Even before the media turned on ethanol, commodities markets were growing volatile because of record prices and subsequent speculation. A legislative assault on ethanol would add further uncertainty to the market, eroding price stability and endangering the utility of futures contracts and options – the two hedges that have protected Iowa farmers for a half-century from the boom-and-bust cycle that plagued their forefathers.
William Yeatman
Do today's soaring food prices and Third World food riots mean we're headed for global famine?
Not any time soon-if we suspend the biofuels mandates quickly. Unfortunately, if we keep burning corn, wheat, and palm oil in our vehicles, there's no limit to the hunger, malnutrition, wildlife extinction and political disruption we can cause.
EU Industry Commissioner Guenter Verheugen is dead against the current plans by the European Commission to reduce CO2 emissions for new cars. He is warning against rules that interfere in the private life of citizens.
A senior EU official said Sunday that a European Union deadline to cut carbon dioxide emissions from new cars by 2012 was unrealistic, according to an interview with a German newspaper.
According to an article in today’s Greenwire, Concentrating Solar Power technology has a bright future if
1. federal renewable tax credits are extended;
2. a federal 25% by 2025 renewable portfolio standard for electric utilities is adopted;
3. a carve-out specifically for solar is included in the 25% RPS;
4. European-style "feed-in" tariffs are adopted;
5. more transmission lines to remote areas with high solar resources are built:
6. a multibillion-dollar federal fund is created;
7. a national cap on greenhouse gas emissions is enacted.
If this level of government support were given to horse-drawn carriages and wagons, the era of the automobile would soon be a brief interlude in the age of the horse.
You may have wondered why there has been no Congressional effort to actually legislate the "global warming" policies that will supposedly save the planet from itself. For six years, the Democratic minority indulged in often nasty rhetoric, with the gist being: We know the problem. We know the solution. Your hearings are a delaying tactic. We. Must. Act. Now!
After winning the majority, Dems muttered for a while about how that mean George Bush would just veto their legi-salvation anyway: Why bother? We'll just work for a bigger majority – and the White House. Though, as I have noted on Planet Gore before, Bush had threatened no veto – and on those occasions since January 2007 when he did threaten a veto, in other policy contexts, the Dems typically took it as a challenge to pass something. So there seemed to be something missing from their political calculation, or at least their public rhetoric.
Today's E&E Daily (subscription required) has a hilarious apologia, "Sponsors lower expectations for Lieberman-Warner bill," offering a walk-through of the phenomenon afflicting our crusaders. Here as in pretty much every country in the world (posturing notwithstanding), global warming is such a grave threat that other people need to "do something." Given the inescapable price tag, lawmakers looked and discovered that anything they propose would actually be doing nothing – besides harming state economies. And if forced to choose, it seems they would prefer it be other states' economies that are harmed.
"The Lieberman-Warner-Boxer camp is facing increasing demands from all corners of the Senate to change the bill that would establish a cap-and-trade system with midcentury emission limits of 70 percent below 2005 levels.
Ohio Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown told the Cleveland Plain Dealer this week he was holding out in his support for the Lieberman-Warner bill because it did not do enough to protect his home state's manufacturing jobs while still stimulating investments in alternative energy. "I have serious concerns about any climate-change bill that doesn't take into account energy-intensive industries like we have in Ohio – glass and chemicals and steel and aluminum and foundries," Brown said.
"He's concerned," Brown spokeswoman Joanna Kuebler explained yesterday. "He's leaning toward a no."
Sen. Maria Cantwell [NB: Democrat] of Washington said in an interview that she is also pushing for changes in the Lieberman-Warner bill to benefit her home state's abundant supplies of hydropower. "We want to make sure people who are already good at reducing CO2 emissions will continue to do that and not be penalized," she said. Cantwell explained that she has not joined the bill as a cosponsor because she wants to keep working on it.
Sen. Kent Conrad (D-N.D.) said he wants a more beneficial emission allocation system for his state's rural energy producers." Obviously, I represent a state that's a significant power producer," Conrad said. "Most people don't think of North Dakota that way. But we produce electricity for nine states. We have the largest coal gasification plant in the country. We have very large reserves of lignite coal." [Meanwhile], Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.) maintained that he is a long way from backing the Lieberman-Warner bill. Instead, he is taking a close look at an alternative climate bill circulated from Sen. George Voinovich (R-Ohio) that opens with tax incentives for new energy technologies but falls back on cap and trade if the other ideas have not worked by 2030."
That mean George Bush and those nasty filibustering Republicans are blocking a climate bailout. Or, maybe not so much. As my CEI colleague Myron Ebell characterizes this: thieves fall out when it comes time to split up the loot.
Speaking of energy (see here), we can't help but give more attention to a recent press release from some of the Senate's leading liberals. Charles Schumer, Byron Dorgan, Bernie Sanders, Bob Casey and Mary Landrieu are demanding that President Bush tell OPEC nations to increase their oil supplies or risk losing arms deals with the United States. The Senators say U.S. consumers need the price relief that only increased oil production can bring.
When heralded Canadian environmentalist Lawrence Solomon first set out two years ago – on a bet, no less – to find credible dissenters to the well-entrenched climate change dogma, he thought he might perhaps unearth enough material for a few National Post columns. Instead, like Alice passing through the looking glass, Mr. Solomon entered a world wherein it soon became clear the much-ballyhooed idea of a "scientific consensus" was as nonsensical as "Jabberwocky."
US presidential candidates John McCain and Hilary Clinton vow to combat man-made climate change by curbing America's CO2 emissions. They also vow to give American drivers a tax holiday this summer by suspending the federal gas tax. Voters are upset at the price they must pay at the pump.
Great Britain is a decade ahead of Canada in the global warming debate and what's happening there today is instructive for us.
RSS Updates 
RSS E-Mail Updates 
CEI.org