Thursday, July 9, 2009

The Sierra Club versus Electricity

By Alan Caruba

In early July the Sierra Club celebrated the fact that, “Today, 100 of those planned coal plants have been defeated or abandoned.”

They crowed over the fact that a year ago there were plans for 150 new plants and that they had successfully thwarted the provision of electrical power around the nation. As for as the Sierra Club is concerned, “This milestone marks a significant shift in the way Americans are looking at our energy choices. Cities, states, businesses and electric utilities are all moving away from the polluting coal power of the past.”

Today’s coal-fired plants are all equipped with very expensive technology that eliminates the pollution of the past, “scrubbing” their massive stacks before any is emitted. They are not polluting anything, but they are providing affordable electrical energy.

Coal represents just a shade over fifty percent of all the electricity Americans use. It is so abundant here in America that the provision of those 150 plants would have ensured that the nation had a significant portion of the additional power it requires for a growing population and our manufacturing sector.

Why does the Sierra Club oppose coal-fired plants? It says that “carbon dioxide pollution, a main cause of global warming” is the reason, but CO2 is not a pollutant. It is the gas of life because without it not one single blade of grass or any other vegetation grows on planet Earth. Our food supply, crops and the livestock that depend upon them, is the result of CO2.

And, of course, there is NO global warming. The planet has been cooling for the past decade and the science of CO2 demonstrates that it plays no role whatever with regard to major climate trends.

The Sierra Club’s opposition to coal-fired plants is entirely based on a LIE.

It doesn’t stop there, however. As far back as 1974, the Sierra Club has been opposed to nuclear energy as well. They called for “adequate national and global policies to curb energy over-use and unnecessary economic growth.”

“Unnecessary economic growth”? If a nation does not maintain its economic growth it also does not provide jobs. It does not have the means by which to fund defense, infrastructure, and to compete globally in manufacturing and exports. This is an idiotic policy, but not if your aim, your purpose is to attack the most essential element of growth, the provision of energy.

A visit to the Sierra Club website provides ample evidence of its objection to all forms of energy except the least practical and effective, the so-called “renewable” forms such as wind and solar. Even T. Boone Pickens who gambled on the largest wind farm in the Texas Panhandle has thrown in the towel, announcing that his $2 billion investment is now, in retrospect, rather foolish given the need to get the power from the farm to where it is needed.

Pickens is now stuck with 687 giant wind turbines, each of which is taller than a 30-story building.

The same may be said of solar power that, like wind, is not dependable and must be located far from the transmission lines and the nation’s urban areas that are most in need of electricity.

At what point will Americans begin to realize that the giant Green organizations like the Sierra Club, Friends of the Earth, and others stand in opposition to the very thing they most desperately need, energy?

At what point will Americans begin to realize that failing to access its own vast natural resources, coal, oil and natural gas, is suicidal?

One hopes it will not be before the economy is so severely damaged that we cannot borrow or fund the coal-fired and nuclear plants that we need to keep us from being figuratively and literally in the dark.

13 comments:

Anonymous said...

All the greenie organization info can be found here . . . very interesting reading.

http://www.undueinfluence.com/

interesting and scary at the same time.

They have huge amounts of money with which to buy influence.

Elizabeth said...

We will always be told what is in the best interest of those trying to scare us...NEVER waste a good crisis, right?

I read once that doom and gloomers were predicting in the 1700's that America was facing an energy crisis as we ran out of forest to burn for fuel...then the coal seams are running out prediction, then oil is finite and WE don't have any...then the global COOLING
scare of the 70's leading to "earth day"...yikes. I remember being told in the early 70's that the glaciers were going to reach down to the Carolinas! When will we learn not to trust these idiots? Oh, please before we have to go back to burning wood...we'd all be up the creek.
Pax Christi

Alan Caruba said...

The biggest scam in the history of man is global warming.

Unknown said...

"The biggest scam in the history of man is global warming."

And the UK is not immune to it either Alan.

Scare tactics are being used over here, allowing our government to use backdoor taxes with impunity...we are heartily sick of it.

Buzzg said...

France produces almost all of its electricity from nuclear power plants and has a reserve of about 12-15% which it sells to neighboring countries. South Africa has been refining coal into fuel and lubricants since the early 1980's. This is old technology and it works. Other examples abound. No country has the multitude of mineral and crude oil resources available to it in the quantities that we have. Why are we not developing these resources while we search for the renewable energy "genie"? Congress. All of the environmental groups in the country could not stop such development on their own. They require the force of Congress to make their dreams come true. What do the people in Congress hope to accomplish by taking this extreme envrionmental stand? RE-ELECTION. That's the daily agenda of any Representative, Congressman, Senator, Councilman, Mayor and Ward Heeler etc. They ask themselves daily; what do I have to do to get re-elected? It appears they have that figured out in spades.
If mining companies and oil companies and our technological resources were turned loose tomorrow, it would take 6-10 years to begin to refine our resources and provide for ourselves instead of buying from our enemies. We may not have that much time.
This situation is unprecedented in our history and those who may survive what comes, will hopefully learn again the hard lessons that our founders and forefathers warned us about. Required reading: The Federalist Papers, Common Sense/Rights of Man, the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.
Do it daily and spread the word.

Buzz
Grants Pass, OR

Alan Caruba said...

Yin: You Brits have suffered mightily from the global warming hoax and it doesn't help that much of it comes out of the European Union.

Unknown said...

It sure does not help Alan. up to 80% of UK law is made in that unrepresentative bunch of morons in Brussels. Our government is bending over backwards like the sycophants they are to kiss EU legislative ass.

We, the people of the UK, want good relations with our European neighbours but not at the cost of our long held liberties and beliefs.

jdgalt said...

I call them the "Bravo Sierra Club." (This is ham radio code for the letters B S.)

If the Sierra Club were to publish a manifesto honestly stating its real goals and motivations, it would read something like this:

We, rich people who already have nice big houses and cars, are concerned that too many people we regard as our inferiors are getting these goodies too.

There's no need for more homes, roads, or power plants to be built, because there are already enough of all three in the world for us. And if more are built, we'll have to deal with more traffic; we'll lose the nice views of other people's empty land that we now enjoy; the artificial shortage of homes that has brought us huge profits for the last fifty years will vanish; and worst of all, we'll have riff-raff living next door to us!

It is to prevent these horrors that we created, and now own and operate, the twin scams known as the profession of urban planning and the environmental movement.

We must always keep the world's media, and through them all "mainstream" opinion, convinced that an environmental crisis and a resource shortage exist, and that everybody would be dropping like flies without all of our favorite nanny-statist laws. If the masses ever figure out that these are lies, they will break up our racket and be able to live as our equals.

Old Backstop said...

The thing that is quite frightening is that both sides of these arguments are very polarized, quick to mock the other side, and both site research to back their claims.

Many parties show evidence of global warming, and other parties show that there is no correlation. The same disputes exist for just about anything, from global warming to the impact of high fructose corn syrup.

Knowing that money buys research (and votes), who can one trust? I personally don't trust either side.

- Neutral

Alan Caruba said...

HELJ, you cannot be "neutral" because there is truth and scientific fact and there are the endless lies put forth by the environmental organizations.

If you check the blog roll on this site, you will find any number of excellent websites and blogs that provide data that disputes global warming, based on the work of leading climatologists and meteorologists.

Bottom line: There is NO global warming. The planet has been cooling for a decade.

Old Backstop said...

I'm open to what you are saying, trust me, but I'm also not closed off to the idea that the "scientific evidence" and articles that the global warming advocates link to.

If it makes you feel any better, the reason I found this post was because I was searching for the words "Sierra Club Scam" in Google after getting a fundraiser mailing from them. I saw "Sierra Club versus Electricity" and it peaked my curiosity, because I was skeptical to begin with. Thing is, my skepticism knows no bounds, and it is even skeptical of your links.

The main key is that I am trying to find my own opinion on all of this, versus just blindly following either side based on a few articles that can be nothing more than properly funded propaganda. Make sense?

Alan Caruba said...

HelJ:
A little paranoia is a good thing, but too much puts you in Crazy Town.

As a longtime (try 50 years) science writer, I long since concluded there is good science and bad. The bad tends to chase out the good in the hands of the mainstream media, but the good can be found even on sites that come with a point of view.

You were right to be skeptical of the Sierra Club. The major green organizations are primarily a scam that operates by scaring people and then getting them to pay for the privilege of "overcoming" the evil corporations, government, deniers, etc.

sarahhhhhhhhhh said...

HELJ, I am right there with you! I was considering joining the Sierra Club and have been conducting a search just like you were. It seems that is very difficult to find unbiased information on nearly anything these days! I have decided not to join any group and just try to be responsible for my own choices and actions. Global warming may or may not be true, but there is no reason why we as individuals shouldn't try to be conscientious in how we live and what we consume. There are a lot of people in this world, and consideration, for other people and for our planet, is an even more valuable commodity than any organized group with its own particular agenda. That's my opinion, anyway.