green

Politics is Conflict

by Fred Smith on May 3, 2010 · 1 comment

in Energy, Environment

In Massachusetts vs. EPA, the Supreme Court sided with a group of Green States seeking to impose draconian energy rationing schemes on America.  A few states have access to non-carbon energy sources (hydro-power or older nuclear power) and, thus, can reward their ideological majorities at lower cost.  But most Americans will become poorer as energy prices sky rocket.   With EPA moving aggressively toward mandating this new power, restricting energy use throughout the nation, conflict will surely erupt among the states of the union.

One of the most creative features of our Constitution was its concept of competitive federalism.  States were to be the laboratories of democracy.  The goal was not to impose national uniformity but to allow states to try different ideas – as long as those policies did not harm interstate voluntary exchanges. 

The Massachusetts decision harmed that arrangement as did the 1857 Dred Scott decision, which forced northern states to enforce southern slavery rules.  The concept of ensuring voluntary interstate commerce had little to do with the coercive institution of slavery but the recognition that slaves were “property” was stretched to force non-slave states into policies that they viewed as harmful and immoral.  Non-slave states responded by enacting laws nullifying that decision, refusing to allocate funds for its implementation and eventually to the Civil War.

The impact of Massachusetts is different but perhaps as significant.  Religious Malthusians are determined to enforce their Puritanical vision on America.  They are most powerful in a handful of coastal states and seem very willing to use federal coercion to force their beliefs on middle America.  States are already moving to enact laws and resolutions to oppose this push.  And as the lights go out and plants are shuttered throughout America, we may find ourselves moving toward greater conflict here too.  The prospect is worrisome.

Between the Headlines: “Russian Voting Tinged with Green”

by Fred Smith on April 20, 2009

in Energy, Environment, Global Warming, International

“Russian Voting Tinged with Green”

This Washington Post headline from earlier this month illustrates one of worrisome side-effects of authoritarian rule.  Political freedom is denied the citizenry but the pressures to allow some form of dissent remain.  Religious dissent often is treated more liberally – and the eco-theocratic values of today are the dominant religion of our secular society.  The risk the Russians face is that in their effort to escape Red tyranny they may rush into the hands of the Greens.  That would be tragic — Virginia Postrel noted long ago that she preferred the old Reds to the new Greens.  Both restricted economic and individual freedom but, at least, the Reds aimed at helping humanity.  That goal is rarely given much priority by green zealots.

LibertyWeek 36: We Go Green

by Richard Morrison on April 1, 2009

in CEI Projects, Podcast

Hosts Richard Morrison and Cord Blomquist join Michelle Minton in welcoming you to LibertyWeek 36: The Green Episode. We begin our environmental adventure with an update on the high cost of renewable energy and the good news from the coal laboratory. We then pass on advice for drinking green in Beer News and celebrate the recent observance of Human Achievement Hour. This brings us to the featured interview with our distinguished colleague and author Steve Milloy – where we explore his new book Green Hell: How Environmentalists Plan to Ruin Your Life and What You Can Do to Stop Them and its targets, from the Audubon Society to Zero Population Growth. Finally we round out the program with a little Olympic News.

U.S. Chamber unveils NIMBY Watch Web site

by Marlo Lewis on March 23, 2009

in Energy, Global Warming, Stimulus to Nowhere

Last week, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce unveiled a NIMBY-Watch Web site called Project No Project .

With case studies from more than 30 states, Project No Project  chronicles how NIMBY (“not in my backyard”) activists “block energy projects by organizing local opposition, changing zoning laws, opposing permits, filing lawsuits, and bleeding projects dry of their financing.” Many of the projects blocked are not coal plants but alternative energy projects or infrastructure often touted as “green.”

The site invites readers to provide examples from their own locales of NIMBY efforts to block or stall energy-related projects.

Proponents of “green jobs” should be concerned as much as free-market and property-rights advocates, because ”stimulus” projects are vulnerable to the same NIMBY tactics that, for example, have immobilized the Cape Wind Project in Nantucket, Mass.

Although Project No Project does not mention it, we also know from  comments submitted by the U.S. Chamber and allied groups on EPA’s Advanced Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, that NIMBY forces will aquire powerful new litigation tools if EPA, in response to the Supreme Court’s Massachusetts v. EPA decision, establishes greenhouse gas (GHG) emission standards for new motor vehicles. (For more background, see my recent post on MasterResource.Org.)

In a nutshell, vehicular GHG emission standards will make carbon dioxide (CO2) a “regulated air pollutant” under the Clean Air Act (CAA). That, in turn, will automatically make CO2 “subject to regulation” under the Act’s Prevention of Significant Deterioration (PSD) pre-construction permitting program. 

The cutoff for regulation as a “major stationary source” under PSD is a potential to emit 250 tons per year (TPY) of a CAA-regulated air pollutant. Approximately 1.2 million previously unregulated entities (office buildings, hotels, big box stores, enclosed malls, even commercial kitchens) actually emit 250 TPY. All would be vulnerable to new regulation, monitoring, paperwork, controls, and penalties if EPA establishes GHG emission standards for new motor vehicles.

To qualify for a PSD permit, major stationary sources must comply with “best available control technology” (BACT) standards. Even part from any investments required for BACT compliance, the PSD permitting process is costly and time-consuming. In 2007, each permit on average cost $125,120 and 866 burden hours for a source to obtain. No small business could operate subject to the PSD administrative burden.

So NIMBY forces must be licking their chops at the prospect that EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson plans on April 30 to issue an “endangerment finding” for GHGs. An endangerment finding  is the prerequisite to establishing GHG emission standards for new motor vehicles and, thus, the critical first step to making CO2 a CAA-regulated “air pollutant.” 

When and if EPA regulates CO2, expect a surge of litigation demanding that EPA impose PSD and BACT requirements on developers proposing to build or renovate big box stores, strip malls, fast-food restaurants, or other projects NIMBYites deem undesirable or contrary to “smart growth.”

Bottom line: Applying PSD and BACT to CO2–the inexorable consequence of establishing vehicular GHG emission standards–will turn the CAA into a gigantic Anti-Stimulus package. Is Team Obama paying attention?

“Smart”: The new ‘green’

by Gary Howard on January 13, 2009 · 1 comment

in Economy, Energy, Environment, Global Warming

Recently in the NYTimes’ via GigaOm, David Erlich drops the knowledge on the alleged infinite job-creating possibilities of the new “smart” energy infrastructure thingy.

A new energy-efficient infrastructure could be coming to the U.S. with the new administration, and up to 280,000 new jobs could be created from the deployment of smart grid technology alone.

Wow! Who knew “creating” that many jobs could be so simple?

But nevermind my skeptical opinion of the magical job-berthing properties said to be present in our president-elect’s very core.  What concerns me firstly is the certain potential for waste, fraud and corruption, i.e. boondoggles for buddies(or just plain boon doggles).  We are talking billions added to the billions (trillion) already promised for bailouts and current boondoggles.  Where is all this cash going to come from?(YOU) Oh yes, we have a printing press!

Secondly, I am concerned with the obfuscation going on here in terms of well, terms.  ’Green’ became just way too, not sexy, or hip like it was say last year.  And besides, people are just sick of being (or being told to be) green. We are like all greened out (plus Wal Mart is doing green so, its not cool).  But when people say let’s be smart, or you get to say ‘I am smart’ or just allow yourself to be ‘smart’ then that’s all kinds of wonderful. Marketing, they pay a lot for it. Its like convincing guys that hot girls will simply appear if you drink ‘this’ beer.  Or convincing girls that ‘these’ jeans definitely make you look thin and beautiful. Definitely.  And you can never be too smart, right?