Fox News: Obama planning to sidestep Congress for next phase in climate change agenda 

USA Today: Obama climate change plan hits coal stocks

National Geographic: Five Reasons for Obama to Sell Climate Change as a Health Issue

Time: Carbon Regulations and Keystone Silence: Previewing Obama’s Climate Speech

Grist: No-drama Obama unveils series of modest, sensible steps on climate change

The White House has released a teaser video and is conducting a Twitter campaign with a paid-for, promoted tweet to try to increase interest in the president’s speech on climate change tomorrow at Georgetown University:

The White House Twitter feed has close to 4 million followers, but this tweet on the speech has only been RT’d 1,400+ times and the video has yet to crack the 4,000 views mark. Do Obamatons even care about the issue?

We’ll see if  the president says anything new, but I doubt he will.

Meteorologist Hans von Storch was interviewed by Der Spiegel where he acknowledges the obvious: the computer models that predict global warming might be wrong. Some excerpts:

SPIEGEL: Will the greenhouse effect be an issue in the upcoming German parliamentary elections? Singer Marius Müller-Westernhagen is leading a celebrity initiative calling for the addition of climate protection as a national policy objective in the German constitution.

Storch: It’s a strange idea. What state of the Earth’s atmosphere do we want to protect, and in what way? And what might happen as a result? Are we going to declare war on China if the country emits too much CO2 into the air and thereby violates our constitution?

SPIEGEL: Yet it was climate researchers, with their apocalyptic warnings, who gave people these ideas in the first place.

Storch: Unfortunately, some scientists behave like preachers, delivering sermons to people. What this approach ignores is the fact that there are many threats in our world that must be weighed against one another. If I’m driving my car and find myself speeding toward an obstacle, I can’t simple yank the wheel to the side without first checking to see if I’ll instead be driving straight into a crowd of people. Climate researchers cannot and should not take this process of weighing different factors out of the hands of politics and society.

Some act like “preachers?” I wonder what the high-priest himself — Al Gore — has to say about that one.

And on the 15-year pause in global warming:

SPIEGEL: Do the computer models with which physicists simulate the future climate ever show the sort of long standstill in temperature change that we’re observing right now?

Storch: Yes, but only extremely rarely. At my institute, we analyzed how often such a 15-year stagnation in global warming occurred in the simulations. The answer was: in under 2 percent of all the times we ran the simulation. In other words, over 98 percent of forecasts show CO2 emissions as high as we have had in recent years leading to more of a temperature increase.

SPIEGEL: How long will it still be possible to reconcile such a pause in global warming with established climate forecasts?

Storch: If things continue as they have been, in five years, at the latest, we will need to acknowledge that something is fundamentally wrong with our climate models. A 20-year pause in global warming does not occur in a single modeled scenario. But even today, we are finding it very difficult to reconcile actual temperature trends with our expectations.

SPIEGEL: What could be wrong with the models?

Storch: There are two conceivable explanations — and neither is very pleasant for us. The first possibility is that less global warming is occurring than expected because greenhouse gases, especially CO2, have less of an effect than we have assumed. This wouldn’t mean that there is no man-made greenhouse effect, but simply that our effect on climate events is not as great as we have believed. The other possibility is that, in our simulations, we have underestimated how much the climate fluctuates owing to natural causes.

“Not pleasant for us?” Yes, but not bad for us earthlings. But it gets better. . .

SPIEGEL: That sounds quite embarrassing for your profession, if you have to go back and adjust your models to fit with reality…

Storch: Why? That’s how the process of scientific discovery works. There is no last word in research, and that includes climate research. It’s never the truth that we offer, but only our best possible approximation of reality. But that often gets forgotten in the way the public perceives and describes our work.

No. No. No. We’ve been told, ad nauseam, that the science is settled. And politicians are asking taxpayers to fund billions of dollars of projects based on that science. No way the entire alarmist community can get away with an “Oops, our bad.” 

Via the Patriot-News:

The Pennsylvania Democratic State Committee’s call for a moratorium on fracking has drawn condemnation from it’s most famous progeny – former Gov. Ed Rendell.

Party officials voted last weekend 115-81 in favor of the resolution asking for the open-ended ban. Proponents argued that fracking was savaging the environment by polluting the state’s water supply.

But Rendell, who noted that he oversaw the state’s largest expansion of fracking in his final year as governor, said the resolution has put the party at odds with the commonwealth’s two most preeminent environmentalists – his former Department of Environmental Protection secretaries John Hanger and Kathleen McGinty.

“It’s very ill-advised,” he told The Patriot-News by telephone Friday. “The two biggest environmentalists in the state, who are both running for governor, both approved of fracking, permitted it and moved to put in place changes that have dramatically reformed the fracking process.”

Rendell also warned that the vote didn’t appear to take into consideration the economic boom that fracking has had for some of the commonwealth’s most impoverished residents.

The rest here.

The National Legal and Policy Center has a good piece up today on Fisker and its history of bad financial decisions. Here’s the key excerpt;

That DOE granted the loan at all is bewildering, if Reuters’ report is accurate. Only launched as a company in 2007, Fisker was already desperate for cash.

“We are oversubscribed in this equity round with the Energy Department support — and nowhere without it,” wrote Barny Koehler, a business partner of Henrik Fisker’s, in an August 2009 email to Energy Department officials.

That DOE granted the loan at all is bewildering, if Reuters’ report is accurate. Only launched as a company in 2007, Fisker was already desperate for cash.

“We are oversubscribed in this equity round with the Energy Department support — and nowhere without it,” wrote Barny Koehler, a business partner of Henrik Fisker’s, in an August 2009 email to Energy Department officials.

The First State follies were not Fisker’s only waste. According to Reuters the DOE move opened a “flood” of investment for the company, but all that meant was the company had more money to fritter away – an estimated $1 billion through 2012. Fisker lost $35,000 on each of the 2,450 Karmas it produced the last two years (none were made in the past year), and the report quoted a former executive who said the Karma “cost far more to produce than we could ever charge for it.”

There was a roadmap for Fisker. The VC’s made the initial investments, the DOE came to the rescue with its loan – allowing the company to raise even more money, and then the company would go public (like Tesla), and everything would be fantastic. Except Fisker didn’t go public, and now the company is on the verge of bankruptcy. Another great job by the due-diligence folks at the DOE.

David Blackmon details in Forbes the many economic and environmental benefits for approving Keystone XL, including keeping the bitumen, processed form Canada’s tar sands, from being refined by the Chinese and their less stringent emission and pollution standards. An excerpt:

Here’s the truth:  Canada’s bitumen has been produced and transported to market for years already, some of it via pipelines that already exist, much of it via rail.  Canada’s government has made it quite clear that this bitumen will continue to be produced and transported to refineries and markets in increasing quantities regardless of what happens with the Keystone XL pipeline.  If it doesn’t go into the US via Keystone, much of it will in all likelihood be transported via an east/west pipeline to the West Coast and shipped to China.

Thus, the clear environmental consequences of refusing to allow the northern leg of Keystone to be built will be that much of this bitumen will be refined in Chinese refineries and burned in Chinese cars and factories, all of which have far lower environmental protection standards than U.S. refineries, cars and factories.  In other words, carbon emissions globally would go up, thanks to the anti-Keystone lobby.

On top of that, you have the unarguable fact that the safest, cleanest, lowest-emission way to transport oil is via underground pipelines, not trains.  Much of Canada’s bitumen currently comes into the U.S. via rail, and that will continue if Keystone is not allowed to go forward.  The environmental consequences would be a higher rate of oil spillage, higher greenhouse gas emissions, and more people injured or killed as a result of accidents.  Thank you, anti-Keystone lobby.

You can read the entire piece here.

CNBC:

What a difference a few years make.

When we launched America’s Top States for Business in 2007 — before the housing market implosion and the financial crisis — our Top States were attracting not only businesses but people: families and home buyers.

Four of our Top Five that year were Southern states: Virginia followed by Texas, Utah, Georgia and North Carolina.

(Watch: Can Texas Stay on Top?)

But while we and everyone else were looking south, oil production in North Dakota’sBakken Shale tripled in 2007. Crude oil was trading at a mere $60 a barrel, though, so not many people noticed. The state finished a mere 13th.

By last year, however, Brent Crude oil was averaging around $111 a barrel, and North Dakota made its first appearance in our Top Five. The move was largely a result of the state’s dizzying economic growth — “bigger than China’s growth rate,” Steven Landefeld, director of the federal Bureau of Economic Analysis, told CNBC in an interview. “It’s been oil and gas [in North Dakota].”

Virginia, by contrast, slipped to No. 3 last year — its worst showing ever. And Georgia slipped all the way to ninth place.

Our rankings reflect what experts say has been a gradual change in recent years, with the core of economic expansion moving to the middle of the country.

The rest here.

“Chrysler Group reversed course and agreed to a recall of 2.7 million Jeeps Tuesday,” reported CNN Tuesday in a story typical of media coverage, “giving in to the government’s request in the final hours before a deadline.

No it didn’t.

In fact, the opposite was true. After targeting Chrysler for a massive, 2.7 million vehicle recall of 1993–2004 Jeeps Grand Cherokees and Libertys for allegedly defective fuel-tank design, the feds surrendered after Jeep-parent Chrysler put up rare resistance. An automaker had not challenged a government recall since 1998.

As a face-saving compromise, NHTSA abandoned the recall, dismissing any claims that the Jeeps were defective (a crucial blow to tort lawyers who pursued the recall through their proxy “pubic-safety” groups) and allowing Chrysler to voluntarily recall 1.6 million vehicles on its own terms in order to satisfy any customer concerns. That is, customers may bring their vehicles in for a determination as to whether they need repair.

Indeed, the Jeep recall will not address fuel tanks at all — but just offer customers trailer hitches which can add rear-end strengthening for low-speed crashes. That in itself is a key government admission that the 51 fiery deaths it initially claimed were the fault of defective fuel-tank design were, in fact, the result of freakish, high-speed collisions that no vehicle could survive.

“Chrysler Group will conduct a voluntary campaign with respect to the vehicles in question that, in addition to a visual inspection of the vehicle will, if necessary, provide an upgrade to the rear structure of the vehicle to better manage crash forces in low-speed impacts,” read Chrysler’s press release Tuesday afternoon. “Chrysler Group’s analysis of the data confirms that these vehicles are not defective and are among the safest in the peer group. Nonetheless, Chrysler Group recognizes that this matter has raised concerns for its customers and wants to take further steps, in coordination with NHTSA, to provide additional measures to supplement the safety of its vehicles.”

Take that, feds.

Yet initial press reports interpreted this as an about-face, part of a pattern of sloppy reporting that ignores the “safety” lobby’s history of auto scaremongering.

NHTSA’s shallow case was telegraphed by its provenance.

The recall was initiated in 2010 by trial-lawyer funded Clarence Ditlow, president of the Center for Auto Safety. This is the same Clarence Ditlow who championed the fraudulent 1992 NBC Dateline rigging of GM trucks with tiny rockets so that they would burst into flame — helping doom NHTSA’s suspiciously similar recall of 4.7 million GM vehicles for gas-tank issues.

Fighting government recalls is a fraught exercise for automakers who risk exposing brands to months of bad press about fiery fatalities. Those deaths are horrible, but Chrysler had strong data showing that their vehicles were safer than most. “The subject vehicles are not defective and their fuel systems do not pose an unreasonable risk,” says the Auburn Hills–based company. “These vehicles met or exceeded all applicable federal motor vehicle safety standards in place at the time they were built.”

Following its failed witch hunts against GM in 1993 and Toyota last year, the Chrysler settlement is another rebuke to NHTSA.

Recall Jeep? Recall NHTSA and defective media coverage.

A leak of radioactive steam shut the plant down in January 2012, but the plant’s owners — Souther California Edison [SCE]– had been trying to reopen the plant ever since, spending hundreds of millions of dollars to keep the plant open without generating any revenue. Well, management decided enough was enough:

[SCE] submitted a plan to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) in October 2012 to restart Unit 2 at 70 percent capacity for an initial period of five months.

That plan has been under review ever since, and several public meetings have been held on the matter.

However, a recent ruling by an arm of the NRC created further uncertainty about when a decision would be made on the restart plan, SCE officials said.

Additional administrative processes and appeals could result in delay of more than a year, according to SCE.

During that time, the costs of maintaining San Onofre and the costs to replace the power it previously provided would continue.

The company decided that the continuing uncertainty was not good for customers or investors, Edison International Chairman and CEO Ted Carver said.

“SCE has concluded that efforts are better focused on planning for the replacement generation and transmission resources which will be required for grid reliability,” according to the news release.

But don’t worry California. Just turn off the air conditioning:

Without that nuclear plant, which accounted for about 9% of the electricity generated in California, power supplies will be tight in parts of Los Angeles, Orange and San Diego counties for at least the next three summers, officials said. That means periods of reduced use of air conditioners, lights and swimming pool pumps for customers of Southern California Edison and San Diego Gas & Electric Co.

“Losing 2,250 megawatts from the system is a big deal, and if we ask for conservation, we need them to respond,” said Steve Berberich, chief executive of the California Independent System Operator, which manages most of the state’s long-distance electric transmission system from a control room in Folsom, east of Sacramento.

In the meantime, utilities, state energy officials and grid operators are looking for ways to compensate for San Onofre’s loss.

Those fixes are likely to include pushing for greater energy efficiency in existing buildings and homes; constructing more state-of-the-art natural gas power plants; adding new long-distance transmission lines and speeding up the shift to wind, solar, geothermal and other renewable forms of energy.

Experts and consumer advocates hope the costs of the new infrastructure will be equal to or lower than the hundreds of millions of dollars it would have taken to make San Onofre safe enough to start running again. Californians already pay some of the highest electricity rates in the nation.

Coincidentally, President Obama is in Rancho Mirage, Calif. today meeting with President of Xi Jinping of China. The expected high today in Rancho Mirage is 106°F. I wonder what they have the A.C. set to? 

Detroit — Having saved Chrysler to satisfy its Big Labor pals, will the Obama administration now feed it to its tort-lobby friends?

That’s one question that pops to mind after the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s (NHTSA) announced — and Chrysler refused — the recall of 2.7 million Jeep Grand Cherokees and Jeep Libertys this week, thus opening the automaker to hundreds of millions of dollars in damage suits from trial lawyers.

Another question is why would NHTSA heed a recall request from Clarence Ditlow?

Ditlow’s Center of Auto Safety petitioned the feds back in 2010 to recall the notoriously bullet-proof Jeep SUVs in a complaint eerily similar to Ditlow’s fraudulent claim against GM pickup trucks in 1993. Ditlow, you may recall (credulous reporters today don’t), applauded  a 1992 NBC Dateline demonstration that rigged the fuel tanks of GM trucks with explosives so that they would burst into flame upon impact. NBC’s program was a pawn in Ditlow’s strategy to recall 4.7 million GM trucks — at a cost to the automaker of perhaps $1 billion and untold lawsuits. Trouble is, GM fought back, forcing an NBC apology for its fakery and ultimately defeating the government’s recall as well.

Unfazed, trial lawyer–supported Ditlow was back at it in 2011, accusing Toyota of making “killing machines”  that suddenly accelerated due to electronic gremlins. That NHTSA-endorsed witch hunt was also proven unworthy by independent scientific review.

Now, with Chrysler riding the Jeep Grand Cherokee back to profitability after its 2009 taxpayer bailout, Ditlow and NHTSA are targeting Chrysler’s cash cow — demanding the recall of all 1993–2004 Cherokees and Libertys because of an alleged gas-tank design flaw.

Taking a page from GM’s offense, Chrysler has fought back — a rare response by an automaker that would just as soon pay recall costs than expose precious brands to months of media sensationalism and Congressional hearings. But NHTSA’s case against Chrysler is that weak.

“The subject vehicles are not defective and their fuel systems do not pose an unreasonable risk,” responded the Fiat-owned company in a white paper Tuesday. “These vehicles met or exceeded all applicable federal motor vehicle safety standards in place at the time they were built.”

Indeed, Jeep uses NHTSA’s own data against it, citing the agency’s own Fatality Analysis Reporting System indicating 24 models that are more likely to be involved in fatal, rear-end crashes — yet none of them have been recalled. Chrysler doesn’t deny that its products have been involved in fiery crashes — resulting in tragic deaths — but it legitimately asserts that its SUVs have historically been among the safest in class.

Jeep’s strategy is admittedly risky. Yes, recall repair costs run an estimated $500 million–$1 billion — but it is also risking exposing an iconic brand that almost single-handedly brought the company back from extinction. Still. Republicans now control the House of Representatives — meaning no show trials in front of California Democrat Henry Waxman’s Energy and Commerce Committee that the NHTSA used to lynch Toyota.

No automaker has challenged a federal recall since Chrysler did it in 1998 to protect its mid-size sedan brands from spurious NHTSA seatbelt-safety claims. The Detroit carmaker won that battle — and figures to win this one too.

Before hiring former Obama EPA bureaucrat-in-chief Lisa Jackson, Tim Cook thought hiring political people was a bad idea. Funny what a congressional kangaroo court can do to change a guy’s mind.

Via The National Legal and Policy Center:

Apple CEO Tim Cook Contradicts Himself with Lisa Jackson Hire

After last week’s announcement that Apple would hire former EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson to handle environmental issues, a series of videos released  last week by Duke University were amusingly timed.

The six clips featured interviews with CEO Tim Cook, who succeeded the late, popular Steve Jobs, and were released by his alma mater’s Fuqua School of Business, where he earned his MBA. Cook had returned for a class reunion in April and while there Duke recorded discussions about topics such as inspiration, career planning, intuition, and other aspects of business management.

But comments he made in excerpts about ethical leadership and collaboration, in light of Jackson’s new employment, were guffaw-worthy. As NLPC outlined on Monday, Jackson fled EPA after undergoing harsh scrutiny about the agency’s – and her personal – practices of evading transparency. Under that cloak she conducted a highly political and destructive implementation of President Obama’s policies to fight the coal industry, jack up automobile fuel mileage standards, and generally set onerous rules on industries without accountability to Congress or the public.

That behavior and leadership was lost on Cook, who told his Duke U. audience about the qualities he sought in effective collaborators, which are obviously critical to Apple’s heretofore (in recent years) well-run technology business that incorporates both hardware and software products, as well as computing services such as data storage and iTunes.

“You look for people that are not political, people that are not bureaucrats…,” he said. If that’s true than Cook is completely blind to, or has ignored, the essence of Lisa Jackson.

Cook also espoused the need for intellect in an effective, technology-focused collaborative environment. Jackson, while a chemical engineer, nevertheless showed utter disdain for science and economics while leading EPA. On her watch she disregarded the evidence of several years that have shown no significant warming of the planet, and rejected the concept that cost-benefit analyses ought to be considered rather than implementing boundless government regulations that can kill businesses. That track record seemed to matter little to Cook.

The rest here.

The BBC reports:

The European Commission has announced it is imposing temporary anti-dumping levies on Chinese solar panel imports.

It comes despite opposition from Germany and other European Union members, and amid fears it could spark a trade war.

The Commission – the EU’s executive arm – argues that Chinese firms are unfairly undercutting rivals.

EU trade commissioner Karel De Gucht has said Chinese panels are being sold below cost and damaging competition.

The measures come into force on Thursday, 6 June, in all of the bloc’s 27 member states.

Initially they will be in force for a trial period.

Protectionism is the natural next step, no? How can countries continue to use taxpayer money to finance these green schemes only to be undersold by the totalitarian Chinese? I’m not saying that this is best for consumers or taxpayers, but the natural progression of things. 

And I don’t think America will be far behind.

By hiring ex-EPA head Lisa Jackson. Presumably, the congressional haranguing will now cease.

Here’s hoping that after burning through $850 million, that Better Place is in a better place. R.I.P., via Venture Beat:

Better Place, the electric car company that hoped to change the world with its ambitious battery-swapping stations, said today it is shutting down. The closure brings to an end arguably the most audacious “clean-tech” company ever attempted.

The news was reported this morning by AP.

Entrepreneur Shai Agassi launched the company six years ago, with the goal of creating a system of stations where electric cars could automatically drop off used batteries and switch in new ones before resuming their journey.

The bet was risky because it required large geographies — indeed, entire nations — to adopt the technology in order for it to scale successfully. The company chose small countries like Israel and Denmark to test its model, but the company’s upfront costs kept mounting, and debuts kept getting delayed. Also, a number of competing electric car efforts, including by new company Tesla, but also by larger car companies, kept the industry from adopting any one standard.

The rest here.

Mark Mills of the Manhattan Institute is out with a new report titlted, “America’s Hydrocarbon Industry Can Revive the Economy and Eliminate the Trade Deficit.”

The executive summary:

The world has changed since the passage of the 1975 Energy Policy and Conservation Act, a law that set the tone for energy policy for nearly a half-century. Technology and demographics have eviscerated old ideas of limits and import dependency. Given the new abundance, the United States now has the opportunity to become a major energy exporter.

America is now the world’s fastest-growing oil-and-gas-producing region and has the capability to become a net energy—and even a net oil—exporter. Meanwhile, China has become the world’s largest importer of oil. Imports are, in fact, rising across the Asia-Pacific region. This new energy reality is fundamentally reversing the trade and economic positions of China and the United States.

Today, oil imports account for about 40 percent of America’s $750 billion annual trade deficit, a deficit that drains the GDP and kills jobs. Expanding the domestic production of hydrocarbons to reduce imports as well as increase exports will function as an enormous subsidy-free stimulus to the U.S. economy, directly creating all manner of jobs across the nation and indirectly creating millions more jobs as the nation’s current account deficit shrinks.

Increased production and exports of oil and gas and of energy-intensive products from chemicals to fertilizers can put the nation on track to wipe out the entire trade deficit within the decade, returning the nation to a trade balance—even a surplus—that has not been enjoyed for decades. This process has already begun: increasing exports of U.S. refined petroleum products are already pushing the trade deficit down.

Oil and natural gas businesses are willing and able to produce more in order to reduce imports as well as to sell to foreign buyers. This cannot be accomplished, however, unless the government avoids policies that prohibit or inhibit oil and natural gas production or that constrain the freedom to sell into markets, foreign and domestic, that make economic sense.

Over the coming decade, private investment in the American energy renaissance is projected to grow to a cumulative $5 trillion—without subsidy or taxpayer assistance. In the past four years alone, $150 billion of foreign direct investment has been made in America’s hydrocarbon domains. No government stimulus program or infrastructure investment could hope to compare with this level of private activity.

To ensure and accelerate all the economic, employment, and geopolitical benefits from America’s hydrocarbon capabilities, the U.S. government should immediately:

1. Approve any and all qualified entities seeking to export natural gas;
2. Approve the Keystone XL pipeline, allowing Canadian crude to replace Venezuelan imports; and
3. Direct the Department of Commerce to approve any application to export crude oil, which is illegal under current law.

Then the Obama administration and Congress should work together to do everything possible to:

1. Encourage private domestic and foreign investment in hydrocarbons; and
2. Open up greater access to hydrocarbon resources on federal lands, where 85 percent of offshore—and half of onshore—territory remains off-limits.

Finally, Congress should:

1. Pursue twenty-first-century omnibus energy legislation, starting with a clean slate;
2. Repeal the authority of the Departments of Energy and Commerce over hydrocarbon exports to open up a free market consistent with historical trade principles; and
3. Restructure federal energy priorities away from funding commercial projects, focusing instead on basic R&D.

The entire study can be read here.

And only President Obama can save us:

President Obama should spend his remaining years in office making the United States part of the solution to climate change, not part of the problem. If Congress sticks to its policy of obstruction and willful ignorance, Obama should use his executive powers to the fullest extent. We are out of time.

With each breath, every person alive today experiences something unique in human history: an atmosphere containing more than 400 parts per million of carbon dioxide. This makes us special, I suppose, but not in a good way.

The truth is that 400 is just one of those round-number milestones that can be useful for grabbing people’s attention. What’s really important is that atmospheric carbon dioxide has increased by a stunning 43 percent since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution.

The only plausible cause of this rapid rise, from the scientific viewpoint, is the burning of fossil fuels to fill the energy needs of industrialized society. The only logical impact, according to those same scientists, is climate change. The only remaining question — depending on what humankind does right now — is whether the change ends up being manageable or catastrophic.

Only someone who was ignorant of basic science — or deliberately being obtuse — could write a sentence like this one: “Contrary to the claims of those who want to strictly regulate carbon dioxide emissions and increase the cost of energy for all Americans, there is a great amount of uncertainty associated with climate science.”

The rest of his alarmism here.

You see, he’s sorry for the “timing” of his statement blaming climate change on tornadoes in Oklahoma, but he stands by his assertion that climate change is causing tornadoes:

“Yesterday afternoon Senator Whitehouse took to the Senate floor to deliver his weekly speech about climate change. It was a speech that had been prepared in advance, and which included a general reference to tornadoes in Oklahoma. Tragically, and unbeknownst to the Senator at the time, a series of tornadoes were hitting Oklahoma at the same moment he gave his remarks. Senator Whitehouse regrets the timing of his speech and offers his thoughts and prayers to the victims of yesterday’s storms and their families, and he stands ready to work with the Senators from Oklahoma to assist them and their constituents in this time of need.”

Here’s white Whitehouse said yesteray, via Watts Up With That?:

So you may have a question for me:  why do you care?  Why do you, Sheldon Whitehouse, Democrat of Rhode Island, care if we Republicans run off the climate cliff like a bunch of proverbial lemmings, and disgrace ourselves? 

I’ll tell you why.  We’re stuck in this together.  When cyclones tear up Oklahoma, and hurricanes swamp Alabama, and wildfires scorch Texas, you come to us, for billions of dollars to recover. 

And the damage your polluters and deniers are doing doesn’t just hit Oklahoma and Alabama and Texas; it hits Rhode Island with floods and storms, and Oregon with acidified seas, and Montana with dying forests.  So like it or not, we’re in this together. 

You drag America with you to your fate. 

Let’s deal with his “facts” point by point. . .

There’s no evidence linking tornadoes to global warming, but the alarmists keep saying it anyway.

How about hurricanes? Larry Bell writes in Forbes:

But there’s a big disconnect from facts here. In reality, there has been no increase in the strength or frequency of landfall hurricanes in the world’s five main hurricane basins during the past 50-70 years; there has been no increase in the strength or frequency in tropical Atlantic hurricane development during the past 370 years; the U.S. is currently enjoying the longest period ever recorded without intense Category 3-5 hurricane landfall; there has been no trend since 1950 evidencing any  increased frequency of strong (F3-F-5) U.S. tornadoes; there has been no increase in U.S. flood magnitudes over the past 85 years; and long-term sea level rise is not accelerating.

And Texas wildfires? That’s so 2011: 

Texas made it through the spring wildfire season without any significant outbreaks and officials don’t expect a slew of massive fires during the summer season, either.

The grasslands and shrubs that fueled the historic wildfires in 2011 haven’t grown back yet, so the ferocity of any fires this year isn’t expected to approach those levels.

Two years ago wildfires killed 10 people, burned 4 million acres and destroyed 4,000 homes.

No wildfire season was declared last year because of ample rain.

This year intermittent rainfall has kept the fire threat low across most of Texas, but if rains don’t fall in the next couple months the state could see wildfires threats rise by mid-July.

So 2012 had no fire season and they’re hoping this year is quiet.

Global warming, you capricious sprite you. Make up your mind!

Via — wait for it — The Nation:

The Center for American Progress, Washington’s leading liberal think tank, has been a big backer of the Energy Department’s $25 billion loan guarantee program for renewable energy projects. CAP has specifically praised First Solar, a firm that received $3.73 billion under the program, and its Antelope Valley project in California.

Last year, when First Solar was taking a beating from congressional Republicans and in the press over job layoffs and alleged political cronyism, CAP’s Richard Caperton praised Antelope Valley in his testimony to the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, saying it headed up his list of “innovative projects” receiving loan guarantees. Earlier, Caperton and Steve Spinner—
a top Obama fundraiser who left his job at the Energy Department monitoring the issuance of loan guarantees and became a CAP senior fellow—had written an article cross-posted on CAP’s website and its Think Progress blog, stating that Antelope Valley represented “the cutting edge of the clean energy economy.”

Though the think tank didn’t disclose it, First Solar belonged to CAP’s Business Alliance, a secret group of corporate donors, according to internal lists obtained by The Nation. Meanwhile, José Villarreal—a consultant at the power-
house law and lobbying firm Akin Gump, who “provides strategic counseling on a range of legal and policy issues” for 
corporations—was on First Solar’s board until April 2012 while also sitting on the board of CAP, where he remains a member, according to the group’s latest tax filing.

CAP is a strong proponent of alternative energy, so there’s no reason to doubt the sincerity of its advocacy. But the fact that CAP has received financial support from First Solar while touting its virtues to Washington policy-makers points to a conflict of interest that, critics argue, ought to be disclosed to the public. CAP’s promotion of the company’s interests has supplemented First Solar’s aggressive Washington lobbying efforts, on which it spent more than $800,000 during 2011 and 2012.

“The only thing more damaging than disclosing your donors and having questions raised about the independence of your work is not disclosing them and have the information come to light and undermine your work,” says Sheila Krumholz, executive director of the Center for Responsive Politics. “The best practice, whether required by the IRS or not, is to disclose contributions.”

Nowadays, many Washington think tanks effectively serve as unregistered lobbyists for corporate donors, and companies strategically contribute to them just as they hire a PR or lobby shop or make campaign donations. And unlike lobbyists and elected officials, think tanks are not subject to financial disclosure requirements, so they reveal their donors only if they choose to. That makes it impossible for the public and lawmakers to know if a think tank is putting out an impartial study or one that’s been shaped by a donor’s political agenda. “If you’re a lobbyist, whatever you say is heavily discounted,” says Kathleen Clark, a law professor at Washington University and an expert on political ethics. “If a think tank is saying it, it obviously sounds a lot better. Maybe think tanks aren’t aware of how useful that makes them to private interests. On the other hand, maybe it’s part of their revenue model.”

Later in the article, more donors are exposed: 

According to these lists, CAP’s donors included Comcast, Walmart, General Motors, Pacific Gas and Electric, General Electric, Boeing and Lockheed. Though it doesn’t appear on the lists, the University of Phoenix was also a donor.

Hmmm. Let’s search CAP’s website for more potential “green” conflicts of interest, whereby CAP failed to disclose its financial interest in companies it was praising. . .

First Solar:

First Solar’s Antelope Valley, California, project will be the first utility-scale solar plant in the United States to incorporate thin-film technology on a system that tracks the movement of the sun. This technology will increase solar efficiencies and help make solar power more cost competitive. Antelope Valley, which will create 350 jobs and generate 230 MW of energy, received a $680 million loan guarantee.

General Motors:

When President Obama took office both General Motors and Chrysler teetered on the brink of bankruptcy. Despite some public and congressional opposition, the president provided loans to the automakers to prevent their collapse and provide them with time to restructure.

One of the stipulations of the auto bailout was that the companies had to develop aggressive plans to return to viability by investing in energy-efficient cars. Both companies agreed to move toward a more fuel-efficient fleet. In a March 2009 press statement President Barack Obama said the landmark agreement would create “a 21st century auto industry that is creating new jobs, unleashing new prosperity, and manufacturing the fuel-efficient cars and trucks that will carry us towards an energy-independent future.”

In addition to the successful bridge loans, other major Obama administration policies helped the auto industry and the nation by creating jobs, reducing oil use, saving families money, and cutting pollution. These policies included modern fuel economy standards, investments in research of alternatively fueled vehicles, retooling facilities to manufacture cleaner cars, and incentives for consumers to buy more fuel-efficient vehicles.

In addition to returning General Motors and Chrysler to profitability, GM announced on January 4, 2013, that it is the first automaker to sell 1 million cars in one year that get 30 miles per gallon.

Pacific Gas and Electric

Some things do improve over time. Among them is the Obama administration’s plan for using government lands to anchor the renewable energy revolution.

Ten months after the Interior Department issued a draft plan for siting large solar energy projects in six western states, and after listening carefully to the views of conservationists, developers, utilities, and others, the Obama administration has made significant improvements.

[. . .]

Fong Wan, senior vice president for energy procurement at Pacific Gas and Electric Company, said the new process “will provide more certainty around project development on the front end, by helping to streamline siting, permitting and other potential challenges. It is steps like these that will help increase the likelihood of successful projects, propelling the country toward our shared renewable energy goals and clean energy future.”

General Electric:

China’s aggressive smart grid plan poses problems and promise for the United States. On the one hand, U.S. companies currently have the most advanced smart grid technology across the value chain—technology that could create big opportunities in China. State Grid is already working with General Electric Co., Honeywell International Inc., IBM Corp., and other U.S. companies on joint standardization projects. If those projects go well then at least some of China’s smart grid investments could go toward purchasing U.S. products and paying U.S. technology licensing fees.

You can read the entire piece at The Nation here.

Marc Morano has roundup of the rhetoric here. 

Auto enthusiasts were thrilled last week as green automaker Tesla made it into the black, earning $11 million profit on revenue of $562 million in the first quarter of 2013. “I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t somewhat surprising to see they’ve been able to turn a profit so quickly” said Alec Gutierrez, an industry analyst for Kelley Blue Book.

A closer inspection of the numbers, however, reveals that the Palo Alto–based carmaker made its profit by selling $68 million in carbon credits to other automakers. Under a mandate that 15 percent of sales be zero-emission vehicles by 2025, California requires that automakers make a certain number of electric vehicles (EVs) or be penalized. And since Tesla makes only the athletic, $70,000 electric Model S, it has credits by the trunkload — while full-line automakers like GM pay a penalty.

“At the end of the day, other carmakers are subsidizing Tesla,” says Thilo Koslowski, an analyst at Gartner Inc. Combine the Golden State’s generous zero-emission credits with federal tax credits ($7,500) and a state rebate ($2,500) on purchase of each Model S, and the government subsidy amounts to $45,000 per car.

But the greater con is the fiction that electric cars are zero-emission vehicles.

According to a comprehensive engineering study published in the February 2013 Journal of Industrial Ecology, greenhouse gas emissions for an EV’s full life cycle — from production through road use — are not much greener than a comparable gas-powered auto, and no more planet-friendly than a diesel car. Indeed, when you factor in the toxicity of materials used in battery production, it’s hard to make the case that EVs are a very green alternative.

“Almost half of an EV’s life cycle global-warming potential is associated with its production,” concluded a study group from the Department of Energy and Process Engineering at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology. “We estimate the GWP from EV production (to be) roughly twice (that) with gas-engine production.”

Read more at the Detroit News here.