Colorado Paper’s Editor Implies If Bombing Syria Is Justified, So Are Acts Of Terror On Americans
By Chris White
An editor of a Colorado newspaper argued that environmental activists could morally justify committing violent acts of terror on Americans in the fracking industry, similar to how President Donald Trump justified bombing Syria, in a brief email exchange Saturday with The Daily Caller News Foundation.
Boulder Daily Camera Executive Editor Kevin Kaufman believe citizens who support Trump’s decision to bomb Syria had no grounds to contest the idea that anti-fracking activists were justified blowing up oil and gas wells in the U.S. He told TheDCNF that the two issues are essentially one and the same.
“I suspect it was a violent act supported by both the right and left, but it also was one fundamentally based upon a moral question,” Kaufman wrote in email about Trump’s decision to strike a Syrian air base in response to a chemical weapons attack by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
“So it’s ok for the U.S., currently under the leadership of a right-leaning president, to take violent action on moral grounds, but it is not ok for citizens of Boulder County to ask fellow citizens to consider even violent actions?” Kaufman asked.
Kaufman’s statement was in response to questions about whether it was appropriate for The Camera to publish a letter promoting violence against the fracking industry. Kaufman’s paper published a letter April 19 suggesting Colorado citizens have a moral obligation to destroy pipelines and eliminate oil jobs.
Editors altered the piece after publication, but left the writer’s basic thesis in place: violence may be the only way to prevent pipeline construction.
“If the oil and gas industry puts fracking wells in our neighborhoods, threatening our lives and our children’s lives, then don’t we have a moral responsibility to blow up wells and eliminate fracking and workers?” Andrew O’Connor wrote in a letter to the paper’s editors.
The piece was edited the following day to read “don’t we have a moral responsibility to take action to dissuade frackers from operating here?” The editorial staff included in the edits its reason for not retracting the letter entirely.
O’Connor’s piece is worthwhile, the editorial board noted, because it brings up philosophical ideas that are important to consider when discussing fracking.
“This letter was edited to delete references that may have been construed to expressly advocate violence or property destruction,” the editors wrote. “The Camera does not condone or endorse violence or property destruction of …
Trump Readies ‘Energy Independence’ Order To Repeal Obama Climate Policies
‘A pro-growth and pro-environment approach’
Source: Trump Readies ‘Energy Independence’ Order To Repeal Obama Climate Policies…
Enviros should ‘be singing the praises of fracking” – Global CO2 emissions flat for 3rd year — Fuels resistance to UN climate accord
…Paper: Fight against ‘climate change’ finds an unlikely ally — Trump – His support of fracking will cause lower emissions
YESTERDAY by: Pilita Clark, Environment Correspondent Is Donald Trump about to become a leading force in the global effort to combat climate change? It seems unlikely, considering the US president has called global warming a “hoax” concocted by China (http://next.ft.com/content/35803636-a82a-11e6-8898-79a99e2a4de6) to hurt US industry and vowed to unpick the Paris climate accord that is supposed to curb rising temperatures. However, new data from the International Energy Agency showing that carbon emissions from burning fossil fuels have remained flat for three years in a row, despite a growing global economy, suggest Mr Trump might play a bigger climate role than expected. One reason emissions have stalled is that the shale revolution hailed by Mr Trump has led to a surge in cheaper natural gas that has pushed out coal in the US. The shale boom has already 3/17/2017 Fight against climate change finds an unlikely ally: Donald Trump https://www.ft.com/content/ab9bd972-0a6a-11e7-97d1-5e720a26771b 2/6 helped drive down gas prices and may accelerate as Mr Trump moves to ease drilling regulations and spur what Fatih Birol, IEA executive director, called a “de-bottlenecking” of gas infrastructure…
U.S. Shale Production Growing At An Unprecedented Pace
U.S. Shale Production Growing At An Unprecedented Pace
http://www.thegwpf.com/u-s-shale-production-growing-at-an-unprecedented-pace/
The oil markets have long expected that U.S. shale production would rebound once oil prices started to rise. But the comeback of shale could be much faster and stronger than many once anticipated. As Bloomberg Gadfly points out, the rise in U.S. oil production since output bottomed out at the end of last summer has been swift. Since September, U.S. production has climbed roughly 125,000 bpd on average each month, pushing total production above 9 million barrels per day. That is a much faster pace of growth than the original shale boom that began years ago. The corresponding period for the 2011-2014 shale boom saw monthly growth of just 93,000 bpd. There are a few reasons for this. First, the industry is leaner than it once was, with some of the least efficient companies forced out of the market and the consolidated sector is now moving quickly with oil prices stabilized in the $50s per barrel range. Second, oil drillers have a lot more experience in shale than they did years ago. Improved drilling techniques, which include longer laterals, more wells per wellpad and stronger fracking processes are yielding more oil per rig and per well. Third, instead of drilling everywhere, companies are focusing on the best spots this time around. Finally, it isn’t just the small companies drilling in U.S. shale – the oil majors are increasingly getting into the shale game. Relatedly, low oil prices have paradoxically made shale more attractive. With all but the most profitable large-scale projects off of the table, everyone is trying to get into relatively low-risk shale. Even though shale has famously suffered from higher breakeven costs, the upfront costs are low and returns are quick, making shale wells a safe bet. ExxonMobil has decided to allocate more than $5 billion to shale drilling in Texas and North Dakota this year, a dramatic shift from the megaproject-focus that the company has had for decades. That all means that U.S. shale is now one of the most highly-prized areas for new oil investment. “North American oil companies are going to increase their spending by 25 percent in 2017 compared to last year,” Daniel Yergin, oil historian and Vice Chairman of IHS Markit, told Bloomberg. “The increase reflects the magnetism of U.S. shale.” More rigs and more investment could mean stronger gains in shale production this time around compared to the …
SCOTT PRUITT’S BACK-TO-BASICS AGENDA FOR THE EPA
The new administrator plans to follow his statutory mandate—clean air and water—and to respect states’ rights.
ILLUSTRATION: KEN FALLIN
Scott Pruitt, whom the Senate confirmed Friday, 52-46, doesn’t fit either mold. His focus is neither expanding nor reducing regulation. “There is no reason why EPA’s role should ebb or flow based on a particular administration, or a particular administrator,” he says. “Agencies exist to administer the law. Congress passes statutes, and those statutes are very clear on the job EPA has to do. We’re going to do that job.” You might call him an EPA originalist.
Not that environmentalists and Democrats saw it that way. His was one of President Trump’s most contentious cabinet nominations. Opponents objected that as Oklahoma’s attorney general Mr. Pruitt had sued the EPA at least 14 times. Detractors labeled him a “climate denier” and an oil-and-gas shill, intent on gutting the agency and destroying the planet. For his confirmation hearing, Mr. Pruitt sat through six theatrical hours of questions and submitted more than 1,000 written responses.
When Mr. Pruitt sat down Thursday for his first interview since his November nomination, he spent most of the time waxing enthusiastic about all the good his agency can accomplish once he refocuses it on its statutorily defined mission: working cooperatively with the states to improve water and air quality.
“We’ve made extraordinary progress on the environment over the decades, and that’s something we should celebrate,” he says. “But there is real work to be done.” What kind of work? Hitting air-quality targets, for one: “Under current measurements, some 40% of the country is still in nonattainment.” There’s also toxic waste to clean up: “We’ve got 1,300 Superfund sites and some of them have been on the list for more than three decades.”
Such work is where Washington can make a real difference. “These are issues that go directly to the health of our citizens that should be the absolute focus of this agency,” Mr. Pruitt says. “This president is a fixer, he’s an action-oriented leader, and a
CO2 emissions ‘crashing’: Take Back Al Gore’s Nobel & Give It To Fracking Industry
EDITORIALS
Take Back Al Gore’s Nobel And Give It To The Fracking Industry
A hydraulic fracturing (fracking) rig is seen in Weld County, Colorado. Thanks to fracking and the natural gas it provides, U.S. output of carbon dioxide emissions is crashing. (Bloomberg)
That’s right. The Environmental Protection Agency’s yearly greenhouse gas emissions report noted that after rising slightly in 2013 and 2014, greenhouse gas output fell in 2015 — the most recent full year for which data are available.
OK, but maybe it was a one-year fluke? Hardly.
First off, the drop was significant in size — 2.2% on an annual basis, far too big to be a fluke or statistical anomaly.
Second, as the folks at The American Interest helpfully point out, “U.S. energy-related CO2 emissions hit a 25-year low over the first six months of 2016, continuing the progress that the EPA says we made in 2015.”
So it’s continuing. More important, The Hill reminds, “The EPA attributed the overall decline to lower carbon dioxide emissions from burning fossil fuels, which itself came about because of less coal consumption in favor of natural gas, warmer winter weather that decreased heating fuel demand and lower electricity demand overall.”
This continues a long-term trend for the U.S. of lower greenhouse gas emissions. Ironically, while the U.S. was pilloried for not ratifying the Kyoto Accord (though then-Vice President Al Gore ostentatiously signed it, despite knowing that the Senate wouldn’t ratify it) to reduce global greenhouse gas emissions, it is the only major industrial nation actually slashing its output.
Since the Kyoto Accord was struck in 1997, Energy Department data show, U.S. output of greenhouse gases plunged 7.3%, even though real U.S. GDP over that time has grown a whopping 52%. We’re greener today than we have been in decades.
Go figure.
For all this progress, we can thank the fracking business, which has given U.S. industry and homes access to massive amounts of cheap, relatively clean natural gas. It may yet make possible a U.S. industrial renaissance — and bring back jobs now done overseas, not by government trade protectionism but by pursuing free-market energy policies that will lead to
‘The Environmentalist War On Science’: ‘EPA threw out 5 years of fracking safety research to appease green extremists’
By JEFF STIER
The EPA just threw out five years of fracking safety research to appease green extremists. Although early drafts found no evidence that fracking has had a “widespread, systemic” impact on drinking water, the final report claims that there isn’t “enough information to make a broad conclusion.”
How absurd. An honest look at the science should have environmentalists waving the white flag in their fight against fracking. It’s time for both the EPA and green crusaders to quit this political charade and recognize that fracking technology has boosted the economy, helped wean America off imported oil and gas, and dramatically reduced CO2 emissions.
In 2015, a draft of the EPA’s report found that fracking operations have not “led to widespread, systemic impact on drinking water.” Since then, the underlying science in the report hasn’t changed. But the EPA, under pressure, adjusted its conclusion to suit critics to the left even of the administration, who would have been left without a leg to stand on in their efforts to sow doubt about fracking safety.…
Statistician: UN climate treaty will cost $100 trillion – To Have No Impact – Postpone warming by less than four years by 2100
Danish statistician Dr. Bjorn Lomborg, the President of the Copenhagen Consensus Center, has come out denouncing the UN climate Paris agreement as a massive waste of money that will do nothing to impact climate change. In a January 16, 2017 Prager U video titled, “The Paris Climate Agreement Won’t Change the Climate,” Lomborg explains that “the agreement will cost a fortune, but do little to reduce global warming.” (Full transcript here)
Lomborg ridiculed the UN Paris agreement supporters as making “grand pronouncements and vague specifics.”
Lomborg first took his analytical skills to take apart President Obama’s EPA climate regulations done through executive order.
“Using the same prediction model that the UN uses, I found that [Obama’s] power plan will accomplish almost nothing. Even if its cuts to carbon dioxide emissions are fully implemented – not just for the 14 years that the Paris agreement lasts, but for the rest of the century — the EPA’s Clean Power Plan would reduce the temperature increase in 2100 by just -.023 degrees Fahrenheit,” Lomborg explained.
“In the unlikely event that all of these extra cuts also happen, and are adhered to throughout the rest of the century, the combined reduction in temperatures would be 0.057 degrees. To put it another way, if the U.S. delivers for the whole century on the President Obama’s very ambitious rhetoric, it would postpone global warming by about eight months at the end of the century,” Lomborg said.
Lomborg continued, aiming his analysis at the much touted UN paris climate agreement.
“Now, let’s add in the rest of the world’s Paris promises. If we generously assume that the promised carbon cuts for 2030 are not only met — which itself would be a UN first — but sustained throughout the rest of the century, temperatures in 2100 would drop 0.3 degrees — the equivalent of postponing warming by less than four years. Again, that is using the UN’s own climate prediction model,” Lomborg said.
He continued: “But here is the biggest problem: These miniscule benefits do not come free — quite the contrary. The cost of the UN Paris climate pact is likely to run 1 to 2 trillion dollars every year, based on estimates produced by the Stanford Energy Modeling Forum and …
Study: Obama ‘war on coal’ responsible for 84% of decline in coal use – Fracking only 16% responsible
…