In Brief: Self-Defeating Environmentalism
The Biden administration claims to seek an “energy transition” while impeding acquisition of the minerals that will fuel it.
Joe Biden is no steady-handed moderate when it comes to environmental policy. He’s a Green New Dealer, guided by the ecofascist “principles” of his handlers. The Manhattan Institute’s Jordan McGillis recently explored the effect this is having on American energy.
As governments in the developed world try to coax their economies away from fossil fuels, commodities that enable alternative energy sources have become more vital. One such commodity, nickel, has seen record prices, spectacular crashes, and warehouse intrigue in recent months. Nickel is a key to the “energy transition”: along with lithium, cobalt, and graphite, it facilitates the battery production that will theoretically support electric grids and transportation without coal, oil, or natural gas. Yet the very advocates of that transition have pursued policies that make it harder to acquire or process the metal.
According to a study on critical minerals from the International Energy Agency, energy-sector demand for nickel has jumped 40 percent in five years. Global exploration for nickel increased 45 percent in 2022 alone. Amid the scramble, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) included nickel in its critical mineral list for the first time last year.
Is the U.S. ready for a world in which nickel matters? As part of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, the Department of Energy allocated $3 billion to fund domestic production of materials needed for the battery supply chain. In 2022, President Biden issued an order pursuant to Section 303 of the Defense Production Act “to secure the supply” of “lithium, nickel, cobalt, graphite, and manganese for large-capacity batteries.” The U.S., the administration stated, depends for the minerals on “unreliable foreign sources” — principally China.
Gee, who’d have thunk that Biden would be beholden to China…
He’s interfering with and blocking domestic mining projects in the name of the environment, which is ironic given the damage the Chinese are doing. McGillis calls it “an incoherent energy agenda.”
As progressive environmentalism prioritizes the procedural over the substantive, it undermines the development of battery minerals. And because the president has simultaneously squeezed fossil energy — for example, by tightening Corporate Average Fuel Economy requirements and power-sector emissions limits — he risks courting energy insecurity.
Again, that’s all while the ChiComs consolidate control. McGillis concludes:
President Biden is doing everything in his power to electrify America — except, that is, approving the necessary mining expansions. As the International Energy Agency warns, global demand for nickel and other critical battery minerals will more than double by 2030. Progressives nod to the importance of resource development, but their policies endanger the secure supply of minerals needed for the battery-centric economy they seek.
