Power mad

(AP Photo/ Dennis M. Rivera Pichardo)

President Biden set a target for a 50% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2030–7 years from now.

He has set a target for net zero–no greenhouse gas emissions in the US–by 2050.

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That goal is to be met by electrifying everything. That is why there is a war on natural gas, not just coal. Natural gas is clean, and while it produces much less CO2 than coal, it still emits some. That is also why Biden wants to electrify cars. And heat. And…everything.

Biden claims that all this is possible not through the strategic use of Unicorn farts, which admittedly emit no greenhouse gases, but through using “renewable” sources of electricity. Whatever you think about the viability of renewables–the solar panels, batteries, and wind turbines are not renewable, remember–there is a hitch.

You can’t actually install them very fast.

A great example was provided by the Wall Street Journal.

Ironically the Journal focuses on the length of the permitting process, which indeed is a huge problem for all big infrastructure projects. But dig a bit deeper and you can see another, even larger problem: Biden wants to completely revamp our energy infrastructure and usage, converting the 80% of our energy use we get from fossil fuels to renewable sources.

Consider the renewable electricity project called SunZia:

When plans for the SunZia project—a massive power line and wind farm in the Western U.S.—were first laid in 2006, Taylor Swift had just released a debut album and George W. Bush was president.

The project might finally receive a crucial permit this week.

That 17-year process underscores why some in Washington say there is a pressing need for an overhaul of the country’s rules for approving infrastructure projects.

As soon as Thursday, the project is expected to receive a green light from the Interior Department’s Bureau of Land Management for a high-voltage power line, according to people familiar with the matter. The permit would allow the developer Pattern Energy to build the country’s largest wind energy project across three counties in rural New Mexico and deliver that electricity to large markets in Arizona and California.

Developers first applied for federal approval in 2008; environmental reviews started in 2009. In 2011, the project was “fast-tracked” by the Obama administration.

David Getts, general manager of Phoenix-based Southwestern Power Group, the original developer of SunZia, said that when the project was conceived in 2006, the company thought it would receive its permits in about five years.

“We didn’t honestly know enough to know what we were getting into,” Getts said. “And of course, here we are 17 years later.”

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The project has not broken ground, after 17 years. It was fast-tracked. 17 years.

That is 2 1/2 times as long as we supposedly have to cut emissions by 50%. Now imagine getting everything switched over from fossil fuels to renewable electricity–not just electricity, but RENEWABLE electricity–in 27 years.

That’s not enough time to finish permitting two SunZia projects, no less thousands.

People voted for this. It isn’t even utopian thinking. It is magical thinking. Somehow people believe that by muttering words about the “fierce urgency of NOW!” reality will bend to the will of the tyrants.

We have already seen the systematic destruction of the current energy infrastructure. Blackouts and brownouts. And we are just getting started.

The Left blames climate change for these events, as if, even were it true, a 1-degree change in temperature could break an electric grid while shutting down power plants would not. A shortage of power is caused by a shortage of generation, and that shortage of generation is the result of policies that shut down power plants and replace them, inadequately, with unreliable renewable sources.

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It is insanity, at least if you believe that the powers that be care about American citizens.

They don’t. The simple fact is that they don’t. This is a religion, pure and simple.

Biden put through an executive order that would shut down every single coal and natural gas plant in America by 2040, and almost everybody shrugged. Conservatives raised hell, but the MSM lined up to embrace the most insane idea put forth by an American president since maybe Woodrow Wilson.

Liberals keep claiming that the idea that the elites want us to eat bugs by candlelight is an absurd conspiracy theory, but the facts are clear: they want you to eat bugs by candlelight. They keep telling us so and acting as if it is so; it is irrational to not believe them. Farms are being bought up and closed down; power plants are closing–New York is closing all its fossil fuel generating plants in 7 years, despite the fact that they produce HALF THE ELECTRICITY. Beege wrote an excellent piece yesterday about this plan and the fact that they have no Plan B.

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As part of last week’s budget deal, Gov. Kathy Hochul and the Legislature ordered the New York Power Authority to shut down all its fossil-fuel plants in just seven years — even though gas-fired plants supply nearly half the state’s electricity.

At the same time, they banned gas (for stoves and heating) in all new buildings by 2029, forcing them to be all-electric.

And by 2035, the only new cars sold here must also be purely electric.

Maybe they can propose another SunZia and get something approved in 17 years, and spend a few more actually building the thing.

Maybe.

Currently, they actually HAVE no plan to replace the electricity. But the need to destroy what generation they have is so great that they must blow up the entire grid and hope something replaces it.

“At an IPPNY convention in the fall, DEC commissioner Basil Seggos was asked how the state planned to “bridge” the gap until renewable power comes online. “Listen, I don’t think there is a plan B, alright,” Seggos said. “And I mean that seriously about our opportunity right now, I don’t think we have a plan B. I think that we are on the edge right now when it comes to global climate change and emissions, I really firmly believe that. So we have one shot to get this right. That’s what makes this so challenging.”

Bugs.

By candlelight.

That is their plan.

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Beege Welborn 5:00 PM | December 24, 2024
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