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Brent's Journal's avatar

"The beat goes on," sung by Sonny and Cher, will continue in California until the voters send a different set of characters to Sacramento.

Michael Wilson's avatar

Thank you for exposing the truth…this trend is an orchestrated move to add more government control and dependence. The economics make no sense, the demand is waning, and the effect on the environment will be a disaster. I’m buying a “spare” gas weed eater so I will have one that actually cuts weeds well into the future 😉. Blessings

Carmen Luna Fredrickson's avatar

Every politician should be required to take a math test before running for office

Also a common sense test

Politicians come up with an idea and run with it before evaluating all aspects

And why is government in business. What happened to entrepreneurs and not taxpayers opening up new businesses

DLDawson's avatar

the ancient Greeks, inventors of democracy, would elect their officials to one year terms…each officials finances were audited at the beginning and end of their term…if anything was amiss, they would be tried & executed…

imagine what would happen, if, by law, every US Congressman/woman, US Senator, President etc. was by US law AUDITED every 1-2 years by an independent agency.

Imagine what would happen if those audits extended to all family members of such 'elected' official?

Would D's continue to push for Foreign Aid to other C's vs. the Homeland?

What happens when the kickbacks dry up?

M. Waters $4mm House?

N. Pelosi net worth $150mm+?

J. Biden son/brother/family members (grandchildren) net worth tens of millions?

Clinton family $200mm+ (pre election of BC less than $1mm)?

Obama family $40mm+ (pre election less than $1mm)?

Disguised under book deals?

our political systems are rotten to the core…

Justin's avatar

Love it. Absolutely. But would definitely need to apply it equally. The Democrats should be prosecuted just as much as the Republicans.

Ira Gottlieb's avatar

Funny that you only list Ds with large incomes and net worth.

DLDawson's avatar

my mistake…it’s both Rs & Ds…

This is not about R v D.

This is about preserving our way of life.

If America falls, the World falls.

Patriots on guard.

https://time.com/collection/great-reset/

Martin Pattison's avatar

The guy who wrote this article would fail a chemistry test.

Paul Aijian MD's avatar

The emperor truly has no clothes. Thank you Andy for explaining the obvious folly of succumbing to the total fantasy thinking that switching to an all electric transportation system could possibly work. Even if we had a dozen Diablo Canyons up and down the state, ( gasp!), the environmental destruction of rare earth mining and distributing the power they would generate makes the scheme impossible.

Eric Gordon's avatar

True

No one wants to actually do the hard work required to clothe the emperor.

Least of all engineers and people who actually have to make everything work.

Much easier to pass legislation that virtue signals, gets votes, makes people think the emperor has clothes on and the color is green and they fit well 😂

The laws of thermodynamics remain undefeated. The reality is that we do not have the intelligence, resources, production capacity, manpower, grid and most importantly “need” to do any of this.

The entire thing is a microcosm of politically manufactured solutions to nonexistent problems

Ranger's avatar

Great article Andy. Facts speak louder than "feel good" hype that liberals live off of. Oh, also there is some economic reality in the EVs, the politicians and globalist make millions if not billions off us tax payers that are indentured tax payers who foot the bills for these "environmental" scams that do NOT help the environment at all.

Liberals and Repukes that push these schemes, are Never wanting to help the environment! They just want our money and our FREEDOMS!!!!!!!

THOMAS M. COLE JD's avatar

Good info.

Carol Redhead's avatar

Thank you for explaining the problems clearly.

Justin's avatar

How is PG&E supposed to afford upgrading our grid infrastructure? Like Andy said, millions per mile for transmission lines. Pacific Gas & Electric annual net income for 2023 was $2.242B. How could they possibly afford it?

https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/PCG/pacific-gas-electric/net-income

Derek Hanley's avatar

Many people are deliberately ignorant because knowing implies the need for action. Others, are knowledgeable, but afraid to act.

Across the world, millions have taken to the streets, sometimes violently, to support the wholesale conversion of all the world from fossil fuels to wind, solar and batteries to serve the needs of 10 Billion people.

I don't recall seeing even a smidgeon of that number of people protesting in the streets across the world in defence of a different view, and opposition to the absurdities of the current path we are on, especially in California, where the collapse of the all-electric world is likely to occur first.

Earl Brown's avatar

Good article Andy.

Where’s nuclear?

- Stable, reliable energy source

- Low greenhouse gas

- High energy density

- Reduced air pollutants

Surely we can find a way to mitigate its 2 main problems - waste disposal and uranium as its fuel source.

Alberto Ortiz's avatar

Yes, where nuclear in all of this? Although, environmentalist are against nuclear too. They want to shut down the Diablo plant and no technology upgrades either.

Polly Frost's avatar

Thank you, Andy - terrific column. I just wish someone would explain to me why electric transportation for us hoi polloi will save the planet but the hoi oligoi still get to bomb the hell out of any country that displeases them.

Emmett's avatar

Any assessment of carbon emissions associated with a product needs to look at its whole life cycle, from manufacture to scrapping.

An EV has an 80% higher carbon footprint to build than a traditional car.

The mining of minerals include lithium, cobalt, and nickel that requires using fossil fuels to mine those materials and heat them to high temperatures. This does not include the effects of fracking and slave labor used to mine these materials.

Most EVs are charged overnight when there is no green energy to charge them, meaning they are using “fossil” fuels to charge them.

The avg EV requires 30 kilowatt-hours to travel 100 miles — the same amount of electricity an average American home uses each day to run appliances, computers, lights and heating and air conditioning.

It takes about 80,000 driving miles to break even on the carbon footprint. And that does not include the disposal of the old battery.

An EV battery has a 10 year lifespan. After which the toxic chemicals battery goes into a landfill poisoning the ground. Less than 10% of the battery is recycled.

And a new carbon intensive battery has to be installed at great expense to the owner.

The used EV market is dying as people realize a 6-7 year old car will require expensive new batteries in a few years. Per our local dealers they will not take a used EV in trade unless you swap brand for brand.

So why is the government forcing them upon you?

Just saying EV are not as green as you think they are. I love them, but between their high expense to buy, the large carbon footprint and limited range they are not right for everyone.

DLDawson's avatar

well said…people should also think about their health when considering purchasing an EV…buy an EMF meter (good ones are less than $200), take it to the dealer & do some measurements & find that EMF levels are beyond the level considered to be healthy…then take measurements at the EV charging stations and find that EMF levels are multiple times the safe health range minimum…then think about sitting on a EMF battery pack for hours at a time…not good

some members of the public have attributed a diffuse collection of symptoms to low levels of exposure to electromagnetic fields…reported symptoms include headaches, anxiety, suicide and depression, nausea, fatigue and loss of libido…

CarsAreBasic's avatar

1 major volcanic eruption creates more green house gases than all of human activity in one year.

Just in the State of Calif. you never see the green house gas production by nature prior to the industrial revolution (aka tar pits, oil leaks and gas leaks)..... So you first have to subtract that from all formulas.

The examples abound.

Thomas John's avatar

Actually 1 volcano does not create more green house gasses than all of human activity in a year. I picked any old year - so it was 2020. This is what I found. You're off by a two factors of 10. Annual Volcanic Emissions: The combined annual CO2 equivalent emissions from all volcanic activity are about 0.3 to 0.4 Gt.

Annual Human Emissions: Human activities in 2020 emitted approximately 36.3 Gt of CO2 equivalents. Science is Basic.

Emmett's avatar

Remember the smart meter controversy and how many people were concerned about EMF back then?

Nowadays people are more concerned about the smell from pot farms than the EMF coming from their EV that they have to drive at least 12,000 miles/year to break even on the carbon footprint in 6-7 years. 240 hours per year sitting in the EMF field.

Ira Gottlieb's avatar

So we should muddle along and do nothing? Do you think there’s no agenda or consequences attached to the continuous use of fossil fuels, pillaging our environment and fracking?

Emmett's avatar

Just saying government is forcing the use of an expensive and carbon intensive lie. Why?

Eventually technology will be ready to replace petrol. But we are not there yet

Until then government is just lying to the people. Why?

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Jun 9, 2024
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Ira Gottlieb's avatar

I can tell you this much: your finger-wagging and diatribes aren’t helping anyone make progress.

Martin Pattison's avatar

Actually lithium and cobalt are not rare earth elements. Also, the picture of an oil derrick next to a open mine is not a good comparison. You need to consider that there are far more oil derricks than these mines. There are over 1000 active oil wells just in Los Angeles and there are concerns about their effect on the health of nearby residents.

Andy Caldwell's avatar

Those wells have been there over 100 years with no health impacts. Same is true in the Santa Maria Valley and Long Beach....

Martin Pattison's avatar

The article still states that Cobalt and Lithium are rare earth elements. Are you going to correct this?

Andy Caldwell's avatar

Whereas, you are technically correct, to quote Hillary Clinton, what difference does it make? Strip mining along with toxic waste left behind is not green!