OPINION:
White House wannabes who come up short on Election Day nonetheless find ways to impose their will over Americans who reject their leadership. John Kerry and Al Gore have done it through their climate change activism. Getting close to the Oval Office is apparently close enough for government work since it’s not necessary to occupy the big desk to reach for the nation’s power switch.
Mr. Kerry, a former Democratic senator from Massachusetts, lost his presidential race to Republican George W. Bush in 2004. He became President Obama’s secretary of state, overseeing the U.S. adoption of two kooky international agreements, the Paris Climate Accord and the Iran nuclear deal. President Donald J. Trump tabled both, owing to the harm they augured for the U.S. homeland.
Mr. Kerry is now serving as President Biden’s “climate czar.” Speaking at the United Nations’ COP26 climate summit in Glasgow, Mr. Kerry made a jarring prediction: “By 2030 in the United States, we won’t have coal. We will not have coal plants.”
If borne out, his prediction will hit Americans hard. U.S. consumption of energy from carbon-emitting coal has waned from 20 percent to 10 percent during the past decade. This year, though, coal consumption for electric power is on course to surge 18 percent, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA). Why?
Comparatively clean natural gas, which rose from 26 percent of U.S. energy consumption to 34 percent during the same period, has climbed 43 percent in price this year. If, as the Biden administration intends, the nation’s 350-year supply of coal and 85-year reservoir of natural gas are to be left in the ground, renewable sources like solar and wind will need to make up a lot of ground.
More “green” energy is coming online, but the odds of meeting sharpening U.S. demand are daunting. Families wanting to keep warm this winter are facing heating bills 54 percent higher than last year. That was when, incidentally, the average electricity consumer suffered eight hours of power interruptions, says the EIA, the most since electricity reliability data has been collected. If Messrs. Biden and Kerry kill coal, America will be colder and darker.
Al Gore, who came up short in his 2000 bid for the White House, informed humanity recently by video that “it’s time to say goodbye to coal, oil and gas worldwide.” He has introduced “Climate Trace,” a network of satellites and ground-based sensors augmented by artificial intelligence (AI) to surveil the planet and root out naughty carbon producers. “We can accurately determine where the greenhouse gas emissions are coming from.” Though eerily reminiscent of “Skynet,” the human-hunting AI network of “The Terminator” films, Mr. Gore’s operation won’t be deploying robots to exterminate offenders, Yet.
Americans can only wonder about pricey schemes the wannabes would have uncorked had they become president. Did we mention they’re both Democrats?
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