In his continuing war on fossil fuels, President Biden and the Environmental Protection Agency are planning to announce a severe new proposal forcing the nation’s power plants to dramatically cut their emissions by 2040. Similar efforts by Biden and President Obama before him were struck down by the Supreme Court.
If the liberal Washington Post is calling the proposal “drastic,” you know it’s going to be contentious. Their headline? “EPA plan would impose drastic cuts on power plant emissions by 2040.” They explain:
If implemented, the Environmental Protection Agency would set limits so stringent that fossil-fuel-burning power plants probably would have to use technology to capture their carbon dioxide emissions from their smokestacks or switch to other fuels to comply, according to the three people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a plan that is not yet public. The proposal is still under final analysis at the White House and could change before the EPA completes and announces it.
There are 3,393 fossil fuel-fired power plants across the country, most of which are natural gas plants. Those plants generate more than 60 percent of the nation’s electricity, compared to around 14 percent produced by wind and solar. The plants account for around 25 percent of the nation’s emissions, according to the EPA.
If approved, the policy would force many power plants to adopt expensive carbon-capture technology:
The policy would not mandate any type of technology or fuel, according to the three people familiar with the latest details. But they said the limits it sets would be so stringent that to meet them, fossil-fuel-burning plants most likely would need to use carbon-capture technology or be capable of switching to use hydrogen, which burns without greenhouse-gas emissions.
The power industry is—not surprisingly—pointing out that the nation isn’t ready to transition that quickly:
“The expected EPA regulation is just the latest in President Biden’s anti-fossil fuels agenda, coercing the retirement of electricity sources that are needed during the grid transition,” Michelle Bloodworth, the president and CEO of America’s Power, a coal power trade group, told Fox News Digital.
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in June 2022 that an Obama-era regulation curbing power plant emissions was unconstitutional since the EPA did not have explicit power to make such rules. Unfortunately, Biden’s behemoth, inflation-causing “Inflation Reduction Act” passed in August 2022, and it has a provision allowing the EPA to regulate greenhouse gas emissions.
Last Friday, Biden signed an executive order that will create a new “Office of Environmental Justice.” This new proposal would likely make energy more expensive, so I’m not sure how that’s going to be justice for poor communities.
One problem facing the plan: carbon-capture technology is not ready for prime time.
Utility Southern Company (SO.N), which is phasing out its large fleet of coal generation, said new gas turbines should be favored “to safeguard electric needs of the U.S.”.
Southern, which also runs the National Carbon Capture Center with the Department of Energy, said commercial deployment of carbon capture technology “is many years away” despite the cost-reduction potential of the Inflation Reduction Act. [Emphasis mine.]
“Switch to other fuels”?
If fossil fuels are off the table, what other fuels are there?
And how can they be developed and implemented nationwide in 17 years?
Are we talking about unicorn farts or something?
— Chris McKeever 🇺🇸 (@TheRealMcKeever) April 23, 2023
The Biden Administration doesn’t care, however, if energy prices go up. Climate fanatic John Kerry is actually rooting for that to happen:
On Friday’s broadcast of MSNBC’s “Andrea Mitchell Reports,” Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry stated that wind and solar power will become “far more price competitive than oil and gas” if oil and gas companies see their costs rise because they “have to spend huge amounts of money for carbon capture and storage and utilization.”
When the costs go up for energy companies, and they will if these regulations are imposed, they will pass those costs on to you and me—and we’ll be faced with the resultant gargantuan utility bills.
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