Thread by @usacsmret

Reality Bites Joe Biden’s “Clean Energy Revolution” - The Post & Email thepostemail.com/2019/06/16/rea…

Mr. Biden’s “climate emergency” exists in computer models and alarmist reports, but not in the Real World windows. Tornadoes, hurricanes, droughts, floods, melting ice and rising seas are no more frequent or severe than humanity has experienced many times before.

Before we destroy our energy and economic system, we need to see irrefutable proof we face an actual climate crisis – and be able to debate and cross examine those who make such claims. Instead of a debate, climate crisis skeptics just get vilified and threatened with prosecution

Anytime you hear the term “environmental justice,” you know someone is trying to create a new category of victims, sow more discord along racial and economic lines, and punish someone new in the name of “justice.”

While we still have pockets of pollution, America’s cars, air and water have been cleaned up dramatically since 1970. Moreover, the best way to prevent, survive and recover from any disaster is to have the energy, wealth and technologies fossil fuels continue to make possible.

There’s nothing clean, green, renewable or sustainable about wind, solar or battery power. Those technologies require enormous amounts of land, concrete, steel and other raw materials to produce.

Many of their most critical materials are extracted and processed using child labor and near-slave wages for adults, with few or no workplace safety rules, and with horrific impacts on land, air and water quality.

The Biden plan would cost many times the “$1.7 trillion in federal funds over ten years” that his talking points use to entice voters: dollars, lost jobs, lower living standards and fewer freedoms.

The ex VP would rejoin the Paris climate treaty; reverse many Trump corporate tax cuts; impose multiple mandates, “enforcement mechanisms” and “legally binding” emission reductions; and at some point demand cap-and-trade schemes and/or taxes on what he calls “carbon emissions.”

That term suggests dirty soot coming out of smoke stacks. Actual emissions are CO2, the life-giving gas that humans and animals exhale, and plants use to grow and produce oxygen. The more CO2 in our atmosphere, the better and faster crop, forest and grassland plants grow.

Mr. Biden would also impose tariffs on “carbon-intensive” goods imported from countries that “fail to meet their climate obligations.” That would quickly affect just about everything we eat, drink, drive, do and use.

His plan would soon make it difficult for America to grow or produce much of anything … and China, India and other rapidly developing countries are not about to reduce their fossil fuel use.

Every Biden Plan provision would increase the cost of living and of doing business. Folks he hobnobs with, who will write, implement and enforce these rules and bankroll his campaign, won’t much notice or mind the soaring prices. But middle and blue-collar classes certainly will.

His ultimate goal is to rapidly replace America’s fossil fuels with industrial wind and solar facilities – to provide electricity for factories, hospitals, homes, offices, data centers, vehicles and countless other uses.

Modern industrialized societies simply cannot function on expensive, intermittent, weather-dependent electricity. As Germany, Britain, Spain, Australia and other countries have shown, that kind of energy eliminates 3-4 times more jobs than it creates

Especially in factories and assembly lines, which cannot operate with repeated electricity interruptions … and cannot compete with foreign companies that get affordable 24/7/365 coal-based electricity and pay their workers far less than $15, $25 or $45 per hour.

“Rigorous new fuel economy standards” would speed the rate at which 100% of all cars and light trucks become electric. This program would be supported by “more than 500,000 new public charging outlets by the end of 2030,” paid for or subsidized by taxpayers.

It would also require upgrading home and neighborhood electrical systems to provide far more power for rapid vehicle charging, and longer hours of peak demand. Another trillion dollars?

Extending mileage for (much more expensive) electric vehicles would mean lighter, smaller cars … and thus thousands of additional deaths and millions of additional serious injuries. Dollar costs would soar. But how do we quantify the cost of injury and death tolls?

Federal tax and environmental laws, subsidies and other incentives would be used to persuade counties and communities to “battle climate change” by altering their zoning and other regulations “to eliminate sprawl and allow for denser, more affordable housing near public transit.”

This would significantly impact suburban living and property values. And packing more people into more apartment buildings would likely mean diseases spread more rapidly and to more people.

Other federal programs would provide subsidies and incentives for home and business owners to reduce “the carbon footprint” of US buildings 50% by 2035. battery disposal?

This could involve retrofitting them for improved energy efficiency and/or replacing gas furnaces with electric heat or heat pumps – or just tearing down and replacing entire buildings. More trillions of dollars.

The Biden plan would also ban new oil and gas permitting on public lands and waters. This would lock up vast quantities of valuable, vitally needed fuel.

This would replace tens of billions of dollars of annual federal and state government bonus, rent, royalty and tax revenue with tens of billions in subsidies for pseudo-renewable energy.

It would eliminate millions of jobs in the petroleum and petrochemical industries, in numerous companies that rely on those industries, and in countless sectors of local and state economies that depend on all that public land energy activity and revenue.

Finally, a new transcontinental high-speed (electricity-powered) rail system would connect the coasts – or at least a couple of cities on each coast – for a few trillion dollars and with a lot of eminent domain.

This is California’s costly “bullet train to nowhere” on steroids. It would bypass numerous towns and cities, marginalizing many of them and destroying trillions of dollars in property values...

....especially if his rail system is intended to replace or significantly reduce air travel and long distance driving.

The cumulative electricity demand for all these Biden Green New Deal programs would be at least double what the United States currently generates. It would mean wind turbines and solar panels on scales that few can even imagine

...especially as they are installed in less and less windy and sunny areas. And if all this power is to be backed up by batteries – since coal and gas-fired backup power generators would be eliminated – we would need billions of batteries …thus even more land and raw materials.

Exactly how many turbines, panels and batteries? On how many millions of acres? Made from how many billion tons of metals and concrete? Extracted from how many trillions of tons of ore? In the USA or overseas, in whose backyard? Under what child labor and environmental standards?

After banning oil and gas permitting, would Mr. Biden open federal lands to exploration, and mining the rare earth and other materials these massive “renewable” energy systems will require? Or will America just have to be 100% dependent on Chinese and other foreign suppliers

All of this smells of eco-fascism: state control of companies and production, government control of our lives, and silencing and punishing anyone who challenges climate crisis claims or green energy agendas.

Perhaps Mr. Biden can address all these issues – at his next town hall meeting or press conference. Indeed, the time to discuss these issues is NOW. Before we get snow-jobbed and railroaded into actions we will sorely regret.

Or maybe those of us who realize how insane all of this is will just have to opt out — and establish Biden-free zones and climate sanctuary states where none of his policies and restrictions apply.