Senators John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Lindsey Graham (R-SC) published a curious op-ed in Sunday’s New York Times titled, “Yes We Can (Pass Climate Legislation).” The bill that they claim to support and that can pass the Senate is not the 821-page draft bill that Senators Kerry and Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) released two weeks ago. It is a fantasy designed to get the support of Senator Graham and other fuzzy-minded Senators with visions of lots of new nuclear plants, billions for technology…

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Your host Richard Morrison welcomes globalwarming.org editor William Yeatman to the program for Episode 61 of the LibertyWeek podcast. Tune into the segment that starts around 7:00 and continues to 12:15, where we discuss the U.S. Treasury Department documents that reveal the true cost of cap-and-trade legislation.

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I attended an excellent briefing  today on “Creating a low-carbon future” by Michael Howard of the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI).  The event  was hosted by the U. S. Energy Association and its executive director, Barry Worthington.   EPRI has done a lot of work on how the electricity sector could meet the greenhouse gas emissions target in the Waxman-Markey energy-rationing bill.  That target is economy-wide emissions 83% below 2005 levels by 2050.

Howard said that EPRI wanted to identify a strategy…

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The Congressional Budget Office released a report on June 5th detailing the costs and revenues of H.R. 2454, the American Clean Energy and Security Act, before the House. Noticeably absent, however, is analysis of the effects of Renewable Electricity Credits (RECs) and the domestic and international offset credits. These should force up costs for consumers and therefore reduce economic growth and federal revenues.

Highlights:

The bill gives away over three-quarters of the rationing coupons, auctioning off just 18 percent until 2020. CBO estimates…

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The House Energy and Commerce Committee just began (at 10:00 AM eastern) the second day of marathon markups for the 2009 American Clean Energy and Security Act. In a “markup,” the Committee reads through the bill (or at least the titles and sections) and members have the opportunity to offer amendments.

The American Clean Energy and Security Act is an awful piece of legislation designed to tax energy. In order to win over Democrats on the Ways and Means Committee, Chairman…

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Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Beverly Hills), Chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, announced late Tuesday that the full committee would mark up the Waxman-Markey energy rationing bill next week and that he planned to vote the bill out of committee before the Memorial Day recess which begins on 22nd May.  Waxman also released some details of the compromise bill that he and Rep. Edward Markey (D-Mass.) have negotiated with Blue Dog and other moderate Democrats on the committee.

This bill…

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The DC Examiner yesterday reported on a “green” car sharing program in Montgomery County that is wasting taxpayer money hand over fist. Since January, the County has been paying Enterprise Rent-a-Car $1,100 a month per car for the use of 28 fuel efficient automobiles. As of April 24, the vehicles have been used a total of 83.5 hours, which means that Maryland taxpayers have paid more than $1,300 an hour to use the cars. For comparison, consider that a limo costs…

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Two years ago, Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius (D) refused to permit the construction of two coal-fired power plants in the southwestern part of the State because she is alarmed by global warming. Her constituents clearly disagreed with her decision-the State Legislature has passed four bills to overturn Sebelius and allow the coal plants. Each time, however, the Governor vetoed the will of the people, most recently this week. President Barack Obama chose Sebelius to become the Secretary of Human Health…

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Paul Chesser, Climate Strategies Watch

The Center for Climate Strategies and their fellow economic holocaust deniers in North Carolina continued their shenanigans this week as they formally released 56 recommendations to create artificial green jobs at the expense of useful ones. The state's Climate Action Plan Advisory Group (CAPAG — sounds like some kind of garment, doesn't it? "That's one ugly CAPAG you're wearing!") posted its final report this week, which is not dissimilar to what they've done with other state climate commissions.

What is different with North…

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Paul Chesser, Climate Strategies Watch

The answer — which is that they don't understand economics — is revealed in a blog post by the Seattle Post-Intelligencer's Lisa Stiffler. Her report explains a review by the Beacon Hill Institute (co-sponsored by the Washington Policy Center) of the state's Climate Advisory Team recommendations to raise the costs of energy so high that people will want to move their tailpipe emissions to other countries.

That was a joke - the tailpipe emissions part.

Anyway, the BHI study is similar to…

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