The Democrats passed the Orwellian named inflation Reduction Act (IRA) without a single Republican vote. They told us that it would be a $369 billion spending package. In fact, it could cost nearly $5 trillion adding to our debt. The United States now has a $36.5 trillion national debt, with a trillion dollars in annual interest payments.
The money for the IRA is all borrowed money. It causes more unnecessary energy spending, driving up electric rates and increasing inflation. This overspending is unsustainable and harmful to the United States; inflation is putting pressure on families’ budgets.
The subsidies in the IRA are incredible. Wind and solar get a 50 percent tax credit to build and a 30 percent subsidy for the electricity they produce. Trump and Congress need to end these subsidies. Not only for wind and solar, but for all the other supposedly green initiatives, like battery factories, electric vehicle manufacturing components, and hydrogen. We simply can’t afford it.
This “green” borrowing is driving up our electric rates. Because wind and solar power are part-time and intermittent, they cannot provide full-time, keep the lights on all the time electricity generation. They do not replace any natural gas, coal, or nuclear power they just add costs.
It is like a household that has two on demand gas cars that serve their needs. They think they can save money with another car. Because of the 50 percent tax subsidies and propaganda they buy a solar car.
They find that the solar car doesn’t work the first and last hour of the day, or when it is raining, or cloudy and not at night. The sun isn’t powerful enough. They learn they cannot replace any of their gas cars with the solar car.
So, they buy a wind car that only works the 30 percent of the time the wind blows. They find they can’t get home from their kids’ soccer game or from work because the wind stopped blowing.
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They are now paying for four cars instead of two. This is exactly what is happening to our electric grid. We are paying for a full-time and part-time electricity production.
To make matters worse, the way that regional transmission organizations (RTOs) pay for our electricity doesn’t allow us to realize any savings from the heavily subsidized wind and solar generation.
The industry calls it take and pay. The most expensive form of electricity the RTO purchases is what they pay all electricity providers. This means that there is no savings from wind and solar for electric consumers, only increased costs.
No other industry pays the highest bid price to all suppliers, regardless of what they bid. But that’s what they do in the electric world. We are paying higher electricity rates because of this practice.
This begs for state legislative action to correct this expensive payment scheme.
Wind and solar further drive up the price of electricity because they require many miles of expensive transmission wires and displace full-time electric generation. Forcing it to run less than it would if they were not on the electric grid.
As natural gas and coal power plants run more part-time, every electron they sell must have a higher price to cover their costs. Their maintenance costs will only increase, too, because they were never designed to run intermittently.
Trump understands that wind and solar drive up the cost of our electricity, particularly offshore wind, which costs five times more than natural gas electricity, and are built in hurricane alley. What could go wrong? The simple answer is to stop subsidizing all electric generation with our borrowed inflation causing tax dollars. And states should end favorable regulations that require the purchase of wind and solar first.
There are 21 House Republicans that have signed a letter saying they don’t want to repeal the IRA, even though they didn’t vote for it. Because it is fostering wasteful pretend “green” spending in their districts. Clever Democrats have the bulk of the spending going into these Republican districts in order to preserve this green slush fund.
President Trump needs to use his considerable persuasion and political muscle to end this Democrat boondoggle, which adds to our $36.5 trillion national debt.
Frank Lasee is a former Wisconsin state senator and former member of Governor Scott Walker’s administration. The district he represented had two nuclear power plants, a biomass plant and numerous wind towers. He has experience with energy, the environment, and the climate. You can read more energy and climate information at www.truthinenergyandclimate.com which Frank leads.
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