“Another factor [for the inaugural project] is a new federal tax credit of 1.5 cents per kilowatt hour on wind power that begins Jan. 1. There was an earlier federal subsidy that fueled the first boom, but it expired in 1985.”

“Wind Farm Awaits State’s Go-Ahead,” read the title of a Houston Chronicle business article (November 18, 1993). The state’s first major wind power project was timed to receive the brand new federal Production Tax Credit enacted in the Energy Policy Act of 1992 (1.5 cent/kWh, inflation-adjusted).

Note the following:

• This is on government land.
• A government agency is making the long-term sales commitment.
• The Production Tax Credit is crucial.
• The company putting in the turbines would declare bankruptcy in 1996, leaving Enron Wind (formerly Zond Corp) as the major U.S.

“First wind and solar–and now batteries. How can a business editorialist not talk about cost and opportunity cost? Does $65 billion and counting ring a bell? I guess when you are a climate alarmist, economics does not matter.”

“‘Demand response’ is more government intervention to rescue prior. ‘Virtual power plants’ are the ultimate government takeover of the grid. Wound the supply side, load it up with costs, and force demand down.”

In “Natural Gas, Coal and Nuclear Power are Failing the Texas Grid, New Tech is the Future,” Houston Chronicle business editorialist Chris Tomlinson carries the water for Green New Deal/Net Zero interests, including his wife’s business of wind/solar origination. His 750-word piece is a tissue of half-truths and misdirection that only church-going climate alarmists can like.

CHRIS TOMLINSON COMMENTARY

The Texas electric grid’s biggest failures so far this summer are coming from the supposedly most reliable generators: fossil fuels.…

“People who pride themselves on their ‘complexity’ and deride others for being ‘simplistic’ should realize that the truth is often not very complicated. What gets complex is evading the truth. – Thomas Sowell

Imagine a self-described classical liberal that cannot define classical liberalism (a real free market) in their area of specialty. Imagine a self-described “directionalist” who cannot define the end-state. And imagine this person telling me, as her critic, “I will not dance to your tune.”

Political Economy 101 deals with the difference between a free market and governmental intervention. For months, I have begged this person to get to the essence of electricity policy, only to be rebuffed as ignorant and out of step. Meanwhile, this person traffics in hidden assumptions, deep jargon, rhetorical flourishes, and technicalities intended to obscure the fundamental questions.…

“The Houston Chronicle (Hearst) refuses to answer the simple question: Have environmental groups donated funds, directly or indirectly, for “environmental education” or “environmental reporting” (climate alarmism/forced energy transformation)? Color me suspicious….”

When it comes to energy, Chris Tomlinson is about as anti-consumer and anti-taxpayer as one can get. And he is about as pro-industrial wind and pro-grid solar as possible.

The business editorialist does not see Texas’s $65 billion investment in parasitic, dilute, intermittent energies as the villain in destabilizing a once reliable, secure electric grid. He wants 1) more wind and solar; 2) enormous grid batteries, as if they were off-the-shelf and cheap; and 3) Big Brother demand-management in the home and business.

Chris Tomlinson is a committed climate alarmist without a care to doubt himself. He is unable to be neutral in his business columns: to present the best arguments on each side and let you, the reader, decide.…