This is what Korea looks like at night from high above Earth. The dark upper half is communist North Korea.

This is what the United States looks like at night.

Everyday some liberal group claims something new as a "human right". Well, since primitive man was able to get beyond his fear and reach out to harness energy and control it energy has been a primal human right. Everything else stems from it.

Listening to local news the other day I heard two area power plants will be closing because of EPA regulations/restrictions on coal-fired power plants. Google search coal-fired power plant closing EPA. See how many states are looking at power plants closing their operations, adding to the strain on the power grids left in operation. All we heard during the push for Obama's election, and then the trillion dollar "stimulus", was how we needed to build on our antiquated infrastructure. And here we are shutting it down. But it doesn't only mean a strain on the power grid during peek and extreme times. It means higher utility prices to the customer ... 40-60% higher than we are paying right now:

Consumers could see their electricity bills jump an estimated 40 to 60 percent in the next few years.

The reason: Pending environmental regulations will make coal-fired generating plants, which produce about half the nation's electricity, more expensive to operate. Many are expected to be shuttered.

The increases are expected to begin to appear in 2014, and policymakers already are scrambling to find cheap and reliable alternative power sources. If they are unsuccessful, consumers can expect further increases as more expensive forms of generation take on a greater share of the electricity load.

"Each generator will have to decide for itself whether the investment required to meet environmental requirements can be justified based on its projection of market prices and the cost of its capital. In any case, those costs will be passed through to consumers," said Mark Pruitt, director of the Illinois Power Agency, which procures electricity for Illinois.

American Electric Power, one of the country's largest coal-burning electricity generators, said Thursday it will retire nearly a quarter of its coal-fueled generating capacity and that it will spend up to $8 billion to retrofit remaining units to meet regulations that start taking effect in 2014. Those moves will have an impact.

"The sudden increase in electricity rates and impacts on state economies will be significant at a time when people and states are still struggling,'' AEP Chairman and CEO Michael G. Morris said.

Exactly how much bills will go up is unclear.

What analysts know is that a portion of ComEd bills that pays electricity generators to reserve a portion of their power three years into the future will increase more than fourfold. That would translate into increases of $107 to $178 a year for an average residential customer in ComEd's territory, starting in 2014, according to calculations by Chris Thomas, policy director for consumer advocacy group Citizens Utility Board. [...]

You think prices on everything are high now, just wait. There is no almighty heralded green renewable energy source. "Renewable" energy is an oxymoron touted by people who seek power over the masses by playing on the willing morons in our society. Once something is used as a fuel to create energy it's gone. Solar and wind? The sun shines one day, and is clouded-over for days on end. The wind blows one day, then is still as a breathless corpse for days. There is no new energy source, people, not anytime soon (and I'm talking the next few generations). The EPA is an unelected entity within our government that has usurped a power and control over us that they are not entitled to. This additional strain on the American taxpayer, consumer ... citizen is an abomination. It didn't begin under the current administration, but it has been greatly accelerated, especially with it's drastic actions since the Gulf oil spill, and its soliciting other nations to drill for oil. Our very lives center around energy. Everything we do and purchase in our daily lives has the cost of energy at every production and transport level factored into the final price at purchase. When the cost of energy becomes too high, and the supply becomes lessened, food and other commodities will become cost prohibitive and/or scarce ... and then directly controlled by the government, and severely rationed. The only "green job" is the continual manipulation that has been and is being done on society. Thank the MSM for hiding such above admissions of Obama from the American people before the 2008 election. Thank the MSM for promoting the global warming lie and climate change hoax of Al Gore and others, and indoctrinating an entire young generation who are now immune to the cold hard scientific facts that all this junk science and junk politics have been crafted to make their lives in the future cold, dark, uncomfortable, and expensive in money and freedom.

Think Venezuela or Cuba ... or North Korea. How soon before much of our nation resembles the northern region of Korea? Life as we know it will disappear under the darkness of night.

HT: HotAir