Roper: The Vermont Climate Council and critical race theory

By Rob Roper

The debate over critical race theory in Vermont has largely focused on education, policing, and with Covid, health care. But, in case you missed it (and judging by the very small number of YouTube views, you have), it is the dominant lens through which the Vermont Climate Council is approaching its mission of greenhouse gas reduction.

Rob Roper is the president of the Ethan Allen Institute.

The Vermont legislature passed the Global Warming Solutions Act a year ago (June 2020), and the Climate Council it created was tasked with coming up with a plan to reduce Vermont’s greenhouse gas emissions to 80% below 1990 levels by 2050 in December of this year.

The first milestone in the ambitious (dare we venture impossible) plan of being 26% below 2005 levels by 2025 is just three and a half years away.

So, you’d think these folks would be in deep discussions about where emissions are coming from, what we have to do to reduce them, what it will cost, etc. Not so much.

Most of the discussion thus far has been about “Just Transitions,” along the lines of:

“Recommendations must acknowledge that the status quo of climate change continues to perpetuate ingrained systems of discrimination, inequality, and racism. Recommendations must examine existing practices and redress historical injustices through concrete actions that will lead to a more equitable future.” And, “A Just Transition acknowledges the Earth is a living, female organism.”

Because … science?

At the May 28 meeting of the Just Transition Subcommittee, moderator David Plumb assured members, “Every [full Climate Council] meeting will have a touchpoint on equity and justice.”

Indeed, at the June 28 meeting of the full Council, the featured speaker was Amy Laura Cahn, from the Environmental Justice Clinic of Vermont Law School, for an hour of testimony like:

“Can we think about solutions that are not just about aggregate [GHG] reductions, but about actually about redressing the past harms, and also shifting power. … We know that race is the greatest predictor of environmental risks and harms across a whole set of sectors, but we also know that if folks are multiply marginalized, they’re more at risk. So, people with disabilities, LGBTQ folks, poor people, and people with disabilities who are also people of color, etc., like where you layer marginalization you also have the potential for compounding risks and harms. … And, finally, I just want to come back to this question of self-determination, and how do with bring back that principle that has been front-line in the movement, but has never really made it into policy so that we’re shifting and sharing power and resources.”

It’s pretty clear at this point that the Global Warming Solutions Act isn’t about the environment. It never was and never could be, as Vermont’s greenhouse gas contributions are a non-factor in impacting global climate trends. It’s about restructuring our government policy and our economy along the lines of critical race theory using environmental concerns as a convenient façade.

Rob Roper is president of the Ethan Allen Institute. Reprinted with permission from the Ethan Allen Institute Blog.

Image courtesy of Public domain

27 thoughts on “Roper: The Vermont Climate Council and critical race theory

  1. Some of our worst Global Warming gas…….
    Seems to come from the State House !!

    ;< }

  2. I understand there are no less than 30 Governors guilty of treason – recall Sec Pompeo speech to the Governors Assoc regarding China rating the governors (ours being rated friendly by the CCP!) Also the photo of Condos and Gov Scott entertaining CCP operatives at the State House February 2019. It would seem appropriate that the rigged election be exposed – anything passed by illegitimate electors be repealed immediately, and some local politicians should be tried and executed for treason and sedition. The enemy isn’t at the door, it’s in the house eating our lunch!

  3. The elephant in the room in all of this is the foundation on which Vermont operated for at least half of its tenure as a state: operating a legal eugenics lab and operation out of Burlington and Waterbury on our poor, disabled, mostly white women and children, and the obligatory Abenaki…but MOSTLY poor white woman and children. Think poor farms which were subsidized by towns, and every town has a “Poor farm road” and of course those useless eaters had to be sterilized so they wouldn’t keep breeding. Scooped up, of course, were those vaccine damaged, EMF damaged, talc/asbestos damaged – who didn’t fit the perfect specimen model (love that word don’t you? MODEL…theories upon which our realities are now based and decisions made…)…
    RACE is a coverup for systemic targeting of woman and children for 7000 years by patriarchy.
    RACE within the context of targeting women and children for sterilization is only relevant in the context of demographics and populations – and in Vermont which is historically white, you have to look beyond CRT, and understand what motivates people to live in Vermont then and now.
    Vermont has always been a hard scrabble place to live, and the state has struggled for its entire existence to make itself relevent in the greater USA.
    We finally found our niche with the eugenics movements, and if you look hard…that is what all of this falls under, still – just a lot more subtle, and definitely covered up and definitely rebranded and renamed as CRT and Planned Parenthood and the jab.
    Aimed at people of color.
    And poor white women and children.
    Our demographics have changed largely due to offering money to newcomers which is how you buy temporary allegiance, not full allegiance. When you offer coercian for something, its unlikely to be successful over the long run.
    People living in Vermont now are being coerced into the NWO of technofascism and we aren’t actually being asked – but told by Daddy Scotty and company – what is best for us.
    Vermont is now solidly in the hands of the snakeoil salesmen and they are cashing in before everything goes kaboom and disappears into a pile of mist.
    And Vermont is left with what it always had – land enough for all of us to live comfortably with one another, grow our own food, and tell the revenue man to keep on moving.
    But only if we humble ourselves and take a good hard look in the mirror, and ask ‘Is this who we want to be?’

  4. We may have a little help here, because of the SCOTUS decision recently that says election integrity must be protected. This had better not go over Condos’
    head.
    But it may until he is called on it.

  5. “Sen. Chris Bray, D-Addison, who chairs the Senate Committee on Natural Resources and Energy, said he wants to make sure homeowners have access to weatherization efforts, modifying buildings to reduce energy consumption and optimize energy efficiency. See VTDigger article.

    Chris,

    BUILDINGS

    The standard “weatherizing”, at about $10,000 each, as practiced by Vermont, is totally inadequate for Vermont’s energy hog houses.
    It is next to useless to make those houses suitable for heat pumps.

    The only way to come anywhere near any CO2 goals, is to build EACH YEAR several thousand net-zero-energy houses and apartments, and energy-surplus houses and apartments.

    All of them would need solar panels, batteries, and heat pumps, and large hot water storage tanks.

    The energy surplus houses/apartments would have extra solar panels and extra batteries to power EVs.

    GAS GUZZLER TAX

    As you know, EAN has grossly overestimated the CO2 reduction of an EV, (about 4.5 metric ton/y/EV), because of incorrect assumptions.
    The actual reduction is much less.

    Vermont needs a gas-guzzler code to impose a fee on low-mileage vehicles.
    The more below 40-mpg, the greater would be the fee.
    Vehicles with greater than 40-mpg, such as the 54-mpg Toyota Prius, would be exempt.

    EVs

    RE folks would have everyone drive unaffordable EVs, that would not reduce much CO2 compared with EFFICIENT gasoline vehicles.

    On a lifetime, A-to-Z basis, with travel at 105,600 miles over 10 years, the CO2 emissions, based on the present New England grid CO2/kWh, would be:

    NISSAN Leaf S Plus, EV, compact SUV, no AWD, would emit 25.967 Mt, 246 g/mile; about a FIFTY PERCENT REDUCTION compared to the present VT LDV mix, which includes larger vehicles than the Nissan Leaf.

    TOYOTA Prius L Eco, 62 mpg, compact car, no AWD, would emit 26.490 Mt, 251 g/mile
    SUBARU Outback, 30 mpg, medium SUV, with AWD, would emit 43.015 Mt, 407 g/mile
    VT LDV mix, 22.7 mpg, many with AWD or 4WD, would emit 56.315 Mt, 533 g/mile

    HEAT PUMPS

    Heat Pumps are Money Losers in my Vermont House (as they are in almost all Vermont houses)

    My annual electricity consumption increased about 50% (the various taxes, fees, and surcharges also increased), after I installed three Mitsubishi, 24,000 Btu/h heat pumps, each with 2 heads; 2 in the living room, 1 in the kitchen, and 1 in each of 3 bedrooms.
    The heat pumps last about 15 years.

    They are used for heating and cooling my 35-y-old, well-sealed/well-insulated house. It has 2” of blueboard (R-10 vs R-0.67 for 8” concrete) on the outside of the concrete foundation and under the basement slab which has saved me many thousands of heating dollars over the 35 years.

    Before heat pumps, my space-heating propane was 1000 gal/y, after heat pumps, it was 830 gal/y, a reduction of 170 gal/y, or $310/y, at $2.399/gal. Additional electricity costs were $609/y. I am losing money
    Domestic hot water, DHW, heating, requires about 200 gallon/y

    My existing Viessmann propane system, 95%-efficient in condensing mode, is used on cold days, 15F or less, because heat pumps have low efficiencies, i.e., low Btu/kWh, at exactly the same time my house would need the most heat; a perverse situation, due to the laws of Physics 101!!

    The heat pumps would be slightly more efficient than electric resistance heaters at -10F, the Vermont HVAC design temperature. It would be extremely irrational to operate air source heat pumps, at such temperatures.

    I have had no energy cost savings, because of high household electric rates, augmented with taxes, fees and surcharges. Vermont forcing, with subsidies, the addition of expensive RE electricity to the mix, would make matters worse!!

    Amortizing the $24,000 turnkey capital cost at 3.5%/y for 15 years costs about $2,059/y; I am losing money.

    There likely will be service calls and parts for the heat pumps, as the years go by, in addition to annual service calls and parts for the existing propane system; I am losing more money.

    NOTE:
    If I had a highly sealed, highly insulated house, with the same efficient propane heating system, my house would use very little energy for heating.
    If I would install heat pumps* and would operate the propane system on only the coldest days, I likely would have energy cost savings.
    However, those annual energy cost savings would be overwhelmed by the annual amortizing cost, i.e., I would still be losing money, if amortizing were considered.

    * I likely would need 3 units at 18,000 Btu/h, at a lesser turnkey capital cost. Their output, very-inefficiently produced, would be about 27,000 Btu/h at -10F, the Vermont HVAC design temperature.

    NOTE: VT-Department of Public Service found, after a survey of 77 heat pumps installed in Vermont houses (turnkey cost for a one-head HP system is about $4,500), the annual energy cost savings were, on average, $200, but the annual amortizing costs turned that gain into a loss of $200, i.e., on average, these houses were unsuitable for heat pumps, and the owners were losing money.

  6. In some respects this is VT Yankee all over again. The Liberal crowd cannot control the petrol business, because it is all out of state headquartered, they cannot get their hands on the money so they are plotting to make petrol disappear. And unless the voters laying back in the woodwork get out and vote in every election matter coming forth, we are doomed. This needs to start NOW, waiting is a recipe for “down the tubes”, folks.
    As Rob has alluded to, there is no info on affordability, to anyone including those who can least afford a massive changeover to “Green”. Green is a road to “Went with the Wind” folks.
    Planning for this new concept is in the works now, as we speak. Start questioning and attending planning commission meetings, where there will be an enormous amount of time spent on this malarky, while the original Town Plans which are lacking current energy concepts, will be eventually infused with reams of crap right out of U N Agenda 21. That’s right, that is the trail folks. I am on a Town Planning Commission, and it is in the “Start Your Engines” mode now, soon to be out of the gates, and underway. The people HAVE to rise up and say NO NO NO, not in my back yard; never.

  7. You mean by pivoting from the current free enterprise system to a central-planning, socialistic system, there will be “justness” everywhere?

    I recall, Marx, Lenin, Castro, etc., said the same thing

    CO2 would be automatically reduced 80%, by magic, along “just” lines, and by universal consent, because the “break their will” folks won.

    Did Sanders, AOC and Pelosi agree with that?

    After all, Vermont would need many $billions of federal money to do all that.

    No one would vote with their feet?

    Gee, I never knew it was going to be that easy.

    Where can I sign up?

    Will Condos mail me a ballot, or is a ballot not needed, as all would be a foregone conclusion with universal consent?

    Committee members are just talking among themselves, because if they dared talk to the people, they would get an earful.

    I willing to bet none of them could make a good omelet.

  8. Maybe if the thousands of Vt bureaucrats had to sleep over in their offices, rather than commute 50 miles each day each way…Then we could decrease global warming by many parts of A degree!!

    And take away all the gov’t cars and trucks from office, enforcement, inspectors, bureaucratic state employees!

  9. I would think, with the increased amount of lead flying in Democrat controlled murder capitals, that the ‘Climate Councils’ would be all over that.

  10. Watching the attached videos and reading the resumes of the Climate Council members does not do much to build public confidence in the process or the participants charged with a task as complex as fixing climate change………What has the Legislature gotten Vermont into?

    There should be plenty of worry under the Golden Dome over what has been unleashed on the citizens of the Green Mountain State……..While Governor Scott’s veto warned the Legislature that they were doing the wrong thing.

  11. Two falsehoods, Global Warming & Critical Race Theory, just more Liberal nonsense
    and it appears it’s falling on deaf ears in ” Montpeculiar” Vermont’s Doom Center !!

    Hey parents, if CRT is being taught to your kids, time to home school or a private school.

    • Time to give the school tax money to the parents control, so that parents can send their children to the best school, not just the nearest Gov’t / NEA school !!

  12. No matter how irresponsible and unnecessary it is, we are saddled with it now. It’s just too bad voters weren’t aware of the truth about it or its repercussions.

      • No, Brian.
        Stop dreaming, and that is not a request.

        As long as we have mail in ballots, and legalized ballot harvesting, and NO-ID VOTING, and illegals voting, there is not a chance in hell, Vermont will have an honest, transparent election, ever.

        The system is rigged for the Burlington, Montpelier, etc., incumbents.

        • We may have a little help here, because of the SCOTUS decision recently that says election integrity must be protected. This had better not go over Condos’
          head.
          But it may until he is called on it.

          • How about collage students from other states claiming domicile in Vermont? A temporary room at a college is not a domicile, it is a temporary residence. A legal definition:
            The concept of domicile has different meanings in different context. For purposes of jurisdiction, “domicile” means a legal residence which is the place where a person has fixed dwelling with an intention of making it his/her permanent home[i].

            Domicile is a combination of two factors namely, residence and intent to remain. As the term domicile includes residence, the scope and significance of the term domicile is larger than the term residence. An individual may have several residences whereas; s/he will have only one domicile. Domicile is more used in reference to personal rights, duties and obligations[ii].Domicile is more used in reference to personal rights, duties and obligations[ii].

            Do you suppose they could vote here and also back where their parents live in another state. Students have no right to vote here until they move into a permanent place where they intend to live and stay. While not illegal aliens, they are illegal voting residents not Vermont citizens and they affect our elections. This should also not be allowed in Vermont.

          • That’s supposed to read, like asking you to prove there aren’t any! Can you prove that?
            Edit, please

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