Sometimes reality catches up with ideology and reality wins. Such appears to be the case with the European Union and climate change.
For years Europe has fancied itself a leader in trying to cool the planet. But now with energy prices so high, along with high unemployment and declining industrial competitiveness, it is time for a reality check. On Wednesday, the EU proposed an end to binding national targets for renewable energy production after 2020. Instead, it substituted an overall European goal that is likely to be much harder to enforce.
It also decided not to impose laws on environmental damage and safety during the drilling practice known as fracking, which extracts oil from shale and is working very well in the U.S.
Europe is pushing ahead on other fronts, such as doubling the amount of carbon emmission by 2020, but this crack in the ideological wall on global warming, uh climate change, is an admission that ideology doesn't produce jobs and reasonable prices for energy. I’m Cal Thomas in Washington.
Publication date: January 24, 2014
