October 29, 2018
Politicized Law Enforcement and the ExxonMobil White Whale
The latest lawsuit against ExxonMobil (EM), filed by Acting New York State Attorney General Barbara Underwood, is straightforward: Got that? Underwood actually is arguing that EM should not concern itself — or its investors — with (1) the aggregate effect of GHG policies on prospective worldwide demand conditions for its energy products, and (2) the…
November 2, 2017
The Union of Concerned Activists: Let the Lawsuits Begin!
They have failed to convince Congress—even Congresses controlled by the Democratic Party—to impose limits on US greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, despite decades of effort, political threats, and grandstanding. Given the election of Donald Trump, they are losing their efforts to use the regulatory bureaucracy—an interest group with powerful budgetary and ideological incentives to impose GHG emissions policies—as a substitute source of such policies in the face of…
October 20, 2017
Subsidizing Reliable Generation Capacity: Is Mark Perry or Rick Perry Wrong?
I take a back seat to no one in my condemnations of subsidies and other policy distortions of state and regional electric power markets, a stance that I have maintained for decades. And so one might assume that I would have applauded my friend and colleague Mark Perry in his recent criticism of Energy Secretary Rick Perry’s proposal to the Federal…