My friend, Josiah Neeley, recently published a piece, “Confessions of a former carbon tax skeptic.” In it, he professes his belief in taxing carbon and then evangelizes conservatives with the gospel of carbon taxation in an attempt to convert us. Except Josiah doesn’t actually share much good news about the carbon tax with us. Instead,…
Category: Energy
Eliminating Renewable Energy Subsidies is Key to Boosting Prosperity
Residential electricity prices have steadily increased for years, up more than 15 percent in the United States (not including Texas) since 2004. A newly released U.S. Department of Energy report on electricity markets and reliability makes it clear that renewable energy subsidies are contributing significantly to the increasing cost—and the decreasing reliability—of the national electric grid. Yet the report…
Wind Power: Meet the New Boss, Same as the Old Boss
An 1883 article in Scientific American noted that one of the main problems with wind power is “gathering it at the time we do not need it and preserving it till we do.” In other words, there was no way to economically and reliably store the electricity generated from windmills. Today, 134 years later, after having…
Short Memories
We have such short memories. Relating to today’s debate about fossil fuels versus renewable fuels, here is what The Times of London said about a similar debate over coal versus renewables: Coal is everything to us. Without coal, our factories will become idle, our foundries and workshops be still as the grave; the locomotive will…
Quote of the Week: Doug Wilson on Energy Independence
“Let’s talk about energy independence. My entire adult life I have been listening to politicians promise to work for energy independence. Just so’s we’re clear, we live on a continent that is so rich in energy that we could light and heat the whole planet for the next millennium or two. Whether we are talking…
Making Electricity More Expensive
Tuesday’s hearing by the Texas Senate Business and Commerce Committee helped shine some light on the challenges of Texas’ green energy efforts. While we heard great things about the state’s energy efficiency program, we didn’t hear how much the program costs consumers–so i helped out with some testimony. Since 2002, Texas consumers have paid $591.1…
Global Deceit
The fallout from Climategate continues to shake the foundations of the theory that global warming is manmade. My employer, the Texas Public Policy Foundation, recently held a debate on the issue at our 8th Annual Policy Orientation for the Texas Legislature. I think the results show even more clearly that the global warming machine may…
National Review and the Contract
Why in the world would National Review say that, “Republicans ought to promote new energy technologies in order to reduce the risks of global warming?” I can’t think of a good reason. Yet that is exactly what it does in an article by Ramesh Ponnuru, “Contractual Obligations,” that discusses the need for a new “Contract…
Subsidies Anyone?
According to the Cato Institute, federal subsidy programs topped the 2,000 mark for the first time last week. Almost half of those have been created in the last 20 years: the number of federal subsidy programs soared 21 percent during the 1990s and 40 percent during the 2000s. As Chris Edwards, Cato’s director of tax…
Electricity Consumers Benefit from Competition
I just released some research, “Prices, Reliability, and Consumer Choice in the Texas Electricity Market,” examining how consumers have fared when it comes to the restructuring of the Texas electricity market to introduce competition. The results? Good. Click on the link to read the whole report.