Once Again, The Murphy Administration And Environmental Groups Are Caught Flatfooted And Playing Defense
Where Is The BPU Fact Sheet On Components Of Residential Electric Bills That Could Prebut The Van Drew And Trump Lies About Consumer Costs?
Where Are The Fact Sheets On The Science And Impacts On Grid Reliability To Prebut The Trump Lies About Brownouts, Blackouts, And Destruction Of Fisheries And Wildlife?
Just Like Biden’s “Pause”, Trump Won’t Weaken The Law Of Leases Because Big Oil & Gas Won’t Allow That To Happen
Passing wind is normal, but the amount varies between individuals and depends on a number of factors including diet. Some people pass wind only a handful of times per day, others up to 40 times, while the average seems to be about 15. Symptoms of excessive (or embarrassing) flatulence include: passing wind often. ~~~ Source Link
The Trump “Memorandum” (not even an Executive Order) on wind is being distorted by media reporting (see today’s NJ Spotlight story:
And media is leaving crucial information out of the story.
So let me try to set things straight on the basics.
Trump issued a “Memorandum”, which is not even an Executive Order in terms of its legal effect.
Similar to Biden’s “Pause” on fossil leasing, Trump issued a “Temporary Withdrawal” (the first words of Section 1).
Politically, it’s very likely to serve the same political/PR purposes and suffer a similar fate.
Big Oil and Gas and Mining simply will not tolerate any monkeying around with the federal law on energy and minerals leasing.
To signal his intent not to mess around with all that and to make that very clear to the Big Oil, Gas, and Mining interests – and revealing Trump’s incredibly corrupt pro-fossil bias – Trump not only highlighted the “Temporary” nature of the policy, he explicitly exempted oil and gas and minerals leases:
This withdrawal does not apply to leasing related to any other purposes such as, but not limited to, oil, gas, minerals, and environmental conservation.
The federal law Trump invoked explicitly limits the President’s authority to withdraw outer continental shelf lands from the federal leasing program. That power is limited to “unleased lands”:
“withdraw from disposition any of the unleased lands of the outer Continental Shelf.”
The suspension of existing leases would require a declaration of war by Congress (see sub-Section c) National security clause).
Trump also makes that clear in his memo:
Nothing in this withdrawal affects rights under existing leases in the withdrawn areas.
Any suspended leases under a declaration of war require payment of just compensation to the lease holder. Big Oil and Gas and Mining made sure that they get paid.
Under certain limited situations, the Secretary of Defense and the President could suspend existing leases, as required for national security. But again, that would require significant compensation to the lease holders. Again, Big Oil and Gas and Mining made sure that they get paid. (see Sub-Section (d)National defense areas; suspension of operations; extension of leases).
The Trump memo applies to BOTH on shore and off shore wind leases.
During the “Temporary” period, Trump’s memo requires an environmental review process. During this period, no “new” permits, leases, rights of way, or loans can be made to on shore or off shore wind. (See Section 2).
Total hypocrisy because Trump is focused on the alleged high subsidies to wind, but he ignored the $7 TRILLION in annual subsidies to fossil, according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which is no radical green group.
Total hypocrisy here, because the environmental reviews apply only to wind (not to the far more destructive fossil and mineral leases).
Total hypocrisy because the Trump memo does NOT include any policy direction, decision rules or standards, or timeframes to govern the environmental review process. The Trump environmental review process is vague and standardless and not time bounded, allowing the exercise of total bureaucratic discretion!
This garbage is coming from an Administration that parrots corporate talking points about the lengthy delays, high costs, and “regulatory uncertainty” of environmental review under NEPA and EPA permit programs!!!!
And in another incredible example of hypocrisy, in order to protect communities from environmental impacts, Trump ordered recommendations on “removal” of “defunct and idle windmills”.
I don’t have data on how many “defunct and idle windmills” there are, but I can guarantee that the environmental impacts don’t come close to the hundreds of thousands of abandoned mines (including uranium) and oil and gas wells that are poisoning communities, water, air, soil and wildlife.
None of these facts or context were reported by media that I am aware of.
Finally, Trump is lying about not only the science, but the economic impacts on ratepayers.
These lies have been deployed for many months now, and yet have not effectively been rebutted by the Murphy administration and NJ environmental groups.
These groups should have anticipated Trump’s Day One attacks on wind and renewables – which were telegraphed months in advance- and gotten out in front of the debate.
Just one example of this: the Murphy BPU’s Energy Master Plan has a chart on the components of the typical residential gas and electric bill.,
That chart shows that subsidies to renewable. energy are a tiny fraction of the typical residential energy bill.
For example, I wrote about this way back in 2013
Facts on the breakdown of energy costs, from the NJ Energy Master Plan – note that the RGGI charge is so small it is invisible on these charts:
Why wasn’t such information prominently and repeatedly presented in advance to “prebut” and inoculate the media from the Trump lies?
Here’s some examples I wrote about that almost 15 years ago:
Here’s a more recent example:
and even NJ Spotlight reported:
For New Jersey ratepayers, however, the actual cost paid will be far less — $46.46 MWh — when the energy and capacity revenue produced by the wind farm is refunded to utility customers. It means the estimated monthly impact will be an increase of $1.46 for residential, $13.05 for commercial, and $110.10 for industrial customers, according to the state Board of Public Utilities, which approved the project on Friday.
That’s Peanuts!
The credibility of those who grossly exaggerated the cost of wind is shot, no?
Why were the Murphy people (BPU and DEP) and the environmental groups AGAIN caught flat footed and playing defense?
