Trump's people-first policy balances the economy, environment

For Immediate Release: Monday, July 8, 2019

WASHINGTON – Bluegrass Institute President and CEO Jim Waters is at the White House today where President Donald Trump will tout his administration’s progress on energy and the environment while producing economic growth arguably at its zenith in American history.

Waters issued the following statement regarding what is being billed as a major policy speech by the president:

We commend President Trump for going on the offensive about his administration’s and this nation’s record when it comes to protecting the environment and for emphasizing the role a strong economy plays in doing so.

From efforts to clean up marine debris to fighting for complete restoration of the Everglades to opening and expanding hunting and fishing access at wildlife refuges nationwide to improved weather forecasting to taking steps to expand the civil nuclear fleet to signing many deregulatory actions, the president’s all-the-above approach is re-balancing the nation’s policies regarding the environment and our economy.

President Trump’s environmental doctrine stands in stark contrast to the political left’s ideology, which for too long has misled the American people into believing this nation cannot have both a roaring economy and a clean environment or that somehow we have failed to lead when it comes to the environment.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

That the United States has the cleanest air on record and leads the nations of the world in providing citizens access to clean drinking water are facts rarely acknowledged by supporters of Obama-era regulatory policies which placed ideological agendas above people’s needs.

Arguably, no other state in America has suffered the traumatic consequences of the radical policies produced by that agenda more than Kentucky, where thousands of coal miners landed in unemployment lines as a result of that agenda’s attack on an entire industry.

It’s a primary reason why the Bluegrass Institute advocates for loosening Washington’s grip and returning responsibility for enforcing environmental regulations to the states where specific obstacles to cleaner air and water can be addressed.

While market forces, primarily a fracking boom that has flooded the market with natural gas, have contributed to coal’s downturn, radical proposals such as the Green New Deal (GND) would completely decimate our commonwealth’s economy, bankrupt our nation and bring even further harm to our environment.

A report by the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) estimates that the GND would cost each American household nearly $4,000 more annually, which would disproportionately affect low-income Americans -- the very constituency purported to be the policy proposal’s primary beneficiaries.

The GND also would “require over 115 million acres of land, an area approximately 15 percent larger than the land area of California,” while supposedly creating large amounts of “clean” electricity. However, “there is nothing clean about ‘clean’ electricity,” the AEI report notes.

President Trump’s bold approach of refusing to stand by and allow Americans to be ensnared in international treaties which disrupt markets and diminish the liberty and living standards of millions of individuals is freeing the private sector to lead the way to a cleaner environment through innovative research and technological developments.

As the nation’s economy continues to rise to historic levels, the CO2, methane particulate matter and all key pollutive indicators continue to fall, indicating that America is further cleaning its air and water.

This approach is fueling an entrepreneurial environment in which new uses for old energy waste are being found.

For example, Arq Fuel is constructing a facility on an old US Steel coal-preparation plant in Corbin, Kentucky, where it will produce a substance using coal sludge that can be blended with oil to lower production costs while still burning and acting like oil. It also burns cleaner since it has a minuscule amount of sulfur, which is filtered out through an intense and repeated process used to turn the coal waste into usable fuel.

Nowhere else in the world are government-dictated energy policies resulting in the kind of research that redeems what was previously considered good-for-nothing waste to produce years’ worth of additional energy supplies.

The Bluegrass Institute, Kentucky’s first and only free-market think tank, stands with the Trump administration’s commitment to commonsense environmental policies which put Americans’ needs above bureaucratic agendas and ideology and allows the private sector to thrive.

This approach offers the best opportunity for Kentuckians hit hard by years of regulatory idiocy to flourish once again.

Bluegrass Institute President and CEO Jim Waters can be reached at jwaters@freedomkentucky.com or 270.320.4376.