Innovation vs. mandates: Why government-first environmental policy only hurts the environment

California officials may have the environment at the top of their minds — but it doesn’t seem to be helping.

Conservative environmentalist Benji Backer has noticed that this has become a pattern, specifically in areas with leftist policies.

“You look at Germany or California or any of the countries or states or places where they are trying this, it not only costs more but it also economically costs more, it also costs more environmentally. So it’s actually doing the opposite of what they say that they want to do,” Backer tells James Poulos of “Zero Hour.”

“The countries that are reducing emissions the fastest in the world are the ones that are growing their economies the fastest, because when you innovate, when you have money to invest in cool technology and cool solutions, that ends up helping the environment,” he continues.

“It increases efficiency; it helps people live their lives better,” Backer says, using Nest thermostats as an example.

“There’s an incentive on your app to conserve energy so that you save money and that the grid doesn’t have to use as much energy, and therefore we take less from the earth. Those sorts of innovations drive down emissions, not these mandates,” he explains.

“Looking at California, Germany, everywhere around the world, Venezuela, anywhere that there’s a government-first approach,” he continues, “emissions and the environment are always going in the wrong direction.”

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