The Folly Of Climate Leadership - Highlighted Article

From: Forbes

By: Tilak Doshi

Date: January 29, 2024

The Folly Of Climate Leadership

Lessons of UK Energy Policy Failure

Citing an International Energy Agency report, The Daily Telegraph reported on Wednesday that UK electricity prices have risen faster than almost any other developed country since 2019. The price of electricity in the UK rose by 19 percent in 2023 alone, compared to the US where electricity prices have risen by 5 percent annually since 2019. Referencing a separate report from the House of Commons library, the same article finds that the price increases have been driven by taxes and levies linked to the country’s commitment to the “net zero” emissions target which made up almost a fifth of household electricity prices.

Rupert Darwall’s 76-page penetrating analysis of Britain’s energy policy, “The folly of climate leadership: Net Zero and Britain’s disastrous energy policies” with a foreword written by Andy Puzder was published last month by the RealClear Foundation. It provides the context necessary to understand how UK’s political elites practically sleep-walked the country into its binding net zero legislation. The follies of quixotic climate leadership are not Britain’s alone, as the Biden Administration took office three years ago as America’s first “environmental administration”. Mr. Darwall’s analysis provides an excellent assessment of the lessons of Britain’s failing energy policies for those of the Biden administration. Under Democrat leadership, the US government unleashed a tsunami of green subsidies under its misnamed Inflation Reduction Act to achieve its net zero targets.

Lies, Damn Lies and Wind Energy

Not to be outdone in its claims to global “climate leadership”, the UK Labour government under Prime Minister Gordon Brown in 2008 committed the country to a legally binding target of reducing carbon emissions by 80 percent by 2050 below the 1990 level. It was all the more remarkable that this policy target was implemented during the global Great Recession that began with the financial crisis in the United States in late 2007 and which lasted until mid-2009. (continue reading)

The Folly Of Climate Leadership