Sorry, L.A. Times: More Fossil Fuel Propaganda, Please!
Landman is a gusher of nuance - not propaganda.
Sammy Roth, the L.A. Times’ climate correspondent, continues to rake in massive L’s with his alarmist takes. First it was his endorsement of Biden’s atrocious Western Solar Plan to litter 20-30 million public land acres with solar panels. After Trump’s re-election, he accused incoming Interior Secretary Doug Burgum of “wanting to intentionally destroy the climate” with his pro-energy agenda.
Now, the breakout Paramount+ show Landman is a “gusher” of pro-oil and gas propaganda. The horror, the horror! How dare a TV show highlight oil and gas in a positive light, right?
Landman brilliantly inserts kernels of inconvenient “green”/clean energy truths about lithium mines, solar and wind projects, and endangered North Atlantic right whales. Naturally Mr. Roth accuses Taylor Sheridan, the show’s creator, of peddling misinformation. Very groundbreaking stuff deserving of a Pulitzer Prize.
Lithium mines can in fact cause environmental damage — not that it’s anywhere near as bad as the heat waves, fires and floods of the climate crisis. Cows are indeed major sources of heat-trapping carbon emissions (not that there’s any chance we’ll “get rid of all the cattle”). And yes, solar and wind farms can harm birds — although not nearly as much as global warming, which is why the National Audubon Society supports such projects.
As for offshore wind farms killing whales? It’s an absurd lie spread by President-elect Donald Trump and other fossil fuel supporters, despite being repeatedly debunked.
He added, “These are just a few of the misleading claims sprinkled throughout “Landman.” They’re emblematic of the show’s biggest flaw: As entertaining as it can be when Sheridan focuses on the riveting characters, he can’t stop getting in his own way with propaganda that serves to lionize the oil industry.”
Roth, ironically, is engaging in the very misinformation he claims to bemoan. I’ll deconstruct some hot air from his new column.
Re: Lithium Mines
What’s the environmental trade off to lithium mining? Sadly, the impacts aren’t heavily weighed. Funny enough, American climate activists like Sammy refuse to support American mining projects but tolerate and champion foreign operations.
Earth.org writes, “Though emissions deriving from mining these two elements are lower than those deriving from fossil fuels production, the extraction methods for lithium and cobalt can be very energy intensive – leading to air and water pollution, land degradation, and potential for groundwater contamination.”
“A paradox, therefore, can arise between “clean” revolution and “dirty” lithium mines: it is true that electrifying cars and other aspects of our society favors the reduction of carbon dioxide emissions. However, after we consider the cost of emissions associated with extracting lithium, the transition may not be as efficient as we believe, especially when miners are not using clean energy.”— “The Paradox of Lithium” - Columbia Climate School, | January 18, 2023
Re: Solar and Wind
Solar and wind, even when subsidized by the government, aren’t reliable and are heavily intermittent. Not to mention their environmental footprints are atrocious.
Solar and wind barely function for 25-35% of the year. This is even highlighted by the Department of Energy.
Given how unreliable solar and wind are, how does their environmental footprint measure up? Sammy Roth should be disappointed to learn his beloved unreliables require 360X (wind) and 75X (solar) more land than nuclear power - an actual proven clean energy source.
Re: Offshore Wind and Whales
Sammy gets this wrong, too. There is a direct causal link between offshore wind development and harm to endangered whales.
In a May 2022 memo to the Biden administration, NOAA Fisheries’ Sean Hayes warned about OWS’s potential negative impacts on whales:
However, unlike vessel traffic and noise, which can be mitigated to some extent, oceanographic impacts from installed and operating turbines cannot be mitigated for the 30-year lifespan of the project, unless they are decommissioned. Disturbance to right whale foraging could have population-level effects on an already endangered and stressed species. The right whale population is food resource-limited and generally in poor body condition.
…
The presence of structures such as wind turbines are likely to result in both local and broader oceanographic effects, and may disrupt the dense aggregations and distribution of zooplankton prey through altering the strength of tidal currents and associated fronts, changes in stratification, primary production, the degree of mixing, and stratification in the water column
Round-Up
Sammy and his ilk are in the minority about fossil fuels. If they hate it them much, they should personally divest and rid their lives of it. Alas, they can’t because oil and gas is integral to everyday life and they wouldn’t last 15 minutes without it.
More fossil fuel “propaganda” - or nuance - like Landman, please!
“A question that puzzles me: most rational folks also understand that our climate is warming. Why has there been no rational study of the actual risks of said warming?”
The answer to your question is because if we study the actual risks, the fraudulent system would be exposed and the house of green cards would collapse. Follow the money and you will find the answer. Many people play the game, Joseph Robinette Biden has mastered the game, as we have seen over the past few years.
Alex Epstein has a Substack and a few books about how Homo sapiens have adapted to the natural world and the danger it presents. He sticks to the facts and is not aggressive in his approach.
Thanks for the book recommendation, I’ll check it out.
That ‘fossil-fuel’ episode of ‘Landman’ made me sit up straight! Beautiful article you wrote here. 👌