From the Daily Caller News Foundation

By STEPHEN MOORE

Things are not going well at all for the global warming crusaders. Despite hundreds of billions of tax dollars spent on green energy over the past decade, the world and America used more fossil fuels than ever before in history last year.

The electric vehicle movement is stalled out, solar and wind power are both still fringe forms of energy, and the green candidates got crushed in recent elections in Europe because voters are sick of the higher prices associated with green policies.

So, having struck out with consumers, businesses and at the ballot box, the greens now are moving on to the courts. The climate-change industrial complex has now joined forces with trial lawyers to advance their war on fossil fuels.

One of the more absurd lawsuits happened in Hawaii.

There, a group of 13 teenagers — honest, I’m not making this up — sued Hawaii’s government over its use of fossil fuels. Environmental law firms Our Children’s Trust and Earthjustice claim that Hawaii’s natural resources are imperiled by CO2 emissions. Even if that were true, shouldn’t they be suing China?

The settlement will require the state to eliminate fossil fuels from its transportation system by 2045, and also formally recognizes the right to file future lawsuits against other parties.

Democratic Gov. Josh Green even stood next to the young plaintiffs as he read a statement claiming, “This settlement informs how we as a state can best move forward to achieve life-sustaining goals.”

There is so much that is wrong about this decision. How did a bunch of teenagers possibly have standing to sue? What possible harm have they suffered from fossil fuels?

The irony is that this island paradise in the Pacific — whose primary industry is tourism — is going to collapse without fossil fuels. With no jets and cruise ships allowed, will tourists and business travelers have to arrive by sailboat?

But this new technique of using lawsuits to advance the anti-fossil fuels movement has spread to other states. Last August, a judge ruled that GOP-dominated Montana violated its constitution when it approved fossil fuel projects without taking climate change into account.

After recent flooding in Vermont, green activists sued the state for not abolishing fossil fuels.

Massachusetts is suing Exxon Mobil for adverse weather conditions.

There are now 32 cases filed by state attorneys general, cities, counties and tribal nations against companies including Exxon Mobil, BP and Shell. The lawsuits claim that the industry tried to undermine scientific consensus about the crisis.

Here’s what’s so frightening about these sham lawsuits from trial lawyers who hope to turn oil companies into cash cows similar to the tobacco lawsuits 20 years ago: The end game of lawsuits against states and oil and gas companies for using or producing energy because of alleged damage to the environment could bring about abolition of fossil fuels through the back door of the nation’s courthouses.

But what none of these judges or litigators take into account is the catastrophic economic effects of not using fossil fuels. As an example, the Left wants to abolish air conditioning, which requires electricity, which mostly comes from fossil fuels. But air conditioning saves tens of thousands of lives a year. What about the millions of jobs that would be wiped out with no fossil fuels? How many thousands of Americans would die in hospitals, or assisted living centers, or day care centers, or schools if the lights go out with no fossil fuel power plants?

Fossil fuels have saved millions more lives over the last century than they take. They make Americans much richer and safer and happier and healthier and more mobile. Meanwhile, there is no evidence backing up the absurd claim by teenagers that if Hawaii stopped using fossil fuels, the state’s weather conditions would improve.

Will judges take that into consideration when they try to rob Exxon and coal companies of their profits for the sin of making life on earth much better?

Stephen Moore is a visiting fellow at the Heritage Foundation and a senior economic advisor to Donald Trump. His latest book is: “Govzilla: How the Relentless Growth of Government Is Devouring Our Economy.”

The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of the Daily Caller News Foundation.

(Featured Image Media Credit: Screen Capture/Supreme Court of the United States)

From the Canadian Taxpayers Federation

Author: Ryan Thorpe

The Trudeau government is dumping $1.7 million into a failed bid to get countries around the world to impose carbon taxes, according to access-to-information records obtained by the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.

“All Canadians need to do to know Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s carbon tax push is an utter failure is look south of the border and see the United States’ refusal to impose their own tax,” said Franco Terrazzano, CTF Federal Director. “If Trudeau can’t even get our biggest trading partner and ally to impose a carbon tax, then why is he wasting money trying to push this unpopular tax around the world?”

The Trudeau government launched the Global Carbon Pricing Challenge at COP26 in 2021.

The program “aims to see 60 per cent of global GHG emissions covered by carbon pricing policies by 2030.” The program website notes “carbon pricing is most effective when more countries adopt it.”

But the results so far are dismal for the government.

Only 24 per cent of global emissions are currently covered by a carbon tax. About 70 per cent of countries do not have a national carbon tax, according to the World Bank.

Three of the four largest emitting countries – the U.S., Russia and India – currently do not have a national carbon tax, according to the World Bank.

“The [climate] community has largely moved into a different framework,” said John Podesta, a long-time Democratic strategist, when asked about whether the Biden administration would impose a carbon tax in the U.S.

Only 12 countries, including Kazakhstan and Chile, have signed onto the Global Carbon Pricing Challenge as “partners,” alongside the European Union. Côte d’Ivoire is listed as the lone “friend” of the program.

There are 195 countries in the world, according to the United Nations.

“This program is a complete failure that’s wasting taxpayers’ money,” Terrazzano said. “The carbon tax makes life in Canada more expensive, forces taxpayers to pay for more bureaucrats to administer it and now we learn we’re also paying for the government to push this failed policy on other countries.”

Records obtained by the CTF show the Trudeau government has spent $811,598 on salaries for bureaucrats, operations and maintenance, and guidance and control for the program since the 2021-22 fiscal year.

The government committed an additional $974,900 towards the creation of an independent secretariat to “support the GCPC.”

The federal government has also spent about $200 million administering the carbon tax in Canada since it was first imposed, according to separate records obtained by the CTF.

Canada’s “GDP is expected to be about $25 billion lower in 2030 due to carbon pricing than it would be otherwise,” according to the Globe and Mail.

“Trudeau should stop wasting money, stop punishing Canadians and scrap the carbon tax,” Terrazzano said.