Yeah, mature, adult greenies would never resort to such childish antics and tantrums disrupting peoples' lives, would they?
Posted on 08/14/2023 9:44:10 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
The NY Times has published a series of articles today about the transition to renewable energy. The articles (there are three of them) are interesting both for what they say and also for what they reveal about certain assumptions made by the NY Times itself.
In an article titled “The Clean Energy Future Is Arriving Faster Than You Think” the authors reveal that red states are embracing new technology, not because they are desperate for AOC’s approval but because it makes sense financially.
Tulsa, a former boomtown once known as the “Oil Capital of the World” where the minor league baseball team is the Drillers, is immersed in a new energy revolution.
At the port, an Italian company, Enel, is building a $1 billion solar panel factory. The bus factory is operated by Navistar, one of the biggest commercial vehicle makers in the world. And the city’s main electric utility, Public Service Company of Oklahoma, now harvests more than 28 percent of its power from wind…
“We have a tremendous sense of pride in our history,” said Dewey F. Bartlett Jr., the Republican former mayor of Tulsa who was an oil and gas executive but now helps recruit clean energy companies to the region. “But we also understand that energy is energy, whether it is generated by wind, steam or whatever it might be.”…
About two-thirds of the new investment in clean energy is in Republican-controlled states, where policymakers have historically resisted renewables. But with each passing month, the politics seem to matter less than the economics.
“We’re the reddest state in the country, and we’re an oil and gas state,” said J.W. Peters, president of Solar Power of Oklahoma. “So it took a lot of time to convince people that this wasn’t snake oil.”
Mr. Peters was broke six years ago, with less than $400 in his checking account after his contracting business slowed down. Then he responded to a help-wanted ad looking for workers to install solar panels, which were becoming more popular in Tulsa. He now employs 61 workers and has $18 million in annual sales. “The environmental benefits are nice,” he said, “but most people are doing this for the financial opportunity.”
The top comment on this story is from a reader who gets it:
“The environmental benefits are nice,” he said, “but most people are doing this for the financial opportunity.”
This is the key. We can continue brow-beating people about the dangers of climate change, the miserable future for our children if we don’t stop, the devastation of extreme environmental events, but none of it gets through like a dollars and cents explanation.
We own a Tesla and a Chevy Bolt. The #1 question we get asked about both cars: How much does it cost to charge them?
We have 24 solar panels on the roof. The #1 question we get asked about them: How much did it cost to install them and what’s our electric bill now?
Everybody we talk to wants to know if buying an EV is worth it, if putting solar panels on the roof is a good investment. Nobody asks about carbon reduction or environmental impact. It’s always about whether it’s worth the expense…
Make it about the money, make it cheaper, and the lines will be around the block.
He’s exactly right. Don’t demand people make choices that make their life worse, supposedly for the collective good. Make products that are better and cheaper and we won’t need any lectures from Al Gore or Greta Thunberg to see people adopt them. We also won’t need any government subsidies. We’re better off letting the market handle this. Instead, we now have government money subsidizing charging stations that must include the inferior CCS2 charging plug.
A companion article titled “The Clean Energy Future Is a Battle for Hearts and Minds” focuses on how this new approach is penetrating with activists.
In conversations with activists, policymakers and corporate executives, it becomes clear that a save-the-planet argument doesn’t go very far. Most people won’t buy green technology unless it will clearly save them money and wows them with stunning designs or jaw-dropping performance.
Many, conservatives in particular, chafe at the prospect of the government forcing them to buy electric cars or ditch their natural gas appliances, polls show. That’s perhaps why those pitching the technology often avoid mentioning climate change. They emulate evangelists who don’t lead with Jesus when trying to win over nonbelievers.
That paragraph above is a pretty clear indication of just how far progressive activists still have to go when it comes to winning over conservatives. No one likes to be told what they have to buy or that they’re a bad person for not falling in line. Why is that a surprise to anyone?
Also, here’s some free advice for environmentalists: Making claims about evangelists not leading with Jesus probably isn’t the best way to win conservatives over. Frankly, I wonder which of the three authors of this article felt that was a good comparison (or an accurate one). Whoever it was might want to think a bit more deeply about why environmentalists are so easily compared to a religious faith. That’s exactly the sort of thing that turns people off. Saving money is good but no one wants to join your weird cult.
To be fair, sometimes people on the right sound a little cultish too. This happened at a car show in Wyoming.
When Mr. Lawson arranged $174,000 to match a federal grant to install charging stations at the city hall and airport, the Riverton City Council declined the money. The one public charging station in town, outside a sandwich shop, is often blocked by trucks, sometimes deliberately parked horizontally to make charging impossible.
During an obstacle race that was part of the car show, another Tesla driver beat all 40 cars. Onlookers were impressed but still skeptical. “It doesn’t fit everybody’s needs,” said Kent Wheeler, a technician at an auto body and paint shop.
Wyoming gets my vote as the most beautiful state in the country. If I had the money to buy a vacation home I’d want to buy it there. But come on people, blocking the public charging with pick-ups parked sideways is like something out of 3rd grade recess. Grow up a bit.
Speaking personally, I took my first real road trip in my Model 3 last week and it went great. I drove up the coast from Orange County to Monterey with many stops along the way. The original plan was to drive up Big Sur but it has been washed out in a few places since the big storms back in January so after a stop to see Hearst Castle we had to detour inland a bit to get to Monterey. Both the hotels we stayed at in Cambria and Carmel included free charging which was a nice perk. Other than that I spent a total of $55 to charge at four different Tesla superchargers during the 800+ mile trip. In my previous car this would have cost at least $300 worth of premium gas.
Those four stops to charge were all pretty easy. We didn’t plan any of them in advance. Two of them were 20 minute stops. My wife and I took a walk for those because we’d been driving for hours and needed a break from sitting. Two of the stops were 30 minutes and we timed them so we could take a break for lunch/dinner. I’m not saying it would be that easy everywhere you might want to go in the country (clearly it’s not so easy in Wyoming) but along the coast there are superchargers and slower destination chargers everywhere. We never had to wait for a space. Give it a few more years and you’ll be able to go anywhere without thinking about it.
Anyway, my own experience matches up with what the NY Times is just figuring out. Most people, including people on the left and right, aren’t interesting in saving the planet so much as they are in saving money.
What a ridiculous story. The author writes [clean energy] “makes sense financially.” The ONLY reason it does is the GD government has so distorted the market with hundreds of rules and regs. Without those, none of the “clean energy” crapola passes any financial breakeven analysis
The author follows the childish logical fallacy that simply declaring it “makes sense financially” makes it true. He is incurious to determine if that is actually true.
… We’re so self-important, so self-important. Everybody’s gonna save something now: “Save the trees! Save the bees! Save the whales! Save those snails!” and the greatest arrogance of all: “Save the planet!” What?! Are these f—g people kidding me?! Save the planet?! We don’t even know how to take care of ourselves yet! We haven’t learned how to care for one another and we’re gonna save the f—g planet?! I’m getting tired of that s—! I’m getting tired of that s—! I’m tired of f—g Earth Day! I’m tired of these self-righteous environmentalists; these white, bourgeois liberals who think the only thing wrong with this country is there aren’t enough bicycle paths! People trying to make the world safe for their Volvos! Besides, environmentalists don’t give a s— about the planet. They don’t care about the planet; not in the abstract they don’t. You know what they’re interested in? A clean place to live; their own habitat. They’re worried that someday in the future, they might be personally inconvenienced. Narrow, unenlightened self-interest doesn’t impress me.Hard to believe that was 22 years ago. Just as applicable today.
Besides, there is nothing wrong with the planet… nothing wrong with the planet. The planet is fine… the people are f—d! Difference! The planet is fine! Compared to the people, THE PLANET IS DOING GREAT: Been here four and a half billion years! Do you ever think about the arithmetic? The planet has been here four and a half billion years, we’ve been here what? 100,000? Maybe 200,000? And we’ve only been engaged in heavy industry for a little over 200 years. 200 years versus four and a half billion and we have the conceit to think that somehow, we’re a threat? That somehow, we’re going to put in jeopardy this beautiful little blue-green ball that’s just a-floatin’ around the sun? The planet has been through a lot worse than us. Been through all kinds of things worse than us: been through earthquakes, volcanoes, plate tectonics, continental drifts, solar flares, sunspots, magnetic storms, the magnetic reversal of the poles, hundreds of thousands of years of bombardment by comets and asteroids and meteors, worldwide floods, tidal waves, worldwide fires, erosion, cosmic rays, recurring ice ages, and we think some plastic bags and aluminum cans are going to make a difference?
The planet isn’t going anywhere… we are! We’re going away! Pack your s—, folks! We’re going away…and we won’t leave much of a trace either, thank God for that… maybe a little styrofoam… maybe… little styrofoam. The planet will be here, we’ll be long gone; just another failed mutation; just another closed-end biological mistake; an evolutionary cul-de-sac. The planet will shake us off like a bad case of fleas, a surface nuisance. You wanna know how the planet’s doing? Ask those people in Pompeii who are frozen into position from volcanic ash how the planet’s doing. Wanna know if the planet’s all right? Ask those people in Mexico City or Armenia or a hundred other places buried under thousands of tons of earthquake rubble if they feel like a threat to the planet this week. How about those people in Kilauea, Hawaii who build their homes right next to an active volcano and then wonder why they have lava in the living room?
The planet will be here for a long, long, LONG time after we’re gone and it will heal itself, it will cleanse itself, ’cause that’s what it does. It’s a self-correcting system. The air and the water will recover, the earth will be renewed, and if it’s true that plastic is not degradable, well, the planet will simply incorporate plastic into a new paradigm: The Earth plus Plastic. The Earth doesn’t share our prejudice towards plastic. Plastic came out of the Earth! The Earth probably sees plastic as just another one of its children. Could be the only reason the Earth allowed us to be spawned from it in the first place: it wanted plastic for itself, didn’t know how to make it, needed us. Could be the answer to our age-old philosophical question: “Why are we here?” Plastic, a—holes!
So the plastic is here; our job is done. We can be phased out now, and I think that’s really started already, don’t you? I mean, to be fair, the planet probably sees us as a mild threat; something to be dealt with, and I’m sure the planet will defend itself in the manner of a large organism. Like a beehive or an ant colony can muster a defense, I’m sure the planet will think of something. What would you do if you were the planet trying to defend against this pesky, troublesome species? Let’s see… what might… hmm… viruses! Viruses might be good. They seem vulnerable to viruses. And uh… viruses are tricky; always mutating and forming new strains whenever a vaccine is developed. Perhaps this first virus could be one that-that compromises the immune system of these creatures. Perhaps a human immunodeficiency virus making them vulnerable to all sorts of other diseases and infections that might come along and maybe it could be spread sexually, making them a little reluctant to engage in the act of reproduction. …
— George Carlin, “Jamming in New York”, 1992
Yeah, mature, adult greenies would never resort to such childish antics and tantrums disrupting peoples' lives, would they?
Green takes $$$ from your pocket and puts in someone elses pocket.
Most Americans suspect this but they lack a voice to express it.
Yeah, something that provides electricity 20% to 30% makes all the sense in the world. /s When they start talking modular nuke plants, upgrading the grid prior to EVs making up a majority of cars and allowing the market determine the transition then I’ll give a damn. Until then I’ll burn coal everyday of the week and twice on Sundays. No one is saving the planet because it doesn’t need to be saved.
Hubris to say you have the power to save the planet.
Well the NYT is more interesting in making money because they still produce their Paper Edition.
Most people don’t trust the BS narrative
Most people don’t trust the BS narrative
2023 - 1992 = 31
Thanks for the correction. Serves me right to pay too much attention to the cats . . .
The author doesn't mention what his previous car was. My 14 year old car uses premium gas and averages about 22 miles per gallon for highway driving. Premium gas would have to be $8+ for me to have a $300 fuel bill for the 800 mile trip.
Gas lighting. Ford can’t give away its inventory of EVs.
“Most People are more interested in saving money than saving the planet”
Most people think their money is in greater danger than the planet.
Pollution is bad and should be addressed. Carbon Di-Oxide CO2 is not a pollutant and nothing should be done to regulate the amount of CO2 produced. NOTHING.
I think a lot of people are wondering if these globull warming efforts really are saving the planet. Or is it about something else.
Those little rascals! 🤣
Most people are more interested in making money than helping people.
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