They're Coming for Your Stove!!!
As we return from a refreshing and relaxing Christmas holiday season, we find that our federal government has been working away to continue to make our lives more miserable in order to accomplish their green energy goals.
Last week, in the latest “the sky is falling, we’re all gonna die” saga, Consumer Products Safety Commission Commissioner, Richard Trumpka Jr. son of former Teamster’s union boss, Richard Trumpka Sr., broke the news to Bloomberg that the agency is planning new regulations for gas stoves which could include a ban. “This is a hidden hazard” as Trumpka breathily informed us. He threatened that “Any option is on the table. Products that can’t be made safe can be banned.”
The public freaked out, so PR spokesperson, Patty Davis, reported that “the agency has not proposed any regulatory action on gas stoves.”…yet. Further, Commission Chair, Alexander Hoehn-Saric, claiming to “debunk the story” but not denying anything that Trumpka said, stated, “Research indicates that emissions from gas stoves can be hazardous, and the CPSC is looking for ways to reduce related indoor air quality hazards. But to be clear (which was anything but clear), I am not looking to ban gas stoves, and the CPSC has no proceeding to do so.”…yet.
The story in this latest attack on fossil fuels is that small particulates could enter the lungs increasing the severity of harm “persons at risk” and of course “the children.” At the same time, we see no movement to prevent or limit smoke emanating from weed which researchers at UC Berkeley have found generates 4 times greater particulate matter concentrations than tobacco hookah smoking.
This CPSC story is just the latest attack on folks doing what folks want to do. The attack on fossil fuels or as some say the Democrats program to abolish fire has now made it to abolishing gas appliances.
In Colorado, in last years’ Senate Bill 138, proponents tried to ban the sale and advertising of devices with small off-road engines such as lawn mowers and leaf blowers. Apparently with opposition (and mockery) of this bill, the sponsors moved to strip the legislation of the ban and focus on giving incentives (that would be your money) to people to switch to electric-powered lawn equipment through tax credits.
The Colorado Public Utilities Commission, not to be outdone in fervor to implement the regime’s goals and in order to implement the General Assemblies passage of the “Adopt Programs Reduce Greenhouse Gas Emissions Utilities,” Senate Bill 21-264 and House Bill 21-1238, “Public Utilities Commission Modernize Gas Utility Demand-side Management Standards” (as I am sure you all have read and studied), issued a regulation on extending gas utility lines to new construction. Even Xcel Energy, the major utility in the state, a green ally, and no friend of the consumer, declared that it would have the practical effect of banning gas lines for all new construction.
Not to be accused of being good winners, a group of conservation advocates including the Natural Resources Defense Council, Western Energy Advocates and the Sierra Club (the usual suspects) were not content with the destruction of future gas usage claiming that the rule for line extensions didn’t “go far enough”, in part because it failed to require more burdensome paperwork such as describing “the social externalities of continued connections to the gas system, such as climate change and air pollution externalities.”
The Public Utilities Commission did not deny these allegations but merely suggested that they come back and stick it to the gas industry “during the process of approving the utility’s tariff schedules, which can include such specific requirements.” So, it’s coming….
This story addresses the problem with the implementation of the Green New Deal and the lack of focused continuing debate and transparency over the elimination of natural gas and climate change in general.
The Democrats proposed the Green New Deal in 2019, and the Republicans in the Senate called them and raised them by putting it up for a vote in S.J. Res. 8. With everyone watching, 57 voted no and 43, all democrats voted “present.” so they could not be blamed for supporting such a radical program in the 2020 election. No Senator would publicly support the Green New Deal.
Whenever the green program is discussed openly, explaining the problems it purports to solve, the programs designed to solve it, the cost, the likelihood of success, and the effect on the people, it is defeated.
However, the proponents are not comfortable with the debate and have sought to implement it piecemeal. They use obscure proceedings to insert unreasonable regulatory burdens on fossil fuel companies, pressure companies and pension funds to withhold investment into those industries, use the Securities and Exchange Commission to implement burdensome green reporting requirements, and do everything they can, without getting caught, to increase the price of fossil fuels to the people while subsidizing politically correct inefficient products and alternative energy sources (except nuclear).
The public then asks why are gasoline prices so high? Why am I being told that solar and wind power is cheaper, but my electric bill keeps going up? Why are rich people being given tax subsidies to buy electric vehicles and put solar panels on their houses? I can’t afford a house as it is. Why do I have to pay for solar panels and EV station hookups in my new house when I don’t have, don’t want and can’t afford an EV or solar panels?
These are discussions we can and should have as a society. Some may say that it is the price of moral leadership in a warming world. Others may say it is moral preening at the expense of the underclasses.
It is said that our elites are just doing this to protect the planet from an existential threat…humanity. It is also said that “nothing is new, only history forgotten.” This takes us back to late antiquity.
Tutela trahit subiectionem in uigiliarum.
Protection drags subjugation in its wake.
If we seek protection in this case from the weather, there always is a price, but if they are going to transform the world, shouldn’t we at least know what the price is before we have to pay it?