Green Jobs: The Last Redoubt (invoking military images of us-versus-them)

By Donald Hertzmark -- February 19, 2010 6 Comments

Over the past few weeks, with more dents accumulating in the armor of warmism, a new battle line is taking shape: ” The U.S. economy is ill, energy is important, green jobs will save us, promote green jobs, give us your money.”  Or something like that.

In fact, the shock troops of the green job army are now promoting the phrase “global weirding” to replacing global warming.  There is also terminological retreat on the green jobs side. You see green tech is not actually going to do much positive for the economy, you should think of it rather as a form of “insurance,” against global weirding, I suppose.

As we limp into our second year of crony capitalism under Barack Obama, with small businesses loath to risk their funds in what is increasingly a rigged crapshoot, and the importance of having friends in Washington all the more vital, government-backed green jobs appear to many as the only way out.…

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Energy Myths versus Reality

By Tom Tanton -- February 5, 2010 13 Comments

In the face of a changing fiscal and political environment, Congress and various states are belatedly rethinking their far-flung  efforts to restructure and regulate the nation’s energy markets. The opportunity is to change course and base their actions on facts, not emotion–and slow down and even reverse governmental largesse. The global warming scare has been cut down to size, after all, and the problems of politically dependent energies are more evident than ever.

Too many legislators and interventionists cling to basic energy myths, however. Here are five major ones.

Myth: Foreign Oil Provides Most of Our Energy

According to the U.S. Department of Energy and the Energy Information Administration, oil represents less than 40% of our energy use. A full two-thirds of that oil comes from North America, primarily Canada, not the Middle East.…

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Remembering When Enron Saved the U.S. Wind Industry (January 1997)

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- January 19, 2010 9 Comments

January 7, 1997, some 13 years ago, was one of the worst days in my 16-year career at Enron. Enron had already entered into the solar business (1994) in partnership with Amoco (Solarex), and the U.S. wind industry was on its back. Zond Corporation was struggling, and rival Kenetech had recently suspended its dividend and was on the way to  bankruptcy. Enron bought Zond on this day and renamed it Enron Wind Company.

Enron Wind would never turn a profit, and it would be sold in May 2002 by the bankrupt parent to GE. (GE and Enron would have other ominous parallels.)

Enron came in at just the right time for a troubled, undeserving industry by

  1. Putting a big-name corporation in the U.S. wind industry for the first time;
  2. Issuing countless press releases on ‘wonderful’ green wind for the next several years; and
  3. Successfully lobbying Texas politicians to enact the most strict renewable mandate in the country in 1999.
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‘The People vs. Cap-and-Tax’: James Hansen and the Left’s Civil War on Climate Policy

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- January 17, 2010 7 Comments

“Washington appears intent on choosing a [cap-and-trade] path defined by corporate greed. Unless the public gets engaged, the present Administration may jam down the public’s throat just such an approach, which, it can be shown, is not a solution at all.”

“Cap-and-trade’s complexity provides a breeding ground for special interests…. [T]ry reading the Waxman-Markey 2,000-page bill to figure out who would get the money! Why do those special interests deserve it anyhow?”

– James Hansen, “The People vs. Cap-and-Tax,” paper delivered to the Chairperson of the Carbon Trading Summit, New York City, January 12, 2010.

James Hansen is losing patience. He is upset at the Obama Administration and its advisors, such as John Holdren (read his futile letters). Hansen is mad at the New York Times; after all, he got suckered by their editors and by Paul Krugman regarding his pre-Copenhagen opinion-page editorial.…

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Power Generation Industry Forecast: Natural Gas as Fuel of Choice, Little Change for Other Technologies (Part II)

By Robert Peltier and Kennedy Maize -- January 14, 2010 3 Comments Continue Reading

Taxing Temperature as Climate Policy: McKitrick’s Proposal Reconsidered

By Robert Murphy -- January 5, 2010 23 Comments Continue Reading

The Left, Nuclear Power, and Copenhagen: Rejecting the Viable

By Robert Bryce -- December 10, 2009 11 Comments Continue Reading

Climate Politics: Running Scared in the EU (even before Climategate)

By Carlo Stagnaro -- November 25, 2009 6 Comments Continue Reading

Global Nuclear Plant Construction Moves Forward, Except in the U.S. (Politics and market conditions make it tough for a large-scale rival to carbon-based energy)

By Robert Peltier -- November 24, 2009 6 Comments Continue Reading

Energy Reality: The Stock Beats the Flow from the Sun (why technology struggles to save ‘renewables’)

By -- November 7, 2009 2 Comments Continue Reading