Did you know that the federal Environmental Protection Agency spends millions of dollars on guns, body armor, camouflage equipment, unmanned aircraft, amphibious assault ships, radar and night-vision gear, and other military-style weaponry and surveillance activities? You read that right—EPA, not the Army, Navy, Air Force, or Marines. Why? Because EPA regulations are so ubiquitous, so onerous, and so contrary to the spirit of our freedom-loving nation that ordinary Americans find … [Read more...]
Stop calling me a ‘denier’: Debating science is honorable, not evil
We’ve all read the articles, and heard the voice of doom about “mother earth.” The earth is going to get really hot, it’s all humans fault, and we must make drastic changes to fix our mistakes. Those who disagree with this viewpoint are termed “Climate Deniers,” an insult intended to bring about the specter of Holocaust denial. The fact that this particular insult makes no sense, since it’s impossible to “deny” climate doesn’t seem to matter. What do climate alarmists and climate skeptics … [Read more...]
Leading Scientists Urge Greater Data Quality Accountability
Over 300 scientists, engineers, economists, and other scholars last week sent a letter to Congressman Lamar Smith, Chairman of the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, in support of the Committee’s efforts to implement greater accountability for the scientific work of federal agencies involved in climate research, such as the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), and the Environmental Protection Agency … [Read more...]
If Only EPA Would Tilt at Windmills!
EPA last August released a new rule requiring America's natural gas drilling industry to reduce methane emissions by 40% to 45% in ten years. EPA's own estimate at global warming to be prevented? An undetectable 0.002 degree Celsius. The Wall Street Journal rightly opined: The rule will ... do immediate harm to a drilling industry that is already under pressure from falling global energy prices. The shale gas revolution has created hundreds of thousands of jobs, reduced costs for U.S. … [Read more...]
Never Underestimate Your Opponent—Coming to Grips with the Paris Climate Agreement
Master Sun [Tzu] talks often about deception and therefore warns against being deceived by the enemy and underestimating their ability. ‘He who exercises no forethought but makes light of his opponents is sure to be captured by them.’ It’s important to properly assess your opponent without prejudice or assumption. Many skeptics of catastrophic, anthropogenic global warming (CAGW) and therefore opponents of a legally binding treaty to limit carbon dioxide emissions to fight it, including me, … [Read more...]
Unelected, Unaccountable Greens Dictated Clean Power Plan to EPA
Emails obtained by the Energy & Environment Legal Institute under FOIA demonstrate that EPA almost certainly violated federal law by using private email to correspond with the Natural Resources Defense Council, correspondence in which NRDC essentially drafted critical parts of the "Clean Power Plan," or even, as the Wall Street Journal puts it, "the rule," not just critical parts. Imagine if some pro-coal organization(s) had done the same in the preparation of an EPA regulation. The Left … [Read more...]
One Small Step toward Reining in the EPA
A Cincinnati-based federal court recently put a hold on the federal EPA's controversial "Waters of the United States" rule that would have put farm ponds, drainage ditches, and similar waters, by no means navigable, under its rule, constituting a huge expansion of EPA authority at the expense of states' sovereignty and property owners' rights. As Larry Bell writes, Applying EPA’s interpretation, the agency defines waters of the United States so broadly that they could regulate virtually any wet … [Read more...]
EPA’s New Ozone Rule Will Be a Deadly, Regressive Tax on Poor and Millennials
Burke, VA, October 1, 2015—The United States economy has long been struggling to fully rise out of the Great Recession. Many young people still struggle to find employment, and many Americans are underemployed. Americans in poverty labor every day to end the cycle that keeps them living paycheck to paycheck. The Environmental Protection Agency’s new ozone rule does nothing but harm these two groups while providing no net benefit. The current ozone standard is 75 parts per billion (ppb), the new … [Read more...]
Ethanol: A Federally Mandated Killer
Terry Scanlon of the Capital Research Center leads his latest email this way: When you gas your car with 10% ethanol, you're dragged into the Renewable Fuel Standard morass run by the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency). This environmentalist policy is so terrible, even the greens have turned against it. But as a government program, it's immortal. Our latest "Green Watch" documents how this disaster funnels money from consumers to crony capitalists, reduces your car's mileage, raises food … [Read more...]
Supreme Court Vindicates Cornwall Alliance on Mercury Emissions
Monday, July 1, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) violated the law by imposing regulations on mercury emissions from power plants without first doing thorough benefit/cost estimates. Nearly four years ago the Cornwall Alliance published a study by environmental regulatory economics Dr. Timothy Terrell, The Cost of Good Intentions: The Ethics and Economics of the War on Conventional Energy, that made that very point. Dr. Terrell comments on the … [Read more...]
