{"id":313064,"date":"2024-03-26T09:45:17","date_gmt":"2024-03-26T08:45:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=313064"},"modified":"2024-03-26T09:45:19","modified_gmt":"2024-03-26T08:45:19","slug":"houstons-robust-fossil-future-chronicles-ceraweek-op-ed-misdirects","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=313064","title":{"rendered":"Houston\u2019s Robust Fossil Future (Chronicle\u2019s CERAWeek op-ed misdirects)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From Master Resource<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

By\u00a0<\/em>Allen Brooks<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

\u201cDo we need a clean energy industry that depends on government handouts forever? Yes, if you ascribe to the climate disaster mantra\u2026. Does anyone consider letting market forces drive technology development?\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

An op-ed in Monday\u2019s Houston Chronicle<\/em>, \u201cHouston is making a losing bet on fossil fuels<\/a>,\u201d greeted visitors to CERAWeek. Author Randall Morton<\/a> attacked oil company CEOs and Houston business leaders for defending a \u201cdeclining\u201d industry. His opening sentence? \u201cLeaders of the oil and gas industry are in Houston for CERAWeek, grappling with the inevitable decline of the industry.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Morton then goes after the \u201ceconomic development leaders at the Greater Houston Partnership [who] are doubling down on this declining industry.\u201d He specifically identifies the GHP\u2019s Energy Transition Initiative \u2013 hydrogen and carbon capture \u2013 as failed technologies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fair enough, but he misses a critical point. These technologies are less about betting on \u201cfading fossil fuels\u201d than they are decisions to suck on the federal teat of subsidies<\/em>. That reality was acknowledged by Energy Secretary Jenifer Granholm in her CERAWeek talk when she told the audience, \u201cMany of you are taking advantage of those irresistible tax credits. Good!\u201d (No mention from any federal officials about the deficit spending and monetary inflation used to pay for it.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Subsidies Are for Losers<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Changing human behavior, which is what subsidies are designed to accomplish, apparently doesn\u2019t sway Morton. Maybe he wants even more government money for his favorite technologies, but he never tells us what those might be. He fails to understand an Economics 101 point: The market picks winners, leaving losers for government. And losers they have proven to be to date, not unlike synthetic fuels of a half century ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cInflation Reduction Act\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

There seemed to be no shortage of taxpayer money being thrown at green energy technologies, based on the legislation passed in 2021 and 2022. First, there was the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act of 2021, then it was the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 (IRA). The former included a laundry list of favorite climate investments to help localities deal with the clean energy transition including $7.5 billion for electric vehicle charging stations, $5 billion for zero-emission and clean buses, $2.5 billion for clean ferries, and $65 billion for clean energy transmission. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The irresponsibly named IRA bill was a trove of subsidies and tax credits for clean energy. The Congressional Budget Office at the time of its passage estimated the bill to cost $391 billion between 2022 and 2031. An analysis by investment firm Goldman Sachs put the cost at $1.2 trillion, while a money manager estimated it at $1.4 trillion. Even the CBO has upped its initial cost estimate to $660 billion through 2031 and increased it to $786 billion for 2024-2033. Many of these subsidies, which originally had time limits, have had them removed\u2014allowing subsidies for the life of projects, further bloating the cost of the bill. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget wrote about the CBO\u2019s revised estimates. They included two charts that dramatically show how much the various categories of spending are projected to increase and how those spending categories will spread over the forecast periods. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Inflation Reduction Act conservatively has increased by nearly two-thirds since it was enacted in 2022.<\/strong><\/em><\/h5>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

You will note the magnitude of the spending increases. They will be even greater according to Goldman Sachs. For categories of green energy spending like electric vehicles, energy efficiency, and carbon capture & clean fuel, they will be much greater in 2031 and 2033. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many of the subsidies in the IRA will continue for well after the 10-year cost assessment period inflating the overall cost of the bill.<\/strong><\/em><\/h5>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

In the world of industrial policy, which the Biden administration is engaged in, the question becomes should one reject the government\u2019s free money? For Morton, no one should succumb to the siren song of subsidies, even if they were enacted to prompt these specific investments. Shunning the subsidies would open companies and CEOs to attacks from activists and politicians for not being patriotic and supporting the government\u2019s effort to solve the existential climate crisis. And they could be slammed by shareholders for accelerating their company sunsets. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Do we need a \u201cclean\u201d energy industry? How about one that depends on government handouts forever? Yes, if you ascribe to the climate disaster mantra. How many years do we have before the world ends? This fear is what is driving the shoveling of taxpayer money into corporate coffers as long as they make the \u201ccorrect\u201d investments. Does anyone consider letting market forces drive technology development? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Coal Question<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some of the claims Morton made were superficial at best. He tried to link Big Oil to King Coal. He was using the decline in U.S. coal production and the reduction in coal employment as the lesson for oil\u2019s future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our coal production has declined as shown in the chart below, but as you can see in the second chart, our coal exports are up and we continue to import coal at about the same level as we did in the late 1990s.  Coal\u2019s decline was because we are blessed with huge natural gas resources that create less pollution. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our coal use is down due to soaring natural gas production and lower cost to generate electricity.<\/strong><\/em><\/h5>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
Coal exports continue growing and our imports are up as global coal markets are posting annual records with no end in sight.<\/strong><\/em><\/h5>\n\n\n\n

Final Word<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Energy has turned into a subsidy play, something for everyone. Yes, so-called Big Oil is at the table. One can join Randall Morton in calling out hydrogen and CCSU as the wrong approach. But why not consider ending similar government favor for wind, solar, and batteries? Do consumers and taxpayers\u2013and the freedom to choose\u2013matter?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

Energy expert Allen Brooks writes at Energy Musings<\/a>, from which this article is adapted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cDo we need a clean energy industry that depends on government handouts forever?\u00a0Yes, if you ascribe to the climate disaster mantra\u2026. Does anyone consider letting market forces drive technology development?\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":121246920,"featured_media":313071,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","_crdt_document":"","advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[691827858,691827857,691818618,691820679,691818576,691818299,691818864],"class_list":{"0":"post-313064","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","6":"hentry","7":"category-uncategorized","8":"tag-coal-question","9":"tag-energy-secretary-jenifer-granholm","10":"tag-energy-transition","11":"tag-houston","12":"tag-inflation-reduction-act","13":"tag-subsidies","14":"tag-the-biden-administration","16":"fallback-thumbnail"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/climatescience.press\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/0fossil-fuel-hero.jpg?fit=3000%2C1170&ssl=1","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paxLW1-1jrq","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":277660,"url":"https:\/\/climatescience.press\/?p=277660","url_meta":{"origin":313064,"position":0},"title":"Wounded Texas from Wind and Solar (backdoor recognition at the Houston Chronicle)","author":"uwe.roland.gross","date":"07\/09\/2023","format":false,"excerpt":"Don\u2019t expect the\u00a0Houston Chronicle\u00a0editorial team, much less the\u00a0conflicted,\u00a0climate-religionist\u00a0business editorialist Chris Tomlinson, to forthrightly explain how a once reliable grid in the Lone Start State became wounded. 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