Blue Mass Group

Reality-based commentary on politics.

  • Shop
  • Subscribe to BMG
  • Contact
  • Log In
  • Front Page
  • All Posts
  • About
  • Rules
  • Events
  • Register on BMG

Globe, put down the pipe

March 6, 2018 By Charley on the MTA

Even yet still another baffling, curdled-milk editorial endorsing more gas pipeline infrastructure, torching (see what I did there) us anti-pipeline “faddists”; and going so far as to flame Sens. Jamie Eldridge and Marc Pacheco and AG Healey, the Little Red Hens of renewable energy expansion and climate readiness.

No. This is Orwellian and silly on the face of it. You cannot say “renewable energy is certainly the region’s future” while at the same time arguing for permanent fossil fuel infrastructure that lasts a generation (30-40 years), certainly crowding out renewables. LNG tankers, rail and trucks; oil-fueled peaker plants are a lot of things — maybe worse in the very short term — but none are permanent.

Furthermore, Eldridge, Pacheco, and Healey are hardly “sitting on their hands” as the Globe preposterously accuses; they are pulling the weight, hastening a clean energy present. If anyone deserves credit and praise, not condemnation, it is them. What’s the motivation for tearing them down, just as they have produced a tremendously positive, visionary piece of legislation? (Head to your phone right now, call 617-722-2000, and tell your state rep to support, nay demand, Eldridge and Pacheco’s S.2302, An Act to Promote a Clean Energy Future).

Who is “sitting on their hands?” Surely our “combo platter” Governor; and our feckless Speaker of the House, who wants to slow-roll climate readiness even after two historic flooding Nor’easters in a season (maybe on the cusp of a third); and even as he lives on a peninsula in the Atlantic Ocean. And the legacy stakeholders — the utilities, power companies, and gas producers — are perfectly happy to continue feeding us more of the same. They haven’t demonstrated an interest in a “renewable energy future”.

Something stinks about this; I don’t know where the Globe is getting their talking points, but until they put their arguments into math and charts, they’re adding nothing to the public knowledge:

  • By all means, let’s talk about the actual GHG production of oil peaker plants for those few days that we need them. Let’s talk about the marginal GHG difference between LNG, train- and truck-transported gas and pipelined, fracked gas — again, for such time as we need them.  Add those to a variety of clean energy conversion scenarios, including a realistically ambitious schedule for clean energy conversion: Game out the possibilities of S.2302, say.
  • … and then compare those scenarios to continued reliance on a powerful greenhouse gas, whose transport involves environmental degradation and public danger its entire journey, and whose permanent infrastructure and easy access will definitely crowd out the uptake of actual clean energy.

Show us the math, Globe. There are people in this state that can do that kind of work; do you need some recommendations?

I’m sure we’ll hear more on this soon.

 

Please share widely!
fb-share-icon
Tweet
+6
0

Filed Under: Editor Tagged With: boston-globe, Eversource, global-warming, ISO-NE, natural-gas, pipelines

Comments

  1. hesterprynne says

    March 8, 2018 at 9:21 am

    Profiles in fecklessness. The Speaker attempts to counter the (very well-documented) notion that the House is dragging its feet on climate change:

    “House Speaker Robert DeLeo, whose hometown of Winthrop has been battered by storms, on Monday pushed back on the suggestion that the House has been reluctant to pass climate change adaptation legislation, and said the issue has been that “probably the legislation has been far more encompassing than” simply climate adaptation.

    “You’ll probably see us address some of these issues, but probably more piece-by-piece pieces of legislation as opposed to an overall piece,” the speaker said Monday.

    He added, “I think that’s going to be one of the things, but I think it’s going to be only one of the things” and said, “we have to talk something more even on a short-term basis as well.””

    http://www.telegram.com/news/20180307/destruction-costs-cited-on-beacon-hill-as-climate-bill-pressure-grows

    • Charley on the MTA says

      March 8, 2018 at 9:41 am

      Exaaaaaactly. That very article sums it all up. “Sure, we’re all in existential danger, but let’s not hurry things … ”

      As I tweeted: How many people know that the Senate has passed climate readiness legislation *five times* — only to have it die in DeLeo’s House?

      • jconway says

        March 8, 2018 at 9:54 am

        Nearly none of my political active friends are working on the kinds of races we need to start running and winning to change our Commonwealth. It is awfully frustrating that the progressive infrastructure in this state is focused on big issue campaigns or bigger ticket races like the Congressional primaries.

        There was even a surge of activism at the municipal level last November. Yet the state level is still largely crickets. More primary challengers are emerging, but we need even more to really turn the legislature around. Particularly when they are working hand in glove to rubber stamp the Baker-DeLeo agenda.

        • Charley on the MTA says

          March 8, 2018 at 11:32 am

          I’m about to start a post that will serve as a primary directory. I’d also like to hear about the kinds of issues BMGers would like to push, perhaps as part of a candidate questionnaire. Obviously for me that would include transit and energy/climate. Open to suggestions.

  2. thegreenmiles says

    March 9, 2018 at 9:32 am

    I know BMGers know all this, but to repeat:

    * Even if global warming didn’t exist, fracked gas pipelines are incredibly expensive, starting at $1 billion with a b
    * Global warming exists and fracked gas is just as bad as coal
    * We don’t need the gas – corporate utilities are trying to scare us into paying for their export pipelines
    * We should be instead be investing in electrifying home heating

  3. stomv says

    March 9, 2018 at 10:08 am

    The “fossil fuel infrastructure” we need is to fix gas leaks, more energy efficiency, more mass transit, more electric storage, and a smart grid. More fossil fuel extraction equipment, pipelines, or power plants? Negatory.

Recommended Posts

  • No posts liked yet.

Recent User Posts

Predictions Open Thread

December 22, 2022 By jconway

This is why I love Joe Biden

December 21, 2022 By fredrichlariccia

Garland’s Word

December 19, 2022 By terrymcginty

Some Parting Thoughts

December 19, 2022 By jconway

Beware the latest grift

December 16, 2022 By fredrichlariccia

Thank you, Blue Mass Group!

December 15, 2022 By methuenprogressive

Recent Comments

  • blueeyes on Beware the latest griftSo where to, then??
  • Christopher on Some Parting ThoughtsI've enjoyed our discussions as well (but we have yet to…
  • Christopher on Beware the latest griftI can't imagine anyone of our ilk not already on Twitter…
  • blueeyes on Beware the latest griftI will miss this site. Where are people going? Twitter?…
  • chrismatth on A valedictoryI joined BMG late - 13 years ago next month and three da…
  • SomervilleTom on Geopolitics of FusionEVERY un-designed, un-built, and un-tested technology is…
  • Charley on the MTA on A valedictoryThat’s a great idea, and I’ll be there on Sunday. It’s a…

Archive

@bluemassgroup on Twitter

Twitter feed is not available at the moment.

From our sponsors




Google Calendar







Search

Archives

  • Facebook
  • RSS
  • Twitter




Copyright © 2025 Owned and operated by BMG Media Empire LLC. Read the terms of use. Some rights reserved.