A Free-Market Energy Blog

Environmentalism: ‘Green’ versus ‘Good’ (in search of real environmentalism)

By Ben Acheson -- July 30, 2014

Environmental lobbies need to work with industry and encourage sustainable practices. Hysteria, dogma and hypocrisy will not save the planet. Neither will thousands of retweets. Balanced approaches separating real green from pretend, crony green is the true pathway to ecological progress.

Environmentalism is now firmly entrenched in our daily lives. It is part of pop-culture. It is even a marker of identity for some people.

Yet is the widespread support given to the environmental movement anything more than supercilious tokenism? Is being ‘green’ just another fashion statement, rather than any laudable drive to protect fragile ecosystems? Are we now at a point where the word ‘Green’ has wrongly become synonymous with ‘Good’?

That’s the topic of this new video: “Environmentalism: Why Green Isn’t Always Good.”

Obviously, there are elements of the environmental movement which are committed purely to protecting our precious environments.

Continue Reading

Who Is Charles Koch? (Senator Reid vs. Mother Jones’s Daniel Schulman)

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- July 29, 2014

“[Sen. Harry] Reid’s attacks have drawn cries of McCarthyism from around the political world, including MSNBC host Joe Scarborough and Mother Jones editor Daniel Schulman. And they’ve even created discomfort among liberal big-money donors and operatives, who worry the argument might expose them to charges of hypocrisy, while they also question the effectiveness of running against donors who won’t appear on any ballots.”

– Kenneth Vogel, “Behind Harry Reid’s War Against the Koch Brothers,”  POLITICO, July 7, 2014.

It was an all-too-familiar reframe: guilt by association (and in this case guilt from false/good association). At Climate Progress, Joe Romm breathlessly reported last month that “Bjorn Lomborg Is Part of the Koch Network—and Cashing In.” In Romm’s vitriolic words:

You know the T-shirt-wearing climate inactivist Lomborg (aka the Danish Delayer) from such recent gems as “Subsidizing renewables won’t stop global warming” and “What an increasingly wonderful world” and “The Poor Need Cheap Fossil Fuels” (seriously — or not).

Continue Reading

AWED Energy & Environmental Newsletter: July 28, 2014

By -- July 28, 2014

The Alliance for Wise Energy Decisions (AWED) is an informal coalition of individuals and organizations interested in improving energy & environmental policies. Our basic position is that technical matters like these should be addressed by using Real Science. It’s all spelled out at WiseEnergy.org, which has a wealth of energy and environmental resources.

A key element of AWED’s efforts is public education. Towards that end, every 3 weeks we put together a newsletter to balance what is found in the mainstream media about energy and environmental matters. We appreciate MasterResource for their assistance in publishing this information.

—————————

Greed Energy Economics:

Report: Renewables Subsidies Can Lead to Severe, Unintended Consequences

Wind and solar power are even more expensive than is commonly thought

Intermittent Renewables and Electricity Markets

German Utilities Bail Out Electric Grid from Wind’s Destruction

Green Hypocrisy: Billionaire Democrat Donor Made his money on Coal

Wind Turbine Fires 10x More Common Than Previously Thought

Climate Change Believers Waste More Electricity Than Everybody Else

Why relying on offshore wind will prove a costly error

Continue Reading

“More People, Greater Wealth, More Resources, Healthier Environment” (Part II: Julian Simon 1994 essay)

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- July 25, 2014
Continue Reading

“More People, Greater Wealth, More Resources, Healthier Environment” (Part I: 1994 Julian Simon essay reprinted)

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- July 24, 2014
Continue Reading

The Struggle to Mainstream Electric Vehicles

By -- July 23, 2014
Continue Reading

Editorializing for Wind in Ohio: A Rebuttal

By Thomas Stacy II -- July 22, 2014
Continue Reading

Zycher: Just the Facts, Mr. Steyer

By Robert Bradley Jr. -- July 21, 2014
Continue Reading

The Voice of Dead Eagles at Shiloh IV (Part III)

By Jim Wiegand -- July 18, 2014
Continue Reading

USFWS Special Agents: Speaking Truth to Wind Power re Shiloh IV (Part II)

By Jim Wiegand -- July 17, 2014
Continue Reading