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I Bet Your Never Even Heard Of “Project Wagon Wheel”

The nuclear roots of fracking

Orwell meets Strangelove

BLM lands outside Pinedale, Wyoming. I think that’s Bridger- Teton wilderness range in background

[Update: As a perfect illustration of the past as present, meanwhile High Country News reports that the BLM has suspended lease & royalty payments and is encouraging more drilling:

[BLM is] encouraging public-land drilling, despite the continued glut in the global market.

The new policies instruct state offices to let companies apply for lease suspensions and avoid royalty payments, which are the legally mandated taxes on the revenue from resources drilled or mined on public lands. ~~~ end update]

As I randomly wander, it seems I can’t help but find trouble, but this one is unusual, even for my experience.

I left the Ajo Arizona Sonoran desert back in early March, on the first day it hit 100 degrees. We can’t take that kind of heat.

Cabeza Prieta National Wildlife Refuge, outside Ajo, Arizona

As I meandered up the western Rockies, despite elevation, the heat kept following me, most recently after a few days in the “North Fruita Desert” just northwest of Grand Junction Colorado.

North Fruita Desert, western Colorado

So, I continued north. After a few nights in Ashley National Forest, through Utah’s magnificent Flaming Gorge National Recreation Area and into Wyoming, I began to have thoughts of perhaps spending time in Montana wilderness.

Ashley National Forest, Utah

Flaming Gorge dam

But, instead of heat, I ran into cold, high winds and forecasted snow, so I hunkered down on BLM lands just outside the small town of Pinedale, Wyoming, about 75 miles southwest of the awesome Tetons.

Grand Teton National Park (7/21/19)

In a round about way, all of which brings me to that “natural gas success story” and “Project Wagon Wheel”.

This morning, after a cold and windy night (and morning), I hiked into the BLM lands. I came across a sign announcing a seasonal winter closure  to protect wildlife. I noted the name of the place and came back to the bus to find out about it

I was surprised to learn that this awesome looking place was home of one of the largest gas fields in the world, the “Pinedale AntiCline Oil and Gas Exploration Project Area”.

According to BLM

The area has one of the richest concentrations of natural gas in the United States, currently estimated at more than 14 trillion cubic feet. 

But, I was astounded by the cavalier and favorable description of the official Wyoming State history of the project – the “success story”- including this little bit of insanity, dubbed: “Project Wagon Wheel”:

Early attempts

California Oil Company, later named Chevron, first drilled on the Pinedale Anticline in 1939 using rotary tools, state-of-the-art drilling equipment at the time. Working only from the geological clues visible on the earth’s surface, these early oilmen had correctly figured out where to drill. But after drilling 10,000 feet into the earth, they found very little of what they were after — oil. They did, however, find plenty of natural gas. Unfortunately, there was no market for the gas and the company plugged and abandoned the site.

El Paso Gas Company purchased the well but with hopes to drill for gas. In the late 1940s and early 1950s, the company drilled a total of seven wells in the area, all producing limited gas, making the venture an economic failure.

But El Paso made plans to return to the Pinedale Anticline in a big way in 1969, to experiment with detonating nuclear devices to assist with natural gas extraction. This attempt, Project Wagon Wheel, was designed to study the effectiveness of nuclear power to mine natural gas. El Paso geologists knew there was plenty of gas below the anticline, but it was locked tightly in sandstone rock formations that resisted conventional drilling methods. Radioactivity, according to a company report, was not expected to be a problem.

When the citizens of Sublette County learned of the planned nuclear detonation, several of them formed the Wagon Wheel Information Committee to learn more about the project. The group soon committed to educating people and stopping the project. Eventually they succeeded. Determined citizens prevented big industry and the federal government from detonating nuclear devices in their county.

I wonder if that “company report” was written by General Jack D. Ripper.

Well, I guess that makes nuclear bombs officially the precursor of today’s fracking, as documented by the “official history”:

In 1974, the test well that El Paso Natural Gas had drilled for Wagon Wheel was used instead for an attempt at what then was called massive hydraulic fracturing, to crack open the gas-bearing rock by pumping large amounts of water under pressure down the well. The procedure didn’t work and the hole was eventually plugged and never reopened.

The Wyoming historians glowingly describe fracking thusly:

Natural gas in the Jonah Field is “locked” in tight rock formations. To extract the gas, first the well is drilled, and then the formations must be broken down, creating channels for gas to flow. This is accomplished by fracturing (fracking) a formation, when fluid and/or compressed gas is forced at high pressure down the well fracturing the gas-bearing rocks, creating cracks and fissures. These fissures become conduits for gas to flow out of the formation and up the steel pipe set in the well. To keep the formation from closing back on the fissures and resealing the rock, solid material is mixed in the “frack fluid” to prop the channels open. The most commonly used “propant” is sand, or “frack sand.”

No mention of the composition of that “fluid” or the effects of the gas on the climate catastrophe (the more specific and critical history of Project Wagon Wheel does mention fracking chemicals, however).

But, that’s not all. The official history touts this too:

More pipelines, more drilling, more wells

Initially hampering production, however, were limited pipelines, as well as a scarcity of compression facilities, which increase the pressure of gas in pipelines and enable the gas to flow properly. Four-inch pipelines were soon replaced with eight-inch surface pipeline. Then in 1996, a twelve-inch gas line was constructed with a capacity of 100 million cubic feet per day. The following year, a twenty-three-mile, sixteen-inch pipeline was added to connect Williams Field Services, Questar (after 2011, QEP in this area), Western Gas Resources, and FMC pipelines from the Jonah Field to processing facilities at Opal, Granger, and Black Fork, Wyoming. This line increased the daily transportation capacity to 175 million cubic feet.

Aside from a few whining NIMBY neighbors and pin headed elite Ivory Tower sociologists at the University of Wyoming, it’s all good:

Impacts

The Jonah Field rediscovery and successful extraction of natural gas initiated by McMurry Oil Company is heralded as one of the most significant natural gas developments in continental North America in the second half of the twentieth century. Jonah represents a turning point because of the enormous amount of production opened up by the new technologies. McMurry Oil Company’s technical advances in the early 1990s, coupled with higher gas prices and a quick boom in pipeline capacity, allowed it and other companies to lucratively produce gas from a previously inaccessible source. This success led to McMurry Oil Company’s expansion of the nearby Pinedale Anticline field a few years later.

Any effects on wildlife – so critical to hunters and tourism – have been mitigated:

Measures have been taken to try to reduce impacts to wildlife and the environment in the Pinedale Anticline. Gas companies are coordinating their drilling efforts into designated areas for year-round development. These Development Areas (DAs) allow the companies to concentrate their activities and timing in specified areas leaving large blocks of contiguous habitat undisturbed and available to big game and their migration corridors and sage grouse habitat. In an effort to reduce the amount of area disturbed, companies have been clustering their wells onto a single pad and then using directional drilling from the pad, resulting in fewer pads and roads needed for drilling activity. By 2010, this method had allowed 100 fewer needed well pads in the Pinedale Anticline Project Area and 70 percent fewer roads to fully develop the field, leading to less habitat disturbance.

Local air pollution was normalized as “a way of life” that has been monitored and effectively managed, and life goes on:

Sublette County citizens are concerned about the increased water and air pollution connected with the development. Long-time residents noticed a decline in year-round air quality starting in 2000. Air pollution is now a way of life. … Air quality monitoring is now required, with ongoing steps taking place to alleviate the potentially dangerous situation, though “Ozone Alerts” continue.

And there are positive economic benefits:

At the same time, positive impacts from the successful drilling in the Jonah Field and Pinedale Anticline were immediate and far reaching. Millions of tax dollars have been collected as a result of the natural gas production in Sublette County, which have been used for improved infrastructure and community resources. Thousands of jobs have been created for local residents and for those willing to relocate to the area. Industry has also been very generous in volunteering time and donating money to organizations that serve the community. Industry operators have also worked with the Wyoming Game and Fish Department to implement innovative technologies and operational practices that lessen the effect of natural gas operations on the environment.

And the gas industry is rising to the challenges, voluntarily making things better, and without all that government regulation:

Natural gas production continues in 2011, and so too, do many of the problems that came with it. Population growth has slowed somewhat since 2008, however, and the newcomers continue to be served reasonably well by private-sector housing and other services. At the same time, increased tax revenues have allowed local governments to be proactive in building infrastructure, and industry is working to alleviate the problems brought on by the drilling activity. Pipelines, for example, are being built to carry out the condensate now carried by large, dust-raising semi trucks. The BLM and Wyoming Game and Fish monitor the area, and face continued challenges.

Like they say, a real “success story”.

That’s what you get when your benchmark for measuring “success” is avoiding nuclear explosions:

Hydraulic fracturing, done now with a combination of water and other chemicals, is routine today, and has made the Pinedale Anticline and the Jonah Field near Pinedale one of the most productive gas fields in the world. And all without exploding a single atomic device.

War is Peace. Freedom is Slavery. Ignorance is Strength.

… fighting terrorism since 1492 …

DEP Hides Behind New York DEC’s Denial

NJ Environmental Groups And Media Mistakenly Praise Murphy DEP

The public is getting the wrong facts and exactly the wrong favorable impression regarding the denial of various environmental permits for the Transcontinental Gas Co.’s proposed Northeast Supply Enhancement Project (NSE) last Friday, by both the NY State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) and NJ Department of Environmental Protect (DEP), see:

• Denial of Permits Signals End for Gas Pipeline Under Raritan Bay

In contradiction of misleading media reports and misguided praise by environmental groups, the exact opposite is true: NJ DEP “denial” actually was a very bad decision, it set bad regulatory precedent, and it exposed longstanding huge flaws in DEP’s permit regulations.

The real story is critical, because unless those flawed DEP regulations are significantly strengthened, several pending proposed new fossil infrastructure projects will be approved by DEP.

Unless the real story is told, then current efforts allegedly intended to strengthen DEP regulations regarding climate change will fail.

The best way to explain what is a fairly complex set of science and regulatory issues is to compare the NY State DEC denial with the NJ DEP “denial”.

Here is the NYDEC denial.

Here is the NJDEP “denial”.

Under federal law, most State regulatory powers over pipelines are federally pre-empted.

However, State’s retain regulatory power under the Clean Water Act to issue or deny a “water quality certification”.

The energy industry, the Trump administration, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), and Republicans in Congress aggressively have sought to strip those powers from States via an across the board attack, including litigation, Executive Orders, FERC Orders, revised EPA Guidance, and proposed new federal legislation.

The law and regulatory oversight of greenhouse gas emissions and climate impacts of fossil energy infrastructure is far less settled, but equally controversial. While the Trump administration has rolled back limited federal regulations, some states, like New York and California, have passed state laws and enacted regulations that address GHG emissions and climate impacts.

So, with that context, the two most critical issues are how and why the DEC and DEP pipeline permits were denied:

1) if and how greenhouse gas emissions and climate impacts were considered; and

2) if and how the Clean Water Act Section 401 Water Quality Certification was implemented and enforced.

The NYDEC denial considered and was based on the Clean Water Act WQC authority (emphasis mine):

 The NYDEC denial then goes into detail to specify the “Statutory and Regulatory Basis” of the denial, which water quality standards are applicable, apply the relevant science, and elucidate how the project failed to demonstrate compliance.

Importantly, NYDEC then considers “qualitative assessments” – which explicitly includes climate change – and then links climate to enforceable NY State water quality standards:

Finally, NYDEC’ denial then goes on to establish – independent of the CWQ WQC basis – an additional climate change basis for denying the permits: (the excerpts below begin on page 14 – please read the entire section!)

Documents Show NJ Transit Lied About Greenhouse Gas Emissions

Federal Funding Driving Christie Era “Resilience” Project

New Fossil Power Makes a Mockery of Gov. Murphy’s Climate & Energy Policies

[Update #2 – 10/23/20 – Looks like – and I emphasize looks like – a victory. But I need to read the fine print of an official document:

• NJ Transit opts for green energy, ending plan for gas-powered plant

 And have a very, very difficult time believing this – not only from the Trump administration, but because federal money that is obligated (or contractually granted) to a specific purpose and project (i.e. a gas fired power plant) can’t just be unilaterally shifted to a completely different purpose and project (i.e. some unidentified “green energy”). This surely sounds like spin to me:

NJ Transit was awarded $409 million in federal funds for the project, which will now be allocated to a renewable energy alternative. ~~~ end update]

[Update #1 – letter to DEP below]

Because I’ve followed Trenton environmental politics for over 35 years and witnessed the decline and corrupt degradation, I’m a skeptic and often a cynic. But this one was so bad it shocked me.

This one illustrates what legendary investigative journalist IF Stone wrote: the damning facts are in plain sight, in government documents. (but do journalists even read the documents anymore?)

NJ Transit (NJT) is proposing to build a $546 MILLION new fracked gas fossil fueled 140 megawatt power plant in the Meadowlands in a floodplain and on a toxic waste site, adjacent to a Superfund site, along the Hackensack River, in an air quality non-attainment area with glaring environmental justice issues in Kearny NJ, and while the public is diverted and preoccupied by a deadly pandemic. They put a 0.6 megawatt 4 acre solar farm as lipstick on this pig and portrayed it as a cutting edge energy and climate project.

Can it get any worse?

Just think what more than half a billion dollars could do to address NJ Transit’s infrastructure deficits or advance energy efficiency and renewable energy (instead of building a fossil dinosaur).

Here is the clueless NJ press coverage, which totally misrepresented the project as a done deal, with approvals:

• NJ Transit natural gas plant in Kearny gets green light

In fact, the project faces huge regulatory and economic hurdles and tremendous public opposition. The “lights” are all flashing red, not green.

I) Orwellian Justification

In order to distract from the facts, the project is euphemistically disguised as the incredibly misleading – “NJ Transit Grid Traction Power System”.

The fossil fueled project is described as a “micro grid”, a path to NJ’s clean energy economy, and that will reduce current greenhouse gas emissions. 

Here’s the complete public notice – it would make Orwell blush.

The fossil project was conceived of, planned, designed and funded YEARS BEFORE GOV. MURPHY’s tenure. Obviously, it can not be reframed as implementing his Executive Orders and climate and energy policies.

II) NJ Transit Project Contradicts Gov. Murphy’s Clean Energy And Climate Policies

The NJT fossil fuel power plant proposal comes at a time when Gov. Murphy has promised to make deep reductions in greenhouse gas emissions and issued a series of Executive Orders to transition to 100% renewable energy.

At a time when Murphy’s BPU has adopted an Energy Master Plan that seeks to implement that goal.

And at a time when Murphy has issued an Executive Order that directs NJ DEP to enact regulations to regulate greenhouse gas emissions.

[Note: the project quietly submitted air quality permits to DEP last year, so even if DEP were to adopt future regulations on greenhouse gas emissions, this project would be exempt from them.]

All this, while environmental groups are demanding that the Gov. impose a moratorium on new fossil infrastructure.

III) NJ Transit Flat Out Lies About Greenhouse Gas Emissions 

NJ Transit’s fracked gas fossil fueled plant would emit about 650,000 tons of greenhouse gases, not counting all the “lifecycle” methane emissions resulting from fracking wells, gas pipeline leaks, and fugitive emissions at compressor stations (none of which were even considered in the “environmental impact statement” (EIS), which was so cursory it was really an “environmental assessment”).

So, as I read the various NJ Transit documents, I was shocked by the claim by NJ Transit that their new 140 MW natural gas plant would REDUCE overall total greenhouse gas emissions by displacing more carbon intensive power plant capacity on the PJM grid.

So, I looked at the numbers.

The NJT gas plant would emit about 650,000 tons of GHG per yer (NOT considering upstream lifecycle emissions from the gas infrastructure, e.g. fracking, fugitive emissions, pipeline and compressor station emissions and leaks etc. This could be another 20% more equivalent GHG emissions).

But, NJT claims: (@ p.36)

“to provide significant environmental benefits by displacing and eliminating hundreds of thousands of tons of GhG emissions each year through generation of power for its own loads and to dispatch into the regional electric system.”

Figure 2-2 on page 37 estimates these NET total GHG emission reductions would range from 50,000 to almost 500,000 tons per year .

But, the NJT analysis uses ONLY FOSSIL FUEL SOURCES in their “displacement” analysis, not the actual mix of fuel type generation sources to the PJM grid – or the dramatic expansion in planned/projected renewable energy that will soon power the PJM grid.

So, I looked up the most recent PJM fuel mix (for 2019), and 18% is zero carbon nuclear, with about another 10% low or no carbon renewables (wind, solar, hydro, geothermal), see pie chart: (and this does not include GHG emission reductions from energy efficiency or demand management).

Use of the actual carbon emissions from the current PJM fuel mix more than wipes out NJ Transit’s  alleged “displacement” GHG emissions reductions.

The “baseline” for any comparison of GHG emissions should be alternative renewable power sources.

I can’t believe they would make exaggerated and false claims on something so critical (i.e. GHG emissions) and so easy to debunk.

On top of this obvious lie, the project assumes that the 140 megawatts in power it generates would displace more polluting current fossil power. This not only ignores low/no carbon nuclear and renewable source of energy to the (current or planned) PJM grid, it has no basis in regulatory reality. There is no regulatory requirement that each megawatt from NJ Transit fossil be displaced by another dirtier fossil plant. More likely, the existing fossil sources that power the PJM grid would continue to operate, would not be displaced, and/or the PJM grid (or PSE&G) would export their power or allocate it to serve new growth or backup reserve power.

They don’t even examine the economic reality of their assumption.

But that’s just the tip of the iceberg of lies deployed to sell this boondoggle.

IV) Federal Funding Is Driving Project, Not Energy or Climate Policy

I found this gem, in “errata” to revise the text of the Final EIS. It’s part of a disingenuous and cynical effort to claim that the project is consistent with Gov. Murphy’s climate related Executive Orders (28 and 100) and Energy Master Plan. The revisions delete original language and replace it with spin.

But the revised text that is most revealing is excerpted below. It  reveals that FEDERAL FUNDING is what limits the use of off shore wind as a NJT power source, instead of this new $546 million fossil boondoggle. Federal funding  – not technology, economics, energy policy, or greenhouse gas emissions – is what’s driving this boondoggle. NJT is only building it because the feds are picking up the tab.You see, the project is 75% federally funded (only 25% NJ Transportation Trust). Here it is (excerpt of full text, emphasis mine):

1.5.2.9 Chapter 7 – Greenhouse Gas Emissions (p. 17-18)

• Section 7.4.5, page 7-7, includes the following text, revised and supplemented as shown

“Offshore wind energy is an emerging technology. The NJ TRANSITGRID’s design does not preclude the incorporation of the emerging technologies. In keeping with the purpose and need for the proposed Project and consistent with the source of funds for the proposed Project, offshore wind in itself will not satisfy the resiliency and reliability needs of the proposed Project at this time. Therefore, while NJ TRANSIT will likely be using offshore wind energy by 2050 through regional PJM grid, under the current funding, regulatory conditions, and grant requirements, it is not feasible to include offshore wind as a potential replacement to natural gas generation for the proposed Project.”

The “feasibility” of wind has nothing to do with the performance of energy technology, greenhouse gas emissions, or economics. The federal funding won’t allow it.

V)  Original Project Justification Revised

In an extraordinary example of revisionism, the entire purpose and justification of the project is being re-written.

The project was conceived and designed in the wake of Superstorm Sandy.

But it is now being sold as a project to implement Gov. Murphy’s climate and energy policies.

VI) Energy Justification Would Cripple Renewables

This issue gets fairly technical, but basically the NJT document lays out the rationale for integrating fossil with renewables, while rejecting the feasibility of 100% renewables.

This alleged infeasibility is due not only to the so called renewable power “intermittency” problem (i.e. sometimes the sun don’t shine and the wind don’t blow), but due to additional technical, regulatory and economic factors and barriers.

To their credit, NJT documents directly engage the issue and pose the question (starting on page 7):

As indicated, NJ TRANSITGRID is being designed to take advantage of anticipated mid- term to long-term technical innovations that will provide a path to net-zero by 2050 for the New Jersey power generation sector. However, this statement may raise the question on why NJ TRANSITGRID would not just go to net-zero power production right away? Why not go immediately to net-zero power production using large-scale renewable energy resources (such as grid-scale PV) coupled with energy storage?

Please read their answer to that question-

They also clearly lay out the fundamental system options we are faced with: either: 1) natural gas with solar & wind, or 2) 100% renewables with energy storage.

If the State of NJ accepts this analysis, it will set a precedent and have dire consequences for the economics, regulation, and infrastructure design (the grid et al) for the entire “transition” to renewables.

VII) Project Is A Federally Funded Throwback to Sandy

This NJT project originated as part of the Christie administration’s response to Superstorm Sandy. It was designed to address the “resilience” issue and provide NJ transit with emergency power. It is now being re-framed and re-packaged as a sustainable energy project and transition to a decarbonized 100% renewable economy (by 2050).

But the NJ Transit documents reinvent this history and present the project as advancing 100% renewables and reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

Here’s how NJ Transit responded to public criticism:

The proposed Project is designed to serve as a bridge between today’s available technologies and those of the future and has been innovatively designed to evolve over time. During normal operations, the power generated and used by the NJ TRANSITGRID project will eliminate the need for NJ TRANSIT to purchase power from less efficient higher emitting power generating resources, such as older coal and natural gas technologies.

But here is the actual original justification for the project, from the “Purpose and need” section of the Draft Environmental Impact Statement:

The Federal Transit Administration (FTA) selected the NJ TRANSITGRID TRACTION POWER SYSTEM as one element of the “NJ TRANSITGRID” project, a Public Transportation Resilience Project in response to Hurricane Sandy. FTA’s selection of the proposed Project makes it potentially eligible for funds made available under the Disaster Relief Appropriations Act of 2013 (Pub. L. 113-2).

Clearly, the project had nothing to do with energy or climate policy or Gov. Murphy’s Energy Master Plan or Executive Orders.

VIII) GHG Emission From The Project Are Exempt From DEP Climate Regulations

The project submitted its DEP air quality permits over a year ago. Projects are regulated based on the rules in place at the time permits are submitted, so even if DEP revises regulations, the project is exempt.

Because NJ DEP still does not have enforceable regulations on greenhouse gas emissions – and the BPU Energy Master Plan has no teeth – instead of killing the project for the right energy and climate reasons, the Murphy DEP has the authority and will need to kill the project using the Clean Water Act.

NJ Transit’s own documents explain how:

2.4.7 Water Quality Certificate

Freshwater wetlands and regulated activities in waters of the U.S. within the Meadowlands are regulated by the USACE, not the NJDEP DLUR. However, the USACE requires projects to receive a Water Quality Certificate from the NJDEP DLUR prior to the USACE issuing a permit pursuant to the Clean Waters Act of 1977 or Rivers and Harbors Act of 1899, verifying that proposed projects will not negatively affect the quality of waters of the U.S. As the proposed Project includes up to 2 acres of permanent impacts to freshwater wetlands and waters within the Meadowlands District, a Water Quality Certificate will be required.

IX) How has this remained below the radar?

Will NJ environmental activists get the word out?

Will the NJ press corps expose this fraud?

Will Gov. Murphy and DEP Commissioner McCabe walk the walk and block this fossil dinosaur?

Will the NJ legislature hold oversight hearings?

Sadly, we’re not optimistic.

[Update – 5/13/20 –  I sent the below email to Ruth Foster, who heads DEP’s Office of Permit Coordination and Environmental Review, the Office that reviews Environmental Impact Statements on behalf of DEP:

———- Original Message ———-
From: Bill WOLFE <bill_wolfe@comcast.net>
To: Ruth.Foster@dep.nj.gov
Date: May 13, 2020 at 10:37 AM
Subject: DEIS NJT power plant, Kearny

Hi Ruth – I was just made aware of and read some of the documents on NJ Transit’s proposed 140 MW fossil power plant on the Hackensack River in Kearny.

The DEIS was superficial and flawed, as were your Office’s comments on it.

I realize that DEP still lacks regulations to authorize controls on greenhouse gas emissions and climate impacts, but did you even review the material regarding the claim that the plant would reduce current greenhouse gas emissions via displacement of other fossil power generation of the PJM grid?

That displacement argument was totally mis-leading because it did not consider the actual fuel mix on the PJM grid.

There were also major energy and climate technical and policy arguments made that required serious consideration by both DEP and BPU.

The EJ analysis was a joke.

When will DEP take climate and energy infrastructure project reviews seriously?

Wolfe

COVID Exposes The Rot Created By Neoliberal Finance Capitalism

The US Is A Failed State – Corporate Coup Consolidated

[Updates below]

I’ve been thinking about writing about how the COVID catastrophe shares many of the same dynamics as the climate catastrophe.

I actually made a list of shared features – e.g. 1) denial of science [update: 4/28/20 – even the NY Times agrees! ~ end update]); 2) the dominance of corporate power and greed; 3) deregulated finance capitalism; 4) global markets, deindustrialization, and “just in time” logistics and inventory management (or running a hospital as a business); 5) Neoliberal austerity policy for the public sector; 6) disinvestment, discrediting, and dismantling of government (“small enough to drown in the bathtub”); 7) rejection of planning in favor of markets to allocate resources; 8) abandonment of the public sphere, notions of the public good (including public health), and a progressive government obligation to redistribute wealth to promote fairness and equality and tame capitalism; and 9) the hollowing out of democratic institutions, consolidation of a corporate coup, and the rise of what Sheldon Wolin calls “inverted totalitarianism”.

But, as the COVID crisis exploded, I rejected the idea as un-necessary, because it was all becoming so blatantly obvious (read Chris Floyd’s devastating “Death of a Nation”).

But, today’s NY Times ran two major stories that drove me to make the argument, however briefly.

The first story is a shocking and horrific tale of how we warehouse the elderly in “death pits”. Reader warning: it could  prompt nightmares.

The title of the second piece caught my eye: “I am the portrait of downward mobility”.

For that story, The Times solicited and published life experience stories from readers about how they were doing in comparison with their parents.

The individual stories are compelling, but the NYT coverage and the stories themselves totally lack historical context, particularly on issues of political-economy. It is as if the weather caused all the problems in these peoples lives. The stories virtually ignore the role of public policy and government in shaping the outcomes and life prospects of the people they profile.

So, I felt compelled to submit a comment of my own story, told in the proper context, with examples of how government matters:

I’m 62. Both my parents were born in 1929 and grew up during the Depression. My mom loved FDR. They both benefited from the New Deal and the GI bill. My dad drove a public transit system bus for 40 years, a stable job with a decent salary, healthcare, and pension. My mom was an Ex. Assistant at an urban development focused planning and architectural firm. They both benefitted from massive government investments in transportation and urban redevelopment, particularly from JFK and LBJ’s Great Society. Neither had college degrees, yet they owned a home, 2 cars, and we never worried about if we could afford going to the doctor.

I was born the year of Sputnik, and benefitted from massive government investments in education, particularly science and math. My SUNY system public university was created and sustained by massive government investments (legacy of Gov. Nelson Rockefeller). My undergraduate education was affordable and funded by low tuition, federal Pell grants, and student work programs. My graduate University, Cornell, was built in an earlier era of massive government investments in “Morrill land grant” colleges (legacy of President Lincoln). I paid a small tuition and had a subsidized job as graduate fellow. My professional career was made possible by government regulation to protect the environment and promote the public interest. Virtually the same story for my wife.

My kids enjoyed a high quality suburban lifestyle and education, made possible by massive government investments in roads, water, sewer, education, and communications infrastructure. They too attended government subsidized world class universities for undergraduate and PhD degrees. Their careers are shaped by government investments and partnerships with the private sector.

Bottom line: Government matters.

The values, public institutions, and policies that made this possible have been dismantled by dark forces and replaced by a Corporate Coup, which COVID effectively has consolidated.

[End Note: this prescient 2018 essay explains a lot:

Donald Trump did not hijack American conservatism; in him it reached its logical culmination. The defining characteristics of post-1980 conservatism—its authoritarianism; denigration of reason and education; obsession with power at all costs; Manichean, black and white thinking; apocalyptic, religious fundamentalist mentality; paranoia and sense of being besieged even when in power; and gangsterish deceit, bad faith, and lack of principle, whether practiced by a transparent swindler like Trump or a supposed intellectual like Newt Gingrich—must lead to nihilism and mindless destruction. […]

If our institutions, flawed and wounded as they are, cannot check the present conservative assault on ethical principles, humanitarian ideals, and objective reality itself, we may be doomed all too soon to live—or die—in the second great nihilistic revolution of the past hundred years.

[Update: 5/11/20 Henry Giroux agrees:

In my view, the pandemic has revealed the toxic underside of neoliberal capitalism with its assault on the welfare state, its undermining of public health, its attack on workers’ rights and its affirmation of the economy and the accumulation of capital over human needs and life itself. […]

The pandemic crisis has shattered the myth that each of us are defined exclusively by our self-interest and as individuals are solely responsible for the problems we face. Both myths have completely broken down as it becomes obvious that as the pandemic unfolds shortages in crucial medical equipment, lack of testing, lack of public investments, and failed public health services are largely due to right-wing neoliberal measures and regressive tax policies that have drained resources from public health, public goods, and other vital social institutions. ~~~ end update]

[Update: 5/7/20 – Chris Floyd agrees. ~~~ ed update]

[Update: 4/30/20 – Chomsky agrees. ~~~ end update]

[Update: 4/26/20: For those who think I exaggerate, even liberals at The Atlantic agree:

• We Are Living in a Failed State ~~~ end update]

[Update: 4/19/20 – In a Sunday NY Times Op-Ed Bernie Sanders notes collapse, but he leaves a lot out. The bastards at the Times give Sanders a platform only after he conceded and endorsed Biden. Bernie highlighted FDR, The New Deal, and FDR’s “economic bill of rights”. Way too late for that! He should have done a lot more of that during the campaign to discredit the “radical” criticism. And note that Joe Biden did not co-author that piece. So much for the Biden – Sanders Task Force bullshit. Has anyone noted that those Taskforces do NOT include healthcare? ~~~ end update]

Rampant Media Bias – Sickening “Progressive Neoliberalism“

By giving away billions of dollars to nonprofit groups …, Mr. Bloomberg has made allies out of people who might otherwise be vocally against him.  ~~~ NY Times Op-Ed by the author of “The Elite Charade”.

I call this the PSE&G Model to control and co-opt the Green Mafia, but it also applies to Foundation funding.

[Update: less than 24 hours after I mentioned “The PSE&G Model” of corruption, Frank Kummer of the Philadelphia Inquirer  wrote a story that perfectly illustrates the Model. ~~~ end update]

This is my 3,000th post since creating this site in 2009 and it will be short and sweet – my last for a very long while, at least with respect to writing about NJ environmental policy and politics.

I simply can no longer tolerate the incoherence, incompetence, sellouts, influence of Foundation and corporate funding, media bias, political corruption, (and worse) I see every day.

Today’s news brought the straws that broke this camel’s back.

I)  Climate Sellout

The first was a remarkable story – ironically reported by NJBIZ, the media outlet of the business community and NOT written by the self proclaimed premier energy and environmental policy issues outlet NJ Spotlight – about a “2030 Climate Pollutants Letter” from 90 “progressive groups” to Gov. Murphy.

Incredibly, this climate letter – signed by the some of the same individuals and groups that just days ago unconditionally praised and aggressively applauded the release of Gov. Murphy’s Energy Master Plan and Executive Order 100 in the Governor’s own press release – seeks a core climate objective that should have been a basic demand extracted as a political commitment (or deliverable) before supporting Gov. Murphy’s EMP & EO 100.

(see our initial analyses of the Murphy EMP & EO 100, in reverse chronology: here and here and here- it’s likely that this shamed some people into writing this new “letter”)

Equally incredible is the fact that most of the groups that signed on to this climate 2030 letter also are members of the Empower NJ Coalition. That coalition has waged a 2 year political campaign to demand basically one critical thing: that Gov. Murphy impose a moratorium on new fossil infrastructure.

Not only did Gov. Murphy’s EMP and EO 100 reject the moratorium, but the letter ignores the Empower NJ coalition’s moratorium demand! It has evaporated into thin air!

The Empower NJ coalition got screwed. [let me be clear and name names: the moratorium campaign was sabotaged and then the Coalition was sold out by Doug O’Malley, Amy Goldsmith, Tom Gilbert, and Ed Potosnak]

Absurdly, some of Empower NJ’s new “2030 climate letter” coalition colleagues even joined and applauded the Gov. for screwing them, and now the whole mess is just swept under the rug.

This is intolerable political incompetence and betrayal.

[Update: Jeff Tittel forwarded me his recent Op-Ed. Jeff gets it right, echoing many of the same criticisms I’ve made. Jeff is the lone exception, see:

• Governor, we’re in a climate emergency but there’s no urgency in your policies

II)  Cowardice on Corporate Subsidies for Sprawl

The second was a NJ Spotlight story on a legislative proposal sponsored by Senate President Sweeney [D] and Senator Oroho, [R], former NJ representative to the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC).

Incredibly, – at a time when corporate subsidies are under attack by Gov. Murphy and finally receiving critical media coverage – this Sweeney/Oroho legislation seeks to provide corporate subsidies to develop the protected Pinelands and Highlands regions of the state. see:

• Sweeney and Oroho Promote Economic Development Plan for Highlands, Pinelands

Let me repeat that: the legislation – “a proposal, unveiled at a press conference in Lafayette in Sussex County” – seeks not only more insane corporate subsidies, but subsidies for development in the protected Pinelands and Highlands, the last relatively undeveloped places in NJ (and no doubt with no consideration at all to the climate or regional implications).

So, how did the so called “leaders” of the two so called “conservation groups” whose exclusive mission is to protect and preserve these last remaining natural regions of NJ react to this insane legislation?

Let me give the full quotes, so you too can get the full stench:

Mixed reaction

The proposal received mostly mixed responses from conservationists who have pushed for greater protections for the Highlands and Pinelands.

“As long as this doesn’t affect the Highlands Act, I think it’s a good idea,’’ said Elliot Ruga, policy director of the New Jersey Highlands Coalition, an organization dedicated to preservation in the region. “It was never intended for these towns to be ghost towns.’’

Carleton Montgomery, executive director of the Pinelands Preservation Alliance, noted the proposal doesn’t appear to change any of the Pinelands Commission’s development rules.

Nevertheless, he questioned whether the region needs to promote economic growth. “There is no evidence at all the region falls behind other areas of the state in economic growth,’’ Montgomery said.

Both Montgomery and Ruga should resign.

They are rank cowards – or they are incompetent – and no longer have the credibility required to lead real preservation oriented organizations. (Ruga was always unqualified and incompetent and their organizations are both drunk on Penn and Dodge Foundation money).

(Adding to a long list, Sweeney worked with Gov. Christie to ram the SJG pipeline through the Pinelands, has blocked confirmation of Gov. Murphy’s Pinelands and Highlands appointments, and shilled for the nuclear, chemical and oil & gas polluters in his district. He sponsored the nuke bailout – including placing a cost cap on renewable power – and may even be behind the stealth LNG export plant on the Delaware River. If Montgomery & Ruga and NJ Spotlight can’t call out Sweeney on all that, they are totally pathetic and need to go.)

III)  Spotlight Ignores Progressive Budget Demands While Printing Neoliberal Austerity

Third, NJ Spotlight not only ignored  the progressive “2030 Climate Letter” press release and found the space to publish a horrible story on the Sweeney/Oroho insanity plan, they also ignored a letter from 48 progressive organizations calling on Gov. Murphy to fund various climate, DEP, and public health projects in his upcoming State Budget.

On top of that, instead of writing a story about progressive budget demands from NJ based public interest groups during the run-up to the Gov.’s budget address, NJ Spotlight chose to publish a story about a national technical Report by the allegedly “non-partisan” but clearly Neoliberal austerity finance oriented “Volker Alliance”. (yes, that’s former Fed Chair Paul Volker’s outfit. No bias and ideology operating here, no, none at all!).

The Volker Alliance Report  was Orwellianly titled (with a capital T): “Truth and Integrity In State Budgeting”.

But, that so called “truth” is based on just “five building blocks of budgeting” (page vi).

Despite the fact that a Budget is a fundamental expression of public policy visions, values, priorities, and people, those so called “five building blocks of budgeting” do not include core budgeting objectives, such as:

• fairness and justice – how the budget impacts the huge inequality of wealth & income
• the distribution of benefits and burdens in the budget allocations & revenues
• corporate subsidies, corporate taxes, and corporate profits
• the relationship between public and private interests
• the needs of the people and the natural environment they depend upon
• the needs of the people, as expressed democratically
• the need for investments
• the climate emergency

The Volker Alliance report is a narrow technocratic exercise in what is basically financial accounting. It is based upon a sterile vision of austerity and neoliberal ideology. All that is very far from the “Truth” about a State Budget.

NJ Spotlight tells readers nothing about this broader context.

That Report must not be allowed to displace a public policy driven and normative budgeting process or evaluation criteria.

If all this is what now passes for public interest advocacy and issue driven journalism, I give up. I’m done.

[Full disclosure: I receive a small state pension which does not include health benefits.]