North Carolina’s Climate Action Plan Advisory Group enlisted the Energy Center at Appalachian State University to apply its mumbo-jumbo economic analysis model
(click on “Ponder presentation”) to the recommendations that CAPAG
produced. Undoubtedly the global warming believers wanted some public
entity to tell them how all their energy tax hike and regulation ideas
would improve the economy and create jobs, and the Energy Center
delivered. They reported that by 2020, North Carolina would see $2.2
billion in new investment and 32,000 new jobs if all CAPAG’s
recommendations were implemented.
Focusing on details, the Energy Center was particularly optimistic
about CAPAG’s biofuel subsidy proposals. A proposal to replace 12.5
percent of the state’s petroleum diesel fuel consumption with biodiesel
by the year 2020 would yield 661 new jobs and $68 million in annual
gross state product. Even more exciting, an ethanol subsidy of 23 cents
per gallon, to replace gasoline consumption in the state with ethanol
by 25 percent by the year 2025, would create more than 12,000 new jobs
and increase gross state product by $4.1 billion.
Someone should have sent that memo to employees at Pilgrim’s Pride, who closed a chicken processing plant in North Carolina in March, as well as six distribution sites. The reason?
Chief Executive Clint Rivers placed blame for the
industry’s trouble on the federal government’s “deeply flawed” policy
of paying subsidies for using corn to produce ethanol for fuel, which
he said would cause food prices to rise further.“American consumers are only just beginning to feel the impact
of sharply higher food prices,” as food producers pass along more of
their higher costs, Rivers said.Rivers said the company hasn’t been able to raise prices fast enough
to cover higher feed costs. He called the current situation facing
poultry producers “among the most difficult I have seen during my 27
years in the business.”
Apparently the science was settled, but the economics was not.
Cross-posted at Cooler Heads.
