“I’m proud to report that the American Gas Association (AGA), the American Public Gas Association (APGA), Spire Inc. (who really led the effort), and a gas appliance manufacturer, Thermo Products LLC (a subsidiary of Burnham holdings), rose to the occasion with a filing that put DOE on notice that the gas industry isn’t giving up.”

“Market conservation, in short, is wholly different from command-and-control government conservationism.”

The Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) of the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) is further escalating its electrification strategies using regulatory appliance efficiency standards. But the good news is that resistance continues and is even on the upswing with the global failure of ‘Net Zero’ in light of recent developments.

The entire debate is colored by DOE/EERE ignoring the intent of the Energy Policy and Conservation Act of 1975 (EPCA) to balance varied consumer interests and energy choices, rather than providing the agency with carte blanche permission to squeeze out every possible BTU without regard to consumer cost, convenience, and fuel preferences.…

“This letter to Biden is a very mixed bag of legalize and subsidize. It is hardly free market; it is a testament about how some Republicans and conservative Democrats are playing the government welfare game in a time of political defensiveness.”

Classical liberalism explains and justifies voluntary transactions between consenting adults. The framework is private property rights, the rule of law, and government abstinence, or neutrality.

Applied to civilian energy, the government should not research, commercialize, subsidize, or penalize. Government should buy energy for its usage, not requisition it. Market transactions should not be subject to price controls, allocation controls, or differential taxation. Jawboning by government officials toward non-market ends should be avoided too.

This background is necessary to parse a March 10, 2022, letter to Joe Biden from two Republicans, one (Trumpian) Democrat, and one Independent.…

“Corporate policy makers entering the fray should be guided by two principles…. First, mandatory GHG programs should be rejected in favor of voluntary approaches….  Second, voluntary actions by corporations should not go beyond win-win ‘no regrets’ initiatives. Control practices that are uneconomic penalize either consumers or stockholders and politicize the issue of corporate responsibility.”

– Robert Bradley, “Climate Alarmism and Corporate Responsibility.” Electricity Journal, August/September 2000.

It was called corporate social responsibility (CSR). Today, it has morphed into Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG).

Upon the election of Donald Trump, the environmental Left redoubled its effort to politicize business on the climate issue. The subtitle to an early 2017 article in Yale Climate Connections, for example, “Business Leadership on Climate Seen as Key,” read: “With expectations of a much lower federal leadership role on controlling carbon emissions, key sectors of business community seen by some as maintaining momentum.”…

“September [2017] sets alarming global temperature record and negates a favorite denier talking point … It was also the most active month on record for North Atlantic hurricanes.”

“2017 is so unexpectedly warm it is freaking out climate scientists.”

– Joe Romm, ThinkProgress, October 5, 2017

Remember Joe Romm? Head of his own nonprofit Center for Energy and Climate Solutions (CECS) until it folded? Climate pundit at the Center for American Progress until Climate Progress folded?

Romm might be busy elsewhere on the Progressive Left, but his exaggerations remain for the record. (Thankfully, CAP has left his posts up for historical evaluation.)

Here is one. Going on five years ago, Romm highlighted a +0.54C (about one degree Fahrenheit) monthly reading above the 30-year average for September 2017. He all but went nuts, stating:

September 2017 smashed multiple climate records, alarming scientists and further negating a favorite talking point of climate science deniers…. It’s