President Joe Biden has turned heads by invoking a Cold War-era legislation to use taxpayer cash to fund electrical warmth pump manufacturing in an effort to curb the usage of gas-powered furnaces, with consultants saying the transfer is “corporate welfare” and utilizing wartime insurance policies as “instruments to advance a policy agenda.”
The plan is marketed as a part of the Biden administration’s “Investing in America Agenda.” The Department of Energy (DOE) announced Friday that $169 million shall be allotted for 9 tasks to “accelerate electric heat pump manufacturing at 15 sites across the country.”
Biden’s utilization of the 1950 Defense Production Act (DPA) provides the president “a broad set of authorities to influence domestic industry in the interest of national defense.”
The DOE’s “historic” announcement boasted that Biden is utilizing “emergency authority” on the “basis of climate change,” arguing that the funding nonetheless matches into the “national security” class by “reducing energy resilience [sic] on foreign adversaries.”
According to the company, thousands and thousands of taxpayer {dollars} will go to billion-dollar multinational companies together with Copeland, Honeywell International, Mitsubishi Electric, and York International Corporation.
Biden administration officers applauded the funding as a software for job creation and preventing again towards the local weather change “crisis.”
“Getting more American-made electric heat pumps on the market will help families and businesses save money with efficient heating and cooling technology,” mentioned DOE Secretary Jennifer Granholm. “These investments will create thousands of high-quality, good-paying manufacturing jobs and strengthen America’s energy supply chain, while creating healthier indoor spaces through home-grown clean energy technologies.”
“Today’s Defense Production Act funds for heat pump manufacturing show that President Biden is treating climate change as the crisis it is,” mentioned John Podesta, who serves as Biden’s senior advisor for Clean Energy Innovation and Implementation. “These awards will grow domestic manufacturing, create good-paying jobs, and boost American competitiveness in industries of the future.”
Biden’s nationwide local weather advisor, Ali Zaidi, mentioned the president was “using his wartime emergency powers under the Defense Production Act to turbocharge U.S. manufacturing of clean technologies and strengthen our energy security.”
Experts from outdoors of Biden’s inside circle are criticizing the transfer, which comes lower than two months after the DOE issued new regulations focusing on conventional residence gas-powered furnaces.
“This is absolutely shameful corporate welfare. But we’re to believe that, because it’s for the sake of climate change, all is well. I think that’s ridiculous,” Ben Lieberman, a senior fellow on the Competitive Enterprise Institute, said in an interview with Fox News.
“Of all the Biden administration’s claimed climate emergency declarations, this may be the craziest of them all,” Lieberman continued. “There is no shortage of heat pumps — it’s just that not every homeowner wants them. Consumers ought to decide for themselves. The government has no role in tilting the balance in favor of one energy source over another. That’s clearly what’s happening here.”
American Gas Association (AGA) President and CEO Karen Harbert additionally slammed the transfer, telling Fox News the AGA is “deeply disappointed to see the Defense Production Act, which is intended as a vital tool for advancing national security against serious outside threats, being used as an instrument to advance a policy agenda contradictory to our nation’s strong energy position.”
“Increased use of natural gas has been responsible for sixty percent of the electrical grid’s CO2 emissions reductions,” she added. “This vital tool for emissions reductions and energy system resilience should not be unfairly undermined through misuse of the Defense Production Act.”
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Congressional lawmakers have additionally begun to voice their concern, with Rep. Erin Houchin (R-IN) calling the transfer “irresponsible and dangerous.”R
President Biden is invoking the Defense Production Act and spending $169 million that we don’t have on electrical warmth pumps within the title of local weather change. All whereas Israel is at battle and China and Russia stay a menace.
This is irresponsible and harmful! https://t.co/qcW63fIcUX
— Congresswoman Erin Houchin (@RepHouchin) November 18, 2023
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