The Senate Energy & Natural Resources Committee held a hearing April 27 examining energy development on federal lands. The hearing focused on the status of the Department of Interior’s current moratorium onshore oil and gas leasing program. The hearing featured testimony from Nada Culver, Deputy Director of Policy and Programs at the U.S. Bureau of Land Management; Wyoming Governor Mark Gordon; Brian Vallo, Governor of the Pueblo of Acoma; Vicki Hollub, President and Chief Executive Officer of Occidental Petroleum; and Kathleen Sgamma, President of the Western Energy Alliance.
Western Energy Alliance partners with the Council on the federal lands issue, and Sgamma used her testimony to discuss the economic and employment implications of continuing the federal ban.
Witnesses on both the majority and minority sides expressed concern with maintaining a long-term leasing ban, including witnesses invited by Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) who leads the panel for the majority.
In his opening statement, ranking member Sen. John Barrasso (R-WY) highlighted the huge economic benefits of oil and gas leasing to the country and the states where the activity occurs.
“In 2019, oil and natural gas leasing and production on federal lands generated about $4.2 billion dollars,” Barrasso said. “Half of that money went to the federal treasury. Almost half the money went back to western states. More than a quarter of the money went to New Mexico alone. In contrast, wind and solar on federal lands have generated no more than $22 million in any given year. President Biden’s plan to end oil and gas leasing on federal lands will devastate the economies and communities of Wyoming, New Mexico, and many other states.”
The Council is continuing to meet with policymakers on both sides of the issue to urge a discontinuation of the moratorium on new leases on federal lands and waters.
Section 301 Tariffs
China’s foreign vice-minister Xie Feng met with Shanghai-based U.S. business leaders to request help pressuring the Biden Administration to remove tariffs on Chinese goods. Xie, appointed in February to his new role in charge of policy planning and U.S. affairs, met with Jeff Lehman, the American Chamber of Commerce in Shanghai’s chair, Commerce president Ker Gibbs, and representatives from major companies including General Motors, Ford, Disney, Delta, United Airlines and the United Parcel Service.
The tariffs issue is heating up in the U.S. as well. All Section 301 exclusions not related to COVID-19 expired on December 31, 2020. The Biden Administration extended pandemic-related exclusions to September 30, 2021. Included in the expired exclusions were those for products used by the OFS. The Council had successfully petitioned USTR to obtain the exclusions in 2019 and 2020.
Biden Administration officials have indicated that Section 301 duties would remain in place for the time being, but many in the business community and on the Hill are asking for the USTR to restart an exclusion process. Last week, a bipartisan group of 40 senators sent a letter to the USTR asking for a new process. Additionally, the senators asked the USTR to renew expired and expiring Section 301 exclusions.
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OIL & GAS:
EPA’s Regan Lays Out Vision of Collaboration With Industry Stephen Lee, Bloomberg Law, April 28, 2021 Climate change poses opportunity, Regan says. ‘Michael S. Regan is in charge,’ administrator adds EPA Administrator Michael Regan sketched out a vision of collaboration with industry to skeptical Republican lawmakers during a Wednesday Senate hearing. Regan’s moderate tone seemed intended to reassure lawmakers that the Environmental Protection Agency has no intention of sidelining ethanol from its biofuels agenda, plunging ahead on tailpipe emissions rules without considering automakers’ ability to produce electric vehicles, or deploying new lower-carbon and lower-methane policies without taking input from the power sector. Nevertheless, some Republicans on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee voiced concerns that the Biden administration will impose a heavy-handed view of environmental extremism. Sen. Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska) said he worried that White House climate adviser Gina McCarthy—whom he accused of having “radical, activist-driven views, out of the mainstream”—will be dictating the EPA’s agenda. ‘Michael S. Regan is In Charge.’ But Regan said McCarthy’s role has been to bring together federal agencies as part of a whole-of-government strategy. “I can assure you that Michael S. Regan is in charge at EPA,” Regan said. Regan also told Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) that the administration’s stance on renewable energy, and its matching shift away from fossil fuels, presents an “awesome opportunity” to create jobs and export new energy technologies overseas. The EPA will meet with industry to discuss “a number of technologies, timelines, and paths” to meet President Joe Biden’s goal of cutting U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by 50-52% by 2030, Regan said. Scientific Integrity Regan also said agency leaders under President Donald Trump made “poor decisions that lacked scientific integrity,” but declined to speculate on their motivations. The EPA is reviewing regulations issued under Trump to find whether scientific integrity was ignored, Regan said. “Where we see that lacking, we’re going to revise those regulations,” Regan said. In at least some cases, the Trump EPA “followed a process that was unlike any process of any previous administration, both Democrat and Republican,” Regan said. He pointed to Trump-era appointments to the EPA’s Science Advisory Board and Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee, which make scientific recommendations to leadership. Regan purged all the members of those committees in March. In a statement, he said the EPA would return to a “time-tested, fair, and transparent process” for appointing new members. Ousted members have been invited to reapply. ‘Disturbing’ Interference The newly minted EPA administrator also told Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.) that he found it “so disturbing to see the level of political interference, and the lack of scientific integrity, that took place over the past couple years.” Duckworth had asked about a recent report from the EPA’s Office of Inspector General alleging the agency under Trump stalled the communication of ethylene oxide emission risks for multiple facilities in Illinois. Regan said he met with the OIG earlier this week to discuss the issue. “They rightfully are making sure, and holding EPA’s feet to the fire, that we do things the right way moving forward,” he said. But Regan declined to speculate on whether the Trump-era decisions were part of a coordinated plan by political leaders to favor industry interests over environmental concerns. “I urge you not to overlook the ‘why,’” said Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.). “If, at the end of the day, nobody understands the cause of all of this, you haven’t done your jobs.” The White House has established a scientific integrity task force to find examples across the government of political meddling in agency decisions. ‘Recruit Back’ Regan further repeated his pledge to rebuild morale at the EPA, which many staffers say was badly eroded during the Trump years. The agency hopes to “recruit back” many of the employees who left under Trump, according to Regan. Biden’s budget blueprint of $11.2 billion for EPA includes $110 million to raise EPA staffing. It also carves out $1.8 billion for investments to tackle the climate crisis, including $100 million for air quality grants to states and tribes and $30 million to research the impacts of climate change. “EPA simply hasn’t been provided with the resources it needs to get the job done,” Environment and Public Works Chairman Tom Carper (D-Del.) said. “The agency has been largely flat-funded, a funding commitment that has undermined EPA’s mission.
The Vancouver-based explorer, which early this year appealed the US Army Corps of Engineers’ (USACE’s) negative Record of Decision (ROD) for the proposed project in the Bristol Bay, said the ESG document would address some of the biases towards the stalled project.
The USACE had originally said, in July last year, that Pebble would “not have measurable effects” on fish populations or fisheries in southwest Alaska.
But the lead federal regulator published a ROD on November 25 denying the project a key permit under the Clean Water Act on the grounds that its “compensatory mitigation plan” was non-compliant and Pebble was not in the “public interest.”
“For many reasons, including the Pebble deposit’s size and significance, its location in a vast region that supports world-class fisheries, and the active campaigning of national environmental organizations, the Pebble project has been marked by public controversy and rhetoric,” Northern Dynasty president and chief executive Ron Thiessen said in a statement.
“It’s unfortunate because so much of the good work done to plan, permit, develop and operate a modern copper mine at Pebble that would, in many ways, set a new standard for responsible mineral development in the US has been obscured,” Thiessen noted.
The report summarizes the major ESG polices, planning and engineering approaches, contracting and business development, revenue sharing, as well as the social commitments the company has made since acquiring the project in 2001.
Supported by fundamentals
Investors reacted positively to the news, with the stock climbing 1.76% to 61 cents US in early trading in New York, still below the multi-year high of $1.94 it reached last July. While the company’s shares have encountered substantial volatility recently, they are up around 74% so far this year.
“Much of the drama and debate surrounding Northern Dynasty’s stock involves the company’s ability (or lack thereof) to develop this project,” InvestorPlace’s analyst Louis Navellier wrote in early April.
If Northern Dynasty wins the battle and gets Pebble permitted it would be North America’s largest mine, capable of producing 70 million tonnes of gold, molybdenum, and copper ore a year.
The asset’s resource estimates talk of 6.5 billion tonnes in the measured and indicated categories containing 57 billion pounds of copper and 71 million ounces of gold, 3.4 billion pounds of molybdenum and 345 million silver ounces,
However, the mine would also create a pit 1,970 ft (600 m) deep in Alaska’s Bristol Bay watershed. Opponents said the project threatens a world-class sockeye salmon fishery, putting more than $1 billion of revenue and over 10,000 jobs at risk.
His latest $1.8 trillion plan rejects the old social contract of work for benefits.
The progressive hits keep coming from the Biden Administration, and the latest is the $1.8 trillion American Families Plan introduced in broad strokes on Wednesday. It’s more accurate to call this the plan to make the middle class dependent on government from cradle to grave. The government will tell you sometime later, after you’re hooked to the state, how it will force you to pay for it.
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We’d call the price tag breathtaking, but by now what’s another $2 trillion? Add $2 trillion or so each for the Covid and green energy (“infrastructure”) bills, and that’s $6 trillion of new spending in 100 days. That doesn’t include the regular federal budget of more than $4 trillion a year. No worries, mate, the Federal Reserve will monetize the debt.
But the cost, while staggering, isn’t the only or even the biggest problem. The destructive part is the way the plan seeks to insinuate government cash and the rules that go with it into all of the major decisions of family life. The goal is to expand the entitlement state to make Americans rely on government and the political class for everything they don’t already provide.
The White House talking points pitch this in the smothering love of the welfare state: “making care affordable”; free medical and family leave; “free education”; two years of “universal pre-school”; “invest in the care workforce.” Subsidies and millions of new care givers, all licensed and unionized, will nurture you through the challenge of earning a living and raising a family.
One question to ask is: Haven’t we tried this before? What is Head Start if not government pre-school education and childcare? Weren’t school lunches and the Women, Infants and Children program supposed to prevent child hunger? Food stamps, welfare checks, child-care subsidies and a supplement to earned income, plus public housing. Weren’t all of these programs and more from previous decades supposed to end poverty?
Why did the trillions of dollars spent on those programs fail? And if they didn’t work, why do we need more?
For the candid answer, listen to Rahm Emanuel, the Chicago Democrat who explained the political calculation this week to the Washington Post: “Once everyone’s in, all the parents want in. Then it’s not a poor person’s program or a poverty program. It’s an education program. . .. That to me, that is essential. It changes the center of gravity once it’s for everybody.”
So much for the “safety net” to prevent poverty. This is now about mainlining benefits to middle-class families, so they become addicted to government—and to the Democratic Party that has become the promoting agent of government.
Democrats are enamored of this principle of “universality” because it has worked to sustain the popularity of Social Security and Medicare, despite their failing finances. But those programs promise benefits in return for work across a lifetime. The Biden New Deal isn’t a deal at all. Most of its programs are free handouts on the model of the 1960s Great Society.
The new pre-school entitlement will go to all families, as would free community college. The tax-credit expansion to $3,600 per child in the Covid bill, which Mr. Biden wants to make permanent, is on top of the other welfare subsidies. The Biden plan also makes permanent an expansion of ObamaCare subsidies for more affluent adults, eliminating the subsidy cap that was 400% of poverty. A new paid family leave entitlement will be an incentive for companies to drop leave benefits that already cover most workers.
All of this adds up to healthy guaranteed annual income largely untied to the social contract that requires work, which is the real path to independence and self-respect.
The White House is also less than honest about how it will pay for all this. Its short answer is that more taxes on the wealthy and more IRS audits are enough. But that doesn’t come close.
The permanent child-tax credit expansion would cost $1.6 trillion over 10 years, according to our friends at Cornerstone Macro. The White House says it only costs $420 billion, but that’s because it only includes four years through 2025. The new entitlements ramp up slowly but explode in the later years, while the tax increases are immediate and won’t raise the revenue they expect.
That’s especially true of the increase in the top tax rate on capital gains to 43.4%, which would lose money by all historical experience. The White House tries to get around this by eliminating the step-up basis for paying capital gains at death, meaning an heir would pay the tax based on accrued value over a lifetime. This is a back door addition to the current death tax rate of 40%.
The White House also predicts that unleashing thousands of new IRS agents will find $700 billion in unpaid tax bills. But this prediction is based in part on old IRS data, before the 2017 tax reform that removed many tax loopholes, especially in the corporate tax code. The only benefit of the IRS audit army is that its $700 billion bogey replaces what would be another tax increase.
The new taxes are destructive, but their impact will take time to be felt as the post-pandemic economy soars. The GOP shouldn’t ignore the taxes and spending. But a more potent political target may be the bill’s tripling down on a welfare state that disdains the dignity of work and seeks to make Americans the wards of government.
The Hawaii state legislature will pass a resolution Thursday to declare a climate emergency.
It establishes a partnership between environmental organizations and the state government.
More than 1,900 jurisdictions across the world have taken similar steps.
Hawaii will make history on Thursday as the first state legislature to declare a climate emergency.
The state legislature is set to pass a Senate Resolution, SCR44, that openly states that climate change threatens both humankind and the environment. It requests state collaboration with organizations devoted to alleviating the adverse impacts of climate change to halt the increase of global temperatures.
“I’m very pleased that the Legislature has taken this step by declaring a climate emergency,” said Sen. Mike Gabbard (D), the primary sponsor of the resolution. “We must take strong action to address climate change related challenges, such as sea level rise, coastal erosion, and the protection of our critical infrastructure.”
The measures would allow eligible Alaskans to nominate up to 10 acres of vacant, unappropriated or unreserved state lands for the Department of Natural Resources “to offer for sale or lease as a remote recreational site,” according to the release. https://t.co/GeAzJazwti
Revenues disbursed to states from federal oil and gas leasing are not expected to decline significantly in the near term due to the Biden administration’s pause and review of the program, an official said on Tuesday.
Nada Culver, deputy director of policy and programs for the U.S. Bureau of Land Management, told a Senate committee that no timeline had been set for completing the review, which froze new oil and gas leasing while officials study the program’s benefits to taxpayers and environmental impacts.
The pause, which is opposed by oil-producing states including Wyoming and Louisiana and the drilling industry, is widely seen as a first step to delivering on U.S. President Joe Biden’s campaign promise to end new oil and gas leasing on federal lands and waters to fight climate change. Around a quarter of the nation’s oil and gas comes from wells drilled on federal lands.
Nevertheless, most revenues to states come from existing production operations, Culver said, rather than the new leasing the administration paused earlier this year.
“We have thousands of permits available for drilling and millions of acres of land that can be developed right now,” Culver said before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources committee at a hearing on the oil and gas leasing program.
Also at the hearing, the committee heard from oil and gas industry players and Wyoming Governor Mark Gordon, who said the undetermined pause would kill jobs and cut revenues his state needs to fund schools and other government programs.
“We see no end in sight,” Gordon said.
The BLM has not decided if it will hold oil and gas lease sales scheduled for the third quarter of this year, Culver said. The agency canceled lease sales in the first and second quarters as part of its program review.
Goldman Sachs is forecasting the largest jump in oil demand on record as the world opens up again amid the Covid-19 vaccination rollout.
The firm is raising its outlook on oil based on this expected upswing in demand, noting that “the magnitude of the coming change in the volume of demand — a change which supply cannot match — must not be understated.”
Russia’s energy giant Novatek said on Wednesday it has inked 20-year agreements with the shareholders of its Arctic LNG 2 project on the sale and purchase of the entire volume of liquified natural gas.
The LNG sales from the plant’s first liquefaction train are planned to commence in 2023, according to the company.
The agreements “provide for LNG supplies from Arctic LNG 2 on FOB Murmansk and FOB Kamchatka basis with pricing formulas linked to international oil and gas benchmarks. The LNG offtake volumes are set in proportion to the respective participants’ ownership stakes in the project,” Novatek said.
The company’s chairman of the management board, Leonid Mikhelson, said that “The long-term offtake agreements between Arctic LNG 2 and its participants ensure the future revenue stream from LNG sales and de-risks the project. This represents one of the most important milestones in attracting the project’s external financing that will be completed in 2021.”
Mikhelson said earlier that the Arctic LNG 2 plant is 39% complete and will be launched as planned.
Arctic LNG 2 envisages constructing three LNG liquefaction trains of 6.6 million tons per annum each, as well as cumulative gas condensate production capacity of 1.6 million tons per annum. The total LNG capacity of the three liquefaction trains will be 19.8 million tons. The first train of Arctic LNG 2 is 53% ready and is scheduled to start operations in two years.
Novatek owns the majority stake (60%) in the project, with minority stakes held by foreign companies. The list of foreign investors includes French oil and gas company Total (10%), Chinese firms CNPC (10%) and CNOOC (10%), and the Japanese consortium of Mitsui and JOGMEC (10%).
The project utilizes an innovative construction concept using gravity-based structure platforms to reduce overall capital cost and minimize the project’s environmental footprint in the Arctic zone of Russia, according to Novatek.
This is a four-part article series on the reality of how and why China retains its dominance in the Rare Earth (RE) industry. Part one investigates how China built its multi-commodity monopolies across the technological spectrum. Part two provides a brief historical overview on what China learned from its Rare Earth monopoly. Part three looks at how China turned Rare Earth metals, alloys & magnets into ‘utility goods’ for its domestic economy. The final part of this article series explores how China’s current monopolistic strategy feeds on the ‘Free Market’ actions of its adversaries and explores a possible solution to overcome Chinese global control in Rare Earths.
During his first press conference, President Biden vowed that he would not allow China to become the world’s leading country: “That’s not going to happen on my watch, because the United States is going to continue to grow and expand.” What are these large growth markets that Biden sees the U.S. leading in? According to this Administration, these growth markets are Green-Technologies such as Electric Vehicles (EVs), Wind, Solar and other net-zero carbon technologies.
The problem is that China not only controls many of the critical materials necessary to produce these products but also tends to be the market leader in these industries. For example, China is by far the largest producer of EVs in the world – clocking in at close to 50% while the United States (US) is about one-third the market share of China. Adding insult to injury, nearly half of the EVs in the world are in China, with just over 20% in the US Regardless, you cannot make an EV without a battery and China makes most of the batteries. According to multiple sources, China accounts for 70% of all EV battery production in the world. China produces more than 60% of the world’s cathodes and 80% of anodes for batteries and intends to boost its market share at every point in the value chain. In fact, of the 143 lithium-ion battery plants in the pipeline to 2029, 107 are based in China.
President Biden on Wednesday proposed tax increases for high-income individuals — including increases to the top income tax rate and capital gains tax rate — as a way to pay for his new plan focused on education and childcare.
Biden’s American Families Plan calls for $1 trillion in spending as well as $800 billion in tax cuts for low- and middle-income households. The White House said that the families plan, when combined with an infrastructure proposal Biden released last month, would be fully paid for over 15 years.
Biden is calling for the top individual income tax rate to be raised from 37 percent to 39.6 percent, its level before the enactment of former President Trump‘s 2017 tax-cut law. The White House said in a fact sheet that this increase would only apply to taxpayers in the top 1 percent of income.
The president’s plan also proposes raising the capital gains rate from 20 percent to 39.6 percent for taxpayers making over $1 million. A White House official said the $1 million threshold would be the same for both single and married tax filers.
The proposal to raise capital gains taxes drew criticism from Republicans and the business community even before Biden’s plan was officially released. White House economic adviser Brian Deesedefended it during a press briefing Monday, saying the tax increase would only impact about 500,000 households.
Biden’s plan calls for ending a tax preference known as “stepped-up basis” that allows people to pass investments down to heirs without the investments being taxed at the time of their death. The plan would ensure that family-owned farms and businesses wouldn’t be taxed if they are transferred to heirs who still run the businesses.
Additionally, the plan would end the carried interest tax break that benefits investment-fund managers, and it would make permanent a limitation on the amount of excess business losses that could be deducted in a given year. The president’s plan also calls for making sure that a 3.8 percent Medicare tax applies consistently to those making more than $400,000.
In addition to calling for tax increases for the wealthy, Biden also seeks to pay for his families plan through increased IRS enforcement to ensure that wealthy people pay the taxes that they owe.
It’s unclear to what extent legislation based on Biden’s plan will include these tax proposals. No Republicans are expected to support such legislation, which means that nearly every congressional Democrat will have to vote for it for it to pass.
Lately, it seems like forgoing red meat has become an unfortunate proxy for environmental credentials. Epicurious, for example, just announced that it will no longer publish articles or recipes with beef in a decision it calls, “not anti-beef but rather pro-planet.” And then there are headlines like “Why do some green activists eat meat?”
Meat-eating, meanwhile, has become a sort of symbol for climate denial. There are Twitter wars swirling around whether Biden’s climate ambitions will infringe on Americans’ right to eat burgers (his actual climate proposals would not).
But diet shouldn’t be a political scorecard for how down you are for the planet. Shaming people over what they eat — particularly for girls, immigrants, and people who don’t fit the unfairly skinny box of beauty standards — is nothing new. We don’t need to add one more minefield.
Focusing heavily on individual responsibility to save the planet can also be a big distraction from the actual systemic change needed to tackle the global climate crisis. What’s more, it can alienate people who do care about climate change but might not have as many options when it comes to what they eat.
Livestock are responsible for a hefty 14.5 percent chunk of global greenhouse gas emissions. Meat industries have taken efforts to obscure the connection between meat and climate change. So, these industries should be held accountable for the damage they do to the planet we call home. As a media outlet and respected food institution, Epicurious does have some power and responsibility to do just that by leaving beef behind.
Most individuals don’t carry the same weight on their shoulders, especially if you live in a neighborhood where fresh produce or meat alternatives feel out of reach. Taking on the climate crisis is a battle against structural barriers and systemic failures. It’s about confronting power, not people’s dinner choices.
Having the alternatives easily available to be able to give up beef, for example, might require some level of privilege. Up to 54 million people in the US — more than 17 percent of the US population — live in low-income census tracts without a grocery store nearby. If you’re in one of these food deserts, a hot dog from a gas station or a burger from McDonald’s might just be what’s at hand.
“Boycotts of terrible retailers are a wonderful idea until you realize that they are the only option in some areas,” Mikki Kendall writes in her book, Hood Feminism: Notes from the Women That a Movement Forgot. “Who is being hurt more? The corporation, or the people who rely on it for access to food?” Kendall’s book is broadly about how mainstream feminist groups can marginalize girls and women of color when they fail to recognize other inequities and injustices they face — including food insecurity. Mainstream environmentalism can apply similar lessons to their movement.
“All too often, our culture broadly equates ‘environmentalism’ with personal consumerism. To be ‘good,’ we must convert to 100 percent solar energy, ride an upcycled bike everywhere, stop flying, eat vegan,” writes Mary Annaïse Heglar, a climate justice essayist, in Vox. “All this raises the price of admission to the climate movement to an exorbitant level, often pricing out people of color and other marginalized groups.”
There could, of course, be big gains for people and the planet if there were better access to fresh fruits and vegetables for everyone regardless of identity, income, or where they live. That’s a conversation about empowerment and self-determination, not shame and moral high grounds.
There already are plenty of people who abstain from meat for environmental, cultural, or personal reasons. And if someone does want to reduce their individual carbon footprint, there’s evidence that cutting down on meat is one of the most effective ways to do that. The best way to support people who do want to eat less meat might be to ensure they have access to the foods they actually want. Again, choosing what you eat is easier said than done when you don’t have fresh foods or culturally specific ingredients nearby.
There are even more disparities to consider when it comes to food and the climate crisis. Not everyone is equally responsible for the problem. Researchers have found that the typical diet of
But again, focusing heavily on individual choice and responsibility to save the planet can be a big distraction. We’re seeing that play out now with the drama over the false story that Joe Biden plans to limit Americans’ red meat consumption to four pounds a year. Biden has never suggested such a meat limit. Instead, he’s proposed dramatically making over the nation’s infrastructure to transition toward clean energy — an actual policy debate with a lot more rhetorical meat to sink your teeth into.
That saga also highlights how much food can be tied to identity, and how shaming someone for their diet tends to divide and disempower people rather than get them to act on climate change. Ultimately, everyone deserves to be at the table if they care about the climate. Refusing someone a seat because they’re not readily abandoning meat hurts more than it helps. Each person might have something different to offer, whether it’s a dish, an idea, or a vote. The solutions make up a potluck — not a prix fixe, one-size-fits-all menu.
Boycotts of terrible retailers are a wonderful idea until you realize that they are the only option in some areas,” Mikki Kendall writes in her book, Hood Feminism: Notes from the Women That a Movement Forgot. “Who is being hurt more? The corporation, or the people who rely on it for access to food?” Kendall’s book is broadly about how mainstream feminist groups can marginalize girls and women of color when they fail to recognize other inequities and injustices they face — including food insecurity. Mainstream environmentalism can apply similar lessons to their movement.
“All too often, our culture broadly equates ‘environmentalism’ with personal consumerism. To be ‘good,’ we must convert to 100 percent solar energy, ride an upcycled bike everywhere, stop flying, eat vegan,” writes Mary Annaïse Heglar, a climate justice essayist, in Vox. “All this raises the price of admission to the climate movement to an exorbitant level, often pricing out people of color and other marginalized groups.”
There could, of course, be big gains for people and the planet if there were better access to fresh fruits and vegetables for everyone regardless of identity, income, or where they live. That’s a conversation about empowerment and self-determination, not shame and moral high grounds.
There already are plenty of people who abstain from meat for environmental, cultural, or personal reasons. And if someone does want to reduce their individual carbon footprint, there’s evidence that cutting down on meat is one of the most effective ways to do that. The best way to support people who do want to eat less meat might be to ensure they have access to the foods they actually want. Again, choosing what you eat is easier said than done when you don’t have fresh foods or culturally specific ingredients nearby.
There are even more disparities to consider when it comes to food and the climate crisis. Not everyone is equally responsible for the problem. Researchers have found that the typical diet of white Americans had higher per capita greenhouse gas emissions compared to that of Black and Latinx Americans.
But again, focusing heavily on individual choice and responsibility to save the planet can be a big distraction. We’re seeing that play out now with the drama over the false story that Joe Biden plans to limit Americans’ red meat consumption to four pounds a year. Biden has never suggested such a meat limit. Instead, he’s proposed dramatically making over the nation’s infrastructure to transition toward clean energy — an actual policy debate with a lot more rhetorical meat to sink your teeth into.
That saga also highlights how much food can be tied to identity, and how shaming someone for their diet tends to divide and disempower people rather than get them to act on climate change. Ultimately, everyone deserves to be at the table if they care about the climate. Refusing someone a seat because they’re not readily abandoning meat hurts more than it helps. Each person might have something different to offer, whether it’s a dish, an idea, or a vote. The solutions make up a potluck — not a prix fixe, one-size-fits-all menu.
The link between vaccine progress and the easing of state restrictions suggests that many Americans will be back on the roads this summer. What does that mean for US #gasoline demand? https://t.co/ERVOScnaOE
President Biden will sign an executive order Tuesday requiring that federal contractors pay a $15-an-hour minimum wage, the White House said.
The order would affect hundreds of thousands of people working on federal contracts, the White House said, including cleaning and maintenance workers, as well as nursing assistants and food-service workers.
Under the order, starting Jan. 30, 2022, all agencies will need to include a $15 minimum wage in new contract solicitations, and by March 30, 2022, all agencies will need to implement it into new contracts. Agencies will also need to incorporate it into existing contracts when they are extended.
The current minimum wage for workers performing work on covered federal contracts is $10.95. The order would also phase out the use of a tipped minimum wage for federal contractors, currently $7.65 an hour, by 2024.
In January, Mr. Biden signed an order to start the process so that he could sign this order within his first 100 days. At the time, the White House said he would sign an order requiring that federal contractors pay a $15-an-hour minimum wage and provide paid leave for their employees.
Sweden-based Lundin Energy said on Monday that it had sold the world’s first certified crude oil produced with net-zero emissions from an oilfield offshore Norway.
Lundin Energy, which is active in many areas offshore Norway, Western Europe’s largest oil and gas producer, said that the crude oil was certified carbon-neutral across the full life, including exploration, development, and Scope 1 and 2 emissions from production.
The oil, pumped at Lundin Energy’s Edvard Grieg field offshore Norway, was sold to Italian refiner Saras SpA for its Sarroch refinery in Sardinia.
The Edvard Grieg field is the first oilfield in the world to be independently certified by Intertek Group under its CarbonClear certification, Lundin Energy said.
To supply a fully carbon-neutral barrel to Saras, residual emissions of 2,302 tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) were compensated through a nature-based carbon capture project, certified by the Verified Carbon Standard (VCS).
Lundin Energy says that all the barrels it produces will be carbon neutral in their production from 2025 onwards.
“We were the first company to have one of its field’s carbon emissions independently certified as low carbon, and this certified carbon neutral transaction with Saras, is the next stage in what we believe will become a key value differentiator for Lundin Energy,” said Nick Walker, President and CEO of Lundin Energy.
The Nordic company is not the only one looking to appeal to customers and investors with carbon-neutral crude.
In January this year, a unit of U.S. Occidental said it had delivered the world’s first shipment of carbon-neutral oil, or oil where emissions associated with the entire crude lifecycle—wellhead through the combustion of end products—have been offset. The delivery of the oil, produced by Occidental in the Permian, “is a first step in the creation of a new market for climate-differentiated crude oil,” Oxy Low Carbon Ventures said.
Last week saw some much-needed good news for natural gas. The European Union signaled that it would include natural gas in its energy plans for the future, emissions, and all. The not-so-good news is that speaking of emissions, the EU might oblige suppliers to minimize these as much as is possible.
In the early days of the rush to cut emissions, natural gas was hailed as what many called a bridge fuel, the bridge being between fossil fuels and renewable energy. Then, as the rush accelerated, the bridge-fuel status of natural gas began to be questioned, increasingly loudly.
While a lower emitter than coal or oil, gas was still an emitter, and many of the proponents of a net zero energy world became increasingly radical with the help of statistics that showed, for example, that U.S. emissions did not decline with the replacement of coal power plants with gas-fired plants because the output of these gas-fired plants—and their numbers—increased.
Gradually, gas became the third focal point of emissions-cutting efforts, almost on par with coal and oil. This is why the European Union’s decision to include natural gas in its brand new EU Taxonomy Climate Delegated Act. The weird-sounding document basically spells out what is green and what isn’t in a list for businesses and investors to peruse with a view to helping the EU along with its plans to become a net-zero emitter by 2050.
The piece of legislation, according to the EU, “introduces clear performance criteria for determining which economic activities make a substantial contribution to the Green Deal objectives. These criteria create a common language for businesses and investors, allowing them to communicate about green activities with increased credibility and helping them to navigate the transition already under way.”
While gas was not included in the list of green economic activities, the EU said it would be included in a separate document treating—and this is the important part—transitional activities. Put simply, the EU legislation will restore natural gas to its bridge-fuel status.
This is, in essence, an admission that it won’t be that easy for the EU to wean itself off fossil fuels completely. It is also a confirmation of what the vice president of the EU and person in charge of the Green Deal, Frans Timmermans, said earlier this year about gas and other fossil fuels.
“Where, and as long as, clean energy cannot yet be deployed on the scale needed, fossil gas may still play a role in the transition from coal to zero emission electricity,” Timmermans said in March. “But I want to be crystal clear with you—fossil fuels have no viable future. That also goes for fossil gas, in the longer run.”
Some would argue that natural gas and almost certainly nuclear power have a pretty bright long-term future in Europe because putting all your energy eggs in the renewable energy basket when you’re electrifying the economies of a whole continent is a pretty risky business. Yet, the EU seems determined to achieve a net-zero status whatever it takes. And this is where the bad news for gas producers comes.
The case of French Engie refusing a cargo of U.S. LNG because of the high carbon footprint of its extraction has now become notorious as an illustration of the EU’s priorities. The bloc may not get to net-zero without gas, but it is highly likely that it will require the gas it uses to be as clean as possible. Methane leak elimination and emission reduction at the liquefaction terminals are just some things that natural gas producers may need to familiarize themselves with if they want to sell to the EU.
The world leader in LNG exports, Qatar is already working on it. When the country made the final investment decision on a 40-percent capacity increase at the world’s biggest LNG project, it also said it would invest in a carbon capture and sequestration system at the site, to lower its LNG’s carbon footprint.
Traditionally, buyers have looked at the quality and the price of commodities—and all other goods, really—to make a decision to buy. Now, the quality aspect has gained a new and very important detail when it comes to energy commodities. Their greenhouse gas footprint is on its way to becoming the single most important factor for some buyers.
For now, Europe is the only one with a comprehensive emissions strategy, but it may not remain the only one for long. The Biden administration has also announced pretty ambitious emission-related goals, and they are bound to affect natural gas consumption and exports. Asian buyers are also becoming increasingly emission-conscious and requiring proof of cleanliness for the gas they buy. In other words, gas may have retained its bridge-fuel status in the energy transition but using it to stay in the race for as long as possible will require a lot of emissions-cutting efforts on the part of producers.
Banking giant Citigroup said that last year it declined 11 “transaction opportunities” around coal mining or coal-fired power as a result of recently launched climate policies.
Why it matters: The tally, part of a wider ESG report released Monday, provides a rare glimpse at specific business fallout of Wall Street giants’ growing restrictions on certain types of fossil finance.
Catch up fast: A number of banking giants like JPMorgan Chase and Citi are boosting finance for clean technology sectors in addition to their fossil restrictions.
Citi’s report comes on the heels of its pledge this month to steer $1 trillion toward “sustainable finance” by 2030, with half for various “climate solutions.”
What they’re saying: One climate activist who tracks banking tells me that the level of detail in Citi’s report on its coal financing rejections is uncommon.
“This sort of specificity and transparency is rare and refreshing,” Beau O’Sullivan of the Bank on our Future network tells me via email.
We’re used to banks boasting about the green business they’re financing, but that’s exactly what banks do — finance profitable and growing sectors. Real climate leadership in the banking sector means turning down business,” he said.
But, but, but: Activists are pushing banks to phase out fossil-related lending more broadly, including the oil-and-gas sector.”
We need to see Citi, the world’s second biggest financier of fossil fuels, ending relationships on a corporate level with companies that are expanding fossil fuel business,” O’Sullivan said.
Center for Biological Diversity Scared of Beaudreau?
Emma Dumain, E&E News reporter, Monday, April 26, 2021: President Biden’s choice for deputy Interior secretary will have the chance this week to explain and defend his record.
Tommy Beaudreau, the nominee to fill the agency’s No. 2 slot, is set to appear before members of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee on Thursday.
His confirmation hearing will present an early test of his popularity among Republicans, as Beaudreau’s selection was designed to offer members of both parties a nominee they could get behind.
It will also mark the first time Democrats are forced to speak openly about Beaudreau since he was formally nominated two weeks ago amid controversy and confusion ( Greenwire, April 13).
Democrats have so far been largely quiet about Beaudreau, who was put forward at the recommendation of Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) and with the blessing of committee Chair Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.).
The two influential lawmakers had expressed opposition to Biden’s first choice for deputy Interior secretary, Elizabeth Klein, who they saw as hostile to oil and gas (E&E Daily, March 24).
It’s not clear if Democrats will let their concerns about the circumstances of Beaudreau’s nomination spill out into the public arena or if they will take direct issue with his record, which came into focus last week.
Beaudreau, who has ties to Murkowski’s native Alaska, is a veteran of the Obama administration, serving as the very first director of the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management and later as chief of staff to then-Interior Secretary Sally Jewell.
But in the years since leaving government, he has been a partner at the global law practice of Latham & Watkins, where he represented a lengthy list of clients in the oil, gas and coal sectors, his financial disclosure report revealed late last week (E&E Daily, April 23).
It’s far from likely these realities will derail Beaudreau’s nomination. He is expected to win support from some Republicans, and most Democrats will have a difficult time rebuffing a Biden nominee, especially someone who has been enthusiastically endorsed by mainstream environmental groups.
However, the disclosure was deeply unsettling to many progressive environmentalists and validated their worst fears about the extent of Beaudreau’s ties to the fossil fuel industry.
A handful of left-leaning green groups are now preparing to fight the nominee and put pressure on their Senate allies to oppose him in a showdown that could become an embarrassing distraction to party unity.
“I don’t expect our efforts will result in him not getting confirmed,” said Brett Hartl, government affairs director for the Center for Biological Diversity. “We just want to register our objection.”
Hartl also said he feared Beaudreau would “undermine” Interior Secretary Deb Haaland as the agency’s second-in-command.
Haaland, who was demonized by Republicans as being too “radical” for her past statements opposing oil and gas drilling on public lands, has been touted as the gold standard for whom staunch environmentalists want to see in the Biden administration.
“We are going to view him and treat him the way we would have treated a [former Interior Secretary] David Bernhardt type: He is too cozy with industry,” Hartl said of Beaudreau. “We are going to want to see all of his calendars and all of his emails and everything he puts his fingers on because we’re not going to trust him.”
The Center for Biological Diversity is expected to join with other organizations to circulate a letter of opposition this week in advance of Thursday’s confirmation hearing.
One of those allied groups could be the Sunrise Movement, which is also coming out strongly against Beaudreau. Press secretary Ellen Sciales called the nomination “atrocious.”
“We need leaders who will reject the influence of the fossil fuel industry and have the clear priorities of moving away from fossil fuels and stopping the climate crisis,” Sciales said in a statement. “We do not trust that Tommy Beaudreau will be that leader, and his nomination must be revoked.”
Schedule: The hearing is Thursday, April 29, at 10 a.m. in 366 Dirksen and via webcast.
A prominent academic with direct ties to the climate litigation campaign confirmed in a recent E&E Newsarticle that so-called “climate attribution science” was designed specifically to support lawsuits against major energy companies. The comments undercut the credibility or objectivity of its proponents, including Peter Frumhoff of the Union Concerned Scientist who has been delivering different messages to public and private audiences about the use of attribution science.
Climate litigation supporters have claimed that attribution science should serve as objective evidence in lawsuits against major energy companies, as it purportedly links a specific amount of greenhouse gas emissions to specific operators, thus providing an avenue by which a court could assign damages to companies. Yet, as University of Oxford climate expert and litigation supporter Friederike Otto told E&E News, attribution science was created solely to bolster these lawsuits. As the article notes:
“But Friederike Otto, a climate expert at the University of Oxford who has worked with [Myles] Allen, said her efforts to link extreme weather events to climate change have always been tied to the possibility of legal action. ‘Unlike every other branch of climate science or science in general, event attribution was actually originally suggested with the courts in mind,’ she said.” (emphasis added)
This stunning admission from Otto undercuts any claim that attribution science should be viewed as a neutral or objective resource by courts of law or policymakers. In fact, Otto herself has relied on climate attribution work to support climate lawsuits as a 2019 E&E Newsstory mentions:
“Friederike Otto, a climate expert at the University of Oxford and lead scientist at the World Weather Attribution project, said she talks ‘a lot with lawyers’ about how attribution science could be used as a litigation tool.” (emphasis added)
Otto also signed onto a motion in support of San Francisco and Oakland’s climate lawsuit and the E&E News article mentions that she works with Myles Allen, another climate academic at Oxford, who, the publication notes, “authored what is widely considered the first attribution study on the 2003 European heat wave,” and he wrote an op-ed that same year linking attribution science and lawsuits.
Nor is this the first time that supporters of climate litigation have cited the need for attribution science to bolster their lawsuits like plaintiffs’ attorney Vic Sher did in 2017.
Different Audiences, Different Messages
For years, Peter Frumhoff – a key player in the climate litigation campaign has been working behind-the-scenes for years to push attribution research forward in the hopes it could be used for litigation. But in the most recent E&E News story, he stated the exact opposite to a public audience.
“In an interview with E&E News, Frumhoff rejected the notion that his work was designed to help local challengers in the climate liability lawsuits… ‘The research we’ve done and published on attribution has definitely not been motivated by any specific piece of litigation or to inform any specific piece of litigation,’ Frumhoff said.” (emphasis added)
It runs counter to everything Frumhoff has said to fellow activists in the past as they have made this research central to the efforts to promote climate litigation for nearly a decade. In 2012, he and the Union of Concerned Scientists helped organize the La Jolla conference, where the playbook for the entire climate litigation campaign was designed, which included discussion on the attribution research done by Richard Heede, the leader of the Climate Accountability Institute. Heede is one of the preeminent persons working in the attribution space and his “Carbon Majors” report was highlighted in the E&E News article and has received extensivemedia attention.
The summary document from the La Jolla conference showed that Matt Pawa – a plaintiffs’ attorney who has served as outside counsel in multiple climate cases – believed that attribution research would aid litigation:
“Most of the workshop’s participants responded positively to Heede’s research. Matt Pawa thought the information could prove quite useful in helping to establish joint and several liability in tort cases, but he cautioned that, in practice, a judge would likely hesitate to exert joint and several liability against a carbon-producing company if the lion’s share of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere could not be attributed to that company specifically. Nevertheless, he said this kind of accounting would no doubt inspire more litigation that could have a powerful effect in beginning to change corporate behavior.” (emphasis added)
That document concludes with a clear message about the use of attribution science:
“Several participants agreed to work together on some of the attribution work already under way…and build an advocacy component around those findings.”
In 2015, Frumhoff told Dr. Edward Maibach, who leads GMU’s Center for Climate Change Communication, in an email that “we’re also in the process of exploring other state-based approaches to holding fossil fuel companies legally accountable—we think there’ll likely be a strong basis for encouraging state (e.g. AG) action forward.”
🇷🇺 Russia's government approved a long-term roadmap in March for building up its #LNG#export industry, setting its sights on a 20% share of the global market for the super-cooled gas by 2035. 👉 https://t.co/SSc9e9wFEi#NGW#natgas#GasInTransition 📰
If you need more evidence that ideology more than common sense is driving the Biden Presidency, look no further than its trial balloon to raise the top tax rate on capital gains to 43.4%. It’s the dumbest way to raise taxes for many reasons, not least because it will cost the government revenue.
The premise behind the tax increase is that a preferential tax rate for long-term capital gains is an unjustified loophole. (Gains on assets held for less than a year are taxed at the individual income rate.) Yet that preferential rate has persisted for decades, through Democratic and Republican administrations. The current top rate is 23.8%, which includes a 3.8% ObamaCare surcharge. Even in the economically irrational 1970s the top capital-gains rate never broke 40%, as the nearby chart shows.
There are good economic and fairness reasons for the preferential rate. First, under current tax rules, all gains from investments are fully taxed, but all losses are not fully deductible. Losses can offset gains in any given year, but losses that exceed gains can only be offset against personal income up to $3,000. The preferential rate compensates for this asymmetry.
Second, gains in asset values aren’t adjusted for inflation, so investors who hold assets for an extended period pay taxes on increases that are partly illusory. Other parts of the tax code, including the income-tax brackets, are indexed for inflation, but not capital gains that arguably need it the most since assets are often held for decades.
Third, a capital-gains tax is a second tax on corporate income. A neutral revenue code would tax all income only once. But the U.S. also taxes business profits when they are earned, and President Biden wants to raise that tax rate by a third (to 28% from 21%). When a business distributes after-tax income in dividends, or an investor sells the shares that have risen in value due to higher earnings, the income is taxed a second time.
Oil fell on Monday on fears that surging COVID-19 cases in India will dent fuel demand in the world’s third-biggest oil importer, while the end of a force majeure on exports from a Libyan terminal and an expected supply increase from OPEC+ added to pressure.
Brent crude was $1.08, or 1.6%, lower at $65.03 a barrel by 1329 GMT. U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude was down 97 cents, or 1.6%, at $61.17 a barrel.
Both benchmarks fell about 1% last week.
“The market is tending to focus more on the bad news from India and Japan at present, where the number of new coronavirus cases has risen sharply, prompting increased mobility restrictions to be imposed,” said Commerzbank analyst Eugen Weinberg.
Japan is the world’s fourth biggest crude oil importer.
India ordered its armed forces on Monday to help tackle surging new coronavirus infections that are overwhelming hospitals, as countries including Britain, Germany and the United States pledged to send urgent medical aid. read more
Consultancy FGE expects gasoline demand in India to drop by 100,000 barrels per day (bpd) in April and by more than 170,000 bpd in May. India’s total gasoline sales came to nearly 747,000 bpd in March.
Diesel demand, which at about 1.75 million bpd accounts for about 40% of refined fuel sales in India, may slump by 220,000 bpd in April and by another 400,000 bpd in May, FGE says.
In Japan, a third state of emergency in Tokyo, Osaka and two other prefectures began on Sunday, affecting nearly a quarter of the population as the country attempts to combat a surge in cases of COVID-19. read more
Consultancy FGE expects gasoline demand in India to drop by 100,000 barrels per day (bpd) in April and by more than 170,000 bpd in May. India’s total gasoline sales came to nearly 747,000 bpd in March.
Diesel demand, which at about 1.75 million bpd accounts for about 40% of refined fuel sales in India, may slump by 220,000 bpd in April and by another 400,000 bpd in May, FGE says.
In Japan, a third state of emergency in Tokyo, Osaka and two other prefectures began on Sunday, affecting nearly a quarter of the population as the country attempts to combat a surge in cases of COVID-19. read more
“It is not clear whether India’s surging cases will be enough to prompt the (OPEC+) group into action (to halt a gradual easing of output restrictions), but the latest increases in cases, particularly in the Asia-Pacific region, are a cause for concern,” said StoneX analyst Kevin Solomon.
The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and allies led by Russia, a group known as OPEC+, will discuss output policy at a meeting this week.
The group agreed at a meeting at the start of April to ease production curbs by 350,000 barrels per day (bpd) in May, another 350,000 bpd in June and a further 400,000 bpd or so in July. read more
Despite a wide range of challenges within the US-China relationship, liquefied natural gas (LNG) trade is one of the few areas that brings strategic benefits to both countries. In the United States, building and operating LNG infrastructure provides significant economic benefits to communities across the country. Internationally, to achieve the Biden-Harris administration’s global climate ambitions, cooperation between the United States and China on cleaner sources of fuel will not only have the highest impact on reducing global carbon emissions but will also encourage other countries to adopt more ambitious climate commitments. In China, the long-term supply of US LNG supports Beijing’s climate and air quality goals by replacing coal with much less carbon-intensive natural gas across industrial, power, and residential sectors and by complementing the increase in the share of renewable in the power sector. Additionally, Henry Hub-linked US LNG reduces China’s exposure to oil price-linked contracts across its imported energy portfolio and improves the long-term stability of energy prices in China.
Currently, the United States has the third largest LNG export capacity in the world, after Qatar and Australia. In the contiguous United States, there are six LNG export facilities that are in operation and another two under construction. A number of other projects are also fully permitted, including expansion plans at several operating export facilities. While not all of these projects will go forward, expanding existing US LNG export capacity and facilities will provide near-term economic and job growth across the Gulf Coast and the United States, accounting for billions of dollars in new investment in the country.
Climate is at the center of both the US and Chinese leaders’ top priorities. China and the United States are the world’s top two CO2 emitters, together accounting for over 40 percent of the world’s CO2emissions. Despite the tensions on display during the recent meeting of Chinese and US officials in Alaska, climate remains one of the key areas for potential bilateral cooperation. The two governments released a joint statement on climate on April 16, committing to cooperate with each other to tackle the climate crisis in support of the Paris Agreement and the upcoming COP26 in Glasgow this November. Both sides also agreed to implement policies to reduce emissions, including methane, and direct investment in support of low-carbon energy in developing countries. This statement builds on President Biden’s Climate Day executive orders and efforts to work with world leaders to enhance global action on climate change, as well as the targets laid out in China’s recently announced 14th Five-year Plan. In the plan, China reaffirmed its climate goal of peaking carbon emission by 2030 and reaching carbon neutrality by 2060. The plan also includes a target to decrease CO2 emissions intensity by 18 percent by 2025. In addition to reducing their own emissions, the United States and China will need to cooperate to secure any meaningful success in combating climate change.
Coal accounts for 78 percent of China’s carbon emissions and 62 percent of China’s power generation. The transition towards a low-carbon economy will lead to a growing role for natural gas, which not only emits 50 percent less greenhouse gases than coal when used in power generation, but also provides essential stability to the power grid as more renewables are integrated into the electricity system. The midstream reforms that have happened within the natural gas sector are also expected to provide a wide range of gas buyers with easier access to pipeline and LNG import infrastructure and in turn stimulate new demand for natural gas.
US LNG also brings the strategic long-term benefit of reducing the price volatility in China’s energy imports. Today, the prices of non-US LNG and most of the pipeline gas imported to China are linked to oil, resulting in significant price volatility. Considering China is already the world’s largest consumer of oil—and more than 70 percent of China’s oil supply is also imported—further linkages of imported gas to oil markets expose China’s energy costs to even more risk. Different from LNG prices offered by other LNG exporters, the US LNG price is composed of the NYMEX Henry Hub price and a fixed fee reflecting the cost of liquefaction. According to IHS Markit, more than 1,100 trillion cubic feet of gas resources, or equivalent to more than thirty-five years of US domestic gas consumption, is available in the US lower forty-eight at below $3 per million British Thermal Units. With the abundant and cheap gas resources in the United States supporting the long-term stability of Henry Hub prices, US LNG brings long-term price stability to China’s oil and gas portfolio. Based on data from 2016-2020, the estimated volatility of a long-term US LNG price to China would have been less than half of that of a Brent-linked LNG contract. This price stability would be particularly beneficial in Northern China, where winter LNG demand could be up to ten times higher than summer demand due to seasonal heating requirements.
Climate change is a global issue that requires international cooperation to bring about large-scale, generational change, and a unique opportunity exists for the world’s two largest economies to engage and work together on climate issues. US LNG is well positioned to provide China with a clean, affordable, and reliable energy source. In turn, multi-decade investment in new LNG infrastructure will bring well-paying jobs across the United States and support much needed post-pandemic economic recovery. LNG trade between the United States and China serves the strategic interests of both countries for the long term and is a win-win that both governments should be pursuing.
Sen. Lisa Murkowski has introduced legislation to speed up the review process for mineral mining on federal land, as demand for Alaska’s metals and rare earth minerals surges.
Sen. Dan Sullivan is among eight co-sponsors of the bill, which aims to reduce U.S. reliance on imports from China for critical minerals and metals used in smart technology and renewable energy, from solar panels to cell phones.
“America’s reliance on foreign countries for the production and recycling of our critical minerals is a vulnerability to our national security, a disadvantage to our economy, and a hindrance to our global competitiveness,” Murkowski said when she introduced the Senate bill last week.
The legislation was referred to the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources for a hearing. It would “improve the quality and timeliness of federal permitting and review processes with respect to critical mineral production on federal land, and for other purposes,” according to the legislation.
Murkowski described the existing federal permitting and review process as “painfully inefficient” and a “major deterrent” for producers, refiners, and recyclers.
The U.S. permitting process for mineral production is among the longest in the world, Murkowski said, describing it as a threat to the nation’s economy and security.
The new legislation would:
• Improve the process for applications, operating plans, leases, licenses, permits and other authorizations for critical mineral-related activities on federal land.
• Create “quantifiable permitting performance goals” and track progress toward those goals.
• Involve agencies, stakeholders, projects sponsors and state, local and tribal governments to resolve concerns.
• Make the review process more efficient, cost-effective, and timely.
Alaska Airlines has banned an Alaska state senator for refusing to follow mask requirements.
“We have notified Senator Lora Reinbold that she is not permitted to fly with us for her continued refusal to comply with employee instruction regarding the current mask policy,” spokesman Tim Thompson told the Anchorage Daily News on Saturday, adding that the suspension was effective immediately.
Reinbold, a Republican of Eagle River, said she had not been notified of a ban and that she hoped to be on an Alaska Airlines flight in the near future.
Last week, Reinbold was recorded in Juneau International Airport arguing with Alaska Airlines staff about mask policies. A video posted to social media appears to show airline staff telling Reinbold her mask must cover her nose and mouth.
Reinbold told the newspaper that had been inquiring about a “mask exemption with uptight employees at the counter.”
“I was reasonable with all Alaska Airlines employees,” she said, adding that she was able to board the flight to Anchorage.
Reinbold has been a vocal opponent to COVID-19 mitigation measures and has repeatedly objected to Alaska Airlines’ mask policy, which was enacted before the federal government’s mandate this year.
Last year, she referred to Alaska Airlines staff as “mask bullies” after being asked by flight attendants to wear a mask aboard a flight, the newspaper reported. After the incident, she reportedly sent a cake to some flight attendants bearing the inscription: “I’m sorry if I offended you.”
Alaska Airlines has banned over 500 people.
Thompson said the length of Reinbold’s ban will be determined by a review.
It wasn’t immediately known how Reinbold, who was in Southcentral Alaska this weekend, would be able to get to Juneau where the legislative session resumes Monday. No other airline has scheduled flights between Anchorage and Juneau, and a ferry trip could take several days.
Lawmakers can participate in committee meetings by teleconference but cannot vote on the House or Senate floor remotely under current procedures.
CLIMATE CHANGE:
From the Washington Examiner, Daily on Energy:
THE PROBLEM WITH KERRY FLOATING A CARBON IMPORT TAX AGAIN: Fresh off the climate summit, Kerry is reiterating that Biden is interested in imposing a border adjustment tax on other countries with high pollution.
The problem is the administration is not promoting the passage of a carbon tax at home because of its political toxicity, and most experts agree the U.S. can’t credibly impose a tax on imports of carbon-intensive goods unless it has a pricing system in place.
“Biden is particularly interested in evaluating the border-adjustment mechanism,” Kerry told Bloomberg as one of a round of interviews he did after the climate summit. “He wants to see if that’s something we need to deploy.”
Kerry noted the European Union is poised to establish a carbon import tax on countries that do not impose levies on their own goods, a prospect he has been pushing back on.
In warning the EU not to act while floating the prospect of a U.S. border adjustment, Kerry seems to be pressing the Europeans to give the administration more time to impose carbon pricing down the line, so the U.S. would be in good standing and not subject Europe’s tax.
In the United States, and around the globe, there is a growing consensus that climate change is real. While many conservative are looking to address this issue through free markets, a growing faction of the Left is turning to big government spending to reduce emissions all while painting capitalism as a villain to the health of the planet.
The attack on capitalism is not only misplaced, but it is also counterproductive. In a study released today by C3 Solutions authored by Nick Loris of The Heritage Foundation, titled Free Economies are Clean Economies, Loris outlines the many ways in which capitalism and free markets benefit the environment.
“Free and competitive markets have reduced emissions, brought millions of people out of poverty, and have led to innovations that have benefitted the health of the planet and its people,” said Loris in the C3 Solutions press release. “While global environmental issues like climate change are incredibly complex, economic freedom is the best solution to reduce emissions and promote economic prosperity.”
Specifically, the report found that open markets double the environmental health of countries. “Mostly free” economies, as determined by The Heritage Foundation’s Index of Economic Freedom, had a higher score on Yale University’s Environmental Performance Index, than “mostly unfree” economies—with scores of 71.72 and 35.17 respectively.
This makes sense. As markets open and economies of countries grow, efficiency becomes prioritized, and consumers have the ability to invest in making the environment cleaner. This purchasing power allows for people to make buildings more energy efficient, and for companies to choose materials that have a lower carbon footprint. As economist Donald Boudreaux succinctly put it, we are “cleaned by capitalism.”
In addition to open markets, private property rights play an important role in environmental well-being. Ownership of property incentivizes stewardship and environmental responsibility. As a 2020 report from the National Academies of Science found, “territories with full property rights show a significant decrease in deforestation, while the effect does not exist in territories without full property rights.”
Perhaps the greatest example of this is seen in the cases of Venezuela and the United States. In Venezuela, Loris points out, the government’s ownership of industry and property decreased foreign investments and prosperity, while increasing corruption and environmental degradation. In contrast, private property rights in America made the fracking revolution possible, which substantively lowered our domestic emissions.
In the same way that government ownership hurts the environment, overregulation can stifle environmental prosperity. Overregulating businesses slows down the innovations that are needed to reduce emissions. As seen in the case of nuclear energy, regulations have increased construction costs by 200%, leading in part to the shrinking of America’s nuclear energy fleet.
Allowing businesses to freely operate greatly improves the health of the economy and the environment. To analyze this, Loris looks to the World Banks’ Ease of Doing Business Index where he found “a strong, positive correlation between the Ease of Doing Business Index and EPI” (Environmental Performance Index). Specifically, countries with the “Most Ease” of doing business had an EPI score twice that of countries with the “Least Ease” of doing business.
With a growing number of people looking to the government to solve climate and environmental issues, it is important to realize that free markets are the best way to lower emissions. As seen in “Free Economies,” open markets, limited government, private property rights, and rule of law are the best ways in which we can improve the health of the planet.
While global issues such as climate change are complex, the best way to tackle it is through economic freedom.
