Fear of government regulation and implementation of the "green new deal" is, according to The Wall Street Journal, forcing rapid increases in oil prices (now above $80 per barrel) and directly causing inflation as the winter heating season approaches.
Adding to the problem, limits on fracking are also playing a key role in an emerging global shortage of natural gas.
The efforts of the Biden administration to rein in fracking by denying permits to drill on federal lands and regulating the chemicals used during the process are, literally, driving up coal use in China and catalyzing global inflation.
And, even in the tunnel vision of the green agenda, the Biden policy is backfiring.
The greens are cramping gas production which is causing shortages and higher prices that are driving China to increase coal use that is raising carbon emissions.
China, which now emits almost half of the world’s carbon (almost double its share over the past ten years), has brought 38.4 gigawatts of coal generated power online in 2020 alone, propelled, in part, by the shortage of natural gas that is caused by the intrusions of government regulators into the production cycle.
China now generates 57% of its electricity from coal, almost three times the 20% figure in the US.
China’s hell-bent switch to coal, while the rest of the world switches to gas, is emblematic of the insanity of the Paris Climate Agreement that tries to tackle the global problem without the participation of China, the leading carbon emitter, by far, in the world.
Voters, who feel lukewarm about the green agenda but who rank inflation as their number one economic worry, are likely to make the link between environmental regulation and rising prices, further turning them off new environmental regulation.
Dick Morris is a former presidential adviser and political strategist. He is a regular contributor to Newsmax TV. Read Dick Morris' Reports — More Here.
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