While campaigning in 2019, Joe Biden guaranteed: “We’re going to end fossil fuels.”
What he didn’t say is that eliminating fossil fuels will create a troublesome scarcity of electricity. He also didn’t say that was part of the plan, even though it just might be.
Now with the power of the presidency behind him – again we ask, how could such a disastrous event happen? – Biden is just a few pages of paperwork away from forcing natural gas- and coal-fired power plants to sharply cut their greenhouse emissions. [emphasis, links added]
If the emission caps can’t be met, power plants will then have to adopt carbon capture technology, which is quite expensive.
Our friends at the Committee to Unleash Prosperity had an interesting response to the news.
“Ben Franklin,” they said, “is often heralded as the man who discovered the power of electricity. Joe Biden wants to be the president who abolished it.”
Output cuts that will be required under the proposed regime “are so stringent,” says the CTUP, that “fossil fuel plants – which supply around 65% of America’s power – would be technologically incapable of complying.”
The only way they will be able to stay open and generate power is if Americans’ utility bills are raised “dramatically.” If not, they close, and the power they produce is gone.
The administration knows this. The administration doesn’t care. The administration, driven by the hard-left zealots that run the Democratic Party, wants the rest of us to make do with less.
It’s the much same in California, where progressive politicians are committed to an unachievable target: As 2045 expires, all retail electricity sold in the state and used in government buildings must be produced by renewable resources, which are effectively limited to solar and wind.
Actually, the objective can be met. But there won’t be enough electricity to meet demand because the natural gas and nuclear power that’s taken offline won’t be fully replaced, so California is looking at a future of blackouts, rationing, and rates more punishing than they already are.
Either policymakers are aware of this and it doesn’t bother them, or they are completely inept and incapable of critical thinking.
We are naturally reminded of Ida Auken, the Social Democrat member of the Danish parliament, who in a World Economic Forum essay insisted that in the future we will own nothing and be happy.
The headline – “Welcome to 2030: I own nothing, have no privacy, and life has never been better” – made it clear that some powerful people are trying to turn the world into a commune that they of course will run.
In the U.S., Democrats see a country of 330 million as their sandbox. In addition to the proposed power plant rules, the administration has decided, with zero input from voters and no regard for the Constitution, that we will all one day be driving electric vehicles.
The White House’s plan isn’t the same as California’s mandate, which bans the sale of new internal-combustion engine cars and trucks beginning in 2035.
Biden is instead placing emissions limits on carmakers that are so strict that they will have no choice but make sure that two-thirds of their sales by 2032 will be EVs.
The political left has no regard for individualism or liberty and intends to take those away by any means possible.
Authoritarianism can start with small changes, but the Democrats are tired of incremental shifts and now are taking long leaps to reach their goal. They want it to be their world and we just live in it to serve them.
Read more at I&I
I am not sure the administration knows that forcing fossil fuel plants to shut down will result in a lack of electricity. It seems more likely that they truly believe “green energy” will work 24×7 to produce all the electricity needed. They are certain that forcing this onto the American people will result in some magical knew technology to show up in time for the electric grid to not fail. And that somehow batteries will be so awesome that the transportation system can be run on EVs.
Steve, some people commenting on this web site have stated that green energy will become cheaper (some say it already is) and that battery storage will improve dramatically. We must remember that the policy makers have no idea how the real world works especially when it comes to technology. So your assessment that they believe green energy will do the job is probably correct.
Basing our planning for the future on technology that doesn’t yet exist is planning for disaster. I have been involved in the development a number of very sophisticated aircraft. We always used existing technology.
David, I used to be a Reactor Operator on our nuclear subs. I can tell you that in developing new systems for the reactor control they always used technology that was stable and not anywhere near cutting edge. That’s because the designers wanted to ensure that it would work because all the kinks were worked out.
The idea that we could count on non-existing technology to run out modern society is a recipe for disaster. And as you say, these policy makers are totally ignorant on what it takes to run our society (same with the vast majority of the citizens). But they will boldly take us where we’ve never been before–well, actually our ancestors have in that they lived in hovels just trying to stay alive.
It would be a real crying shame if Sacramento were to suffer a complete blackout, say from 2PM to 6PM, three days in a row. If PG&E wanted to make a point, that might just do it. (Sub-station repair work perhaps?)
(What’s the bet that the various government offices have backup generators.)
A very good article providing a glimpse into the democrat created future.
It’s no wonder blue states are banning AR-15’s.
Do democrat voters have any idea what their party has in stall for them? I think not !!!!
Silly me. How can they. The (democrat) education system isn’t designed to help us to think…Just to – do as we are told.
Bidens polls continue to drop fast down to 41%
In 2006 Tony Juniper, then head of “Friends of the Earth” ,
told us that in the future we would be using only half the electricity that we were using then, what he omitted to say was that there would only be a half the power available to use!