The Supreme Court will soon decide on cities pushing an extreme climate agenda
Municipalities like Boulder, San Francisco and Baltimore, among others, have been filing claims against oil and gas companies, seeking damages they allege are directly attributable to the firms’ actions.
But holders of these cities’ bonds could be forgiven for being surprised by these lawsuits.
Why?
Because the ambiguous claims these cities made to their bondholders belie the specific nature of the claims they later made to courts.
In their bond disclosures, these cities all acknowledge they’re unable to forecast with any degree of certainty climate change’s adverse effects and the science underlying their assumptions is evolving.
Fair enough. But contrast this with the incredibly specific claims in these cities’ lawsuits.
In 2017, San Francisco’s city attorney, Dennis Herrera, filed a lawsuit in state court against five energy companies, alleging they are responsible for very specific effects of climate change and should pay for infrastructure such as sea walls to deal with its ongoing and future consequences.
The lawsuit’s claim about predicting the effects of climate change comes into serious question when the city attorney’s bond-issuing employer has stated it cannot accurately determine the extent of climate change for its investors.
In a 2018 petition in Texas state court, Exxon alleged the “stark and irreconcilable conflict” between the municipalities’ allegations in the lawsuits and their disclosures in bond offerings indicated the suits were brought “not because of a bona fide belief in any tortious conduct by the defendants or actual damage to their jurisdictions, but instead to coerce ExxonMobil and others operating in the Texas energy sector to adopt policies aligned with those favored by local politicians in California.”
Its petition was denied, but the concern about the “stark and irreconcilable conflict” has quietly simmered ever since — and for good reason.
Disclosures in other areas have been a source of angst for muni bondholders.
In 2016, the Securities and Exchange Commission issued a cease and desist order against the City of Boulder for misstating that it had complied with prior agreements to provide continuing disclosure to its investors.
What prompted renewed interest in this issue was not just the reexamination of bond risks after Credit Suisse’s failure but also the solicitor general’s recent recommendation to the Supreme Court, urging the justices to reject ExxonMobil and Suncor’s petition for their case to be heard in federal rather than state court.
Credit Suisse’s AT1 investors have reason to be upset but not necessarily all that surprised.
After all, those bonds were yielding 9.75%, suggesting the risks were high.
For comparison, the average yield on ostensibly much safer 10-year muni bonds is about 2.49%.
But what if, in addition to the risks laid out in disclosure documents, Credit Suisse had been aware of other material risks it had failed to disclose to its bondholders?
Well, that would be securities fraud.
Might the same hold true for these municipalities doing the bidding of trial lawyers pushing an extreme climate agenda?
To the extent that these cities have a much greater degree of certainty about the risks they face, have those risks been adequately described to all audiences, investors and the courts alike?
And while these lawsuits seem meritless, one hopes the Supreme Court concludes at least that they ought to remain in federal court — where they belong.
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Chefs and Restaurateurs Win Big as Trump-Appointed Judge Leads Unanimous Panel in Overturning Gas Stove Ban
The California Restaurant Association has been doing a slow burn since the city of Berkeley cooked up a scheme in 2019 to ban natural gas hookups to new buildings.
But the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals put chefs’ favorite appliance back on the menu — at least for now — when they overturned the ban Monday, USA Today reported.
Berkeley’s ordinance went into effect in 2020, making the San Francisco Bay Area community the first municipality to take such a step. Many others have since enacted similar laws.
“The measure, which took effect in 2020 to cheers from environmentalists, was intended to reduce emissions of greenhouse gasses that contribute to global warming,” the Associated Press reported.
But restaurant owners were not among those cheering.
“Natural gas appliances are crucial for restaurants to operate effectively and efficiently, as they allow for a wide variety of cuisines and innovations in the restaurant industry,” California Restaurant Association President and CEO Jot Condie said in a statement published on the organization’s website.
Condie argued that cities and states “are not equipped to regulate the energy use or energy efficiency of appliances that businesses and homeowners have chosen; energy policy and conservation is an issue with national scope and national security implications. This ordinance, as well as the solution it seeks, is an overreaching measure beyond the scope of any city.”
That’s the stance the organization’s lawyers argued before the court, and the Ninth Circuit agreed.
The court ruled that Berkeley’s ordinance was preempted by the federal Energy Policy and Conservation Act, Bloomberg Law reported.
The court ruled that “Berkeley’s ban on natural gas infrastructure in new buildings is ‘clearly outside the preemption provision of the EPCA,’” according to the outlet.
Judge Patrick Bumatay, an appointee of former President Donald Trump, wrote in an opinion that Berkeley’s action was not permissible in light of the language in the EPCA.
“Put simply, by enacting EPCA, Congress ensured that States and localities could not prevent consumers from using covered products in their homes, kitchens and businesses,” he wrote.
Sarah O. Jorgensen, attorney for the restaurant association, said in a statement:
“The Ninth Circuit’s ruling today underscores the importance of a consistent national energy policy, which was Congress’ intent the whole time.
“Cities and states should not be permitted to overrule energy decisions that affect the country as a whole.
“The panel’s unanimous decision that Berkeley’s ban on natural gas piping is preempted by EPCA sets an important precedent for future cases, especially with other cities considering similar bans or restrictions on the use of natural gas.”
Despite the victory, gas-stove proponents still face a heated battle to continue using their appliance of choice, according to USA Today.
“The Berkeley ordinance was not a building code requirement, so the appeals court ruling will only affect other municipalities that used the same type of ordinance and only in Alaska, Arizona, California, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Oregon and Washington state,” the outlet reported.
“Most municipalities that have such bans in place use building energy codes, which the appeals court specifically said was allowable.”
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The Real Reason the Left Is Banning Gas-Powered Cars
Last summer, California Governor Gavin Newsom issued a directive to his wealthy constituents not to plug in their electric vehicles. It was an emergency. The grid was overloading, and if EVs weren't taken off their chargers, the system would melt down. For many, this meant being effectively stranded, but they still had the option to call a gas-powered Uber for a ride.
The plea to unplug, a regular and repeated occurrence each summer, came at the same time Newsom signed a new rule to outlaw all gas-powered vehicles by 2035.
"We can solve this climate crisis if we focus on the big, bold steps necessary to cut pollution. California now has a groundbreaking, world-leading plan to achieve 100 percent zero-emission vehicle sales by 2035," Newsom declared in a statement, calling on other states and the federal government to follow his lead. "This plan's yearly targets — 35 percent ZEV sales by 2026, 68 percent by 2030, and 100 percent by 2035 — provide our road map to reducing dangerous carbon emissions and moving away from fossil fuels."
To put it bluntly, these directives for change are suicidal — especially given politicians like Newsom know how quickly the grid gets overwhelmed.
To the contrary, Elon Musk, the creator of the most successful electric car company in the world, warns that the United States — not to mention the rest of the globe — isn't ready for a rapid transition to electric.
"Realistically, I think we need to use oil and gas in the short term because otherwise, civilization will crumble," Musk said last fall during a conference in Norway. "One of the biggest challenges the world has ever faced is the transition to sustainable energy and to a sustainable economy. That will take some decades to complete."
In addition, Americans can't afford the move, and the sales numbers at car dealerships across the country prove it. How will regular people get to work when their affordable, gas-powered vehicles are illegal or no longer available for purchase and repair?
"Only 19% of U.S. adults say it's 'very' or 'extremely' likely they would purchase an electric vehicle the next time they buy a car, according to the poll, and 22% say it's somewhat likely. About half — 47% — say it's not likely they would go electric," a recent survey from the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research and the Energy Policy Institute at the University of Chicago shows. "Six in 10 said the high cost is a major reason they wouldn't and about a quarter cited it as a minor reason. Only 16% said the high cost would not be a factor in rejecting the EV."
Musk is right. Civilization will crumble without oil and gas, so why are the Biden administration and their globalist, elite allies trying to accelerate the collapse? If U.S. infrastructure isn't capable of handling the switch to electric, and Americans can't afford to buy electric cars, how is this new and alternative utopia going to come to fruition?
To critically thinking people, these facts don't logically add up to a good faith effort to save the environment. Instead, it raises red flags about the true intention of the rapid shift. This is especially true given those who are pushing the shift most aggressively. John Kerry and Bill Gates, for example, aren't changing their own habits of private jet use, SUVs and luxury, living in mansions or ornate government buildings. So what's going on here?
Catastrophes enable government control. Look no further than the recent COVID-19 pandemic, which was extended for years by bureaucrats and politicians interested in exercising power over the population as long as possible, for proof. The coming government-inflicted mobility crisis will be similar to the pandemic response, with directives about who can work, when, how long, where they can travel, whether you really need to travel to church and much more. A lack of gas-powered vehicles means forced reliance on public transportation. It will cripple life in rural America, forcing moves into the cities. Social credit scores regarding travel, like the ones we're already seeing when purchasing airline tickets, will certainly be implemented.
The government-mandated move to electric vehicles has nothing to do with the environment and everything to do with the left's vision for America: tyrannical government control. Time will tell if the country is willing to go along with it.
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Earth Day at 53
None of the eco-doomsday predictions have come true
From predicting ecological collapse and the end of civilisation to warnings that the world is running out of oil, all environmental doomsday predictions of the first Earth Day in 1970 have turned out to be flat out wrong.
More than three decades before Greta Thunberg was born — the Swedish environmental activist on climate change — more than 20 million Americans participated in the first Earth Day on April 22, 1970.
We now look back at quotes from Earth Day, Then and Now,” by Ronald Bailey of the spectacularly wrong apocalyptic predictions from Earth Day 1970.
Considering the current doomsday predictions scaremonger activists are verbalising about global warming that will result in the demise of civilisation within the next decade, many of those unscientific 1970 predictions are being reincarnated on today’s social and news media outlets.
Many of the same are being regurgitated today, but the best prediction from the first earth day five decades ago, yes 50 years ago, was that the “the pending ice age as earth had been cooling since 1950 and that the temperature would be 11 degrees cooler by the year 2000”.
The 1970’s were a lousy decade. Embarrassing movies and dreadful music reflected the national doomsday mood following an unpopular war, endless political scandals, and a faltering economy.
The first Earth Day was celebrated in 1970 — okay, “celebrated” doesn’t capture the funereal tone of the event. The events (organized in part by then hippie and now convicted murderer Ira Einhorn) predicted death, destruction and disease unless we did exactly as progressives commanded.data.
Behold the coming apocalypse as predicted on and around Earth Day, 1970:
1. “Civilization will end within 15 or 30 years unless immediate action is taken against problems facing mankind.” — Harvard biologist George Wald
2. “We are in an environmental crisis which threatens the survival of this nation, and of the world as a suitable place of human habitation.” — Washington University biologist Barry Commoner
3. “Man must stop pollution and conserve his resources, not merely to enhance existence but to save the race from intolerable deterioration and possible extinction.” — New York Times editorial
4. “Population will inevitably and completely outstrip whatever small increases in food supplies we make. The death rate will increase until at least 100-200 million people per year will be starving to death during the next ten years.” — Stanford University biologist Paul Ehrlich
5. “Most of the people who are going to die in the greatest cataclysm in the history of man have already been born… [By 1975] some experts feel that food shortages will have escalated the present level of world hunger and starvation into famines of unbelievable proportions. Other experts, more optimistic, think the ultimate food-population collision will not occur until the decade of the 1980s.” — Paul Ehrlich
6. “It is already too late to avoid mass starvation,” — Denis Hayes, Chief organizer for Earth Day
7. “Demographers agree almost unanimously on the following grim timetable: by 1975 widespread famines will begin in India; these will spread by 1990 to include all of India, Pakistan, China and the Near East, Africa. By the year 2000, or conceivably sooner, South and Central America will exist under famine conditions…. By the year 2000, thirty years from now, the entire world, with the exception of Western Europe, North America, and Australia, will be in famine.” — North Texas State University professor Peter Gunter
8. “In a decade, urban dwellers will have to wear gas masks to survive air pollution… by 1985 air pollution will have reduced the amount of sunlight reaching earth by one half.” — Life magazine
9. “At the present rate of nitrogen buildup, it’s only a matter of time before light will be filtered out of the atmosphere and none of our land will be usable.” — Ecologist Kenneth Watt
10. “Air pollution…is certainly going to take hundreds of thousands of lives in the next few years alone.” — Paul Ehrlich
11. “By the year 2000, if present trends continue, we will be using up crude oil at such a rate… that there won’t be any more crude oil. You’ll drive up to the pump and say, ‘Fill ‘er up, buddy,’ and he’ll say, ‘I am very sorry, there isn’t any.’” — Ecologist Kenneth Watt
12. “[One] theory assumes that the earth’s cloud cover will continue to thicken as more dust, fumes, and water vapor are belched into the atmosphere by industrial smokestacks and jet planes. Screened from the sun’s heat, the planet will cool, the water vapor will fall and freeze, and a new Ice Age will be born.” — Newsweek magazine
13. “The world has been chilling sharply for about twenty years. If present trends continue, the world will be about four degrees colder for the global mean temperature in 1990, but eleven degrees colder in the year 2000. This is about twice what it would take to put us into an ice age.” — Kenneth Watt
History seems to repeat itself as there will be a disproportionately influential group of doomsters predicting that the future–and the present–never looked so bleak. I guess we’ll need to critique the 2020 doomsday predictions in the year 2050 and see if they were any better than those from the first Earth Day 50 years ago.
https://mailchi.mp/093a98a205a8/happy-earth-day-4j6imn4q1z-195551?e=cc88839e92
*****************************************************My other blogs. Main ones below
http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM )
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)
http://jonjayray.com/blogall.html More blogs
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Jim Hansen and his twin
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