Several months ago I posted an article titled, Relative Negative Effects of Energy Sources. In that article I postulated that the negative effects of various energy sources are about the same on the whole and in the long-term. I said this about the generation of electricity using solar panels:

The impact on the environment appears to be about zero, until you account for the manufacture and transportation of the panels. Think about the magnitude of an operation to keep all the homes and businesses in the world supplied with enough solar panels to supply their total power needs. And what about the batteries and their disposal issues?

I’ve reconsidered the first sentence above. There could be significant negative effects aside from the manufacture and transportation of the panels.

The glowarmists (yes, I believe it is an “ism”) insist that the amount of “greenhouse” gases in the atmosphere must be significantly reduced if we are to avert a disaster in the next few decades. They base their claim on the fact that gases in the atmosphere trap heat from the sun’s rays that are reflected from the earth’s surface, much like greenhouses trap heat from the sun’s rays.

(Most people agree that the greenhouse effect exists, but many disagree that human activity is a significant contributor or that it deserves the level of attention that the glowarmists want.)

My question is: If any increase in trapped heat from the sun is undesirable, and for some a pending crisis, why do we want to trap more of the sun’s heat in solar panels? Eliminating the coal-fired and oil-fired power plants might indeed reduce the greenhouse effect, but replacing those plants with enough solar panels to generate the same amount of energy will likely trap the same amount of heat. The point of solar panels is to not reflect the sun’s rays, but to absorb them and convert the sunlight into electricity. Unfortunately, the process of converting light into electricity wastes most of the energy as heat and that heat can raise the global average temperature.

How much? Who knows? I’m just saying that we should gather more data and gain more knowledge before we depress the world economy and slow the progress of developing nations as the glowarmists apparently want. Their agenda is rife with the potential for unintended consequences. Or are they unintended?

CBS News reports:

The Supreme Court ordered the federal government on Monday to take a fresh look at regulating carbon dioxide emissions from cars, a rebuke to Bush administration policy on global warming.

So what? President Bush should simply ignore the “rebuke.” He should just announce after a few weeks that he has taken “a fresh look” and found no compelling reason to change his current policy.

Anyway, I don’t know how a 5-4 decision by the Court can be considered a rebuke. It would appear that the Court is divided almost down the middle on the issue.

I have said that no bill before Congress should become law without approval by a two-thirds majority. I also believe that all rulings by the courts (Supreme, District, and Appeals) should be unanimous. If a small number of justices can’t reach agreement on an issue, then it should be considered a ‘no decision’.

Another argument for unanimous decisions is that the makeup of some courts — like the present Supreme Court — essentially gives one justice the power to make most rulings. The Supreme Court often decides along ideological lines. The Court is now made up of four liberals, four conservatives and one moderate. The vote of the moderate ’swing voter’, Anthony Kennedy, often determines the decision on major cases before the Court.

In a 5-4 decision, the court said the Clean Air Act gives the Environmental Protection Agency the authority to regulate the emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases from cars.

Again, so what? Police have the authority to shoot criminals when threatened by them but they don’t always do so. (Yeah, I know. They do sometimes shoot innocent citizens when they aren’t threatened by them.) ‘Authority’ doesn’t mean ‘obligation.’ If the Supreme Court thinks it does, does that mean that the Court will rule in my favor if I sue the federal government to get them to enforce immigration laws? That may turn out to be the best thing about this ruling: It establishes a precedent that can be used to force the government to shut down the flow of illegals into this country.