By Bob Tita
Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES
CHICAGO -(Dow Jones)- Deere & Co. (DE) has quietly dropped out of a coalition of large companies that has supported a cap-and-trade program for reducing carbon dioxide emissions.
Deere, the world’s largest manufacturer of farm machinery, opted to leave the U.S. Climate Action Partnership in May because the group’s legislative strategy “no longer served as a foundation for moving forward” with climate change regulation, Ken Golden, a spokesman for the company said Tuesday.
“We came to the conclusion that Deere had other opportunities to be involved in climate change initiatives,” Golden said.
The Moline, Ill., company joins a handful of other companies that have left the partnership in recent months, as political support erodes for comprehensive energy legislation that includes a cap-and-trade program and stricter mandates for energy conservation. Other members to leave the group include construction machinery company Caterpillar Inc. (CAT), and energy companies BP PLC (BP.LN, BP) and ConocoPhillips Co. (COP)
A spokesman for the partnership, Tad Segal, offered no reaction to Deere’s reasons for leaving the group, but credited the company with “playing a valuable and significant role” in developing the group’s policy initiatives.
“As with every coalition, there have been membership changes, including departures and new memberships,” said Segal.
About two dozen companies remain in the group, including corporate heavyweights General Electric Co. (GE), Johnson & Johnson (JNJ), Siemens AG (SIE), and Alcoa Inc. (AA) The group also has picked up four new members in the past year, including Honeywell International Inc. (HON) and Weyerhaeuser Co. (WY)
full story here:
Perhaps they came to realize that farm equipment isn’t exactly going to attract the huge government subsidies that GE et. al. could, because a solar-powered combine would actually have to work around the clock.
You can’t argue the fact that they are the original Green company. They gotta know what they are doing….
No one runs faster from a lie than a Deere … Think they will use it?
cap’n’tax, carbon offsets, carbon tax – they are all scams.
25 Aug: Guardian: Reese Erlich : Poorer nations hit with ‘exorbitant’ consultancy fees for carbon offset projects
Nepalese government has paid a Norwegian consultancy €150,000 (£123,000) to get UN certification for biogas projects
Stein Jensen, a spokesman for the Oslo-based consulting company used by the Nepalese government, Det Norske Veritas (DNV), said that there is such competition to provide consultancy services that the fees reflect the market rate. He added: “for small projects the transaction costs are high.”…
The government paid DNV €150,000 (£123,000) for initial site visits and related services. It will have to pay €50,000 (£41,000) for subsequent annual visits. Nepal hopes to complete the UN-administered certification process by the end of this year and ultimately wants to build 200,000 biogas installations. It expects to earn $400,000 (£259,000) per year in carbon credits.
The biogas equipment currently costs $575 (£372) per household, a significant sum for farmers earning under $1,500 (£971) per year. The government offers partial subsidies, but farmers must spend some of their savings and take out microcredit loans to pay for the rest…
WWF will get credit for each tonne of carbon not produced as a result of using biogas. It sells the credits to the Zurich-based NGO Myclimate, which in turn provides offsets to individuals, airlines and other European companies seeking to reduce their carbon footprints.
Thomas Finsterwald, project manager with Myclimate, admitted that the high fees make “it difficult to do small projects.” He said inspection fees might eat up 40% of income for some other projects. “This is really a problem.”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/aug/25/carbon-offset-consultancy-fees
I would think that it is a fairly safe bet that every single one of these companies that is in this coalition is in it for some reason relating to the fact that they figure they can make some money out of some scam they can talk the Government into mandating for their benefit.
Big Companies do do things that are environmentally beneficial; but very seldom is it altruism that motivates them.
One example; I used to work for Monsanto chemical; Central Research Labs in St Louis Mo; well actually out in the County towards the Airport where MacDonald Aircraft was/is located.
Over in East St Louis, Monsanto had smoke stack factories that put out every colored smoke known to man from some plant or other. In a weak moment of public sentimentality, they decided that they should clean up their act; for the good of their image.
So their plant engineers set about developing designs for special smoke stack cleaning systems to get rid of all that Krap. And since they knew exactly what species of Krap was in all those rainbow smokes; they could design very effective and cost efficient scrubbers; so they cleaned up the ESL sky line; and started feeling pleased with themselves.
Then out of the blue, someone somewhere else asked them how they got rid of that weird purple smoke; or whatever. They suddenly discovered that they had unearthed a whole new business for Monsanto, manufacturing off the shelf smokestack scrubbers for whatever ails you; which they started to (and presumably still do) sell all over the world.
What they started as simply good pr; turned out to be a profitable busness opportunity for them; and an environmental benefit for everyone else.
But it’s a rare business that does things for the pr effect; there’s a buck in it somewhere you can be sure.
I’m a great fan of capitalism. I don’t like businesses mucking with the legislation to line their nest with golden feathers; at the expense of the taxpayers.
“Capitol Hill is just a black hole for dollars and we are real tired of throwing ours in”
I don’t understand, Pat, it’s Nepal and its poor farmers who are paying for the biogas infrastructure while it’s the WWF that gets the credits? Something very wrong with that picture.
Deere sells equipment for crop production. When it looked like there would be a new crop (cellulosic ethanol, etc. ) they wanted to be the supplier of the equipment that would work it. Deere now sees no future in such biofuel crops as a driver for specialized equipment to harvest, transport, etc., and therefore nothing to be gained for the business. Deere is not the biggest manufacturer of farm equipment because they are stupid. They have a Crystal Ball group as do most other successful large corporations, and they plan ahead 20+ years.
Pay attention folks.
weather IS climate:
25 Aug: New Scientist: Anil Ananthaswamy: Time to blame climate change for extreme weather?
IT IS time to start asking the hard questions. Countless people in flood-stricken Pakistan have lost families and livelihoods. Who can they hold responsible and turn to for reparations?
Less than a decade ago, these questions would have been dismissed outright. “Many scientists at the time said that you can never blame an individual weather event on climate change,” says Myles Allen of the University of Oxford. But a small meeting of scientists in Colorado last week – organised by the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office and the UK Met Office’s Hadley Centre, among others – suggests the tide is turning…
“With the tools we have today we can do much better,” says Allen. His team is now using borrowed computing space from thousands of PC owners to run simulations for recent devastating weather events, though their results are not yet in.
Kevin Trenberth of the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado, thinks similar analyses should be done within weeks of an event…
Trenberth agrees. “It comes to the question: given that there is a global warming component to an event, is there any way in which you can sue somebody for it? Who do you sue?” He points out, though, that it will always be difficult to rule out natural variation in climate. “It’s going to be messy.”…
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20727754.200-time-to-blame-climate-change-for-extreme-weather.html
They better get it while they can, because the gravy train has left the station!
Obvious choice:No CO2, no plants:: no plants, no John Deere…
Remaining Johnson&Johson also meaningful…..Bedwetters et Diapers go along 🙂
TX Pat.
Bravo to Deere.
The bad news is that, with the interventionist policies of the gov’t, such coalitions have to exist as a matter of self-preservation. Even worse for small businesses that can’t afford a seat at the table is that the large corporations that can afford to be heard manage to influence legislation so that it is least harmful to them and the small businesses are left out in the cold to fend for themselves.
Sort of like the situation facing the colonists in the 18th century. The only organizations that could afford to speak to the gov’t (Parliament) were located in England. Rather one-sided. The middle class businesses in the colonies had no voice. Georgy #3 & taxation w/o representation? PR instruments to fan the feelings. It was a revolt of the middle class wanting out of the raw deal they were getting. In the winter of 1776/77 they kept on while many of the wealthy wanted to broker a peace. Fortunately, the middle class prevailed and independence was won. And for a century or so it worked and the gov’t knew its place.
Now, however, forgetting the painful lessons of the 18th century, we’ve recreated our own version of gov’t favors via Congress and all the offices they created for the Executive Branch. How the free have fallen.
I will consider that what’s been said, is less important that what’s not been so.
Remember here: Virtually every corporation, whether it be national or multinational, has members sitting on its board of directors whom also sit on the boards of directors in yet other corporations.
It’s all something of a rather incestuous nature, once you come to understand it all.
When those people start bailing, you’ve got to know that they’ve seen the ‘hand writing on the wall.’
Looks like the rats are leaving the sinking ship.
The trouble with the cap n trade Green Legislation is that everyone expects to make gazillions of dollars off the new trading scheme by charging astronomical fees and lisences plus labyrinth trading schemes. Only problem is, the West is low on cash these days, seeing that the Bailees have been ladled all there is, and there ain’t no more. The East doesn’t want to play the game, unless the West ladles all the benefits out to them.
A sea of sticky fingers grasping for GreenBacks that aren’t there.
The rats are indeed jumping ship. That’s very good. But let us never forget that they are indeed rats.
Deere has outsourced practically all of their manufacturing to China, a nation that courageously refuses to limit CO2 emissions. Yet they had supported cap-and-trade for Americans. That tells me that they have absolutely no faith in America, American employees, or the very idea of America. They wanted it both ways, and they almost had it.
I stopped buying GE appliances many years ago, and I decided NOT to buy a Deere tractor last summer, when I was in the market for a medium-sized tractor, for these reasons. I now buy AMERICAN as much as possible. And real American companies believe in America, don’t manufacture in China, don’t get in bed with politicians, and don’t behave like rats.
Companies will spread good will and a few dollars easily
Deer may find the stink is to much tand the risk of a dirty reputation by association is getting expensive.
Our administration is in bad shape. The notion of green jobs is bogus. They did however re classify ag food production jobs as green ones so they can brag about green job creation. We have had farmers growing food before america was discovered.
From the article:
“We came to the conclusion that Deere had other opportunities to be involved in climate change initiatives,” Golden said.
The only ones who still believe the climate doesn’t change are those credulous folks who believe in Michael Mann’s debunked hockey stick [MBH98/MBH99], in which Mann et al. argues that there was neither a Medieval Warm Period, nor a Little Ice age — nothing but a benevolent, unchanging climate for the past thousand years, with CO2 levels between 280 – 285 ppmv everywhere, from the equator to the poles.
Really, that is Mann’s preposterous conclusion. No wonder he still refuses to disclose his methodology, twelve years after arguing that the climate never changed until the industrial revolution came along.
The John Deere folks should get up to speed regarding the term “climate change.” WUWT readers have known all along that the climate is constantly changing. Only Mann’s acolytes believe the climate is unchanging.
From the U.S. Climate Action Partnership website:
” Washington, D.C. (June 11, 2010) – The following is a statement from the U.S. Climate Action
Partnership (USCAP) regarding the June 10 vote on the Murkowski Resolution that would have
prohibited EPA from regulating greenhouse gas emissions under the Clean Air Act.
The vote on the resolution offered by Sen. Lisa Murkowski reinforces the need for a legislative
approach to solving our energy and climate challenges. Many who voted for the Murkowski
resolution have also supported federal energy and climate legislation that creates jobs while
reducing our greenhouse gas emissions.
This includes Sen. Murkowski herself, who said upon introducing her resolution: “I would also
remind my critics that I co-sponsored a cap-and-trade bill in the last Congress, and last year worked
with the members of the Senate Energy Committee to craft a bipartisan clean energy bill.”
=========
From:
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-20014726-503544.html
“Sen. Lisa Murkowski, who trails Tea Party-backed candidate Joe Miller by a few votes in the Alaska GOP primary with thousands of absentee ballots yet to be counted, told reporters this afternoon that “it ain’t over yet.”
“There is much, much yet to be counted,” she said.”
——————-
Looks like the Senator tried to cover all the bases, and lost half the voters.
Carbon runs John Deere, but so does profits….
“BP PLC (BP.LN, BP) and ConocoPhillips Co. (COP)”…….everyone here should note the big oil conspiracy. As far as I know, Dutch Shell is still part of the group. Fact is, big oil was the father of the cap and trade scheme. Caterpillar, too. The lie, repeated, over and over again was simply a diversion. Anyone that cared to know did know. Why this was never front page news is disquieting. The reasons as to why big energy and big oil was behind the cap and trade should be obvious. Why it was never properly reported, too, should be obvious, if one thinks for just a moment.
Did my comment go down the memory hole?
[Reply: Yes. But it’s rescued & posted now. I have no idea why your posts end up in the spam folder. Maybe you weren’t a good boy in a previous life. ~dbs, mod.]
I can only hope my
screamingcounseling at farmers that brought new green machines nearby made a difference.Wonder if the Deere people feel uncomfortable being in league with the EPA and now have to come up with ‘Dustless’ farm equipment. Of course $0.10 / ton CO2 may not be a robust generator of cash flow.
k, so I’ll try again. BP PLC (BP.LN, BP) and ConocoPhillips Co. (COP)……….big oil? Yep. As far as I know, Dutch Shell is still part of that group. There is the “big oil”conspiracy. Funding the cap and trade markets. Anyone that cared to know should have already. Any time some idiot spews blathering bs about big oil funding the skeptic movement should be taught this information. Why this was never clarified by MSM, well, most of us already know. But, we should always let them know they helped fund big oil by espousing the cap and trade scheme. Stupid SOB’s.
[Reply: Yes. But it’s rescued & posted now. I have no idea why your posts end up in the spam folder. Maybe you weren’t a good boy in a previous life. ~dbs, mod.]
lol, nor, probably, this one! But, I’ll keep trying ’til I get it right! It’s NBD, except when I reiterate the same thoughts in a more drunken state!!! Then it’s just sad.
DD More says:
August 25, 2010 at 6:12 pm
“Wonder if the Deere people feel uncomfortable being in league with the EPA and now have to come up with ‘Dustless’ farm equipment……”
Don’t know about the Deere people, but the limited few Deere buyers that I was able to show how Deere was in league with the EPA, cap and trade, and CO2phobes, well, they told me they’d find other hues to cover their equipment.
Pat @ 4:10,
So Hansen wants to sue someone for the floods in Pakistan. How will he feel when someone sues him for his role in wasting billions on a non-event. Billions that may have been used for flood mitigation in Pakistan or revegetation of the catchments which apparently caused much of the flooding. Hansen has got very dirty hands and one day should be held to account.
While I hold politicians responsible for the politicising of climate and accuse them of failing to do due diligence before accepting the theory, the real criminals are the scientists who advise them.
The recent Australian election has shown that 13% supported the Greens and an ETS, 50% voted for no ETS/carbon price and some 37% who voted for delayed (2013) introduction of a carbon price. Three years ago over 70% voted for an ETS. People started bailing out when they realised electricity prices would increase by about 40%. If the MSM ever start publishing data showing a cooling world the whole mess will collapse.
From: James Sexton on August 25, 2010 at 6:07 pm
Could it be related to his last name being potentially suitable for a pr0n star?
🙂
Deere has outsourced practically all of their manufacturing to China, a nation that courageously refuses to limit CO2 emissions.
I don’t doubt this is true, but don’t think Deere or most of the other corporations using foreign outsourcing are doing it to line their fat wallets. Most corporations are doing it just to stay alive. It’s getting really tough to sell an American-made product and still maintain a positive profit margin. I know in my industry we now have competition from places like Brazil where the average worker makes something like US$4 to $6 an hour. The US labor cost is probably four times that number, at the low end, not including benefits like health insurance. If your product is labor intensive, it is almost impossible to compete on price with a foreign manufacturer. We’ve changed how we do business, redesigned our products to reduce cost and build time, and in the end we still can’t compete with the foreign competition on price. Unfortunately we’ve started moving work to Mexico just to keep our costs down to maintain our marketshare. We would love to keep local workers on the payroll but unfortunately the choice is to shift some of the work or go out of business.
I don’t know what the solution is. Free trade has been great for the consumer but it’s killing the manufacturing sector. Maybe it’s time to start re-evaluating import tariffs. If the super-cheap imported products weren’t so cheap, the domestic products would have a better chance.
Jerry says:
August 25, 2010 at 4:59 pm
China fully supports America throwing itself upon the Emerald Green Sword of it’s own making.
All the better for the Orient. They surely are not going to kick a gift-horse in the mouth.
I can hear the raucous laughter, as America beats itself into economic hamburger.
“Could it be related to his last name being potentially suitable for a pr0n star?
:-)”
With my name and particular build, I often have to persuade people that I’m really not in the industry…..:-) (While I’m jamming to Nick Gilder….hahhahahahah)
John Deere also makes industrial size wind turbines. similar in size to the ones GE makes. Maybe they can see the writing on the wall and don’t want to get caught in the backlash.
JimBob says:
August 25, 2010 at 7:36 pm
“Deere has outsourced practically all of their manufacturing to China, a nation that courageously refuses to limit CO2 emissions.”
JimBob said…..”I don’t doubt this is true, but don’t think Deere or most of the other corporations using foreign outsourcing are doing it to line their fat wallets. Most corporations are doing it just to stay alive. It’s getting really tough to sell an American-made product and still maintain a positive profit margin…..”
JimBod, it is true, and they are lining their pockets. That being said, that is more indicative of our insane trade laws as opposed to people in business. The nature of people in business is to make money. God bless the ones that do. It is what feeds the rest of the country. There is no shame in making a profit. There is a shame in sacrificing your countrymen in doing so. Regardless of you nationality, the prior statement is true. Given the current trade laws in the U.S., it is almost impossible to have a corporate presence in the U.S. Sam Walton showed the world the loyalty of the U.S. consumer. Sadly, the lesson wasn’t learned. Today, the products we buy are given to the cheapest bidders. There is plenty blame to go around, but remember, the nature, nay, the purpose of corporations is to be profitable. The laws need to be changed. The priorities of this nation need to be changed. We will not thrive elsewise.
“Regardless of you”, obviously should read “Regardless of your”……..I wouldn’t even bother, but that statement is important and central to the concept I’m trying to convey.
JimBob says:
August 25, 2010 at 7:36 pm
Deere has outsourced practically all of their manufacturing to China, a nation that courageously refuses to limit CO2 emissions.
“I don’t doubt this is true, […]”
‘Practically all’ is not close to true. My company here in the US supplies some components to Deere and we’re nowhere near the only U.S. supplier to Deere. It is true that a fair amount of their components come from China.
Note that many U.S. manufacturers are now starting up “on-shoring” efforts. Sure, the direct cost per part from China is lower, but with long lead times and long supply lines, inventories must need be larger and inventory costs are higher. And if there is a quality problem, you could be shut down for a month or two or three while waiting for good replacement parts. (Believe me, China still has a host of quality problems. They are still learning how to manufacture quality goods while the U.S. is losing generations of knowledge about how to make things.)
China will continue to be an important supplier to U.S. manufacturers, but many U.S. companies are rethinking China’s role as a supplier of their high quality, high volume components.
The dust has not even begun to settle over strategic onshoring vs. offshoring, though the U.S. government seems hellbent on encouraging (read that as forcing) offshoring.
From: James Sexton on August 25, 2010 at 7:56 pm
Say, now there is a marketing idea for the site:
Come see Jimmy Sexton take care of the Warming all over the Globe, online at WUWT!
pat says: “…Trenberth agrees. “It comes to the question: given that there is a global warming component to an event, is there any way in which you can sue somebody for it? Who do you sue?” He points out, though, that it will always be difficult to rule out natural variation in climate. “It’s going to be messy.”
It’s going to be a travesty.
kadaka (KD Knoebel) says:
August 25, 2010 at 9:03 pm
hahahhahahahaahhaha!!!! WIN!!
except, I’m old, tired and irratable.!! H.R…imagine a world where people put their country first………..
pat says:
August 25, 2010 at 4:10 pm
May we call it the Trenberth Tort?
Precedent is for weather events as being ‘Acts of God’.
Pakistan would then have to abandon it’s current forms of religion and beliefs in order to defend the argument that Man is now in control of the weather/climate.
That means diminishing Islamic teaching, and it will go over like a ton of bricks.
Next up, one would have to prove intent to harm.
Then there is the problem of a contract between Pakistan and the US in the form of aid (goodwill) to denounce.
I think Mr. Trenberth is blowing smoke in a hornets nest, and has tarried too long at the well of Climate Change hysteria.
At my little house in Marietta,GA. I not only have a birdfeeder I have flower beds planted by my beloved Libby. Every once in a while when I get up at dawn and open the front curtain there is a deer munching on Libby’s flowers. When the light hits the deer they bolt and run. The light has hit the John Deere Corp. and they have bolted and run!
The “Greens,” and “Eco-Crazies” have turned against Agriculture with a vengeance. Deere was in the same untenable position Caterpillar was in; they were supporting an orgnization that was beating their customers to a pulp. And, the customers didn’t like it.
James Sexton says:
August 25, 2010 at 9:47 pm
“[…]H.R…imagine a world where people put their country first………..”
The only true sources of wealth are mining, manufacturing, and agriculture. A country that doesn’t know how to make things is ripe for the pickin’. The U.S. is coming to that, thanks to our political skunks of every stripe.
I am passionate about U.S. manufacturing. It is one of the cornerstones of our liberty… [self snip; save the moderators from the hassle of deleting column-acres of OT diatribe]
The U.S. Climate Action Partnership is a “CYA” Partnership. When it is no longer something that you can, or have to, spend time and money on to cover your A$$, you pull out. It’s a Corporate ‘Political and Public Relations’ thing that helps your image with your most important clients – Dick & Jane Customer; and your most dangerous – Congress, Presidents, Judges, NPO’s, PAC’s, the ACLU, the ABA, the AFL-CIO, the DNC, and the GOP, ad nausyium.
There’s more to be read -at any given point in time- to who ISN’T in the Club than who IS. (The ‘AGW’ Image is taking a real bad hit when those like the recent members leave the ‘Club’.)
kyoto insanity in Aus is forcing farmers off their land or making it so they cant grow graze or use in any way their own land, while paying for maintaining it and taxes for owning it. so Tractor sales etc wont be growing anytime soon.
we lost our aussie makers, to OS same as you pretty much have.
anyone noticing USA Aus and Britain are ALL bitching re offshored products we used to make so well and proudly, massive unemployment and underskilled workers abound.
so much for Free trade and improved lives.
I am not seeing that.
we are copping imported fruit and veg from china usa etc, constantly undercutting our own. we are NOT happy about it. not do we like the sell off of our land and food producers to foriegn owners who after screwing our farmers to the wall with low prices, then proceed to raise prices when they buy the same farms out from under us!
Deeres aggressive marketing helped ruin aussie makers. so how? is the clintons wheeling and dealing over free trade good? like to put the pair of them and the commerce chaps UNDER a deere.
The rat may have jumped the ship, but it is still a rat.
Major US manufacturers are getting ready for climate regulation via the USEPA, using the Clean Air Act and/or Clean Water Act. I have this information right from the horses’ mouths.
Cap & trade was a sop to Wall Street & utilities so they could recoup some of their costs for the upgrades they will be forced to make. With EPA regulation, they get none of that.
The DC lobbyists are thrashing about in bloody waters, wait and see how this works out. EPA will act before November 2010 elections.
See how they distance themselves, Kohai?
From today’s Chicago Tribune: John Deere bails on wind energy:
http://chicagobreakingbusiness.com/2010/08/deere-selling-windpower-unit-to-exelon.html