Below are a series of pictures highlighting the size of ANWR, the size of the part of ANWR that Republicans want to drill in, what that small area really looks like during the summer and winter, and pictures of the existing oil rigs at Prudhoe Bay and what it looks like during the summer and winter.

This first diagram shows the size of ANWR and Alaska compared to the continental U.S. Clearly ANWR, while containing 19 million acres, is small when compared to the entire U.S.

This second diagram shows the actual proposed drilling area of 2000 acres.

These are a series of photos of that 2,000 acre area in ANWR in the summer and in the winter. Note the stark and desolate landscape in the area that is proposed for drilling. Pictures normally shown in the media are of areas of ANWR much further to the South.

The drilling area in the summer.


The drilling area in the winter.


These are pictures taken at the oil rigs located at Prudhoe Bay. Environmentalist were concerned that oil drilling in Prudhoe Bay would be an ecological disaster and harm the local animal populations. Clearly neither of these dire predictions came true.

Prudhoe Bay in the summer.

Prudhoe Bay in the winter. Note the similar desolation of Prudhoe Bay and the proposed drilling area. Neither is hospitable in winter.

As Paul Driessen of Townhall.com points out, "One of our best prospects is Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, which geologists say contains billions of barrels of recoverable oil. If President Clinton hadn’t bowed to Wilderness Society demands and vetoed 1995 legislation, we’d be producing a million barrels a day from ANWR right now. That’s equal to US imports from Saudi Arabia, at $50 billion annually.

Drilling in ANWR would get new oil flowing in 5-10 years, depending on how many lawsuits environmentalists file. That’s far faster than benefits would flow from supposed alternatives: devoting millions more acres of cropland to corn or cellulosic ethanol, converting our vehicle fleet to hybrid and flex-fuel cars, building dozens of new nuclear power plants, and blanketing thousands of square miles with wind turbines and solar panels. These alternatives would take decades to implement, and all face political, legal, technological, economic and environmental hurdles.

ANWR is the size of South Carolina. Its narrow coastal plain is frozen and windswept most of the year. Wildlife flourish amid drilling and production in other Arctic regions, and would do so near ANWR facilities. Inuits who live there know this, and support drilling by an 8:1 margin. Gwich’in Indians who oppose drilling live hundreds of miles away – and have leased and drilled their own tribal lands, including caribou migratory routes.

Drilling and production operations would impact only 2,000 acres – to produce 15 billion gallons of oil annually. Saying this tiny footprint would spoil the refuge is like saying a major airport along South Carolina’s northern border would destroy the state’s scenery and wildlife.

It’s a far better bargain than producing 7 billion gallons of ethanol in 2007 from corn grown on an area the size of Indiana (23 million acres).

It’s far better than using wind to generate enough electricity to power New York City, which would require blanketing Connecticut (3 million acres) with turbines."

The Sarasota Herald-Tribune has a major article written by Zac Anderson titled, "Not so cool: Sarasota-Bradenton tops for 'greenhouse gas emissions".

Actually, the Sarasota-Bradenton area should get a medal for producing more CO2 than other areas. We are helping our plants grow because you see CO2 is plant food. When we breath we emit CO2. The plants love us.

Zac spends the entire article talking about and to global warming alarmists. He quotes Jerry Karnas, Florida climate project director for Environmental Defense who states "You have the perfect storm for a carbon nightmare." Carbon nightmare? Really? Freddy Kruger is a nightmare, not our good friend carbon.

Of course our very own Florida Representative Keith Fitzgerald is quoted. He states, "Studies like this [Brookings Institution study] are important,"...They give us evidence to back up these efforts to change our growth and transportation patterns."

"This drives home the point we've been making as far as encouraging redevelopment, urban revitalization and the importance of our land use pattern," said County Administrator Jim Ley.

"Change our growth and transportation patterns" and "land use pattern" are code for destroying our local economy with more restrictions and taxes on energy, gasoline, development and of course us citizens. All in the glorious name of reducing CO2 emissions.

In Sarasota County, FL there is a movement right now within a group called SCOPE to require 100% of new development and 50% of existing buildings to have solar water heaters within five years. I sit on the committee looking at this proposal from the SCOPE SEA conference. I will be reporting out on the results soon.

The interesting thing is that Zac, who is a reporter, does not discuss the other side of the issue. I always thought that reporters were supposed to present both sides and let us decide. That is fair and balanced. Clearly Zac is not.

The only quote he uses at the very end of the article is from Rep. Paige Kreegel, R-Punta Gorda, who favors a free-market approach."We can talk all we want about conservation of energy and people not moving out towards the periphery, but nothing does it more than $4 gas," Rep. Paige said. We agree with Rep. Page.

Since Zac didn't, we will give you the other side of the issue. Human caused global warming is a theory that has been proven to be false. We can measure CO2 emissions all we want but human caused CO2 emissions are not the primary cause of global warming. In fact, we are entering a global cooling period at a time when CO2 emissions are at an all time high and rising.

We now know the following facts:

· Ice core data shows that there have been repeated heating and cooling events on the earth long before human activity was significant. Global warming is a naturally occurring event. Attempting to interfere in this process may have unpredictable consequences.

· The Earth cooled between 1940 and 1975 while fossil fuel consumption rose dramatically. The Earth should have warmed if CO2 emissions from fossil fuel consumption is a cause of global warming. The theory does not fit the data.

· Ignoring data that does not fit a theory is poor science. Only one inconsistent piece of data is necessary to negate a theory.

So why do environmentalists, politicians and the Sarasota Herald-Tribune still cling to a debunked scientific theory? Global warming has transformed into a political movement. It is no longer science it is propaganda. It is a perceived vote getter, plain and simple.

We are saddened to read in the article that, "Sarasota County leaders said the report reaffirms their efforts to curb greenhouse gas emissions. Such gases are trapped in the atmosphere, creating a greenhouse effect that warms the plant."

These "Sarasota County leaders" ignore the fact that Global warming stopped in 1998. We have entered a global cooling period that is predicted to last until 2015 according to current research.

The evidence based data showing the Earth's failure to continue warming has confounded the promoters of man-made climate fear. The American people have consistently rejected climate alarm as a Gallup Poll released on Earth Day 2008 shows the American public’s concern about man-made global warming is unchanged from 1989.

Curbing greenhouse gas emissions is a fool's errand that will cost us all with higher prices for food, fuel, energy and housing. These are the building blocks of our economy. They are beginning to crumble under the weight of the "carbon nightmare" propaganda.

Get ready for $10 a gallon gasoline, higher energy bills, and un-affordable housing courtesy of our local, state and nationally elected officials.

We continue to be amazed at the editorial board of the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. In their column, "Same old drill", they take the totally illogical position that we should not drill for our own oil.

Their rational is it will take us ten years to get the oil flowing. This was the same rational that caused former President Bill Clinton to veto an energy bill in 1995 that would allow drilling in ANWR. If that bill had been signed we would have 1 million barrels of American owned oil flowing now into our economy every day.

According to Robert J. Samuelson of the Washington Post, "It may surprise Americans to discover that the United States is the third-largest oil producer, behind Saudi Arabia and Russia. We could be producing more, but Congress has put large areas of potential supply off-limits. These include the Atlantic and Pacific coasts and parts of Alaska and the Gulf of Mexico. By government estimates, these areas may contain 25 billion to 30 billion barrels of oil (against about 30 billion barrels of proven U.S. reserves today) and 80 trillion cubic feet or more of natural gas (compared with about 200 tcf of proven reserves).

What keeps these areas closed are exaggerated environmental fears, strong prejudice against oil companies and sheer stupidity. Americans favor both "energy independence" and cheap fuel. They deplore imports -- who wants to pay foreigners? -- but oppose more production in the United States. Got it? The result is a "no-pain energy agenda that sounds appealing but has no basis in reality," writes Robert Bryce in "Gusher of Lies: The Dangerous Delusions of 'Energy Independence.' "

As Senator John Cornyn (R-TX) said, "The real common sense solution, as we transition away from dependence on fossil fuels, is to increase the supply of domestic energy. We need to get the government out of the way and allow use of plentiful resources under our control. If Congress stopped penalizing and handcuffing our domestic energy production, we could produce an additional 2.7 to 3 million barrels of oil a day within a relatively short period of time."

Senator Cornyn went on to say, "That is why Senate Republicans have introduced legislation, The American Energy Production Act, an important step towards driving down gas prices for all Americans. If enacted, this new legislation would allow access 24 billion barrels of oil—enough oil to supply America for 5 years with no foreign imports. It would also provide for authorization to explore for American oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) and the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS)."

We have shown over and over again that conservation and greater efficiency (like fleet mileage standards) do not work. According to the Manhattan Institute, "The history of the twentieth century is one of gigantic increases in efficiency—and even larger increases in consumption. The American economy has experienced massive efficiency gains: for each unit of energy, we produce more than twice as much GDP today than we did in 1950. Yet during that period of time, our national total energy consumption has tripled. Paradoxically, when it comes to energy, the more we save, the more we consume."

Prices do go down when you increase supply. The best way to lower energy prices, and reduce our dependence on foreign oil, is to accelerate production of all forms of domestic energy.

We have taken off the table drilling for more fossil fuels in Alaska, the East and West coasts and in the Gulf of Mexico. We have not built a new gas refinery in over 30 years. We have not built a new nuclear power plant in over 40 years.

The Sarasota Herald-Tribune is oblivious to the pain caused by high gas and energy prices. All they, and their environmental friends in Congress, care about is reducing carbon emissions.

Americans don't care about carbon emissions. What American's care about is cheap reliable energy.

The "same old drill" is the solution. Increase supply and reduce price. Economics 101.

Waldo Proffitt our friend and columnist for the Sarasota Herald-Tribune writes an interesting article on the high price of gasoline titled, "Will desperation bring change?".

Waldo is hoping, "The high price of filling up the fuel tanks of cars or trucks just might motivate millions of voters to demand elected officials "do something" or get out of the way for those who will."

The time to do something has long passed. In 1995 President Bill Clinton vetoed an energy bill that passed both houses of Congress to drill in ANWR in Alaska. Had he signed that bill we would be pumping at least 1,000,000 barrels of American oil into our economy.

Anyway, let's look at the specific proposals of Waldo and present our view on each of them.

Waldo's Proposal 1:

Waldo states, "The first thing we can do is conserve energy, including electricity, because much of our oil and natural gas is used to generate electricity. Kilowatt hours saved are barrels of oil saved."

Actually this is not true. The issue is not conservation, it is where we get our power from. Fifty percent of all of America's electricity comes from coal. If we really want to save oil and natural gas, which is much more expensive than coal, we would build more coal plants like they are planning to do in Europe. America is the Saudi Arabia of coal. We have billions of tons of coal. Enough to last us at least 200 years.

If you are worried about increased pollution by using coal don't be. In fact the energy industry as a whole has done a fantastic job reducing pollutants according to the James Madison Institute.

According to America's Power Florida only gets 29.2% of our power from coal. We get 16.9% from petroleum, 38% from natural gas and 0.1% from hydroelectric. If we went full tilt to coal we would dramatically reduce our costs and save oil and natural gas. Because of our heavy use of oil and natural gas Florida is the 13th most expensive state for power generation.

For example, our neighbors in Georgia, who are ranked 25th in cost of electricity, pay 7.63 cents per KWH of electricity, while we pay 10.45 cents per KWH. The difference? Georgia gets 62.7% of its energy from coal, 23.2% from nuclear, o.6% from petroleum and 9.4% from natural gas. Get the picture?

Waldo's Proposal 2.

Waldo wants to reduce our dependence on oil by a combination of conservation and efficiency. He says, "for starters we could raise mandated auto fuel efficiency by, say, 40 percent. Of course, increased production of hybrids would make it easier to reach that goal quickly."

The problem is conservation and greater efficiency are not the answers. According to the Manhattan Institute, "The history of the twentieth century is one of gigantic increases in efficiency—and even larger increases in consumption. The American economy has experienced massive efficiency gains: for each unit of energy, we produce more than twice as much GDP today than we did in 1950. Yet during that period of time, our national total energy consumption has tripled. Paradoxically, when it comes to energy, the more we save, the more we consume."

“Efficiency fails to curb demand because it lets more people do more, and do it faster—and more/more/faster invariably swamps all the efficiency gains,” Peter Huber and Mark Mills state in The Bottomless Well. Or, as Huber characterized this “efficiency paradox” in a 2001 Forbes column: “More efficient jet engines … cheaper tickets … more passengers … more jets in the air.” The same holds true for cars, lightbulbs, power plants, and everything else that uses energy.

Waldo Proposal 3:

Waldo wants, "Solar. Great strides are being made in the conversion of sunlight to heat to steam to electricity -- the most significant being ways to store solar energy. One of the most promising is to use the sun to heat molten salt to high temperatures and then use the molten salt to make steam to drive turbines at night or on cloudy days."

Here are some cons of solar energy from PowerPedia:

• Limited areal power density: For electrical generation with photovoltaics, the average irradiation power density is approximately 1 kW/m² usable by 8-15% efficient solar panels.
• Intermittency: It is not available at night and is reduced when there is cloud cover, decreasing the reliability of peak output performance or requiring a means of energy storage. For power grids to stay functional at all times, the addition of substantial amounts of solar generated electricity would require one or more of the following;
  • energy storage facilities, such as Pumped-storage hydroelectric facilities, are needed to 'gapfill' low points in solar generation
  • other renewable energy sources (i.e., wind, geothermal, tidal, wave, ocean power, etc) would need to be active, or
  • backup conventional powerplants would be needed. There is an energy cost to keep coal-burning power plants 'hot', which includes the burning of coal to keep boilers at temperature. Natural gas power plants can quickly come up to full load without requiring significant standby idling. Without changes in the energy supply and control system (such as a shift to using current hydropower as nighttime/backup across wider regions or the incorporation of more renewable power), few coal power plants could be displaced, according to critics.
• Locations at high latitudes or with frequent substantial cloud cover offer reduced potential for solar power use.
• Solar cells produce DC which must be converted to AC when used in currently existing distribution grids. This incurs an energy penalty of 5-10%.

Waldo's proposal 4:

According to Waldo, "Wind. With rotors nearing 500 feet in diameter, windmills are among the more efficient sources of non-fossil power. Some people consider them unsightly, onshore or offshore. I would think their visual impression no worse than that of an open-pit coal mine. They are getting pretty close to being competitive in price to oil."

Let us give you a real example of using wind power. Shorty after Governor Crist signed three Executive Orders last year capping carbon emissions the plans to build five coal plants in Florida by 2012 were canceled. These plants combined would have produced 4,150 MW of much needed power for our state. To make up this deficit using wind power we did some rough calculations on what it would take to make up for the 4,150 MW of power.

Here is what we learned:

1. The Horse Hollow Wind Energy Center in Texas remains the largest wind farm in the world with a total capacity of 735 megawatts (MW) spread across approximately 47,000 acres in Taylor and Nolan counties near Abilene in west central Texas. The wind plant consists of 291 1.5-MW wind turbines from General Electric and 130 2.3-MW wind turbines from Siemens.

2. We used the bigger 2.3-MW wind turbines (which are 370+ feet tall) from Siemens to meet our current power deficit of 4,150 MW. That means we would need 1,805 wind turbines. We know from the Horse Hollow Wind Energy Center that they needed 47,000 acres for their 421 wind turbines. So we in Florida would need 4.29 times the acres of the Texas wind farm or approximately 201,508 acres.

Bottom line we would need approximately 201,508 acres of land to simply replace the capacity of the cancelled plants. Of course, Florida can put the wind farms in the Gulf of Mexico and bypass the need to use massive amounts of land. Either way the solution of using wind power is difficult at best to meet the current deficit, let alone any future energy needs due to growth.

Waldo's Proposal 5:

Waldo demands, "Ethanol. No, not ethanol made from corn. That has proven to be a mistake, driving up the price of corn for human and animal consumption beyond any acceptable level. Rather ethanol from sugar, biomass, agricultural wastes, and non-food crops."

Clearly the use of ethanol from corn, which the environmentalists and folks like Waldo raved about is bad. Fertilizer runoff from Mid West corn fields used to produce ethanol has caused the "dead zone" in the gulf to grow, food prices to go up and food riots to occur in many parts of the world. So what is so great about ethanol from sugar, biomass, agricultural wastes and non-food crops? Nothing.

A dark cloud looming over biofuels is whether producing them actually requires more energy than they can generate. After factoring in the energy needed to grow crops and then convert them into biofuels, Cornell University researcher David Pimental concludes that the numbers just don’t add up. His 2005 study found that producing ethanol from corn required 29 percent more energy than the end product itself is capable of generating. He found similarly troubling numbers in making biodiesel from soybeans.

“There is just no energy benefit to using plant biomass for liquid fuel,” Pimentel says.

Waldo's Proposal 6:

Waldo states, "I have not mentioned coal or nuclear. More reliance on coal, of which we have a gracious plenty, is not an option unless we can burn it in a way which does not add to the threat of global warming. As of now, we do not have a proven technology to do it. Nuclear is fine with me, but lots of people find it scary, and it may not be politically feasible."

Actually there is a great technology called "clean coal". The federal government said yesterday [May 7, 2008] that it will spend $61.1 million for a clean-coal project in Ohio, a major step in deciding whether it is commercially feasible to burn Midwest coal without emitting the carbon dioxide thought to cause global warming.

The money will be funneled to a demonstration project in the Mount Simon Sandstone formation in Darke County in western Ohio.

About 1 million tons of carbon dioxide from an ethanol facility will be injected 3,000 feet into the sandstone formation.

Proponents contend that the process, known as carbon sequestration, is crucial for the future of Ohio coal. If electric utility plants can burn coal without causing global warming, it would provide a major boost to Ohio's coal industry.

We have written many times about the hoax that the primary cause of global climate change is human caused. Finally, we are big proponents of nuclear power. It is clean, cheap, safe and renewable. We are big fans, as is Dr. Meg Lowman from New College, in both fusion and fission nuclear power.

What is the real problem with higher gas prices? Supply.

We have shown above that altering demand (conservation or greater efficiency) does not cause use to go down. Rather use increases with conservation and efficiency.

Prices do go down when you increase supply. The best way to lower energy prices, and reduce our dependence on foreign oil, is to accelerate production of all forms of domestic energy.

We have taken off the table drilling for more fossil fuels in Alaska, the East and West coasts and in the Gulf of Mexico. We have not built a new gas refinery in over 30 years. We have not built a new nuclear power plant in over 40 years.

It is time, as Waldo says, to ""do something" or get out of the way for those who will". We agree. Waldo get out of the way.

We have decided to rename our local paper the Sarasota Hypocrisy-Tribune for their editorial, "Warm dead zones".

In the editorial they link the dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico to global warming and use an article in Science magazine to prove their point. The problem is the scientists who wrote the article aren't sure that global warming is the culprit.

According to Phil Berardelli of ScienceNOW daily news, "The team doesn't yet know why some areas are worse off than others, adds physical oceanographer and lead author Lothar Stramma of the University of Kiel in Germany. Although models predict oxygen reduction due to warming, he says, ocean circulation may also play a role, perhaps by transporting oxygen away."

So ocean circulation may also play a role. "Models" predict oxygen reduction? Remember the UN's IPCC models have been proven wrong on human caused global warming.

Berardelli states, "an international team cobbled together all available data on oxygen content of tropical waters collected since 1960, concentrating on six areas for which the records were the most complete."

Cobbled together? Tropical waters (where water is supposed to be warmer anyway)? Six areas where the records "were most complete"? Cherry picking the data input?

Sprintall, one of the scientists states, ""The results definitely exceeded my expectations". Expectations? I thought scientists trying to prove a theory were open to all data available.

Let's look at some facts.

1. The earth cooled between 1940 and 1975 even though global CO2 emissions from the use of fossil fuels increased dramatically. The Science team looked at data starting in 1960. So 15 years of the early data came from a global cooling period.

2. Global warming stopped in 1998. We have in fact entered a global cooling period that is predicted to last until 2015 according to current research. So of all the data the Science team looked at from 1998 to 2007 we were not warming. Nine years of the data came from a time the planet was not warming. So that leaves the period between 1975 and 1998 (23 years) when the planet warmed 0.7 degrees.

3. According to a 2006 article in Mother Earth News, "the dead zone is human-made: runoff from farms in the Midwest adds as much as 7.8 million pounds of nitrate fertilizer to the Mississippi River and its tributaries each day during peak loading periods, which then runs downriver and empties into the Gulf. As it does with plants grown on land, the nitrogen causes algae and plankton in the area to flourish, using all available oxygen in the water. The result is hypoxia, an oxygen depleted dead zone in which fish and other marine life simply cannot survive."

4. The Environmental Working Group reports that, "Taxpayers have been subsidizing wasteful commercial agricultural practices that hurt an important source of our fish...Farmlands in 15 percent of the Mississippi River Basin send 80 percent of the critical spring surge of fertilizer pollution into the Gulf. Farms in 124 counties that make up 5 percent of the Basin send 40 percent of the spring fertilizer pollution load to the Gulf."

5. The Herald-Tribune in its own editorial, "Corn-based caution" states, "the recent expansion of corn farming in the Midwest, in response to higher prices triggered by ethanol production, has been linked to a spreading 'dead zone' in the Gulf of Mexico." This reality is backed up by National Geographic.

So is the "dead zone" in the Gulf of Mexico due to human caused global warming or human caused production of corn based biofuels?

The answer: It is caused by growing corn to produce ethanol and other biofuels.

Why are we growing crops for fuel? Of course, to fight global warming.

As we reported earlier the Democratic controlled Congress passed an energy in 2007 that called for a massive expansion of the production of ethanol. To produce the additional eight billion gallons of corn ethanol use mandated in the energy bill will require growing 20 million more acres of corn. In Florida it would mean massively expanding sugar cane production, which will impact the Everglades.

The UN has already rung alarm bells saying that ethanol production for fuel is harming the world's poor. A UN report released just days after the Bali conference on global warming states, “Unless new policies are enacted to protect threatened lands, secure socially acceptable land use, and steer bio energy development in a sustainable direction overall, the environmental and social damage could in some cases outweigh the benefits.”

Stratfor in April 2008 reported that, "High food prices have sparked a great deal of unrest over the past few weeks. Indeed, the skyrocketing cost of food staples like grain has caused protests involving thousands of people in places such as South Africa, Egypt and Pakistan. These protests turned deadly in Haiti and even led to the ouster of Prime Minister Jacques-Edouard Alexis."

There you have it. The cause of the dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico is not caused by global warming but rather by human caused production of ethanol to help stop global warming, which is a failed theory. The result of this ethanol and biofuel program pushed by environmentalists and liberals has many unintended consequences. We may be soon killing people with this wrong-headed idea, let alone fish in the Gulf of Mexico.

It is amazing how hypocritical the Sarasota Herald-Tribune really is on the "dead zone". That is why we renamed them the Hypocrisy-Tribune.

The Sarasota Herald-Tribune editorial board again tells only one side of the story in their column, "Climate change of heart".

In their column they support the Lieberman/Warner Senate Bill 2191. Their only support for this onerous bill is, "He [President Bush] warned that "bad legislation would impose tremendous costs on our economy." But Bush's own EPA says the gross domestic economy would grow 80 percent from 2010 to 2030 under the bill, just one percentage point less than it would without the new policy."

That's it. The EPA says that gross domestic product will only drop by 1%. Again, the Herald-Tribune only tells you less than half of the story to fit their political agenda which is, "mandatory restrictions on emissions and, even better, a carbon tax..."

As we have said many times human caused global warming is a hoax. Current scientific research has shown that global climate change is caused by the sun. Read our articles on this here, here and here.

Now let's talk about the real costs of "mandatory restrictions" and a "carbon tax".

Dr. Margo Thorning, Senior Vice-President and Chief Economist for the American Council on Capital Formation, testified before the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works in November 2007 on the impact of S.B. 2191. This is a link to her full testimony.

The Sarasota Herald-Tribune had full access to this testimony and yet reported on none of it in their editorial. Why, because it shoots down their justification that there will be no economic impact of S.B. 2191.

Dr. Thorning in her testimony points out the following:

1. Meeting the carbon emission goals of S.B. 2191 are impossible simply because of projected population growth in America from a current 308 million to 363 million by 2030. The more people the more homes, more businesses, and cars - the more fuel and power needed.

2. The U.S. Department of Energy projects a 30% increase in carbon emissions from 2012 to 2030, even taking into account increases in energy efficiency and technology to reduce green house gases. The projection is for an increase of 6,613 million metric tons of CO2 (MMTCO2) by 2020 compared to the mandated target reduction of S.B. 2191 of 4,432 MMTCO2. Meeting the targets of S.B. 2191 just can't physically be done.

3. Per capita emissions fell by 0.8 percent from 1990 to 2000 and are projected to fall by 0.6 percent from 2000 to 2012. However, due to population growth, the Energy Information Administration (EIA) projects per capita emissions to increase 12.2 percent from 2012 to 2030.

4. Looking at the European Union's (EU) efforts to reduce green house gases, the model for many, we find a failure. The EU 15 (the most industrialized countries) have a Kyoto Protocol target of an 8 percent reduction below 1990 levels by 2010 to 2012. The European Environmental Agency's latest projection (October 2006) shows the EU 15 emissions will increase by 7.4 percent above 1990 levels by 2010.

5. Dr. Thorning also testifies that any cap-and-trade or carbon tax will simply be passed on to consumers in higher fuel and energy prices.

Again, to read all of Dr. Thorning testimony and view her slides go here.

The Sarasota Herald-Tribune lies to its readers implying minimal impact on GDP growth with S.B. 2191 saying, "But Bush's own EPA says the gross domestic economy would grow 80 percent from 2010 to 2030 under the bill, just one percentage point less than it would without the new policy."

The EPA actually projects that S.B. 2191 will cost at least 4.0 percent of GDP when implemented.

According to the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, "This bill [S. 2191] is patterned after the Lieberman-McCain bill which an MIT study earlier this year found would cost $3,500 per family of four. According to an EPA analysis, Lieberman-McCain would impose a price increase for oil of 20% and for natural gas of 23%. This will have enormous impacts, especially on the poor."

"A 2006 survey of Colorado homeless families with children found that high energy bills were cited as one of the two main reasons they became homeless. (LINK) The Lieberman-Warner is even more stringent than the Lieberman-McCain bill on covered sectors, but fails to provide any more environmental benefits. In addition, the United States Senate has passed two resolutions that any climate action must neither harm our economy nor fail to include developing countries. Lieberman-Warner does not pass that test."

So there you have it. This is a bad bill based upon a bad scientific theory, harms the poor, and will cost you and me trillions of dollars. We believe that any carbon emission legislation must first do no harm to our people or economy, and must include developing countries.

Our biggest concern is that the Sarasota Herald-Tribune editorial board's column on this bill is plain wrong. This is either lazy journalism, dis-information, or political propaganda. You decide which.

Joseph Goebbels, Hitler's Propaganda Minister said, "The bigger the lie, the more it will be believed."

The Sarasota Herald-Tribune continues to tell the greatest lie ever told in their editorial, "Changing places". What is the big lie? Global warming is caused by humans.

The editorial board has embraced the ideology that we must reduce human caused carbon emissions in order to save the planet from global warming. The problem is scientists are proving every day that global warming is in fact not caused by carbon emissions but rather by activity on the sun. Scientists have proven that historically warming occurs prior to a rise in carbon emissions. Finally, scientists have proven that the temperature has not risen since 1998 and we may in fact be entering a global cooling period.

As Lord Christopher Monckton said, "The alarmists are alarmed, the panic mongers are panicking, the scare mongers are scared; the Gores are gored. Why? Because global warming stopped ten years ago; it hasn't got warmer since 1998," he points out. "And in fact in the last seven years, there has been a downturn in global temperatures equivalent on average to about [or] very close to one degree Fahrenheit per decade. We're actually in a period ... of global cooling."

So why is the Herald-Tribune editorial board telling the big lie? Well here it is in their own words, "because the EPA for almost eight years has worn a black hat as big as President Bush's home state of Texas."

The Sarasota Herald-Tribune editorial board hates President Bush, his administration and all it stands for, or against - in this case human caused global warming.

You see the Sarasota Herald-Tribune not only believes the big lie that global warming is caused by human use of fossil fuels but also believes that President Bush is the devil and wants to kill us all by not enforcing carbon emission standards via the EPA on our power industry.

The result of basing public policy on the faulty scientific theory that global warming is human caused is folly at best and dangerous at worst. Hatred of President Bush blinds them to the truth.

But the bigger the lie the more it will believed. We choose not to believe the big lie because it is a lie.

Well the liberal media is elated that solar power in Florida just got a boost from the Public Service Commission (PSC).

In their editorial, "Fueling solar power" the Sarasota Herald-Tribune says that, "The PSC, which regulates utilities, approved a rule change that triples the credit for excess solar energy that homeowners and businesses sell to power companies. The PSC also expanded the size of solar electric systems that qualify for the program and broadened the types of systems eligible to all sources of solar energy, not just photovoltaic cells."

Here we go, government subsidizing one thing over another and thereby trying to impact the market. We believe, like Milton Friedman, that the government solution to any problem is worse than the problem itself. Our question is who is paying for the credits? We consumers are, of course.

This is the same as subsidizing corn for ethanol in the Midwest that has the environmentalists up in arms because the fertilizer run off into the Gulf of Mexico has dramatically impacted the "dead zone".

Something that the editorial board says however is misleading at best and mis-information at worst. They state, "Locally, the PSC's new rule could help attain a goal set last Friday at a gathering of community leaders in Sarasota: that half of the homes and buildings in Sarasota County will have solar water heaters in five years. It was among the proposals made at the Environmental Summit for Action, which drew 180 representatives of the local, state and federal governments, community groups, businesses and environmental organizations."

In fact, there were only 97 participants remaining (not the implied 180) that voted on this "idea". According to the SCOPE post summit e-mail we received this was an "idea" and not a proposal. Most of the elected officials and nearly half of the participants left during the lunch break and never saw, discussed or voted on these "ideas". I have asked the Herald-Tribune to print a clarification.

Of course, 97 participants at a limited access summit do not equate to nor reflect the wants, needs and desires of the other 370,000 residents of Sarasota.

In the editorial the cost of implementing the "idea" that 50% of the "buildings" in Sarasota County would have solar water heaters is mentioned - between $3,000 and $5,000 for a single family home and much higher for larger systems.

What the editorial does not tell you is that a good standard water heater is around $300 and a tank less water heater system sold by Tankless, Inc. a Sarasota based green manufacturing company costs from $800 to $1,000 for a home with two adults, two teenage children and two showers. A tank less water heater saves the average home 70+% on their electricity bill because it only runs when used, unlike a standard water heater that runs 24 hours a day.

What they also don't tell you is that when the sun goes down or it is cloudy, no hot water. What if you go to work early before the sun comes up (remember daylight savings time) and want a hot shower? What if you take a shower in the evening? We also know people who have put solar powered pool heaters on their roofs and have serious problems with roof leaks and roof maintenance afterward.

Here are some cons of solar energy from PowerPedia:

• Limited areal power density: For electrical generation with photovoltaics, the average irradiation power density is approximately 1 kW/m² usable by 8-15% efficient solar panels.
• Intermittency: It is not available at night and is reduced when there is cloud cover, decreasing the reliability of peak output performance or requiring a means of energy storage. For power grids to stay functional at all times, the addition of substantial amounts of solar generated electricity would require one or more of the following;
  • energy storage facilities, such as Pumped-storage hydroelectric facilities, are needed to 'gapfill' low points in solar generation
  • other renewable energy sources (i.e., wind, geothermal, tidal, wave, ocean power, etc) would need to be active, or
  • backup conventional powerplants would be needed. There is an energy cost to keep coal-burning power plants 'hot', which includes the burning of coal to keep boilers at temperature. Natural gas power plants can quickly come up to full load without requiring significant standby idling. Without changes in the energy supply and control system (such as a shift to using current hydropower as nighttime/backup across wider regions or the incorporation of more renewable power), few coal power plants could be displaced, according to critics.
• Locations at high latitudes or with frequent substantial cloud cover offer reduced potential for solar power use.
• Solar cells produce DC which must be converted to AC when used in currently existing distribution grids. This incurs an energy penalty of 5-10%.
  

We want to say that we are not against solar water heaters or the companies that produce, market or sell them. We like companies that make standard water heaters, and companies like Tankless, Inc. a local green manufacturing company that builds, markets and sells tank less water heater systems. These companies should be able to compete in our markets on a level playing field.

Government should stay out of the way and not try to pick winners and losers. Government certainly should not impose upon the consumer one proposal or "idea" over another. Consumers should look at the pros and cons and costs of each system and make a decision.