Senator Scott Weiner (D) introduces a invoice to financially nail Californians who can least afford the costliest power within the nation.
The Senator’s SB 467 will increase electricity and fuel bills for those who can least afford it and exacerbate poverty.
By Ronald Stein
Ambassador for Energy and Infrastructure, Irvine, California
California Senator Weiner took Governor Newsom’s recent order to ban gas-powered vehicle sales and hydraulic break-down one step further with the introduction of SB 467 to destroy California’s economy. The bill is so broad and ambiguous that the results of its passage would result in a total ban on production in California and increase energy bills for those who can least afford it.
With California already having the highest fuel bills in the country, the rich and middle class are more tolerant of expensive energy, but poverty killings and legislative moves that make energy more expensive for the less fortunate will exacerbate poverty.
The governor is proud of California, despite its dysfunctional energy policies that make California the only state in the bottom 48 states that imports most of its crude oil from abroad almost halfway around the world.
California’s reliance on overseas suppliers increased imported crude oil from abroad from 5 percent in 1992 to 58 percent today. The imported crude oil costs California more than $ 60 million a day, yes, every day when it is paid to oil-rich foreign countries, thereby stealing jobs, careers and business opportunities for Californians. SB 467 will eliminate in-state manufacturing and require the state to increase its monthly imports, resulting in spending on overseas countries reaching a whopping $ 90 million every day to support the fifth largest economy in the world .
Newsom’s Executive Order and Senator Weiner’s SB 467 enforce increasing reliance on other countries that have fewer environmental controls than California. SB 467 further reduces oil production by requiring major setbacks from existing oil production wells, forcing companies to shut down everything within 2,500 feet of a building.
Hopefully, if the bill is presented to the Senate Natural Resources Committee at a hearing on Tuesday April 13th, it will find its demise. The bill would leave hundreds of thousands of Californians jobless and all 40 million residents completely dependent on oil from other parts of the world.
It was a tough year for everyone during the pandemic, but especially for the lower-income segment. As we emerge from an emotionally and financially challenging year, we see that the rich and low-income people have largely recovered. The lower half remains far from it.
This dichotomy is evident in many facets of the economy, particularly in employment. Less than half of the jobs lost this spring have returned for those earning less than $ 20 an hour from director, according to a new analysis of job data from John Friedman, an economics professor at Brown University and co-worker Opportunity Insights.
Exorbitant energy costs are making California’s economic recovery from the pandemic even more difficult for the 18 million (45 percent of the 40 million Californians) who represent the United States Hispanic and African American Population of the state. The median income for Latino households were $ 56,200 in 2016, $ 55,200 for African American households, and $ 96,400 for white households. According to several studies, up to 40 percent of all Californians cannot cover the basic monthly costs on a regular basis.
In 2019, 57 percent of black families and 50 percent of Latin American families with children were wealth poor and lacked the financial means to support their families in poverty for three months Research from Duke University.
Governor Newsom’s recent ordinance, which ordered the state to require all new cars and passenger cars sold in California to be zero-emission vehicles by 2035, will add more electric charging requirements to a dysfunctional energy program that has already closed nine (9) in -State power plants over the past decade.
California, with 0.5 percent of the world’s population (40 million versus 8 billion), claims to be the leader in everything because of its dysfunctional energy policies imports more electricity than any other state– Currently at 32 percent from the northwest and southwest and dysfunctional hopes other states will be able to generate enough electricity to meet the state’s demands.
In addition to closing the San Onofre nuclear power plant and three natural gas power plants in recent years, the state has five more on its crosshairs – the last nuclear power plant in Diablo Canyon and four more natural gas power plants. The governor wants to add more electrical charging requirements to a power grid, which would most likely result in more blackouts in the years to come.
As much as Governor Newsom and Senator Weiner want to electrify anything with intermittent electricity, they have yet to understand that intermittent electricity cannot support:
- The energy demand for fossil fuels for the non-nuclear military equipment of aircraft carriers, battleships, destroyers, submarines, aircraft, tanks and armor, trucks, troop carriers and weapons.
- Commercial aviation, with 23,000 commercial aircraft worldwide who were courteous 4 billion passengers a year,
- Cruise ships, each of which consumes 80,000 gallons of fuel daily, which accommodate more than 25 million passengers annually worldwide, and
- The 53,000 merchant ships Burning more than 120 million gallons of high sulfur bunker fuel per day (which will soon be converted to diesel fuel to reduce sulfur emissions) moves billions of dollars worth of products worldwide every day.
Put simply, the goal of “electrifying everything” is a de facto energy tax for low and middle income Californians that could lead to more instability already proven unstable state power grid.
It is amazing that California lawmakers are maintaining steadily higher energy bills for those least able to afford “energy poverty” as everyone sees the direct link between high energy costs for electricity and fuel and poverty, homelessness and an emerging housing affordability crisis can recognize the golden state.
To exacerbate the dysfunction, Governor Newsom’s recent order to ban gas-powered vehicle sales by 2035 and state power generation will wreak havoc on the state’s economy and environment as the governor add a greater need for electrical charging wants dysfunctional energy program and increased reliance on foreign oil.
California legislature continues the state’s dysfunctional energy policies and continues to do whatever it takes to further increase energy bills for its 40 million residents, which is not good for the bottom half, who earn less than $ 20 an hour. It’s time for the Senate Natural Resources Committee to reject Weiner’s SB 467.
Ronald Stein, PE
Ambassador for energy & infrastructure
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