THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Volume IX, Issue # 127, July 5, 2007
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
Government Committed to & Acting in Accord with Conservative Principles
Ensures a Nation's Strength, Progress, & Prosperity
CLIMATE ETHICS ON CAPITOL HILL:
The Truth About Climate Change Consensus, Prevention, & Price Tags
By Paul K. Driessen
CLIMATE CHANGE & ENERGY LEGISLATION PENDING IN THE U.S. CONGRESS: PROPOSALS TO TRANSLATE INTO U.S.
PUBLIC POLICY THE POLITICAL AGENDA & IDEOLOGY OF ENVIRONMENTALISTS -- MAJOR ADVERSE EFFECTS THAT SUCH
LEGISLATION WOULD HAVE ON U.S. ENERGY PRODUCTION & SUPPLY, TRANSPORTATION, AGRICULTURE, MANUFACTURING,
EMPLOYMENT, & FAMILIES -- GREENHOUSE GAS EMISSIONS & GLOBAL WARMING THEORY: THE FAULTY ANALYSIS
SUPPORTING THE DRIVE TO ENACT & ENFORCE CLIMATE CHANGE LEGISLATION
FULL STORY:
The 2002 Sarbanes-Oxley Act and the 2006 elections supposedly inaugurated a new congressional commitment to
ethics, transparency, accountability, and consumer protection. Something has been lost in translation.
The “energy” bill now wending its way through the legislative labyrinth dedicates $6 billion to goodies like more
energy-efficient snowmobiles for ski resorts, outlaws “price gouging” at the gas pump, and sets new mileage standards
that will likely make cars and light trucks less safe and cost more lives. It also provides subsidies and mandates for
politically correct “alternative” energy projects that probably wouldn’t survive without such aid.
But the bill doesn’t increase the nation’s energy supply by one drop of gasoline or one watt of electricity, says
Congressman Jim McCrery (Republican -Louisiana). It lifts no bans on oil and gas drilling, and does nothing to ease
regulatory impediments to pipelines, transmission lines, refineries, or coal and nuclear generating plants. The only power
it generates is expanded bureaucratic power over energy and economic decisions.
Its ethanol mandates will result in more land converted from wildlife habitat to corn fields, and in greater use of water,
fertilizer, pesticides, and tractor and truck fuel.
Corn prices will continue to rise, along with the cost of meat, candy, soft drinks, and other products that use corn for feed
or corn syrup as a sweetener. The biofuel itself will cost more, but provide less mileage per tank.
Expanded wind power will mean more 300-foot-tall “cuisinarts” killing birds and bats, marring once-scenic vistas, and
feeding into hundred-mile transmission lines – to provide expensive, intermittent electricity that has to be backed up by
natural-gas-fired generators.
Even more problematical is the rush to “do something” about global warming. Assorted climate change bills propose to
slash U.S. carbon dioxide emissions by varying amounts, under different timetables, to prevent speculative disasters
conjured up by computer models that do not reflect complex atmospheric processes and cannot predict temperature or
rainfall one year in the future, much less 40 or 90.
The worst of the lot -- the Sanders-Boxer Bill (S 309) -- would compel the United States to cut CO2 emissions to 15% below
2006 levels by 2020, and 83% below 2006 levels by 2050. That’s far more than even the Kyoto Protocol contemplates.
Such mandates might help special interests – which are lining up to proclaim “consensus” on climate change and claim a
share of any taxpayer-funded entitlements. But the mandates would severely impact U.S. energy production,
transportation, agriculture, manufacturing, employment, and families.
An MIT analysis concludes that Sanders-Boxer would cost the U.S.A. up to $403 billion in foregone Gross Domestic
Product, corresponding to a loss of some 4.5 million jobs and an impact of $5370 per family of four. The Sanders-Boxer,
Feinstein, and Waxman bills would result in carbon offset allowances priced at $210 per ton of CO2, adding a truly
price-gouging $95 to the cost of a barrel of oil, $2 to a gallon of gasoline, $143 to a ton of coal, and 50% to the price of
electricity, by 2020.
Domestic production of goods and services would plummet, and families with low incomes or living in regions with high
heating or air-conditioning needs would be disproportionately affected, as they would have to spend much higher
portions of their incomes on energy, food, and consumer products.
MIT’s evaluation presumes developing countries would match our emission cutbacks. It’s more likely that they would
prefer to reap the benefits of more energy at lower prices, to fuel economies, create jobs, and improve living standards
that lag far behind those of wealthy Western countries. That means the impacts on U.S. workers and consumers could be
much worse than MIT anticipates.
The US Energy Information Administration calculated that Kyoto mandates (CO2 emission reductions to 5% below 1990
levels) could cost up to 2.5 million jobs and reduce our GDP by up to $525 billion annually – equivalent to a tax of $7,000
on every family of four.
Wharton’s Business School of Economics determined that Kyoto would cost 2.3% of America’s GDP. At $12 trillion in
2006, that translates into $275 billion a year or $3700 per family.
Management Information Services concluded that Kyoto could eliminate 1.3 million black and Hispanic jobs, force nearly
100,000 minority businesses to close, and cause average minority family incomes to plunge by more than $2,000 a year.
States with large minority populations would lose $10-40 billion a year in economic output, and over $2 billion annually in
tax revenues.
At these prices, Congress should be 100% certain about alleged climate change cataclysms, before enacting any such
laws. But the case for immediate drastic action is getting progressively weaker, and none of these measures would bring
any detectable environmental benefits.
In fact, Congress is telling American families it is prepared to impose enormous costs to achieve minuscule reductions in
global CO2 emissions and avert speculative impacts 90 years from now – on the assumption that carbon dioxide causes
climate change, and any change will be disastrous.
The Kyoto Protocol, if adhered to by every signatory nation, would prevent a mere 0.2 degrees F of warming by 2050. To
stabilize atmospheric CO2 and prevent theoretical climate catastrophe, we would need 30 such treaties, each one more
restrictive and expensive than the last. The various congressional bills would accomplish far less than that.
Moreover, increasing numbers of scientists doubt that carbon dioxide is the culprit. They point out that there has been
no rise in average global atmospheric temperatures since 1998, despite a 4% increase in CO2. Ice core and other data
indicate that, over the past 650,000 years, temperatures usually rose first and CO2 levels increased several centuries later.
Timothy Patterson, Henrik Svensmark, and other climate scientists have found growing evidence that our sun is the
dominant cause of climate change. As its energy output varies, so does the solar wind that determines how many galactic
cosmic rays reach the Earth.
More solar energy warms Earth directly and generates stronger solar winds, deflecting cosmic rays, reducing cloud cover
and warming us still more. Less solar energy results in reduced solar wind, more cosmic rays, and thus more clouds –
further cooling the planet.
Solar scientists now predict that, by 2020, the sun will begin its weakest cycle in two centuries. That could bring on global
cooling that would harm agriculture in northern latitudes, raise heating bills, and make the clamor about manmade global
warming look like wasted hot air.
Will Rogers once said, every time Congress makes a joke it’s a law, and every time it makes a law it’s a joke. The energy
and climate bills are perfect examples.
Luckily for Congress, it routinely exempts itself from ethics, accountability, and price-gouging laws.
© 2006 Paul K. Driessen
LINKS TO RELATED TOPICS:
Political Environmentalism Versus Human Progress & Prosperity:
Policy Issues Relating to Energy, Environment,
& Natural Resources
Political Economy -- Philosophies, Systems, & Public Policies:
Government, the Economy, & Economic Prosperity
Paul K. Driessen is Senior Policy Advisor for the Congress of Racial Equality, the Committee for A Constructive Tomorrow, and the
Center for the Defense of Free Enterprise. Driessen is author of Eco-Imperialism: Green Power, Black Death, which can be
obtained at www.Eco-Imperialism.com. Email: pdriessen@cox.net --- Telephone:
(703) 698-6171
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THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
Conservative & Free-Market Analysis of Government, Politics & Public Policy, Covering Political, Legal, Constitutional, Economic,
Cultural, Military, International, Strategic, & Geopolitical Issues
Conservative Government Ensures a Nation's Strength, Progress, & Prosperity