Biden’s “Turbocharged” Climate Ironies

How do you “turbocharge” electric power? You can’t. Nevertheless, Joe Biden and his climate screamers just unleashed thousands of new regulations on Americans at the UN Climate Conference, claiming they are “turbocharging” their crackdown on American oil and gas, ending fossil fuels by 2035. What folly.

Like “illegal aliens,” they can then outlaw the word “fossil fuels,” begin tearing down those circular monuments to oil refinement, energy preparedness, and capitalism – fuel storage tanks. Next will be the funding for levitation, anti-gravity boots, cold fusion, and Rube Goldberg’s latest. Folly on folly.

Back in college, I liked fast cars. Who didn’t? For 600 dollars in 1982, I purchased a Hanger Queen, a beautiful 1963 “turbocharged” Spyder Corvair. It did not run. These cars were condemned by activist Ralph Nadar as “unsafe at any speed,” one reason I bought it. The other was the turbocharger.

I had no idea what a turbocharger was, but it sure sounded cool. Books said it made a car zoom.  The Spyder’s speedometer went to 120 mph. So, one summer working on the rear-mounted engine and she ran, if barely.

That phrase, “she ran,” is misleading. I had not driven her yet, but getting a car not started in 20 years, old belts, coagulated gas, and turbocharger to idle was wild. 

Here is the lesson Mr. Biden apparently missed, when he bought that corvette for storing classified documents (by the way, none came with my car).  Lesson: Turbochargers are delicate, and only work with combustion engines. They make those engines highly efficient, but only by using oil and gas.

A “turbocharger” pushes exhaust (air-fuel mix) from a gas-powered combustion engine through a turbine, pressurizing the air and sending it to the cylinders through an intake manifold, in turn making the engine more efficient.

Back at the ranch, what does Biden want from his “turbocharged” climate agenda? You will hardly believe it, although maybe you will, as so much is unbelievable.

Standing beside his “White House Climate Czar,” Biden – ever the consummate plagiarist – stole a line from God, swearing to “slow the rate of climate change.”

Biden’s “Climate Czar” – fluttering nearby – then declared, “Under President Biden and Vice President Harris’s leadership, the U.S is turbocharging the speed and scale of climate action, at home and abroad… to tackle super-pollutants like methane.”

Super, super, super! You could almost hear Harris giggling at “leadership” being used to describe her, then Biden giggling when he finally got the joke. They then promised to cut, ban, tax, mandate, prosecute, and reverse God’s climate.

For anyone not used to this kind of super statement by super people on a super stage, with promises of turbocharging electric cars, beating China to hyper-inflation, this was a tour de force, rock & roll without rock or roll, pure turbo-folly.

Biden promised to “protect the planet,” stop “super pollutant” methane, and push a “super emitter program” secretly incentivizing informers on methane emitters.

Makes one wonder…Agriculture and humans top the list of global methane emitters, so one is hard-pressed to see how this will work unless all are informed on all.

If you think this a jest, all studies on methane conclude agriculture and human waste top global emissions, with agriculture being 30 percent of all methane emissions, “primarily because of enteric fermentation by ruminant livestock, such as cattle and sheep.” What is that? Irritable bowel syndrome, flatulence, cow farting.

I mean thank God, or rather Biden, that someone is on this, at last. “The Global Methane Assessment published in 2021” shows “methane emissions from livestock (including cattle) are the largest sources of agricultural emissions worldwide,” as “a^” single cow can make up to 99 kilograms of methane gas per year.”

Humans are part of the problem, of course, some more than others. We like to drive and stay warm, eat and drink. Landfills and wastewater treatment account for 18 percent, biomass 15 percent, and – who knew? – “rice production” tops biomass emissions. Then add wild animals, no gas-x. Whoa.

Net-net, there’s a steaming pile of stuff to deal with. Thankfully we have the right people on it. Mr. Biden and his turbocharged activists are all over it, with thousands of new regulations coming our way.

Here is the closing irony. My 1963 Spyder’s delicate combustion turbocharger was efficient. Old, it soon broke, leaving me on my bicycle, also efficient. But between us, we made less methane than a standard cow, which leads me back to how – Mr. Biden will turbocharge electric power?

Robert Charles is a former Assistant Secretary of State under Colin Powell, former Reagan and Bush 41 White House staffer, attorney, and naval intelligence officer (USNR). He wrote “Narcotics and Terrorism” (2003), “Eagles and Evergreens” (2018), and is National Spokesman for AMAC.