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Google Joins Apple in Condemning the Repeal of the Clean Power Plan (theverge.com)
An anonymous reader shares a report: Google filed a public comment today criticizing the Environmental Protection Agency's proposal to roll back the Clean Power Plan, an Obama-era policy that aims to cut power plant pollution. With its comment, Google joins Apple in arguing that keeping the policy is a good deal for the US. Google's comment, which it shared with The Verge, lays out what it called a strong economic case for the Clean Power Plan.It says that the plan would encourage utilities and companies like Google to keep investing in renewable energy -- which Google says is getting cheaper, is desired by both consumers and investors, and is a good source of jobs.
If it is really that important it should be passed as a law. This is the issue with executive orders and regulations. Then next guy can just undo it. Perhaps previous administrations should have focused more on compromised laws and less on orders and regulations.
So what you're saying is that...
"His name was James Damore."
Yeah clean power is really a leftist plot to cripple America, go drink your fracking fluid you Libertardian fool.
The repeal of this measure has nothing to do with the environment, economy or jobs. Slowing or stopping the cost reductions in clean energy is what this is about. Robert E. Murray, the chief executive of Murray Energy, the owner of the largest number of coal fired plants in the country, is a long time personal friend of Trump. The fact that clean energy has been getting cheaper every year is killing his company whose margins are getting cut every year. This has nothing to do with anything other than improving Trump's friends bottom line; everything else is irrelevant.
"Be particularly skeptical when presented with evidence confirming what you already believe." -
Silicon Valley billionaires don't care about middle class workers in the energy industries or poor people who can't afford to pay more on their utility bills. Let them eat cake.
You know what powers your Tesla, your Prius?
Coal.
Or you can create new nuclear plants, Captain Nimby.
They were anti-science looooong before Obama though. Now they're fully anti-governance.
If it is really that important it should be passed as a law. This is the issue with executive orders and regulations. Then next guy can just undo it. Perhaps previous administrations should have focused more on compromised laws and less on orders and regulations.
Executive Orders are abused more by each successive President. They're completely out of hand in the Obama/Trump era. I really think there needs to be some soul-searching and perhaps an amendment to the constitution. They're not supposed to be used as work-arounds when the President can't get a law passed that he wants. They are supposed to be for use executively not legislatively. Both Obama and Trump have abused executive orders and used them for things it was not designed to do.
We need to rein in on abuses, close down loopholes, and put checks and balances on executive orders.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
They say the plan shouldn't be rolled back because then companies would not be encouraged to use renewables.
But are Apple and Google going to cease using renewable power sources? No. Nor will lots of other companies.
They also claim it's getting cheaper - great! Then obviously that alone would be a driving factor toward companies seeking renewable energy.
So what does this rollback really hurt?
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Pretty sure that regardless of environmental impact, coal being a non-renewable, finite, resource is scientifically settled.
Google/Apple could just contract with clean power producers to supply their data centers and other operations. And pay what market asks for that type of power.
Have gnu, will travel.
The science is in fact settled, and Obama had nothing to do with it. Sorry if this destroys your head-in-ass-in-coal-mine worldview, but you're wrong. Coal is a major polluting energy source, that's a fact. No such thing as clean coal.
There is no such thing as clean oil extraction or clean fracking. Anyone arguing this point is a moron fighting their reality for whatever perceived political gain can be had from being a moron, sorry.
The entirety of scientific consensus says coal is dirty and needs to be phased out ASAP. Fact, deal with it.
You are confusing Trump and Obama. Obama abused E.O.s because he couldn't get them passed by Congress. Trump is abusing them because he has the attention span of gnat and needs instant gratification so he can bellow at his base about all the wonderful things he's doing to America.
So, your comment goes against all the statistics which that say that renewable energy is decreasing the overall cost of energy and you link to a climate change denial website to back your claim up. Costs of wholesale energy are decreasing at such a fast rate in Europe that it's causing hell for the retail electric companies. They had an incident in Europe several months ago where the wholesale cost of energy went negative for a time. Yes, renewable energy comes with a different set of problems than we are used to in traditional energy but, it's nothing insurmountable. You either live in an alternate reality or are a paid shill for Murray Energy.
"Be particularly skeptical when presented with evidence confirming what you already believe." -
No that's now what I'm saying at all Anonymous Coward.
Need to stay in California.
Any policy that subsidizes solar is subsidizing the PRC since they have been dumping panels for ages.
The problem with solar particularly is that the panels have a limited lifespan and the materials they are made out of are difficult to recycle and can not be dumped without impacting the environment
They're not supposed to be used as work-arounds when the President can't get a law passed that he wants
An effective president works with Congress regardless of which party controls it (e.g. Reagan, Clinton, and Bush all got things they wanted passed even when the other party was in control). Sometimes they needed to compromise to get what they really wanted.
Obama was good at delivering speeches, but he was useless when it came to executive leadership.
Because you're afraid to admit the truth, or because you don't understand the science involved? Most people know coal is a pollutant and spreads mercury into water supplies, a potent neurotoxin. Even a few Republicans know that.
Like you, they try to downplay such facts.
I think that looking at executive orders will not really solve anything. The abuse of orders is not the problem, they are the result of the problem.
And that problem is that to much power is given to one person in a 'win all' election system. That system only looks at the winner and you automagically roll into a bi-party system, even if that means your policy disagrees with 75% of the population.
The only way to go is to look how you can reinstate a multy party system. The problem there is that many people believe that some dudes 250 or so years ago can not be wrong, no matter what. Once you realize that what they have put in place was designed to be changed, you can start doing that.
It would mean that a lot of people who now have power have to give up that power. In many other countries that was done by a a lot of blood.
The USofA has a second amendement to throw people out if the people do not like them. It is right there that it says that if the system does not work, kill them. (Yeah, those guns are for killing, not for hunting so you can feed the people at the picket lines)
There have been countries where changes have been a lot less bloody and even peacefull. So that is an option as well.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
The problem there is that many people believe that some dudes 250 or so years ago can not be wrong, no matter what. Once you realize that what they have put in place was designed to be changed, you can start doing that
Interestingly enough. Many of the founding fathers, including George Washington saw the problem with party politics and wanted to prevent political parties forming. So even those "old dudes" knew how dangerous party politics could be on the American political set-up.
But you are right, the constitution was written so it could be changed and it was intended that it would be changed. They knew what they had set up would not be 100% applicable at all times in the future.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
Actually you're retarded. The Republican obstructionist Congress passed just about nothing during Obama or since of any value. They can't balance a budget or fix health care, nothing. They were SAVED by Obama's bailout also, which they resisted on the grounds that spending money to save the economy was bad math - then they ignored their own party line on the deficits and passed a massive giveaway for the richest despite economists saying it would only swell the debt further, which it has.
Obama understood the economy and pushed basic reforms, Republicans don't give a fuck what's good for America so long as they can enrich their Billionaire coal faggots.
Actually, the Second was put in there so that we wouldn't be forced to maintain a standing Army. Obviously, it didn't succeed in that mission terribly well.
And where, exactly, does it say "if the system does not work, kill them". I've managed to miss that every time I've read the Constitution....
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
Obama (and by extension the Democratic Party) never understood that they had to fight fire with fire when it came to the Republicans. That was his biggest failure.
If renewables are decreasing the overall cost of energy (rather than hiding part of the cost in other parts of the budget), then the regulation change in question won't have any effect at all.
People aren't going to stop building out cheap power just because a law was changed (unless the change was to FORBID the building of renewables, which this wasn't).
So, chill. If solar really is cheaper than coal, then anything short of mandating use of coal (which noone is proposing) won't even slow down the uptake of solar...
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
That's not a problem with a clean power plan. That's just life. If you invest in anything, you'd better be prepared to have the floor fall out under it, because you can't go back and change your forecast and not invest.
Unless you've been under a rock, or think that a vast majority of scientists are somehow plotting together to make up some huge carbon-footprint global-warming conspiracy theory, it really doesn't work both ways. Economic problems will be the least of our concerns if we render this pale blue dot largely uninhabitable.
There are two types of people in the world; those who believe there are two types of people, and those who don't.
At issue is the ability for local utility to provide means to connect sources that reduce CO2 emissions. While some companies do indeed generate on-site power, they also rely on local utility to also provide any additional energy. Some locations provide the means to determine the source of power delivered to the site. Now obviously the local utility doesn't come out and hook Apple up to a wind farm or anything, but it is more along the lines of, "You used x kWh of power, so we generated x kWh of power from a clean source."
At any rate, since that's totally getting off rails here, the entire point is that cities and what-not have an administration cost to maintain those kinds of services and delivery. With the plan being rolled back, the fear (be it a real one or one that doesn't materialize) is that cities will offer less of these services and in turn Apple or Google will have to generate 100% power on-site (not possible) or have questionable sources (which was sort of questionable to begin with but less so questionable with the plan in place, I don't know it seems like a lot of marketing grey area here) to their energy needs.
There's other things at stake here like investment credits and regulation on CO2 emissions, but reading the statement it seems (to me at least, but take my word with a grain of salt) that availability is the thing that they're trying to hammer home here.
Getting cheaper isn't the only factor in choosing energy. Reliability also goes a long way. Something can be super cheap, but if it only delivers power for 40% of the day, then there's extra cost in having a setup that switches seamlessly from one to the other.
I honestly think the plan to begin with was good intentions but poorly executed since it totally circumvented Congressional approval. I grow tired of Presidents acting like they're kings of the nation and that rings true for our current and former Presidents. But at the same time I can't act surprised, Congress has slowly gifted large tracts of power to the executive so that they can play the blame game come reelection...
I'm going off on a tangent here. My apologies. At any rate, it seems availability is the issue here. They wish to secure the option to purchase green energy from local utilities. For where they're at, I don't think that they'll ever have to worry about not having the option, but whatever.
says it all.
Time to end the tax exemptions, subsidies, exclusions, and deferrments for fossil fuels so that there is a level playing field for renewables - fossil fuels get 90 percent of the Dept of Energy subsidies that aren't for nuclear weapons.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
And where, exactly, does it say "if the system does not work, kill them". I've managed to miss that every time I've read the Constitution....
That's because it is elsewhere, not in the Constitution.
When in the course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.
That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
The Republican obstructionist Congress
It wasn't Republicans obstructing; Harry Reed used filibusters to block anything he didn't like.
They're completely out of hand in the Obama/Trump era.
The Obama era? You mean the Obama who has cast the lowest number of executive orders per year since Grover Cleveland in 1889? Is that the Obama era you're talking about?
And as much as we like to heap shit on Trump, he's got a long way to go before he gets to the level of Carter. Actually he's got a long way to go to get to the level of T. Roosevelt to Carter, as in the first 80 years of last century.
Umm... false equivalency. The cost of renewable energy has nothing to do with retail utility costs to the consumer. The cost of retail (the cost you pay) electricity bills continue to climb, even though the cost of wholesale (the cost that utility companies pay) electricity continues to decline. The cost of renewables affects the wholesale price of electricity which has remained flat and therefore has actually dropped in price, due to inflation, for the last 10 years and for the first time in history. This has not been affecting retail prices however because the wholesale cost of electricity is only one factor in retail pricing. Other factors include maintenance of aging infrastructure, employees (especially employee healthcare), lobbying and executive compensation (the largest area of increase at a lot utilities). So, sadly, even though renewables are reducing the cost of producing electricity, it's had little to no effect on what we pay the utility companies.
"Be particularly skeptical when presented with evidence confirming what you already believe." -
Actually, they have been crafting a plan to mandate the use of coal using the cold-war era Defense Production Act. Thankfully, so far, that have not actually done it but, they have seriously proposed it.
"Be particularly skeptical when presented with evidence confirming what you already believe." -
They're not supposed to be used as work-arounds when the President can't get a law passed that he wants.
What the US needs, then, is a mechanism to deal with a dysfunctional government. In Canada, for example, if a matter of confidence fails to pass (the budget being the big one), the government falls, and an election occurs shortly thereafter. Even with the absurdity that is the Citizens United decision, eventually the taps will run out of money for another election campaign.
...si hoc legere nimium eruditionis habes...
...that they won't use clean power unless they're forced to? Seems they could just use "clean power" (whatever that means today) anyway, and continue to expand their resources and supplies of same regardless.
Seems rather against their stated point, I think.
Ferret
Sic gorgiamus allos subjectatos nunc
No shame, Tom? It's amazing you can breathe at all with your head so squarely wedged in your corpulent liar's asshole... but enjoy Trump's prison tour! You're going to ensure Democratic control of congress for DECADES.
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2013/nov/22/harry-reid/harry-reid-says-82-presidential-nominees-have-been/
Oh yeah, and you're still a moron for asserting something that wasn't true again Tom. The same old problem you've always had : Lying like a bitch.
https://www.cnn.com/politics/live-news/epa-pruitt-congress-hearing/index.html
An interesting assertion....evidence of them being virtuous in the first case and not so in the second?
Ferret
Sic gorgiamus allos subjectatos nunc
... and yet he's managed to pass so little legislation ... even with full control of the government.
This space for rent. All reasonable inquiries will be entertained at proprietors discretion.
If it is really that important it should be passed as a law. This is the issue with executive orders and regulations. Then next guy can just undo it. Perhaps previous administrations should have focused more on compromised laws and less on orders and regulations.
The next guy(s) can just undo a law too, just so you know. At least, that's how it's supposed to work.
The main objection here doesn't seem to be to the executive order-ness, but that it was possible to undo it at all.
Apparently decrees of Obama are like from the King of Babylon or something. Even he can't reverse them!
I'd say "consider the source," but then I considered the people I'm dealing with.
He also clearly doesn't remember the shit show that was the republican congress that Clinton had to deal with.
"In America, first you get the sugar, then you get the power, then you get the women..." -H. Simpson
No he is not a denier (another ad hominim attack rather than deal with substantive issues raised).
He is "Michael Shellenberger is a Time Magazine “Hero of the Environment,” Green Book Award Winner". ....Time that ultra liberal climate change alarmist mouthpiece.
He believes the whole CO2 narrative, but thinks nuclear is the best path to a low carbon dioxide future. He probably has that view because of the poor economics of wind and solar.
Google themselves came to the conclusion that renewables cannot replace stable base-load power to halt climate change.
https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/google-engineers-explain-why-they-stopped-rd-in-renewable-energy
" Two Google engineers who worked on the REC initiative have finally opened up about why the team halted their efforts. And it wasn't because they thought existing renewables were enough to decarbonize the global economy.
"Trying to combat climate change exclusively with today’s renewable energy technologies simply won’t work; we need a fundamentally different approach," wrote Google's Ross Koningstein and David Fork in a piece published yesterday in IEEE's Spectrum.
It's a striking admission from a company that has relentlessly supported the growth of renewable energy.
When Google first set out on its mission, the REC team was convinced that existing renewables (or those close to commercialization) could reduce emissions enough to avoid the worst climate change scenarios. But by 2011, when engineers realized that their investments were not playing out as expected, they ditched the program and set out to rethink its goals.
"As we reflected on the project, we came to the conclusion that even if Google and others had led the way toward a wholesale adoption of renewable energy, that switch would not have resulted in significant reductions of carbon dioxide emissions," wrote Koningstein and Fork.
The team came to that conclusion after examining different scenarios for renewable energy penetration using a low-carbon modeling tool from the consulting firm McKinsey. They compared those scenarios to former NASA scientist James Hansen's famous 2008 model showing that a 350 ppm emissions level was needed to stabilize the climate.
They didn't find promising results: ....
Those calculations cast our work at Google’s REC program in a sobering new light. Suppose for a moment that it had achieved the most extraordinary success possible, and that we had found cheap renewable energy technologies that could gradually replace all the world’s coal plants -- a situation roughly equivalent to the energy innovation study’s best-case scenario. Even if that dream had come to pass, it still wouldn’t have solved climate change. This realization was frankly shocking: Not only had REC failed to reach its goal of creating energy cheaper than coal, but that goal had not been ambitious enough to reverse climate change."
They're not supposed to be used as work-arounds when the President can't get a law passed that he wants.
What the US needs, then, is a mechanism to deal with a dysfunctional government. In Canada, for example, if a matter of confidence fails to pass (the budget being the big one), the government falls, and an election occurs shortly thereafter. Even with the absurdity that is the Citizens United decision, eventually the taps will run out of money for another election campaign.
The President is not a legislator though. If a President can't get laws past- tough cheese! That's not his job. A President is not the same role as a Prime Minister, or at least, is not intended to be.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
It says that the plan would encourage utilities and companies like Google to keep investing in renewable energy -- which Google says is getting cheaper, is desired by both consumers and investors, and is a good source of jobs.
ok, well if all thats true... you dont need a law, or an act to make you do it. you just keep doing it.
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
So, Google wants to continue being "encouraged" to do, what it already thinks is a good idea...
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
Well, he hasn't managed to control the judiciary, but if the republicans keep appointing people who can't do the most basic judicial functions, including knowing the vocabulary of judges, then they may get there. Those appointments of completely unqualified people will destroy the judiciary.
if its so meaningless there is no reason to roll it back. Leaving it in place will save companies money so why bother... unless maybe its going to be packaged with a way to drive down the cost of fossil fuel based energy in the form of increases subsidies.... But I doubt the administration would do that, right?
"In America, first you get the sugar, then you get the power, then you get the women..." -H. Simpson
This says Mr Trump is averaging more than every prez back to Carter. http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu...
Your sig here!
Source for the above claim. Obama falls pretty much right in the middle of the pack, with Trump a few places higher.
The question is really whether "number of executive orders per year" is a good metric for executive overreach. Surely not all executive measures are created equal. Hypothetically, Trump/Obama (35 and 55 executive orders per year respectively) could have issued much more over-reaching executive orders than FDR (308 per year). The problem lies not in the number, but in the content. You'd have to do a much more in-depth analysis to say whether or not Obama and Trump's EOs are "out of hand."