WEBVTT 1 00:00:01.520 --> 00:00:04.040 At six o six. I think about garre ceed talk station. 2 00:00:05.519 --> 00:00:08.320 I hope you're having a happy Tuesday. Coming up inside 3 00:00:08.359 --> 00:00:10.480 scoop with bright Bart News every Tuesday, nay o five. 4 00:00:10.519 --> 00:00:13.640 Today Kurtz and Dalka, the bright Bart London Debut editor. 5 00:00:13.720 --> 00:00:15.160 What in the hell is going on with the French 6 00:00:15.160 --> 00:00:18.640 election parallels to what happened with Trump? That the subject 7 00:00:18.640 --> 00:00:20.719 matter with Kurt followed by the Daniel Davis deep dive 8 00:00:20.760 --> 00:00:22.960 the latest on the Russia Ukraine. Trump apparently not real 9 00:00:23.000 --> 00:00:25.960 happy with Vladimir and Putin right now an Zelensky, I 10 00:00:25.960 --> 00:00:28.120 guess pulling out of that mineral deal that I thought 11 00:00:28.199 --> 00:00:31.320 was kind of negotiated, sort of kind of Plus, you 12 00:00:31.440 --> 00:00:35.520 see surgeons are using three D printed organs in the 13 00:00:35.560 --> 00:00:40.600 operating room. Just that brief statement about the subject matter, right, 14 00:00:40.600 --> 00:00:44.840 we're talking about you see researcher doctor Prasha Robbie, he'll 15 00:00:44.840 --> 00:00:46.719 be a guest on at eight forty five to explain 16 00:00:46.799 --> 00:00:49.439 that to us. And I've never done this before, but 17 00:00:49.679 --> 00:00:51.920 I got a great reaction to an op ed piece 18 00:00:51.960 --> 00:00:55.880 out of Reason the other day. Mark Osterich, who was 19 00:00:55.920 --> 00:00:58.799 described as a founding partner of a nonprofit firm Crane 20 00:00:58.880 --> 00:01:01.520 and Gray, and the editor of a daily energy newsletter 21 00:01:01.560 --> 00:01:05.760 called Gridbrief. But he did such a beautiful job explaining 22 00:01:05.799 --> 00:01:11.120 the bat crap insanity of United States energy policy that 23 00:01:11.239 --> 00:01:13.159 I just wanted to bring it back to everybody's attention 24 00:01:13.200 --> 00:01:14.680 because I didn't get to it till the very end 25 00:01:14.680 --> 00:01:16.920 of the program, and I only read a part of it, 26 00:01:17.480 --> 00:01:19.599 but I got so many requests for the link to 27 00:01:19.640 --> 00:01:22.120 the article. I've just asked Jostreker to put a link 28 00:01:22.159 --> 00:01:26.959 to it on my blog page or podcast blog page 29 00:01:26.959 --> 00:01:33.439 at fifty five caresee dot com. Because when you contemplate 30 00:01:33.519 --> 00:01:36.560 his words and they make perfect sense, you realize what 31 00:01:36.640 --> 00:01:38.680 a lie and a bill of goods we've been sold 32 00:01:39.319 --> 00:01:44.959 on this whole green crap. Anyway, bear with me and 33 00:01:45.079 --> 00:01:48.280 enjoy if you haven't heard it before. We're not short 34 00:01:48.319 --> 00:01:50.840 on power, we're just too sanctimonious to generate. At the 35 00:01:51.200 --> 00:01:57.280 caption of the article, I recall Ontario Premier Doug Ford 36 00:01:58.040 --> 00:02:02.879 he threatened at twenty five percent retally on American energy exports, 37 00:02:03.680 --> 00:02:05.519 and I know he pulled that off the table, but 38 00:02:05.560 --> 00:02:13.599 that's the predicate for this wonderfully written analysis. And he 39 00:02:13.639 --> 00:02:17.560 writes the headline framed as another Trump tariff story Ontario 40 00:02:17.599 --> 00:02:20.400 premiere Doug Ford threatening a twenty five percent retaliation in 41 00:02:20.439 --> 00:02:23.840 American energy exports. But the real story of the Northeastern 42 00:02:23.919 --> 00:02:27.719 energy crisis is more than a cross border drama and 43 00:02:27.800 --> 00:02:32.000 goes back well before the tariffs and trumpeting. Ford's threat 44 00:02:32.080 --> 00:02:34.919 is the latest lash and a decade's long ritual of 45 00:02:35.159 --> 00:02:40.520 energy self flagellation. US regulators and lawmakers have been kneecapping 46 00:02:40.560 --> 00:02:45.759 American energy electricity production with regulation after regulations, smothering new 47 00:02:45.800 --> 00:02:50.039 projects in the name of preservation wetlands of the Northeastern 48 00:02:50.240 --> 00:02:55.560 bullrush sedge, often before they even break ground. Instead of 49 00:02:55.599 --> 00:03:00.039 building up capacity, we import Canadian power to keep the 50 00:03:00.080 --> 00:03:05.240 missions off our ledgers like mafia countants, cleverly skirting the 51 00:03:05.319 --> 00:03:08.680 law while they convinced the world that they're making us cleaner, greener, 52 00:03:08.680 --> 00:03:12.360 and smarter. Even as the lights flicker and the bills climb. 53 00:03:13.800 --> 00:03:16.560 The people paying the price are not in press conferences 54 00:03:16.639 --> 00:03:20.360 or policy meetings. They're at home, choosing between groceries and 55 00:03:20.360 --> 00:03:23.280 the gas bill. I met them last winter in North Philly. 56 00:03:23.280 --> 00:03:25.280 I was there to run focus groups on the impact 57 00:03:25.280 --> 00:03:29.159 of rising energy costs. A father talked about replacing olive 58 00:03:29.240 --> 00:03:31.919 garden dinners with Spaghettio. It's a shame that little League 59 00:03:31.960 --> 00:03:35.159 wins no longer earned a night out. A grad student 60 00:03:35.199 --> 00:03:37.599 turned her one bedroom apartment into a boarding house, three 61 00:03:37.599 --> 00:03:39.800 people sharing the space just to keep the lights on. 62 00:03:39.879 --> 00:03:42.879 A restaurant owner described her kitchen working in winter coats 63 00:03:43.319 --> 00:03:46.039 because they couldn't afford to run the heat. These weren't 64 00:03:46.080 --> 00:03:51.000 sob stories, they were quiet portraits of sacrifice and grit. 65 00:03:51.639 --> 00:03:56.599 Since then, prices have jumped another seven percent percent despite 66 00:03:56.639 --> 00:04:00.319 our reliance on Canadian imports. In twenty twenty four, this 67 00:04:00.360 --> 00:04:01.800 is where we get to the meat of it, folks, 68 00:04:02.960 --> 00:04:08.000 the US imported twenty seven thousand, two hundred gigawatt hours 69 00:04:08.039 --> 00:04:10.560 of electricity from Canada. That is enough to cover twenty 70 00:04:10.560 --> 00:04:13.639 percent of New York supply and fifteen percent of New 71 00:04:13.639 --> 00:04:18.319 England's total winter load. Because we've made building new power 72 00:04:18.360 --> 00:04:24.199 here nearly impossible and incentivized imported power through regulatory loopholes 73 00:04:24.519 --> 00:04:27.639 that allow us to ignore any emissions that happen outside 74 00:04:27.639 --> 00:04:36.160 the United States. It's a simple formula, export emissions, import virtue. Meanwhile, 75 00:04:36.199 --> 00:04:40.040 domestic energy products in the Northeast stall, sputter or collapse. 76 00:04:40.480 --> 00:04:44.040 We're sitting on four hundred and sixty nine billion tons 77 00:04:44.040 --> 00:04:47.240 of coal, two point nine trillion cubic feet of gas, 78 00:04:47.480 --> 00:04:51.000 and centuries of nuclear fuel. But in the United States, 79 00:04:51.040 --> 00:04:54.839 building power plants now requires a legal team and decades 80 00:04:54.879 --> 00:04:58.399 of hearings. We've turned power generation into a theater of guilt. 81 00:04:58.959 --> 00:05:02.240 We're producing energy in the United States is too sinful 82 00:05:02.360 --> 00:05:05.800 to permit, but importing it from somewhere else lets us 83 00:05:05.839 --> 00:05:10.680 feel pure. It's not policy, it's penance. In twenty twenty one, 84 00:05:10.720 --> 00:05:14.720 New York shut down the Indian Point Nuclear Plant, one 85 00:05:14.720 --> 00:05:19.000 of its last sources of zero emissions based load power. 86 00:05:19.800 --> 00:05:24.160 That same year, New York began ramping up electricity imports 87 00:05:24.199 --> 00:05:27.360 from Canada to fill the gap, bringing in seven thousand, 88 00:05:27.560 --> 00:05:32.439 six hundred gigawatt hours. Hydro electric power alone couldn't handle 89 00:05:32.480 --> 00:05:36.800 the demand, so Ontario's gas plants fired up to meet 90 00:05:36.839 --> 00:05:40.279 the demand, releasing an estimated one million tons of carbon 91 00:05:40.360 --> 00:05:45.040 dioxide plant food. But because those emissions occurred north of 92 00:05:45.079 --> 00:05:47.439 the border, New York claimed to drop in its own 93 00:05:47.560 --> 00:05:53.319 energy sector emissions. And that's the game. When Canadian hydro falters, 94 00:05:54.360 --> 00:05:57.959 Canadian gas steps in, but the emissions vanish on US. 95 00:05:58.040 --> 00:06:02.879 Climate ledgers turned to Vermont, importing over eighty percent of 96 00:06:02.959 --> 00:06:06.040 its electricity. Massachusetts and much of the rest of New 97 00:06:06.040 --> 00:06:09.519 England operate from the same playbook. The grid operators they 98 00:06:09.560 --> 00:06:13.279 belong to import around fifteen percent of its winter peak 99 00:06:13.360 --> 00:06:17.759 from Canada. When hydro output dropped eighteen percent due to drought, 100 00:06:18.319 --> 00:06:23.040 gas peaker plants and fossil fuels save the day. In 101 00:06:23.120 --> 00:06:26.680 twenty twenty three alone, utilities in Quebec, Ontario, and New 102 00:06:26.720 --> 00:06:31.839 Brunswick generated an estimated thirteen point four million metric tons 103 00:06:32.240 --> 00:06:36.040 of carbon dioxide plant food, none of which appear on 104 00:06:36.040 --> 00:06:39.279 the emission ledgers of states like Massachusetts and Vermont, despite 105 00:06:39.319 --> 00:06:44.040 their heavily reliance unimported power from those provinces. Meanwhile, the 106 00:06:44.240 --> 00:06:48.639 twelve hundred megawat Commonwealth wind project was canceled outright after 107 00:06:48.680 --> 00:06:53.160 a developer paid fifty million dollars to walk away, citing 108 00:06:53.199 --> 00:06:58.600 financial infeasibility and permitting delays. This is not a glitch 109 00:06:58.720 --> 00:07:04.480 in the system. Is the system and I love this line. 110 00:07:05.319 --> 00:07:09.600 A nineteen to ninety nine rule by the Environmental Protection 111 00:07:09.720 --> 00:07:14.519 Agency allows states to treat imported electricity as emissions free, 112 00:07:14.639 --> 00:07:20.759 regardless of how it's generated. I don't make the rules, man, 113 00:07:20.839 --> 00:07:23.959 I just think them up and write them down. It's 114 00:07:23.959 --> 00:07:27.519 a convenient accounting trick that lets politicians hit climate targets 115 00:07:27.519 --> 00:07:31.560 without actually reducing actual emissions. At the same time, domestic 116 00:07:31.680 --> 00:07:35.959 energy projects face a labyrinth of legal, regulatory, and activist 117 00:07:36.120 --> 00:07:39.079 roadblocks thanks to laws like Title VIV of the Clean 118 00:07:39.160 --> 00:07:42.360 Air Act and a permitting system that treats any new 119 00:07:42.399 --> 00:07:48.360 infrastructure as a threat until proven otherwise. We've built the 120 00:07:48.360 --> 00:07:52.160 political culture that worships the optics of clean energy while 121 00:07:52.199 --> 00:07:56.879 punishing the act of actually producing it. Across the Northeast, 122 00:07:56.920 --> 00:08:00.920 domestic energy projects don't just struggle. They're buried. Offshore wind 123 00:08:00.920 --> 00:08:04.800 collapses under lawsuits over fishing rights in ocean views, small 124 00:08:04.879 --> 00:08:09.519 modular reactors gathered dust in regulatory limbo. Pipelines are killed 125 00:08:09.560 --> 00:08:14.959 over silt and wetlands. Nuclear plants drowned in litigation. In 126 00:08:15.000 --> 00:08:20.199 twenty sixteen, New York veto to the Constitution pipeline, leaving 127 00:08:20.240 --> 00:08:23.279 the Marcella Shale untapped. Two years later, during a brutal 128 00:08:23.319 --> 00:08:29.879 cults in a Massachusetts imported liquefied natural gas from Russia 129 00:08:29.959 --> 00:08:34.360 rather than lay pipe from Pennsylvania. A proposed forty two 130 00:08:34.480 --> 00:08:38.120 megawat biomass plant in Springfield, Massachusetts, was blocked on a 131 00:08:38.159 --> 00:08:41.720 technicality in twenty twenty one after years of permit delays 132 00:08:41.720 --> 00:08:47.960 and concerns over quote unquote environmental justice. Clean local energy 133 00:08:48.080 --> 00:08:56.240 was too controversial, imported emissions no comment. Altogether, the region 134 00:08:56.279 --> 00:09:00.799 has canceled enough projects to generate forty two thousand gigawatt 135 00:09:00.919 --> 00:09:06.159 hours annually, more than fifty percent above the power we 136 00:09:06.200 --> 00:09:10.519 imported from Canada in twenty twenty four. We're not out 137 00:09:10.519 --> 00:09:15.399 of energy, we just outlawed reality. We pretend its progress, 138 00:09:15.879 --> 00:09:19.440 We pretend the air is cleaner. We pretend that exporting 139 00:09:19.480 --> 00:09:24.440 emissions is environmentalism. It's not. It's theater for climate lobbies, 140 00:09:24.480 --> 00:09:28.399 campaign sound bites, and activists to measure success and press releases, 141 00:09:28.759 --> 00:09:35.039 not power output. The emissions remain, only the guilt is outsourced. 142 00:09:35.279 --> 00:09:39.200 So No Ford's tariff thread isn't the story. It's just 143 00:09:39.279 --> 00:09:43.159 the headline. The real story is what made that threat possible. 144 00:09:43.240 --> 00:09:48.440 Our addiction to imported virtue, our refusal to build in 145 00:09:48.559 --> 00:09:52.279 a regulatory culture that punishes the very act of producing energy. 146 00:09:52.360 --> 00:09:56.840 We're not short on power, we're just too sanctimonious to 147 00:09:56.960 --> 00:10:00.039 generate it. Thank you for indulging me on that I 148 00:10:00.080 --> 00:10:03.399 thought he made awesome points. And isn't it crazy the 149 00:10:03.559 --> 00:10:09.639 nineteen ninety nine rule imported electricity is emissions free. They 150 00:10:09.639 --> 00:10:13.679 could be using the dirtiest coal plants on the planet 151 00:10:14.639 --> 00:10:19.360 in Canada, but because that smoke isn't coming out of 152 00:10:19.360 --> 00:10:21.639 the state of New York or ver modern New Jersey, 153 00:10:21.679 --> 00:10:25.399 its counts as emissions free. You see the nonsense. And 154 00:10:25.480 --> 00:10:32.240 all this we import products from China, the component products 155 00:10:32.240 --> 00:10:35.799 for all these environmentally correct green electric vehicles, with the 156 00:10:35.840 --> 00:10:37.879 exception of teslas, which apparently you're not allowed to drive 157 00:10:37.919 --> 00:10:43.879 anymore because well, yeah, evil space man, they come from 158 00:10:44.120 --> 00:10:50.039 coal plants, energy generated by coal plants in China. Aren't 159 00:10:50.039 --> 00:10:52.320 we all breathing the same air on this globe of ours? 160 00:10:52.360 --> 00:10:58.440 Don't the winds flow? And it is an amazing reality 161 00:10:58.440 --> 00:11:01.720 that one volcanic eruption can negate all of the efforts 162 00:11:01.759 --> 00:11:05.679 to get rid of carbon from the atmosphere. And again, 163 00:11:05.960 --> 00:11:14.679 carbon dioxide's plant food. It's plant food. It's a lie, man, 164 00:11:14.879 --> 00:11:17.840 We are living a lie. This climate religion has got 165 00:11:17.840 --> 00:11:21.000 people so damned delusional that they just you buy into 166 00:11:21.039 --> 00:11:26.879 this six seventeen fifty five Kerosite talk station. I just 167 00:11:27.440 --> 00:11:29.919 I just woke up in some sort of parallel universe. 168 00:11:29.960 --> 00:11:31.360 I just don't know when it happened.