Gov’s Greenhouse Gasbags Report
April 19th, 2008
When I look at the Green Chameleon Gov’s Greenhouse Gasbags’ Report, words fail me, good thing… we don’t need more CO2. But it’s so absurd, the assumptions are so bizarre, counterintuitive, where do I even begin? I think I’ll just post it first until I find the words. But that itself is a problem, because they have it all divided up, compartmentalized as it were, and it’s hard to get the whole thing. So I downloaded them and combined into the Report and the Appendices, while downloading I had the pleasure of watching a doe feeding just up the bluff, about 35 feet up from my door. Anyway, here we go:
From their site:
Public Comments – The deadline for public comment is midnight Sunday, April 27, 2008.
The link to the online form for submitting comments is:
www.commerce.state.mn.us/ClimateChangeResponse.html
The form is weird because it’s the only way I see to be able to comment, there are no email addresses… GRRRRRRRR… and they say: “You will need to fill-in and submit one web-based comment form for each policy option on which you are commenting.” And it seems that ONLY these web-form submitted comments will become part of the bigger report: “All comments submitted through the website will become part of the final report to the Governor and legislature after April 27th, 2008.”
So I’d recommending cutting and pasting into the form, keeping the comments in their entirety in another document, and then send separately to our agency buddies, just for giggles:
Now, why would I think this Gasbag report is a load o’ crap? Try this:
The generation performance standard (GPS) is a mandate that requires entities that deliver electricity to acquire electricity or power plant developers to build and operate new base-load generation, with a per-unit emission rate below 1,100 pounds of CO2 per megawatt-hour (MWh). For base-load projects that are part of a combined-heat-and-power project, the GPS would be raised to 1,300 pounds of CO2/MWh. By MCCAG vote, the two proposed new coal stations for meeting Minnesota base-load demand—Big Stone 2 and Mesaba—were exempted from the GPS. At its final meeting, MCCAG decided that this policy required further study.
Gasbag Report, Ch. 4, p. 5, para. ES-1. “MCCAG vote, the two proposed new coal stations for meeting Minnesota base-load demand—Big Stone 2 and Mesaba—were exempted from the GPS.” Excuuuuuse me, but how will exemption of 10 million new, NEW, tons of CO2 annually do anything but put us back, worse off then before we started? The gall, the audacity, whatever are they thinking? show me how they’ll make up that 10 million tons much less have any net decrease? What’s the point.
Oh, and here it is again, in the Executive Summary, p. EX 10:
All totals are relative to the underlying assumption that electricity expansion in Minnesota proceeds with the recently legislated Conservation Improvement Program (CIP), Renewable Energy Standard (RES), and all planned additions including the Mesaba and Big Stone 2 stations.
And we’re supposed to take the time to evaluate this piece o’ crap? How can they put something like this out into the world?
When does “Equal Time” campaign provision kick in?
February 23rd, 2008
From a stranger in a very strange land, a question posed from the home of former Gov. Jesse Ventura, current Gov. Tim Pawlenty, soon-to-be U.S. Senator Al Franken, former Congressional candidate Wendy Wilde and former State House Rep. Mike Osskopp, all radio personalities who quit when they were campaigning:
Here’s David Oxenford’s post last October on this very question:
And regarding that question posed, from Oxenford himself:
Sounds to me that, in your situation, if the candidate bought the time,
it’s just like the Hillary Clinton hour on the Hallmark Channel - other
candidates probably have equal opportunity rights - but they just have
the opportunity to buy an equal amount of time on the cable channel.
They don’t get free time unless the first candidate got her time for
free.
Yup, that’s just what I was thinking…
If anyone wants to check that out with the expert himself, he’s got 25 years of FCC and campaign experience, BROADCAST LAW, get the real poop, CLICK HERE FOR A PROFESSIONAL OPINION!
Rep. Tschumper takes on ethanol
February 9th, 2008
Today’s StPPP reports that Rep. Ken Tschumper is taking on ethanol, demanding environmental review. THANK YOU, KEN! Here’s the article:
Lawmaker proposes environmental review of new ethanol plants
BY DENNIS LIEN
Pioneer Press
Article Last Updated: 02/08/2008 04:03:42 PM CSTA southern Minnesota lawmaker said today he plans to introduce a bill in the state House next week that would require mandatory environmental reviews of all new ethanol plants.
State Rep. Ken Tschumper, DFL-LaCrescent, said such plants have environmental impacts, and should face the same types of scientific study that many other large ventures undergo. Besides using substantial quantities of groundwater and polluting the air, corn-based ethanol plants have led to increases in soil erosion, fertilizer runoff, and herbicide use, according to Tschumper.
This will go to the House Environment Committee.
CLICK HERE for House Environment Committee members & contact info.
Here’s his own press release with a little more detail:
TSCHUMPER PROPOSES ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT STATEMENTS FOR ETHANOL PLANTS
ROCHESTER, MN - State Representative Ken Tschumper (DFL - Houston and Fillmore counties) announced new legislation today that would require mandatory Environmental Impact Statements (EIS) for all new ethanol plants in Minnesota. Facilities that produce ethanol in Minnesota are currently exempt from having to do an EIS in most cases.“Congress and various state legislatures have passed generous subsidies to promote the development and expansion of ethanol plants and mandated various levels of ethanol content in gasoline,” Tschumper commented. “Some states, including Minnesota, have gone even farther by exempting ethanol production facilities from the normal environmental review and regulation that such projects of similar size would undergo in other sectors of the economy.”
However in the last several years existing ethanol facilities have expanded and new plants are proposed that are much larger than in the past.
“The environmental impacts of this expanding ethanol production are causing great concern,” Tschumper emphasized. “Huge demands on groundwater, increased air pollution, heavy demands for rail transportation, increased soil erosion and fertilizer runoff, negative impacts on livestock prices and the increased use of atrazine, (a pesticide known to cause prostrate and uterine cancer in humans) are impacting our lives, our financial stability, and our environment.”
This is especially true for Minnesota. Many of the rural areas where ethanol plants exist or are proposed also have important livestock farming, especially in southern Minnesota.
“As we all know, the most important resource we have in southern Minnesota is our abundant, high quality supply of groundwater. Our livestock industry is very dependent on this critical resource, ” Tschumper, a dairy farmer himself, added.
Since the Groundwater Protection Act was passed in 1989, the State of Minnesota, working with county governments, has engaged in many initiatives to monitor and protect our precious groundwater resources.
“Unfortunately our groundwater resources on which our livestock industry is so dependent, is now being threatened by this new generation of ethanol plants. I plan on doing everything I can to protect our groundwater and our livestock industry,” Tschumper promised.
Ethanol production uses 5-6 gallons of high quality groundwater for every gallon of ethanol produced. An ethanol plant capable of producing 100 million gallons of ethanol annually will draw 500 million to 600 million gallons of water from an aquifer annually. This tremendous draw down in such a short period of time will challenge the ability of many aquifers to recharge themselves and will expose cleaner, higher quality aquifers to more pollution from pesticides and fertilizers. This has long-term implications for not only our livestock farming but also our small towns and other rural businesses.
Environmental Impact Statements are a complete scientific study of all the environmental, economic and health impacts of a proposed project.
“It is important to understand that Environmental Impact Statements do not halt projects,” said Rep. Tschumper. “They simply provide more science-based information as to the long-term consequences of these projects for our environment, our economy, and our health. Requiring an EIS for all future ethanol production facilities is reasonable, responsible and necessary.”
The EIS process that ethanol facilities will do under this legislation is similar to the standard environmental review required for projects of similar size in other sectors of the economy.
“Many large industrial and commercial projects in Minnesota are required to complete an Environmental Impact Statement before they can be built,” said Rep. Tschumper. “Prior to 2004, ethanol plants of a certain size were required to do the same, but they were exempted from this requirement that same year. Clearly that was a mistake given the growing environmental concerns surrounding current ethanol production practices.”
Rep. Tschumper will introduce his bill when the legislative session resumes February 12, 2008.
HF 1955 - outrageous
December 3rd, 2007
The Kiffmeister just sent an email waving H.R. 1955 in front of my nose, daring me not to be outraged. And of course, I AM OURAGED. It’s bills like this that make us wonder when they’ll be banging on our door. And it passed through the House virtually unopposed, not one Minnesota Representative had the gonads to vote against it.
Here’s HR 1955, The Violent Radicalism and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act:
Bills like this show the utter unawareness of causes of civil unrest, and any knowledge of what’s going on — like this might prevent anything, or that there’s anything to prevent! It’s just one more way to tighten the screws and take away peoples’ rights, quash objections — it’s governmental terrorism directed at the people.
How misguided and paranoid can we get?
“Progressives” get needed slap upside da head!
August 27th, 2007
Jonathan Larson (www.elegant-technology.com) sent this around, and it’s “spot on.” But it’s not only our federal elected officials, it’s our state Senators and Representatives too, those riding the wave of discontent and of revitalized progressive fervor — they get in and lose their backbone and gonads. What gives? State energy bills, the 2005 “Transmission Bill from Hell” in particular, and also the 2007 CO2 bill with loopholes, these are painful examples of wrongheaded policy, of giving away the farm for a teeny bit of gain. Whatever are they thinking?
Amy Klobuchar and Tim Walz are meeting over breakfast. They are talking and comparing notes about being freshmen in the Congress. Suddenly, a wiry, balding man with a slight limp pulls up a chair, sits down, and says “hello.”
Amy and Tim are speechless for a moment, and then Amy says, “Is that you Paul Wellstone? How can it be; you’re dead. Aren’t you?”
The man smiles and replies, “Maybe not so dead, after all. A person’s life can reverberate for a long time. It’s a measure of what you did in life, I guess.”
“It’s wonderful to see you, if that’s what we’re doing,” says Tim.
“Thank you; it’s nice to be seen, so to speak,” replies the man. “There’s something I want to talk to you about.”
“Of course,” says Amy, “we’re eager to hear what you have to say.”
“I am afraid,” says the man, well, we’ll just call him Paul, “that the two of you are going native.”
“What do you mean?” asks Tim.
“I am talking about your votes on the most recent Iraq war supplemental funding bill and your votes on the FISA expansion. By “native” I mean taking your cues from the Washington establishment, listening to inside-the-Beltway consultants too much, and trying to calculate your votes on some things are pretty fundamental. The D.C. people you’re listening to don’t seem all that progressive to me.”
“I am sure we’re both doing what we think it right,” say Amy.
“Ok, I’ll accept that at face value. But let me ask you this: why are the two of you sitting here?”
Tim answers, “Because we both won our elections.”
“Of course,” says Paul, “but why do you think that happened? You both beat people already in Congress.”
“We both ran great campaigns!” pipes in Amy.
“Yes, you did,” replies Paul, “but don’t you suppose that unhappiness with the Republicans, especially President Bush, had something to do with it?”
“Well, sure,” says Tim. “That doesn’t make our votes on the Iraq supplemental and FISA wrong.”
“It makes them mystifying to me,” Paul says evenly. “My time in the Senate began and ended with votes against the first and the second war in Iraq. I took plenty of heat for those votes, especially the first one. I announced my vote in a clumsy way—at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial—and I spent a lot of time redeeming myself from that with vets. And Norm Coleman was certainly trying to use the second one against me.
“Do you think I would have voted to continue to fund the war and condone wireless wiretaps of American citizens?”
“No,” say Amy, a little sullenly.
“Tim, you went to Camp Wellstone. You even had my friend Rick Kahn speak at your election party. And Amy, you were one of the people over at DFL headquarters after my plane went down asking to be the replacement candidate, right?”
Amy and Tim reply, “Yes.”
“And both of you have invoked my memory in your campaigns, haven’t you?”
Again the reply is “Yes.”
Tim says, “But, Paul, we have to try to keep everybody happy now. I have an election in just another year.”
“That’s true. But you’ll never please everyone, and you need to remember the tide of public opinion that brought you into office. The people you pleased with those votes won’t support you anyway.”
“Let’s suppose, just for the sake of argument, that we regret those votes. We can’t very well say that, can we?” asks Amy.
“I don’t know why not. I voted for the federal Defense of Marriage Act, a vote that I very much regretted. And I said so. Having regrets and being able to express them makes you authentic. And I have high hopes for both of you as authentic politicians.”
Just then, in different parts of the Washington area, Tim and Amy are jerked awake by their alarm clocks. They dress hurriedly and make their way to the restaurant where they had agreed to meet for breakfast the day before. When they meet, they say to each other simultaneously, “I had a dream last night.”