Commentary
“Look at my eyes. I guarantee you. I guarantee you; we’re going to end fossil fuels.” Candidate Joe Biden, September 6, 2019, New Castle, New Hampshire
President Biden’s approval of the Willow Project, the permits ConocoPhillips to drill in a tiny patch of the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska, is the good news.
The company expects it to produce some 180,000 barrels of oil each day at its peak. The increased production will prevent future shortages and reduce costs for consumers.
Good news also results from Biden’s decision to go ahead with the project in that complaints by left-wing environmentalists are answered. U.S. oil industry production is cleaner than that of other oil-producing countries. But don’t expect it to satisfy the left.
Leave it to Biden to sour the project. Finding it necessary to throw a bone to the environmentalists, he cut the scope of the project from five to three drilling sites. He also persuaded ConocoPhilliips to relinquish 60,000 other acreage in the Reserve.
Good or Bad?
Buried in an article about the failure of the Silicon Valley Bank was news of the bank’s commitment to fight climate change. SVB publicly committed $5 billion in “sustainable finance and carbon neutral operations to support a cleaner planet.”
SVB’s 2022 report lists a litany of cross section of groups, including a Sustainable Finance Group, that monitors implementation of operational greenhouse gas reduction initiatives under ESG (environmental, social and governance), with its mission of no funding for fossil fuel projects.
Since the bank’s risk management director position was left vacant, the remaining officers who approved those politically-motivated expenditures need to be held accountable. That’s good, but will the bank’s investment in ESG projects cause other financial institutions to wake up to woke?
The Anti-Oil Crowd
Those who seek the end of fossil fuels are proclaiming that oil and gas fields and coal mines owned by large energy firms will soon become worthless, stranded assets, as the transition to renewables continues.
They’re claiming it will necessitate the write-down of major, functioning assets and reserves reflected as assets on fossil energy companies’ balance sheets.
Just as ESB funding is encouraged, the left is warning investors in fossil fuel projects of the financial risks they face during the transition away from oil and gas.
Good News from Germany and the UK
That is, the fact that Germany’s consumer electricity rates are in now in the range of triple the U.S. average and likely to go to about four to five times higher is good news to those of us who disapprove of governments picking winners and losers in the energy sector. Good, because they are learning the hard way. We are beginning to see electric rates going up in the U.S., too.
In the UK, where the government has offered a 6,000-pound subsidy to families who install a heat pump, are so upset that they are having them removed because they can’t keep the homes warm. In the UK, heat pumps run on electricity at five times average U.S. rates.
More Good News …
Despite the government pressure to purchase electric vehicles, they still only make up about seven percent of all new vehicle purchases.
… and Bad News
While the news of the U.S. forking over millions of dollars for the installation of electric car charging stations may have been good news to purchasers of EV’s, it certainly wasn’t for us taxpayers footing the bill.
There’s more … Pete Buttigieg, obviously in over this head as Transportation Secretary, following a less than high pressure job as mayor of South Bend, Indiana, announced $2.5 billion in new grants for the installation of charging stations in underserved neighborhoods. It’s part of his equity plan.
Since residents there cannot afford to purchase an electric vehicle, he must be thinking those in upscale communities will drive to underserved areas to charge their vehicles. I wonder, will Pete be encouraging the building of hotel and restaurants, where people can go while their EVs are charging?
More Bad News
I haven’t supported the Biden administration’s $60 billion investment to deliver high-speed Internet to rural areas of the country. People choose to live in less-populated areas for a reason, mostly because of farming.
I’m sure you’ve heard this Biden tale: “Here in the United States of America, how many times have you seen a mom or a dad drive up to a parking lot outside a McDonald’s, just so they could get connected to the Internet, so their kid could do their homework. It’s just not right. It’s not who we are.”
Getting the same service from cities to rural areas requires the stretching of fiber-optic cables to those areas.
Here’s the catch … while there are utility poles carrying electric or telephone traffic in rural areas, they are owned by electric and phone companies that are not getting public money to build out broadband. They are in business just as cable firm is … to make money and satisfy their shareholders. Going underground? Sure, but who pays?
In a More Serious Vane
Bad news continues to emanate from Biden defense policy. With the delay in the shoot down of the Chinese balloon after it had completed extensive surveillance over our defense still in our memories, Russian jets took down one of our surveillance drones flying over international waters.
In his response to his Russian counterpart, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin’s get tough message was, the incident was part of a “pattern of unprofessional, aggressive, risky and unsafe actions by Russian pilots in international airspace.”
More Biden Nonsense
What could have been a good news story turned into a one that again brought laughter around the world, I am sure.
During a celebration of International Women’s Day, Secretary of State Antony Blinken presented the International Women Courage Award to …. wait for it … a transgender woman, a biological male. Still another “in your face” message.
The honoree, Alba Rueda, serves as Argentina’s special envoy for sexual orientation and gender identity. Of course, First Lady Jill Biden was on hand for hugs and kisses.
May God continue to bless the United States of America.
