Commenter Vindaloo Bugaboo (VB) nails the imperative question at TreeHugger leaving little wiggle room, which makes the Renewable Energy types howl, scream, and break Godwin’s Law. VB took all of the posts at Tree Hugger and wrapped it up into a single question that ANY Conservative should be asking:
“What’s the higher moral imperative preferred here on TreeHugger? Poverty and reduced living standards commensurate with lower emissions or higher carbon emissions and all the benefits of a modern society?”
Energy fuels our economies and our standard of living. Making energy more expensive, by forcing renewables upon us by Govt fiat, serves only as a means to control living standards – which is a proxy for “emissions” control.
Yes, “control” is what is at risk here – Govt controlling more and more of what we can or cannot do and choose for ourselves.
Now put the WuFlu “control” into play as well and even nominally “free” government has turned to the dark side. The intersection of the two is “it will be better for you in the end” as if we all, excluding the Ruling and Governing Class, are simply chess pieces to be moved around. Or, as Progressives visualize, simply cogs in their “social machine.” And who cares how many parts have to be replaced to finally make the perfect machine?
While Lloyd, the post author, is trying to live a 1.5 degree C lifestyle (which the UN’s IPCC says we ALL have to adopt to keep climate change in check – yeah, good luck with that), most won’t. I certainly won’t. I don’t live the most luxurious lifestyle but, as Americans, I know that I’m in the top 1% of the heap worldwide.
I LIKE modern living and really have no great motivation to live as they do in Malawi or Ethiopia. However, all of the “decarbonization” that we are now hearing from the people that are surrounding Biden will indeed move us downward in that direction.
So, while I would suggest you go read the comments at the link above because they really are a proxy for what we are going to be seeing from the Biden Administration if he gets to take the oath of office (i.e., we’re still not at the end of the line where Congress blesses the Electoral College vote). Yeah, they get into the weeds but the Renewable folks show how much this whole thing gets into being a cult religion that we ALL are going to have to deal with rather soon and it all comes down to my most favorite question lately: Who Chooses?
So here are just two comments (‘natch, I’m one) that I think are important (emphasis mine) as a lot of the rest is merely squabbling:
Vindaloo Bugaboo:
Roser believes that the solution is to “find large-scale energy alternatives to fossil fuels that are affordable, safe and sustainable.”
First off, thank you Lloyd for taking up my query and writing an article about the question. The one issue you didn’t touch on is the imperative of time constraints for addressing climate change.
If one assumes we have 12 years (or 11, or ten, or whatever number it is which climate alarmists say we have left) until we irrevocably and irreversibly ruin our climate, do we legitimately have the infrastructure, permitting processes, regulatory exemptions, and resolve to build sufficient quantities of turbines and solar panels to sufficiently replace large-scale proportions of our global energy needs? I would argue we don’t. We have neither the time, siting permits, or capabilities to make a serious dent in the number of exajoules of fossil fuel energy we use every year. The only source to do so is nuclear—and ultimately one day, fusion—and only if the death-spiral of regulatory overload through endless litigation is banned. Does the world have the stomach to do so and adopt a proven, safe technology en masse—especially the newer, safer Gen IV designs? As the saying goes, I guess the proof is in the pudding.
Solar and wind are too low density of power sources to quickly drop worldwide emissions through displacement of fossil fuels. For those who believe we have an extremely short timeframe left to save us from climate change, it’s far past time to recognize the singular solution that will get us there is the large-scale adoption of nuclear power. Anything less is, as they say, just pissing into the wind.
GraniteGrok to Vindaloo Bugaboo:
Excellent!
You posed a question that everyone involved in the sustainability / environmentalist movement should be forced to answer – putting them on point. No more prevarications, no more going down ratholes of one type or another.
You’ve asked what I consider to be a fundamental question that precludes soaring into some fantasyland of tale spinning.
Lloyd, at least you are trying to put your “life where your beliefs are” (riffing off “putting your money where your mouth is”). As you have documented, it is forcing a lowering of your standard of living – and still not meeting your standards of 1.5C. More discarding of your modern life will be required, n’est pas?
And are you willing to go to the end to do so? And then stay there?
I admit – I am not. And no, that does not make me selfish, nor you. Frankly, poverty sucks and I don’t wish to live that lifestyle (others’ mileage will vary).
You can’t have reduced energy and still maintain the current standard of living, at least here in the US and no amount of wishful thinking can make it otherwise. Oh sure, we DO hear the soaring rhetoric and how things could be with Renewables – but not without massive amounts of cash NOW (which we don’t have) and not without better technologies that we don’t have NOW either.
Enough of the pie in the sky – because they’ll just ruin it anyway and obviate any gains that are actually achieved? Think I’m wrong? Here are two examples:
- Both Jeanne Shaheen and Kelly Ayotte (sorry for duplicating myself) ganged up on the rest of us to force “more efficient” appliances into the marketplace – like dish and clothes washers. They used to do FINE jobs years ago – and now they don’t. Dishes don’t come clean and the clothes look dingy. So you wash them again – using more water and more energy. And again. So tell me how did that move to up energy use efficiency work out?
- Obama decreed LED bulbs. Here in NH, Jeb Bradley has so screwed around with our electricity marketplace, any gains we would have had by buying those more expensive bulbs went out the window as our base rate electrical costs are among the top five most expensive in the US. So, how’d that work out for all of us?
Yeah, we’re not like Nancy Pelosi that can afford a $30K SubZero fridge and then fill it with $10/pint luxury ice cream (pointing out that she can afford any screwing around with prices being jerked around by Government fiat). Most of us look at our monthly electricity bill and go “c’mon, give us a break”.
Wait until it REALLY starts to affect your living standards.