“Leave the Paris Agreement Behind! What We Need Is Energy for All to Lift the World Out of Poverty!” By Doug Sheridan, THOMAS J SHEPSTONE
“ In its withdrawal, the US should urge all nations to eliminate energy poverty. Energy inequalities across the globe are astounding.”
Leave the Paris Agreement Behind! What We Need Is Energy for All to Lift the World Out of Poverty!
DEC 19, 2024
Donald Trump has wisely promised to pull the United States out for that awful Paris Climate Agreement, as he did before. It can’t happen soon enough but it also needs to become permanent by turning the whole sham on its head to doing something meaningful, measurable and monumental. That would be a new agreement among nations to fight energy poverty and lift billions out of it.
Doug Sheridan addresses this in one of his latest posts, building on some Steve Koonin comments to the Wall Street Journal. Here is the Sheridan’s formula:
In its withdrawal, the US should urge all nations to eliminate energy poverty. Energy inequalities across the globe are astounding. On average, an American citizen uses 30x as much energy as a Nigerian does. There are also inequalities within our own borders. More than a third of US households experience some form of energy insecurity. That fraction will increase if decarbonization efforts continue their current course.
DC's goal should be energy for all. Providing affordable and reliable energy, no matter the source, would do far more good for humanity than discouraging fossil fuels based on fear of some vague climate catastrophe. US leadership on this front would counter China's influence in the Third World through its Belt and Road Initiative. American efforts would increase demand for US energy and energy-technology exports, setting the stage for the future deployment of cost-effective clean tech around the globe.
Renewed commitment to developing this tech could be the final element of Trump's productive withdrawal. Creating affordable, reliable, emissions-lite energy technology is essential. Small modular fission reactors and better batteries are particularly promising.But we shouldn't subsidize or mandate the deployment of immature or ineffective technologies-such as offshore wind farms, residential heat pumps and EVs that nobody wants.
It will take a year for a withdrawal from the Paris Agreement to take effect. Trump could use that time to highlight the agreement's failures, plan a global “energy for all" program and strengthen efforts to develop cleaner tech. Doing would show how futile and destructive the world's current efforts to reduce emissions really are, and chart a healthier path for the planet.
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I love every bit of this. My only caution is that we don’t need a global War on Poverty along the lines of LBJ's giveaways that only made the problem worse. That’s the Biden strategy, of course, and it only incentivizes failure. What’s needed is research, regulatory reform, and real partnerships between developed and developing nations to help the latter realize the potential they possess given their natural resources. Help those with uranium create their own nuclear energy. Help those with natural gas engage in fracking. Help those with coal employ the latest clean technologies to ensure it doesn’t pollute their air. Help all developing nations mitigate climate impacts, whatever they may be.
That’s a real strategy. The devil is in the details, of course, so we don’t want it to become just another form of corporatism or imperialism, for that matter. It needs to be focused less on money we don’t have and more on simply working together to share expertise. The current crop of climate corporatists will hate the idea, of course, as will the wannabe masters of the universe at the UN, the WEF, and the like. But, with Trump's leadership and the right marketing, it can happen. Moreover, the timing is just right, as the costs in money and freedom and risks of the “green energy transition” have become ever more apparent across the globe and the “climate crisis” has become a case of “crying wolf.”