“It’s policy, it’s regulation, it’s industry structure and it’s incentives . . . It’s not physics, it’s not chemistry, it’s not even the electric grid. It’s what we decide we want.” – Ron Binz

“Postmodernism … can be described as a set of critical, strategic and rhetorical practices employing concepts such as difference, repetition, the trace, the simulacrum, and hyperreality to destabilize other concepts such as presence, identity, historical progress, epistemic certainty, and the univocity of meaning.” – Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy

A small victory for consumers and free-market energy policy came yesterday when energy statist Ron Binz withdrew as a nominee to chair the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) in Washington, D.C.

Binz put the blame on others rather than his own postmodern energy philosophy and coercive energy-policy views, which he unsuccessfully tried to hide before Congress.…

Windaction.org’s periodic newsletter keeps readers updated on the latest news in the wind energy industry!

facts, analysis, exposure of wind energy’s real impacts
Issue: 2013-06-15

News

“[Wind accident] data … is by no means fully comprehensive – CWIF believe that what is attached may only be the ‘tip of the iceberg’ in terms of numbers of accidents and their frequency…. Renewable UK confirmed that there had been 1,500 wind turbine accidents and incidents in the UK alone in the past 5 years. Data here … may only represent 9% of actual accidents. “

– Caithness Windfarm Information Forum (UK), Wind Turbine Accident Data to 31st December 2012.

My latest Forbes Political Energy post, Oil & Gas Isn’t Just One Of The Richest Industries, It’s Also One Of The Safest, examined the improving, impressive safety of the U.S. oil and gas industry compared to the much smaller (but accident prone) industrial wind power industry. The massive height of open-element wind turbines introduces hazards for high-up workers and from falling debris.…

“How is any American going to feel good about reforming Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security when … businessmen are making off with so many tax dollars?”

– Richard Fink (Koch Industries), quoted in Bill Wilson and Roy Wenzl, “The Kochs’ Quest to Save America,” Wichita Eagle, October 13, 2012.

A major political-economy theme at MasterResource is how government intervention stifles value-creating entrepreneurship, or, in the case of mineral resources, resourceship.

MasterResource has chronicled the sorry history of government trying to turn energy losers into winners. Last year alone, this site published 60 blog-posts on the history, operation, and current politics of (government-enabled) industrial wind power. And who can forget Solyndra on the solar side, a name that might enter the textbooks as the Teapot Dome of our time.…