In June 2007, at a global warming “summit” in New Hampshire, Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) warned, “If we don’t cut global warming pollution now, the White Mountains will become the ‘Once Upon A Time White Mountains’, because there may be no snow.” This week, snow fell in 49 of 50 states, and covered 70% of the U.S.

Inside the Beltway

Myron Ebell

Three events this week demonstrated that the EPA’s new regulation to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from large stationary emitters such as power plants is not the only tool being employed to strangle the economy. There’s also the Clean Water Act, the Endangered Species Act, and Corporate Average Fuel Economy or CAFÉ standards.

First, the Clean Water Act

The EPA on Thursday announced that they were going to force the Corps of Engineers to revoke an already granted Section 404 permit to Arch Coal’s Spruce Fork Mine, which is an operating surface coal mine in West Virginia. The New York Times and the Wall Street Journal articles repeated the EPA’s ludicrous claim that new scientific research since the permit was granted in 2007 shows that surface mining will have much more detrimental environmental and health effects than previously thought. My CEI colleague William Yeatman has written about this issue here, and CEI sent out a press release criticizing the decision. EPA’s revocation of a permit that has already been granted for a mine that is already in operation is outrageous. The consequences could be catastrophic if this precedent scares away investors in future energy projects because of the risk that their investment could be lost by the retroactive revocation of an operating permit.

Second, the Endangered Species Act

The polar bear was listed as a threatened species by President George W. Bush’s Secretary of the Interior Dirk Kempthorne in 2008. Last month, President Obama’s Interior Department designated 187,000 square miles in the Chukchi and Beaufort Seas off Alaska’s north coast as critical habitat. Interior also explained that the designation of critical habitat would require more environmental scrutiny of offshore oil and gas exploration and production, but that it would not be used to ban drilling. The Center for Biological Diversity on Thursday announced that they would file suit in federal court to force Interior to ban all oil and gas drilling within the critical habitat designation. This is a game that has often been played by environmental pressure groups working with their allies in the executive branch (and often those allies were formerly employed by environmental pressure groups). Interior Secretary Ken Salazar can claim that he is trying to be reasonable and to balance environmental and economic interests, but will then probably reach a settlement with the Center for Biological Diversity to ban some or all drilling in the designated critical habitat. Once the court approves, the settlement will have the force of law and will be nearly impossible to overturn.

Third, CAFÉ standards

In 2009, the Obama Administration did a deal with the State of California and the auto industry. The auto industry thought they were getting some mythical beast called “regulatory certainty” in return for agreeing to a CAFÉ standard of 35.5 miles per gallon for cars and light trucks by 2016. First, EPA said last fall that they were considering raising that to up to 62 miles per gallon by 2025. Now, the California Air Resources Board is making sounds that it wants to control the process by setting its own higher standards beginning in 2017, which would precipitate the same mess that the auto industry assumed they had alleviated with their 2009 deal over the California Waiver. So this week the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers sent a letter to Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), the new Chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, and Rep. Fred Upton (R-Mich.), the new Chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, asking for help.

I don’t have much sympathy for the automakers because they were warned that this is what would happen (I know because I and my colleagues at CEI were among those warning them publicly), but it needs to be kept in mind that the ultimate victims will be consumers who want to buy cars.

National Commission Spill Report: Too Anti-Drilling Instead of Anti-Spilling

Ben Lieberman

The BP Deepwater Horizon Spill Commission report is out and its recommendations would spell bad news both for energy industry jobs and the future price at the pump. The administration-selected panel, dominated by anti-drilling activists but devoid of anyone with actual experience producing energy, proposes to pile new layers of red tape onto a process that already leaves much domestic energy off-limits and creates years of delays for rest. It even includes measures that would virtually shut down new oil drilling in Alaska, though the spill occurred thousands of miles away and under very different conditions in the Gulf of Mexico.

But buried in the report is an important truth – the spill occurred because of a series of blunders by BP and its contractors and was far from inevitable. This contrasts sharply with the recommendations suggesting systemic problems to be fixed by an industry-wide crackdown.

There is ample reason to believe – along with the powerful circumstantial argument that the deadly April 20th explosion and subsequent oil spill is unique amidst the thousands of offshore wells drilled in Gulf – that this incident was due to gross mismanagement and is not a justification for closing the door further on domestic drilling.

The American public is more worried about a repeat of $4.00 gas than a repeat of Deepwater Horizon – and rightly so as the former is vastly more likely than the latter. Reasonable changes to improve safety are warranted, but should occur in the context of a policy that ensures expanded offshore drilling. To do this, Congress should not adopt the report’s recommendations or allow Obama regulators to impose them.

Across the States

New Mexico

As the Cooler Heads Digest reported last week, New Mexico Governor Susana Martinez’s (R) first order of business upon taking office was to overturn outgoing Governor Bill Richardson’s (D) attempt to impose a cap-and-trade program. Predictably, environmentalists filed a lawsuit to block Governor Martinez’s move against energy rationing, and this week the state Supreme Court agreed to take the case. The environmentalists allege that Governor Martinez did not have the authority to block the cap-and-trade scheme, which is interesting in light of the fact that ex-Governor Richardson imposed it without approval from the state legislature.

Around the World

Spain

President Barack Obama frequently has cited the supposed success of the Spanish solar power market in order to justify the scores of billions of dollars of taxpayer money that his administration has given to the U.S. renewable energy industry. The President might want to rethink this allusion. A new report this week estimates that the Spanish solar industry has lost more than 30,000 jobs since 2008, due to the rollback of solar subsidies.

The Cooler Heads Digest is the weekly e-mail publication of the Cooler Heads Coalition. For the latest news and commentary, check out the Coalition’s website, www.GlobalWarming.org

Great Start for New Mexico Governor

by William Yeatman on January 9, 2011

in Blog

After being sworn a week ago, New Mexico Governor Susana Martinez’s (R) first order of business was to overturn outgoing Governor Bill Richardson’s (D) attempt to impose a cap-and-trade program. As the Cooler Heads Digest reported, then-Governor Richardson pushed an energy rationing scheme through the Environmental Improvement Board, without approval from the State Legislature, on the same day that voters elected Martinez, who had campaigned against cap-and-trade. On Saturday, Governor Martinez fired the entire EIB, and moved to block the cap-and-trade regulation. Last Friday, she chose former astronaut and climate change skeptic Harrison Schmitt to run the Energy, Minerals and Natural Resources Department. What a great start!

Cooler Heads Digest 7 January 2011

by William Yeatman on January 7, 2011

in Blog, Cooler Heads Digest

In the News

Obama’s $5 Gas Is Just Ahead
Washington Examiner editorial, 7 January 2010

Did U.K. Government Hide Cold Weather Info on Eve of Climate Talks?
Global Warming Policy Foundation, 6 January 2010

Rocky, Shadow Boxing EPA
Chris Horner, AmSpecBlog, 5 January 2010

The Climate Crisis Hoax
Larry Bell, Forbes, 5 January 2010

Drilling Is Stalled Even After Ban Was Lifted
Ben Casselman & Daniel Gilbert, Wall Street Journal, 3 January 2010

Green Skeletons Hide in GOP Closet
Darren Samuelsohn, Politico, 2 January 2010

The EPA’s End Run around Democracy
Marlo Lewis, Pajamas Media, 1 January 2010

New Peer Reviewed Study: No Correlation between GHGs, Temperature
Anthony Watts, WattsUpWithThat, 1 January 2010

News You Can Use

Gas Tops $3

For the first time during President Obama’s tenure, gasoline prices are averaging more than $3.00 per gallon nationwide, and many signs point to further increases as 2011 unfolds. The President’s global warming regulations, drilling moratoriums, and other anti-energy policies were unpopular enough when gas was cheap. Now that it isn’t, the call for change is going to get a lot louder.

Inside the Beltway

Myron Ebell

112th Congress starts with flurry of bills to block EPA regulations

The 112th Congress was sworn in on Wednesday, and Rep. John Boehner (R-Ohio) was elected Speaker of the House. Nineteen Democrats voted against Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco), which is extraordinary when you consider that Pelosi as Minority Leader still controls committee assignments for her party’s members. The House began Thursday by reading the Constitution (my thoughts on that may be found here), which surprised me by causing a lot of foaming at the mouth on the left. Later that morning, Senator Barbara Boxer (D-Marin County), who remains Chairman of the Environment and Public Works Committee, held a press conference during which she vowed to block any attempt to prohibit or delay the EPA from regulating greenhouse gas emissions using the Clean Air Act.

Boxer may be very busy. The hottest item of the first week of the new Congress was introducing a bill to block EPA. Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) along with 45 co-sponsors re-introduced her bill (H. R. 97) to remove greenhouse gas emissions from the list of things that can be regulated under the Clean Air Act. Rep. Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV) introduced a bill to delay EPA from regulating greenhouse gas emissions for two years. This is similar to the bill that Senator Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) introduced last year and announced this week that he would re-introduce in the 112th Congress. And Rep. Ted Poe (R-Tex.) introduced a bill to prohibit any funding to be spent on implementing or enforcing a cap-and-trade program to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Key House Committee Chairmen in the 112th Congress

Here is the lineup so far for House committees with jurisdiction over energy, energy-rationing, and global warming policy. Rep. Fred Upton (R-Mich.) is the new Chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee. Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Beverly Hills), who was the Chairman in the 111th Congress, is now the Ranking Democrat. The Energy and Environment Subcommittee will be chaired by Rep. Ed Whitfield (R-Ky.). The Democrats have not yet picked their ranking member for the subcommittee.

The new Chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee is Rep. Doc Hastings (R-Wash.), and the ranking Democrat is Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), of Waxman-Markey fame. Rep. Doug Lamborn will chair the Energy and Mineral Resources Subcommittee. Again, the Democrats have not yet picked their subcommittee ranking members.

Rep. Ralph Hall (R-Tex.) will chair the Science, Space, and Technology Committee. The ranking Democrat will be Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-Tex.). Chairman Hall has not yet announced his pick to chair the Energy and Environment Subcommittee. On the Appropriations Committee, Rep. Hal Rogers (R-Ky.) is the new the Chairman and Rep. Norm Dicks (D-Wash.) is the new Ranking Democrat. Rep. Darrell Issa will chair the Oversight and Government Reform Committee, while Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.) is the new ranking Democrat.

The Senate, as is usually the case, is taking longer to organize itself.

Across the States

New Mexico

After being sworn in on Saturday, New Mexico Governor Susana Martinez’s (R) first order of business was to overturn outgoing Governor Bill Richardson’s (D) attempt to impose a cap-and-trade program. As the Cooler Heads Digest reported, then-Governor Richardson pushed an energy rationing scheme through the Environmental Improvement Board, without approval from the State Legislature, on the same day that voters elected Martinez, who had campaigned against cap-and-trade. On Saturday, Governor Martinez fired the entire EIB, and moved to block the cap-and-trade regulation. Yesterday, she chose former astronaut and climate change skeptic Harrison Schmitt to run the Energy, Minerals and Natural Resources Department.

Texas

On Monday, the EPA started regulating greenhouse gases from stationary sources using the Clean Air Act. Texas, however, refuses to participate, so the EPA wants to seize control of the State’s air quality permitting program. In an effort to ward off the EPA’s power grab, Texas Attorney General Greg Abott is challenging the EPA on a number of fronts. In October, Texas filed suit in the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia alleging that EPA does not have the authority to regulate greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act. In mid December, it filed a petition in the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals challenging EPA’s finding that Texas’s permitting process was not in compliance with the agency’s rules. On December 30 the State filed a new petition in the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia taking issue with EPA’s regulatory schedule. In the latter case, the District of Columbia court agreed to stay EPA’s takeover of the Texas permitting program until all parties filed briefs, which could be as early as today.

The Cooler Heads Digest is the weekly e-mail publication of the Cooler Heads Coalition. For the latest news and commentary, check out the Coalition’s website, www.GlobalWarming.org

Cooler Heads Digest 30 December 2010

by William Yeatman on December 30, 2010

in Blog, Cooler Heads Digest

In the News

The Mid-West Wind Tax
Wall Street Journal editorial, 30 December 2010

Ed Rendell Is a Wuss about Climate Change
Iain Murray, Washington Examiner, 29 December 2010

No Comfort and Joy over Holiday Gas Prices
Ben Lieberman, GlobalWarming.org, 29 December 2010

President Obama’s Never Ending Drilling Moratorium
Greg Pollowitz, Planet Gore, 29 December 2010

Jobs, Joblessness, and Obamanomics
Chris Horner, Daily Caller, 28 December 2010

Regs for Rigs
Marlo Lewis, MasterResource.org, 28 December 2010

The Mystery of Vanishing Snow
James Delingpole, Telegraph, 27 December 2010

Hot Sensations vs. Cold Facts
Larry Bell, Forbes, 27 December 2010

Pennsylvania Legislature Should Repeal Expensive Energy Mandate
Paul Chesser, Harrisburg Patriot-News, 26 December 2010

News You Can Use

Global Warming Science Jumps the Shark

Over the last decade, the “scientific consensus” has been that global warming would cause warmer winters and the absence of snow in the United Kingdom. Now that the U.K. is in the grip of the coldest winter in 1,000 years, the consensus has shifted. In an oped last Sunday in the New York Times, atmospheric scientist Judah Cohen explained how freezing temperatures in Europe are in fact due to global warming.

Inside the Beltway

Myron Ebell

EPA Issues Schedule for Greenhouse Gas Regulations

Just in time for Christmas, the Environmental Protection Agency released further plans for regulating greenhouse gas emissions using the Clean Air Act. The EPA announced on December 23rd that it would release performance standards for power plants by July 26, 2011 and have the final rule adopted by May 26, 2012. Performance standards for oil refineries would be released by December 10, 2011 and a final rule by November 10, 2012. The new performance standards would cover about 40% of total U. S. greenhouse gas emissions-primarily carbon dioxide.

EPA is going to begin regulating large stationary sources of emissions on January 2, 2011, but those regulations will only apply to permits for new or expanded facilities. The performance standards for power plants and refineries will apply to existing facilities. Few details were given in the announcement, but there has been speculation that EPA is thinking about devising a cap-and-trade program within the Clean Air Act and without any further involvement by Congress. Further performance standards for other sources, such as cement kilns, may be on the way as well.

Robin Bravender in Politico provided a good overview of EPA’s announcement, which can be found here. Gabriel Nelson’s more detailed story in Greenwire was picked up by the New York Times’s web site and can be found here.

Will Rep. Fred Upton Stand up to the EPA?

Representative Fred Upton (R-Mich.), the incoming Chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, and Tim Phillips, president of Americans for Prosperity, published an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal on December 28 on “How Congress Can Stop the EPA’s Power Grab.” They mention that, “The best solution is for Congress to overturn the EPA’s proposed greenhouse gas regulations outright.” However, most of their article discusses two more limited alternatives. Upton and Phillips favor delaying EPA until the court cases challenging EPA’s legal authority are decided over the proposal originally made by Senator Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) for a two-year delay. They call a two-year delay arbitrary and express some confidence that the federal courts are going to find that EPA lacks legal authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions.

I believe their confidence is misplaced. There is a long history of federal courts deferring to the EPA as long as the EPA is asserting broader regulatory authority. What worries me more is that Upton and Phillips seem to be implying that if the federal court tells EPA that they can go ahead and regulate, then Upton and Phillips will be happy and the Congress should be happy with that outcome. It seems to me that a senior Member of Congress should be arguing that it is up to Congress to decide whether and how to regulate greenhouse gas emissions and therefore that the court’s decision is irrelevant. Moreover, as a matter of political strategy, I think it is dangerous for the Congress to wait for a court decision before acting. If the court allows regulation under the existing Clean Air Act, then environmental pressure groups will use that as an argument against any attempt in Congress to block or limit EPA.

Interior Issues Anti-Energy Regulations

Also just in time for Christmas, Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar on December 23 ordered the Bureau of Land Management to manage millions of acres of federal lands as “Wild Lands” and thereby prevent such human uses as mining and oil and gas production. Salazar’s action effectively overturns a 2003 deal between the Department of the Interior and the State of Utah that prevented the BLM from arbitrarily withdrawing land from management under the Multiple Use and Sustained Yield Act and putting it under de facto wilderness management. The new “Wild Lands” category is an arbitrary bureaucratic classification that has no status in law and should not be confused with Wilderness Areas designated by Congress and managed under the Wilderness Act.

Utah Governor Gary Herbert reacted angrily, as did Rep. Rob Bishop (R-Utah), the incoming chairman of the House public lands subcommittee. Bishop told the Salt Lake Tribune, “Make no mistake about it, this decision will seriously hinder domestic energy development and further contributes to the uncertainty and economic distress that continues to prevent the creation of new jobs in a region that has unduly suffered from this administration’s radical policies.” An editorial in the Washington Examiner asked, “Who’s doing the most to hobble the productive power of the U.S. economy, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa Jackson or Department of the Interior Secretary Ken Salazar?” The answer is that they’re both acting on behalf of President Barack Obama and that what they’re doing is part of his multi-front war against American energy and the large part of our economy that runs on that energy.

Across the States

Texas

The EPA last week seized partial control of Texas’s air quality permitting authority, after the state refused to regulate greenhouse gases. Texas is one of three states (the other two are Alabama and Virginia) to have filed a lawsuit against the EPA alleging that the agency doesn’t have the authority to regulate greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act, but the federal courts have yet to rule on the case. In the meantime, the EPA’s climate regulations start on January 2, and Texas is the only state to refuse to implement them. As a result, the EPA will bypass Texas regulators, and directly issue greenhouse gas permits. Texas Governor Rick Perry (R) has vowed to fight the EPA.

Washington

In an excellent column today, George Will noted that Cowlitz County in Washington state recently approved the construction of a coal export terminal from which millions of tons of U.S. coal could be shipped to Asia annually. As the Cooler Heads Digest has reported in the past, the Obama administration’s crackdown on coal has forced U.S. coal companies to seek other markets, primarily China. As such, this President’s anti-energy policies are putting the U.S. on the path to a future whereby: (1) we export our affordable energy to China; (2) China uses this affordable energy to build energy-intensive renewable energy generation, like massive wind turbines and solar panels; (3) and then the U.S. buys these expensive, renewable energy goods from China, using money borrowed from China. What a deal!

Around the World

New Zealand Climate Skeptics Fight Back

The New Zealand Climate Science Coalition this week presented convincing evidence that the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA) overstated the robustness of its alarmist climate data. In a recent paper, NIWA claimed that New Zealand temperatures rose 1 degree Celsius. Last week, NIWA issued a “peer review” of its paper by the Australian Bureau of Meteorologists, which, NIWA claimed, confirms its findings. The Climate Science Coalition this week noted that a true peer review is impossible, because NIWA has lost the underlying data. NIWA’s embarrassing inability to back up its temperature claims with raw data only became public after the Climate Science Coalition asked for it.

The Cooler Heads Digest is the weekly e-mail publication of the Cooler Heads Coalition. For the latest news and commentary, check out the Coalition’s website, www.GlobalWarming.org

Energy Policy: Top 5 Worst Sitting Governors/Governors-elect

by William Yeatman on December 28, 2010

in Blog

In an earlier post, I listed the top five worst governors on energy policy. Alas, four of the five were lame ducks, which means that my original list had a very limited shelf life. With that in mind, I made a new list. This one is limited to sitting governors and governors-elect, so it should remain relevant for the foreseeable future.

And so, without further ado, THE TOP FIVE WORST GOVERNORS ON ENERGY POLICY….[cue drum roll]…

5 Kansas Governor-elect Sam Brownback

Sam Brownback has yet to serve a day as Governor, but he earned a place on this list for a particularly egregious mistake he recently committed while representing Kansas in the U.S. Senate. It happened late last July. At the time, with an election looming, Senate majority leader Harry Reid decided that to drop debate on a Soviet-style renewable energy production quota, known as a Renewable Electricity Standard. Cap-and-trade had already died in the Senate, and the Congressional calendar was nearing its end, so Reid’s decision to abandon a RES meant that the 111th Congress would avoid the worst ideas in energy policy. Then, Sen. Sam Brownback, in an apparent effort to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, announced that he would introduce aRES. Thankfully, Brownback’s proposal was ignored.

4. New Jersey Governor Chris Christie

Christie’s skepticism of global warming alarmism is great. What’s not so great is his continued participation in a regional cap-and-trade energy rationing scheme. For whatever reason, the climate skeptic sounding governor has yet to pull his state out of the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, the aforementioned energy tax.

3. Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick

For Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick, climate policy is all about style over substance. In one sense, that’s a good thing, because Patrick (like me) has no interest in expensive energy policies. In 2008, for example, Gov. Patrick championed the Global Warming Solutions Act, which, according to the Governor’s press release, requires emissions reductions 25% below 1990 levels by 2020. That sounds like a big commitment, but when you read the fine print, it turns out that the legislation mandates emissions reductions of only 10% below 1990 levels. Moreover, the State’s business-as-usual future is projected to reduce emissions 3% below 1990 levels by 2020. And when you account for federal and state policies already in place, Massachusetts is on track to reduce emissions 18% below 1990 levels by 2020. The upshot is that the Governor’s climate plan is pointless, which is probably the reason why his website’s “key priorities” page makes no mention of global warming. While I appreciate the Massachusetts Governor’s aversion to expensive energy climate policies, by enacting long term, legally binding emissions reductions targets, he created a powerful tool with which environmentalist lawyers can gum up economic activity.

2. Maryland Governor Martin O Malley

Governor Martin O Malley wants his constituents to believe that they can have their cake and eat it, too, when it comes to climate change mitigation. In 2009, Governor O Malley sponsored the Greenhouse Gas Reductions Act, which requires emissions reductions 25% below 2006 levels by 2020. Yet the law requires that any emissions reductions strategy also, “produce a net economic benefit to the State’s economy and a net increase in jobs in the state.” Of course, these are mutually exclusive propositions. No matter how much politicians blather on about “green jobs,” the fact remains that the price of “doing something” about climate change is forsaken economic growth. To be sure, O Malley ensured that he wouldn’t be the one to square this circle. The law postpones any meaningful requirement until after the Governor is safely out of office.

1. California Governor-elect Jerry Brown (the #1 worst by a landslide)

Californians will rue the day they elected Jerry Brown for a second stint in the Governor’s mansion. He is exactly the wrong person at the exact worst time. The start of Brown’s term coincides the implementation phase of the 2006 Global Warming Solutions Act, which grants the state executive virtually unlimited authority to reduce greenhouse gas emissions 20% below 1990 levels by 2020. Governor-elect Brown has given every indication he will use this unprecedented expansion of authority in an imprudent manner. In the 1970s, when he was last governor, Brown refused to allow new generation resources to be built in the State, claiming instead that energy efficiency regulations would so diminish energy demand that no new power plants would be needed. Of course, he was wrong, and the policies he put in place led directly to the California energy crisis in 2000/2001. During the Schwarzenegger Administration, Jerry Brown served as Attorney General, and in that capacity he sued California counties for failing to take climate change mitigation into account in their long term growth strategies. It is difficult to overstate what trouble lies ahead for California.

The Big Green Buy Is a Very Dumb Idea

by William Yeatman on December 27, 2010

in Blog

Mark Hertsgaard and Christian Parenti, two reporters from The Nation, a far-left periodical, have an oped in syndication about how the federal government’s huge buying power can alter the economics of green energy.

Here’s how it works, in the authors’ own words:

Federal spending is responsible for roughly 25% of the gross national product, giving Washington enormous power to influence marketplace behavior even if annual spending levels are trimmed…If the Pentagon, the Postal Service and other agencies shifted their buying wherever possible from dirty technologies to clean ones, it would give manufacturers…a huge influx of orders. These orders would yield economies of scale that would enable green manufacturers to substantially reduce prices.

As the prices of green technologies fall to near that of dirty technologies, consumers and private companies will begin buying green of their own accord. Their purchases will yield additional economies of scale, enabling green manufacturers to lower prices further and entice more buyers, thus hastening the displacement of dirty technologies.

Hertsgaard and Parenti call their plan the “Big Green Buy.” I call it a “Very Dumb Idea.”

Recent history supports my description over theirs. Evidently unbeknownst to these authors, the federal government already has attempted The Big Green Buy, and it was a disaster.

From 1999 to 2006, the Post Office became the world’s #1 buyer of “flex-fuel” cars capable of running on E-85, a fuel blend containing 85% ethanol, a then-voguish green fuel distilled from the starch in corn. The Post-Office’s 30,000 car buying spree was meant to achieve markets of scale for ethanol production and use.

Unfortunately for the feds, the flex fuel plan backfired. The problem was that E-85 fueling stations were only available in a handful of states; everywhere else, the new Post Office vehicles had to use regular unleaded. And because “flex-fuel” vehicles tended to be SUVs, and were therefore larger and less fuel-efficient than the vehicles they replaced, gasoline consumption increased by almost 1.5 million gallons.

Such are the unintended consequences of Best Laid Plans.

Cooler Heads Digest 17 December 2010

by William Yeatman on December 17, 2010

in Blog, Cooler Heads Digest

In the News

The Congressional Research Service’s Dirty Little Big Green Secret
Ron Arnold, Washington Examiner, 17 December 2010

Duke Energy’s Bad Bet
Chris Horner, Planet Gore, 15 December 2010

Wikileaks Climate Cables Show Obama’s Desperation
John Rossomando, Daily Caller, 15 December 2010

Budget Hawks Oppose Nuclear Loan Guarantees
Jesse Emspak, International Business Times, 15 December 2010

7 Year Moratorium Is a Bad Idea
Phil Ciciora, Illinois News Bureau, 14 December 2010

Energy Policy: 5 Worst Governors
William Yeatman, GlobalWarming.org, 14 December 2010

Ethanol Idiocy Will Not Die
Rich Lowry, National Review, 14 December 2010

Deutsche Bank’s “Corporate Irresponsibility,” Part 1
David Henderson, Financial Post, 13 December 2010

Deutsche Bank’s “Corporate Irresponsibility,” Part 2
Terence Corcoran, Financial Post, 13 December 2010

News you Can Use

Offshore Wind = Ultra Expensive Energy

In a Master Resource post on the economics of offshore wind energy, Lisa Linowes notes that Massachusetts regulators recently approved a contract to buy offshore wind energy for 18.7 cents a kilowatt, “a price that’s three times the cost of in-region natural gas and at least double the cost of other renewable options.”

Inside the Beltway

Myron Ebell

Congress Passes and President Signs Tax Bill with Goodies for Renewables

The Senate and House overwhelmingly passed and President Barack Obama signed the bill to extend the Bush tax cuts of 2001 and 2003 for two years. There were a lot of other provisions in the bill, including one-year extensions of the 45 cents per gallon taxpayer subsidy and 54 cents tariff for ethanol and the section 1603 up-front taxpayer cash grants of 30% for renewable energy projects. So we will keep throwing money away on dead-end renewables for at least another year.

Rockefeller Plays Games with Two-Year EPA Delay Bill

Senator Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) suddenly started talking again this week about offering an amendment to delay implementation of Clean Air Act regulation of greenhouse gas emissions for two years. Then he quickly blamed Republicans for thwarting his efforts by blocking consideration of the Omnibus Appropriations bill. Having failed to pass any of the twelve appropriations bills for the various federal departments and programs this year, the Omnibus Appropriations bill is the Democratic majority’s last-ditch attempt to lock in colossal spending levels before the Republicans take over the House in January.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) promised Rockefeller a vote on his amendment last June during the debate on Senator Lisa Murkowski’s (R-Alaska) Resolution of Disapproval under the Congressional Review Act. Reid peeled enough Democrats away with that promise to defeat the resolution that would have blocked EPA from regulating greenhouse emissions permanently. But of course, a promise from Senator Reid is not what is sometimes understood by that term. Everyone knew at the time that Reid was not promising anything.

Senator Rockefeller vowed that, “I will be back fighting hard for my two-year bill as my first order of business in the new Congress.” That may be true, but events have passed beyond the Senator from West Virginia. House Republicans will be looking to move a permanent suspension of EPA greenhouse gas regulations.

Across the States

California

By a 9 to 1 vote, the California Air Resources Board this week approved a state-wide cap-and-trade scheme. The adopted regulation is more than 3,000 pages long, but most of the details have yet to be worked out as the CARB rushed to meet a December 31 deadline set by the 2006 Global Warming Solutions Act, legislation that authorizes the CARB to reduce the State’s greenhouse gases to 1990 levels by 2020. In order to protect California businesses from out-of-state competition, the CARB will allocate emissions credits (a.k.a. energy-rationing coupons) for free. The European Union Emissions Trading Scheme is the only precedent for free allocation of carbon credits, and it resulted in windfall profits for politically-connected industries and higher electricity prices for consumers.

Kansas

In October 2007, Kansas Health and Environmental Secretary Roderick Bremby denied permits for two proposed 700 MW coal-fired power plants in western Kansas. In 2008 and 2009, the State Legislature passed four bills to allow Sunflower to build the plants, but then-Governor Kathleen Sebelius (currently the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services) vetoed them all. After she left office to join the Obama administration, her successor Mark Parkinson immediately brokered a deal to allow for a scaled-down version of the project. This week, John Mitchell, the state’s acting secretary of health and environment, issued an air-quality permit for an 895 megawatt plant. The permit was issued only weeks before the start of new EPA regulations for greenhouse gases. Environmentalists have promised to litigate.

Around the World

Cancun Wrap-up

Last week’s Cooler Heads Digest was published before the conclusion of the 16th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in Cancun, Mexico; nonetheless, we predicted that the negotiators ultimately would “produce an agreement to meet again.” We were right. The “Cancun Agreement” achieved a near-consensus (Bolivia was the only country to object) by deferring all decisions to future negotiations. The parties agreed to meet in Durbin, South Africa for COP-17 in December 2011.

The Cooler Heads Digest is the weekly e-mail publication of the Cooler Heads Coalition. For the latest news and commentary, check out the Coalition’s website, www.GlobalWarming.org

Energy Policy: Top Five Worst Governors in America

by William Yeatman on December 14, 2010

in Blog

5. New Jersey Governor Chris Christie
Christie’s skepticism of global warming alarmism is great. What’s not so great is his continued participation in a regional cap-and-trade energy rationing scheme. For whatever reason, the climate skeptic sounding governor has yet to pull his state out of the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, the aforementioned energy tax.

4. Florida Governor Charlie Crist (lame duck)
In 2007, Crist signed a series of environmentalist executive orders, which, thankfully, never came to fruition because they were spurned by the State Legislature. Crist earned his spot on this list for his invertebrate take on offshore drilling. When he campaigned for Governor, he opposed offshore drilling; when gas prices spiked in the summer of 2008, he supported drilling; and after the Gulf oil spill this past summer, he reverted back to opposing the practice.

3. California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger (lame-duck)
As I’ve explained here, here, and here, the Governator’s environmentalist pandering is empty blathering. For all the talk about California going green, the fact of the matter is that California’s environmentalist energy policies have been ineffectual at achieving anything other than higher energy prices. Rather than environmentalist accomplishments, Schwarzenegger’s only lasting legacy will be the almost-unlimited power he has bequeathed to his successor, Governor-elect Jerry “Moonbeam” Brown. Starting in 2011, the law accords the Governor amorphous, yet absolute, authority to mitigate climate change.

2. New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson (lame duck)
Using authority derived from 1978 state law, New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson (D) last month imposed a cap-and-trade energy rationing scheme. The lame-duck Governor enacted the energy-rationing scheme administratively on November 2, the same day that voters indicated their displeasure with expensive energy climate policies by electing Susana Martinez (R) to succeed Richardson. She had campaigned against cap-and-trade. To be sure, Richardson’s energy policy is largely toothless; nonetheless, the executive power grab is disconcerting.

1. Colorado Governor Bill Ritter (lame duck)
It will take a generation for Coloradans to undo the harm inflicted by the Governor Bill Ritter’s much-ballyhooed “New Energy Economy.” At Ritter’s behest: the General Assembly changed the mission of state utilities from providing “least cost” electricity, to fighting climate change; the Public Utilities Commission allowed the nation’s first carbon tax; and Department of Public Health and Environment exaggerated the threat of federal air quality regulations in order to justify legislation that picks winners and losers in the electricity industry.

LA Mayor’s Expensive Green Scheme

by William Yeatman on December 13, 2010

in Blog

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa’s green energy plan will increase utility bills 3%-8% annually for twenty years, according to the LA Department of Water and Power. Currently, Los Angeles gets almost 50% of its electricity from out-of-state coal power plants, which is the primary reason that its ratepayers avoided the price spikes that plagued California during the 2000 electricity crisis, but the Mayor’s energy plan would have the Department of Water and Power disinvest from its Nevada coal generating facility and replace this power with expensive renewable energy.

New Report Puts the Lie to China’s “Green Dragon”

by William Yeatman on December 11, 2010

in Blog

Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.), Ranking Member of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, last week released a new minority report, titled, “The Real Story Behind China’s Energy Policy-And What American Can Learn From It.” The report shows that, regardless of its wind and solar production, China is predominantly relying on coal, oil, and natural gas, along with hydro and nuclear power, to fuel its economy.

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