Your Weekly Dose of

“Common Sense“ Energy News

Presented by:

The Empowerment Alliance

May 13th, 2022

• By an overwhelming majority, DTE shareholders defended the company against costly voluntary disclosures. EnergyNews
• Carbon tax is back and worse than ever. Politico
• The Department of Justice is creating an Office of Environmental Justice.Axios
• Inflation barreled ahead at 8.3% in April from a year ago, remaining near 40-year highs. CNBC
• The Department of the Interior once again re-cancelled the mandated federal lease sales in Alaska and the Gulf of Mexico. The Hill
• With a finite amount of discovered precious metals in the world, people are starting to realize that the numbers don’t add up to the volume required to hit green energy objectives. So, “Greenflation” begins. WSJ
• Germany is poised to become a European and global LNG behemoth by filling the void left by Russia across the continent (and the U.S. has not stepped up to fill). Bloomberg

With over 70% of the vote, DTE shareholders defended the company from a radical proposal to include scope 3 emissions into its climate targets.

The Environmental Protection Agency defines scope 3 as, “the result of activities from assets not owned or controlled by the reporting organization, but that the organization indirectly impacts in its value chain.”

The DTE board of advisors counseled shareholders ahead of the vote that the proposal would, “divert resources from our existing climate strategy and expose the Company to unnecessary legal risk to achieve a target without a clear path to accomplishing.”

To incorporate factors that the company has little influence over in emissions targets is setting up the executive team responsible for those targets to fail. The shareholders overwhelmingly agree that making goods more expensive and saddling the company with impossible goals is not the right way to conduct business.

Bottom line: Raising the cost of doing business will only hurt consumers and especially the consumers who can least afford price hikes.

Once again rearing its ugly head is the idea of a carbon tax. A carbon tax requires assigning financial value to carbon emissions. Applying that to the economy raises the cost of doing business for every industry.

A carbon tax is still a tax. A tax that could be raised. A tax that would not go away once created. It is nothing short of a Pandora’s Box that would forever make life and business more expensive every day.

Perhaps it would start in a narrow aspect of the economy. Perhaps it would start applying only to other people. Perhaps it would start out being fairly inexpensive.

But that is the problem. “Start.”

What comes next?

Any carbon tax will absolutely open the door to more expensive goods and services across the country and across the economy.

Bottom line: A carbon tax is a slippery slope that will take us to a more expensive future.

In another ‘Ministry of Truth’ style move, the Biden Administration’s Department of Justice recently announced the creation of an Office of Environmental Justice.

Attorney General Merrick Garland said, “OEJ will prioritize meaningful and constructive engagement with the communities most affected by environmental crime and injustice.”

Hopefully the office includes a review of the connections between environmental justice and economic opportunities. The same communities that AG Garland claims will be the focus of the office, are the ones most negatively impacted by rising costs for everyday supplies. Communities most affected by injustice are the ones who can least afford price hikes in their energy bills.

American families are faced with rising bills every month due to inflation. Some this winter may have been forced to choose between heat and food.

So why would this administration pursue energy policies that hurt American producers and make energy more expensive thus disproportionately harming those already disadvantaged communities?

Hopefully the OEJ will figure that out for us.

Bottom line: Natural gas will lower costs for those who are economically and environmentally disadvantaged. Hopefully the OEJ will figure out why this administration is not being more supportive of those hard working Americans.

If the red-hot inflation reports weren’t enough to concern you, this week marked another all-time high for average U.S. gas prices. As of yesterday, the average price for a gallon of regular unleaded was at $4.42, and the average for a gallon of diesel reached $5.55.

This increase comes as the price per barrel of oil is declining, so what gives? Unusually low inventories at our refineries, plus a limited capacity to refine (due to environmental red tape) is throwing off the gasoline supply chain. Production is up, but it’s not translating to an increase in the supply at the gas pump. As gas analyst Patrick De Haan points out, it has nothing to do with “price gouging” by gas stations or oil companies.

Hearing On Energy Partnership With Canada: On Tuesday, May 17, the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee will hold a hearing “to examine ways to strengthen the energy and mineral partnership between the U.S. and Canada to address energy security and climate objectives.”

Hearings On EPA Budget: On Tuesday, May 17, the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Environment and Climate Change will hold a hearing on the FY2023 Environmental Protection Agency budget. And, on Wednesday, May 18, the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Department of the Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies will hold another.

FERC Open Meeting: On Thursday, May 19, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission will hold a Virtual Open Meeting of the Commission.

Hearing On Building An EV Workforce: On Friday, May 20, the House Science, Space, and Technology Subcommittee on Research and Technology will hold a hearing on “Building a Workforce to Navigate the Electric Vehicle Future.”

COMMON SENSE QUOTE OF THE WEEK

“Energy production in the U.S. is cleaner than it is in China thanks to American innovation—not government intervention.

Democrats claim that their energy policies help the climate, but all they do is hurt the American people and put us at a disadvantage on the world stage.”

–Senator Tim Scott, speaking from the floor of the Senate.