By Lawrence Kudlow , Special to the Sun | August 6, 2021
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| Image: Rare earth mine at Bayan Obo, China. Via Google Maps. |
The Biden administration is now rolling towards its goal of a Green
New Deal. The infrastructure deal has about $140 billion worth of
subsidies and government investment funds. Subsidies for electric cars, electric charging stations. A
transformation of our utility grid, handouts to certain companies, a
slush fund for the energy department — all under the general grandiose
goal of net-zero emissions by some date certain yet to be determined.
American car-makers are boasting that electric vehicles will be half
of their sales by 2030 even though right now they're only 3%. Mind you
this whole exercise is a textbook case of central planning that is
unprecedented in this country. Instead of free markets and free choice, we’re getting guidelines
that will turn into mandates, that will completely disrupt our entire
transportation and energy and power systems in this country.
It is a breathtaking endeavor that is doomed to fail:
a) because
consumers don't want the high prices and high costs,
b) because America
does not even remotely have the resources to support this net-zero
emissions crusade, and
c) because Americans are already waking up to the
enormous national security and military risks endemic to this poorly
thought out utopian plan.
There is an enormous amount to be said and discussed on this topic.
We’ve already begun —and will continue — to express our opposition to
the Green New Deal. But here are a few brief points:
First, raising corporate average fuel economy standards, as Mr. Biden
announced today, would significantly increase the cost of cars and
trucks. And significantly reduce automobile safety. These two reasons
were the basis of the Trump administration's opposition to punitive CAFE
standards.
Second, the Green New Deal utopians have no idea of the cost and
difficulties of creating an entire new infrastructure. Nor do they
understand that a new infrastructure would generate enormous carbon
emissions by itself. Nor do they understand that the minerals and
materials that go into electric power and batteries and new electricity
grids and so forth are simply not available to the United States at the
present time.
The Biden administration is reducing access to minerals and oil and
gas resources. Leases are being canceled at the Arctic National Wildlife
Refuge. The Keystone pipeline was canceled. Far-left ideologs are in
charge of the Environmental Protection Agency and the Energy and
Interior Departments.
To generate battery driven autos and anything else, we need minerals
like nickel, cobalt, lithium, and copper. Guess who has them. China.
Some 95% of rare earth mining and processing is done in the communist
country. They have a monopoly.
Some 45% of the world’s supply of polysilicon necessary to build
solar panels is done in China. And actually in terms of these resources,
China and the Congo are the biggest players. Both employ slave labor
and child labor. Both lack human rights and freedoms.......To Read More....
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