Global warming, climate change, all these things are just a dream come true for politicians. I deal with evidence and not with frightening computer models because the seeker after truth does not put his faith in any consensus. The road to the truth is long and hard, but this is the road we must follow. People who describe the unprecedented comfort and ease of modern life as a climate disaster, in my opinion have no idea what a real problem is.
[SADLER] What is an inefficient tire? An inefficient tire to me is one that a tire that doesn’t roll.
[MORANO] That’s right. And all tires roll. No, what this is is they’re considering tires that are inefficient, meaning not aerodynamic enough, not fuel-mileage conscious enough. Doesn’t meet their specific requirements for carbon dioxide reduction. Their goal is to remove the equivalent of almost half a million cars off the road, you know, equivalent in CO2 reductions. That’s what’s going on behind this energy efficiency.
So when they say a noncompliant tire, say you got one from the factory that was just sort of your boring middle-of-the-road tire and you want to upgrade. So you have an SUV you want to upgrade to maybe a mud tire or an aggressive all-terrain. Well, hey. That’s not very good with resistance. That’s going to cause a lot more resistance with the road, i.e. more traction in that case, or even people who live in the mountains want snow tires. All sorts of specialty tires are going to be impacted.
And the tire manufacturers themselves say 70% of the tires currently sold in California may not be legal to be sold by the time this is fully implemented. That’s how insane this is. So it’s climate-focused, climate-motivated, and it’s unelected bean counters in California coming after just the next thing. I mean, they’ve already come after the pizza ovens, the gas stoves, the dishwashers, the washing machines, the dryers, the ceiling fans, gas-powered cars. Why not add tires to that list?
[SADLER] So what has been the response from the tire industry? Let’s say Goodyear, Bridgestone, Michelin, because it seems like they’re going to have to change their business model to deal with California. California has a huge economy; a lot of tires are sold in the state of California. What is the industry’s response, as well as the car dealerships and the car manufacturers, let’s say Ford?
[MORANO] Well, I can say no one likes this, and they’ve all been pushing hard against it. Dunlop Tire, Goodyear, they’re actually saying, as I said, 70% of the tires won’t be legal to be sold. And this is a huge business model problem. And California knows it. California dreaming is that they set environment, energy, climate policy for the rest of the country. And for years, they had that sort of terrorist role to be able to do that with the — starting with the California Air Resources Board — this is back now, and I think it was 2021 maybe, where they actually did the EV mandate and they started the slow gas-powered car ban.
And their goal was to force the auto manufacturers to follow, because California is such a big market. And then you add to that, you have other insane states that will likely follow, including Washington, Oregon, Massachusetts, New York. A lot of these blue states will follow whatever. I live in Virginia and we have a law on the books that says whatever California does, Virginia will follow. So we had the California gas-powered car ban, EV mandate on our books just because we were blindly following California. It’s nuts.
And so this is huge. The tire manufacturers see what’s coming. What it really means, at least in the short term, is people leaving California to cross state lines to buy tires. Just like they’re probably buying tobacco, fireworks, gas, stoves- who knows what else they have to buy in California. They’re going to have to cross over. Manufacturers are sounding a big warning on this, but this is California. Nothing usually deters them, except that the Trump administration was able to reverse the gas-powered car ban. And that took federal statutes. That took court cases. It took years. California is like — I want to say environmental terrorist, but they’re like an economic terrorist when it comes to this. They can do a lot of damage. Damage lasts for years. It takes a lot of years to overdo it.
[SADLER] When does this ban go into effect? I read it, it’s a two-phase ban. And is there any way to reverse it before it does go into effect?
[MORANO] Well, in terms of reversing, yes. This is five unelected board members of the California Energy Commission, and it was a unanimous vote. And so they have to have the efficiency standard in place by — for original equipment tire replacement — by 2033, and the automakers are saying that by that point, you know, especially the way these bureaucrats — not even the way something’s written or the initial ruling — it’s actually how it’s going to be interpreted, and then how it makes economic sense to react to it.
So even if a bureaucrat lays out, well, here’s all you have to do: follow these 14 steps and you can still sell that tire, a tire manufacturer is going to look at that and say, that’s insane, I’ll never do it, we’re just not going to sell that tire there. And that’s the reality of it. The unelected bureaucrats don’t ever see that part of it. They just say, well, I just follow these 18 point plan and they can do it. No, well, no company will do that if the 18-point plan is going to cost more and not be even remotely cost-effective. They’ll just say, not worth it, not going to happen. And that’s what’s going to end up happening to the California consumer.
Yeah. There appears to be evidence supporting the claim that media coverage of climate change has declined in recent years after reaching a peak.Data from the Media and Climate Change Observatory (MeCCO) at the University of Colorado Boulder, which tracks mentions of “climate change” or “global warming” in newspapers, TV, and radio worldwide, shows coverage generally increased over decades with notable spikes tied to events like IPCC reports, COP summits, and political developments. It reached its highest levels in 2021, coinciding with the Biden administration’s green agenda, the Glasgow COP26, and post-COVID recovery discussions.
Yeah. There appears to be evidence supporting the claim that media coverage of climate change has declined in recent years after reaching a peak.
Data from the Media and Climate Change Observatory (MeCCO) at the University of Colorado Boulder, which tracks mentions of “climate change” or “global warming” in newspapers, TV, and radio worldwide, shows coverage generally increased over decades with notable spikes tied to events like IPCC reports, COP summits, and political developments.
It reached its highest levels in 2021, coinciding with the Biden administration’s green agenda, the Glasgow COP26, and post-COVID recovery discussions.
Since then, coverage has trended downward—described in sources as a “precipitous” drop starting in 2022 and continuing through 2025, with an estimated 30% reduction over the past 3–4 years in some datasets. This post-2021 decline is corroborated by:
Reuters Institute reports (2024–2025) — noting gradual decreases in weekly climate news exposure from a 2023 peak, especially in Global North countries.
DW and Yale Program analyses — highlighting shrinking U.S. coverage amid competing priorities like politics and economics.
Media Matters studies — showing drops in broadcast TV climate segments (e.g., 25% decline from 2023 to 2024).
I know many of you have been feeling it. I certainly have, especially when I go look for stories to debunk from media outlets that take some press release and massage it so it reads like “turbo doom clickbait.”
There’s less of those these days and the data suggests a downward trend.
Our friend, Steve Milloy of junkscience.com posted a very interesting plot on X yesterday. Given the clues he left, I was able to replicate it with Grok.
It goes from 1988 (when Dr. James Hansen first testified before Congress about the climate scare,) to the present post-Biden era where Trump is effectively replicating Sherman’s march to the sea in the climate world.
Numbers are approximate and scaled to represent total articles across monitored sources, normalized for consistency across periods (e.g., fewer sources pre-2020 expansion).
The data comes from Media and Climate Change Observatory (MeCCO) which tracks media coverage of “climate change” or “global warming” in newspapers, radio, and TV across dozens of sources worldwide, with data starting in 2004 for global monitoring (and 2000 for US-specific).
Pre-2004 data comes from earlier studies by MeCCO founder Max Boykoff and colleagues, which analyzed English-language newspapers from 1988 onward.
Absolute article counts are not publicly available without accessing their datasets, but trends show low coverage in the late 1980s, spikes around key events (e.g., IPCC reports in 1990, 1995, 2001; Kyoto Protocol in 1997), and overall increases with major peaks in 2007, 2009, 2015, 2019, and especially 2021 (the highest since tracking began).
The peak around 2006-2007 is likely due to Al Gore’s climate movie An Inconvenient Truth gaining traction.
The peak in 2009 is clearly due to Climategate, which as you may recall, WUWT broke that story.
The plunge afterwards was the loss of faith in “The Hockey Team” of climate scientists. Since then, climate as a topic in media coverage has clawed its way back uphill, peaking in 2021 with Biden’s green agenda and EV mandate.
Coverage dipped during the 2018-2020 COVID-19 pandemic but has fluctuated with events like COP summits.
Whether this short down trend will hold depends on us. We have to keep fighting climate alarmism, calling out nonsense, be it scientific or political, when we see it.
In the summer of 2024, I reported that the state of Connecticut opted to forgo adopting California-style electric vehicle (EV) mandates. Additionally, Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin put the brakes on his state’s EV mandate at the end of the year.
Just last month, Maryland’s governor delayed its sad attempt to be East Coast California via a similar mandate.
Now Vermont Governor Phil Scott issued an executive order halting the enforcement of the state’s electric vehicle (EV) sales mandate, which had required that 35% of all vehicles delivered to Vermont dealerships be zero-emission starting with the 2026 model year.
This pause affects passenger cars and medium—to heavy-duty trucks and continues the trend of progressive states following California into a progressive blackhole of senseless energy policies.
Vermont is one of 11 states including New York, Maryland and Massachusetts that have adopted California’s zero-emission vehicle rules, which seek to end the sale of gasoline-only vehicles by 2035. California’s rules require 35% of light-duty vehicles in the 2026 model year to be zero-emission models.
Scott cited warnings from automakers that they could limit supply of gas-powered vehicles to dealers in the state because of the EV rules.
“It’s clear we don’t have anywhere near enough charging infrastructure and insufficient technological advances in heavy-duty vehicles to meet current goals,” said Scott.
It’s important to note that according to an analysis by Here Technologies and SBD Automotive, Vermont has one of the more favorable EV charging networks in the country, with a +1.3 charger-to-electric-vehicle ratio. That means if the mandate can’t work there, it won’t be working anywhere…and that includes California.
Local automobile dealers, who have to address the realities of customer preferences, are delighted with this news.
Vermont’s auto dealers, meanwhile, welcomed news of the executive order. The California rule doesn’t obligate local dealers to sell a certain percentage of electric vehicles, rather it requires car and truck manufacturers to, starting in model year 2026, ensure that 35% of vehicles shipped to those dealers be zero emissions.
Matt Cota, with the Vermont Vehicle and Automotive Distributors Association, said that demand for those EVs doesn’t yet exist in Vermont (about 14% of new cars registered in Vermont last year were zero emission).
Cota said manufacturers would likely comply with the mandate by sending fewer total vehicles to Vermont dealers. And he said dealers in New Hampshire, which has not adopted the California rule, will be well-positioned to satisfy demand for gas-powered vehicles that are no longer delivered to Vermont.
“In a way, if you don’t create the demand of electric vehicles, all you’re doing with this regulation — you’re not putting more electric vehicles on the road, you’re harming the local businesses that sell vehicles of all types,” Cota said.
It must be noted that the rollback of a federal waiver of the special California rules is poised to occur, which means these governors are simply getting ahead of the likely regulatory changes related to energy policies.
The governor’s decision is a setback for California, whose 2022 Advanced Clean Cars law makes it possible for states to mandate EVs. The 1970 Clean Air Act allows California to obtain a federal waiver to issue vehicle emissions regulations that are stricter than federal emissions standards and for other states like Vermont to adopt those regulations.
In December, the Biden administration issued a waiver green-lighting California’s Advanced Clean Cars rules, which a dozen states have adopted.
The House recently passed a bill to revoke that waiver, but the Senate has yet to take it up. The Trump administration said in February that it would support revoking the waiver.
I predict other states who followed California’s lead are going to rethink their plans. Furthermore, given Gov. Gavin Newsom’s hot, new, centrist rebranding….I foresee him “delaying” the EV mandate for California on the way out the door.
What’s the over/under that California Gov. Gavin Newsom jettisons state EV mandates as part of his hot new centrist rebranding efforts? https://t.co/X4SzxOXFaj— Leslie Eastman ☥ (@Mutnodjmet) May 17, 2025
As promised, President Donald Trump on Day One of his second term issued an executive order. Unleashing American Energy, that declared as U.S. policy an intention “to eliminate the ‘electric vehicle (EV) mandate’ and promote true consumer choice.”
As promised, President Donald Trump on Day One of his second term issued an executive order. Unleashing American Energy, that declared as U.S. policy an intention “to eliminate the ‘electric vehicle (EV) mandate’ and promote true consumer choice.”
But shortly after the Trump EPA sent its waiver cancellation request to Congress for review, the Government Accountability Office announced that Congress has not authority to review the Biden waiver or to revoke it. The GAO has thus created a difficult dilemma for the Trump Administration and for the millions of Americans who find the mandate unconscionable.
While the Energy Policy and Conservation Act of 1975, which created the Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFÉ) standards, expressly preempts states from establishing their own fuel economy standards, Congress had given California the authority to set its own vehicle emissions standards in a 1967 clean air law, with one caveat: California standards require a waiver from the Environmental Protection Agency.
Under the Clean Air Act, though, the EPA can legally reject a California waiver only if it is “arbitrary or capricious” and thus unnecessary or technologically infeasible. Historically, not a single California waiver has ever been revoked, and CARB claims there is no process within the Clean Air Act to reject a waiver. Moreover, when President Trump in 2019 sought to end its authority to set its own emissions and mileage rules, California and 22 other states sued.
In one of his last official acts, President Joe Biden last December granted California a new waiver that authorizes its mandate to require 35% of new 2026 model cars and light trucks sold in California to be zero-emission vehicles. Those numbers jump to 60% by 2030 and 100% by 2035. When Biden in 2022 approved a waiver for earlier California emissions rules, auto manufacturers and 14 states went to court.
The battle over zero-emission vehicle mandates is not restricted to California, because other states can follow California regulations once the state receives a waiver from the EPA. To date, 18 states have followed at least parts of the new California mandate, and the Golden State has put pressure on auto manufacturers to both follow and defend its unpopular regulations.
There are just two problems with the increasingly unpopular EV mandate. First, it appears that the only way for California to meet its 2026 milestone is to revise its downward. The California New Car Dealers Association reports that zero emission vehicles’ market share fell to 21.3% in the fourth quarter of 2024, down from 23.7% in the prior quarter for an annual average of 22% (barely above the 21.7% in 2023).
Second, nationwide polls show that 75% of Americans oppose any kind of gasoline- and diesel-powered vehicle ban. Public support in California for its mandate peaked at 55% in 2022 (with 39% opposed) but has been slipping in the wake of a 20% increase in electricity rates that have resulted in much higher costs for recharging EV batteries. EV sales in California fell from 447,000 in 2023 to just 387,000 in 2024.
But as long as the mandate stands, it will punish both auto manufacturers and auto buyers for not bowing to Governor Newsom’s whims. Automakers face penalties of $20,000 per noncompliant vehicle sold, with the only alternatives buying emission credits for EV-only manufacturers or limiting their inventories of gasoline and diesel vehicles.
This will force Californians to either buy an EV or just hold onto older vehicles longer – limiting their choices significantly. Similar penalties and limitations on consumer choice are looming in many other cities and states. One can only imagine the anger and frustration. (Meanwhile, formerly popular Teslas are now being blown to bits by radical supporters of EV mandates.)
The Institute for Energy Research’s Kenny Stein says that the sheer size of the California market (and that of the states that conform to California standards) means that automakers must either make their entire fleet California-compliant or sell different car lines in different states – a near economic impossibility. This forces citizens of other states to purchase more expensive vehicles and thereby subsidize California’s regulatory choices against their will.
But, adds Stein, ending the mandate requires revising or rejecting three major regulatory actions: EPA’s tailpipe emissions standards, the CAFÉ standards, and California’s Advanced Clean Cars II regulations for which the Biden EPA granted a waiver (that the GAO says Congress cannot overturn). Unlike President Obama, it appears, President Trump cannot eliminate this unpopular mandate “with a pen and a phone.”
Europeans, who started the ZEV crusade, have also been unable to meet their own mandate milestones. The EU, like California, has banned non-EV sales as of 2035 (with possible exceptions for hydrogen-powered vehicles). One result is that European automakers are terrified that cheap Chinese EVs will drive them into bankruptcy.
As with California, 23 of the 27 EU nations, including Germany, Italy, and France, missed their national climate targets under the Effort Sharing Regulation. This means they may face heavy financial penalties if they are unwilling or unable to purchase increasingly expensive carbon credits. But like Governor Newsom, the Europeans have not let the facts – or the cost – interfere with their zeal to be first to reach zero.
On top of the public outcry against mandates, California and the nation face the very real threat that Zombie-like adherence to the EV mandate will collapse the electric grid – rendering the EV totally undriveable. Add to that longer repair times, the high cost of replacement batteries, the growing fear of EV fires, and a host of other concerns.
Only time will tell whether pro-EV lawfare will prevent California – and much of the nation – from continuing its lemming-like march toward the cliff. The 25% are hell bent on forcing the 75% to jump with them, while the 75% only want to be free to make their own choices.
Meanwhile, the Gavinator’s own presumed desire to move to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue in 2029 has hit a bump in the road, as he is learning any step toward the center will unleash the vehement anger of the Democratic base.
Duggan Flanakin is a senior policy analyst at the Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow who writes on a wide variety of public policy issues.
This article was originally published by RealClearEnergy and made available via RealClearWire.
China is the only country in the world that can seriously challenge America’s longstanding status as the globe’s top dog. And a rejuvenated United States is the only thing standing in the way of an ambitious China ascending to the peak of the heap. The reemergence of a bipolar world in the 21st century – replicating the old U.S.-U.S.S.R. rivalry of the Cold War era – is the no-longer-to-be-ignored reality of our time.
China is the only country in the world that can seriously challenge America’s longstanding status as the globe’s top dog. And a rejuvenated United States is the only thing standing in the way of an ambitious China ascending to the peak of the heap. The reemergence of a bipolar world in the 21st century – replicating the old U.S.-U.S.S.R. rivalry of the Cold War era – is the no-longer-to-be-ignored reality of our time.
However, unlike the late Soviet Union – sometimes referred to as “Haiti with missiles” – China is an economic powerhouse, one that puts is technological prowess in the service of its geostrategic aspirations. ”China has roughly nine times as many engineers as the U.S. and perhaps as many as 15 times as many science and technology graduates,” George Gilder recently noted in the Wall Street Journal. This gives China a decisive edge in a world where rapid advances in technology have far-reaching economic and military implications.
There are, however, things that Trump and his team can do, and in some cases are already doing, that can turn the tables on Beijing. With the departure of the geopolitically inept Biden administration, Washington can now harness its considerable geological assets to the disadvantage of its rival in the Far East.
Beijing was quick to realize the importance of gaining control of both the mining and processing of rare earths and other critical minerals, which it had largely done by the time the U.S. and other industrialized countries embarked on their climate-driven green energy transition. Beijing was not so foolish; to meet its own energy needs, it built hundreds of coal-fired power plants. Abandoning fossil fuels, which the United States has in abundance, and embracing green energy, the supply chain for which is largely controlled by China, could benefit only one country. And for a while, China’s bet looked to be paying off.
But China’s dominance of such sectors as electric vehicles, batteries that power EVs and serve to backup intermittent wind and solar energy, and the raw materials in wind turbines and solar panels makes the Middle Kingdom vulnerable to Trump’s renewed embrace of “American energy dominance.” One of Trump’s Jan. 20 executive orders titled “Unleashing American Energy” includes directives revoking the EV mandate, freezing unspent funds for green energy, expediting approval of liquid natural gas (LNG) export facilities, and streamlining the permitting process for oil and gas leasing, exploration, development, and production. It also speeds up the approval process for new pipelines and other critical fossil-fuel infrastructure.
Another, less-reported section of Trump’s order focuses on the mining of critical minerals. It instructs federal agencies to identify all regulations, policies, and orders “that impose undue burdens on domestic mining and processing of non-fuel minerals and undertake steps to revise or rescind such actions.”
The geostrategic case for promoting the mining and processing of critical minerals in the U.S. is compelling. “China now produces 80-90% of the world’s rare-earth minerals, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. Yet China has only about 37% of the world’s estimated reserves,” notes Greg Walcher, president of the Natural Resources Group LLC. “Relying on China for critical minerals is obviously not smart, not safe, nor necessary.”
Known to the public for their unpronounceable names, rare earths – which are actually quite abundant – have a variety of commercial and military applications. They include smartphones, MRI equipment, satellites, jet engines, night-vision goggles, sonar on submarines and other naval vessels, and real-time imagery and targeting for surveillance and reconnaissance flights by unmanned aerial systems – just to name a few.
Taking rare earths and other valuable minerals seriously means upgrading the nation’s hollowed-out domestic supply chain for these natural resources. This is the purpose behind Trump’s order to eliminate “undue burdens on domestic mining and processing” of these strategically important minerals. That, of course, will be easier said than done, because Trump’s initiative will be challenged by lawsuits launched by activists determined to cripple America’s industrial base.
Trump’s desire to acquire Greenland from Denmark must be seen in this light. The icy island where the North Atlantic meets the Arctic abounds in mostly untapped mineral resources. In bringing the giant island under American jurisdiction, in whatever form, Trump can deny China (and Russia) access to Greenland’s riches while solidifying the U.S. presence in the Arctic.
Another Trump executive order temporarily halts offshore wind leases in federal waters and pauses approvals, permits, and loans for offshore and onshore wind projects. Aside from signaling to investors that putting their money into capital-intensive wind projects may not be a good idea, the order undercuts Beijing’s investment in raw materials used in wind energy.
“Wind farms require 10 times the amount of critical minerals as natural gas power plants and 1.6 times as much as nuclear power plants,” writes the Heritage Foundation’s Austin Gae.
China is the world’s leading supplier of raw materials that go into wind turbines, including in the U.S. Trump is deliberately shrinking the U.S. market for wind turbines and for the predominately Chinese-supplied raw materials that go into them. The goal is to play to America’s strengths, which lie in fossil fuels and a rejuvenated nuclear-power industry, while lowering our dependence on China by turning away from wind and solar power.
President-elect Donald Trump’s overwhelming electoral victory and his winning of the popular vote gives him a mandate to move forward with his agenda, not the least of which on the climate and energy deregulatory policies he promoted during his campaign.
Editor’s Note: President-elect Donald Trump’s overwhelming electoral victory and his winning of the popular vote gives him a mandate to move forward with his agenda, not the least of which on the climate and energy deregulatory policies he promoted during his campaign.
In anticipation of Trump’s victory, a coalition of groups, among them the Heartland Institute, E&E Legal Institute, Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT), Truth in Energy and Climate, and The American Energy Institute, assembled a list of 10 climate and energy actions Trump could begin implementing on day one to bring sound science and economics back to energy and climate policy.
Bloomberg News provided a cursory discussion and critique of these proposals in a story misleadingly titled, “Climate Skeptics Urge Trump to Boost Coal, Gut Federal Science.” While the proposals do boost coal, it does not gut science but rather proposes policies to improve it while getting America on track to energy dominance within the law. We at Climate Realism believe people should judge for themselves to determine the merits of the proposals, thus we present the TOP 10 list below unfiltered.
1. Paris Climate Treaty and Endangerment Finding. Determine that the Paris climate agreement is properly a treaty (rather than a mere “Executive agreement”) that requires Senate ratification. Transmit the treaty to the Senate for its advice. This is will legally relieve the US of any and all obligations under the treaty until and unless the Senate formally ratifies it. Repeal the Obama/Biden EPA determination that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases are threats to the public health and welfare (the “endangerment finding”).
2. EV mandate and California waiver. Repeal the Biden tailpipe rule/EV mandate and withdraw the California CO2 waiver that allows California to set tailpipe emissions and de facto national gas mileage standards. Request legislation clarifying that the 1975 Energy Policy and Conservation Act (EPCA) pre-empts state regulation of fuel economy, including Clean Air Act waivers, and that clarifies that the Clean Air Act cannot be used to regulate CO2.
3. Green New Scam and Grid Security. Freeze all Inflation Reduction Act climate/energy spending pending review. Ask Congress to repeal all the energy subsidies in the Inflation Reduction Act through budget reconciliation. For national and economic security purposes, bar electricity grid reliance on variable sources of electricity generation such as wind and solar.
4. Oil and Gas. Restore active federal oil and gas leasing on federal lands and offshore, including the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska (NPRA) and the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) in Alaska. Lifting moratoria on offshore drilling in areas put off limits by prior presidents. Reverse the Biden moratorium on federal leasing for coal mining. Streamline the permitting process for energy production. End the Biden moratorium on LNG export terminals.
5. Presidential Appointments. Appoint officials at federal agencies like EPA, Interior, DoE, FERC and other key agencies who will aggressively permit new oil and gas pipelines, LNG terminals and other infrastructure required for producing oil, gas and coal. Streamline the permitting process. Terminate all existing federal science advisory boards and reconstitute only the ones legally required. Appoint qualified and pro-energy individuals to the boards.
6. Offshore wind. Foreign offshore wind developers threaten consumers, endangered species, and iconic maritime communities whose prosperity depends on the fishing. The industrialization of fisheries by offshore wind development should be terminated by delisting unleased wind energy areas, revoking the “30×30” pledge, implementing a cumulative effects approach to planning, and developing a balanced interagency process not dominated by the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM).
7. Coal. Repeal all the anti-coal regulatory actions of the Biden administration and promote coal as a preferred means of producing electricity. Commence a review of related air quality regulations issued by EPA.
8. Litigation. Withdraw from, so as to terminate, industry litigation over Biden administration regulatory actions. Re-staff the Justice Department’s Environment and Natural Resources Division attorneys who will zealously defend administration priorities.
9. Regulatory Reform. End regulatory agency use of the linear non-threshold model (LNT) for radiation and chemical risk assessment. Reinstate the EPA rule against the use of “secret science.” Request legislation to require that federal courts no longer defer to regulatory agencies on scientific matters.
10. Regulatory Burden. Request the REINS act be passed to require congressional authorization of regulations with a significant economic impact, including but not limited to those with an economic impact of $100 million or more.
“EPA is attempting to hide its illegal electric vehicles mandate behind a ‘fleetwide’ average…. Congress has not directed EPA to force the adoption of electric vehicles, EPA is claiming this mandate unilaterally.” -CRA Tailpipe Coalition Letter
“EPA is attempting to hide its illegal electric vehicles mandate behind a ‘fleetwide’ average…. Congress has not directed EPA to force the adoption of electric vehicles, EPA is claiming this mandate unilaterally.” -CRA Tailpipe Coalition Letter (below)
The vote was 215-191, with all but one Republican and eight Democrats in favor. Twenty-five members did not vote.
“The very idea that the federal government would try and kill off gas-powered cars should scare anyone concerned with basic freedoms in this country,” noted Daren Bakst , Director of the Competitive Enterprise Institute’s Center for Energy and Environment. “EPA’s de facto electric vehicle (EV) mandate will hurt Americans, driving up prices and hurting mobility. It will especially hurt low-income households.”
A coalition letter dated September 19, 2024, explains why energy and mobility freedom is good policy–and mandates bad.
Dear Representative,
The undersigned organizations write to support disapproval under the Congressional Review Act (CRA) of the Environmental Protection Agency Multi-Pollutant Emissions Standards for Model Year 2027 and Later Light-Duty Vehicles. This rulemaking is beyond EPA’s authority, seeking to impose a de facto electric vehicle mandate on American consumers.
This rule on tailpipe emissions standards is a massive overreach, using a novel application of EPA motor vehicle authorities in an attempt to force a transition in the motor vehicles market to products that align with the ideological preferences of the Biden administration. This rule is a de facto electric vehicle mandate.
Congress has not given EPA the authority to require the purchase or production of certain types of motor vehicles or outlaw the purchase or production of other types of vehicles. Congress has not given EPA the authority to require the purchase or production of electric vehicles. EPA’s attempt to infer such power is contrary to longstanding administrative practice and contrary to recent Supreme Court precedent.
EPA openly stated that the intent of this rulemaking is to force a transition to electric vehicles. In this rulemaking and press announcements surrounding it, EPA repeatedly made clear that the intent of this rulemaking is to transition the motor vehicles market to electric vehicles, pollution reduction is merely an aside.
For example, the first sentence of EPA’s press release announcing the rulemaking states “Today, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced new proposed federal vehicle emissions standards that will accelerate the ongoing transition to a clean vehicles future.” The rulemaking itself extensively focuses on trends in electric vehicle manufacturing and announced plans from automakers and state governments regarding electric vehicles.
But EPA’s mandate from Congress is to reduce criteria pollutants from vehicles, not to pick and choose what type of vehicles can be sold. EPA cites an executive order from the Biden administration as impetus for this de facto electric vehicle mandate, but an executive order does not create new authority.
EPA’s statutory authority is to control emissions of vehicles, not to require the manufacture and sale of entirely different vehicles. Congress has not directed EPA to force the adoption of electric vehicles, EPA is claiming this mandate unilaterally. The Clean Air Act directs EPA to reduce pollutant emissions from vehicles themselves, by for example requiring emissions control devices like catalytic converters.
Electric vehicles are entirely separate products, they are not an emissions control device for internal combustion powered vehicles. EPA is thus for the first time seeking to mandate substitution of a different product in order to comply with its tailpipe emissions standards. This is a novel application of existing authority, and is frankly illegal. This illegality is made clear by an alternative scenario where EPA mandates the use of mass transit rather than individual motor vehicles. This would certainly reduce emissions from motor vehicles, but would be transparently beyond EPA’s regulatory authority.
EPA is attempting to hide its illegal electric vehicles mandate behind a “fleetwide” average. EPA is setting fleetwide average standards for vehicles rather than setting individual standards for specific classes of vehicles as a means of hiding its de facto electric vehicle mandate.
While these two actions may appear indistinguishable in many applications, the distinctness is put on clear display by the EPA’s rulemaking. Setting fleetwide average standards at reasonable levels allows for the inclusion of new emissions control technologies in new vehicles. This has a similar effect to setting a reasonable emissions standard for each specific class of vehicles.
However, setting a fleetwide average at an unreasonably low level, as this rulemaking does, disguises that there is no means of compliance through new control technologies, the only means of compliance is transitioning to a different product. If EPA set the same unreasonably low standard for a given class of vehicles, it would effectively outlaw that class of vehicles.
If EPA were to directly say that a class of vehicles was illegal and require that an alternative replacement must be purchased, that would be clearly acknowledged as beyond EPA’s authority. Congress has given the EPA no such power. But using the “fleetwide” average set at an unreasonably low rate, EPA can pretend it is not outlawing the manufacture or sale of any class of products, while it is effectively requiring carmakers to produce and sell an alternative product (electric vehicles) as that is the only way to comply with the unreasonable low standard. But hiding behind a “fleetwide” average to attempt to disguise this kind of impermissible mandate does not suddenly give EPA the power to impose such a mandate.
This EPA rulemaking is clearly beyond the scope of the regulatory power granted to the agency by Congress. While this overreach will be litigated in the courts, a positive CRA decision now would ensure that consumers are protected today, rather than wait years for the issue to work its way through the court system.
Sincerely,
Thomas J. Pyle, President, American Energy Alliance; Tim Chapman, President, Advancing American Freedom; Isaac Orr, Vice President, Always On Energy Research; Bob Carlstrom, President, AMAC Action; Phil Kerpen, President, American Commitment; Myron Ebell, Chairman, American Lands Council; Margaret Byfield, Executive Director, American Stewards of Liberty; Richard Manning, President, Americans for Limited Government; Brent Gardner, Chief Government Affairs Officer, Americans for Prosperity; Grover Norquist, President, Americans for Tax Reform; Jeffrey Mazzella, President, Center for Individual Freedom; Craig Rucker, President, CFACT; Daren Bakst, Director, Competitive Enterprise Institute; Jerry Simmons, President/CEO, Domestic Energy Producers Alliance; Kristen A. Ullman, President, Eagle Forum; Craig Richardson, President, Energy & Environment Legal Institute; Beatrice Lam, Secretary, Fueling California; Cameron Sholty, Executive Director, Heartland Impact; James Taylor, President, Heartland Institute; Ryan Walker, Executive Vice President, Heritage Action; Jon Sanders, Director, Center for Food, Power, and Life, John Locke Foundation; Jason Hayes, Director of Energy & Environmental Policy, Mackinac Center for Public Policy; Brandon Arnold, Executive Vice President, National Taxpayers Union; Donna Jackson, Director of Membership Development, Project 21 Black Leadership Network; Paul Gessing, President, Rio Grande Foundation; James E. Enstrom, PhD,MPH, President, Scientific Integrity Institute; Frank Lasee, President, Truth in Energy & Climate; Kathleen Sgamma, President, Western Energy Alliance
“The idea that government should tell people what kind of car they can or can’t purchase is fundamentally wrong. Virginians deserve the freedom to choose which vehicles best fit the needs of their families and businesses. The law is clear, and I am proud to announce Virginians will no longer be forced to live under this out-of-touch policy.” —Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin
“The idea that government should tell people what kind of car they can or can’t purchase is fundamentally wrong. Virginians deserve the freedom to choose which vehicles best fit the needs of their families and businesses. The law is clear, and I am proud to announce Virginians will no longer be forced to live under this out-of-touch policy.” —Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin
In Episode 440 of District of Conservation, Gabriella discusses Virginia exiting the California Air Resource Board’s EV mandate by the end of 2024. Tune in to learn more.
In Episode 579 of District of Conservation, Gabriella discusses the permitting reform bill – aka BAAJA – that is gaining traction in Congress now. The Senate will hold a cloture vote starting at 3:30pm ET in a motion to proceed. Gabriella discusses the status quo without permitting reform, how BAAJA is good for the environment and affordability. Tune in!SHOW NOTESBipartisan Policy Center: BAAJA ExplainerEstimating the US Energy System Impacts of the Bipartisan American Affordability and Jobs Act
‘With each passing day, it becomes clearer the electric vehicle mandate is unrealistic’
‘With each passing day, it becomes clearer the electric vehicle mandate is unrealistic’
So, what is more important to the Biden White House, campaign politics or meeting its nominal climate goals? The administration’s rhetorical flourishes say one thing, but its policy actions seldom manage to match the narrative.
The New York Timesreported Saturday that the Biden administration will delay its onerous new tailpipe emissions standards as an election-year sop to the United Auto Workers and other union special interests.
Citing only unnamed sources, the Times said the Biden regime would delay current requirements for automakers to rapidly increase EV sales in just the next few years, pushing the targets back until after 2030.
The sub-head to the article gives away the purely political motivations behind the move, saying, “The change to planned rules was an election-year concession to labor unions and auto executives, according to people familiar with the plan.”
In addition to labor union pressure, this latest move by the administration to adjust its agenda was likely impacted by the letter it received last November from nearly 4,000 US car dealerships urging a slowdown in its EV mandate agenda due to low consumer demand for the cars.
“While the goals of the regulations are admirable, they require consumer acceptance to become a reality,” the signatories wrote. “With each passing day, it becomes more apparent that this attempted electric vehicle mandate is unrealistic based on current and forecasted customer demand.”
It is key to note that the Times story also specifies pressures coming into the White House from auto executives, which should hardly surprise anyone. One can easily envision complaints from executives at Ford, for example, which just reported a whopping $4.7 billion loss for 2023 in its Model e EV division, along with an expectation the division will lose another $5.5 billion for 2024.
Losses at General Motors’ EV business also ran into the billions for the year. Regardless of the utopian desires of the Biden regulators, investors in these and other US automakers are going to have only so much patience for this sort of financial malpractice before a general rebellion begins.
The truth, of course, is that every element of the Biden energy and climate agenda is motivated almost entirely by partisan politics. If a given policy move is not a response to pressure from the climate alarm lobby that has collectively become one of the Democrat party’s biggest source of campaign funding, it is likely a payoff to labor unions who play a slightly smaller funding role, or to trial lawyer interests who support the administration’s lawfare efforts to put its political opposition – most notably presumptive GOP nominee Donald Trump – into prison before this November.
Biden’s move in January to halt permitting processes related to proposed new export facilities for liquefied natural gas is another clear example. The Wall Street Journal reported on February 8 that decision was motivated by pressures from leftwing billionaire interests like the Rockefeller Family Fund and Michael Bloomberg who “have provided millions of dollars in recent years to front-line environmental groups that are campaigning against fossil-fuel projects, including LNG terminals that have been proposed on the Gulf Coast.”
Following an intense multi-year pressure campaign, the WSJ quotes one unnamed White House source as stating, “They got our attention.” Next thing you know, a new executive order disrupting a rapidly expanding global LNG market is drafted and signed for the obvious motivation of keeping all the dark money flowing from the billionaires into Biden campaign-supporting political action committees.
Some people out there have an inner itch to do things different. Maybe it’s art, or music, or some other glorious pastime that we as the rest of humanity benefit from, far, far more than we pay.
Some people out there have an inner itch to do things different. Maybe it’s art, or music, or some other glorious pastime that we as the rest of humanity benefit from, far, far more than we pay. What sort of car these types drive is fascinating; usually something quirky or wonderfully weird; Neil Young spent years before he made it big driving an old hearse, various narcotics taped under the dash.
Others think completely differently, bone-dry aesthetically-speaking; thinkers who just want to make things better. Their inner guiding light is efficiency. I had a genius uncle, a farm boy who made it to high levels in national security in Ottawa through no formal education and sheer ingenuity, who would love describing how he could achieve 70 miles per gallon driving carefully and methodically and under-the-speed-limit around Ottawa in a tiny car, joyously oblivious to Type A heads exploding in his rear-view mirror.
Most people are somewhere in the middle, neither artists nor efficiency maniacs, a space that is quite comfortable for most of humanity. We like nice things, we like how they look, but we also care about practicality. We want to be different from everyone else! But just a bit, or that’s weird. And we all want to drive! Even if it is getting harder and harder for today’s youth to afford it, that drive is still there if finances allow.
This overwhelmingly dominant trait can drive the two extreme camps crazy, a battle that becomes stark and vivid in the automotive industry. Our automotive choices make a statement whether it is intentional or not, and whether we want it or not, because nothing makes a person easier to judge than their automotive preferences.
That’s a reality that people who want to change the world have to accept. It is a very hard thing to swallow, particularly for logicians who can make a near-perfect argument as to why one choice is clearly superior to another, and yet people will look you in the eye and do the opposite. (Long ago when minivans were fully earning their stripes as useful and comfortable transport, about when the perplexing stigma of minivan ownership was setting in, I watched a friend of a friend, standing five-foot-not-much, try and wrestle a mountain bike onto the roof rack of her SUV (yes, yes, I helped), and as she did so she said, “What I really need is a minivan but what would people think of me if I drove one?”)
Minivan vs. SUV was symbolic of the sheer power of how the 80-percent-in-the-middle will shape the landscape, to the extent that personal choice is allowed (hope you’re not scoffing at that, if so, see: federal 2035 all-EV mandate). Because I’m petty and juvenile, it used to fill me with scorn to see people sub-optimize such an expensive purchase on the altar of ‘what other people think of me’.
I’m still petty and juvenile, but have gained enough miles under my wheels to know that things aren’t so simple, and even if they are, it is hardly any of my business what people choose or why. Some care about resale value. Some like an available colour. Some like the feel of the steering wheel or comfort of the seats or the look of the front grille. So what.
It’s not easy for automakers either, because it’s not just that people will actually make auto purchase decisions based on some ridiculously small feature, but also that the lead time from when consumer preferences head in a new direction can be far less than the time it takes to develop a new vehicle. For example, a significant change in gas prices can lead to a preference, or abhorrence, for small, fuel efficient cars, while manufacturers won’t really be able to fully reflect this for a few years.
That’s what makes the EV ‘transition’ so fascinating. If there is one thing that is glaringly obvious in the whole topic, it is that people absolutely do not purchase ‘what they are supposed to’. You can’t make any sense out of it, because the whims and motivations come from external influences that are unpredictable. If Taylor Swift started driving a black Toyota Corolla sedan all of a sudden, what do you think would happen to black Toyota Corolla sedan sales? Not sales of grey ones though, pah! What am I, crazy? Who’d be caught dead in one of those things?
So now, particularly here in Canada but in many other jurisdictions including California, drivers are being told they will not be allowed to buy any new vehicle that isn’t EV, nor will manufacturers be allowed to sell anything that isn’t an EV.
The manufacturers are playing their part, nervously unveiling EV after EV after EV. They advertise the crap out of them, auto publications dutifully test and review them, and the media breathlessly reports how a model’s sales skyrocket by, say 33 percent, when sales go from 3 to 4 units per month.
Think about how amazing that order book is. A mass manufacturer like Ford is so swamped with interest that they simply must grandiosely and loudly announce: “Sorry Sir or Madam, we can no longer take your order, our success is just too overwhelming.” Many manufacturers reported similar order-book hysteria.
Sales in November 2023 did indeed ‘double’ compared to the prior November, but in the entire quarter Ford sold only 11,905 units. In the two years after the hail-the-future order book bumper crop, Ford only sold about 40,000 F-150 Lightnings. In two years. Recently Ford announced a halving of 2024 production plans down to about 1,600 units per week, or just under 7,000 per month.
Keep in mind that in 2023 Ford sold over 750,000 F-150 internal combustion pickups in the US, and many of these go to urban dwellers for whom an EV pickup might make total sense – ones that rarely leave the city (EVs are in general far better suited to urban environments where they can scoot home safely to a nice warm private charging station every night).
Which brings us back to consumer behaviour again, that mystifying and surely exasperating trait of humanity that no amount of cajoling and ‘proper thinking’ will break. “Two hundred thousand reservations!” to “Slashing production forecasts!” In half. On a variant of the most popular vehicle in the US.
Tesla continues to dominate EV sales, and many people, when they decide they want an EV, mean they want a Tesla (in the pickup world, Rivian might be the Tesla of EV pickups, time will tell). Major auto manufacturers are having a very difficult time seeing EV sales grow to any level that would approach profitability.
It’s hard not to feel bad for them, if one can or should feel bad for huge corporations. How on earth does one plan for the coming year, when two hundred thousand consumers say yes, I want one of those, but then 80 percent change their mind by the time Ford can actually manufacture them?
But observe; whispering in their manufacturing ears are governments saying not subtly that “Don’t worry, we will be legislating internal combustion out of existence, just build them and they will come…” Said less loudly is the supporting evidence: “because they have no choice.” Well, it worked for a while in the Soviet Union didn’t it? 29dk2902lhttps://boereport.com/29dk2902l.html
Making things even more complicated for manufacturers are upcoming elections in the US (this year) and Canada (what feels like an eternity but is really only 1.5 years) that could see either minor or major revisions to EV policy rollouts of the past few years.
But forget all the uncertainty surrounding manufacturers; that all gets trumped (no pun intended) by the human element. Here’s an important realization that we all need to accept: Some stuff just gives us a sense of belonging with others in a way that is critical to mental well being. Some people like to dress in the latest fashion. Some get the most popular hair styling. Some drive a rugged SUV because of what it says about them.
That can make manufacturers pull their hair out, because something illogical might be their biggest hit ever. But on top of that one must now layer the rancid decay of politics. EV sales seem to be falling along political fault lines, which in a way is not surprising: one side of the political spectrum sees climate change as a moral imperative to be dealt with as rapidly as possible, and that element, to the extent it can afford it, is responsible for the highest uptake of EVs (it is another sign that ‘left wing vs. right wing’ is a historical anachronism of little value any more; the traditional ‘left’ represented the working class, the downtrodden, the ones that needed a safety net; today’s main EV purchasers are wealthy enough to pursue Teslas first and foremost, often with a multi-car garage full of options). EV as political statement is yet another example of how our preferences link us to a tribe of our choice, rational or not, and it will be supra-humanly difficult to change that, whether in Canada or the US or Togo.
All one can conclude from this hodgepodge of observations is that the auto market will continue to reflect certain aspects of human nature that we may not even be aware of ourselves, and also reflect physical, financial and security realities/rationales that will not be changed by government edict. I have no idea what that means in terms of a transition to EVs, and that trajectory could change with the development of new battery technology, for example. But at present, it should be clear, based on examples like the Ford F-150 Lightning EV experience, that human enthusiasm and professed care does not necessarily translate well into the cold hard reality of what people put their money down on.
It is a nuanced world. People are imperfect and beautifully so, it adds colour to the world. Either the landscape is more or less free, where people express themselves as they wish, or it is a closed quasi- or full-dictatorship where that is not permitted (see: censorship, over-reaching legislation, thought police/moralistic systemic governmental intervention, personal carbon budgets, etc.). The latter never succeeds because it fights human nature, and the former has elements that make no sense outside one’s own circle of people that get it. I choose not to be part of some tribes, but I probably choose to be part of others, and likely do so subconsciously, which makes the whole thing even trickier.
Current politicians and WEF-types believe they have a blueprint for humanity to unroll. It is an absurdity, if for no other reason than they can’t comprehend the complex realities of 8 billion people whom they are trying to force in a certain direction. They are trying to force them all into metaphorical minivans, because minivans make more sense than anything else. They will fail.
Energy conversations should be positive and, most of all, grounded in reality. Life depends on it. Find out more in “The End of Fossil Fuel Insanity” at Amazon.ca, Indigo.ca, or Amazon.com. Thanks!
Read more insightful analysis from Terry Etam here, or email Terry here.
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