“Air-conditioning demystifies nature’s miracles, and contributes to a culture characterized by disconnection and overconsumption.”
– Neri Oxman (MIT Media Lab), quoted here
“‘I’d rather sweat and stink and drink ice water.'”
– Mark Feeney (Boston Globe), quoted here
My recent blog at the Institute for Energy Research (IER) website documented an ongoing series at the New York Times aimed at getting one and all to lower their carbon footprint.
Grill vegetables, not meat. Use gas, not charcoal or wood. Watch how you wash your car and boil your water. Drink your coffee cold. Avoid dairy. Forgo the flowers. To which I said:
…In a free society, personal choices are made for reasons of health, safety, convenience, quality, and affordability. Time is as important as dollars. Quality is valued over lesser substitutes.
“I will not stand for [the Green New Deal]. We will defend the environment, but we will also defend American sovereignty, American prosperity, and we will defend American jobs.”
– President Donald Trump, The White House, July 8, 2019.
E&E News headlined its story, “Trump slams Paris deal in remarks about the environment.” Never mind that the major nations of the world are violating, if not decimating, the global climate agreement’s voluntary quotas. And never mind that the President talked about a raft of other environmental issues where the news is all good.
In fact, it was a speech of substance, the major theme of which is mineral energies are compatible with environmental progress. Some highlights from Trump’s speech in regard to energy and climate follow:
Remarks by President Trump on America’s Environmental Leadership
“ICCC-13 will serve as a roadmap for further Trump administration efforts regarding climate science and policy, as well as highlight the voluminous scientific evidence that humans are not creating a climate crisis.”
– James Taylor, Conference organizer, 13th International Conference on Climate Change, Washington, DC: July 25, 2019.
Climate conferences by the Heartland Institute once could be dismissed by the alarmist mainstream as fringe affairs. But with President’s Trump withdrawal from the Paris Climate Accord, as well as the US-led boom in oil and natural gas production, the Obama-era “keep it in the ground” philosophy is in full retreat.
Political problems aside, climate alarmism is in intellectual trouble, as dire forecast after forecast proves exaggerated, and false scares come and go. And those romantic energy transformation predictions? The reality of dilute, intermittent energies is little energy and growing grass roots complaints.…