In sharp contrast to wind turbines, the wind lobby is spinning at 100 percent capacity—in order to keep the industry in the taxpayers’ pockets. Their dizzying logic makes you wonder if they have been riding the blades instead of examining the facts. First, they make two contradictory assertions: (1) Wind …
According to Germany’s environment minister, Norbert Roettgen, “Solar is a success story made in Germany.” “Success” appears to mean having the world’s largest amount of ridiculously overpriced electricity. (The German subsidy for solar energy is up to five times the actual wholesale cost in the U.S.) But even Roettgen realizes …
In his State of the Union address last month, President Obama requested that Congress pass legislation mandating a national clean energy standard (CES). A CES targets the CO2 emissions from the electric power industry by setting minimum percentages of total power (electricity) generation that must come from sources that emit …
The Obama Administration, encouraged by environmental groups, has blocked yet another affordable energy project—the Keystone XL Pipeline. Add this to the unconscionable slowdown of leasing and production in the Gulf of Mexico, foot-dragging on production in the Chukchi and Beaufort Seas, blocks on offshore production in the Atlantic and Pacific, …
The EPA’s analysis of the new mercury rule (the Utility Maximum Achievable Control Technology, or Utility MACT) is yet another example of regulatory bait-and-switch. The rule refers to mercury but really targets CO2, and it generates its purported benefits from reducing particulates that are already covered by other regulations. For …
Because the concept of opportunity cost is fundamental to all of economics, it is covered in the first chapter of every principles-of-economics textbook. Opportunity cost tells us what we give up when make decisions on consumption and production. There are no free lunches. In spite of the universal agreement on …
If clean-energy means “low-carbon” (a definition to which I object), then the U.S. is way, way ahead of China in the clean-energy race. If it means low-everything-else, we are still way, way ahead, since China has a pathetic record on controlling genuine pollution. Getting hung up on commoditized solar-panel or …
