My Senate ENR testimony (47 footnotes!), Hanekamp on coal
My Senate ENR testimony on energy realism and energy humanism, Hanekamp on inelastic coal demand, video of my Senate testimony, and...Turkey Vultures aren't big on nests
I live a privileged life. One of the joys of my job is that I get to visit industrial sites. I love Big Iron. I love seeing how things are made. Over the years, I’ve visited automobile manufacturing plants, refineries, winch makers, underground coal mines, open-cast mines, gas-fired power plants, a nuclear power plant (Indian Point), and lots of oil and gas fields. As part of my speaking engagement with the executive team at the East Penn Manufacturing Company, I finagled a tour of the company’s battery plant in Lyon Station, PA. According to the company, it’s the world’s largest single-site lead battery manufacturing facility. And after seeing it again, on Monday morning, I have to say it’s an impressive operation, one that produces tens of millions of batteries every year. Less than 24 hours after touring the battery plant, I was in Washington, DC in the Dirksen Senate Office Building testifying in front of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee about the causes and implications of soaring energy prices. By about noon on Wednesday, I was ambling through Tower 2 at the East Wing of the National Gallery of Art looking at Alexander Calder’s masterpieces. Yes, I’m a lucky man. And yes, it’s been a rather head-spinning week.
I got back home late Wednesday and have been basking in the amazing late-fall weather in Austin ever since. Four things today:
My Senate testimony: 3,282 words, 47 footnotes, & 6 graphics
Video clips of my spoken remarks
John Hanekamp on why coal isn't going away
Turkey Vultures: kettles, committees, and wakes, but no nests
(Image note: The photo of the Turkey Vulture above was taken by Peter K. Burian in 2017.)
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On Monday evening, after my presentation to the leadership team at East Penn in Reading, PA, I drove to Washington for the Senate Energy & Natural Resources Committee hearing, which was captioned “To examine the causes, outlook, and implications of domestic and international energy price trends.” It was the third time I’ve testified before Congress in the last five months. (In June, I testified virtually before the House Select Committee on the Climate Crisis. Last month, I testified, again, virtually, in front of the Senate Subcommittee on Government Operations and Border Management.)
I was honored to be asked to testify and was pleased with my presentation and with the questions I got from the senators. Democrats and Republicans alike were concerned about the surge in energy prices, and rightly so. In preparing my testimony, I drafted my spoken comments first (to a length of about 700 words) and then expanded on that for my written remarks. I didn’t intend to write as much as I did, but once I started, it was difficult to stop. I ended up submitting a 14-page opus with about 3,200 words, plus 47 footnotes, and 6 graphics. As I was working on it, I thought, “well, they invited me, so I’m going to give them both barrels.” Here’s a link to my testimony. I’d be flattered if you share it. I say that because I am deeply concerned – and I say this not as a partisan but as a member of the Disgusted Party – that the energy policies being pushed by the Biden Administration, top Democrats, and climate activists will cause tremendous harm to the United States in general and to the poor and the middle class in particular. Much of my testimony focused on why the U.S. should not follow Europe’s disastrous blueprint. I began my spoken remarks thusly:
Good morning. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am grateful for the opportunity to testify again before this committee. Respectfully, I must say that legislators and policymakers in Washington need a big dose of energy realism and an even bigger dose of energy humanism. The causes and implications of soaring global energy prices are clear. Europe provides a case study for what not to do. Millions of Europeans are facing the prospect of a cold winter without enough affordable energy to heat their homes. Fertilizer plants and steel mills are closing because of high energy prices.
Europe’s price spikes are being caused by underinvestment in hydrocarbons due to aggressive decarbonization and ESG policies.
Second, Europe has overinvested in weather-dependent renewables which left it vulnerable to a prolonged wind drought. On Monday, spot prices for electricity in Britain hit $4,000 per megawatt-hour due to low wind speeds.
Third, European countries are prematurely shuttering their coal and nuclear power plants.
Finally, they are too reliant on imported energy -- and Russian gas, in particular.
The implications of Europe’s price spikes include soaring inflation, deindustrialization, and increasing energy burdens on consumers, especially the working poor.
I then focused on fertilizer and the fact that fertilizer plants across Europe and Asia are shutting down their plants due to high natural gas prices. I used Alex Epstein’s great phrase, which is that fertilizer made from hydrocarbons is the “food of food.” I continued, saying
Numerous fertilizer plants across Europe and around the world are shutting down because of high natural gas prices. This will mean less food production, and therefore, higher food prices, which will lead to additional inflation. The United States must not emulate Europe’s disastrous blueprint.
We need energy realism. Energy is the economy. Energy nourishes human potential. Hydrocarbons provide 82 percent of our total energy and about 60 percent of our electricity. The U.S. now gets 18 times more primary energy from hydrocarbons than it does from wind and solar combined. The myriad claims being made by climate activists, politicians, and elite academics that we can run our economy solely on wind, solar, and a few drops of hydro have no basis in physics, history, or math.
Furthermore, wherever renewables have been ramped up, as in Europe, energy prices have soared. Senators, look at California, where electricity prices are “absolutely exploding” – that in a state with the highest poverty rate, and largest Latino population, in America.
I concluded:
Who will stand up for rural America and against the landscape-destroying sprawl of wind and solar? Who will speak against the federally subsidized slaughter of our birds and bats by the wind industry?
Expensive energy is the enemy of the poor. Who in the Senate will stand up for them?
Who in Congress will stand up for the affordability, resilience and reliability of our electric grid, which is being undermined by this senseless rush to renewables and the premature retirement of our nuclear reactors?
Where are the pro-nuclear, pro-energy realists? Where, I must ask you, are the energy humanists?
Thank you.
You can watch the entire hearing here. My opening statement starts at about the 40:00 mark. Here’s a link to my written testimony.
Two videos of my spoken remarks at Senate hearing
My friend, Gordon McDowell, a video savant, kindly grabbed the video of my spoken testimony and condensed it, added some of the graphics from my written remarks, and sent it along so I could post it on YouTube. Here’s a link.
If you want an unabridged version of my remarks, IllinoisChannelTV has it. Click here.
John Hanekamp on why coal prices soared, and why we are going to see “higher lows” for hydrocarbon prices
John Hanekamp has spent almost his entire career in the commodities business, including nearly 20 years in the grain sector and the last two decades in the coal industry. In this episode of the Power Hungry Podcast, Hanekamp explains why global coal prices have soared in recent months, the macro outlook for energy commodities, why high energy prices will lead to a global economic slowdown, and the “unintended consequences” that are being felt due to underinvestment in hydrocarbon production around the world.
Hanekamp was particularly critical of the ESG push, which he said has “starved capital from fossil fuels all over the world.” The result of the underinvestment in hydrocarbons he said, is that coal producers have not been able to expand output to meet the increased demand as the world unlocks from Covid-19. He believes that hydrocarbon prices have “higher lows,” that is, that the baseline prices for coal, oil, and natural gas will be elevated in the future because of this underinvestment combined with inelastic demand for those fuels. Hanekamp knows his business and he’s passionate about it. It was a fun episode. Please give it listen.
A wake of Turkey Vultures
Turkey Vultures (Carthartes aura) are unusual birds. They don’t build nests. Instead, they lay their eggs on the bare ground. The first time I learned of this was from Chuck Sexton, an expert ornithologist who used to work for the City of Austin and then later went to the Fish and Wildlife Service. I only went birding with Chuck a couple of times, and that was probably 30 years ago, but I recall him pointing out a vulture egg inside a cave that we were passing on a trip somewhere in Travis County. I’ve lost touch with Chuck. But that fragment of the trip has, for some reason, stuck in my head as one of the myriad oddities and quirks of the avian world. This week, when I mentioned this no-nest info to my buddy and fellow birder, Chris Cauthon, he expressed some skepticism. That sent me straight to The Google, which thankfully confirmed that I am not experiencing early-onset Alzheimers, or at least, not yet.
Turkey Vultures are not pretty. They don’t get much love and are about as common as dirt. But they are effortless and graceful fliers. A group of Turkey Vultures is known as a kettle, committee, or wake. They are also one of “the few birds of prey that is able to use its sense of smell to find food. They are attracted to the smell of mercaptan, a gas produced by the beginnings of decay.” Hawk Mountain, the famous birding site (and conservation group) in central Pennsylvania has an extensive entry on Turkey Vultures. About nesting, it says they:
do not build nests, but rather lay their eggs in dark recesses in ledges, caves, crevices, and hollow logs, as well as on the ground. Turkey Vultures also nest in the abandoned stick nests of birds, in mammal burrows, and in abandoned buildings. The species is monogamous, and evidence suggests that pairs remain together until one member dies. Existing pairs return to and reuse nesting sites year after year. For several days to several weeks prior to egg-laying, the pair spends time sitting together at the nest. Vultures perform aerial courtship displays during which one bird follows the other and precisely mimics the lead bird’s flight path. Flight displays are usually brief, although occasionally they are repeated for several hours.
It also lists these bullet points:
Belongs to the family Cathartidae, a group of 7 species of New World Vultures.
Are so named because their red, featherless heads resemble those of Wild Turkeys (Meleagris gallopavo).
Although they feed almost exclusively on carrion (dead animals), they sometimes take live prey.
Are the most migratory of all vultures.
Their plumage is dark brown, not black.
When flying, Turkey Vultures, hold their wings in a “V” above their backs, creating a slight dihedral that stabilizes their flight in turbulence.
Turkey Vultures projectile vomit to defend themselves.
Turkey Vultures are abundant along Barton Creek. I see them almost daily and frequently see them in large groups (dozens of them) perching in tall trees or soaring along the canyons. They also like to perch on the steel-lattice towers used for high-voltage electricity transmission lines. (The photo of the above was taken by Matthew T. Rader in 2020 in the Florida Everglades.)
Have a good weekend.
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