The Retirement of the RCP8.5: Why Apocalyptic Modeling Should Not Dictate Climate Change Policy

While I was on vacation in Portugal last month, I really made sure I wasn't paying attention to politics or the media circus. One of those moments that I missed around that time was this post from President Trump:

It was in reference to some recent news about climate change modeling. In its 2014 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report, the United Nations prepared four main scenarios. The gloomiest of these scenarios was the RCP8.5 scenario. 

In late April of this year, the IPCC retired the RCP8.5 scenario as a plausible future emissions pathway. There are those who believe, including the authors of the IPCC paper, that this is being scrapped because there has been enough progress with climate change policy intervention to merit its retirement. I did not buy in 2018 that the RCP8.5 scenario was plausible back then. 

American Enterprise Institute scholar Roger Pielke, Jr. and Competitive Enterprise Institute scholar Marlo Lewis Jr. explain why the scenario was never plausible to begin with. For one, coal production would have had to implausibly increase by 900 percent and become the predominant form of energy, which is peculiar given that coal was already declining as a form of energy in the 2010s. The RCP8.5 also assumed that the population would reach 12 billion, which is a far cry from the 10.2 billion that is projected. And the idea that low-income countries would stay considerably poorer than other countries? Then there are the assumptions of unabated fossil fuel use and no negative emissions technologies. 

The problem here was not mere theoretical modeling for its own sake. As this article from Carbon Brief details, RCP8.5 was treated as a "business as usual" and likely outcome when it came to climate change policy and activism. At best, it was meant to be an upper-bound, highly improbable stress test. When such scenarios are used as a baseline, they exaggerate projections of future warming and damages. 

This exaggeration leads to a form of policy overcorrection, and results in regulatory and fiscal responses that are larger, faster, and more intrusive than would be justified if a more accurate model were being used. That is how we get such policies as emission standards for electric vehicles, gas stove bans, carbon capture & sequestration mandates, and energy efficiency standards.

Trying to prevent a scenario that is essentially not going to happen is a waste of money, time, and resources. If we are basing policy on false assumptions, it means that we cannot begin to understand the costs and benefits of each policy decision. As we learned during the COVID pandemic, a miscalibration at that scale is a form of harm in which the cure is worse than the disease. Retiring RCP8.5 is a "better late than never" moment, but this whole debate acts as a reminder that we should let skepticism be at the helm of energy and climate policy instead of hyperbole and alarmism. 

7-3-2026 Addendum: If you want a detailed analysis on why the RCP8.5 was an extreme, unrealistic model, Competitive Enterprise Institute Senior Fellow Marlo Lewis Jr. provides a detailed description in Part I and Part II of his series on the RCP8.5 model.

Hotter Doesn't Always Mean Worse: The Value of Healthy Skepticism Towards Climate Change Activism

A senior fellow from the American Enterprise Institute, Roger Pielke Jr., took aim at climate change economics. It was not enough for Pielke to point to a redacted paper that claimed doing nothing with climate change would cause a whopping $38 trillion in damage. Keep in mind that this paper was quite influential in climate change policy, much like Neil Ferguson's COVID lockdown model was an abject failure. Pielke pointed out a recent study from the University of Wyoming entitled The Empirically Inscrutable Climate-Economy Relationship.

Why does this new study come with an inconvenient truth? Most climate change activists do not simply say that global temperatures are increasing. They posit that each increase in global temperature means that it will produce immeasurable harm. It is from this assumption that you get policy suggestions like Net Zero or the Paris Agreement. A lot of climate change modeling translates temperature into dollar losses. The problem, as this new study details, is that it is based on shaky ground. 

There are countries out there that have similar temperatures and affluences. The authors point to El Salvador and Iraq as examples to remind us that there are a number of confounding factors that influence economic growth beyond temperature: institutions, education, technology, trade, and culture. Certain adaptations also change the relationship to heat, including air conditioning, crop switching, migration, and infrastructure changes. It means climate change scientists are trying to estimate a moving target, not a stable law. 

This does not even get into the fact that reliable economic data goes back only a few decades, especially for more developing countries. The problem is not only with imperfect data. It is impossible to isolate temperature as the sole factor, which makes the house of climate change economics built on quicksand. 

Is this to say that climate change is a hoax? No, it does not. To quote Mercatus Center scholar Jack Salmon, "they [the authors of the study] are not claiming that climate change is harmless or that reducing emissions lacks value. The existence of a negative carbon eternality remains well-established. What they are challenging is the confidence with which economists, and especially policymakers, treat specific numerical estimates of climate change."

Good policy is supposed to weigh the costs and benefits. However, if the benefits of avoided damage is highly uncertain, model-dependent, and sensitive to assumptions, as is the case with climate change economics, then you cannot reliably say that a given policy is worthwhile. 

Does it sound familiar? We dealt with this during the COVID pandemic. Lockdown Lovers kept forcing lockdowns down our throats during the pandemic. They claimed that skepticism of the lockdowns meant that you wanted Granny dead. How did that weaponization of kindness turn out? You can read more here, but it meant trillions in economic damage, causing even more health problems than the lockdown solved, and helping society writ large take a nosedive. 

What does that mean for climate policy? If this core relationship between temperature and economic output is fragile, then the foundation for confident, large-scale climate policy like carbon taxes, cap-and-trade, or energy-efficiency mandates is tenuous. 

This does not mean we should do nothing. It means getting off the moral high horse and stopping virtue-signaling the fake certainty. It means injecting a little humility into the conversation. After all, we have seen this movie play out with the COVID pandemic. Uncertain models get translated into certain policy prescriptions, dissent gets quashed, and tradeoffs get shunted to the side because it is too inconvenient to address. 

The sad irony is that the more uncertain the underlying assumptions become, the more confident climate change activists come in with sweeping mandates and regulations. What emerges is not better policy, but simply more confidence where it becomes less and less defensible. But don't worry. We're still told to "follow the science."

Government Making Appliances Costlier and Crummier in the Name of Going Green

Prior to the 20th century, families commonly used washboards to wash clothes, cooked over a coal- or wood-fired stove, and had to rely on iceboxes for food storage. Inventions like the refrigerator, vacuum cleaner, microwave, and washing machine became signs of human progress. What was once grueling, manual labor became much more manageable. These appliances saved people time, helped improve health and hygiene, and raised the standard of living for millions. It was only a matter of time before government regulations began to stifle progress for appliances. 

A recent report authored by Senior Fellow Ben Lieberman from the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI), entitled Free the Appliances, provides a compelling examination of how these regulations evolved from responses to the oil crises in the 1970s into the cumbersome regulatory framework that they are today. As we will see shortly, this CEI report details how these appliance efficiency standards have become a nightmare for the everyday American. 

CEI emphasizes how this regulatory framework expanded far beyond its initial energy-saving intentions, evolving into a broad set of environmental mandates that prioritize climate goals over consumer interest and practical appliance performance. I have covered two such instances previously here on Libertarian Jew, both of which were from the Biden administration in 2023.

A proposed gas stove ban would have limited consumer choice, imposed unnecessary restrictions on appliances that are efficient and cost-effective, and undermined individual freedom by dictating what homeowners could use in their own kitchens. Biden's water heater standards are similarly perturbing. They raise upfront costs significantly for consumers, especially lower-income households. Meanwhile, these standards offer minimal energy savings and do not provide a fair return on investment (ROI). While these are some of the more high-profile instances, CEI covers other instances in which consumers have been subjected to the unintended consequences of these appliance efficiency standards:

• Dishwashers: To comply with water-use restrictions, manufacturers compensate by increasing the cycle time. This regulation costs consumers more than $8 million a year while providing an annual energy savings of $17. Meanwhile, the standards result in about an extra hour per load while compromising the wash quality.
• Refrigerators: Since DOE regulations began, the average life of a refrigerator went from 19 years to 12 years, mainly due to the energy-saving features.
• Furnaces: Because of these standards, the average furnace costs an extra $1,500-$3,000. The DOE calculates a lifetime energy savings of up to $1,635 over 21 years. The issue there is the average furnace lasts 15-20 years. Saving money over a lifetime is far from certain. Even if those savings materialized, the high upfront costs can strain household or business budgets before those savings are realized. 
• Air Conditioners: Trying to recoup the loss of upfront costs for efficiency standards on air conditioners is even worse than with furnaces. A compliant air conditioner unit costs $1,500-$5,000 more on average. For hot/humid areas like the Southeast, the DOE calculates a savings of $1,853 for an ENERGY STAR unit and up to $6,724 in the best-case scenario. The problem is that the calculation is for 18 years, but the average A/C unit lasts 10-15 years. In the Southeast, it is theoretically possible, but far from guaranteed, to get your money back in the long-run. For the rest of the United States, don't count on that net cost to be in your favor.  
• LED Lightbulbs: In 2024, DOE regulations increased efficiency requirements for LED and general service lamps. This is phasing out many current bulbs (e.g., incandescent) and forcing customers to purchase higher-cost alternatives. According to the DOE, the requirements will increase the average price of an LED bulb from $2.98 to $5.68 (p. 5-33). In turn, this can reduce product choice, cause compatibility issues, and disrupt the lightbulb market. 

Conclusion: The High Cost of Feel-Good Environmentalism

In summation, these appliance efficiency standards are a class example of feel-good environmentalism in which politicians and regulators feel virtuous but do little good for consumers or the environment. Whether it's a $5 LED lightbulb or an extra $3,000 for a furnace, these costs are significant and often fail to materialize in a meaningful way. Far from empowering the average American with choices or savings, these regulations are a way to check of a feel-good box while ignoring real-life consequences. 

Moreover, these regulations can compromise quality, whether it is refrigerators that wear out faster or dishwashers that take longer to clean. The promise of a greener future comes at the expense of functionality and consumer choice. Consumers are forced to trade off reliability and performance for regulatory mandates that cannot guarantee significant savings in the long run. 

As I have brought up with plastic straw bans and recycling, these efficiency standards are little more than environmental brownie points created to support a certain moral high horse. If all countries opted to adhere to the Paris Climate Agreement, it would have only reduced global temperatures by 0.2 degrees Celsius. This is my way of saying that every American adhering to these efficiency standards would do nothing of statistical significance to slow down increasing global temperatures. If overpriced appliances is all consumers get out of these regulations, then the only thing "green" happening is the money going out of our wallets as we pay more for these half-baked regulations. 

Studies Show Hurricanes Not Increasing in Power Dissipation: Another Coup to Climate Change Hysteria

Those who believe that climate change will be the end of mankind tell us that all we need to do is drastically cut our carbon emissions to avert Armageddon. It would explain why the Biden administration was gung-ho with such climate policies as onerous power grid regulations, water heater energy efficiency standards, stricter emissions standards to encourage electric vehicle purchases, or the Inflation Reduction Act. Let's take a look at President Biden's response to Hurricane Helene as an example:

Nobody can deny the impact of climate crisis anymore. At least I hope they don't. They must be brain-dead if they do. Scientists report that with warming oceans powering more intense rains, storms like Helene are going to get stronger and stronger. 

Forgetting the irony of a man with clear cognitive decline commenting on brain function for a moment, I have to question the general premise of his claim that "climate change's impact on hurricanes is so obvious that someone with half a brain can realize it." I hate to break it to Biden and climate change activists everywhere, but it is decidedly not the case. 

In September 2024, the scientific journal Nature published a study showing a decreasing trend in the destructive potential of cyclones, which include typhoons and hurricanes (Tu et al., 2024). These Chinese meteorologists used a "power dissipation index" (PDI), which combines storm intensity, duration, and frequency, to determine whether hurricanes, cyclones, and typhoons have become more intense in the past four decades. Guess what they found? The overall global trend is that the PDI is on the decline, whereas it remains steady in the North Atlantic (see below; see Addendum for further detail). 

As much as I would like to say that I am surprised by these findings backed by meteorological data, I am not. Shortly after Hurricane Ian in 2022, I wrote a piece on how the media continued to exaggerate the effects of climate change on hurricanes. I had pointed out how weather-related deaths have been on the decline, the normalized cost of hurricanes (which adjusts for population and property construction increases) remained relatively constant, and that the number of overall hurricanes and major hurricanes has not increased. 

I can point to a study from the Heritage Foundation that was released in December (D'Aleo and Dayaratna, 2024) about how the lack of trends in hurricane activity since the mid-1800s (see chart above). I suspect that Biden would not read a Heritage Foundation report, much less heed it, because the Heritage Foundation is on the Right. Instead, maybe President Biden should listen to his National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), which found the following: 

• "There is no strong evidence of century-scale increasing trends in U.S. landfalling hurricanes or major hurricanes. Similarly for Atlantic basin-wide hurricanes, there is not strong evidence for an increase since the late 1800s in hurricanes, major hurricanes, or the proportion of hurricanes that reach major hurricane intensity." 
• "After adjusting for a likely under-count of hurricanes in the pre-satellite era, there is essentially no long-term trend in hurricane counts. The evidence for an upward trend is even weaker if we look at U.S. landfalling hurricanes, which even show a slight negative trend beginning from 1900 or from the late 1800s." 
• While the NOAA projects that the lifetime maximum intensity of Atlantic Hurricanes will increase by about 5% during the 21st century, NOAA also projects "substantial decrease (~25%) in the overall number of Atlantic and tropical storms." 
• "After adjusting for such an estimated number of missing storms, there remains just a small nominally positive trend (not statistically significant) in tropical storm occurrence from 1878-2006." 
• "We conclude that historical Atlantic hurricane data at this stage do not provide compelling evidence for a substantial greenhouse warming-induced century-scale increase in: frequency of tropical storms, hurricanes, or major hurricanes, or in the proportion of hurricanes that become major hurricanes." 

Aside from the ubiquitous nature of climate change, what draws people's attention is the notion of "if it bleeds, it leads." That is why climate change activists and their allies have to resort to using low-probability models with tenuous assumptions to make their case. The fact that actual meteorological data show that hurricanes in the Atlantic or cyclones and typhoons in other regions of the world are not getting worse, at least indicated by the PDI, in spite of increased carbon emissions undermines the climate change hysteria. It is why I remain skeptical of climate change fear-mongering. We should focus on policy alternatives to mitigate the effects of hurricanes, which can include constructing hurricane-resilient buildings, privatizing flood insurance, and eliminating price gouging laws. Giving into climate change hysteria like the former President has done will do nothing to help us weather future hurricanes.

1-30-2025 Addendum: I had a spouse of a longtime friend reach out and comment on this blog entry since he is an electrical engineer by trade and has a passion for climate change. He correctly pointed out that the Nature study points out there has been a slight increase in intensity (See Figure below, Part B) and that this increase was caused by various atmospheric phenomena. I concede this point where I changed the title of this blog entry and made some other tweaks to acknowledge the fact that intensity has indeed been increasing. 

I will also point out that the overall PDI is on the decline due to decrease in frequency and duration (See Figure above, Parts A and C). The authors point out that the PDI has been more commonly used in the literature instead of focusing on a singular factor, such as intensity or frequency. There could be a methodological flaw in how each factor in the PDI is weighted or whether there are other considerations that should be factored into PDI. I am sure that debate could be had by experts who know more about this than I do because my profession in the field of public policy and I cannot possibly know everything about every topic. 

At the same time, it begs an important question for me. If PDI is indeed being more frequently used as a metric for tropical storm severity in the field of climate change, why is PDI not increasing if climate change is supposed to engender apocalyptic change? At the very least, it has me think that the magnitude of climate change is not as obvious as President Biden makes it out to be. Maybe I will get a lengthy response from my friend's spouse addressing some of these concerns, which is why I would not be surprised if this topic ends up being a future blog entry.

Conflatulations to Denmark for Implementing a Bullheaded Methane Tax on Cow Burps and Farts

For those of you who have read my blog enough, you will understand that the title of today's blog entry is both a pun with the word "flatulence" and sarcasm. I am not seriously congratulating Denmark for being the first country to tax livestock flatulence, a tax that will be in effect in 2030. I understand that the Danish government's intent with this 300 kroner tax (or about $43) per metric ton of carbon dioxide equivalent is an attempt to reduce methane emissions and mitigate climate change. 

After all, methane traps about 87 times more heat over a 20-year cycle than carbon dioxide does. According to the International Energy Agency, methane has been responsible for about 30 percent of the rise in global temperatures since the Industrial Revolution. Plus, cattle are the largest per-unit emitters of greenhouse gases (GHGs) when it comes to food production (Oxford). 

At first glance, it seems like a methane tax on livestock flatulence would be something worth targeting. Aside from collecting government revenue, the other main function of a tax is to disincentivize behavior. In this case, that would be disincentivizing methane emitted from livestock flatulence.  However, I have a few concerns with this methane tax.

Climate change is not a crisis. I have explained before why we need to be skeptical about climate change fear-mongering. Climate change is in fact a manageable problem and that we should learn to adapt to the reality of changing global temperatures. For argument's sake, let us assume with the proceeding questions that an apocalypse would ensue unless we take further action.

What is the price elasticity of cattle? Price elasticity of demand is a wonky, economic term referring to sensitivity of the consumer as a result of a price change. If a price goes up and it significantly reduces the amount consumed, then the good or service has elastic demand. If there is little to no change of consumption as a result of the price change, then it is inelastic. Since the main goal of this methane tax is to reduce methane emissions from livestock flatulence, it is preferable that cattle is an elastic good. 

I could not find the price elasticity of beef for Denmark. However, I did find data on a neighboring country that is also the largest importer of Danish beef: Germany. According to this research paper (Roosen et al., 2022; Table 4), beef has an elasticity of 1.49, which is higher than pork (1.17) or poultry (1.15). If the tax ends up driving consumer prices enough, it could mean that consumers substitute beef for pork or poultry. Elasticity can also change over time. In the United States, the price elasticity for beef had historically been 0.75 (Andreyeva et al., 2010), which would suggest a more inelastic demand that would be sub-optimal for this type of methane tax. If there is a strong substitution effect between red meat and white meat (the latter of which emits much less GHGs), then there could be a justification for this methane tax. The elasticity has implications both for the economy and for carbon emissions.

How much will this tax reduce GHG emissions?  This is a trickier question to answer because Denmark is the first country to implement a methane tax on livestock. Research from agribusiness groups Alltech and Archbold suggests that the carbon sequestration performed with cattle grazing neutralizes the methane emissions from the livestock flatulence, as does the British-based Sustainable Food Trust. If it is true that the cattle grazing emits fewer carbon emissions on net, then this tax is unnecessary because such an effect would undermine the justification for the tax. 

There is another factor in this: carbon versus methane. As a technical paper from atmospheric physicists from Princeton and York Universities shows (Harper and van Wijngaarden, 2019), carbon makes up more of the atmosphere than methane. Although methane is 30 times more efficient than carbon dioxide at capturing heat, carbon dioxide is also increasing in the atmosphere 300 times more quickly than methane. This would mean that methane is contributing to about a tenth (i.e., 30/300) of the global warming than compared to carbon dioxide. That being the case, I would question how effective this tax would be if implemented worldwide. 

What would happen to global temperatures if the European Union halted all GHG emissions? This hypothetical question comes from the Right-leaning Heritage Foundation. It is not a matter of this specific policy or about Denmark ceasing GHG emissions. We are asking what would happen if all GHG emissions were to cease today on an entire continent. Answer: It would reduce global temperatures by 0.12 degrees Celsius by 2100. This is similar to what would have happened if every country committed to the Paris Agreement last decade. Answer: a reduction of global temperatures by 0.2 degrees Celsius. 

Economic considerations. If beef has greater price inelasticity of demand, then all the Danish government is doing is increasing the cost of eating. The tax also affects Danish farmers. Professor Joseph McFadden, who is a dairy cattle biologist at Cornell University, said that imposing these regulations on Danish farmers when the technology to safely reduce enteric methane emissions at scale does not exist is premature. This sort of regulation would do little to protect the future of farming, which is important because people need to eat. It would also affect "our food mosaic and dietary heterogeneity," which affect cultural contributions. 

Conclusion. A methane tax on livestock flatulence is a novel policy. It could end up doing nothing to help the environment while harming the economy in a way that sin taxes cause unintended consequences. If it functions more like carbon taxes, which have been found to not harm the economy, then this methane tax could similarly be a net positive. Part of me would like to remain agnostic until there are more data to confirm which direction. 

Given the hype around climate change and how the libertarian part of me generally feels about new tax, I am inclined towards skepticism that this will work. There is more than the economic aspect to consider. I have questioned from multiple angles whether this methane tax is necessary or if it will even contribute to a net decrease in GHG emissions. Furthermore, it would not matter if all of Europe went on a plant-based diet or if it developed a zero-carbon footprint today. The impact on global temperatures would be statistically insignificant. While I await the data to more empirically know what the impact is, I will not be surprised if this tax does very little, if anything, to mitigate the problem the tax was meant to address.

Biden's Climate Crusade With EPA Power Plant Regulations Will Take Out Electric Grids and Jobs

Since President Biden started campaigning for president in 2020, he vowed to get rid of fossil fuels. That goal has translated into over 200 ways in which the Biden Administration has made it more difficult to acquire energy from fossil fuels. One of those ways was in May 2023 when the Biden Administration proposed power plant rules that would make it more difficult for existing coal plants, existing gas plants, and new gas plants to operate. On May 9, 2024, the Biden Administration's Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released final rules on the Federal Registrar that are to take into effect today: July 8, 2024. 

The purpose of these rules is to "protect all communities from pollution and improve public health without disrupting the delivery of reliable electricity." This rule requires that existing coal plants planning to operate past 2039 and new gas plants to employ best system of emissions reduction (BSER) to control 90 percent of carbon reduction based on carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) technology. Essentially, CCS technology siphons the carbon dioxide from a plant's smokestack before reaching the atmosphere and would store the carbon underground. While this sounds fine and dandy, the proposal comes with a few major issues:

1) CCS technology is neither reliable nor able to comply with the law. In spite of the millions that the U.S. Department of Energy has spent on CCS, the technology is not fully proven. As of date, there is no power plant on the planet that is capturing 90 percent of its carbon. As this report from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) shows, CCS can capture 10 percent on a good day. Why is the Biden Administration creating onerous regulations based on unrealistic expectations and technology that does exist according to the regulation's specifications? 

2) The final rule is predicted to have negligible impact on carbon emissions. You would think that if the EPA were to enact such regulations, it would help bring down carbon emissions in a statistically significant manner. Much like with the Inflation Reduction Act and the Paris Agreement, this proposed rule will fail in that endeavor. Per EPA modeling, the proposed rule will reduce carbon by 1 percent (Chamber of Commerce, p. 6). Since power plants produce 30 percent of U.S. carbon emissions, that means that this would only reduce 0.3 percent of the United States' carbon emissions, never mind global emissions.

3) This final rule will most probably cost more than the EPA estimates. An analysis from the Chamber of Commerce found that this proposed rule has a number of flaws, one of which being cost suppression. As we see in the chart above, there is a difference between the projections from the EPA and Energy Information Administration (EIA). If the EPA is indeed rosier in their projections about coal and natural gas demand, as well as their prices, then the EPA is neglecting regulatory costs in addition to the $960 million per annum costs that the EPA is anticipating. A sensitivity analysis to better sense of the costs and benefits would solve the discrepancy between the EPA and EIA calculations. 

As the libertarian Cato Institute points out in its analysis, the EPA continues to overestimate the growth of wind and solar energy, as well as the growth of technological development that makes its projections so rosy. 

If that were not enough, the state of North Dakota commissioned a report to determine the effects of this EPA rule. To quote the report: "The Finalized Rule will increase costs, which, compounded with inflation, will negatively impact the affordability electric and gas services, resulting in a disproportionate effect on low-income citizens." 

4) This final rule is anticipated to cause further strain to the country's electric grid. As I brought up last year, fossil fuel demand is high and is only going to get higher. To replace the increase of fossil fuel demand, renewable energy production would have to increase sixfold. Quite frankly, trying to aim for green energy without increasing nuclear power production is a fool's errand. 

That is because wind and solar energy are intermittent and weather-driven forms of energy. Incentivizing renewable energy over fossil fuels will strain the electric grid and reduce grid reliability. Remember that North Dakota study from the previous point? The study determined that blackouts would be more likely if the EPA rule passes. 

Postscript: Last year, Pew Research found that 50 percent of Americans disagree with Biden's climate policy and 45 percent agree. Count me among the 50 percent who disagree. I have criticized Biden's climate policy, whether it was his water heater energy efficiency standards, electric vehicle standards, the misleading Inflation Reduction Act, or his administration proposing a gas stove ban. 

In his misguided attempt to lower carbon emissions, Biden's climate change policies neither help the economy nor the environment. Biden continues that pattern with his EPA power plant regulations. Not only will this power plant final rule do very little to reduce emissions, but it will make this country's electric grid more insecure by relying on intermittent energy sources. Expect higher electricity prices, brownouts, and blackouts as a result of this misguided policy. 

Top "Libertarian Jew" Blog Entries from 2023 and Reflecting on the Politics of 2023

As another year comes to a close, I think about how the world has ceased to be crazy since the pandemic started in 2020. Instead of surpassing the pandemic, it looks like we as a society are still reeling from it. In February, I wrote about how the golden standard of research, the systematic review of randomized controlled trials (RCT), showed that face masks are ineffective at spreading COVID transmission, including the N95 masks. That did not stop former CDC director Rochelle Walensky from clinging onto face masks at a congressional hearing, thereby showing us why we should not trust the CDC to give the American people health guidance. The Biden administration showed similar disregard for the science when it came to natural immunity. Meanwhile, the evidence for how awful and horrid lockdowns were continues to accumulate.

Dealing with a post-pandemic world had its effects in making the world topsy-turvy. One notable area was after Hamas attacked Israeli civilians on October 7. Here you have an anti-Semitic, homophobic terrorist organization with genocidal intent that carried out an actual pogrom. Hamas terrorists raped, kidnapped, tortured, murdered, and decapitated hundreds on that day. I came to a realization about Hamas. Even if Israel were to get rid of Hamas, Palestinian survey data still show that most Palestinians hate Jews and do not want a two-state solution. This undermines the narrative that Hamas is some minority, rogue party as opposed to being a reflection of the majority of Gazans. 

Even before the Israeli Defense Forces began its ground attack on Gaza, there were many eager to blame Israel and have declared Hamas to be the good guys. I noticed that many on the Far Left in particular embraced anti-Semitism and Hamas. I had to ask myself why, which resulted in a three-part blog series (Part I, Part II, and Part III). I noticed the Far Left/woke doublespeak on Middle Eastern politics, especially with the word "genocide." Here is Israel, a country who is trying to minimize civilian casualties in a densely populated urban war zone, falsely accused of genocide. Meanwhile, the Far Left is content on ignoring the entity that has been calling for genocide and ethnic cleansing of Jews since its founding, i.e., Hamas. 

The Israeli-Arab conflict is not the only instance in which the woke crowd plays fast and loose with the meaning of words. It goes beyond the Woke Left being incapable of distinguishing between correlation and causation, which helps explain why the Woke Left likes to view nearly everything as racist. As I pointed out in January, it is part of a greater strategy to render words meaningless all the while gaining power. This doublespeak exists when they call colorblindness racism. The phrase "gender-affirming care" comes under great scrutiny considering there is not evidence to show that it is truly affirming care. 

Speaking of the LGBT community, I was flabbergasted as to how the Human Rights Campaign could declare a "state of emergency" for LGBT rights when 2023 was far from the worst year for LGBT rights in the United States. This is what happens when people declare everything a crisis to score political points. 

This crisis mentality was clear with climate change. I reached the point where I had to write about how we should be skeptical of climate change fear-mongering. This was especially acute when the media was freaking out about heat waves this summer. I did something which very few, if any, climate change activists have done, which is ask what it would actually take to implement Net Zero. None of this stopped the Biden administration from trying to implement energy policy based on such hysteria, whether that was gas stove bans, stricter emission standards to encourage electric vehicle purchases, or rigorous water heater energy efficiency standards.

Other forms of craziness this year included bowlderizing Roald Dahl's texts, conservative moral panic on Drag Queen Story Hour, French citizens protesting an increase in the retirement age, the Supreme Court ruling affirmative action as unconstitutional, a TikToker's rant on time blindness showing a pervasive victimhood mentality in society, the U.S. credit rating being downgraded again because of Congress' fiscal irresponsibility, blasphemy laws in Denmark, the Federal Trade Commission going after Amazon (see Part I, Part II, and Part III), and woke K-12 educators removing honors classes and basic skills requirements to water down education. 

As the previous paragraphs illustrate, I researched and analyzed a wide variety of issues this year. My takeaway from it is a greater disregard of freedom, words being rendered meaningless, and lowering standards to the point where mediocrity and people's feelings are more important than emotional resilience, work ethic, moral decency, or facts. As we put 2023 behind us, I hope that we can look forward to a better year than this one.

Why We Should Be Skeptical and Critical of Climate Change Fear-Mongering

Blog entry #1,200! Amazing how time flies! I wanted to muse a bit on the importance of critical thinking. I always have believed that a healthy dose of skepticism not only makes for a great freethinker, but a keen intellect that helps us remain objective. As is illustrated below, skepticism is a balance that is based on evidence. This moderate view falls between gullibility and straight-up denial, both of which are forms of being incapable of understanding and accepting the world the way it is. The importance of skepticism and critical thinking skills are especially important when it comes to climate change in no small part due to the ubiquitous nature of climate change and the numerous public policy implications. 

You would have to be living under a rock to not know that there is a fight against climate change. What is at the basis of the arguments for climate change advocates? Since the Industrial Revolution, humans have been burning fossil fuels. Those fossil fuels emit a considerable amount of greenhouse gases (GHG). These emissions have increased over time with increased economic production, especially in the 20th and 21st centuries. GHG emissions are generally believed to be harmful for the environment. 

Unless something is done to reduce those emissions quickly and sharply, there will be catastrophic global warming sometime within the next century that will cause a global armageddon. This doomsday scenario has been used to justify and advocate for a variety of public policy choices, including water heater efficiency standards, carbon taxes, using regulations to encourage electric vehicles, and gas stove bans. Is such a heightened reaction warranted? 

The debate is obfuscated with the very vague question of "do you believe in climate change?" Yes, I believe that climate changes. Almost everyone does. Most people also recognize that there is at least some human contribution to rising GHG emissions. The extent to which humans contribute to climate change versus natural phenomena (e.g., solar trends, cloud chemistry, ocean cycles) is up for debate. I am not here to say that there is going to be zero impact from the rise in GHG emissions because there will be costs and benefits, much like there is with anything else in life. What I can tell you is that climate change is not the crisis that advocates make it out to be. As I have brought up before, those advocating for drastic policy change have to rely on low-probability models fraught with tenuous assumptions in order to reach the apocalyptic scenario they think will happen but probably will not. Here are a few other points to consider.

The High Costs of Net Zero. Many activists talk about the need to global average temperatures less than 1.5° C of what they were in the pre-industrial era. Exceeding that figure would mean armageddon...that is, if you listen to the activists. Very few talk about what would actually need to take place to reach that goal. Last month, I took a look at what implementing Net Zero would entail. There would need to be a huge cut in fossil fuels, as well as a major ramping up of renewable energy and electric grids.

Not only would it be nigh impossible to achieve, but such an attempt would be tantamount to collective suicide. Making such radical shifts in a low-probability scenario makes little sense to me, but neither did letting fear and panic guide the decision to harmful COVID lockdowns instead of a cost-benefit analysis or standard risk assessment. The one-sided obsession with the harm of COVID ignored the harm caused by COVID regulations. Rather than repeat history, we really need to ask whether the benefits of climate action exceed the cost? The lack of forethought on Net Zero suggest that this sort of fear-based thinking has not left us as a society since the pandemic.  

How does one measure global warming? This is something I touched upon while discussing heat waves last month because the U.S. has only been gathering global surface data since the late 19th century. It is hard to pull definitive historical trends from average global temperature data, especially when the data collection process began at the end of a mini Ice Age. Even the low-resolution data we have from beforehand indicate that the global temperatures were warmer than they are now (this includes the Medieval Warm Period of 900-1300 CE), which would imply that this planet has survived worse.   

Fossil fuels are still popular. Fossil fuel consumption continues to rise globally. Furthermore, China remains the largest emitter of GHGs (Oxford). China continues to build more coal plants. In addition to China, southeast Asia, India, and Africa are using more coal. 

Plus, here is another question: what evidence do we have that three decades of climate conferences have actually made a difference in lowering GHG emissions? France is one of the only countries that consumes less than 60 percent of its energy from fossil fuels. That is because France is a major consumer of nuclear power. Many climate change activists oppose nuclear power, even though it is the only carbon-neutral energy source that can meet global energy demand. 

A Need to Look at Facts Versus Sensationalism. In the past year, I have examined hurricanes and heat waves on this blog. It turns out that in both instances, the media was exaggerating prevalence and magnitude because "if it bleeds, it leads." We should be asking whether a) there is an increase of natural disasters, and b) whether these trends show a correlation or causation with increased GHG emissions. This all points to the reality that the environmentalist movement historically has a habit of exaggerating threats, whether it was the Great Barrier Reef, polar bears, acid rain, deforestation, or nuclear winter. Decades of failed eco-doomsday predictions make me as wary as I would with a cult leader who continues to make lousy predictions about the Apocalypse. 

Another point to consider is that weather-related deaths have dropped precipitously in recent decades. This would imply a resilience in which we can better weather what Mother Nature throws at us. We should focus on policy alternatives that continue to build that resilience, not on uprooting our lives as a form of secular self-flagellation. It is for that reason and more that I am firmly opposed to the extreme policy recommendations made by climate change activists. 

I do not consider myself a climate denier, but rather a climate thinker. Facts should dictate our opinions and emotions on climate change or any topic, not the other way around. We need to think about climate change in a leveled fashion. Having such an exaggerated take on the problem is how people take the radical proposal of Net Zero. I am sure that climate change will come up as a topic again. For now, what I will say is that I prefer skepticism over the media's fear-mongering about climate change any day of the week.

Net Zero Is a Pie in the Sky Solution That Is Far From Being Zero-Cost

Fighting climate change has been all the rage, especially from activists and politicians on the Left. According to this narrative, an increase in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions is causing a surge of natural phenomenon that threaten our way of life. If we do not do something fast to lower GHG emissions, our planet will either be destroyed or severely damaged. We need to act fast or else, say the climate change activists. 

That is where the Net Zero debate comes in. Net Zero refers to a balance between the amount of GHG emissions that are produced and the amount that are removed from the atmosphere. It is a goalpost to make sure that we do not go above 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels. This 1.5°C threshold is what many climate scientists believe is acceptable before crossing to a "point of no return" in terms of there being catastrophic and irreversible events. 

My questioning of the premise goes beyond my generally skeptical and inquisitive behavior. It certainly would not be the first time the environmental movement has cried wolf. The media has exaggerated climate change's effect on such phenomena as hurricanes or heat waves to peddle climate change sensationalism. As a matter of fact, I have enough skepticism of the apocalyptic view where I would state that climate change is not a crisis because the worst-case scenarios are based on low-probability climate modeling that makes unrealistic assumptions. This is why I view climate change as a manageable phenomenon to which we can adapt. For argument's sake, let's assume that climate change is a threat to all of mankind and that we need to cut emissions like mad if we want to survive. 

What would it actually take to reach Net Zero? Last week, the Institute for Energy Research (IER) released a study entitled The Challenges and Costs of Net-Zero and the Future of Energy answering that question. Here are some actions that would need to take place in a U.S. context (p. 16-17):

• Eliminate coal usage by 2030. While coal consumption has been decreasing since 2007, coal still accounts for 19.5 percent of U.S. energy consumption. This ignores an elephant in the room. China is the world's largest consumer and producer of coal. Even the Left-leaning New York Times admits that this is a challenge to climate change goals. 
• Renewable energy supply 100 percent in primary energy by 2050. In 1991, fossil fuels made up 85.6 percent of U.S. energy consumption. In 2021, that figure went down to 78.7 percent. While renewables grew by 5.6 quadrillion BTUs between 1990 and 2022, fossil fuels grew by an even higher 6.8 quadrillion BTUs. To replace the increase in fossil fuel consumption, renewable energy consumption would have to increase by sixfold over the next thirty years. That would include wind and solar needing to increase by fourteen-fold. Given the land use required for solar and wind, it presents considerable challenges (more on that in a moment). 
• Between 210 and 330 million light-duty electric vehicles (EV) by 2050. Last April, I criticized Biden's emissions standards that encouraged EVs too quickly. As of 2022, less than one percent of all vehicles are EVs. According to a report from Princeton University, anywhere between 6 and 17 percent of the vehicle stock would need to be EVs by 2030. To do that, the U.S. would need to triple its EV production to reach the lower end of that range. Seeing how EV manufacturers are struggling to produce enough EVs without going bankrupt, this seems too lofty of a goal. 
• 2-5 times more electricity infrastructure. To reach this goal, you would need 1.3-5.9TW of wind and solar to do it. To reach the low-bound 1.3TW, wind and solar farms would need to take up 260,000 square kilometers. To put that into perspective, that is larger than the size of Oregon, Wyoming, Michigan, or New England (IER, p. 21-22). 
• Going back to my EV emissions critique from last April, the United States already has a strained electric grid system. It would be a huge amount of change. You expect that we can quintuple the grid size by 2050?

This only gets into the scenarios needed for it to work. We would also need to increase the mining of lithium, graphite, cobalt, nickel and rare earth metals (IER, p. 35). If by some miracle we could make it halfway to Net Zero, it would still cost a decline in GDP of $7.7 trillion, 1.2 million jobs, an increase of household electric bills to $840 [in 2017 dollars], and gasoline prices increasing 236 percent (IER, p. 5). 

If you are looking for additional reading on Net Zero scenarios, the Energy Policy Research Foundation published a report in June 2023 showing how ridiculous and rosy the assumptions the International Energy Agency made in its Net Zero projections.

Net zero is as delusional as zero-COVID or the quixotic dream of chasing windmills. The truth is that fossil fuels still have a major role in energy portfolios. I believe that we should move to greener energy. The problem is that much of the environmentalist movement is anti-nuclear. Without nuclear power as a major part of the energy portfolio, we have de facto shut down the only viable path towards Net Zero that can meet energy demands. 

It sounds like an environmentalist wet dream to envision a world without fossil fuels. Doing so without nuclear at the forefront would be like holding a coal in your hand and expecting it to burn someone else. As long as the anti-nuclear crowd is driving the green agenda, activists and politicians will go after everything, whether it is our cars, stoves, or water heaters. We need to keep our guard up and remain skeptical of such environmental ploys, especially if the environmental movement continues to make such radical proposals under such tenuous assumptions. 

It Was a Hot July, But We Shouldn't Give Into Climate Change Hype on Heat Waves or "Global Boiling"

Last month was the hottest month that I can remember in recent memory. That is not simply anecdotal evidence on my end. The World Meteorological Association is positing that July 2023 is the hottest month on record. As we see below, global mean surface air temperature is above what it historically has been. If you read news from media outlets, we should not only be worried but downright terrified about how climate change is making extreme heat worse and very well bring the end of days. The Guardian opined that Phoenix's heat waves are testing the limits of survival. Washington Post said that this deadly heat are the alarm bells of a planet on a brink. The Atlantic asked how much longer the Southwest will be habitable. The Left-leaning Center for American Progress released a report on the health care costs of extreme heat. 

Since we are in an age of global warming, it makes sense that it is going to be warmer than it was in the Little Ice Age (16-19 c.). It seems tautological, to say the least. But it is more than the planet getting warmer. It is about whether more extreme heat is wreaking more havoc on the world. Last year after Hurricane Ian, I scrutinized the media hysteria on hurricanes as it pertained to climate change. It turns out that the media was ignoring that number, frequency, and intensity of hurricanes did not increase due to climate change. Furthermore, it turns out that hurricanes have not caused more economic damage when using normalized cost trends. I would like to know if the media is exaggerating the effects of heat waves in the same way they have with hurricanes or if this time is different. 

First of all, saying that this is the "hottest year on record" does not mean much when experts only have been collecting surface temperature data since the late nineteenth century (see NASA data below). There are literally centuries for which we do not have such detailed data. Nevertheless, let us use what data we do have. For context, they started collecting these data at the tail-end of the Little Ice Age. What we see with these NASA data are that the planet has warmed up by about 1° Celsius over the past 140 years. We started collecting these data at a cold period and entered a period in which the global temperatures have gradually increased over time. 

Scientists have gathered surface temperature data since the late 19th century and satellites have only gathered data since the late 1970s. Aside from surface temperature data and satellite data, we only have proxy measures that a 2006 study from the National Academies of Science called "low resolution." Let's take a look at one of these proxy measures: benthic carbon and oxygen isotopes from up to 66 million years (Westerhold et al., 2020). What we see below is that in prehistoric times, the Earth's global temperature was up to 12° Celsius warmer for millions of years. In spite of those warmer temperatures, the planet survived. One can infer from this proxy measure that we could withstand a bit more heat (more on that later). 

There is a factor in play with what we have since the 1880s: temperature readings are disproportionately taken in urban areas (Zhang et al., 2021). This is important since, as the European Commission points out, cities are often 10-15° Celsius warmer than the surrounding rural areas in no small part due to the urban heat island effect. As urban centers developed in the 20th century, so has the urban heat island effect. We need to keep this upward measurement bias in mind when discussing the modern temperature data we do have.

For what we do have on record prior to this year, the worst years include 2015, 2016, 2019, 2020, and 2021. In 2003, Europe had a nasty heat wave (Lhotka and Kysely, 2022). This still was not as bad as the Drought of 1540, not to mention other nasty droughts between the 11th and 15th centuries (Cook et al., 2015). This illustrates how extreme weather situations existed in pre-modern times, which is to say that hot summer days do not automatically mean climate change. 

As for the United States, we have data to show that the worst heat waves have not taken place this decade. Data from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) shows that the worst heat waves in known history comes from the Dust Bowl era in the 1930s, not this century. 

One more interesting chart on U.S. data, this one showing the number of warm spells. This chart below comes from the government's Climate Science Special Report. In Chapter 6 of the report, we see that the length of warm spells has decreased since the Dust Bowl era and started to pick up again in 1970s. The figure plateaued in the 21st century. 

This same government report shows another peculiar trend. If we are to compare the highest temperatures between 1986 and 2016 versus that between 1901 and 1960, what we see is that the highs were warmer in the first part of the 20th century. If the massive increase in greenhouse gas emissions are supposed to cause greater temperatures, why are we seeing most parts of the United States have lower highs than in previous years?

An important question to ask is what sort of impact heat waves have. One is that of droughts because heat waves can exacerbate drought, which has impact on agriculture and general water availability. I went to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report to answer this question. I did see multiple regions dealing with a low level of increased drought (IPCC, p. 10). What I did not see is a high level of drought that would correspond with the media sensationalism. 

 

What about people dying from extreme heat?  The Lancet published a study covering 854 European cities between 2000 and 2019 (Masselot et al, 2023). The study found that extreme cold was way more likely to kill than extreme heat (more than ten times likely), as we see from the study's chart below. Take a look at the x-axis of the chart. 

What is the difference? The scaling for extreme cold deaths is not the same as that for extreme heat. The scaling is about 1:6, which is to say that the authors of the study exaggerated the excess death rate by about sixfold to make their point. If you make the scaling equal by using a 1:1 scale, you see an even more obvious picture, which is that extreme cold is way worse than extreme heat. Based on figures in the Lancet study, Bjorn Lomborg was able to extrapolate that rising temperatures are able to save over 150,000 lives a year. The truth is that the largest source of temperature-related mortality is the extreme cold, not extreme heat.

And if that were not enough, there was decline of around 50 percent in global heat wave deaths between 1980 and 2016 (Formetta and Feyen, 2019, see below). Not only are the fatalities much smaller than extreme cold deaths, but heat-related fatality rates have been on the decline. Another study showing heat mortality data for the United States shows a similar decline in heat-related mortality (Sheridan et al., 2021).

This is not to say that there is no cost to warmer summers. What we do see in the data is that the concern is nowhere near where it needs to be to justify panic. That is because climate change is not an apocalyptic disaster. We have seen environmentalists use fear and alarmism multiple times where the event did not pan out, whether that was it deforestation, acid rain, the death of the Great Barrier Reef, a nuclear winter, or Rachel Carson's The Silent Spring. If people stopped using worst-case, low-probability models to justify the fears, we would not be in such a panic. Climate change is a manageable problem. How do we manage it? Adaptation is our best bet because it has already worked. 

As already illustrated, weather-related deaths have decreased about 96 percent in the past century, even with population growth. Instead participating in a secular form of self-flagellation, we should embrace the technology we have to make our lives better. We can do more to mitigate the effects of warmer summers with air conditioning, fresh drinking water, swimming pools, and electric fans. We could fight the heat waves by asking for subsidies on air conditioners, painting streets white to reflect the sunlight, or working towards cheaper energy (especially nuclear power). These are superior policy options compared to dealing with climate change by forcing electric vehicles on the American people, gas stove bans, implementing cap-and-trade, or using really strict water heater energy efficiency standards. Do-good policy beats feel-good policy and looking at the data for what they are beats the sensationalism around so-called "global boiling." 

Biden's Water Heater Energy Efficiency Standards Would Put American Homeowners in Troubled Waters

The Biden administration has been on a crusade against climate change. Its weapon of choice has been regulations. The Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) included electric vehicle provisions and clean energy tax credits, neither of which will do anything significant to reduce global temperatures. Earlier this year, one of Biden's Consumer Product Safety Commission commissioners suggested the ludicrous idea of a gas stove ban. In April, Biden proposed electronic vehicle (EV) emission standards so strict that they illustrate the flaws of advocating so much for EVs. 

Now we have Biden's Department of Energy (DOE) proposing energy efficiency standards on consumer water heaters. If successful, these regulations will compel "that most common-sized electric water heaters to achieve efficiency gains with heat pump technology and gas-fired instantaneous water heaters to achieve efficiency gains through condensing technology." The latter regulation is designed to push more people towards electrification. The Biden administration's DOE calculated that the regulations would save consumers $11.4 billion per annum. It makes it seem like a win for fighting climate change. Here are some issues I take with that assertion.

I am going to forget the fact that these sorts of rosy projections tend to overstate benefits while understating costs. Industry data show that the average installation cost for a heat pump versus an electric water heater is up to $2,800 more expensive. How long it takes for the consumer to recoup savings depends on climate, house size, and number of occupants. Based on DOE estimates, it can take anywhere between a few months and eight years to break even. 

Even if someone experiences a modest savings of $20/month, odds are most households would rather not pay extra money upfront for the more expensive unit. 57 percent of Americans do not have enough to cover a $1,000 emergency. Especially with the monetary and fiscal policy that brought this inflation, what makes you think most households have an extra $2,800 laying around to pay for a water heater that complies with these DOE standards? This does not get at the fact that the same industry data show that a gas water heater is cheaper in the long-run than an electric water heater. 

I have other reasons to think prices will go up as a result of these proposed regulations. The leading water heater manufacturer, Rinnai Corporation, stated that the proposed standards are not feasible for its noncondensing line and that they will "force consumers to choose less efficient water heating solutions such as tank style water heaters." That means supply of water heaters will be constricted, which will drive up prices. Rinnai President Frank Windsor also warned that in addition to higher energy bills, there will be shorter appliance lifespans. This means higher repair costs, as well as that the DOE's projections are based on rosier assumptions about longer appliance lifespan. 

The Right-leaning National Review illustrations functional considerations for a water heater: "The heat-pump water heaters are a compelling choice for those living in hot climates, but for those living in places that get colder, it isn't as great of an option. The unit essentially functions as an air conditioner because after it suck in hot air from the room, it then blows out cold air." The article points out another issue: "The heat-pump water heaters require seven feet of clearance, which means they are not a good option for people who have water heaters in rooms with low ceiling or underneath staircases." In other words, a heat-pump water heater is not an optimal choice for all households. People should have the right to purchase whichever water heater best fits their circumstances. 

I am already skeptical about the monetary benefits for the climate since most of our energy still comes from fossil fuels. Only with an electric grid with predominantly renewable energy could this possibly work, and we are still a long ways from that objective. But let's get at a more essential question: What about the carbon emissions reduction these standards are supposed to bring? 

The DOE calculates that it will reduce carbon emissions by 501 million metric tons (p. 15). 501 million sounds like a large number, but that number needs to be put into greater context. I asked a similar question with the IRA last year: How much will this policy actually reduce global temperatures? After all, the rationale for these efficiency standards is that reducing global temperatures will mitigate the effects of climate change. If it does not reduce global temperatures significantly (certainly at the 1.5 degrees Celsius threshold that has people worried), then we should seriously question why the DOE is implementing these regulations in the first place.

Per the Right-leaning Heritage Foundation, even if the United States eliminated all fuel-based carbon emissions, it would only reduce global temperatures by 0.2 degrees Celsius. If that is how little eliminating all carbon emissions helps, imaging how insignificantly tiny and minute these water heater efficiency standards are going to make a difference. It is basically next to nil. Plus, as I brought up in April, climate change is not the crisis the alarmists make it out to be. 

Why is the DOE going out of its way to burden the American people with these regulations? It surely is not because these efficiency energy standards help with climate change, which makes the DOE's motives here more suspect. Using the excuse of "it's to fight climate change" is giving the Biden administration the carte blanche to regulate anything with an electric plug or that fires up around the house. Any home owner that wants to go all-electric can do so at any time. There is no need for government fiat, especially since these regulations will do nothing of actual significance to lower carbon emissions. As such, the Biden administration should back off its war on home appliances and rescind its proposed rules. That way, we can get back to some actual common-sense environmental policy instead of feel-good environmental policy.