“We'll import our fuel. We import 30% of our electrons. You can't import an electron from around the country and expect it to be zero emissions because it's not, or cheaper, because it's not… So you're just exporting your environmental damages to other states or countries and you're importing a more expensive product. So what are you really accomplishing?”
Energy News Beat · Climate & Energy · October 2026
The guest runs an energy-storage startup in California's oil fields. He argues the state's policies have made it an importer of fuel and power, which he says leaves its power prices among the highest in the country without cutting emissions overall.
Transcript
…all the benefits, it was banned through this executive order. So another case where a judge is, you know, basically saying, hey, we're going to throw this out and you're going to be able to stimulate wells again in California. So another sign that things are turning for the better in California.
Yeah, that is a good sign. Yeah. I mean, do you feel like Becero is going to be any better on the issue than Newsom has been? I haven't seen it. Yeah, I do. I do.
…bunker fuel or however they're running their power plants on diesel or whatever they're running them on. It's like all the Caribbean islands. It's not clean, yeah. And yet it's still on par with our pricing, which is just crazy. So yeah, I think Becero will have to embrace money-making endeavors. And that's really what the state has been pushing us for the past eight years to be an import state. We'll import our fuel. We import 30% of our electrons. You can't import an electron from around the country and expect it to be zero emissions because it's not, or cheaper, because it's not. Or cheaper. So what's happening in the court system now is really showing that these climate accounting schemes are not legal and they're causing environmental leakage. So you're just exporting your environmental damages to other states or countries and you're importing a more expensive product. So what are you really accomplishing?
Let me ask two questions because the cap and invest program and the carb programs are on the you pay what 20, 30 extra cents on diesel for this slush fund that Gavin Newsom can buy extra hair gel for his buddies. And then it goes to homeless or it doesn't do anything, doesn't do anything for the…
Yeah. You know, on the nonprofit side through Californians for Energy and Science, we show up and we advocate at public hearings and kind of share the truth behind the environmental leakage of these of these programs and the cost. For our project, we will be able to apply for and gain access to the…
The only 2% of the United States imports from the Straight Hormos goes to California.
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