the new wpa

Our leadership in DC and state capitals are absolutely worthless when it comes to energy policy, instead of freeing up the market and/or making wise investments in energy production, our political class is turning our energy grid into a 21st century New WPA. 

The federal government threw $16.6 billion in subsidies and grants at energy producers in 2007, which was double the amount handed out eight years ago.  The WSJ has an editorial up on the absolute mind-numbing idiocy of these green energy proposals.  Here's a comparison of how much money goes to different energy sources, done by the independent US Energy Information Administration,

For electricity generation, the EIA concludes that solar energy is subsidized to the tune of $24.34 per megawatt hour, wind $23.37 and "clean coal" $29.81. By contrast, normal coal receives 44 cents, natural gas a mere quarter, hydroelectric about 67 cents and nuclear power $1.59.

And don't think they forgot the ethanol,

The same study also looked at federal subsidies for non-electrical energy production, such as for fuel. It found that ethanol and biofuels receive $5.72 per British thermal unit of energy produced. That compares to $2.82 for solar and $1.35 for refined coal, but only three cents per BTU for natural gas and other petroleum liquids.

And of course, the amount of tax dollars the green energy money sinks are going to take in is going to increase as politicians jump on the bandwagon and start pounding the podium demanding more funds for green energy before The Global Warming Destroys Us All^TM.  I guarantee they won't even go for the good, sensible choice like the nuclear reactors, they'll go for the stupid choices like solar panels and windmills, which are the ditch digging tasks of the New WPA. 

All the new green energy jobs that Obama, Hillary and to a lesser extent McCain are promising to create are frauds, meant to convince the masses that increased demands for energy are being met, and done so in an environmentally clean fashion.  The green energy madness isn't confined to Washington DC either, you can probably find it in your own state capital too.

Posted by: doubleplusundead at 01:43 PM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
Post contains 359 words, total size 3 kb.