Environment/Energy · Featured · Science
Heartland Institute President Joseph Bast sat down with the New American’s Bill Jasper during the 9th International Conference on Climate Change to talk about the origin and purpose of the conference. Boasting 64 speakers, from a multitude of disciplines, ICCC9 was the most star-studded climate conference yet.
Wind energy produces costly, intermittent, unpredictable electricity. But Government subsidies and mandates have encouraged a massive gamble on wind investments in Australia – over $7 billion has already been spent and another $30 billion is proposed. This expenditure is justified by the claim that by using wind energy there will be less carbon dioxide emitted to the atmosphere which will help to prevent dangerous global warming.
Environment/Energy · Featured · Regulation
For years we argued that the farming community should respect OUR right to be organic. Now we’ve switched to denying our neighbors THEIR rights. And that goes against everything it has ever meant to be organic.
Economics · Featured · Government
We’ve seen it in too many sectors of the economy to possibly mention – both domestically and internationally. The greater the government involvement in an economic sector – the greater the ensuing economic damage. To that sector – and the broader economy.
Rewards of tax dollars for the renewable energy industry are so great it takes tax experts days of explanations to locate all possibilities. Additional subsidies are available from the federal government in forms of tax credits, loan guarantees, grants, and possible mandates for energy source use.
After the global warming-battling Edwardsport coal gasification power plant used more power than it generated during the September-to-November time-frame, earlier this month information filed with the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission showed the Duke Energy facility operated at less than 1 percent of capacity in February.
Environment/Energy · Featured · Regulation
Mischa Popoff is one of the most formidable opponents of the organic food movement, as this video of his speech to the Far West Agribusiness Association clearly shows. The simple fact that he is carrying to the masses is that the organic industry, particularly the organic certification industry, is a big racket.
With the growing story coming out of Ukraine, the ongoing search for the missing Malaysian jet, the intensifying Nevada cattle battle, and the new announcement about the additional Keystone pipeline delay, little attention is being paid to the Production Tax Credit (PTC) for wind energy—or any of the other fifty lapsed tax breaks the Senate Finance Committee approved earlier this month. But, despite the low news profile, the gears of government continue to grind up taxpayer dollars.
Economics · Environment/Energy · Featured · Regulation
Last week John Stossel hosted a segment on Earth Day featuring Heartland Senior Fellow James Taylor and Paul Gallay from the Riverkeeper environmentalist organization. Taylor (with some backup from Stossel) crossed swords with Gallay on a number of environmental subjects.
I started covering some of the shenanigans from the solar industry last summer when I wrote about the “Green Tea Party” in Georgia. I had no idea what a can of worms I’d opened. In September, I wrote about the net-metering battle taking place in Arizona—and pointed out the national implications of what was playing out there. The following month, I addressed, what I believe, is an organized effort by the industry, to co-opt the language of the free-market/conservative/limited-government thinking population in an effort to convenience them that government-mandated and -subsidized solar energy was a good thing. Last month I warned consumers of solar scams in a column I wrote titled “Clouds on the solar horizon.”
Environment/Energy · Featured · Government
As Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz announced last week a renewed push to provide $16 billion in taxpayer-backed loans for “clean” technology vehicles, more bad news emerged from another stimulus-funded electric vehicle company over the weekend.
Environment/Energy · Featured · Science
Last week AAA released findings from tests it had run on three models of electric automobiles, and announced that the heavily subsidized vehicles suffer dramatic driving range loss in both cold and hot temperatures.
The news wasn’t new, but apparently the broader media noticed because the pronouncement from the nation’s largest consumer automotive club made it official. NLPC (beginning with a Consumer Reports experience) has reported from time to time on such problems since late 2011. The Tulsa World reported that AAA found driving distance for electric vehicles can be diminished up to 57 percent in extremely cold temperatures, and by one-third in very hot temperatures.
Featured · Government · Liberty · Podcast
This weekly podcast features the second half of a conversation between Jim Lakely, Heartland’s communications director, and Yaron Brook, president of the Ayn Rand Institute. In this half of the interview, Jim and Dr. Brook discuss President Obama’s treatment of capitalism, corporate cronyism, and the morality of libertarianism.
Budgets/Taxes · Economics · Featured · Government · Politics · Regulation
First you get the sugar, then you get the power, then you get the women.
Even as ObamaCare is trying to self destruct, its advocates suggest a détente in which “Republicans recognize the conservative nature of the law,” in the words of Austin Frakt in Bloomberg News. The Affordable Care Act (ACA), they point out, incorporates some ideas from a Heritage Foundation proposal and a law promoted by Mitt Romney. Those are not, however, conservative ideas, much less good ideas, and are not a “sound chassis” for anything.
Over the past several years, the federal government has launched several programs to encourage the development of new and advanced telecommunications services in all areas of the country. The two[...]
Budgets/Taxes · Economics · Environment/Energy · Featured
The most recent report (reflecting up until March 31) under the $32 million grant shows that Smith delivered 421 of its vehicles, with $27,343,311 reimbursed to the company with government funds thus far. That calculates to a whopping $64,948 taxpayer subsidy per vehicle.
Budgets/Taxes · Environment/Energy · Featured
To date, precious little action to combat climate change has been seen from the White House—which pleases most Republicans and angers the left.
Environment/Energy · Featured · Regulation
US politicians and bureaucrats have less compassion and common sense that average Londoner.
Budgets/Taxes · Featured · Politics
…Farming and agriculture have been around for tens of thousands of years. For the vast majority of that time, we grew stuff just fine without a Farm Bill (let alone an entire Cabinet-level Department).
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