China - Green Energy Revolution

The Green Energy Revolution is strengthening the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and weakening the United States. Based on an ideology that believes reducing carbon dioxide in the atmosphere will reduce or eliminate climate change, billions of taxpayer dollars are being spent on lithium batteries, electric vehicles (EVs), windmills, and solar panels.

The EV ideology pursued by the Biden administration “could imperil national security,” states a top Democrat donor, Jamie Dimon, Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer of JPMorgan Chase financial services corporation. The CCP’s unrestricted warfare strategy includes economic warfare to dominate the world’s batteries, rare earth, semiconductors, and EVs.

The hysteria over climate change is driving the green energy ideology. Science has not proven that increased carbon dioxide leads to global warming, and if so, what are the dangers to humanity? More carbon dioxide might lead to greater plant growth and increased food supply. Warmer temperatures might free up northern lands in Canada and Russia for more farming. Warmer temperatures can reduce deaths; more people die of cold than of heat.

Computer models project various climate change scenarios, but such scenarios should be taken with a grain of skepticism. How accurate is your local weather station’s forecast for the week? And we are supposed to believe a 20-year projection based on suspect data? For over four billion years, the climate has been changing and continents moving. As recently as 20,000 years ago, northern parts of the present-day United States were covered in 5,000 feet of ice. What caused that ice to melt?

The U.S. government is spending billions of dollars in subsidizing green carbon-free energy for EVs, windmills, and solar panels. All are unreliable, cost-inefficient, environmentally toxic, and a poor allocation of the nation’s resources. And while the U.S. green agenda is driving inflation and weakening national and economic security, it is laying waste to important economic segments in America - automobile and energy industries.

Ford Motor Company recently announced a $3.1 billion loss in the first quarter of this year due to EV costs and chip supply chain issues. Ford predicts electric cars will be profitable in a few years and plans to make 2 million by 2025. That would be an incredible achievement considering Ford sold only 61,575 in 2022. It sold 3,624 in February 2023.

General Motors (GM) is asking for the voluntary separation of 5,000 employees to save $1.5 billion as it invests $35 billion in EVs between now and 2025. GM plans to sell 1 million electric cars by 2025, even though it sold only 40,000 in 2022. The so-called affordable GM Bolt sells for $30,000 yet loses $9,000 for the company. The only way the automobile industry can survive is through massive government subsidies, tax credits, and government mandates, such as in California, when in 2035, you can buy only EVs. ((Fascism anyone?)

Millions of American jobs will be lost because of the government's central planning, Marxists establishing unattainable regulations and mandates. Associated industries to energy and automobiles will suffer closures and bankruptcies. Society will suffer from increased unemployment and mental depression. Increased family fractures, alcoholism, and drug use will follow.

Consumers don’t want EVs because they are too expensive and too unreliable. Internal combustion engines work fine, are dependable, can be recharged easily, and are cost-efficient. Outside of major urban cities, the electric grid will not be able to supply the electricity needed to power EVs. Even then, major cities may not have power due to declining carbon-based power plants and unreliable wind/solar power plants. If climate change ideologues were honest, they would support nuclear energy. It is carbon dioxide-free, 24/7 reliable, cost-efficient, and not dependent upon CCP raw materials and technology.

The mining industry does not have the capacity to supply the minerals used in EVs, and much of the country will not be able to charge EVs economically. That is assuming consumers will buy. The U.S. will end up like Cuba, where the citizens desperately work to keep old cars running. The climate will not be changed by a switch to EVs.

Summary
What is the purpose of this irrational green energy revolution? Is it to strengthen China and weaken America? China is the world’s biggest contributor to atmospheric carbon dioxide. China is building two coal-powered power plants per week, or six times more than any other country. The United States and the European Union are building none.

And while Americans are committing societal suicide with the clean green energy revolution, the CCP is getting stronger. China does not have the gas, oil, and coal energy resources of the U.S. What China does have is a stranglehold on rare earth minerals and lithium batteries - all used by American green energy industries and the military. The U.S. is banning the export of high-tech chip technology. What would happen if China retaliated against the U.S. and banned rare earth exports as it did with Japan in 2010?

The United States must stop funding the green energy madness. If the product makes sense, the consumer will buy it. It should not be force-fed, as in totalitarian societies.

Peace Through Strength

Laurence F. Sanford
Senior Analyst
American Security Council Foundation
www.ascf.us