This year remember to be thankful we don't live under the European anti-energy regime...yet.
Wall Street Journal (11/21/22) editorial: "Europe is struggling to keep its lights and the heat on this winter, and fuel supply is only half of the energy crisis. The other half, now coming into view, is the ruinous fiscal cost associated with the failure of green-energy flights of fancy. European taxpayers will pay this bill for years to come. Governments across Europe have announced €674 billion ($696 billion) in handouts and subsidies to alleviate the burden of skyrocketing energy prices between September 2021 and October 2022, according to Bruegel, the Brussels-based think tank. The money includes €264 billion in Germany alone and the equivalent of €97 billion in the United Kingdom. This is on top of what households and businesses are paying in higher energy bills even after the subsidies. Some policies will help. Almost every European country has reduced excise taxes on fuel. This is a rare instance of the energy crisis forcing a beneficial rethink of green fixations—in this case, Europe’s tendency to treat energy levies as a green “sin tax.” But for the most part the money is subsidizing households and businesses directly or indirectly. One common tactic is to impose a retail price cap, with taxpayers plugging the gap between the costs that utilities must pay for energy and what they’re allowed to charge consumers. A special dishonorable mention goes to countries such as France and Germany whose energy policies have dragged the government directly into the utility business. Paris has turned majority-state-owned utility EDF into a subsidy slush fund, using state control to limit retail prices today while apparently hoping taxpayers won’t notice plunging dividends or a big equity injection tomorrow. Berlin may nationalize Uniper and is offering tens of billions of euros in subsidized credit to other utilities."
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"The decision to ban natural gas heating is emblematic of the state of climate policy in the United States. Policies are chosen based on the desire of politicians to appear righteous when addressing the 'climate crisis.' Whether those policies actually reduce emissions is ancillary, and the price for those ineffective and purely symbolic policies is paid by everyone."
– Todd Myers,
Washington Policy Center
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