A Free-Market Energy Blog

Jim Clarkson: Wit and Wisdom In a Sea of Utility Regulation/Cronyism

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- May 3, 2022

“A band of desperate terrorists has taken over the PSC building and is holding the entire staff and all the commissioners as hostages.  The dastardly fiends are threatening to release one regulator every hour until their demands are met.”

Jim Clarkson (above) has a sense of humor (also see his “The Ratepayer’s Prayer). Remaining light-hearted is necessary when regulation-protected utilities take advantage of ratepayers every kilowatt hour of every day. For Clarkson is a a friend of free markets and thus ratepayers. [1]

Clarkson, founder and president of Resource Supply Management, publishes a monthly Georgia Regulatory Update. Clarkson’s fare mixes the inevitable bad news of current events with short explanations why markets protect ratepayers better than bureaucrats and politicians.

A major ongoing saga involves Georgia Power Company (Southern Company) and Vogtle Nuclear Plants #3 and #4, which is still in construction.…

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Africa Wants Oil and Gas: Not UN/COP Poverty

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- May 2, 2022

“When people driving Teslas tell Africa to turn away from hydrocarbons — it’s immoral, it’s wrong,” [Erik] Prince said. “We have real energy poverty across the continent.” (quoted in Bloomberg Green, 11/11/2021)

Oil, gas, and coal are energies for the masses; wind, (on-grid) solar, and batteries/EVs are for the elite. This theme, while old, is more pertinent than ever with the failures of “green” energy policy in a fossil fuel world. Paul Driessen emphasized it in his neglected book, Eco-Imperialism: Green Power, Black Death (Merril Press, 2010). Vijay Jayaraj emphasizes it today in “Climate Colonialists Disrupt African Pipeline, Perpetuate Poverty.”

Such is completely lost at Hot Take, where Mary Heglar titled a recent piece, “It’s Not Climate Denial, It’s White Supremacy.” But maybe Africa does not count to her.…

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Steak Nights Ahead! (Rare or well done, spare the plants and skip fake meat)

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- May 1, 2022

Get ready for steak night–even more steak nights since “Let’s Go Branden” wants to instruct the rest of us that plants and fake meat are what is “good” for us and the planet.

E&E News Reports:

A White House conference on hunger and nutrition announced this week already has the meat industry bracing for a fight.

Of all the food and agriculture interests bound to be represented in the Biden administration’s discussions, meat — and especially beef — may have the biggest messaging challenge, extolling its value in the diet against charges that Americans already eat too much and that raising and sending livestock to market contributes to climate change.

“We look forward to being a part of this important conversation and sharing the science-based, data-driven research regarding the immense environmental and nutritional benefits from cattle and beef production,” the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association, a producers’ trade group, told E&E News.

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Tomlinson’s Beef against Beef (Houston Chronicle editorialist says we’re irrational)

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- April 29, 2022
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DeSmog on Vaclav Smil (this deep thinker is largely correct)

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- April 28, 2022
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Will Planting Trees Reduce Global Warming?

By Richard W. Fulmer -- April 27, 2022
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“A Promise Kept: Biden’s War on American Energy”

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- April 26, 2022
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Energy and Environmental Review: April 25, 2022

By -- April 25, 2022
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Resourceful Earth Day (celebrate freedom, innovation)

By Pierre Desrochers and Jasmin Guénette -- April 22, 2022
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Increased Plant Productivity: The First Key Benefit of Atmospheric CO2 Enrichment

By -- April 21, 2022
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