Regardless of how you look at it, Friday was a big day for climate-change rhetoric in California. Democrat Governor Gavin Newsom signed several new bills that look to do away with inexpensive and reliable energy in the Golden State and replace them with “100 percent renewable energy” by 2045.
The governor signed the bills in the wake of a heat wave, which caused a “flex alert” in the southern part of the state. The state’s electric grid was on high alert as Newsom called for residents to cut down on air-conditioner use and charging electric cars. The heat wave forced the state to procure energy from outside providers, which utilized fossil fuels — most notably natural gas — to address the state’s energy crisis.
Newsom signed six bills in total, with a jaw dropping cost to taxpayers of nearly $54 billion. Newsom lauded California’s climate leadership while other states continue to enjoy the benefits of cheap and efficient fossil fuel.
“Here we are, leapfrogging and moving ahead, the deniers and the doubters, all that anger these guys are spewing every single night. Let’s think about the state of Texas,” Newsom said. “The first five months of this year, talk about spewing. 22.9 million tons of coal they spewed in the first five months of this year, compared to California’s 18,000 tons.”
According to Newsom, the new climate agenda is as much about the future economics of California as it is about addressing climate change.
“We often talk about electricity and electric power. It’s not about electric power. It’s about economic power,” Newsom bragged. “Electricity is the architecture to transform and decarbonize, not just the sector but our economy. It allows us to leapfrog into low-carbon green growth. It allows us to dominate in the next big industry.”
In August, unelected California bureaucrats enacted a rule intended to remove all new gas-powered vehicles from the road by 2035, essentially mandating only electric vehicles in the state in decades to come.
In a statement from Newsom’s office, the governor claims the new climate measures will create four million new jobs, cut air pollution by 60 percent, reduce state oil consumption by 91 percent, save California $23 billion by avoiding the damages of pollution, reduce fossil-fuel use in buildings and transportation by 92 percent, and cut refinery pollution by 94 percent.
“Taken together, these measures represent the most significant action on the climate crisis in California’s history and raises the bar for governments around the world,” the statement claims.
Specifically, the legislation includes AB 1279, dubbed “The California Climate Crisis Act.” The new law codifies California’s intention to achieve “carbon neutrality” by no later than 2045.
A coalition of no less than 60 groups opposed the legislation, believing it will adversely affect new housing construction, agriculture production, energy, transportation, and manufacturing in the state.
Also signed was SB 1137, which places tough restrictions on oil and gas exploration in the state and would lead eventually to an “abandonment of oil and gas wells in the state and the operation, maintenance, and removal or abandonment of tanks and facilities related to oil and gas production within an oil and gas field.”
Newsom also signed SB 1020, a law that mandates California’s electricity to come from 90-percent renewable or zero-carbon sources by the end of 2035, 95 percent by 2040, and 100 percent by the end of 2045.
In addition, he signed Senate bills 905 & 1314. SB 905 will mandate “carbon capture” technology in certain industries, while SB 1314 will “prohibit an operator from injecting a concentrated carbon dioxide fluid produced by a carbon dioxide capture project” for the purpose of “enhanced oil recovery.”
The last piece of legislation is the least onerous, as AB 1757 calls for natural methods of carbon-dioxide mitigation such as planting trees and creating urban forestry projects.
Newsom and the state legislature intend to make California not just a national leader on climate action, but a global one.
“This month has been a wake-up call for all of us that later is too late to act on climate change. California isn’t waiting any more,” Newsom said. “Together with the Legislature, California is taking the most aggressive action on climate our nation has ever seen. We’re cleaning the air we breathe, holding the big polluters accountable, and ushering in a new era for clean energy. That’s climate action done the California Way — and we’re not only doubling down, we’re just getting started.”
Newsom is right about a “wake-up call,” but for all the wrong reasons. The recent heat wave has shown, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that California — the “greenest” of all the United States — is observably not ready for a post-fossil fuel world. Not even close.
