Friends of the Earth, an activism group generally devoted to impeding science and progress, is excited that the Texas Clean Energy Project, a carbon capture and sequestration facility in Texas, has support from the Department of Energy that is set to expire.

And fiscal hawks are right there with them, as part of the Green Scissors coalition. They want the Department of Energy to permanently withdraw funding from the facility after suspending it in February. What will Secretary Dr. Ernest Moniz do? I think it's obvious. The Obama administration is stuffed with anti-science activists, and his DOE Chief of Staff Kevin Knobloch was rewarded for demonizing science and Republicans while running Union of Concerned Scientists by being allowed to make sure the environmental playbook is followed in energy policy. Adding in fiscal responsibility advocates who want something ... anything ... not to be funded makes this look bipartisan.

$220 million is a drop in the bucket compared to the $72 billion the federal government has already squandered trying to pick winners and losers in making the environment cleaner, but it's at least something. The Texas Clean Energy Project would break down coal, take out the CO2, and then give that to oil companies for enhanced oil recovery while burning the cleaner coal. Much of the work would be done by companies in China and the $450 million project would lead to ... 150 jobs.

If only environmental groups used that same critical thinking about solar and wind we'd still have chronic underemployment and no business growth in the U.S., but we'd have saved $100 billion in the last seven years.
 
“It’s time for DOE to stop bending over backwards to accommodate this flailing project,” said Autumn Hanna, senior program director at Taxpayers for Common Sense. “Taxpayers have already lost $116 million, and the absolute least DOE can do is learn from their costly mistakes and prevent taxpayers from losing more after Summit misses its deadline this Friday.”

Look at that; terrible federal climate change policies are bringing the left and the right together.

Top image credit: NewsWest9