California is following Germany’s Failed Climate Goals

Global WarmingGermany was the first major economy to make a big shift in its energy mix toward low carbon sources, but Germany is failing to meet its climate goals of reducing harmful carbon-dioxide emissions even after spending over $580 billion by 2025 to overhaul its energy systems. Germany’s emissions miss should be a “wake-up” call for governments everywhere.

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Germany stepped us as a leader on climate change, by phasing out nuclear, and pioneered a system of subsidies for wind and solar that sparked a global boom in manufacturing those technologies.  

Like Germany, California’s renewables are becoming an increasing share in electricity generation, but at a HIGH COST. The emission reduction goals have increased the costs of electricity and transportation fuels and increased the already high cost of living in California and may be very contributory to California having the highest percentage of homelessness and poverty in the nation.

California households are paying about 40 percent more than the national average for electricity according to 2016 data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

Californians continue to pay almost $1.00 more per gallon of fuel than the rest of the country due to a) the state sales tax per gallon which are some of the highest in the country; b) refinery reformatting costs per gallon; c) cap and trade program compliance costs per gallon; d) low-carbon fuel standard program compliance costs per gallon; and e) renewable fuels standard program compliance costs per gallon.

California is an “energy island” to its almost 40 million citizens, bordered between the Pacific Ocean and the Sierra Nevada Mountains. The state’s daily need to support its 145 airports (inclusive of 33 military, 10 major, and more than 100 general aviation) is 13 million gallons a day of aviation fuels. In addition, for the 35 million registered vehicles of which 90 percent are NOT EV’s are consuming DAILY: 10 million gallons a day of diesel and 42 million gallons a day of gasoline.  All that “expensive” fuel is a heavy cost to consumers.

Despite higher energy bills, public opinion has remained supportive of the energy transition and the strategy to cut emissions. That support is apt to shift when politicians resolve the debate about how their targets match reality. Either they will have to abandon the goals and live with more pollution than they’ve promised, or they will have to force through painful and expensive measures that further limit emissions.

Germany, like California, is also trying to phase out nuclear reactors. California has already shutdown the 24/7 nuclear generating facility of SCE’s San Onofre (SONGS) which generated 2,200 megawatts of power that closed in 2013, and will be closing PG&E’s Diablo Canyon’s 2,160 megawatts of power in 2024.

Shutting down nuclear plants is leaving California, like Germany, short of 24/7 generation plants that can work on the breezeless and dark days when wind farms and solar plants won’t provide much to the grid—and demand is at its peak. Yet to be determined is the impact on rate payers? Will there be more reliance in California placed on fossil fuels for 24/7 power?

Germany’s economy, like California’s, is dominated by services that require less energy and produce less carbon than places tilted toward industry and manufacturing. Thus, less emissions to micromanage cost effectively reduce. California is a miniscule contributor to the world’s greenhouse gases. Statistically, the World is generating about 46,000 million metric tons of GHG’s, while California has been generating about 429 million metric tons, which is less than one percent of the world’s contributions. Germany’s contributions are about 905 million metric tons, which is about two percent of the world’s contributions.

Germany’s failed climate goals is an ominous wake-up call for California and governments everywhere struggling to reach their own targets. The result is a puzzle for politicians. Enacted legislation to make sure climate targets are hit, including stringent rules governing energy use, and new building codes to make buildings carbon neutral, and utility bill charges that subsidize investment in green energy, are all resulting in higher energy costs to consumers.

ounder of PTS Staffing Solutions, a technical staffing agency headquartered in Irvine.

This article was originally published by Fox and Hounds Daily

Comments

  1. Stupid Jerry has been sucked in by the climate change dupes. There is scientific proof that CO2 is NOT a pollutant but a necessary element to life. History has shown us many times that CO2 was a lot higher than now and there wasn’t an SUV in sight. The USN has shown that submariners suffer no ill effects when running in a +5000ppm CO2 climate. What in the hell does Moonbeamy think grows the forests and our vegetables? His Quixotic march to “clean energy” has us already in the “highest” electric rates in the Nation. Is he too dumb to read what has happened in Europe and Spain? There is a great experiment that can be done for about $10 to prove that CO2 does NOT increase any temps.His staff must be too afraid of him to suggest this experiment or he is too confused to consider it.

    • Boris Badenov says

      It’s not about Saving the $%^&* Planet, it’s about raking in tax dollars to line the pockets of rich supporters.

  2. Good Day,
    The money spent on climate change is a joke. In just a two week period several hundred million cubic metric tons of green house gas was put into our Ca air with the Rim fire. This is about 1/2 the yearly total for all Ca sources. The fire itself is not the bad part – the decomposition of the stumps and burned out trees continue to produce even more green house gas over time. Every year fires are bigger and more expensive and yes more cumulative green house gas. Oh by the way, I just got a permit in mid August to clear behind my home after having applied for a permit to weed eat in March. Brilliant! Ca is broken!

    • Boris Badenov says

      Has ANYONE calculated how much more ‘green house gasses’ is released since schools no longer have buses and tens of thousands of parents have to drive their kids to school, sitting with their cars idling waiting.

  3. Will the “enviro-nuts” ever be satisfied? We are living in the atomic age? Ha!

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