Bidenomics And Energy

Posted on Fri 05/24/2024 by PA Pundits - International

By Frank Lasee ~

A big part of Bidenomics is the financial pain and future loss of choices caused by his climate policies. Joe Biden has said he wants to end fossil fuels and attempting it at great cost and risk. Biden has weaponized the entire federal government and filled it with climatistas. They put radical climate policies above the interests of poor and middle-class Americans.The people who can least afford the $2,300 increase in energy costs. Or the double-digit inflation caused by the borrowing that increases our $34.7 trillion national debt, the higher energy prices that make everything more expensive, as do the never-ending stream of climate regulations. Nothing is immune from these climate change addled meddlers.

Despite the climatistas multi-decade efforts. More coal, natural gas, and oil was used and emissions than ever before in history. The eight billion of us humans use a lot of energy and billions of us need much more. Because affordable, abundant, reliable energy is the cornerstone of health and prosperity. Without energy, life would be shorter, less prosperous, and not fun.

The Biden climate agenda doesn’t recognize the fact that Americans, as former climate czar John Kerry said, “could go to net zero and it wouldn’t make any difference at all.” (Net zero is no net CO2 emissions). This is one thing John Kerry said that is true.

Last year the people of the world used about 37 billion barrels of oil, 4 trillion cubic meters of natural gas and 8.5 billion tons of coal, which is equivalent to about 41 billion barrels of oil. These fuels provide 81% of the world’s total energy. Wind and solar just 3%.

China uses more than half of the coal in the world and the U.S. uses about 20% of the oil, or about 20 million barrels a day. Is it senility, deliberate blindness, the climate religion, or some other agenda, which has people feeling that we can just end 83% of the world’s energy in the next 25 years (by 2050) without horrendous consequences for all of us?

No sane person who wants to keep their good health and vibrancy would just end the foods (fuel for the body) that provides 83% of their calories for energy needs. The wise person would have a plan to replace food before ending their primary food sources. There workable plan or costs for replacing the energy fossil fuels provide us.

Fossil fuel energy is the food that feeds our civilization. Without it, we lose our vibrancy, and many will die. It is time that we admit that wind and solar cannot meet the energy needs of our advanced civilization.

Even if wind and solar could, it wouldn’t make any difference. Because India and China with 2.8 billion people between them are using more coal to increase energy availability for their people. Where literally 100s of millions are energy underserved.

Both of these countries get more than half of their total energy, not just their electricity, from coal. This is unlikely to change in the coming decades because they are ramping up their coal usage by opening more mines and building more coal electricity plants. Coal is abundant in most countries in the world, it is low cost, and provides reliable electricity. There is at least 500 years of coal in the ground.

Reliable electricity is a cornerstone of prosperity. There is no way to build the hundreds of thousands of wind towers and thousands of square miles of solar panels fast enough to phase out even 10 or 20% of the energy supplied by fossil fuels over the next 25 years.

Even if we could build them fast enough, which we are not, we’d still have a problem. What provides electricity when the wind doesn’t blow, and the sun doesn’t shine? Nope, it’s not batteries. They’re far too expensive and we don’t have the supply chains to manufacture them during this century.

And the international bully, Communist China controls the wind, solar, and battery supply chains from the beginning to end. It is not in our national best interest to drive up our national debt and energy prices to purchase and rely on a powerful rival country like China for our critical needs.

Any time something that is necessary, like energy or food is in short supply, the prices rise. When energy prices rise, all other prices rise, including food, because energy is required for everything that we do. The inflation causing profligate spending and the endless climate regulations are features of Bidenomics.

We need to change direction soon. If we do not, our electric rates will at least triple, everything will cost even more, and we will have to get used to blackouts or brownouts on a regular basis. Our ability to defend ourselves will be compromised. And we are losing out around the world to China, as it helps countries develop their fossil future, while we are attempting to force them to remain in the Dark Ages, burning wood and dung for fuel.

Americans can do better. We need to change our energy course before it is too late.

This article originally appeared at Real Clear Energy.

CFACT policy advisor Frank Lasee is an expert on energy and environmental issues. His articles have appeared in the Washington Examiner, Washington Post, Real Clear Energy, Town Hall. He has been a guest on TV and radio news. He is the president of Truth in Energy and Climate. Frank Lasee served as a Wisconsin State Senator and in Governor Scott Walker’s Administration.

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