Don't be fooled by the title.
A concerning trend in the United States is assigning a title to legislation that has little or nothing to do with the content of the document. While I applaud those that use valid techniques to gain consensus, we have stretched the use of a title as a strategy to discredit anyone with an alternative view.
A prime example is the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022. Almost nothing about the act is directed at inflation. Even the whitehouse.gov website touts the act as "the most ambitious investment in combating the climate crisis in world history." So, why is it not titled The Climate Crisis Act? I believe this has to do with gaining consensus and providing a strategy to shutdown any dissenters. After all, if you were against the act, then you were for inflation. Right?
A prime reason for this could be that the act does virtually nothing to reduce greenhouse gasses. Again, the whitehouse.gov states that the act will "lead to greenhouse gas emissions reductions of approximately 1 billion tons in 2030", but the United States emission have been falling steadily since 2000 in the absence of the act. In other words, the United States has been generally reducing emissions for almost a decade which greatly puts the rush to green energy into question. In fact, it appears that the US emission of green house gasses decreased by roughly a billion tons between 2000 and 2020, so the White House seems to be taking credit for something that was likely in the absence of the legislation. I'm all for green energy, mostly because I'm against wasting resources, but I tend to question the forcing of specific technologies down the throats of industry without serious consideration of the pain it may inflict on the citizens.
For example, the rush to electric vehicles (EVs) does not seem to be thought out well. First, the bottom half of the population can not afford them. Long gone are the days of congressmen pointing out that many Americans would love to drive newer more efficient cars, if they could afford them. This is just common sense, because almost nobody would choose to drive an beat up 20 year old vehicle unless they had too. I can use myself as an example, I drive a huge two-decade old SUV. It gets terrible gas mileage, but it was cheep, repairs are reasonable, and it still cost me less that the purchase price of a Prius over the previous 10 years. In fact, the amount of total carbon released by me driving the old vehicle will likely be less than that released if it went to the junkyard and I drove a new vehicle. The dirty little secrete about vehicles is that about a third to half of the carbon emissions are from the manufacturing. EVs consume much more to make than equivalent gas-powered vehicles, and government statistics on total carbon release seem to assume zero emissions when charging. Seems the notion of reuse, quality, and longevity of a car has been lost by the policy makers. Don't get me started on how low-viscosity oil has likely resulted in an increase in emissions due to the increased need for parts and lowered longevity of newer vehicles.
If we are serious about carbon-neutral, then we must take all sources of green house gas into account. The simple-mindedness of only fossil fuel use by vehicles matter will surely result in unintended consequences. When driving on the interstate, I am amazed at what vehicles have provided for the people of the Earth. We can move food and goods from places with abundant resources to places with few resources. We have the ability to travel hundreds of miles in a single afternoon. True poverty has been almost eliminated, and regional starvation in this country is virtually unknown. If crops fail in California, alternative food resources can be obtained and transported from another region blessed with abundance that year. It is a thing of beauty that fossil fuel have made possible. Think that cell phone in your pocket would be possible without fossil fuels? Plastics, inexpensive energy, solvents, chemicals, medical devices, high yield agriculture and the roof over your head have been made possible by fossil fuels and petroleum products. As we move forward, we will need to ensure that this precious resource is available for as long as possible, but we must be careful or our efforts to "save the planet" will result in pain and suffering beyond reckoning.
So, what does this have to do with the title of legislation? It means that if you want to be informed, you can't take the shortcut of simply reading the title. There is a directed strategy to lead you astray ... don't fall for it. If you want to understand a document, you need to read beyond the summary and dive deep into the contents.
September 15, 2023
U.S. Carbon (CO2) Emissions 1990-2023
"We got the message, I heard it on the airwaves, The politicians are now DJs, ... The politics of, ooh, feeling good"
"It's in the papers, ooh, it's on your TV news; Ooh, the application is just a point of view"