The Environmental-Industrial Complex
One expects the environmental movement to publish reports extolling so-called clean energy and pathways to a carbon free world.
But industries have joined in, and support these same reports.
A recent report from the Rocky Mountain Institute, an environmental group promoting CO2 as the cause of climate change, is replete with names from businesses.
A few companies involved with the report are: General Electric, BlackRock, BHP Billiton, Saint Gobain, HSBC, Royal Dutch Shell and Bank of America. According to their website, these companies funded the report.
While some of the companies are from Europe, where there is the political need to conform to the climate change convention, others have an economic rent-seeking relationship.
Add to this the involvement of governments, and we have a perfect storm of powerful institutions attempting to impose their views on the public.
President Eisenhower not only warned of the military-industrial complex, he warned of government involvement in science.
“Yet, in holding scientific research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific technological elite.” (Emphasis added.)
The ordinary citizen is facing this array of powerful forces, promoting so-called clean energy and #CO2 as the cause of global warming.
Typical of the reports published by this complex of people and organizations is the report published by the Energy Transitions Commission, chaired by the Rocky Mountain Institute.
This report warns of the threat from global warming and makes it appear as though it is a simple matter to cut CO2 emissions sufficiently to prevent a climate disaster.
In short, it has the appearance of science, but is propaganda with few real solutions.
Cover of Rocky Mountain Institute Report, by the Energy Transitions Commission
Using sweeping statements, the report provides a superficial analysis, devoid of any substantive explanation, of how to achieve the elimination of fossil fuels from power generation. It uses graphics that purport to show the low cost of wind and solar, though they note in the fine print that the costs are after subsidies.
The report has the appearance of a scientific report, but actually has little substance. It talks about storage, but doesn’t explain how it will work or what it will cost.
Here’s typical gobbledygook from the report:
“On the demand side, circular economy value chains could reduce the need for virgin energy-intensive products and alternative less energy/carbon-intensive products could be used.”
And, one that suggests authoritarian control:
“Allocation of risks, such as fuel price volatility or resource variability, to those actors best suited to manage or control them.” (Emphasis added.)
The pronouncements in the report are impressive, but they lack credible support, or engineering facts.
For example, the report claims 50% of light vehicles could be BEVs by 2040. Specifically:
“More than 50% electrification possible by 2040 in an aggressive case.”
What are the implications for the United States of this broad claim?
- It would require that over 125 million light vehicles be battery powered BEVs.
- It would infer that every household in America own at least one BEV, or that many would own two BEVs.
- It infers forcibly requiring ownership of BEVs, or huge subsidization.
A similar claim is made that all heating of buildings and homes can be electrified, eliminating the use of natural gas.
The term air conditioning is not in the report, but there is a claim that cooling can be shifted to when demand for electricity is low. There is also a reference to low-carbon cooling, which apparently refers to district heating and cooling with no explanation as to how that would work in American suburbs.
As usual, American suburbs are under attack, with the report promoting the need for more dense cities.
Atlanta and Barcelona are compared to demonstrate the terrible American practice of single family homes.
With the series of claims about how segments of the economy can be electrified, there is no mention of how many additional power plants would have to be built to support the electrification … or the additional number of wind farms and solar power plants that would be needed.
It’s already been demonstrated that wind and solar can’t replace enough fossil fuel power plants to cut US emissions 80%, so how could they possibly also provide the electricity for cars and homes, etc.? (See Chapter 3, Clexit For a Brighter Future.)
These are only a few of the outrageous claims made by this report. For those interested in reading the report, the web address is: http://www.energy-transitions.org/who-we-are
The report mentions Germany as already having the necessary “flexibility” to achieve a 40% reduction in CO2.
Yet, Germany has only reduced its CO2 emissions by 27% since 1990, with possibly half of these reductions being the result of East Germany’s collapse with its inefficient industries. See, Extolling Failure.
And Germany has invested billions of dollars in attempting to do what the Rocky Mountain Institute report recommends.
Most revealing, and egregious, about the report is the claim that each of the signers of the report is a commissioner. This is apparently done to infer the group has authority, and to create the impression that the report has official standing.
A dictionary definition of commissioner is:
“The act of committing or entrusting a person, group, etc., with supervisory power or authority.”
There is no indication who granted these people the “supervisory power or authority” to speak on this subject. It appears to be self appointed. The Energy Transitions Commission, itself, was established September 28, 2015, by an unknown, pretentious entity.
Claiming these individuals are commissioners is a flagrant attempt to seize power, and/or intimidate people.
The report is a manifestation of the environmental-industrial complex, where the elite few are attempting to steamroller the rest of us into adhering to their pronouncements about climate change.
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