Guest essay by Eric Worrall
Greens have requested that Private Businesses step in and top up an anticipated funding shortfall of in excess of ten billion dollars per annum, when Trump cancels US government funding of climate programmes.
The Private Sector May Lead the Charge Against Climate Change During the Trump Administration
Why? Because it makes economic sense. No matter what Trump and his cabinet do, the private sector will likely forge ahead, argues Shayle Kann.
by Shayle Kann
December 15, 2016
As the inauguration of President Donald Trump approaches, the future of federal action on energy and climate change remains highly uncertain. And while nothing is set in stone, there is mounting evidence that the new administration will drastically change course from the path set out by President Obama.
…
While no outcome is preordained, it is probably safe to assume that the U.S. will not take significant federal action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions over the next four years. And it is possible that the federal government will begin to roll back many of the R&D and investment programs that have supported the recent domestic boom in clean energy. Initiatives already underway in a few states may act as a limited countervailing force, but the absence of federal action will be strongly felt.
Large companies are already taking action
If the federal government steps back, the private sector may leap forward. The U.S. business community has already become an increasingly emphatic voice in the chorus of calls for greater action on climate change. Just after the U.S. election, during the Marrakech climate talks, over 300 businesses signed an open letter to the incoming president in support of the Paris climate accord and continuation of low-carbon policies. Ninety-one of these companies have annual revenue over $100 million, including DuPont, General Mills and Intel Corporation.
…
Corporate action cannot entirely make up for intransigence at the federal level, but it may just be enough to allow the global decarbonization trend to continue apace.
While there is no doubt some CEOs are as rabidly committed to renewables as any Greenpeace protestor, this assumption that private businesses will step into the breach, that they will somehow be able to keep the party going, verges on delusional.
I’m sure private businesses run by hardline greens be able to stump up a few hundred million, maybe even every year. But in my opinion green groups are about to experience a very hard landing. Nobody will be able to cover the multi-billion dollar cash shortfall they are all about to experience.
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Why would stockholders of a business allow teh management of the company to divert their return dollars from dividend payments to “social action” without retribution – such as removing the CEO.
There is in fact a concept of a stakeholder that is treated quite seriously. So far the government was the stakeholder in the green murky-business. Exit the government, and all other green stakeholders turn silly.
Hang on, I thought is “deeenyerz” who were funded by a well organised ‘industry’ of private money.They want to steal our funding, no way ! LOL.
The government is a stakeholder in a very small percentage of companies. Most of the money that has been given out is in the form of grants or loans. Neither makes the government a shareholder, unless the loan is a convertible one.
@Greg – “deeenyerz”
Love that spelling! You can almost hear the nasal whine of a 9-year old on the playground when it’s spelled that way.
In the private economy, a “stakeholder” is an interloper who wheedles his way into a business decision even though he has no property or legal rights. He is a usurper and any business executive who allows third parties to have a “stake” in a private matter have subverted the rights of the shareholders.
If any third party wants to influence a business decision, they are welcome to appeal to the shareholders who in turn indicate that the issue should be taken into account, and who would be willing to accept any financial consequences to the value of their shares.
This is one reason why progressives hate property rights and seek to erode and destroy them.
@buckwheaton – Actually, when a company is very close to insolvency, there is a fiduciary responsibility to run the company for all “stakeholders”, usually defined as creditors, employees, and shareholders. But yes, most of the time you hear it, it is hardly said in that context.
“Stakeholders” are interlopers who want a say in making decisions in an enterprise or organization in which they have no ownership or contractual authority.
Anthony why am I getting the annoying Security Screen again? Was prevalent last week.
Never seen a “security screen” here. Do you mean a login prompt? Sounds like you might have a browser hijack.
I get it as well. Eventually it goes away. Yes, maddening to me.
Perhaps it goes like this – a net worth of maybe 5 million $ will buy one all of the creature comforts many people would ever want. So, say I have a net worth of $20M. I will certainly apply $15M of that toward something that I care deeply about. My std of living ain’t gonna change much going from $20M to $5M net worth. And chances are if I have that kind of money, I have the talent to make plenty more of it.
So… perhaps there will be private contributions in the Billions $ all combined. If so, I say great! That is how it should work. If people want to spend their own money on this stuff, more power to them! But get the govt the heck out of funding crap science. Govt should fund some science – but it needs to do a WAY better job of oversight of the return taxpayers are getting on their hard earned dollars!
Dreamers these greens Ha Ha These people are businessmen!
Cheers
Roger
http://www.rogerfromnewzealand.wordpress.com
There are also private foundations. However every penny diverted to funding climate research is a penny diverted away from supporting left wing causes.
“Greens have requested that Private Businesses step in and top up an anticipated funding shortfall of in excess of ten billion dollars per annum, when Trump cancels US government funding of climate programmes.”
And if I don’t?
If you don’t you won’t be throwing your money away.
Anyway, it is only a request. the answer to which is “Please explain exactly why I should give you anything. Include scientific data to support your request, if any exists.”
You’ll get to see a Greenie cry. Or at least spit feathers.
One of the differences between President Obama and President Elect Trump
Obama
Oh I wish I was a globalist and greenie,
that is what I truly want to be.
‘Cause if I was a globalist and greenie,
everyone would be in love with me
Trump
Oh I’m glad I’m not a globalist or greenie,
that is something I don’t want to be.
‘Cause if I was a globalist and greenie,
klimate ka$h is what they’d want from me
@Bryan A
Golf Clap!
You will get bad reputation. They will say that your business hurt the environment and cause climate change. If they were able to give bad reputation to CO2, which is the most important gas for life on Earth, they can give bad reputation to anything.
That is why I call them “green mafia”
Pay up or your business will suffer.
Have you seen the No pressure ad where people who do not support climate action were blown into pieces? Well, the sponsors were Sony and Kyocera, among others. According to Sony Europe’s Director of Communications, they did not know what they were sponsoring. That is what I call extorsion.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_Pressure_(film)
There is a sort of precedent!
Some years ago, when a Shell North Sea Oil Platform became redundant, Shell wanted to simply cut the legs and let it slide under the sea. The Green Brigade protested that it would create an environmental disaster, particularly for marine life, as there was a great deal of very toxic materials, chemicals and other contaminating items on-board. They demanded that Shell tow the rig onshore into a UK specialised dry dock with environmentally friendly, but excessively expensive, clean up and demolition facilities. The Green campaign raged on with banner headlines in all the UK Press, and Shell eventually caved in and did as were ere being asked. Low and behold, very, very little toxic materials and waste was discovered; nothing even mildly providing and environmental problems, particularly with the inevitable dilution actions of the sea, given Shell’s intended original procedure. Typically, the Greens never apologised or even accepted they had been wrong!
This time, with the massive drop in oil and gas prices, the Oil and Gas Industry are far less financially strong and so, hopefully, their own self interest will kick in and they will not so easily buckle, even with a similar sustained and hysterical Green outburst!
The big problem any CEO will have wasting money on far-left climate agendas is the stockholders. Any CEO this stupid will quickly find himself not longer a CEO.
Awesome. If Apple, Google, etc, refuse to bring their foreign money back home to avoid taxes (which were being used for this stuff) then they can happily self-fund… it’s not “real” money if it’s in Ireland as far as I’m concerned… why do I care if Ford-China is profitable or not if it doesn’t benefit the US? Similarly, I don’t really give a rip that they waste foreign money… if anything, it’s a net upside as it means less cash for foreign investment which could indirectly hurt US investment.
Because some companies attract similarly minded people. Apple specifically invited people to sell the stock if they don’t like the policies (probably to make sure it never becomes an issue during a shareholder vote.)
http://www.cultofmac.com/268413/tim-cook-tells-profit-obsessed-investors-sell-stock/
http://mashable.com/2014/02/28/apple-ceo-tim-cook-climate-change/#xIb9AvvfOuqT
I think the desire of any private business to do virtue signalling will vastly diminish with the Obama adminstration out of office. Exxon-Mobil and carbon capture will go away, unless the EU or such makes it attractive, and similar silly notions by other corporations will be put on hold.
I agree. After inauguration day that garbage will go out with the Kann.
General Electric is conspicuously absent from The List.
They are on this list. https://www.santos.com/media/2839/bccc-media-statement-businessstatement.pdf
Thanks Chris, that document is vague lip service, which history will hopefully file under “Failed Climate Change Global Govt. Coup in early 21st Century”. Two drawers up from German business documents of the 1930’s aligning themselves with a successful ideological take-over.
Pop, it’s not lip service. Companies moving to obtain 100% of their energy needs from renewable sources is not lip service.
Chris===> which the companies are not actually doing, only buying offsets for the amount of power they use. That is rather like buying indugences, as no one has an actual all-renewable grid up anywhere.
Pop, it’s not lip service. Companies moving to obtain 100% of their energy needs from renewable sources is not lip service
Well ’nuff said. Could you list them all so that I could avoid any investment in said businesses?
The companies agree to endeavor to persevere.
H/T Chief Dan George
Tom Halla said: “Chris===> which the companies are not actually doing, only buying offsets for the amount of power they use. That is rather like buying indugences, as no one has an actual all-renewable grid up anywhere.”
Do you have links to support those claims? Here is one example of renewable purchases (Apple): http://www.datacenterdynamics.com/content-tracks/design-build/apple-reaches-100-renewable-energy-across-all-data-centers/74708.fullarticle
Chris==.> There were two attempts to do an all-renewable grid, in Tasmania and one of the Spanish Canaries, both of which were failures, even using the EU definition of hydro as”renewable”. I am sure there is no such unicorn in North America or Europe.
In Washington State, hydro power is considered “clean”, not sure if it’s considered “renewable”. But greenies don’t like hydro either, because it hurts the fishies.
I was taught as a wee laddie that Bonneville had a fish ladder to let the fishies get around the dam.
Visited there a few years ago. The lampreys stuck to the observation glass were FREAKY!
As we say here in the UK. Our dear, how sad , never mind.
Allow me …
Oh dear, so sad, never mind ?
lol. Keep giving. money to a cause that is more parasitic than all religions combined. The climatocracy is the least productive movement yet created. Any private concerns giving that mob money willingly are run by fools. Starve the climate beast. The result will be that we discover “‘climate change” really is man-made…only not in the way the climate parasites claim.
I’m curious how paying danegeld to the green monster may ever be considered heroic after it becomes obvious it is not a monster, but a bottomless pit with some silly green camouflage.
Watching them cry is going to be delicious. Private sector isn’t going to come close to the $Texas$ they’re used to, and most were in it for the Federal handouts and tax breaks.
Did you mean”$Taxes$”?
They are easily confused now that $Taxes$ has replaced Texas as the largest state in the union. As Mitt once inferred, all but 47% of the country lives in the state of $Taxes$.
There should be no limit on how people in the private sector choose to spend their money. And there should be limits on how other people’s money is spent by politicians.
The U.S. business community —> Solyndra
Why can’t we send all our nasty below zero weather to Silly Cone Valley in California and have them enjoy global cooling personally.
Feeding misguided environmentalism at the public trough — trillions. Subjecting it to market forces — priceless.
The good side of this is that once the money is cut-off, we will probably start to see some better science being done in this field (for the first time).
All the funding just encouraged ever more faulty science to be produced. It just got worse and worse. It even resulted in the good science providers getting pushed out and fired. The peer pressure system evolved into something that encouraged bad science “only”.
This is a prime example of providing too much free money to something.
The green energy subsidies are the same. It is never beneficial to be “too” anything but providing “too much funding” to something usually produces the opposite results compared to that originally intended. Governments need to understand that but they often fall victim to lobby efforts or politically correct movements and often provide too much funding to various programs.
Climate science needs to go back to Zero funding except to keep the lights on the satellites and observation gathering instruments until the peer pressure system and the group think can be reset and the bad scientists let go. How long do you think that will take?
Bill,
Exactly. Most readers here probably know the old economic adage, “If you want more of something, subsidize it. If you want less of something, tax it.”
I think less time than we might expect, Bill. If I understand Trump’s plans correctly, one of the ways of downsizing government is to eliminate or combine duplicate efforts and pare down non-performers. Using that approach eliminates the long slog of trying to fire individual employees. As best I know, it’s nearly impossible to fire any given government worker, but it’s a snap to eliminate whole groups, except for the fight with Congress. But since Trump can bypass the MSM, he’ll ask the voters, “Why do we need 2 (or 3 or 4 or 5) groups doing the same thing?” Given the election results, it will be Trump and the congress critter’s constituents against the congress critter.
I wish people would stop using the term, “congress critter”. It sort of makes them sound all cute and fuzzy and harmless.
I guess ‘critters’ have positive or negative connotations depending on your location. Around my local, the coyotes eat sheep and pets, the rabbits girdle trees, the raccoons often carry rabies and fish out ponds, the skunks tear up your yard, and the deer eat your landscaping to the ground. Last winter, the deer came up on our front porch to ring the doorbell because the bird feeder hadn’t been filled for a couple of days.
But I take your point and will no longer use the alliterative descriptor, ‘congress critters’. Instead I’ll refer to them as congress vermin.
MoC (Members of Congress) is my preferred label.
I’d prefer ‘varmint’, but can’t come up with a good modifier. How about ‘creature’ ? As in the congress creature from the Black Lagoon on the Potomac.
[“Critter” is the mid-country, non-Hillary-elector-state, generic term for an unidentified rural creature wandering in the night. Hillary-elector-states use “rat”, since “politician” is an insult even there. .mod]
The desire for ‘better science’ is rooted in the belief that climate science is relevant. It’s not. Once you remove the doom, it resumes being esoteric. A field for hundreds, not thousands of scientists.
Ten billion dollars per annum is a not inconsiderable sum of money. Per annum.
no its not inconsiderable
I’d like to see such funds used to actually DO something useful.
like provide water/sewerage or food to the same people they say…they intend to help…by greencrap instead.
Here’s the math: There are roughly 100 million families in the US. However, half the families in the US pay no taxes, and many even get “negative taxes”, I. e. subsidies. That means that EVERY taxpaying family in the US is on the hook for $200 in order to pay the 10 billion.
If only more people would realize that fact, there would be lot of teeth gnashing. Great for dentists. GK
If the companies want to finance it and the shareholders are on board then great. I just don’t want a bunch of taxpayer money funding think tanks in Universities and funding the profit of political donors.
I, for one, have enormous sympathy for their plight and hereby pledge to donate every single one of my ‘Big Oil’ checks to fight CO2-based Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming.
I urge you all to join me. It’s the least we can do.
H.R. I agree with your motives and action. I hereby pledge to spend all my Big Oil Climate Change Disruption cheques to the development of poverty reducing technologies and offsetting the effects of climate change, especially winter.
I’m in for that as well.
Not sure the warmists will be willing to hold their collective breath until they get it, though.
Nah, I’m going to keep mine and reinvest it in shares of Chevron or Exxon. Let Green Peace, Sierra Club, SkepticalScience, and Union of Concerned Scientists fund the research.
Okay. But only the $$ given to me expressly to support my actions as a denier. All else is MINE.
Me too. Nobody gets my Quick Trip rebates. My wife has distant relatives that own a pipeline terminal and all they ever gave me was a job pumping gas while in college. So much for big oil money here.
Green blob wailing will be loud enough to be heard on Mars. Can’t wait.
In space no one hears you wail.
Crispin, you obviously don’t understand the magical powers of man-generated CO2.
There was a Question Contest in Omni Mag years ago. The answer given was, “Space”. The winning question was, “What do most students occupy at university?”
The overall winner was to the answer, “To be or not to be.” The winning question was, “What is the square root of 4b^2?”
It is clear that in the current Administration it was considered good business to become a lapdog of the President because there were considerable favors for those who fell in line. Not to say this has not happened in previous Administrations, but normally our “free” media has historically exposed close relationships between business and the President. As others have mentioned, when the prize an propaganda are removed, support for climate change will wain.
Looking at the list supporting the Paris Agreement, although I did not count, I note that a considerable number on the list are not corporations but government offices, religious groups, Unions, and ski lodges. Of course nothing would stop the 300 from donating their money to the UN rather than using my tax payments if they really believed in the movement.
I am so glad I invested in popcorn futures last year.
Munch munch munch…
An implicit recognitiojn that “green” can’t stand on its own legs. And asking for a few billion per year can be put in the context of the scurrilous accusations at our address of being in the pay of “fossil fuel interests”.
The Green Mob doesn’t have to worry, Gov Brown will keep things going. Well, for the next couple years…
Hasn’t he run out of other peoples money ?
“………And it is possible that the federal government will begin to roll back many of the R&D and investment programs that have supported the recent domestic boom in clean energy. Initiatives already underway in a few states may act as a limited countervailing force, but the absence of federal action will be strongly felt……..”.
Soooo sorry GreenTechMedia, but I hardly think that solar energy, which is currently providing about 0.6% of our total electricity needs in the U.S., constitutes what you call a “boon”. And that was as of April of 2016 according to the fed’s EIA—and the solar panel has been around for going on 63 years now. Wind isn’t doing a whole lot better at a mediocre 4.7% when those turbines aren’t killing birds. Look at the physics and engineering problems with wind and solar if you want to know why.
http://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.cfm?id=427&t=3.
Coal, natural gas, nuclear and hydro together are producing 92% of our electrical energy needs, and I am all in favor of nuclear’s and NG’s numbers going up. Wouldn’t mind coal going up either, but the bad reputation it’s been given makes that seem unlikely to me. Some new nuke plants are being built in Georgia and South Carolina, IIRC, and one in Tennessee just went online a while back. Good to see.
Do yourself a favor GreenTechMedia, you and California need to rid yourselves of the delusion that this country can do without fossil fuels and nuclear power in the absence of some major breakthrough to replace them (nuclear fusion?)—-especially crude oil which we use primarily for transportation, among other things, and not electricity generation.
The country’s economy would collapse without fossil fuels and nuclear, and I have yet to hear of a game plan you greenies have in place to prevent that. Not that you probably care………
Oops, meant “boom”, not boon. Anthony: When are we going to be able to edit typos in our comments like we can do on Facebook?
Or Disqus.
CD, good posting, it IS delusional to believe wind, solar, and bio-fuels have a chance to replace the fossil fuels which currently make our lives comfortable. It is a crime that so many scientists are misinforming the policy makers and citizens into believing otherwise just to enrich their bank account. It will be many decades before sufficient alternatives are developed.
When a government will subsidize a business for being green, businesses are more likely to act green. I wonder how many of those 300 business people represented companies receiving green financial incentives. Of course, they may also act green if it is good PR, but the election outcome shows that many Americans aren’t that interested in patronizing companies delivering the green mantra.
Finally…the science will shift. It is already shifting. Research will reveal a much lower climate sensitivity than previously expected (it already has) and those papers will get more coverage. New studies will reveal that previous temperature adjustments were too large and often in the wrong direction. Crisis skeptical scientists will be funded and get more press, finally revealing the glaring false assumptions in the AGW Theory. Global temperatures will cool.
Of course, Hansen et al, will still be regarded as heroes among the ‘intelligentsia’ and the ‘elite’. Those with massive egos will always cling to their delusions.
“If the federal government steps back, the private sector may leap forward.”
The private sector already leaped forward. They leaped forward to grab the money and run. I have been a US DOE grant reviewer. You should see the chancers and dancers that rock up when there is free money on a plate. Obviously it is felt that singing the current psalm from the right hymn book is how to win a beauty contest.
Expecting to have the private sector leap forward is to hope (in vain?) that the government will give tax credit – in the sense of deducting it 1 for 1 from taxes payable – for anything shovelled at renewable and CO2 energy reduction projects.
It is an interesting concept. Would private companies, even on that basis, fund the development of technologies that they didn’t already have a piece of? I am not saying don’t do it – not at all – but it raises an interesting question: Does the AGW meme find traction in private companies beyond sucking up free money? Would they actually pay for these things if it didn’t have perceived caché with the Starbucks and iPhone crowds?
If CAGW is more than a party-political marketing and greenwashing exercise, now would be the time to prove it.
“If CAGW is more than a party-political marketing and greenwashing exercise, now would be the time to prove it.”
Bang on the money, D day approaches. Put up or shut up, the science stands without public funding or it dies a death.
The idea that private companies are going to fund government departments with that level of money is ridiculous. University science will attract private funding as always but without public money on offer to wind and solar companies then there won’t be any profit to invest. Do the alarmists think that funds are going to suddenly appear from companies that currently don’t back the science? That thinking falls into the same trap as government demanding ever more energy efficiency from industry because it thinks that companies normally waste money.
Trump will not only be the best thing for America if he can force top down business ideology but also show a lead to the rest of the world.