The title of this 800-page tome is “Accelerating Decarbonization in the United States: Technology, Policy, and Societal Dimensions” from the US National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine (NASEM).
I seldom use the term “socialist”, but it is the perfect word here once the concept is updated. It originally referred to government ownership of the means of production. But in today’s Regulatory State, ownership is not required for control, so it means government control of production, or more broadly, government control of both production and use.
In this case, it is government control of the production and use of what they call “the energy system.” Since everybody uses energy, this includes control of everybody. Under the proposed system, the government does not serve people; it “manages” them, or at least their energy use, which is a lot of what we do.
They are, however, rather confused about this. The very first sentences state their basic assumption, which is wildly false. They say this:
“The world is coalescing around the need to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions to limit the effects of anthropogenic climate change, with many nations setting goals of net-zero emissions by midcentury. As the largest cumulative emitter, the United States has the opportunity to lead the global fight against climate change. It has set an interim emissions target of 50–52 percent below 2005 levels by 2030 toward a net-zero goal.” (All quotes are from the Executive Summary.)
The United States has set no such targets. The US is a big country with hundreds of millions of people, so it does not set targets. Perhaps they mean the US Government, but Congress has set no such targets. In fact, these so-called targets are merely the wishful thinking of the Biden Administration and their radical net zero colleagues, which apparently include the National Academies. And if a Republican wins the next election, it will not even be a Presidential wish.
So, there is much less here than meets the eye. This tome is basically a radical socialist manifesto, and that is how it should be read.
The funding is surprising. NASEM studies used to be done at the request of Congress or Federal Agencies and funded by them since objectively advising them is supposed to be the job of the Academies. Instead, this work was funded by a collection of Foundations, presumably left-wingers. So, the National Academies are for hire by those with radical causes.
The socialist management thrust is exemplified by this topic, which is listed as a central theme: “Managing the Future of the Fossil Fuel Sector.” Only under socialism is this a government function.
That the called-for management process is also non-democratic is made clear by this segment of their lead-off discussion of risks: “In developing its findings and recommendations, the committee recognized the inherent risks and uncertainties associated with such an unprecedented, long-term, whole-of-society transition. These include … political, judicial, and societal polarization risk—that political and judicial actions or societal pressures will change the policy landscape….”
So elected officials, the Courts, or the people in general might get in the way. Their solution is not to get the support of the people; rather, it is more management. They say, “Mitigating these risks will require adaptive management and governance to coordinate and evaluate policy implementation and to communicate progress on outcomes.”
Sounds like the Plan is to manage the elections, the Courts, and the people. Sit down, shut up, and we will tell you what we have done as we go along.
For those interested in the details of the net zero wishlist, this is a grand source. Otherwise, it is just another radical manifesto to line the shelves with.
My concern is that the three National Academies have abandoned their mission and, therefore, lost their integrity. Tools of left-wing foundations are not worthy of the name National Academy.
The world of climate policy abounds with bad ideas – from force-feeding an increasingly reluctant driving public a steady diet of EVs, to regulating popular household appliances out of existence.
But one of the worst is megaprojects aimed at sucking carbon dioxide (CO2) out of the air and burying it deep underground. These pricey monstrosities, we are told, are necessary if the planet is to be saved from the onslaught of manmade greenhouse gases. Known as “direct air capture,” the unproven technology has attracted enough investor interest to finance decarbonization plants that are beginning to sprout up in the U.S. and elsewhere.
In southeastern Montana’s Snowy River region, two strange bedfellows – the Biden administration and ExxonMobil – are proposing a giant carbon sequestration project on and underneath federal land. It would be supported by a vast “carbon capture” network consisting of tens and thousands of miles of new pipelines and dozens of remote storage sites. The White House sees the scheme as advancing its decarbonization agenda, and ExxonMobil is eager to pocket what The Washington Post reports could be as much as $12.7 billion in federal subsidies for participating in the project.
But the Snowy River project is running into fierce resistance from locals, led by ranchers and county officials, who don’t want to see their part of the world used as a dumping ground for a technology they don’t trust. A similar uproar in the Midwest proved the undoing of the Heartland Greenway. Also known as the CO2 pipeline, the Heartland Greenway was supposed to pump 15 million tons of carbon dioxide captured annually from emissions of ethanol plants via a 1200-mile pipeline traversing five states to an underground site in North Dakota. Such was the outcry among landowners, regulators, and elected officials along the path of the pipeline that the developer, Navigator CO2, abandoned the project last October.
Louisiana has over 20 carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) projects in various stages of planning and development, most of them in the southeastern part of the state. Yet even in a state as historically friendly to the oil and gas industry as Louisiana, the projects are encountering stiff headwinds from residents concerned about the impact of injecting massive amounts of CO2 into ground overladen with bayous. In Iceland, Swiss start-up Climeworks recently opened the world’s biggest direct air capture facility, dubbed “Mammoth,” designed to remove 36,000 tons of CO2 from the air each year. After Climeworks captures the CO2, and has it pumped deep underground, it sells offsets based on the captured CO2.
But global carbon offset markets have become so dodgy that the Biden administration found it necessary to issue a set of voluntary guidelines to restore trust in the transactions. Released May 28, the new guidelines will “advance high-integrity” voluntary carbon markets, the White House said in a fact sheet.
Carbon offsets are an artificial commodity – completely unrelated to the climate or any other tangible asset. They are an open invitation to fraud, because it is impossible to say what effect buying or selling them will have on the climate. As even the Biden administration acknowledges: “In too many instances, credits do not live up to the high standards necessary for market participants to transact transparently and with certainty that credit purchases will deliver verifiable decarbonization.” A nine-month investigation in Europe into Verra, the world’s leading certifier of the voluntary carbon offset market, concluded last year that “more than 90% of their rainforest offset credits – among the most used by companies – are likely to be ‘phantom credits’ and do not represent genuine carbon reduction.” Companies using the Verra standard included Disney, Shell, and Gucci.
Corporate interest in the $2 billion carbon offset market has sagged in recent years, and it is not clear that the White House’s guidelines, including such things as voluntary disclosures by market participants, will improve matters. But carbon offsets and direct air capture and sequestration of CO2 fit neatly into the prevailing narrative that rising atmospheric levels of carbon dioxide are dangerously warming the plant.
But are they? Atmospheric levels of CO2 began rising in the mid-20th century, but the slight warming the Earth is undergoing dates from the late 17th century. In other words, the planet’s slow rebound from the Little Ice Age (ca. 1250-1800) cannot have been caused by something that happened after World War II. Moreover, today’s higher levels of atmospheric CO2 – about 420 parts per million (ppm) compared with roughly 250 ppm in the Little Ice Age – are highly beneficial to plant life and essential to growing crops needed to feed the world’s 8 billion people.
Some entities – whether selling carbon offsets, providing software platforms to facilitate carbon market transactions, or pocketing taxpayer subsidies for carbon capture and sequestration – can make money on the scheme the White House is trying to rescue. But the price paid by ordinary people for solving a non-existent climate crisis is incalculable.
How did the current obsession with decarbonization arise?
Part of a lecture given by Prof. R, Lindzen to MIT Students for Free Inquiry on March 6, 2024 is posted by John Ray at his blog Greenie Watch. Excerpts in italics with my bold and added images.
Currently, there is great emphasis on the march through the educational institutions: first the schools of education and then higher education in the humanities and the social sciences and now STEM.
What is usually ignored is that the first institutions to be captured were professional societies. My wife attended a meeting of the Modern Language Association in the late 60’s , and it was already fully ‘woke.’ While there is currently a focus on the capture of education, DEI was not the only goal of the march through the institutions. I think it would be a mistake to ignore the traditional focus of revolutionary movements on the means of production.
The vehicle for this was the capture of the environmental movement.
Prior to 1970, the focus of this movement was on things like whales, endangered species, landscape, clean air and water, and population. However, with the first Earth Day in April of 1970 , the focus turned to the energy sector which, after all, is fundamental to all production, and relatedly, involves trillions of dollars. This was accompanied by the creation of new environmental organizations like Environmental Defense and the Natural Resources Defense Council. It was also accompanied by new governmental organizations like the EPA and the Department of Transportation.
Once again, professional societies were easy pickings: the American Meteorological Society, the American Geophysical Union, and even the honorary societies like the National Academy of Science, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, etc. There was a bit of floundering to begin with. The movement initially attempted to focus on global cooling due to the reflection of sunlight by sulfate aerosols emitted by coal fired generators . After all, there seemed to have been global cooling between the 1930’s and the 1970’s. However, the cooling ended in the 1970’s.
There was an additional effort to tie the sulfates to acid rain which was allegedly killing forests. This also turned out to be a dud. In the 70’s, attention turned to CO2 and its contribution to warming via the greenhouse effect. The attraction of controlling CO2 to political control freaks was obvious. It was the inevitable product of all burning of carbon – based fuels. It was also the product of breathing.
However, there was a problem: CO2 was a minor greenhouse gas compared to the naturally produced water vapor. Doubling CO2 would only lead to warming of less than 1°C. A paper in the early 70’s by Manabe and Wetherald came to the rescue. Using a highly unrealistic one – dimensional model of the atmosphere, they found that assuming (without any basis) that relative humidity remained constant as the atmosphere warmed would provide a positive feedback that would amplify the impact of CO2 by a factor of 2. This violated Le Chatelier’s Principle that held that natural systems tended to oppose change, but to be fair, the principle was not something that had been rigorously proven.
Positive feedbacks now became the stock in trade of all climate models which now were producing responses to doubling CO2 of 3°C and even 4°C rather than a paltry 1°C or less.
The enthusiasm of politicians became boundless. Virtue signaling elites promised to achieve net zero emissions within a decade or 2 or 3 with no ideaof how to achieve this without destroying their society. Ordinary people, confronted with impossible demands on their own well – being, have not found warming of a few degrees to be very impressive. Few of them contemplate retiring to the arctic rather than Florida.
Excited politicians, confronted by this resistance, have frantically changed their story. Rather than emphasizing miniscule changes in their temperature metric, they now point to weather extremes which occur almost daily some place on earth, as proof not only of climate change but of climate change due to increasing CO2 (and now also to the even more negligible contributors to the greenhouse effect like methane and nitrous oxide) even though such extremes show no significant correlation with the emissions.
From the political point of view, extremes provide convenient visuals that have more emotional impact than small temperature changes.
The desperation of political figures often goes beyond this to claiming that climate change is an existential threat (associated with alleged ‘tipping points’) even though the official documents produced to support climate concerns never come close to claiming this, and where there is no theoretical or observational basis for tipping points .
I should note that there was one exception to the focus on warming, and that was the ozone depletion issue. However, even this issue served a purpose. When Richard Benedick, the American negotiator of the Montreal Convention which banned Freon passed through MIT on his way back from Montreal, he gloated over his success, but assured us that we hadn’t seen anything yet; we should wait to see what they would do with CO2 . In brief the ozone issue constituted a dry run for global warming.
Yes, they are projecting more than 100 Trillion US$.
To be sure, the EPA ’ s activities still include conventional pollution control, but energy dominates. Of course, the attraction of power is not the only thing motivating politicians. The ability to award trillions of dollars to reorient our energy sector means that there are recipients of these trillions of dollars, and these recipients must only share a few percent of these trillions of dollars to support the campaigns of these politicians for many election cycles and guarantee the support of these politicians for the policies associated with the reorientation.
“Our utilities are working in collusion with NGOs and ENGOs that promote decarbonization over affordability and reliability. Compromised utility board members will waste no time using this change in statute to gaslight everyone around them into believing this is what is best for them.”
“An Act relating to the Regulatory Commission of Alaska; relating to public utilities; relating to electric reliability organizations; relating to the Alaska Energy Authority; relating to the Railbelt Transmission Organization; and providing for an effective date.”
This bill was introduced by the Alaska Senate Resources Committee on March 1, 2024. Per the sponsor statement, “Senate Bill 257 lays the groundwork for an electric system that is more affordable, more sustainable, more equitable, a grid that can power a prosperous future for generations of Alaskans to come.”
Sustainability and equity in our electric system? The last thing needed is an energy framework based on the highly politicized and dangerous United Nations Sustainability Goals. Equity means socialism. Sustainability is the Tyranny of the 21st Century. Our legislators should be protecting us by rejecting these constructs with every ounce of “energy” they have.
Senate Bill 257 was referred to three committees – Senate Labor and Commerce, Senate Resources, and Senate Finance. The bill is currently in the Senate Labor and Commerce Committee, chaired by Jesse Bjorkman. The bill is being heavily sold by Senator Cathy Giessel, her staff, as well as Gwen Holdmann with University of Alaska Fairbanks’s Alaska Center for Energy and Power (ACEP). Gwen’s expertise includes decarbonization, energy transitions, and greenhouse gas inventories.
The sponsor statement claims that the bill’s “open-access transmission network … will provide sound long-term governance and planning.” Planning? Government or market? Why central planning by unelected bureaucrats and technocrats where we can least afford it? They go on to state, scarily, that this “open-access transmission network” will enable and accelerate the energy transition in Alaska.
Further justification for this bill reads:
The electric transmission system that provides electricity from Homer to Fairbanks serves more than 70% of our population along a 700 mile-long corridor. This system, however, is challenged with insufficient transfer capacity, outdated technology, and inefficient pricing, all of which threaten reliability and prevent new, diverse generation sources from serving ratepayers at the lowest possible cost.
The open-access idea is for Independent Power Producers (IPPs) to come onto the grid and provide power without paying for fees and upgrades required. ACEP’s presentation suggests we should adopt Texas’s methodology to “pool backbone transmission system costs and allocate those costs based on a coincident peak or load share ratio basis.” After-all, Texas (the state most hampered by government intervention) had it all right during the historical energy crisis from Winter Storm Uri. These policies in Texas actually cost blood. Must we follow?
The bill amends the statute that defines what a utility can request rate changes for. It adds clarification that the RCA “may” consider diversity of energy supply, promotion of load growth or enhanced energy reliability or security in determining if an electric utility’s rate is just and reasonable. Non distinctly it erodes and redefines the RCA’s mission which is to “Ensure that safe, efficient, and reliable utility and pipeline services are provided to the public at just and reasonable rates, thereby protecting consumer interests and promoting economic development.”
Our utilities are working in collusion with NGOs and ENGOs that promote decarbonization over affordability and reliability. Compromised utility board members will waste no time using this change in statute to gaslight everyone around them into believing this is what is best for them.
Senate Bill 257 stands up and transfers power to yet another bureaucracy, the Railbelt Transmission Organization (RTO), and gives them the right to identify and transfer assets that may fall under the ownership of our member-owned co-ops. The bill states the transfer of management of assets to the RTO shall be done on or before July 1, 2026. If they do not transfer the management of the assets, they will be subject to fines as determined by the RCA.
This bill appears to remove a lot of the duties originally granted to the Electric Reliability Organization (ERO). It repeals the ERO tariff, which we are currently paying for (see ERO surcharge on your power bill). It removes the entire ERO Integrated Resource Planning statute and sets out the ability for the RTO to establish tariffs related to the backbone transmission system. Upon RCA approval, it creates a revenue mechanism so the RTO can recover costs for their central planning services – to the tune of over $4M per year for agenciesestimated. It is unclear what will happen with the existing ERO, the Railbelt Reliability Council (RRC).
Their continued presence is mentioned in the bill and clarifies their responsibility is to “ensure the stable operation of the interconnect bulk-electric system served by the ERO and specifically require coordination with the RTO when developing reliability standards.” It is also unclear how the board seats of the RRC will evolve as the RTO states it will have representatives from each of the Railbelt utilities. The RRC has co-op members on their board today. Utility rate payers sure pay a lot of money for their executives to facilitate central planning and energy transitions to be done to us.
Public testimony is scheduled for Friday, April 5th at 1:30 PM in the Senate Labor and Commerce Committee. Oppose the creation of another state-owned enterprise.
Email the committee at Senate.Labor.And.Commerce@akleg.gov.
You can also submit a 50 word Public Opinion Message (POM) to the committee through the AK Leg website.
If the makers of this bill are heartfelt about the sales pitch and propaganda behind “reliable and affordable,” we propose an amendment that calls for repeal of this bill when it does not deliver as promised, and that promise is an overall reduction in cost to ratepayers and demonstrated increase of reliability. Similar to United States Senator Lisa Murkowski’s carbon tariff, PROVE IT act, we call this the PROVE IT amendment to demand performance for all of the empty promises to come.
Legislative Scoring
To summarize – this bill is a monstrosity. This as demonstrated in the detailed legislative scoring:
The score for this bill in its present state is a -8 with -9 being the worst, 0 neutral and +9 being the best in the way of freedom and liberty.
1. Expand/Contract Government?
Does it create, expand or enlarge an agency, board or function/activity of government? Conversely, does it reduce the size/scope of government?
Does it give the government any new/expanded power to prohibit, restrict or regulate the free market? Conversely, does it eliminate/reduce govt intervention in the free market?
Score -1. The RTO will be a state-owned enterprise under the Alaska Energy Authority. Central planning is government free market interference. This sets up the framework for authoritarianism to make people do things they might not want to do. This is especially dangerous when this control can be used against the people. This legislation unfairly games power production, instituting fraud on a massive scale that IPPs are reliable and affordable. It places too many aspects of our economy and infrastructure and capital in the hands of unelected bureaucrats.
3. Create / Remove Barriers to Enter Market?
Does it increase barriers to entry into the market? Conversely, does it remove barriers to market entry?
Score -1. It creates a lobsided playing field. If it was an open market, you would not make rate payers pay for the infrastructure and entry fees of Independent Power Producers to come onto the grid. This is taking the open market and subjecting it to corrupt crony controls. This is being setup by people calling themselves “stakeholders” when in reality they are nothing but rent seeking grifters. This bill is not removing barriers, it just makes someone else pay for them. If we were removing barriers, no power producers would be subjected to taxes and fees. Additionally, it creates expense for existing generators to make up for the expense of the IPPs. Voltage and frequency are stable when controlled by the utilities. The IPPs show up when we don’t need them, they don’t show up when they are needed most, and the utilities bear the brunt of thermal cycling. These decisions to prop up a market that doesn’t exist are placed in the hands of unelected bureaucrats that are not responsible to the rate payer.
4. Increase Taxes, Fees, Etc.
Direct/Indirect increase of taxes, fees/assessments? Conversely, does it reduce them?
Score -1. Section 5 repeals the Electric Reliability Organization’s Railbelt Reliability Council tariff and moves it over to state control to allow for the creation of yet another middleman, the RTO. Per the bill the “RTO is also given the authority to purchase, lease or acquire backbone transmission assets; construct, own, and operate new transmission assets; establish tariffs subject to the approval of the RCA” We see this charge on our electric bill currently, see “ERO Surcharge.” The only problem that we have today with energy transmission are the problems created by instituting the IRA to facilitate installation of IPP renewables and storage to enable them. These are solutions in search of a problem. The state has no business inserting itself into the process of picking winners and losers. This bill is wholesale state takeover and consolidation of power distribution assets where the RTO gets to “identify existing backbone transmission assets and that the Railbelt utilities will transfer management of those assets to the RTO by July 1, 2026.” The ERO Surcharge on your electric bill is only just the beginning.
5. Increase Govt Spending?
Does it increase govt spending or debt? Conversely, does it reduce govt spending/debt?
Does it grow government by displacing the private sector in the market? Conversely, does it eliminate or return a function of government to the private sector?
Score -1. Our co-ops are the private sector. This legislation is building up a giant co-op for the state. This legislation takes away the review and ownership from the utilities. The utilities will be nothing more than a billing entity that will not be able to determine its fate to properly serve their customers. Assets will be transferred to the state. Rate payers will lose control and representation of the decision-making process because it will be in the hands of the unelected and appointed bureaucrats. Revenues to be used to build and maintain utility reliability today will be spent on increased operations and maintenance costs caused by IPPs tomorrow.
7. Govt Redist. of Wealth Tax Policy Reward Special Interests
Does it increase govt. redistribution of wealth? Tax policy to reward special interests/businesses/govt. employees. Conversely does it decrease govt. redistribution?
Score -1. The major component of this bill aims to remove fees for IPPs to come onto the grid without paying for the upgrades needed for them to do so. The bill sets up a framework that would not need to exist if not for bureaucrats and special interests chasing federal dollars to “Upgrade” the grid for the allowance of more renewables. It shifts system reliability, operation and maintenance costs that shouldn’t exist to rate and taxpayers to enable opportunistic grifters to further take advantage of them for subsidies and credits while falsely claiming to be cheap and reliable.
8. Restrict Public Access to Information?
Does it restrict public access to information related to govt. activity or reduce accountability? Conversely, does it increase government transparency/accountability?
Score 0. Although this bill doesn’t restrict public access related to government activity, this bill adds layers of complexity to an already complex energy system. It reduces accountability to the utility and the utility boards that represents the rate payer when the state creates laws whose sole purpose is to consolidate power for the executive branch. How many different alphabet agencies need to be involved? The Railbelt Reliability Council, the Alaska Energy Authority, Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority, Regulatory Commission of Alaska, our local utilities and now the Railbelt Transmission Organization. Undoubtedly this complexity erodes effective public access to information. Interestingly, non-governmental organizations have more access and influence than private citizens, they are writing legislation and invited in as expert testimony to support what they authored. Right now if people wanted to be involved they can and would be through participating in their co-ops. How will it that look now with bureaucrats managing the process? This rating could very well be -1.
9. Violate U.S. Constitution or Alaska Constitution
Does it violate the spirit or the letter of either the U.S. Constitution or the Alaska Constitution? Conversely, does it uphold either of those constitutions?
Score -1. Through section ten, the RTO has the right to identify and transfer assets that may fall under the ownership of Railbelt utilities over to the state. The Railbelt utilities shall transfer management of those assets to the RTO on or before July 1, 2026. If the Railbelt utility does not transfer management of backbone transmission assets, they will be subject to fines. This is seizure of private assets. Our forefathers never foresaw the problem we are having with the federal reserve and inflation – inflation is the mother of all taxes. This legislation would not exist if not for inflationary fed dollars. The IRA was written to morph and take over the state with massive subsidies for renewables and restriction on generation that we could be utilizing our abundant resources. This legislation is also in conflict with the Alaska Constitution Article 8 – “It is the policy of the State to encourage the settlement of its land and the development of its resources by making them available for maximum use consistent with the public interest.”
Total Score -8.
Please see the energy bills on the docket to be scored along with the ratings here
Wyoming has vast resources of coal, oil and natural gas. With 40% of the nation’s coal resources, the state has been the United States’ top producer since 1986, primarily from the Powder River Basin located in the northeastern part of the state. It is also a national leader in the production of oil and natural gas, ranking in the top 10 in production of both products.
Yet, even though the Wyoming economy is heavily dependent on the mining and extraction of fossil fuels, its governor, Mark Gordon, has adopted a strong “decarbonization” policy. The science tells us that this is not a winning strategy for the people of Wyoming.
We also sent a team of climate experts from the CO2 Coalition, including Dr. William Happer, Dr. Byron Soepyan and Gregory Wrightstone to Wyoming to provide the facts concerning the huge benefits of carbon dioxide. This team presented the science at a hearing of the Wyoming Senate Agriculture Committee (pictured above.)
The team also presented accurate science regarding Wyoming’s climate to students at Gillette College, Laramie County Community College, and at the University of Wyoming.
Temperature Data Shows Good News for Wyoming
Data for Wyoming contradict the 4th National Climate Assessment (NCA4) assertion that “the frequency and intensity of extreme high temperature events are virtually certain to increase.”
Our data analysis shows that high daily temperatures peaked during the Dust Bowl years of the 1930s and have been in a 90-year decline. This is confirmed by reviewing the percentage of days that were reported to be hotter than 100°F (37.8°C) by Wyoming temperature stations. There is no discernible increase, and the largest numbers occurred in the first half of the 20th century when CO2 levels were 70% of recent measurements.
There has been, however, a beneficial increase in the minimum nighttime temperatures, which has led to a lengthening of the Wyoming growing season. Since the late 1800s, these nighttime temperatures have increased about 2°F (1.1°C).
The slight increase of about 1.2°F (0.7°C) in the average temperature in the last 120 years is being driven by reductions in extreme cold rather than increases in extreme heat.
The recent proposal by Wyoming Governor Mark Gordon to use “carbon capture” to achieve what he terms “negative net zero” (Gordon 2021) is based on a flawed theory that increasing CO2 in the atmosphere is leading to harmful effects on Wyoming’s environment and its people. Within this report, we have documented that modest warming and increasing carbon dioxide are clearly beneficial for the Cowboy State’s ecosystems and citizenry.
The data tell us the following:
• Current levels of carbon dioxide are at near historically low concentrations. • Adjustments to historic temperature records have artificially amplified modern warming. • Wyoming temperatures have increased a modest 1.2°F (0.7°C) since 1895. • Heat waves peaked in the 1930s and have been in slight decline since that period. • Nightime low temperatures have increased, lengthening growing seasons. • Precipitation data, while varying greatly from year-to-year, show no increasing or decreasing trend. • Droughts are not increasing in Wyoming. • Severe weather and natural disasters are declining. • Agricultural production, globally and in Wyoming, is thriving due to modest warming and more CO2. • Vegetation in Wyoming and around the world is increasing. • Greenhouse-induced warming that would be averted (< 0.003°F) by eliminating Wyoming’s CO2 emissions would be too small to measure and achieved, if at all, at enormous cost. • Models used to project future temperatures significantly overpredict the amount of warming in coming decades.
Innovation Zero 2024, set for April 30-May 1, is the largest net zero conference in the United Kingdom, a nation that has opted to keep nuclear energy in its “green” portfolio. The government-sponsored event “provides a meeting place for announcements, partnerships, deal-making, and collaborations for those who develop, produce, deploy, and fund low-carbon solutions.”
Just two of the 40 speakers at the Innovation Zero 2024 Energy Forum will represent the nuclear energy industry – Michael Hewitt, CEO of Allied Nuclear Partners, and James Walker, CEO of NANO Nuclear Technology, which is also a cosponsor. Both the UK and the U.S. are bullish on nuclear energy as part of their decarbonization programs.
In a very positive review of the nuclear industry, National Public Radio quoted Tennessee Valley Authority President and CEO Jeff Lyash, “You can’t significantly reduce carbon emissions without nuclear power.”
Likewise, Columbia Climate School dean Jason Bordoff questioned California’s plans to abandon nuclear energy. In his view, “We have to incorporate nuclear energy in a way that acknowledges it’s not risk-free” while admitting that “the risks of falling short of our climate goals exceed the risks of including nuclear energy.”
Today, there are no small or even micro nuclear reactors in operation in the U.S. or Europe even though these two technologies are the supposed “wave of the future.”
Walker admits that public sentiment for nuclear energy is the highest in decades. People should know, he said, that “nuclear” combines zero carbon emissions with 24/7/365 reliability. Nuclear leads all energy sources in fewest deaths per trillion kilowatt-hours of generation. Moreover, nuclear is the only large-scale energy-producing technology required to take full responsibility for all its waste and that fully includes waste management in its costs of operation.
A year ago, Casey Crownheart posed the question, “We were promised smaller nuclear reactors; where are they?” Crownheart said small modular reactors (SMRs), both cheaper and safer than full-sized reactors, could solve some major challenges of traditional nuclear power. NuScale in early 2023 was the first to receive final federal approval for its SMR design, but operational SMRs are still years from deployment.
In the UK, Rolls Royce is developing large-sized SMRs to supply the national grid, cities, towns, and possibly massive industrial processing facilities (chemical plants, for example) that require huge amounts of power. Microreactors are designed to serve a largely different clientele, such that SMRs are a complementary, rather than a competing, technology.
Even more than SMRs, microreactors are fast becoming the rage among those seeking to decarbonize energy generation. Microreactor designs allow them to operate as part of the electric grid, independently of the grid, or as part of a microgrid to generate up to 20 megawatts of thermal energy for both electricity generation and heat for industrial applications.
Walker was effusive about the “huge potential” for microreactors, starting with the “tens of thousands of mining operations running on diesel fuel.” Microreactors are 100 to 1,000 times smaller than conventional nuclear reactors and considerably smaller than SMRs. Most are designed to be portable, and many can be hauled from site to site in a semi-tractor trailer.
This combination of reliability and operational flexibility makes microreactors an attractive choice at many, especially remote, locations that today rely on diesel generators. Pursuant to a contract awarded in 2022, BWX Technologies, Inc., is scheduled to deliver the first advanced, transportable, nuclear microreactor prototype in the U.S. later this year for testing at the Idaho National Laboratory.
The potential customer base for these tiny reactors includes deployable mobile reactors, remote industrial and manufacturing projects, current and previously uneconomic mining sites, oil and gas projects, military bases, remote towns and communities, and small islands. Another valuable application is supplying emergency power following catastrophic events (tsunamis, earthquakes, hurricanes).
Walker noted that returning uneconomic mines to viability using inexpensive, clean energy creates the potential to free up huge deposits of mineral wealth. This is especially true for African nations whose huge mineral wealth is concentrated at locations inaccessible to existing electricity grids. Moreover, microreactors do not need daily supplies of diesel fuel.
Market research, said Walker, has identified over 100 remote settlements in Canada that today run exclusively on diesel fuel. Similarly, many countries – the Philippines, Indonesia, and Thailand, among others – have numerous small islands that rely on diesel fuel. Microreactors can also service electric vehicle charging stations.
Another major area for potential growth is the shipping industry. The U.S. Navy has for decades powered aircraft carriers and submarines with nuclear fuel without incident and without carbon emissions. Yet oil tankers, shipping container vessels, and other large ships all use high-polluting bunker fuel. If the Navy can rely on nuclear energy, so can these ships.
The resurgence of interest in nuclear energy has prompted funding opportunities from both the federal government and private industry, but there are disconnects. The Department of Energy, says Walker, has allocated over a billion dollars this year toward rebuilding the U.S. nuclear infrastructure, with a primary strategy favoring supply-chain continuity.
The recent DOE enrichment RFP required bidders to have established relationships stretching from mining (or sourcing) of the uranium ore through conversion to enrichment, but this requirement alone excludes most nuclear energy system developers.
On the industry side, mining companies, tech companies, and large industrial processing companies are all examining and investing in nuclear solutions to power their operations with nuclear energy – but none are investing in early-stage prospective technologies. Instead, significant existing development supported by an established company with a strong technical workforce is a precondition for prospective partnerships.
On the positive side, said Walker, cryptocurrency miners have begun looking at nuclear energy to generate the massive power for mining economic quantities of cryptocurrencies. AI and data center companies are also looking at nuclear energy to power their operations, especially at remote locations. No prominent nuclear energy company has funded its development with cryptocurrencies, but this may soon change.
Walker says that NANO’s microreactors are expected to begin demonstration and physical test work this year. The hope is that working prototypes will be ready by 2027, with full licensing process by 2030. Manufacturing facilities would be constructed during the licensing phase to enable prompt deployment upon approval.
The best scenario would be that the regulators issue a general permit for the reactor design so that multiple reactors could be deployed, moved to new locations, and piggybacked as needed without additional regulatory delays.
The best business model, says Walker, keeps the manufacturer as owner and operator of the reactors, selling power to customers. Dozens of microreactors can be operated from a central control room, employing only a few onsite personnel. This keeps operating and power costs low and ensures that the manufacturer retains responsibility for operation and maintenance, decommissioning, and liability insurance.
In sum, as development of microreactors continues, the primary hurdle may not be on the manufacturing end. Adapting the nuclear regulatory framework to accommodate microreactors, perhaps with a general permit structure, could be the key to revolutionizing electricity generation for industry, remote communities, and other applications without straining the electric grid or building massive new transmission infrastructure.
And that, said Walker, is what makes microreactors ideal for a green future.
Residential and commercial buildings throughout the United States are in the bull’s eye of a White House plan “intended to help move the building sector to net-zero emissions.”
A “pre-decisional” draft quietly circulating since December outlines the vast scope of an initiative aimed at nothing less than the decarbonization of one of the nation’s largest economic sectors.
“A broadly accepted minimum definition of a zero-emissions building, as well as a pathway for documentation, is foundational to efforts by public and private entities to transition the building sector to zero greenhouse gas emissions,” the draft states. “The intent of the National Definition of a Zero Emissions Building is to create a standardized, consistent, measurable basis for zero emissions buildings.”
“This clear market signal and consistent target, backed by measurable data, is intended to help move the building sector to zero emissions,” the White House draft continues. “The definition may serve as a framework that users can achieve through multiple pathways to influence the design and operation of buildings to substantially reduce building sector emissions.”
And which buildings are to be included in this definition? “This definition can be applied to existing buildings and to new construction of non-federally owned buildings,” the White House explains. “The definition applies to whole building operational emissions, including those from tenants.”
To meet the administration’s net-zero emissions criteria, a building must be highly energy efficient, free of on-site emissions from energy use, and powered solely from “clean energy,” defined as “carbon-free sources.”
Verification of each building’s compliance with the zero-emissions regime is a key element of the Biden program. “EPA’s ENERGY STAR Portfolio Manager will generate standardized documentation that can be independently verified through licensed professionals and/or third-party certification bodies or others as determined by organizations using the zero-emissions building definition.”
A Roadmap to Control
Anyone wishing to know how the administrative state seizes power needs look no further than the White House’s net-zero building emissions plan. It starts with a “broadly accepted minimum definition of a zero-emissions building … to transition the building sector to zero greenhouse gas emissions.” The White House fails to say by whom the definition is “broadly accepted” but quickly moves on to a scheme that will put the federal government in every building – existing and not yet constructed – in every community in the country.
Several well-trodden pathways are at its disposal, including regulation of fossil-fuel sources of energy that might otherwise make their way into buildings. Another is EPA’s ENERGY STAR Portfolio Manager, who is accountable to absolutely no one but nevertheless has the power to generate standardized documentation that can be “independently verified” by third parties with a financial stake in the net-zero program. The White House draft places no restrictions on the size of the buildings subject to the program, meaning even smaller structures could fall under its net.
Building Codes
The administration’s move comes amid a nationwide fight — playing out in such places as North Carolina, Michigan, and Idaho — over efforts to adopt “climate-friendly” building codes at the state and local levels. Climate advocates, often under the banner of energy efficiency, demand that building codes for homes be updated to include thicker insulation, super airtight windows, and upgraded wiring to accommodate all-electric appliances and in-home chargers for EVs.
With home prices already at record-high levels, the 140,000 members of the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) are mobilizing against state and local efforts to enact what are said to be more energy- efficient building codes for residences. Last year, NFIB’s North Carolina affiliate successfully lobbied against a Tarheel State plan to tighten energy efficiency standards designed to lower the carbon footprint of residential buildings. Ron Jackson, a home builder in predominantly rural Moore County, worried that the code would put the affordable housing he specializes in out of reach for nurses, police officers, and teachers.
“All that energy code was going to do in my price range is make it where the working man and woman would not be able to buy a home,” he toldThe Washington Post (Feb. 25). Jackson, who sells homes in the $250,000 range, cited figures from NAHB’s North Carolina affiliate, saying the code would add $20,000 to the price of such a home.
What the White House says is merely a “definition” of a zero-emission building won’t stay a definition for long. It will be a launching pad for regulations – ideally at the federal, state, and local levels – that mandate which materials can go into a green building. Politically connected purveyors of those materials stand to profit handsomely from this arrangement.
On the other hand, prospective home buyers, particularly those on a tight budget, will ultimately pay the price exacted by the administrative regulatory state and its partners, the climate cartel.
The “energy transition” depends on massive expansions of our high-voltage transmission grid. But capacity additions are falling, and per-mile costs and utility product costs are soaring.
Proponents of the much-hyped “energy transition” frequently claim that rapid decarbonization of the electricity sector can only be achieved with huge expansions of America’s high-voltage transmission grid. We are told those expansions, totaling tens of thousands of miles of new capacity, must be completed in the next decade or two.
But there’s a terawatt-size disconnect between the rhetoric and the reality. America isn’t building anything close to the amount of high-voltage transmission capacity that the wind promoters, solar advocates, and spreadsheet jockeys claim is needed. Indeed, the latest numbers from Atlanta-based C Three Group show that the amount of new high-voltage transmission (230kV and above) built annually in the United States is flat or declining. Furthermore, the cost of building new high-voltage capacity and the components needed to expand the electric grid is skyrocketing. Meanwhile, all across rural America, transmission projects are facing fierce resistance from local communities and some Native American tribes. Let’s take a look.
In 2023, the U.S. added about 1,251 miles of new high-voltage capacity. That’s significantly below the average number of miles added to the U.S. power grid over the past two decades. According to C Three, which has the best information on transmission trends in the U.S., about 1,677 miles of new high-voltage capacity was added annually to the grid between 2008 and 2023.
As seen in the graphic above, new capacity additions peaked in 2013, when Texas completed the CREZ lines, a system of HV lines spanning some 3,600 miles. That $7 billion project is significant because the CREZ lines were all built intrastate. That is, they didn’t cross any state boundaries, which made the permitting process much easier. In addition, Texas has very little federal land and relatively few state parks.
Costs are also soaring. Before diving into those numbers, reviewing the hype is essential. Last February, in the original “Out Of Transmission” published in these pages, I explained that billionaire investor John Doerr, who has funded a “sustainability” school at Stanford University and is giving hundreds of millions of dollars to climate activist groups, claims we need enormous expansions of the grid to accommodate more wind and solar projects.
In his 2021 book Speed & Scale: An Action Plan for Solving Our Climate Crisis Now, Doerr lays out what he calls “Key Emission Reduction Policies” including a clean electricity standard that could, in theory anyway, cut emissions by at least 50% by 2025 and 100% by 2040. In what amounts to a footnote, Doerr explains that his modeling assumes “a doubling of the transmission system above business as usual.” But Doerr didn’t deign to explain how that doubling will happen.
Independent estimates indicate that we need to expand electricity transmission systems by 60% by 2030, and may need to triple it by 2050 to meet the country’s increase in renewable generation and expanding electrification needs.”
Also, in February 2023, the Department of Energy released the “National Transmission Needs Study,” which claims the U.S. needs to build 47,300 gigawatt-miles of new power lines by 2035. The study didn’t define gigawatt-miles. But it did say that “in future scenarios with moderate load but high clean energy assumptions,” the U.S. will need “a 57% growth in today’s transmission system.” Given that the current grid has about 240,000 miles of high-voltage capacity, that would require building roughly 136,000 miles of new capacity. The same report says, “By 2040, new transmission deployment is projected between 100,000 and 185,000 GW-mi (115,000 GW-mi median), a doubling in size of today’s transmission system.”
Last November, Jesse Jenkins, who heads the Zero Lab at Princeton University, told Utility Dive that “By 2035 alone we’re going to need to add about 75,000 miles of high voltage transmission lines, enough to run from New York City to Los Angeles and back 15 times…That sounds like a lot for a country not used to building big things. But we have built big things in the past, this is not unprecedented, and shouldn’t be viewed as impossible.”
Jenkins may be correct that it “shouldn’t be viewed as impossible.” But the odds of the U.S. building 75,000 miles of new high-voltage transmission over the next 10 years are, as my father used to say, “slim and none, and Slim left town.”
The math here is so simple even a Ph.D. could do it. Jenkins claims the U.S. must build 75,000 miles of transmission in 10 years, or 7,500 miles per year. But there’s no precedent — none — for adding that much capacity. Indeed, constructing that much new transmission would require a four-fold increase in the average number of line miles built annually since 2008. Furthermore, that pace of new capacity would have to be sustained for a decade.
The hard truth about the alt-energy/net-zero/energy transition hype is that almost no one — including Doerr, DOE, Jenkins, reporters at big media outlets, pundits, and others — has bothered to do the math. They did not calculate how much transmission we are building every year or how long it may take to achieve significant expansions of the power grid. In other words, it’s easy to talk about adding transmission capacity. But building high-power lines is hard. Really hard. And the cost of building them is soaring.
According to C Three, recently acquired by Yes Energy, each mile of new high-voltage capacity added to the grid in 2023 cost about $3.95 million. As seen in the figure above, that’s nearly triple the per-mile cost recorded in 2008. During a recent phone interview, C Three’s president and founder, Jean Reaves Rollins, told me that “a big chunk” of the surge in costs “is due to the soaring cost of acquiring right of way and dealing with permits and regulatory compliance.” Rollins, who has worked in the utility sector for decades, said building any high-power infrastructure is challenging. For instance, installing a 345kV substation, she said, can take three to five years. It requires experienced linemen, engineers, and lots of heavy equipment. “These big infrastructure projects don’t happen quickly. The grid is enormously complex,” she said. “It requires hundreds of suppliers and a lot of complicated engineering, not to mention acquiring rights of way.”
Rollins is doubtful that significant quantities of new greenfield transmission will be built in the next few years. “About the only way to add new capacity today is to upgrade the existing high-voltage transmission line you have,” she said.
In addition to the cost and difficulty of acquiring rights of way, electric utilities across the country are seeing staggering cost increases in the products they need to maintain and upgrade the grid. Matt Brandrup, the CEO of the Wisconsin-based Rural Electric Supply Cooperative, recently sent me the latest information on price increases for commodities like conductor and transformers.
Brandrup, who was on the Power Hungry Podcast last March, told me that “RESCO’s 2023 average electric utility product cost inflation rate on the distribution and transmission products we sell (transformers, underground/overhead conductor, related hardware, poles, etc) finished at just over 10%.” He noted that over the past three years, “Transformers (single-phase transformers that feed the homes and small business and the larger three-phase transformers that feed the larger businesses and industrial type of loads) have all increased by 50 to 75% depending upon the manufacturer.” He continued, noting that the cost of primary underground conductor, the wire used in main underground circuits, has jumped by 50%, and the cost of overhead conductor (the wire used to feed pole-mounted transformers) has increased by 45%.
As seen above, utility product costs have climbed steadily since 2017. Brandrup broke down the impact of this inflation on electric coops and other electricity providers. “A $10,000,000 work plan budget (total cost of materials purchased by that member) in 2020 would now cost our member $14,800,000 in 2024 if they purchased the same exact material,” he said.
In addition to the construction and cost issues, transmission projects are being hindered by local opposition. In my May 26, 2023 piece, “47,300 Gigawatt-Miles From Nowhere,” I wrote about the 345 kV Cardinal-Hickory Creek transmission project that aims to move juice from Iowa to Wisconsin. That 102-mile project, which initiated public involvement in 2014, is now 98% complete. But it has been delayed by multiple legal challenges and is expected to cost $500 million, or roughly $5 million per mile, far more than the $3.9 million figure I cited above. The project includes 1.3 miles of wire that cross the Mississippi National Wildlife and Fish Refuge. In 2021, several conservation groups sued to stop the project. A lawyer for the plaintiffs explained the litigation is “really an effort to preserve our public conservation lands from encroachment from massive transmission lines and pipelines.”
In October, in an embarrassing move, the Bureau of Land Management rescinded approval of the Rock Creek Wind Gen-Tie transmission line in southeast Wyoming after the Albany County Conservancy sued it. As reported in Cowboy State Daily, the line:
Was proposed to connect the Rock Creek Wind project to two larger transmission lines that will carry wind energy out of Wyoming. The lawsuit claimed the approval process was improperly done, without required public notification and without opportunities for public participation, including public comments. All of that is required as part of the National Environmental Policy Act.
Last month, the San Carlos Apache tribe, Tohono O’odham Nation, the Center for Biological Diversity, and Tucson-based Archaelogy Southwest sued to stop the construction of a $10 billion high-voltage transmission project that aims to connect a wind project in New Mexico to consumers in southern Arizona. The groups filed suit in federal court alleging that the U.S. Bureau of Land Management failed to comply with federal statutes when it approved the 500-kV SunZia Southwest Transmission Project. The 32-page complaint alleges the $8 billion project will cause “serious, irreversible adverse effects on Tribal cultural sites and sacred areas, including areas with human remains.” They are seeking a restraining order or injunction to stop the project and require federal agencies to adhere to the provisions of the National Historic Preservation Act and Administrative Procedures Act.
On February 6, two Minnesota counties — Meeker and Chippewa — adopted one-year moratoriums on wind and solar projects because local regulators were concerned that the projects would result in the construction of transmission lines across their counties.
I could cite many more examples of the opposition to transmission here. But the punchline here is obvious: the high-voltage grid is expanding very slowly, the costs associated with it are soaring, and the opposition to such a vast expansion is real and growing.
These facts indicate that the “energy transition” to a grid mainly powered by far-flung wind and solar projects will not happen. That means we must use the existing rights of way and wires to the fullest extent possible. I will close by repeating what I wrote last year in “47,300 Gigawatt-Miles From Nowhere.” I explained we won’t see a quick expansion of the high-voltage grid:
Because of the physical limits on the system. Given these limits, policymakers aiming to decarbonize the electric sector should be looking at ways to utilize existing infrastructure, including wires and transformers, by building new nuclear plants on the sites where coal- or gas-fired power plants are being retired. That’s what TerraPower hopes to do in Kemmerer, Wyoming and other locations. In short, the electric grid we have today is largely the electric grid we are going to have. We should not be spending hundreds of billions of dollars to build a grid designed to accommodate the low power density of weather-dependent renewables like wind and solar. Instead, we should be building high-power-density, weather-resilient generation that can exploit our existing grid. That, of course, means nuclear energy.
What I wrote last May still applies today. If we are serious about reducing CO2 emissions from the electric sector, that means building lots and lots of nuclear reactors. Building lots of new nuclear won’t be cheap, quick, or easy. But it will be far more manageable (and probably more affordable) than trying to string tens of thousands of miles of new transmission lines across the American West.
As one digests Rupert Darwall’s latest report for the RealClear Foundation, the well-known quote from Spanish philosopher George Santayana might ring through the mind: “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”
Anyone looking to combat the activists pushing a ‘net zero’ agenda here in the U.S. would be wise to read Darwall’s piece, entitled “The Folly of Climate Leadership.”
The analysis tells the story of Great Britain heeding the cries for decarbonization, starting when Parliament wrote an 80% decrease in emissions target into law in 2008. They raised it to 100% – or “net zero” – in 2019. The results have clearly been catastrophic.
Since decarbonization efforts commenced, Britain’s economy has grown at half the rate as it did from 1990-2008. According to a research study from noted British economic historian Nicholas Crafts, that’s the second-worst period of British peacetime growth since 1780.
In addition to the economic malaise, British energy prices have skyrocketed, and Britons are now concerned with how to survive the effect of those costs on their wallets, as they look to heat and power their homes and businesses, travel for work and pleasure and live life as best they can.
The differences between British energy costs and those here in the U.S. are staggering: Britons paid an average of $228 per megawatt hour (MWh) for electricity generated from coal in 2022, whereas Americans paid an average of $27 per MWh. For natural gas, 2022 saw Britons paying $251 per MWh, versus American consumers averaging $61 per MWh for their power.
Darwall’s report also highlights the effects of unchecked and anti-market driven government investment in ‘green’ energy on grid reliability, as intermittent production from wind and solar – coupled with a lack of utility-grade energy storage – dropped electricity generated per gigawatt of capacity falling 28% since 2009.
The same arguments that have crippled Britain’s economy are now being used by the Biden Administration here at home, with zealots in Cabinet-level positions – including Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm, Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, and EPA Director Michael Regan – pushing the message from their bully pulpits.
The recent – and completely misnamed – Inflation Reduction Act passed by Congress provided the zealots with nearly $400 billion to dole out to supportive organizations and start-ups to jump-start our nation’s push for ‘net zero.’ Those dollars – doled out with few oversights or performance metrics attached in many cases – have produced very few wins in the last year, unless a win is measured in keeping political cronies happy and rich.
Consider: wind energy projects in Nebraska, Colorado, Rhode Island, Connecticut, and New Jersey were scrapped last year, even after untold millions of federal dollars went to their developers. Over 100 solar companies went bankrupt, and solar projects from California to Florida were shuttered in the middle of their development. Battery storage – a key component to offsetting the intermittency of wind and solar – also saw projects stalled, along with at least one lawsuit filed against a storage company when its solution failed.
Despite the perils of ‘green’ energy dependence shown throughout Europe, the eco-left continues to double down on ridding America of traditional energy sources. Supporting those efforts are ideologue billionaires, who continue to fund net-zero initiatives.
Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg has given well over $1 billion of his personal wealth to the Sierra Club to fund its “Beyond Coal” and “Beyond Carbon” campaigns. Designed to rid the U.S. of every coal-fired power plant by 2030, the Sierra Club/Bloomberg partnership has succeeded in shutting down nearly two-thirds of the plants to-date, with most of the remaining in rural locations, including my home state of Alaska, where alternatives to existing coal plants in the state’s interior don’t readily exist. Without coal, countless Alaskans would have their livelihoods – and very lives – threatened during our long, dark and sub-zero-temperature winters.
With activists entrenched in government bureaucracy, zealots running government agencies and rich men (and women) funding these efforts, only those educated in historical failures of decarbonization – and willing to stand up and fight back against the climate warriors – stand a chance of helping stem the attacks. Darwall’s study should be required reading for anyone looking to build a fortress in their state against job-killing, family-harming decarbonization efforts.
Rick Whitbeck is the Alaska State Director for Power The Future, a national nonprofit organization that advocates for American energy jobs. Contact him at Rick@PowerTheFuture.com and follow him on X (formerly Twitter) @PTFAlaska
Republican Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti filed a consumer protection lawsuit Monday against BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager and a leading proponent of Environmental, Social and Corporate Governance (ESG) investing.
The consumer protection suit alleges that BlackRock has misled Tennessean consumers about the scale and impacts of its ESG initiatives for several years. The suit further alleges that BlackRock’s own policies and corporate voting records demonstrate that its ESG push bleeds into financial products that are marketed as non-ESG funds, despite the company’s statements that it allocates capital where its clients request as a fiduciary.
“We allege that BlackRock’s inconsistent statements about its investment strategies deprived consumers of the ability to make an informed choice,” Skrmetti said in a statement. “Some public statements show a company that focuses exclusively on return on investment, others show a company that gives special consideration to environmental factors. Ultimately, I want to make certain that corporations, no matter their size, treat Tennessee consumers fairly and honestly.” (RELATED: Jim Jordan Hits Major Financial Institutions With Subpoenas)
Nikki Haley Meets With BlackRock CEO Larry Fink, Other Wall Street Eliteshttps://t.co/2CHInqgu4g
BlackRock has more than $8 trillion in assets under management, according to the lawsuit. Because of its size and diverse holdings, the company has considerable influence over many American firms because of its large shareholder voting blocs, which Skrmetti alleges the company uses to push its own policies and preferences, including ESG policies that advance the decarbonization and climate agendas.
“We reject the Attorney General’s claims and will vigorously contest any accusations that BlackRock violated Tennessee’s consumer protection laws. Contrary to the Attorney General’s claims, BlackRock fully and accurately discloses our investment practices and our approach to proxy voting,” a BlackRock spokesperson told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “On behalf of our clients, BlackRock has invested approximately $40 billion in Tennessee, and we are helping more than 600,000 hard working Tennesseans retire with dignity. We are proud of our contribution and committed to the future in Tennessee.”
Many of BlackRock’s clients are institutional investors, including pension funds, endowments and foundations, official institutions, and financial institutions, according to the lawsuit.
“BlackRock has agreed to use all of the assets in their portfolio to push the net-zero agenda,” Will Hild, the executive director of Consumers’ Research, told the DCNF. “If you have a dollar invested in BlackRock, you’re invested in an ESG fund.”
Conservative officials have sharply criticized ESG investing in the past for injecting politicized considerations into the traditional model of investing, in which maximizing returns is the top priority.
BlackRock’s ESG investing has drawn the scrutiny of Republican state officials in the past as well. Several red states, such as Louisiana and Missouri, have divested tens of millions of dollars of state assets from the firm and some of its competitors that similarly promote ESG investment. More recently, BlackRock and several of its prominent competitors have been involved in a House Judiciary Committee investigation into potential collusive agreements to push ESG.
All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.
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Global warming, climate change, all these things are just a dream come true for politicians. I deal with evidence and not with frightening computer models because the seeker after truth does not put his faith in any consensus. The road to the truth is long and hard, but this is the road we must follow. People who describe the unprecedented comfort and ease of modern life as a climate disaster, in my opinion have no idea what a real problem is.
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