For American energy, the Overton Window has gone from almost shut under President Biden to fully open under Trump. Energy scarcity and its policy of Net Zero by 2050 has been replaced by energy abundance and a “Drill, Baby, Drill” mindset.
That said, the American mind is very divided and needs to unite around an energy standard that can connect its right and left lobes. We need a real energy standard by which to judge the energy stack. ARC — affordable, reliable, and clean — is it.
The policy commitments of the Net Zero camp are a product of strong emotion and weak science and economics: mankind’s use of fossil fuels and the attendant CO2 emissions are killing the planet and our future on it. However, the net effect of Net Zero — globally and domestically — is a politically induced green inflation and a Hunger Games logic that hurts the world’s poor and middle classes for no net environmental gain.
The ARC standard brings needed economic, scientific and policy clarity and literacy to a divided American and global mind. The value of any given energy input is best understood as a blended average of affordability, reliability, and cleanliness.
Here’s the ARC ranking of our energy stack, according to a new study by The Heartland Institute:
It shows natural gas as the clear winner when all three criteria are taken into account. Across the A, R, and C, natural gas gets 1 point in each category, for a combined score of 3 — with lower scores closer to perfect power sources and higher scores being least compatible with ARC. By contrast, while solar performs well in the emissions category, it accumulates a number of strikes against it due to factors like its price per megawatt-hour, intermittency, and poor performance on land conservation, animal kills, and soil impacts.
Let’s look at each of the ARC measures separately, which will show the commonsense value of this energy formula.
Affordable is the energy bang for the energy buck. The affordability of any unit of energy is a product of extraction costs and the regulations that govern them. For example, the Biden administration’s regulation of oil and gas artificially increased its market price at a huge cost to the larger economy. Raise the cost of fossil fuels and your raise the price of chemicals used for farming, clothing, medical devices, as well as the cost of creating windmills and solar that are petroleum dependent. One of my favorite scenes in the popular Paramount series “Land Man” is when Billy Bob Thornton’s character explains how much fossil fuel goes into creating a windmill to his shark lawyer conflicted by her green values. For a windmill, the concrete slab, the extraction cost for the materials, the grease to keep it spinning, and the asphalt roads needed to service it, all use fossil fuels — and it takes 20 years for the fossil debt to be paid off and turn a green profit. It’s crushing logic.
Reliable means always-on energy — a prerequisite of modern civilization. The Net Zero crowd favors wind and solar above all others in the present stack. The problem with these politically favored energy sources is that they’re not reliable. The sun does not always shine, and the wind does not always blow, and the battery tech required to make up for their natural limits is neither on-hand nor on the horizon.
Clean is the measure of an energy unit and its impact on the physical environment. Solar, wind, and nuclear are the cleanest by CO2 standards. Among the fossil fuels, natural gas is the cleanest of all the Jurassic energy gifts.
Imagine if we had an energy source that could meet society’s ever-growing energy needs without CO2. What a breakthrough that would be. We’ve been chasing the engineering unicorns of hydrogen and fission for decades. All the while, nuclear is the cleanest in the stack. Nuclear’s CO2 output is zero. Nuclear’s problem is regulatory, and its barriers come from the Net Zero crowd. If they cared about avoiding the fast-approaching gloom and doom of their models, they would embrace nuclear and clear its regulatory path. Fortunately, under this administration, the voracious appetite of A.I. and advances in nuclear tech help change nuclear’s ARC score and proportion in the stack.
Not all inputs are equals with regards to affordability, reliability, and cleanliness. Based on present regulatory conditions natural gas is the undisputed champion in America’s energy stack. On its ARC merits, natural gas should be the baseline green standard of energy. It’s the trifecta — the best-of-class blended average. Because of this, natural gas should be prioritized, favored, and enlisted in building our energy infrastructure and industrial policy for the future. ‘Our County tis of thee’ has over a hundred years of sweet supply under our feet — in service to our economy and way of life. Unlike wind and solar, it’s always-on, reliable energy, and the cleanest of the hydrocarbon work-horses.
Twenty years ago, I worked at the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research, and we had as our guest T Boone Pickens, a Texas billionaire and prophet of a better, more affordable, more reliable, and more clean American energy future. Pickens saw from the beginning what fracking and natural gas abundance could mean if boldly seized for the American economy.
What most caught my attention was the self-evident logic of switching American heavy trucking to affordable, reliable, and clean natural gas. This was 3 years after the advent of Amazon Prime’s free shipping and the CO2 goosing that it unintentionally but necessarily unleashed. I’m sure there’s a quant out there that could easily run the numbers and show the green and clean environment benefit to the United States and the planet if the Pickens Plan was allowed to check the negative externalities of the Amazon plan.
Today, 17 years later, new futurists speak of “transitioning” our nation’s heavy trucking fleet away from petroleum gas and onto the electric grid via batteries. This 16,000-pound, rare-earth battery on wheels is an energy pig with moral preening lipstick. It’s an 18 wheeled-windmill, traveling down the short-range, long-charge highway. The consequence of a tilting-at-windmills mindset that would make Don Quixote blush.
Mr. Sheridan, your “Land Man” fans would enjoy a story line ripped and retold from the Pickens Gospel that has still yet to happen. Do not give the lines and story arc and ARC standard to Billy Bob. This is a role for his character’s son, Cooper, who is just as logical as he, but not yet jaded by the weight of a status quo that does admit doing what is self-evidently in our enlightened, immediate, and long-term self-interest. Your American artistry just might keep apace with fast approaching, unleashed energy abundance that is going to fuel the on-shoring of American manufacturing and Make America Great industrial policy.
If you are interested in big thinking like this, check out RealClear’s Future of Energy Forum, scheduled for May 19 in D.C.
David DesRosiers is Conference co-chair & President, RealClear Foundation.
This article was originally published by RealClearEnergy and made available via RealClearWire.
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Yeah, no.
Carbon dioxide, essential for life as we know it, is at fairly low levels, up from critically low levels. Any slight warming it may possibly have induced, has saved many thousands of lives.
You missed the “:” in that sentence. The sentence begins, “The policy commitments of the Net Zero camp are a product of strong emotion and weak science and economics:”
This:
“Clean is the measure of an energy unit and its impact on the physical environment. Solar, wind, and nuclear are the cleanest by CO2 standards. Among the fossil fuels, natural gas is the cleanest of all the Jurassic energy gifts.
“Imagine if we had an energy source that could meet society’s ever-growing energy needs without CO2”
conveys Mr. DesRosiers’ belief in the argument.
No. Context matters as does the audience. He is trying to steer the attention away from the bright and shiny CO2 to reality.
We’ll have to disagree, absent Mr. DesRosiers’ testimony.
What are the impacts on the physical environment taking into account fabrication, assembly, all of it. Massive solar voltaic arrays certainly have an impact on the environment in just CO2 terms. Just in the wafer fabrication.
See my next comment, which I believe demonstrates his belief in the supposed dangers of CO2.
Sufficient CO2 is a beneficial ingredient for abundant flora and fauna on the planet.
We need MORE CO2 not less.
Any statements made claiming CO2 is evil, dangerous, a control knob, etc., shows being brainwashed and having a lack of scientific insight
The problem is those emotional, irrational, non-STEM nitwits are not suited to be in government and in businesses.
The rational STEM professionals have to be near the top everywhere to MAGA
Europe had a near stagnant population, due to relying on wood for buildings, etc., and energy.
That changed for the better when coal, oil, and gas were used, health improved and population grew to the present almost 8 billion, plus, and here is the big bonus, the CO2 ppm finally increased from 280 to 425, which increased flora and fauna all over the world, except in places with human detritus, such as the 700-mile heat island from north of Portland, Maine, to south of Norfolk, Virginia
Crushing logic indeed, which you almost immediately try to refute!
Not even by fictitious ‘CO2 standards that you try to bring into play are these remotely ‘clean’, as you previously pointed out! 20 years to pay off the CO2 ‘debt’, and they’re due for replacement. Utter balderdash, as measured by your own words!
If this is the best on offer, we should give up now.
Wind and solar also have some the filthiest, most toxic and polluting manufacture processes.
Installation in massively disruptive to the environment.
They harm avian and land life in many ways.
Then at the end of their short erratic and intermittent life, they are either left to decay as an eyesore, or end up taking massive amounts of landfill volume.
Wind and solar are NOT REMOTELY CLEAN or ENVIRONMENTALLY SUSTAINABLE.
Right- every day I hear here in Wokeachusetts the call for more “clean and green” energy- which forces me to puke.
Climastrology is a secular religion.
Climastrology results in economic slavery.
Story Tip
Climate change mostly caused by the Sun:
https://dailysceptic.org/2025/04/23/global-warming-is-mostly-caused-by-the-sun-not-humans-says-astrophysics-professor/
But still seems wedded to human carbon dioxide emissions.
Oh well.
He also seems to be unaware that the temperature record itself is flawed, and biased towards warm. He’s another anti coal cultist as well. Well, I guess they can’t all bat 1,000.
Quick theory. Volcanic explosion of 15% increase in H2O in stratosphere has given us a little warming which will dissipate over the next few years and then we will really begin to see global cooling.
Darn- maybe we need to find a way to trigger more volcanic explosions. I spend 9 months of the year running my oil furnace and only maybe 2 months running the air conditioner.
What nonsense. The idea of “clean energy” is a total fabrication, based on the idea that our CO2 emissions are “killing the planet”, or some such idiocy, when in fact, the reverse is true. The planet, and humanity has benefited from it, as it has helped green the planet. Any slight additional warmer it might be providing is also beneficial, as history shows. Sure, NG is great, but we also need coal, and there is plenty of it. And nuclear belongs in the mix as well, although it has hurdles to get through.
I detest the use of the word “clean” for energy- it’s reminiscent of words like “pure”, “innocent”, “virgin” and the like. After all, when used- how could anyone dispute wanting “clean” energy?
Add renewable to the list of detestations.
Yuh, the solar panels and wind machines- you have to renew them every few decades.
Perhaps, but engineering estimates put it a 2 or more times per decade.
How often are hail storms occurring with sufficient impact to wipe out a solar voltaic installation?
Right behind my house is a 20 acre solar “farm”. It was installed in 2012.
4 or 5 years ago- lightning destroyed several acres- I saw them installing the new panels- of course this never made the news
I knew of the lightning that hit that wind turbine generator that lost a fin (washed up in bits and pieces on the Atlantic coast).
This is a first, but unsurprising, report of lightning hitting a solar voltaic array.
💯
“Renewables” = trans-energy
I.e. fake energy.
I’ve used that before but in the identity context.
I agree, coal is perfect for large utility electricity production, especially with supercritical plants.
Not as efficient or cheap as CCGT, but the rush to to it means all our eggs in one basket, so the potential to drive up natural gas prices making it more expensive for home heating.
Ontario used to pride itself in having a mix of coal, nuclear, hydroelectric and gas to avoid any problems – seems like a good plan, especially for government regulated utilities.
By using the word “Clean” in the acronym “ABC” you cede the high ground to the enemy. There is nothing clean about wind, batteries and solar, and nothing dirty about beautiful clean coal.
By calling carbon dioxide dirty, you accept the crazy premises of the left. We are carbon-based life. Of course they hate life too, a well-hidden but obvious fact based on an old cartoon that no one actually remembers. Pogo, who famously quipped “We have met the enemy, and he is us”.
Let them hate themselves and fade away. We who remain need to take the actual facts into account. Winter is coming.
They, the alarmists, love to call CO2 carbon. Carbon footprint, emissions, etc.
Why? Because coal, aka carbon, is relatively dirty. But C is not CO2. Oxygen cleans it up nicely.
how much of this has been codified by law versus executive order?
“Imagine if we had an energy source that could meet society’s ever-growing energy needs without CO2. What a breakthrough that would be.”
Why? 🙂
“We need a real energy standard by which to judge the energy stack. ARC — affordable, reliable, and clean — is it.”
As for the use of the word “clean” as an adjective for some forms of energy – it’s getting tiring. That word has too many implications which are not relevant.
I am hoping cleans means not a biological poison, such as many true pollutants are.
When we finally do start running out of fossil fuels, whenever that might be, we will need to dedicate power sources to start decomposing limestone in order to maintain CO2 levels.
I agree.
I have posted numerous times that we, the pragmatists, realists, and skeptics need to avoid using climate alarmist vocabulary as it only gives their claims undue credibility.
On the other hand, if, sometime in the future, the planet reaches a population of 100 billion, the CO2 levels in the atmosphere might affect breathing. Key word: might.
When I read someone referencing the “global mind” and the “Overton Window” I tend to step back and wonder why the superfluous verbiage. Then at the bottom I see the point: sign up for this fellow’s symposium in May for more “big thinking.”
Consider the internet, captive digital media, social media, and every person with a cell phone glued to their eyes/ears. Then consider the research to embed cranial computers so we are in constant world wide contact.
This creates a hive mind, which may not be all that different from a “global mind.”
“Smart Phones” are not smart
“Smart [fill in the blank]” are not smart.
AI is not intelligent.
But we are taught and trained and brainwashed to think they are.
How soon will we achieve the hive mind? Ask an AI.
“What most caught my attention was the self-evident logic of switching American heavy trucking to affordable, reliable, and clean natural gas.”
I agree this is logical even more so when you consider that the conversion technology is available today as opposed to theory of EV trucks.
It is baffling then that the environmental justice advocates who are justified in complaining about heavy-duty truck impacts in New York City have not figured out that the solution to their problem is available. They are so hung up on the alleged evils of fracked fossil gas that they cannot accept its benefits relative to costs.
Makes me wonder if their end game is not to solve the problem but to keep the hustle going.
I’m old enough to remember NYSERDA’s incentive programs for CNG vehicles. It made good sense, especially for fleets.
There are plenty of good examples, buses, fork lifts, etc., that demonstrate natural gas does work to power vehicles.
Yet the only time it happens is when there are massive subsidies and incentives.
Not every time. Fork lifts and golf carts make sense and are practical.
Buses have been NG powered for a while now, but not universally.
“Solar, wind, and nuclear are the cleanest by CO2 standards. Among the fossil fuels, natural gas is the cleanest of all the Jurassic energy gifts.”
CO2 is not “dirty” – not even a little bit. So let’s stop repeating the false framing that “clean” has anything at all to do with the level of CO2 emissions.
I’m all for promotion of nuclear power and reduction of the regulatory obstacles to its wider adoption. But it’s not because of CO2.
Took the words right out of my mouth, David.
CO2 is not “dirty”, nor is it controlling the Earth’s temperature!
“mankind’s use of fossil fuels and the attendant CO2 emissions are killing the planet and our future on it.”
Utter BS.
“Solar, wind, and nuclear are the cleanest by CO2 standards.”
CO₂ is not dirty.
“Imagine if we had an energy source that could meet society’s ever-growing energy needs without CO2.”
By every observable standard, human CO₂ emissions have been a net large benefit.
I am in sympathy with the argument for nuclear fission as the next generation energy source. But not the riding on the back of an overwhelmingly specious argument demonizing fossil fuels and CO₂ emissions.
The full quote is:
The policy commitments of the Net Zero camp are a product of strong emotion and weak science and economics: mankind’s use of fossil fuels and the attendant CO2 emissions are killing the planet and our future on it. However, the net effect of Net Zero — globally and domestically — is a politically induced green inflation and a Hunger Games logic that hurts the world’s poor and middle classes for no net environmental gain.
Yes, the Net Zero proclamation is total BS. Just want to ensure the quote was not attributed to the author’s position on the topic.
“Imagine if we had an energy source that could meet society’s ever-growing energy needs without CO2.”
I saw that too and was puzzled. Maybe it was needed to ensure publication? Maybe it was to be politically correct so people would read further? I like CO2. I like my beer. I like trees and all of nature. IMHO we do not yet have an optimum level of CO2 in the atmosphere.
“Jurassic energy gifts”
Very much love that expression.
For a windmill, the concrete slab, the extraction cost for the materials, the grease to keep it spinning, and the asphalt roads needed to service it, all use fossil fuels — and it takes 20 years for the fossil debt to be paid off and turn a green profit.
I wonder if that analysis also includes maintenance and repair. An engineering FMEA and MTBF were done and the results are 4.3 years between needed repair and ~ 50% of those repairs were major component replacement. I do not know if those analyses include the blades.
This scale needs to also include the environmental costs associated with constructing all forms of energy. By that I’m referring to the mining/drilling that is needed to get the raw materials needed to build and then power all forms of energy.
That is, how much iron/steel, rare metals, concrete, etc. is needed to construct each form of energy and what are the costs of acquiring those materials.
In addition, you need to account for the support services. By this I’m referring to the economic/environmental costs for building power lines to wherever the power source is being constructed. As well as roads needed to build and maintain the power sources.
For offshore anything, you will need to include the cost of building and operating the boats necessary to get workers and material to and from the construction site.
I don’t believe that this addition will change the rankings, but it will make the differences more stark.
Or indeed, we could examine some far more important metric, by any reasonable person’s standards: The number of fatalities per GWh of energy produced.
I don’t have the figures to hand, but I recall that wind & solar are high on that list, and nuclear is by far the lowest.
Proper metrics, for a change.
Add in the human cost. Look at Indonesia. Look at Congo.
There’s a reason why natural gas powered vehicles have never caught on. No matter how many people push them.
The problems and costs greatly outweigh the alleged benefits.
I see what you did there 🤣
Golf carts and fork lifts have been around a long time, so I conclude you are referencing to heavy load trucks and the like.
Typo!
“chasing the engineering unicorns of hydrogen and fission for decades.”
I think you mean fusion not fission.
Also, while I love nuclear and that’s my degree, I have to correct you when you say nuke’s CO2 footprint is zero. Obviously with all the concrete and high tech metals involved the CO2 emissions are not 0 – though any sensible deep thinking person or environmentalist should be saying: who cares about CO2 while the biosphere is gasping for more at the current low, quasi-extinction levels???
Very nice but I have issues. ARC is really important because it leaves wind and solar out. As for clean, CO2 is not dirty so should not be a consideration when talking about clean. Yes it’s true natural gas may have the most desirable ARC score but that doesn’t mean we should become dependent on just natural gas. We should consider all workable sources by that I mean fossil fuel, hydro and nuclear. Wind and solar don’t work so they shouldn’t be considered. We know how to do fossil fuel and nuclear the only thing in our way is politics. I doubt we will see more hydro built for a few reasons. The best sites have already been dammed, reservoirs displace real people and cover real attractions and last I don’t think enough thought has gone into how we are going to retire the dams we have.
Solar voltaic and wind turbine generators have niche applications and when used in the optimum applications (not, NOT, grid scale) can reduce demand a trifle making other sources more efficient.
ARC need to be expanded to include abundance and C (clean) needs to recognize that CO2 is not a pollutant (not dirty). Otherwise, this analysis in fatally flawed.