Man-caused climate change is real, but it isn’t an existential crisis. It’s not going to destroy human civilization like a nuclear war would. Climate change will greatly damage economies and kill a lot of people, so it’s a serious issue that needs to be dealt with, but it isn’t existential.
Technologies like solar and windmills are good, but have trade offs. Many rightwing arguments like how inefficient these technologies are or how many birds they kill are based on original versions of these technologies that have been greatly improved upon; so these critiques are no longer valid and people making them either are ignorant on how outdated their information is, haven’t done their due diligence, or are being dishonest.
Cost benefit analyses on the benefits of reducing carbon emissions have already been done, and they overwhelmingly show that reducing emissions is worth it. However, it is only worth it if we cut emissions slowly. Cutting too fast likely makes the costs of cutting greater than the benefits.
“No vehicle is currently anywhere close to meeting these standards: According to data from the Energy Department, motorcycles come closest, at just shy of 45 miles per gallon, while cars average less than 25 miles per gallon. But the standards are fleet-wide, meaning the average for all of an automaker’s output needs to fall below the minimum. In practice, this means manufacturers must rely heavily on low- or zero-emission vehicles, like battery-powered electric vehicles or plug-in hybrids, to get on the right side of the average.
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The Senate version of the “big, beautiful bill” sets both of these dollar amounts at “$0.00,” effectively rendering it moot: Automakers making cars that don’t adhere to CAFE standards will still technically be in violation of the law, but they would face no reprisal.”
“The energy provisions of the 900-plus page bill have come under particular scrutiny after last-minute changes phased out clean energy tax credits faster than expected and added new taxes on wind and solar projects.
At the same time, new last-minute inducements were unveiled for fossil fuels, including one classifying coal as a critical mineral when it comes to a government manufacturing credit.
“We’re doing coal,” Trump said in an interview released over the weekend on Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures,” where he also called solar energy projects “ugly as hell.””
“Under Trump, who promised to implement a policy “where no windmills are being built,” the federal government has bolstered fossil fuel projects and deterred renewable energy development. The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management recently halted the construction of an offshore wind project that would power 500,000 homes, whose federal lease was approved in 2017 under the first Trump administration. The Environmental Protection Agency has also rescinded Clean Air Act permits for a New Jersey offshore wind project, which had “devoted extensive time and resources to follow a complex, multi-year permitting process, resulting in final project approvals that conform with the law,” according to the project’s developer.”
Home insurance in California and Florida is up big thanks to climate change. Polluters get a massive subsidy through their pollution’s negative externality, and they spend the big bucks on lobbyists and propaganda to prevent environmental protection.
“Coal’s decline was not caused by a federal plot to transition away from coal, like Trump thinks, but rather by markets and innovation. Advancements in renewable energy technologies—which were, and continue to be, supported by subsidies—made the energy source more attractive to investors. Breakthroughs in horizontal drilling in the early 2000s brought a flood of cheap and abundant natural gas to the market. These technologies priced coal out, which lowered energy bills for consumers and significantly reduced greenhouse gas emissions in the United States.
The energy source is also not as cost-effective as the executive order claims. Coal plants are expensive to build and operate, and transportation costs can exceed the price of coal at the mine. These economic factors have informed investors and utilities not to build coal-fired power plants—the most recent large plant was built in 2013—which has made the current fleet of these power plants less efficient than other energy sources.
To be sure, some regulatory barriers, including federal air quality standards and state-level bans, have made coal less competitive. However, “it is the market that explains coal’s decline better than regulations,” Philip Rossetti, an energy policy analyst at the R Street Institute, tells Reason.”