What’s the Deal with the Green New Deal? | 5 Minute Video
There’s been a lot of talk about The Green New Deal. Beyond the headlines, what is it really? Given our energy needs, is it practical? Can we have an abundance of energy and a clean planet? Alex Epstein, the author of The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels, considers these questions and has thought-provoking answers.
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Script:
We face an existential threat. Life as we know it is on the line. We have 12 short years to change everything or it’s game over.
This is the terrifying scenario that’s used by many leading politicians to justify a “Green New Deal”: an unprecedented increase in government power focused on the energy industry.
The core idea of a Green New Deal is that government should rapidly prohibit the use of fossil fuel energy and impose “100% renewable energy,” mostly solar and wind.
This may sound appealing, but consider what it would entail.
Today, 80% of the energy Americans use to heat their homes, farm their land, run their factories, and drive their cars comes from fossil fuels: coal, oil, and natural gas. Only 3.4% comes from solar and wind—despite decades of government subsidies and mandates to encourage their use.
The reason we don’t use much sunlight and wind as energy is that they are unreliable fuels that only work when the sun shines and the wind blows. That’s why no town, city, or country has ever come close to 100%—or even 50%—solar and wind.
And yet, Green New Deal proponents say they can do the impossible—if only we give the government control of the energy industry and control of major users of energy, such as the transportation industry, manufacturing, and agriculture.
All of this is justified by the need to “do something” about the “existential threat” of rising CO2 levels. We’re told on a daily basis that prestigious organizations like the United Nations have predicted mass destruction and death if we don’t get off fossil fuels. What we’re not told is that such predictions have a decades-long track record of getting it wrong—and by wrong, I mean completely-missing-the-dart-board wrong.
For example, in 1989, the Associated Press reported a United Nations prediction that “entire nations could be wiped off the face of the earth by rising sea levels if the global warming trend is not reversed by the year 2000.” We’re now two decades past 2000, we’re not missing any nations, and human beings are living longer, healthier, and wealthier lives than ever before.
But aren’t things bound to get worse? Haven’t scientists established that CO2 is a greenhouse gas with a warming influence on the planet? Yes—but that’s only a small part of the big picture.
Although CO2 causes some warming, it’s much less significant than we’ve been told. Since we started using significant amounts of fossil fuels in the middle of the 19th century, we’ve increased the percentage of CO2 in the atmosphere from .03% to .04%, which correlates with an average temperature increase of about 2 degrees Fahrenheit. It also correlates with significant global greening—because CO2 is plant food.
All of this is far from unprecedented territory for our planet, which has existed with at least 10 times today’s CO2 levels and a 25-degree warmer average temperature.
What is truly unprecedented, though, is how safe we are from climate. The International Disaster Database, a nonpartisan organization that tracks deaths from climate-related causes—such as extreme heat, floods, storms, and drought—shows that such deaths have been plummeting as CO2 emissions have been rising.
How is this possible? Because of the fossil fuel energy that emitted the CO2, which has empowered us to climate-proof our environment with heating, air-conditioning, sturdy buildings, mass irrigation, and weather warning systems.
For the complete script, visit https://www.prageru.com/video/whats-the-deal-with-the-green-new-deal
source
BRO SAID THAT THE PLANET SURVIVED +25 CELCIUS AHHAHAHA, bro rn it's the hottest summer ever where I live and it's only a couple of celcius more than last summer, my phone is overheating my laptop is overheating, I've been drinking more water than ever (this hasn't happened before). AND YOU'RE TELLING ME THAT +25 CELCIUS IS SOMETHING NORMAL ????' NAHAHAHHHA
As someone who lives on a boat powered only by wind and solar STFU I have seen with my own eyes the damage global warming does coral bleaching is incredibly prevalent because of the rise in temperature AND solar and wind are not unreliable at all so please PLEASE stop spreading your propaganda
And this kids is propaganda
@PragerU PLEASE issue a correction for your misinterpretation of the UN quote at 2:13. You used this as an example of a failed prediction, but the UN did not actually predict that nations would disappear in 2000. I am concerned that many people will not realize this and will misunderstand this quote. Please take accountability for this error (errors are 100% okay!) and pin a comment explaining the error, or edit the video. Thank you!
Edit: I originally typed 2:33, but I corrected this to 2:13. See, fixing your own errors isn’t that hard.
The one thing I agree with you on: NUCLEAR ENERGY. Yeah it creates dangerous nuclear waste, but it’s also a critical part of the transition to renewable energy. I believe coal plants can even be converted to nuclear plants because of some similar machinery. Also I am a Green New Deal proponent. Please do not put words in my mouth; I wholeheartedly support nuclear.
Correction at 2:13. The UN statement does NOT say that entire nations will be gone by the year 2000. It says that by not acting before 2000, we doom entire nations to sea level rise. The key difference between what they said and what you thought they said is this: they provided no timeline for WHEN these nations would disappear.
Sea level rise is a slow process. We have already set in motion future sea level rise for centuries to come. We can expect I think a foot or a meter or so of sea level rise by the end of the century, but sea level rise will continue to limit land area available to us for a long time afterwards. The good news is that since sea level rise happens so slowly, we have time to prepare, reverse the warming trend, and adapt. The bad news is that it will cost us valuable land. It will cost people their homes, farmers their fields, and yes, probably also some low-lying nations.
You want to eliminate fossil fuels for the environment
I want to eliminate fossil fuels so that the lazy gen Z will experience actual hardship, struggle, and build their character
We are not the same
It doesn't matter if some Energy Source is "Carbon" Free or not. BTW, Carbon is an Element. What the Anthropogenic Climate Change Marxists are Propagandizing has to do with Carbon Dioxide, CO₂ — which is a compund of Carbon AND Oxygen.
Nuclear Power is however NOT "Carbon Free". You need machinery to build and maintain the plant. Thy usually run on Diesel. The Minerals that goes into producing the Machinery are also mined using Machinery run on Fossil Fuels. And the Concrete used in building a Nuclear Power Plant also releases CO₂.
That being said, Nuclear is a great Energy Source. And among them, Thorium Power Plants are safer by an order of magnitude, has a non-proliferation risk of Nuclear Weapons, and Thorium is actually a Waste Product from Rare Earh Mining, which Mining Companies have to pay for to get rid of. Why not build Low Pressure Thorium LFTR Reactors and use this waste to produce Cheap & Abundant Energy?
Another PLUS with Thorium Plants, is that you can take Nuclear Waste from today's Light Water Reactors and burn it in Thorium LFTR Reactors and produce even more energy from what today has to be stored safely at great cost.
Green New Deal. Another Excuse for more Government Over reach in businesses and individual lives. Another path for Socialism.
We're being scammed by Socialist Green Activists in Government the Media schools and universities
C02 is .04% of the atmosphere and humans make 3% of global C02 the rest 97% is naturally occurring
Only human arrogance would think we can change the temperature of the Planet either up or down
I'd agree with nuclear power when they figure out a way to store the every increasing volume of radioactive waste from spent nuclear rods. The waste remains radioactive for 10's of thousands of years before it is safe for human contact. Currently plants store the waste in safe containers onsite, but have no long term plans to deal with it.
this guy looks like a giant moth slammed into his face at 120 miles an hour
Nuclear is the way
And the downside of removing all the carbon dioxide from the atmosphere is…..you kill all the plant life on the planet.
Green Fraud Explaind (Full audiobook): https://odysee.com/@audioboy:7/Green-Fraud:f
Wow, the first and only preguru video I can agree on, but only on the nuclear one, climate change is still dangerous
Well they did it fjb
When I was a kid there was an ice age that was coming then I waited in line with my dad to get gas cause oil was running out then acid rain skin cancer was going to kill us The government lies WE NEED TERM LIMITS FOR CONGRESS
The implication here that nuclear is affordable when compared to wind and solar is incorrect, but I do agree nuclear has a role to play in the energy transition
Nuclear energy can act as a constant supply of energy, through day and night and solar and wind can send excess energy to pumped storage facilities (big water batteries-search it up) now you have a reliable source of energy from the “terrible impractical wind turbines” and “sus solars” like seriously, when it comes to the environment does this channel do ANY area search or write the script with people that actually KNOW about these things? Or is this video sponsored by FracTech. Has to be one.
Understand the magnetic fields and the polar shift and the magnetic pole shift and how you have a magnetic field most people in the spiritual World call it your aura. These are the things that they know for a fact without a shadow of a doubt are taking place in the near future this is what the majority of the real Discovery Science community has uncovered. And most of the information that is common knowledge because it's all written in Revelations. The thing is the truth shall set us free from the majority of the darkness that would be fall not only men's minds but their Spirits as well. They know more than they let on by far. God bless you all and Godspeed.
Dear prager U,
Amazing video, I wish more YouTube channels, or just people In general understood this. May I recommend looking into the former company known as sapphire energy.
Isn’t this the channel funded by a fracking company?
Nuclear energy is even safer now that we have standards such as IEC 61511 and IEC 61508 for functional safety shutdown. Some of the smaller, self contained units are nearing certification. We could place them in a grid around the country and be on easy street.
The corrupt politician just wants to sell these "renewable" to the public by using fear.
THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS FOSSIL FUEL!
Do you know what fossils are? If they were real they would be made of rocks like other fossils. Did you ever try to burn a rock? You can't. Thus, the term "fossil fuel" is, at best, a misnomer. But in reality it just another attempt by the Marxists to shove another lie down the public's throat. The term "hydrocarbon" is more apt but just does not raise images of dying dinosaurs that you get from the stupid and inaccurate term, "fossil fuel".
Wind power and solar power is unreliable and pretty much insane. For different but equally potent reasons. Windmills stop when the wind stops. Solar stops when there are clouds, rain, snow, anything other than perfect weather as well as the onset of night time. During all of these situations you need coal, oil or methane as a 100% backup or you will have blackouts. Some of these could last for weeks or even months!
"Correlation" is not proof. Take a science class some day.
You forgot to mention that fossil fuels fund PragerU
Did you know that usa bans efficient nuclear reactors that use the fuel again? Now you know
yes the earth has existed with 10 times the current co2 levels… But no currently living mammal species have… or can
It’s called the green new deal because it lines the pockets of the politicians pushing it.
The "Green New Deal"!???
Just another COMMUNIST assault on the economy of America!
I wasn't fooled for a second!
Everyone says nuclear but not every country can afford to buy a nuclear power plant and keep it running. Plus, obtaining things like uranium and other metals are extremely difficult and in limited supply. Yes, we need more nuclear, yes, they should stop taking down the ones in Germany and such, but green should still be the priority.
Nothing better than chopping down millions of acres of trees that keep us breathing and eat CO2 to install extremely expensive and extremely non efficient wind and solar just to scrap that trash ten years later after its life span has eroded. Climate activities have to be the dumbest people to put in charge of saving our planet. Plant more trees folks. Its that easy.
Anyone destroying God's creation is from Satan and anyone trying to change God's plan is trying to play God.
How long do we have to screm? Nuclear is the solution!
Just like the mask mandate of today, the elites will not wear the mask but you better have yours on peasant. So when we are all on horseback to save the planet from pollution, the elite will still be driving there exotic sports cars. Wake up people.
But what about the spills from extracting oil from the ground?