Research

Today, The Marietta Times Reports That FirstEnergy Corp. Will Close Three Power Plants Because Of Costly Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Regulations, Affecting 105 Jobs. “The Willow Island Power Station in Pleasants County is one of three aging coal-fired power plants in West Virginia that will be shut down later this year, FirstEnergy Corp. announced Wednesday. Its subsidiary Monongahela Power will be retiring Willow island, the Albright Power Station in Preston County and the Rivesville Power Station in Marion County by Sept. 1. The company said 105 employees will be affected. The decision was based on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's new Mercury and Air Toxics Standards, which were recently finalized, and other environmental regulations.” (Brett Dunlap, “FirstEnergy Closing Power Plant,” Marietta Times, 2/9/12)

NOTE: Weeks Ago, EPA Regulations Led FirstEnergy To Announce It Was Shutting Down Plants In Ohio, Pennsylvania, And Maryland, Threatening 529 Jobs. “In ... more

In the wake of the Solyndra scandal, another green energy program Obama invested in has announced more layoffs.

Obama: “Some Technologies Don’t Pan Out; Some Companies Fail.  But I Will Not Walk Away From The Promise Of Clean Energy.” (President Barack Obama, Remarks In The State Of The Union Address, 1/24/12)

Fisker, Which Received More Than A Half Billion In Loan Guarantees, Announced It Is Laying Off Staff After Failing To Meet Early Manufacturing And Efficiency Goals

Fisker Automotive Has Announced It Is Laying Off Staff To Try To Reserve Enough Capital In Order To Qualify For More Taxpayer Funds From The DOE. “In another setback for President Obama's clean energy loan programs, the recipient of more than a half-billion dollars in federal loans is laying off workers at their Delaware and California operations. Delaware’s News Journal reports that Fisker Automotive, a California-based electric car start-up company, is laying off an undisclosed number of staff to try to reserve ... more

Obama political appointees from the Department of Energy and Office of Management and Budget testified today before the House Energy & Commerce Subcommittee on Oversight, but didn’t really answer many questions or acted as if they were very well aware of what was going on.

Here’s Department of Energy official Jonathan Silver not being able to answer a simple question about whether he received any communications from any individuals in the White House, to the point that he has to be reminded that he is under oath:

Further stonewalling and claims of ignorance came when Rep. Steve Scalise asked Mr. Silver who in the Obama White House made the decision to put taxpayers at the end of the line and on the hook for the $535 million loan to Sylndra. Mr. Silver, not surprisingly, refused to answer the question. Lots of questions that remain to be answered – why are taxpayers guaranteeing a $535 million loan behind private investors, including a prominent Obama donor/bundler?

And just more ... more

Obama’s EPA Considers Job-Killing Regulations; Families Will See Electric Rates Skyrocket

“Two New EPA Regulations Will Slam The Coal Industry So Hard That Hundreds Of Thousands Of Jobs Will Be Lost, And Electric Rates Will Skyrocket 11 Percent To Over 23 Percent, According To A New Study Based On Government Data.” (Paul Bedard, “Coal Regs Would Kill Jobs, Boost Energy Bills,” U.S. News & World Report’s “Washington Whispers”, 6/8/11)

Regulations Would Hurt Families Living In Economically Challenged States.  “‘Many of these severe impacts would hit families living in states already facing serious economic challenges,’ said Steve Miller, president of the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity.  ‘Because of these impacts, EPA should make major changes to the proposed regulations before they are finalized.’” (Paul Bedard, “Coal Regs Would Kill Jobs, Boost Energy Bills,” U.S. News & World Report’s “Washington Whispers,” 6/8/11)

Regulations Could Cost Billions Of Dollars To The ... more

When reports of increasing the gas tax as part of so-called “climate legislation” was floated, the White House was quick to turn “the hose on that fire.” But Americans haven’t forgotten that President Obama does support a so-called “cap-and-trade” national energy tax that will “significantly increase gas prices” according to an economics professor at North Carolina State University:

In addition to having drastic effects on the economy, the cap-and-trade system could significantly increase gasoline prices in the short run, perhaps as much as 60 cents per gallon ... In the meantime, because of increased costs, oil production would decline making us more, not less, dependent on foreign oil.

One of those “drastic effects on the economy” from the national energy tax could be nearly 1 million jobs lost per year. And while Democrats are trying to rebrand this national energy tax, Americans aren’t going to be fooled:

But “gas tax” is a compound cuss word in Washington, even less acceptable ... more

Newsweek’s piece on President Obama’s EPA Administrator, Lisa Jackson, has a telling title that summarizes the Obama administration’s energy policy: “Regulate, Baby, Regulate.”  After all, it was just last week the administration continued its war on Appalachia with strict new mining regulations, and as the Newsweek article reports, the Obama administration remains intent on pushing backdoor regulations through the EPA to encompass the entire economy, even though “the Nixon-era Clean Air Act was never intended to regulate” carbon dioxide.

Obama has consistently used his “green jobs” agenda as a smokescreen for his job-killing regulations. But as Newsweek reports, there are serious doubts about Obama’s economic diagnosis.

Green-tech workers—people who do things like design and build wind turbines or solar panels—now make up only 0.6 percent of the American workforce. McKinsey figures that clean energy won't command much more of the total job market in the years ahead.

Unfortunately, ... more

Speaking in Charlotte this afternoon, President Obama was talking about his bogus announcement about offshore drilling for oil this week. He said that we don’t need to start drilling immediately to get relief from high gas prices, because they’re not a big deal.

But the notion that we could drill our way out of the problem -- you'll start hearing about this because you know what happens during the summer. As soon as gas prices start going up, every summer, it's the same thing, right? And politicians start standing up, “We're going do something about it!” And these days, some of my colleagues on the republican side, what they'll say is you've got to drill even more.

So who are these cynical politicians complaining about rising gas prices and saying they’d do something about them? Guess who said this?

In fact, if I'm not mistaken, he was quoted today as saying that he thought it was interesting that gas prices might reach $4 a gallon at the pump. He wasn't aware of it apparently. Let ... more

Yesterday, in yet another move in Obama’s war on Appalachia, the Obama administration “imposed strict new environmental guidelines that are expected to sharply curtail ‘mountaintop’ coal mining” in communities stretching from New York down to Mississippi.  Once again, the Obama administration is aligning with extreme environmentalists rather than the American worker, as this new rule will cause drastic job losses across the entire Appalachian region and imperiling an important U.S. commodity, since mountaintop mining currently accounts for 10% of U.S. coal production. 

Sadly, this regulation isn’t the first time the Obama administration ignored the American worker with jobs-killing regulations.  Just last week, Obama’s EPA proposed a veto of a previously approved 2007 Army Corps of Engineers project in West Virginia, the first time in EPA’s history an approved permit has been vetoed.  And under Obama’s supervision, only one mountaintop permit has been granted in West Virginia since ... more

In a bid to win support in the Senate for his unpopular cap-and-trade bill, President Obama announced his administration’s plans for an “expansion” of offshore drilling.  However, the truth of the matter is that Obama’s new plan will actually reduce and delay the production of domestic energy allowed by President Bush’s decision to end the decades long moratorium on offshore drilling in 2008.  That decision would have created jobs and reduced our reliance on foreign oil by freeing up millions of acres to domestic energy exploration.  These areas are shown below, in green, by House Natural Resources Committee.

Unfortunately, President Obama’s “expansion” of domestic exploration merely continues the offshore drilling moratorium of previously approved domestic energy sites in Alaska’s Bristol Bay and across the West Coast and delays possible development across the southern and central Atlantic seaboards.  With yesterday’s announcement, President Obama closed off a far greater area ... more

That is what Foreign Policy’s The Cable asked President Obama’s Assistant Secretary Of State for Public Affairs P.J. Crowley – and his answer sure was surprising:

I think the next 30 years will be defined in terms of how we manage the environment and whether we are prepared to reduce the release of greenhouse gases, reduce our use of fossil fuels and increase alternative sources of energy.

So according to the Obama administration, global warming poses a greater threat than international terrorist organization or rogue state such as Iran and North Korea acquiring nuclear weapons.  But should we really be surprised? This is the same administration that read Miranda rights to an international terrorist after only 50 minutes of interrogation, an administration that treats terrorists as common criminals by granting them civilian court trials in New York City, and an administration that fails to effectively confront Iran over its nuclear program.

Instead, his most important foreign ... more