But what about the grift?

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pie in the sky and money in the pocket — just not your pocket

Ethanol plants, wind and solar farms, battery cars: all have their corporate and political beneficiaries, but let’s not forget that other boondoggle, “Green Hydrogen”

Kill Them All - Stop Wasting Our Money on Green Pipe Dreams

Frank Lasee | Apr 06, 2025

European energy expert Samuel Furfari sums up green hydrogen (GH) perfectly; “It’s like burning Louis Vuitton handbags for heat.” He says this because it is so very expensive. Federal law allocated $9.5 billion for GH hubs, and the Orwellian-named Inflation Reduction Act (Inflation Causing Act) expanded tax subsidies. Even with massive taxpayer subsidies, GH is a money loser.

Leftists claim GH is a way to replace batteries for transportation. It is at least five times more expensive, which doesn’t include all the extra costs associated with the production of natural gas, such as purifying massive amounts of water, which takes about 13 times more water than the hydrogen it produces. Desalination is an additional cost. Putting these processes anywhere they’ll need to compete for water resources is just plain stupid. 

Infrastructure costs are astounding because we currently have none, and hydrogen is not suitable for pipelines because it escapes easily, embrittles metal, and is prone to explode. It only takes a few massive hydrogen car or truck explosions to end hydrogen use for transportation, just like the Hindenburg disaster that ended hydrogen ballon travel.

GH is an excessive waste of money, and it hasn’t ever been made at scale—even after tens of billions spent by Europeans, Australians, and the United States.

All it takes is a little critical thinking to realize that something is amiss once one understands how GH is produced. First of all, we don’t have enough wind and solar to power the hydrogen plants. Second, wind and solar are part-time and weather dependent. The GH process is required to run at all times, not just the 30 percent of the time the wind blows and the 20 percent of the time the sun shines bright enough. 

Making GH requires pure water to be heated to 2,000° F and is then electrocuted. This cracks the hydrogen and oxygen molecules. The hydrogen is then chilled to 420° F below zero, turning it into a liquid, and then it is finally compressed to 10,000 psi, comparable to three times the average scuba tank or compressed natural gas (CNG). Without this chilling and compression, hydrogen has one-tenth the energy per volume as natural gas. Under normal compressed circumstances, hydrogen has less energy than CNG. A kilogram of this liquid hydrogen has the energy of a gallon of gas.

When working with the liquid near zero, compressed hydrogen is tricky, as it is the smallest molecule, escaping normal pipelines and embrittling metals, causing them to crack sooner than later.

"Every time you involve hydrogen, you get not small losses, but large, substantial losses," an energy specialist tells us. “The main cause of the issue is that hydrogen is a molecule that is too small and volatile to be used, transported effectively using the gas pipelines, turbines, boilers, cooktops, or burner jets that are now in place.” Deep pocket oil companies are getting out of this boondoggle. BP cancelled 18 hydrogen projects because they were unprofitable, all in an effort to save $200 million a year. Shell cancelled a Norway hydrogen project and others for lack of demand, while a $750 million GH plant in Australia was cancelled because it was a money loser. 

….

And what about water needs? 

It's just stupid to put hydrogen hubs in areas without enough water. Houston, Utah, and Southern California, to name a few, are recognized as government sponsored GH hotspots.

Particularly in Utah, on the edge of the desert, where solar and wind power barely account for 2 percent of total electricity generated. Or California, which suffers from droughts, and often sees water shortages.

…. While it was reported that Trump is considering killing hydrogen hubs in blue states, Trump should kill all of them. 

Marxists and their useful idiots gather in Greenwich: End deportation of illegals! Bring back waste!

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what happened to the ukrainian flags and BLM banners? (Asking for a friend)

“Hands off our government!” they demand, “we like it exactly as it is.”

“Among the handmade protest signs were messages regarding free speech, schools, Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security, public lands, personal data, the courts, the media, libraries and personal data – to name a few.”

  • Social Security: 20,000 million dead recipients? — “so what?” Greenwich Invisible founder Merlyn Pierson insisted to FWIW. “Those people were alive at some point, and today their great-grandchildren are receiving and entitled to the benefits their ancestors earned. Removing them from the rolls doesn’t make Social Security stronger, it weakens it — somehow.”

  • Deportation of Venezuelan gang members. “We’re against that, too — those individuals took the trouble to get to America, they have every right to stay here, and we have the obligation to feed, house and pay them, because no human is illegal.”

  • Trillions in Government waste: “That’s not waste”, attendee Jimbo Himes insisted: “It’s how we do business. Without waste, and a bit of fraud here and there, the wheels of government wouldn’t be greased, and everything would grind to a halt. No, the proper way to do this is to form another study group that will prepare a report on the subject for Congress, so that we can submit it to a new committee and ignore and bury it, as we’ve always done. That’s tradition, and anything that threatens that tradition threatens government as we know it.”

  • Boys competing in girls sports. State Attorney General William Tong is all for it: “Title IX was enacted all the way back in 1972” he explained, “when science was still evolving, before it was settled and immutable. Today we know that “science” is feelings; if an individual feels like a girl, he is a girl — period. Well, not period, maybe, but you get my point. Anyone who claims that the gender formerly known as female is less physically capable than a 6’3” 195 lb child with a penis is just a homophobic Nazi and probably drives a Tesla. Hands off our school children!”

Speaking of schools, the teachers union, Connecticut Education Association, sent dozens of its members to the party, to protest anything Trump and to warn against anything that would threaten their record of accomplishment.

“It’s simply amazing”, CEA president, the late Belle Haven resident and still-active Social Security recipient Dorothy Blanche insisted. “We’re innovative and effective, and we get results. Sure, Hartford school students test out at 14% math proficiency and 22% reading, but statewide, those numbers are 40% and 51%, * so clearly, we’re on the right track — let’s not stop now. Besides, how important are those scores, anyway? Look how many of those kids we send to college, and isn’t that what counts?”

All in all, a grand time time was had by all, and afterwards the crowd dispersed, many to partake in celery/carrot juice high colonics at Glenville’s new Green & Tonic, leaving only the usual trash and litter that’s the hallmark of leftists’ protests. “Don’t worry about picking this up, dearie”, one of the Invisible Ladies assured a reporter, languidly waving a hand at the debris, “there are people who do this sort of thing — they’ll take care of it”.

Well, dang; for a second there (literally) one of Greenwich's stalest listings appeared to have found a buyer

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$10.995 million and it’s yours

188 Round Hill Road, 11 acres and a 1948 Mott Schmidt (think Sutton Place mansions) house was briefly reported as under contract yesterday and then immediately restored to the active list.

Originally built for Enid Haupt — sister of TV Guide’s Walter Annenberg — the property was sold by her estate in 2006 for $14.650 million, and that buyer’s been trying to unload it ever since: $18 million in 2008, then dropped to a more modest $16 million in 2011 and declining all the way to $8.750 in 2019. The following year, with the property still unsold, a daring approach was effected: raise the price to $9.5 million. When that didn’t work, it was raised again in 2022 to $12 million. Astonishingly, this strategy was also unsuccessful, so the more traditional approach was returned to in April ‘24, and the price cut to its current $10.995.

So what’s wrong with the place? Eleven sub-dividable acres at a decent address, a mausoleum that can be fairly easily removed, and a price probably as low as that 2019 asked-for price of $8.750 — I don’t see why this hasn’t sold. I can see, however, that it hasn’t.

This appears to be working out better than last time. (Updated – it has sold)

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38 Aiken Road, asking $11.5 million, went to contract February 28th, just 40 days after being put up for sale, and today it’s reported as pending. (UPDATE: Pending 4/3, closed 4/4 at full price. )

Way back when, the same house sold for $6.9 million in 2002 ($12.164 million in constant dollars); the buyers renovated it in 2004, and offered it for sale in 2013 for $6.995 million — seven years later, in 2020, they gave up, and sold it to the current owners for $3.2.

Sales reported

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101 Old Mill Road, $6,237,000. NYC buyers. It started off at $7.9 million way back in January 2024, but the market for 1800 homes, no matter how beautifully renovated, is thinner than that for newer construction.

And another older home, though not as old: 1904 vs 1800, has also sold. 14 Lincoln Avenue (the Greenwich, not the Old Greenwich Lincoln Ave) originally listed for $2.9 million last September closed yesterday at $2.3.

Excellent suggestion

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pothole Pete took two months off in the middle of the covid shut down-caused transportation crisis; he should have quit.

'Resign': MTG, Other GOP Ladies Blast Off Against Proxy Voting As House Dem Goes Full-Metal Demagogue

Sister Tolja, RedState:

As we've reported, the standoff between Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-FL) and House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) over the proxy voting issue is showing no signs of letting up, with Luna ally Rep. Brittany Pettersen (D-CO) bringing her infant child to the House of Representatives and interviews to demonstrate how hard it allegedly is to be a new parent while also being expected to show up for votes.

Predictably, Petterson is also (wrongly) claiming that the actions of those who oppose proxy voting in the House, including Johnson, are "anti-woman, anti-parent, and anti-family," despite the fact that Republicans have long been opposed to proxy voting on grounds that it's unconstitutional and would, as Johnson described, "open a Pandora's box."

READ MORE -->> 'Opened a Pandora's Box': Mike Johnson Blasts GOPers Who Want Special Voting Privileges for New Parents

“There's evidence for Johnson's suggestion, as explained by conservative legal scholar, author, and mother of three Carol Swain, who pointed out how the proxy voting allowed during the COVID-19 pandemic proved Johnson's point:”

Far from being confined to the “public health emergency,” it ballooned into a catchall excuse for lawmakers who cited COVID but instead held campaign events, went on vacation or simply sought to avoid travel.

Votes were cast from conferences, cars and even from a celebrity wedding in France, stark departures from the measure’s intent.

If reinstated for new parenthood, what prevents its creep into other categories — illness, family events or inclement weather?

Congress already meets sparingly: The House convened just 117 days in 2024, and the Senate 154.

Expanding remote options will further dilute a duty that demands presence, not mere participation.

Sec. of Transportation Sean Duffy's daughter, Evita Duffy-Alfonso, was a little less diplomatic, explaining why the issue was very personal for her and the Duffy family:

When my baby sister was born with two holes in her heart and needed a very risky surgery, my father, @SecDuffy, knew he needed be at home with his newborn daughter, my mother, and my eight siblings. So my dad resigned. What he did not do was demand an unconstitutional exception that would allow him to vote remotely. He viewed his job in Congress as a responsibility and a privilege, not an entitlement. 

If you are unable to fulfill the duties required of a member of Congress because you are a parent of a small child, feel free to resign. Many have before.

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) also blasted back:

I can’t believe that Congress was hijacked this week over Luna’s resolution to allow members to skip work and vote from home. 

As a mom, I know all about seasons of life. If you aren’t capable of doing the job your constituents sent you to do, then you should step aside and let someone else do it. 

We have critical bills to pass to prevent illegals from voting and to stop judges from vetoing President Trump’s agenda. 

It’s a shame that selfish politicians are putting themselves before the American people.

Daring, but hey, if it works in Guyana and Niger, why not try it here at home?

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Homer City Generating Station imploded, marking the end of an era in Indiana County

Seen on Instapundit:

CHANGE: Reversal of fortune in Homer City: new manufacturing project a ‘Game Changer.’

HOMER CITY, PA — Eleven days after the massive smokestacks and cooling towers of Pennsylvania’s largest coal-fired power plant came down in a dramatic fashion in this Indiana County village, causing both emotional and economic distress and a sense of hopelessness, Homer City Redevelopment announced that an even bigger natural gas power center would be built in its place.

The Homer City Energy campus will be a series of natural gas plants that will power a massive data center campus.

…. The emotion coming from hometown boy Shawn Steffee was palpable — not just because the build will resurrect Homer City, which has seen six generations of Steffees, but also because it will create thousands of good-paying manufacturing jobs for at least the next four to six years.

“It is a game changer for the region and for the state of Pennsylvania,” said Steffee, the business agent for the International Brotherhood of Boilermakers Local 154, in an interview with the Washington Examiner.

Steffee said part of what makes this a big deal is that the HCR is building up to 4.5 gigawatts of natural gas generation. Homer City will now be the largest electricity producer in the state, and Steffee’s members in Western Pennsylvania will be instrumental in building and maintaining the facility.

Opportunity, Steffee said, has not been available to his members for four years, forcing them to leave their families and communities behind to travel to New Mexico, Washington, Ohio, West Virginia, and Tennessee because nothing new was being built in Pennsylvania.

“What this means for us is I can bring the boilermakers home back to Pennsylvania. This will be anywhere from a four-to-six-year job. They will need hundreds of boilermakers and thousands of construction workers. This is good for everybody in the building trades,” Steffee said.