Category: Sovereignty and National Security

Wind weakens UK energy security

Excessive reliance on wind power jeopardizes the UK’s energy security says, the business advocacy group CBI.

According to a report in the Financial Times, CBI warns,

Britain will see rapid growth both in wind power and in new gas-fired power stations – needed when the wind is not blowing.

That will make the country more dependent on imported gas, from Russia and elsewhere, more exposed to volatile commodity prices, and less able to cut the CO2 emissions produced by burning fossil fuels.

Instead, the CBI wants more help for investment in new nuclear reactors and “clean coal” power stations that can capture and store emissions.

It’s too bad that CBI doesn’t yet understand that, if CO2 emissions are all it’s worried about, then coal is already “clean.”

Cap-and-Trade War

From today’s Wall Street Journal editorial page:

One of President Obama’s applause lines is that his climate tax policies will create new green jobs “that can’t be outsourced.” But if that’s true, why is his main energy adviser floating a new carbon tariff on imports? Welcome to the coming cap and trade war.

Click here for the full column.

UN climate plan: Trillions for new world economy

FoxNews.com reports today that,

A United Nations document on “climate change” that will be distributed to a major environmental conclave next week envisions a huge reordering of the world economy, likely involving trillions of dollars in wealth transfer, millions of job losses and gains, new taxes, industrial relocations, new tariffs and subsidies, and complicated payments for greenhouse gas abatement schemes and carbon taxes — all under the supervision of the world body.

Click here for the 16-page document.

UN: ‘Global Green New Deal’

Reuters reports that the UN Environment Programme wants to levy an oil tax on developed nations of $5 per barrel to fund a “Global Green New Deal.”

According to Reuters,

“[The tax] would be almost, if not totally, unnoticed by the consumer,” [UNEP head Achim Steiner] said, especially since oil prices have fallen from more than $140 a barrel at mid-2008 peaks to about $40.

A barrel of oil contains 158 liters and OECD consumption is about 20 billion barrels a year, he said. “This is just one example, there may be many others,” of funding, he said.

“I am concerned about the prospect of a meaningful deal in Copenhagen if there is not a significant financial package on the table,” he said. Cash would encourage poor nations to step up actions to curb rising greenhouse gas emissions.”

Remember how the UN’s oil-for-food program worked out — for Saddam Hussein?

Imagine the UN klepto-crats with $750 billion (of our money) to spend.

Obama Energy Chief: Climate a trade ‘weapon’

The Wall Street Journal reported today,

Energy Secretary Steven Chu on Tuesday advocated adjusting trade duties as a “weapon” to protect U.S. manufacturing, just a day after one of China’s top climate envoys warned of a trade war if developed countries impose tariffs on carbon-intensive imports.

Mr. Chu, speaking before a House science panel, said establishing a carbon tariff would help “level the playing field” if other countries haven’t imposed greenhouse-gas-reduction mandates similar to the one President Barack Obama plans to implement over the next couple of years. It is the first time the Obama administration has made public its view on the issue.

“If other countries don’t impose a cost on carbon, then we will be at a disadvantage…[and] we would look at considering perhaps duties that would offset that cost,” Mr. Chu said.

While trade is a proven tool of international economic growth and peace, green is shaping up to be a tool of protectionism and international hostility.

UN head: US a ‘deadbeat’

United Nations head Ban Ki-moon, who is looking to thrust global governance on the U.S. through global warming regulation, called the U.S. a “deadbeat” on Thursday. Apparently the U.S. has been been somewhat tardy in paying its 22 percent of the UN’s $5 billion operating budget.

The most outrage that the Obama administration could muster publicly was to have White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs call Ban’s word choice “unfortunate.”

So not only does the corrupt (e.g., oil-for-food) and incompetent (you-name-the-international-crisis) UN use U.S. taxpayer money to advance its anti-American mission, but we get insulted to boot. And all the Obama administration does is to peep about Ban’s choice of words — not his sentiment.

Steve Milloy discusses “America in the Rearview Mirror” in his new book Green Hell: How Environmentalists Plan to Control Your Life and What You Can Do to Stop Them.

Green-supported LOST torpedoes U.S Navy

The Wall Street Journal editorialized today that the recent Chinese harassment of an unarmed U.S. Navy ship demonstrates how the Law of the Sea Treaty (LOST) threatens U.S. national security.

While President Reagan “sank” the treaty, as the WSJ notes, President Obama wants to sign it. President Obama has apparently decided that the time has come for the sea to “give up her dead.”

Steve Milloy’s new book Green Hell: How Environmentalists Plan to Control Your Life and What You Can Do to Stop Them spotlights the LOST and green support for it.

WSJ: ‘Warming to protectionism’

Editorializing about the EU’s new tariff on biodiesel imports from the U.S, the Wall Steet Journal noted that,

Just as more scientists acknowledge that we don’t know as much about the Earth’s climate as Al Gore says, it’s becoming clearer that environmental policies won’t lead to some green economic boom…

… Neither side is in the right here — which makes the case such a good illustration of the way green policies warp markets.

… If EU environmental policies were really about the environment, [U.S. biodiesel] arguably would be a good thing. More green fuel for everyone, and on the cheap to boot…

It turns out that Europe — which also isn’t known for restraint in supporting farmers — is more interested in protecting its own biodiesel industry than in seeing motorists fill their tanks with low-carbon fuel… And all of this despite evidence that fuels like biodiesel increase CO2 emissions compared with fossil fuels…

We keep hearing about the coming “green tech” bounty. But green-collar jobs will continue to cost more in subsidies and lost efficiency than the jobs themselves are worth. Not to mention the positions that are lost along the way in other firms or industries, or never created because energy costs more for everyone. A report last year by the economic research institute RWI Essen found that €205,000 in subsidies were spent for each solar-industry job created in Germany, and that the net effect on employment was negative…

Obama attack on oil & gas industry begins

Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner wants to take away tax breaks for oil and gas companies because they contribute to global warming.

Reuters reported that Geithner told the Senate Finance Committee on March 4 that,

“We don’t believe it makes sense to significantly subsidize the production and use of sources of energy (like oil and gas) that are dramatically going to add to our climate change (problem). We don’t think that’s good economic policy and we think changing those incentives is good for the country.”

I’m not for the government subsidizing anyone, but Geithner’s statement indicates that the Obama administration is starting its long-promised attack on the oil and gas industry. Their tax breaks apparently are first. Are profits next? Since last summer, Obama has been saying that he would impose a windfall profits tax on oil companies.

A recent study by CRA International commissioned by the American Petroleum Institute concluded that a windfall profits tax likely would:

  • Cause a net loss of up to 490,000 U.S. jobs by 2030.
  • Reduce U.S. gross domestic product by roughly 1 percent, or $240 billion by 2030.
  • Increase U.S. imports of crude oil by up to 18 percent in 2030 and reduce U.S. domestic production of crude oil by up to 26 percent in the same year.

Unions attack free trade through climate

Carbon Control News reported this morning that the United Steelworkers union is

is exploring a hybrid policy that would combine a cap-and-trade scheme for utilities and other domestic sectors, while narrowly applying an excise carbon tax on domestic and foreign manufacturers to avoid “leakage” of jobs and GHG emissions to countries with lax environmental policies…

The model envisioned by the USW would apply an excise tax on manufactured products, based on the GHGs emitted during production. In order to spur GHG reductions, the taxes would be levied on GHGs in excess of a predetermined cap that could be lowered periodically to meet the emissions-reduction targets President Obama has set forth; the taxes also could increase over time to provide further incentive for manufacturers to clean up their processes, according to sources. To ensure domestic and foreign manufacturers are treated the same, the tax would be levied on importers of foreign products and rebated on exported products, similar to the value added tax (VAT) applied to an array of products in many countries.

Democrat lawmakers supporting the idea, according to Carbon Control News, include Reps. John Larson (D-CT), Jim McDermott (D-WA) and Pete Stark (D-CA).

Just what we need during the most significant global economic calamity in 75 years — anti-trade policies.

Take action:

Contact your congressional representative as well as Reps. Larson, McDermott and Stark and tell them that global trade is the path to peace and prosperity while junk science-based tariffs can only lead to global economic stagnation and international ill-will.

Will Planet Earth sign a mercury emissions treaty?

The Washington Post reports that the Obama administration has embraced the idea of an international treaty to limit mercury emissions.

According to the EPA, the U.S. is only responsible for 3% of manmade mercury emissions — and U.S. emissions are on the decline. Let’s not forget that Mother Nature’s mercury emissions are thought to be on the same order as anthropogenic emissions.

Should we just let the world’s other emitters knock themselves out and leave us and our sovereignty alone?