researchers have disclosed in the past that the agency considers factors such as functions pertaining to livestock feeding costs — in addition to more conventional types of damages — in their cost calculations.

Further, the complaint alleges that BDD events are quietly added and removed from the dataset without explanation, citing Roger Pielke Jr., a former academic who believes climate change to be a real threat but opposes politicized science. In a forthcoming paper analyzing the merits of BDD statistics, Pielke compared the dataset in late 2022 to the dataset in the middle of 2023 and found that ten new BDD events were added to the list and 3 were subtracted without explanation.

Apart from the issues with methodology alleged by PPT in its complaint, the use of BDD events as a proxy for climate change’s intensity is inherently misleading because economic data does not reflect changes in meteorological conditions, Pielke has previously explained to the DCNF.

For example, increasing concentrations of assets, especially in coastal areas, can confound the usefulness of BDD events as an indicator for the intensity of climate change, as Energy and Environment Legal Institute Senior Policy Fellow Steve Milloy has previously explained to the DCNF. Hypothetically, the same exact hurricane could hit the same exact place, decades apart, with vastly different damage totals; this would be the case because there are simply more assets sitting in the way of the storm, not because the storm was any more violent due to worsening climate change.

NOAA has acknowledged this limitation of the dataset in prior communications with the DCNF.

Additionally, NOAA will add disasters to the list retrospectively because it adjusts for inflation, meaning that a hurricane that caused $800 million in damages in 1980 dollars would be added to the list because the damages exceed $1 billion when adjusted for inflation, for example.

The Biden administration has frequently cited the BDD dataset to substantiate its massive climate agenda.

For example, Deputy Energy Secretary David Turk cited the dataset in written testimony submitted to lawmakers in February explaining the White House’s decision to pause new approvals for liquefied natural gas export terminals.

The BDD statistics are also referenced Fifth National Climate Assessment (NCA5), the Biden administration’s landmark climate report that is intended to provide the most sound scientific basis for lawmakers and officials to craft climate policy.

NOAA asserted that the increasing frequency of BDD events is a sign of intensifying climate change in a January press release and blog post summarizing 2023, and then defended the use of the dataset in subsequent communications with the DCNF.

“Sensational climate claims made without proper scientific basis and spread by government officials threaten the public’s trust in its scientific officials and undermines the government’s mission of stewarding the environment,” PPT’s complaint states. “It also poses the danger of policymakers basing consequential government policy on unscientific claims unsupported by evidence.”

NOAA declined to comment, citing the active nature of the scientific integrity complaint. The White House and the Department of Commerce did not respond immediately to requests for comment.

https://dailycaller.com/2024/04/03/exclusive-watchdog-challenges-key-data-used-by-biden-admin-to-push-sweeping-climate-agenda-noaa/

DougMacG

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Re: The Folly of the LNG “Pause”
« Reply #1299 on: April 04, 2024, 02:00:26 PM »
"A Biden policy that doesn’t survive scrutiny on any level."

  - That line could apply to SO MANY Biden policies, maybe all of them:
 The Afghan Withdrawal.  Billions to Iran. The Southern border.  The crazy spending.  The inflation.  Israel policy.  The war on energy.  The EV mandate push.  Killing the pipeline.  Nuclear closures.  Shipbuilding delays.  No restrictions abortions.  Letting criminals run free.  Buttigieg in charge of the bridge?  Kamala in charge of the border?  Trans men and boys competing with women and girls.  And yes, the LNG export ban.  It's all nuts.  And they want us to find common ground?


"Incredible Dumbness"?  My eyes read it, incredible dumbass.

Democrats rejected Sanders and Warren in 2020 for being too extreme to get elected.  Only Joe the moderate could beat Trump.  Voters were sold one thing and got something different.  And now they revolt - I hope.