The Beginning of Wisdom

By Rich Kozlovich

What is the beginning of wisdom? Well, that’s not an easy question to answer since so many factors come into play. However, when it comes to Global Warming and all the ancillary arguments for and against - the beginning of wisdom is the availability and price of energy!

Last night approximately 43 percent of First Energy’s customers in Lake County lost their power starting for sure at 12:00 when I awoke. Of course having lost "my" power it was clear to me - we now have a "really serious” problem!

Actually I can’t complain because my power wasn’t out for much more than two hours, and the temperature in the house didn’t drop all that much, but what happens when the power goes out around Sunday morning at 12:00 AM, and nine hours later it isn't restored?

Originally the outages affected 43 percent of Lake County’s FirstEnergy customers. At 9:00 AM it was closer to 24 percent and with no clear timetable for complete restoration. (Update: According to FirstEnergy's website as of 8:16 PM over 1800 customers are still without power) What are people supposed to do to protect their families and property? Without electricity there is no heat, even if we're using gas heat. It still takes a fan to push that heat around the house, and that takes electric power. If someone has one of those ventless gas heaters then there's nothing to worry about, but how many have them? I don't know, but I'm will to bet the number is small.

The EPA now wants to restrict the use of wood burning fireplaces and has done all in its power to restrict drilling and mining, and is attempting to put Clean Air Standards in place that will be doing exactly what President Obama promised during the 2008campaign. Put coal fired power plants out of business. Did everyone think he was just kidding around?

Ohio has now experienced a cold period that has lasted longer and deeper than we have experienced for decades. For or the first time in recorded history the Great Lakes are on the verge of becoming completely ice covered. Lake Ontario is the hold out, but the next few days have been predicted to be ‘cold’.

Alternative energy is a failure!

The German government - which has been the great bastion of arguments for alternative energy and CO2 reduction to prevent Global Warming – hired a consulting firm that has now concluded three things.

“An independent committee of expert advisors to the German government is recommending in a report that the country’s once highly ballyhooed EEG renewable energy feed-in act be scrapped altogether because it is 1) “not doing anything for the climate”, 2) “not promoting inn0vation”and 3) driving up the cost of energy.”

Although it is expected the green activists will rail against this report and find all sort of excuses to justify their anti-energy positions it is clear “the pressure on the German government to radically scale back the EEG act is mounting as citizens struggle with skyrocketing electricity price.”   The beginning of wisdom!

As for support of renewable energy mandates in Ohio, an article by Travis Fisher February 12, 2014 entitled IER Expert Testifies on Ohio’s Alternative Energy Standard states the following. 

“Support for Renewable Portfolio Standards (RPSs), such as Ohio’s Alternative Energy Standard, are based in large measure on misperceptions. Common misperceptions regarding these mandates include:

RPSs will create jobs

RPSs are needed because America is running out of coal, oil, and natural gas

RPSs are needed because renewable energy is an infant industry in need of help

RPSs will reduce the cost of electricity

RPSs are an effective way to reduce carbon dioxide emissions

None of these are true, but what is true is that RPSs raise the cost of electricity, and the states that have RPSs tend to have the most expensive electricity. More expensive electricity hurts people and businesses, and it hurts the long-run competitiveness of local and state economies because it drives energy-intensive industries out of the state. RPSs hurt consumers by shielding producers of renewable energy from market forces that drive reductions in cost and real increases in efficiency through technological progress.”

Inexpensive readily available energy sources are foundational to a modern industrial society.  The availability and price of energy is the beginning of wisdom! 

Oh, one more thing! For those who are constantly bleating, "we need to return to nature", I would like to expand on the progress we've made today by linking the article, " In Balance With Nature".