February 2012

Last week I attended a roundtable discussion hosted by Konrad Adenauer Stiftung, a German-based political foundation and think tank. The topic at hand was, “Sustainability in Energy Policy and Beyond: A Modern Conservative Approach in German Politics,” featuring Dr. Gunter Krings, a member of the German Christian Democratic Party.

I was warned beforehand by my colleague Myron Ebell that the event would most likely be “a lot of (E.U.) rubbish,” and it was, indeed, rubbish. Among the Dr. Krings’s most pressing concerns were the “social justice” aspect of sustainability and the imperative to plant as many trees as you take out and leave the world a better place for the children, etc. His presentation thus had the feel of a Sally Struthers television spot. He endorsed heartily the Precautionary Principle, which argues that even if the affects of global warming (or cooling, or whatever eco-disaster is being prophesied) are not entirely clear, it is better to err on the side of extreme caution and to return us all back to a simpler, more sustainable, caveman-esque lifestyle.

In a strange parallel, the same week that Dr. Krings explained his modern, conservative approach to environmental policy in Germany, Dr. Fritz Vahrenholt, considered one of the fathers of Germany’s green movement,  published a book denouncing the climate change science “consensus” and the IPCC. The book, titled Cold Sun: Why the Climate Disaster Won’t Happen, points out the abundance of errors in IPCC reports which led Vahrenholt to his skepticism.

How does it happen that when looking for the voice of reason in German climate politics, one must turn away from the self-described conservative, and to a formerly radical, green, self-proclaimed Socialist?

Below is a letter I sent yesterday to ClimateWire, an energy policy trade publication that I usually enjoy, about this article. Normally, ClimateWire requires a subscription, but the article was picked up this morning by RealClearEnergy.

Here’s the back story: In late January, Ohio-based utility FirstEnergy Corp. announced that it was closing six coal-fired power plants in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Maryland. The company blamed the closings on environmental regulations, in particular the Mercury and Air Toxics rule. The majority party in the House of Representatives has since used the plant closures as evidence of the economic harm inflicted by EPA’s regulatory war on conventional energy production. Talking points beget response talking points: such is the dialectic of political communication. Accordingly, the minority party claims that the plant closures caused by a number of factors, in addition to environmental regulations. To my eyes, yesterday’s ClimateWire story reported the House minority party’s talking points. Its thesis is that “energy experts” believe that a number of factors caused the closings; ergo, the House majority party is telling half-truths when it claims that FirstEnergy Corp.’s decision to shutter six power plants is evidence of EPA’s regulatory overreach. In the letter below, I question whether the article’s thesis is misguided.

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Iain Murray and I today published an article in the American Spectator, which disputes many of President Obama’s State of the Union energy policy claims. As we wrote, “While the president spent more time on the topic than any other policy area, he distorted the facts, misrepresented his plans, and ignored his record.” It’s time to set the record straight:

Obama announced that “tonight, I’m directing my Administration to open more than 75 percent of our potential offshore oil and gas resources.” For those who favor energy production, this sounds great, but a close inspection reveals that this announcement was nothing new — the sale should have been scheduled last year, and the only reason the administration is planning it now is that it is required under the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act. In fact, he didn’t direct his administration to do anything new — he just recycled a plan actually released in November 2011 that actually kept closed key areas for future oil and gas exploration in Alaska, the Gulf of Mexico, and the Atlantic coastline.

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As my colleague Myron Ebell reported earlier this week, Joe Romm pulled out of a scheduled debate on climate policy last Friday with the Heritage Foundation’s David Kreutzer.

Given the last-minute nature of Romm’s cancellation, the host of the debate initially used a bottle of Corona Light to symbolically take Romm’s place at the podium.  I thought the beer bottle was a poor substitute, and replaced it with a plate of ice cubes.  As the photo below shows, by the end of the event the ice cubes had undergone significant melting.  There was, however, no suggestion that anthropogenic warming was the cause.  On the other hand, I’m not sure there were any climate modelers in attendance.

On February 1, an urgent alert was sent to supporters of wind energy. It stated: “The PTC is the primary policy tool to promote wind energy development and manufacturing in the United States. While it is set to expire at the end of 2012 … the credit has already effectively expired. Congress has a choice to make: extend the PTC this month and keep the wind industry on track…”

The wind energy industry has reason for concern. America’s appetite for subsidies has waned. Congress is looking for any way it can to make cuts, and the twenty-year old Production Tax Credit (PTC) for wind energy is in prime position for a cut. It naturally expires at the end of 2012. Without action, it will go away.

The payroll tax extension will be a hot topic over the next few weeks as it expires on February 29. Wind energy supporters are pushing to get the PTC extension included in the bill. Whether or not it is included will be largely up to public response. After all, regarding the PTC’s inclusion in the payroll tax extension bill, the February 1 alert stated: “our federal legislators heard us loud and clear.” In the December payroll tax bill negotiations, the wind energy PTC was placed on a “short list of provisions to be extended through that bill.” Wind supporters are worried—hence the rallying cry.

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Over at the American Spectator, my colleagues Vincent Vernuccio and Matt Patterson have an excellent piece about how the President’s Keystone punt has been received by organized labor. Here’s a roundup of reactions noted in their oped:

• Terry O’Sullivan, head of the Laborers’ International Union of North America (LIUNA), has called Obama’s action “politics at its worst,” saying that “once again the President has sided with environmentalists instead of blue collar construction workers.” O’Sullivan angrily vowed that “workers across the U.S. will not forget this.”

• Mark H. Ayers, president of the Building and Construction Trades Department, AFL-CIO has publicly hammered the jobs issue. In a January 18th press release, Ayers voiced the frustration of many union workers, saying “…with a national unemployment rate in construction at 16 percent nationally, it is beyond disappointing that President Obama placed a higher priority on politics rather than our nation’s number one challenge: jobs.”

• James T. Callahan, president of the International Union of Operating Engineers, agrees, complaining to the Washington Post that Obama’s decision was “…a blow to America’s construction workers,” who are struggling in “the sector hardest hit by the recession.”

Read the whole thing here.