America is aggressively pursuing “green” electricity and actively phasing out of crude oil to reduce emissions generated in America by deliberately increasing worldwide exploitations of humanity, environmental degradation, and increased emissions.
California Governor Gavin Newsom, President Joe Biden, and world leaders are not cognizant enough to know that wind turbines and solar panels only generate occasional electricity and are unable to manufacture tires, cable insulation, asphalt, medicines and the more than 6,000 products now made from the petrochemical derivatives manufactured from crude oil.
Without a replacement for those petrochemical derivatives manufactured from crude oil, phasing out oil would phase out the Medical Industry, Militaries, Transportation, Communications, and the Electrical Power industries, none of which existed before the 1800’s.
Climate changes may impact millions, but without fossil fuels and the infrastructures and products we have today that did not exist before 1800’s, we may lose BILLIONS from diseases, malnutrition, and weather-related deaths.
Eradicating the world of crude oil usage would ground the 20,000 commercial aircraft, and more than 50,000 military aircraft in the world and leave the 50,000 merchant ships tied up at docks and discontinue the military and space programs! Without a backup plan to replace crude oil, the 8 billion on this planet will face the greatest threat to humanity without jets, merchant ships, and space programs.
America’s climate policies being introduced are particularly harmful for developing countries. America is probably the most environmentally controlled county in the world, but by deliberately relying on poorer developing countries for our fuels and products, we are “leaking” to other countries:
- Leakage of emissions to countries with minuscule environmental laws.
- Leakage of the exploitations of people with yellow, brown, and black skin to counties with minuscule labor laws.
- Leakage of environmental degradation to landscapes in developing countries where there are minuscule environmental laws.
In the aftermath of the 1973 oil crisis in 1977, the Department of Energy was established to lessen our dependence on foreign oil but today, with its 14,000 employees and a $48 billion dollar budget the D.O.E. continues to remain dead silent and has allowed California, the 4th largest economy in the world to increase imported crude oil from 5 percent in 1992 to almost 60 percent today of total consumption.
California is home to 9 International airports, 41 Military airports, and 3 of the largest shipping ports in America. California’s growing dependency on other nations is a serious national security risk for America!
China’s Xi Jinping and Russia’s Vladimir Putin are great War historians. As World War I and II historians, Russia, China, and OPEC know, the country that controls the minerals, crude oil, and natural gas, controls the world! It’s shocking that of all the Generals that report to President Biden (Army, Navy, Marines, Air Force, Space Program), NONE have asked the President how are we going to run our military ships, planes, vehicles, and supply products to our troops WITHOUT oil?
It’s a no-brainer that an attack on the ports at San Francisco, Los Angeles, or Long Beach could paralyze the American economy with huge reductions in fuels for California’s in-state infrastructures and stagnate the supply chain of products for the entire country.
Meanwhile, California continues to constantly reduce in-state refining capacity that refines fuels and petrochemicals for the materialistic demands of society and continue its growing dependency on foreign oil.
A few notes about ELECTRICITY:
- Everything that needs electricity, like the basic light bulb, computers, iPhones and iPads, televisions, washing machines, X-ray equipment, etc., are all made with the oil derivatives manufactured from crude oil.
- Every method of generating electricity, like wind turbines, solar panels, hydroelectric, nuclear, coal, and natural gas power plants all exist only because all the parts and components of the generation system are made with the oil derivatives manufactured from crude oil.
Renewables, like wind turbines and solar panels, only generate occasional electricity from inconsistent breezes and sunshine, but manufacture no products for society.
Fossil fuels, on the other hand, manufacture everything for the 8 billion living on this planet, i.e., products, and transportation fuels.
And MOST importantly today, there is a lost reality that the primary usage of crude oil is NOT for the generation of electricity, but to manufacture derivatives and fuels which are the ingredients of everything needed by economies and lifestyles to exist and prosper. Energy realism requires that the legislators, policymakers, and media that demonstrate pervasive ignorance about crude oil usage understand the staggering scale of the decarbonization movement.
The ruling class and powerful elite have yet to identify the replacement for the oil derivatives that are the basis of more than 6,000 products and all the fuels for the merchant ships, aircraft, military, and space programs that support the 8 billion living on this planet?
The American government provides incentives and tax deductions to transition society to EV’s, but those incentives are financial incentives for the continuation of Child Labor and Ecological Destruction “Elsewhere”. Is it ethical and moral to provide financial support to the developing countries that are mining for exotic minerals and metals to build EV batteries for Americans?
We’ve become a very materialistic society over the last 200 years, and the world has populated from 1 to 8 billion because of all the products and different fuels for planes, ships, trucks, cars, military, and the space program that did not exist before the 1800’s. Until a crude oil replacement is identified, the world needs a back-up plan that replaces crude oil that will support the manufacturing of the products of our materialistic society.
Today’s materialistic world cannot survive without crude oil! Conversations are needed to discuss the difference between just ELECTRICITY” from renewables, and the “PRODUCTS” that are the basis of society’s materialistic world. Wind turbines and solar panels are themselves MADE from oil derivatives, and only generate occasional electricity but manufacture NOTHING for society.
How dare the ruling class, powerful elite, and media, avoid energy literacy conversations about the “Elephant in the Room”, as the end of crude oil that is manufactured into all the products and transportation fuels that built the world to eight billion people, would be the end of civilization as “unreliable electricity” from breezes and sunshine cannot manufacture anything.
Photo by Davide Taviani. Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported.
Ronald Stein is an internationally published columnist and energy consultant, and a policy advisor for The Heartland Institute.
