April 11, 2017
Sticky Tar of Climate Politics Oozes over Oil Reserve Valuations
Environmentalist ideology and political ambition in combination make for a dangerous blend, and nowhere is that truth clearer than in the context of climate politics, the valuation of fossil-fuel reserves and accusations of “fraud.” With the deregulatory decisions of the Trump administration, in particular in the context of a severe prospective reduction in federal efforts…
April 5, 2017
No Compromise Is Perfect: Time to Accept Puerto Rico Debt Agreement
Pain is painful, in particular for policymakers confronted with tough decisions and difficult compromises. And so kicking the can down the road is a time-honored fallback position for the political class, especially when voters prefer to see “wins” on their behalf as distinct from nuanced solutions to difficult problems. Related Content: Puerto Rico Needs Compromise, Not…
March 27, 2017
Real Reform for Indiana Power Consumers: SB 309
Energy policies in the U.S. historically have been shaped by poor analytic arguments, resulting in an incoherent policy environment driving costs and prices upward. The adverse resulting effects have afflicted economic growth, employment, and consumer wellbeing generally and in the electricity market in particular. Indiana Senate Bill 309 would reform the net-metering system of subsidizing…
March 13, 2017
Does It Really Matter If Exxon Mobil Changes Its Reported Oil Reserves?
The latest quarterly earnings reports season looms on the horizon, providing full employment for business reporters, accountants, attorneys, various species of number crunchers, prognosticators, kibitzers and pizza delivery firms catering to all of them as they burn the midnight oil. And that is before the reports are submitted to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC)…
February 9, 2017
The Achilles’ Heel of the Obama Climate Regulations
An existing executive order can be reversed with a new one — a stroke of the pen — but regulations promulgated through the formal public notice and comment processes of administrative law can be undone only with newer regulations adopted through that same mechanism. Moreover, efforts to reform or to reverse a regulatory apparatus as…
January 27, 2017
The Environmental Left and Keystone XL
Everything old is new again, the latest manifestation of which is the reaction of the environmental Left to the news that President Donald Trump has issued presidential memoranda and an executive order resurrecting the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines, and beginning the process of reversing the abject obstructionism of the Obama administration toward infrastructure investment for the production and transport…
December 14, 2016
Trump Nominee Scott Pruitt Will Clean up the EPA
Life in the Beltway offers a range of amusements, the latest of which is the reaction of the environmental left to President-elect Donald Trump’s announced intention to nominate Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt (R) to be the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Climate denier! An enemy of the EPA! An arsonist in charge of fighting…
December 6, 2016
Trump’s Realistic Thinking on Climate Change
President-elect Donald J. Trump said recently that there exists “some connectivity” between human activity and climate change, which may or may not reflect a shift in his view on that scientific question. But he has indicated no change in his policy stance on various attendant regulations, and an “open mind” on a U.S. exit from…
November 21, 2016
The Magical Powers of the Social Cost of Carbon
When last we joined hands around the ourenergypolicy.org campfire, roasting s’mores and singing songs of camaraderie, we told tales of one particular monster of the dark, to wit, the Obama administration analysis of the social cost of carbon, perhaps the most dishonest exercise in political arithmetic ever produced by the federal bureaucracy. But this is the Beltway: No perfidy goes unrewarded. And so…
October 26, 2016
Solar Energy Can’t Survive Without Massive Subsidies
Notwithstanding the thunderous applause that solar photovoltaic (rooftop) power receives from enlightened opinion, it is not cost-competitive with conventional electricity, and cannot survive without massive subsidies. An army of lobbyists, commentators and bureaucrats has told us for years that rooftop power will be cost-competitive with conventional electricity very soon, if it is not already, and technically could provide over 38 percent of U.S….