The Games Politicians Play

Democrat Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia wanted regulatory reform, in part, he claimed, to reverse some of Biden’s reversals of Trump-era reforms for fossil fuel projects.  Majority Leader Chuck Schumer needed Manchin’s vote to enact Biden’s cash cow for green energy, the Inflation Reduction Act.  A deal was struck behind closed doors with Schumer, Pelosi, and Biden to pass Manchin’s comprehensive permitting reform package before the end of the fiscal year on September 30th, 2022. Manchin voted yea on Biden’s cash cow.  That’s when he lost his leverage.   

Democrats said no to the secret deal and Republicans, well they said no but not because they were concerned with the bill’s goals but because they wanted an even stronger bill.  There are times you have to wonder which side Republicans are on.

Turns out that Manchin’s bill, the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2022, would give unelected  government bureaucrats and federal agencies the authority to override state and local laws banning or limiting high-voltage transmission lines, a move that the wind and solar industries have been seeking for years.  Follow the money!

Specifically, this bill would give the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), in conjunction with the Secretary of Energy, the authority to override state laws if they (the government) determined transmission lines were in the “national interest” and if these lines  “enhance” the ability of facilities that generate or transmit firm or intermittent energy to connect to the electric grid.

In English, Manchin’s bill would handcuff America’s national interest to weather-dependent renewables that require staggering amounts of land and whose supply chains depend heavily on metals, minerals and magnets produced almost exclusively in China.

Blue states with massive economic destroying mandates like California, Massachusetts and New York would be able to force neighboring states to accept hundreds of 200 foot towers and the lines needed to connect to their electric grid. And worse, if that is possible, the FERC would have the authority to socialize the cost of these projects onto residents of states that would not be able to benefit from any energy created and moved over the new transmission lines.

New York could work with the FERC to have offshore wind farms built in Maine or North Carolina and force every state along the east coast to accept new transmission lines.  New York’s peak summertime needs alone would require a minimum of 2,500 monstrous 680 foot 12 MW offshore turbines, operating 24/7. Imagine what we’d need to power the entire U.S.

Talk about an overreach of federal authority. Most states do not want these lines in their backyards.  More than 350 communities across the US have rejected or restricted wind projects and transmission projects since 2015. Iowa passed a law prohibiting the use of eminent domain for high-voltage lines killing a project to move electricity from Iowa to Illinois.  Arkansas killed a project to build a 720 mile transmission line from Oklahoma to customers in the South East. New Hampshire made short work of a transmission project to carry hydropower from Quebec to Massachusetts and Maine nixed a project to move Canadian hydropower to customers in Massachusetts.

In addition to forcing states to accept green projects and the transmission lines needed, Manchin’s bill directs federal agencies to “take all necessary action” to issue permits for the Mountain Valley Pipeline, a project to move natural gas from West Virginia through Virginia to North Carolina.  The bill would also require that Biden declare the MVP project as a  “most-critical” energy project which would set time limits on federal environmental reviews.

This bill would allow the biggest land grab by the federal government in modern history.  

The left expects us to go along with Green Energy schemes as we did with masks, lockdowns and vaccinations because our government, media and “public interest” groups insist that we “follow the science,” on which there can be no doubt (certainly none permitted) that we face a “manmade climate crisis” that threatens the very existence of humanity and “the only Earth we have.”  

It’s time to short-circuit this electricity nightmare, by asking questions, demanding answers, and ending the notion that governments can simply issue edicts and compel reality to fit the nightmare.

Source:  Manchin’s infrastructure bill includes federal power grab for high-voltage transmission by Robert Bryce, The Hill; The Coming Green Electricity Nightmare by Paul Driessen, Townhall

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