In as much as you considered 'character' as a determitave variable for those voting for president, and what I understood as a preference for Harris using that metric, does the nomination of Chris Write as energy secretary mitigate your (likely) disappointment with the election results?
I tend not to get too excited or disappointed by elections. I'm a policy guy and good policy is good policy regardless who gets elected, the politics just change the boundary conditions! Wright is a smart choice and a good guy. Whether that translates into effectiveness in energy policy depends upon a lot more than that, but from where I sit, the possibilities for more pragmatic and sensible policy increased with this appointment.
This response is exactly what I would have expected - it is one reason why I have such great respect for you!
BTW - I am a CU alum having grown up in Boulder (my family moved there in 1965 when I was 10), and at CU I earned my BA in biology in 1978 and a PhD in pharmacology (UCHSC) in 1988. I started my MD degree at UCHSC in '88 but finished in Syracuse. I read The Honest Broker several years after it was published and have been promoting it to colleagues & friends ever since. You make me proud to be a Buff!
With respect to coach Sanders, I was skeptical when he was hired, but I am obviously happy with his work so far - and not just the W-L record but also with the overall message that is projected by the coach & the team.
I don't mean to be "piling on" here, but another interesting post from THB could well be about the letter sent to the UN from the Club of Rome suggesting overhaul of the COP conferences. I didn't care much for their suggestions, but your thoughts on providing more meaningful input from such venues would be worth reading.
I, too, am guardedly optimistic about Wright's success. However, recognize that the 1/6th of the DOE budget labelled "Environmental Management" is actually for managing and disposing of the legacy of the Cold War. This is also politically ugly, and will consume an inordinate amount of the Secretary's time. NNSA is responsible for design of nuclear weapons, production of the nuclear materials that go in them and their storage. In effect, Wright will play a key role in a truly existential matter - maintaining nuclear deterrence - while at the same time trying to bring sense to both our climate and energy policies. Wright's success will depend on his choices for Deputy Secretaries, and his ability to effectively delegate to them.
Thank you for this timely post and disarming the climate community before they can mount any kind of attack. It won’t be pretty when it happens.
As is my custom, I have a question. About midway through the piece, you quote Mr. Wright as saying that two things are “required for positive progress on climate change.” By what metrics can we measure “progress on climate change?” What is progress, in this case? Decarbonization? Stable temperatures? Stable CO2 readings?
A fun metric might be, how many apologies can we get from Michael Mann, John Podesta, and Al Gore? “Gee, we were wrong.” Yeah…not happening.
But seriously sir, what constructs are needed to measure (meaningfully) what is essentially a geologic process. Yes, humankind might be messing with the trajectory, but is it possible to detect the contribution of man’s work to the change in slope of that trajectory? Especially given the geologic time frames involved, the extent of the earth’s surface, and the fluid dynamics (PDEs?) of the oceans? “Progress” implies a beginning and an end. Is the goal of progress to restore the climate to pre-industrial conditions? That would seem to be the goal of nut-zero [sic]. Is the goal of progress to improve man’s relationship with his climate by continuing to improve his means of adapting to changes as they occur? How do you measure that? Life expectancy comes to mind, as do various metrics comparing to GDP (energy per person per GDP, e.g). What end do we seek? Please, don't say "get re-elected."
Mr. Wright is the shining star of Mr. Trump’s cabinet picks, and I’m certain we’ll see many changes, some subtle and some not so much, in energy policy in the US. From his book, “Bettering Human Lives,” the most politically charged statement is “Zero Energy Poverty by 2050 is a superior goal compared to Net Zero 2050.” The numbers in the US, 1 in 4 living in energy poverty, are embarrassing. Globally, over one-third of the world lives without clean cooking fuel. Zero energy poverty is a helluva lot better goal than nut-zero! At least, one can find measurable metrics.
Two posts I would like to see from you, sir. First, a two- or three-part series on “measuring progress” in climate change. Second, a post on energy poverty in the US. A third post, perhaps from EBB, Doomberg, GLF or PER, or Jim Conca, might be how energy poverty distorts the death ratio of fossil fuels. What portion of the death print from coal, oil, and gas are due to indoor pollution? Certainly, biomass could be curtailed, but that’s for another day.
Thank you again for you wonderful work and diligent efforts to keep the conversation honest!
"nut-zero" LOL. I plan on using that. It's right up there with "unreliables" . I would also like to see the two posts you would like to see from THB. Great questions. Hopefully they'll get answered.
Roger, this is an articulate defense of Chris Wright and his environmental thinking. To my eye, the team of Wright and Burgum will be a potent, global force for practical and economic environmentalism. You ain’t chopped liver in that regard. Thanks for your tireless efforts.
Many thanks and let us all hope that all this "Climate Alarmism" that scares children, and makes mistaken activists out of the young, is more reasonably and practically approached during the next four years of a different administration in America.
Here is Bjorn Lomborg on this subject …
“The practical challenge, of how to respond politically to the unambiguous message of human-induced climate change, remains huge.
A lot of people are convinced climate change is a catastrophe. This is the end of the world. But when we are inundated with “weather porn,” we end up focusing on the least effective policies first.” Watching the news, you get the sense that climate change is making the planet unlivable. We are bombarded with images of floods, droughts, storms, and wildfires.
So, the real point here is just simply to say, if this is the end of the world, it is not. And that's of course, why you constantly hear this end of the world drumbeat. That's why it's so important that the OECD- Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development - has now convinced 60% of all people to something that is manifestly untrue, that this is the end of the world. That humankind could be eradicated. This is THE problem, not the supposed ‘end of the world.’
The Heat Is On: Bjorn Lomborg On The Summer’s Record Heat | Hoover Institution The Heat Is On: Bjorn Lomborg On The Summer’s Record Heat (....... copy and paste into your browser.)
So, I'm engaged in trying to get people to think smarter about climate. It’s really, really hard because a lot of people already hold very entrenched positions. On both sides. It's almost impossible to have a sensible conversation on this.
Linking every disaster to climate change — and wrongly suggesting that things are getting much worse — makes us ignore practical, cost-effective solutions while the media focus our attention on costly climate policies that help little.
We should promote prosperity, adaptation, and resilience. It's entirely possible to help the climate "and working families at the same time if the policies to do so are innovation-focused."
Politicians don't help matters either. Here's a quote from AOC from 2018 "Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the Democrat from New York, called climate change "our World War II" and warned that the world will end in 12 years if we don't address global warming on Monday."
She is just another unfortunate bubblehead reading from a script
All too many of them hold power
It’s why this election was so important even for me up here in frozen canada where we have a 9 year experiment in clown-based govt hopefully coming to an end soon, but not soon enough.
Roger, Thanks for a balanced approach (as usual for you). I suggest that the Dept of Energy should sponsor a debate that is focused on the average taxpayer. The debate topic might be. "Climate Change is a crisis causing temperatures to rise, and extreme weather events to increase, and it is solely caused by Human generated CO2. The problem justifies spending huge amounts of money, because the risks are high. True or False. Only proven data is allowed, and no name calling. If the Climate Crisis people do not show up with facts, they lose out and the skeptics present all of the data.
Thanks for writing this and rounding up "what the nominee really said". Worth the price of a subscription!
Two DOE stories from when I shared an office with a person from DOE while I was working at OSTP.
1. National Labs are contracted so therefore can lobby. Most government agencies can't lobby for their budgets, so this is a cool cut-out for a research agency. I visited the National Ignition Facility and at the time they had poster in the main hall showing how much money went to which Congressional districts. These folks are not subtle.
2. I worked at OSTP right after the Los Alamos Fires. Some folks came from the Lab to suggest to the Powers That Be that more research bucks for wildfire should go to them. I asked "doesn't the FS already fund wildfire research?" The implication was that physicists (wink-wink) are smarter and therefore.. well they should have a (large) piece of every topic. When I visited NIL, I also asked why they were doing genetics work that seemed just the same as what NIH or NSF would do. Their answer was "we used to study nuclear impacts on genetics" so I guess the ball just kept rolling.
I hope Wright helps DOE focus its energy research $ on..errr... energy. One wonders how decarbonized we would be by now with a more focused R&D approach.
5 hrs ago·edited 5 hrs agoLiked by Roger Pielke Jr.
Roger great work... I will be using this to add to my brief to some in the new Canadian government that needs a re-invent after we get rid of the existing idiots in power....
I hope Wright's confirmation hearings will inform the public abour the real IPCC info on climate change effects vs the extreme misinformation widely provided by the media.
Agree in principle, but too often Congress has a tendency to turn those hearings into theater! From what I've read about Mr. Wright, he should be able to hold his own with any of the staunch democrat climate crazies (Markey and Sanders come to mind).
Two concerns: will he prioritize fossil fuels over other forms of energy generation?
What policy conclusions does he draw from acknowledging that climate change is real?
Getting criticized by the right people is not a policy
Doomberg nailed this as well
I like to cross post on both of these sites
https://newsletter.doomberg.com/p/in-praise-of-chris-wright?utm_source=post-banner&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=posts-open-in-app&triedRedirect=true
Well said Roger. Chris Wright will be the most educated & knowledgeable individual to fill the post of Energy Secretary for a very long time!
He does not adhere to the alarmist narrative and therefore will be mercilessly attacked.
Just as you are constantly attacked Roger.
The climate/insane have no interest interest in reasoned debate, they don’t even know what that is.
I hope Trump steamrolls this and other appointments thru, the only hope of energy and climate sanity the USA and the world can see.
Sure is great that the democrats didn’t win that election, right now we would be looking at Piltdown Mann as Energy Secretary.
Imagine that possibility for a moment.
In as much as you considered 'character' as a determitave variable for those voting for president, and what I understood as a preference for Harris using that metric, does the nomination of Chris Write as energy secretary mitigate your (likely) disappointment with the election results?
I tend not to get too excited or disappointed by elections. I'm a policy guy and good policy is good policy regardless who gets elected, the politics just change the boundary conditions! Wright is a smart choice and a good guy. Whether that translates into effectiveness in energy policy depends upon a lot more than that, but from where I sit, the possibilities for more pragmatic and sensible policy increased with this appointment.
This response is exactly what I would have expected - it is one reason why I have such great respect for you!
BTW - I am a CU alum having grown up in Boulder (my family moved there in 1965 when I was 10), and at CU I earned my BA in biology in 1978 and a PhD in pharmacology (UCHSC) in 1988. I started my MD degree at UCHSC in '88 but finished in Syracuse. I read The Honest Broker several years after it was published and have been promoting it to colleagues & friends ever since. You make me proud to be a Buff!
With respect to coach Sanders, I was skeptical when he was hired, but I am obviously happy with his work so far - and not just the W-L record but also with the overall message that is projected by the coach & the team.
I don't mean to be "piling on" here, but another interesting post from THB could well be about the letter sent to the UN from the Club of Rome suggesting overhaul of the COP conferences. I didn't care much for their suggestions, but your thoughts on providing more meaningful input from such venues would be worth reading.
I, too, am guardedly optimistic about Wright's success. However, recognize that the 1/6th of the DOE budget labelled "Environmental Management" is actually for managing and disposing of the legacy of the Cold War. This is also politically ugly, and will consume an inordinate amount of the Secretary's time. NNSA is responsible for design of nuclear weapons, production of the nuclear materials that go in them and their storage. In effect, Wright will play a key role in a truly existential matter - maintaining nuclear deterrence - while at the same time trying to bring sense to both our climate and energy policies. Wright's success will depend on his choices for Deputy Secretaries, and his ability to effectively delegate to them.
Thanks for telling us what "environmental management" was.
Thank you for this timely post and disarming the climate community before they can mount any kind of attack. It won’t be pretty when it happens.
As is my custom, I have a question. About midway through the piece, you quote Mr. Wright as saying that two things are “required for positive progress on climate change.” By what metrics can we measure “progress on climate change?” What is progress, in this case? Decarbonization? Stable temperatures? Stable CO2 readings?
A fun metric might be, how many apologies can we get from Michael Mann, John Podesta, and Al Gore? “Gee, we were wrong.” Yeah…not happening.
But seriously sir, what constructs are needed to measure (meaningfully) what is essentially a geologic process. Yes, humankind might be messing with the trajectory, but is it possible to detect the contribution of man’s work to the change in slope of that trajectory? Especially given the geologic time frames involved, the extent of the earth’s surface, and the fluid dynamics (PDEs?) of the oceans? “Progress” implies a beginning and an end. Is the goal of progress to restore the climate to pre-industrial conditions? That would seem to be the goal of nut-zero [sic]. Is the goal of progress to improve man’s relationship with his climate by continuing to improve his means of adapting to changes as they occur? How do you measure that? Life expectancy comes to mind, as do various metrics comparing to GDP (energy per person per GDP, e.g). What end do we seek? Please, don't say "get re-elected."
Mr. Wright is the shining star of Mr. Trump’s cabinet picks, and I’m certain we’ll see many changes, some subtle and some not so much, in energy policy in the US. From his book, “Bettering Human Lives,” the most politically charged statement is “Zero Energy Poverty by 2050 is a superior goal compared to Net Zero 2050.” The numbers in the US, 1 in 4 living in energy poverty, are embarrassing. Globally, over one-third of the world lives without clean cooking fuel. Zero energy poverty is a helluva lot better goal than nut-zero! At least, one can find measurable metrics.
Two posts I would like to see from you, sir. First, a two- or three-part series on “measuring progress” in climate change. Second, a post on energy poverty in the US. A third post, perhaps from EBB, Doomberg, GLF or PER, or Jim Conca, might be how energy poverty distorts the death ratio of fossil fuels. What portion of the death print from coal, oil, and gas are due to indoor pollution? Certainly, biomass could be curtailed, but that’s for another day.
Thank you again for you wonderful work and diligent efforts to keep the conversation honest!
Great post suggestions!
"nut-zero" LOL. I plan on using that. It's right up there with "unreliables" . I would also like to see the two posts you would like to see from THB. Great questions. Hopefully they'll get answered.
A note of hope in the otherwise cluttered atmosphere of gloom suffusing recent US energy policy.
Roger, this is an articulate defense of Chris Wright and his environmental thinking. To my eye, the team of Wright and Burgum will be a potent, global force for practical and economic environmentalism. You ain’t chopped liver in that regard. Thanks for your tireless efforts.
Many thanks and let us all hope that all this "Climate Alarmism" that scares children, and makes mistaken activists out of the young, is more reasonably and practically approached during the next four years of a different administration in America.
Here is Bjorn Lomborg on this subject …
“The practical challenge, of how to respond politically to the unambiguous message of human-induced climate change, remains huge.
A lot of people are convinced climate change is a catastrophe. This is the end of the world. But when we are inundated with “weather porn,” we end up focusing on the least effective policies first.” Watching the news, you get the sense that climate change is making the planet unlivable. We are bombarded with images of floods, droughts, storms, and wildfires.
So, the real point here is just simply to say, if this is the end of the world, it is not. And that's of course, why you constantly hear this end of the world drumbeat. That's why it's so important that the OECD- Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development - has now convinced 60% of all people to something that is manifestly untrue, that this is the end of the world. That humankind could be eradicated. This is THE problem, not the supposed ‘end of the world.’
The Heat Is On: Bjorn Lomborg On The Summer’s Record Heat | Hoover Institution The Heat Is On: Bjorn Lomborg On The Summer’s Record Heat (....... copy and paste into your browser.)
So, I'm engaged in trying to get people to think smarter about climate. It’s really, really hard because a lot of people already hold very entrenched positions. On both sides. It's almost impossible to have a sensible conversation on this.
Linking every disaster to climate change — and wrongly suggesting that things are getting much worse — makes us ignore practical, cost-effective solutions while the media focus our attention on costly climate policies that help little.
We should promote prosperity, adaptation, and resilience. It's entirely possible to help the climate "and working families at the same time if the policies to do so are innovation-focused."
Amen to that......
Politicians don't help matters either. Here's a quote from AOC from 2018 "Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the Democrat from New York, called climate change "our World War II" and warned that the world will end in 12 years if we don't address global warming on Monday."
She is just another unfortunate bubblehead reading from a script
All too many of them hold power
It’s why this election was so important even for me up here in frozen canada where we have a 9 year experiment in clown-based govt hopefully coming to an end soon, but not soon enough.
Roger, Thanks for a balanced approach (as usual for you). I suggest that the Dept of Energy should sponsor a debate that is focused on the average taxpayer. The debate topic might be. "Climate Change is a crisis causing temperatures to rise, and extreme weather events to increase, and it is solely caused by Human generated CO2. The problem justifies spending huge amounts of money, because the risks are high. True or False. Only proven data is allowed, and no name calling. If the Climate Crisis people do not show up with facts, they lose out and the skeptics present all of the data.
The transcript link for your talk with Chris Wright isn’t to a full transcript
Bah, sorry about that!
Thanks for writing this and rounding up "what the nominee really said". Worth the price of a subscription!
Two DOE stories from when I shared an office with a person from DOE while I was working at OSTP.
1. National Labs are contracted so therefore can lobby. Most government agencies can't lobby for their budgets, so this is a cool cut-out for a research agency. I visited the National Ignition Facility and at the time they had poster in the main hall showing how much money went to which Congressional districts. These folks are not subtle.
2. I worked at OSTP right after the Los Alamos Fires. Some folks came from the Lab to suggest to the Powers That Be that more research bucks for wildfire should go to them. I asked "doesn't the FS already fund wildfire research?" The implication was that physicists (wink-wink) are smarter and therefore.. well they should have a (large) piece of every topic. When I visited NIL, I also asked why they were doing genetics work that seemed just the same as what NIH or NSF would do. Their answer was "we used to study nuclear impacts on genetics" so I guess the ball just kept rolling.
I hope Wright helps DOE focus its energy research $ on..errr... energy. One wonders how decarbonized we would be by now with a more focused R&D approach.
Roger great work... I will be using this to add to my brief to some in the new Canadian government that needs a re-invent after we get rid of the existing idiots in power....
I hope Wright's confirmation hearings will inform the public abour the real IPCC info on climate change effects vs the extreme misinformation widely provided by the media.
Agree in principle, but too often Congress has a tendency to turn those hearings into theater! From what I've read about Mr. Wright, he should be able to hold his own with any of the staunch democrat climate crazies (Markey and Sanders come to mind).