By Senator Joni Ernst
Retired Lt. Colonel in the Iowa Army National Guard
Last year, on Earth Day, President Biden proudly declared he would “start the process where every vehicle in the United States military is going to be climate-friendly.”
He said, “We’re spending billions of dollars to do it.”
That’s why it was no surprise that Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm testified to the Senate Armed Services Committee that the U.S. military should transition to an all-electric nontactical vehicle fleet by 2030.
While Ms. Granholm stated that the goal would “reduce our reliance on the volatility of globally traded fossil fuels,” she forgot to mention that it would increase our reliance on China, our greatest adversary.
The Biden administration’s obsessive and insane intent to force through green energy mandates jeopardizes our military’s lethality, enriches our adversaries, and works against our collective security and prosperity.
China dominates the supply chain for the materials needed to go green: lithium, cobalt and spherical graphite.
And in typical communist fashion, these materials are often mined and produced with child and slave labor.
The truth is, American resource stewardship is the cleanest, most innovative and most ethical in the world.
But if we aren’t producing energy ourselves, we are signing up to purchase it from other, often adversarial nations.
As a result, we are sending U.S. dollars abroad while our jobs and pocketbooks are suffering under “Bidenomics” at home.
The Biden administration’s priorities are completely out of touch and unsustainable.
China, our greatest threat, is mentioned only nine times in the president’s 48-page National Security Strategy.
Meanwhile, climate is mentioned 63 times, proclaimed most grimly as “potentially existential for all nations.”
As a veteran and former commander of a transportation company in Iraq, I believe that this green energy push fueling China is pure fantasy.
Last year, when Democrats tried to lock the military’s electric vehicle mandate into law, I included a limitation to ensure that no vehicle component made from slave labor can be used for transitioning the fleet.
President Biden and his entire Cabinet are willing to give up our security, our conscience and our future prosperity in pursuit of their green fantasy.
Washington should be making it easier to control our future through energy independence.
Unfortunately, the leaders at the helm of our government are more interested in going electric than supporting ready-made, reliable energy sources, like homegrown Iowa biofuel, in our energy mix.
It’s past time we put our economic and national security first and return to sanity.
First published in the Washington Times
Leftmedia Finally Questions Ethics of EVs (Patriot Post, 10 AUG 23)
There are ironically high costs for the Biden administration’s green revolution.
It’s taken long enough, but members of the Leftmedia finally have begun noticing that the promise of an electrically driven future may not quite live up to the morally superior moniker it has been given.
In fact, a future where the vast majority of cars Americans drive are electric holds some considerable downsides, especially when it comes to human labor and negative environmental impacts.
Even The Washington Post has begun highlighting several of the genuinely problematic and morally reprehensible aspects of the “green revolution.”
In a recent article titled “In scramble for EV metals, health threat to workers often goes unaddressed,” the Post notes the serious health dangers associated with the mining and production of manganese, one of the materials necessary for the production of EV batteries.
These mines and production facilities are located in places such as South Africa and Gabon, where worker protections and safeguards are often secondary as the demand for manganese rises. An increasing number of workers are suffering the negative health effects.
The article highlights one former worker who asks: “How long is it going to take until people start realizing what is happening? Another 30 or 40 years? Must we wait until people start dying?”
Another Washington Post article, published this week, is titled “Despite reforms, mining for EV metals in Congo exacts steep cost on workers.”
This time, the Post observes that mining cobalt from Congo, the world’s largest producer, comes via dire working conditions often endured by child laborers. Slave labor is also a significant contributing factor in the mining of cobalt.
While noting that “EVs are widely considered crucial to addressing climate change,” the article observes, “Without a full accounting, there is a risk that the green-energy transition could repeat the painful history of earlier industrial revolutions.” Ya think? . . . . (read more)
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