(Cracking the Code with Greg Kozera - Photo Illustration - MetroCreativeConnection)

There is THE economy big picture, and then there is YOUR personal economy.

Before the last election, we heard supposedly smart people in Washington, D.C., and New York City who make big money, apparently don’t do the grocery shopping and call people like me stupid because we didn’t understand how great the economy was. They told us inflation is cooling off. When I did grocery shopping for our Christmas family gathering, I didn’t see it. Prices never go down as fast as they go up, whether it is groceries or gasoline. Our personal economy (Are we working? Can we pay our bills?) is what matters.

My wife Lynnda and I like to vacation in January. Our kids are grown. School isn’t an issue. Crowds are smaller for attractions and restaurants. The first part of January is slow for our business, with no conferences or major events. We go south where it is warm, sunny and green. Cold is below 50 degrees to Florida locals and brings out winter coats. We don’t miss snow.

At the airport in Charleston waiting for the plane, I had a conversation with a minister from southern West Virginia who was also flying south. He asked what I did. I told him about Shale Crescent USA and the economic development work we do with the West Virginia Development Office, Jobs Ohio and Team PA. His face lit up, “We were destined to meet. In southern West Virginia, we have a drug problem and need hope. Jobs bring hope.” We exchanged business cards. The people of southern West Virginia don’t care if the Ohio Valley and Eastern Panhandle of West Virginia are thriving with manufacturing growth. Southern West Virginia isn’t. Their economy sucks.

During the pandemic, people suddenly realized how much manufacturing the U.S. outsourced to China. In 2020, I was a radio guest on WVON Chicago’s “The Perry Small Show,” serving the Black community. Perry, the host, asked, “Mr. Kozera, we have a lot of vacant warehouses. What can we do to bring jobs back to Chicago? If we can bring back jobs, we can create hope and end the gun violence in this city.” I shared ideas but couldn’t do much more.

We have an opportunity to help southern West Virginia and other depressed areas. Southern West Virginia doesn’t have the Marcellus and Utica. They do have natural gas, an extensive rail system and are in the center of half the U.S. population.

In Florida, we visited our nephew, a manager in the construction business who we had not seen for a couple of years. He builds homes. His focus is on the Florida economy. My nephew said he pays a lot less for utilities than when he lived in Pennsylvania. He uses natural gas for cooking and heat in the winter. An electric heat pump does his air conditioning, which is also fueled by natural gas since 75% of Florida’s electricity comes from dependable natural gas. The only state that produces more electricity than Florida is Texas. Florida is “The Sunshine State” but only

7% of its electricity comes from renewables. My nephew is happy. Solar would increase his power cost since it doesn’t work at night and needs a natural gas backup.

Our nephew, as a firefighter, knows a lot about EVs. The economics of owning one make no sense to him. He said, “We carry water and foam on firetrucks and can’t carry enough foam to put out an EV fire until the vehicle is destroyed.” Like me, he isn’t convinced EVs are “green” when mining and shipping of lithium, cobalt, graphite and rare earths are considered. He learned this on his own. Our power grid is struggling to meet base power demand from data centers, AI and onshoring of manufacturing. The amount of additional electricity to fuel even 25% of our transportation system is massive. EVs aren’t selling based on people’s personal economies.

Climate change organizations, advocates in government and academia can’t understand why climate change is so low in importance to Americans. It might be because current proposed climate solutions, like getting rid of fossil fuels, don’t consider the economies of everyday people. Energy cost impacts everything we buy. The replacements for fossil fuels are all more expensive. If the fossil fuel replacement fuel was dependable and cheaper, it would rapidly be implemented. Places like Europe and California are examples of what happens when fossil fuels are replaced by renewables. Cost goes up, and dependability goes down.

The public is beginning to understand energy and its impact on their cost of living and personal economy. In October of 2024, a Commonwealth Foundation statewide poll found a staggering 78% of Pennsylvania voters said energy affordability is an important consideration when choosing a candidate. Over two-thirds of every demographic supported spending more for natural gas infrastructure to reduce their energy cost. Over two-thirds of voters polled, including more than 50% of Democrats, agreed affordable energy is more important than climate change, and 57% of voters are unwilling to spend as much as $100 to fight climate change. A whopping 86% of voters believe the U.S. needs to be energy independent. People still care about the environment, but their first concern is feeding and caring for their families today.

Recent Shale Crescent USA work shows natural gas to be the energy transition fuel for onshoring manufacturing from overseas, reducing global emissions in addition to creating high-wage U.S. jobs. The U.S. and Europe have greatly reduced emissions, yet global emissions have yet to peak. Increased environmental regulation and restricting fossil fuel use have driven manufacturing jobs from Europe to places like China, continuing to increase global emissions.

Politicians and government officials who care about the personal economies of average Americans is a start. For 25-plus years, the plan to lower global emissions hasn’t worked, made the problem worse and hurt everyone but the wealthy. We need to work together for common sense global solutions that uplift people.

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Greg Kozera, gkozera@shalecrescentusa.com, is the director of marketing for Shale Crescent USA. He is a professional engineer with a master’s in environmental engineering and over 40 years experience in the energy industry. Greg is a leadership expert, high school soccer coach, professional speaker and author of four books and many published articles.