June 2008

I have heard an awful lot of public discourse over the past few days about the irresponsibility of our Washington policymakers’ refusal to tap domestic sources of hydrocarbons. What seems to be gaining particular traction is objection to the lame defense that, well, the oil from ANWR wouldn’t be here for another seven to ten years anyway, so let’s not do it.

I have heard in response the rather sane assessment that it does seem rather likely that we are going to need it in seven to ten years, as well, and as such that accessing our own energy sources remains a good bet.

And there's the rub. The typically implicit and often express rationale underlying the “it’s not immediate” rationalization is that we should instead invest in alternatives of the future. First, taxpayers have been investing in alternatives to hydrocarbons to the tune of about $40 billion since the 1970s — and what have we gotten for all that appropriated money

More absurd is the larger argument that X resource won’t be here for seven to ten years so let’s invest instead in something else that will be here in, I don’t know, 14 to 20 years. If ever. Remember how the wind and solar industries tell us every year for the past three decades — since the subsidies started pouring in — that in a few years they’ll be cost competitive, that the technologies and economics will make sense in, oh, maybe a decade, but for now they must have subsidies and mandates? How has that worked out?

No one knows when the next miracle drug for any particular ailment will be here, but the fact that it isn’t immediate has never, ever been a reason not to go after it. (Yes, I am comparing tapping the most abundant affordable energy sources with life saving technologies; I believe you would too if you thought about it). 

So here’s the bet. Let’s go after both, and see which gets here first. ANWR oil, or the miracle fuels, commercialized and somewhat economically sensible hydrogen alternatives, cost-competitive wind and solar, cold fusion, cellulosic ethanol. You name the viable, commercial-scale alternative that you believe would be here to compete in seven to ten years on its merits with no more subsidy than hydrocarbons receive, and get it here first, and you were right.

If you bet on it with your own money, you will win, and win big. Name names. Tell me the technology you bet on that can win that race.

Climate experts agree that the seriousness of manmade global warming depends greatly upon how clouds in the climate system respond to the small warming tendency from the extra carbon dioxide mankind produces.

The other day in southwestern Fresno County, a poor part of Central California, I talked with a number of folks at a rural gas station. Most drove second- and third-hand pickups, large cast-off sedans or used SUVs. Their general complaint was twofold: They didn’t have the cash to buy a new fuel-efficient Honda or Toyota. And they were now spending a day or two of their wages just to fuel their cars for their long rural commutes.

Congratulations New Hampshire! Yesterday Governor John Lynch signed a bill that makes the Granite State the newest party to the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI), a multi-state cap and trade climate change program in the Northeast.

New Hampshire’s commitment to RGGI is to decrease its emissions by 8 million tons. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, putatively the world’s foremost body of climate scientists, we would have to decrease emissions 38 gigatons (1 gigaton=1 billion tons) by 2050 to halt global warming.

So New Hampshire’s contribution will solve .0002% of global warming. Meanwhile, China busily builds three new coal fired power plants every two weeks.

Last month, the Democrat-controlled Senate was intent on “doing something” about the high price of fuel. Big oil execs were harangued for the sin of having benefited from high demand for gasoline, and President Bush was prevailed upon to stop stockpiling oil for the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, a move that analysts say will decrease the price of gas by a fraction of a cent.

Fresh off that major victory, in the first week of June, the Senate Democrat leadership tried to pass its “solution” to global warming—a cap and trade scheme that is designed to raise the price of gasoline so that consumers use less of it, thereby emitting fewer greenhouse gases. Economic forecasts predicted that the Congress’s cap and trade would have boosted the price of gas anywhere from 40 cents to 2 dollars. Thankfully, the bill was scuttled swiftly.

Now, Senate Democrats are back to bitching about the high price of gas. Yesterday, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) tried to pass a “windfall profits tax” on those greedy oil companies. Considering that the Congressional Research Service found that a similar “windfall profits tax” enacted in 1980 increased America’s dependence on foreign oil, American voters should think themselves lucky that this misbegotten legislation failed.

What the heck are the Democrats that run Congress trying to do on energy policy? On the one hand, they bemoan the high price of gas. On the other, they sing the praises of a climate policy that is designed to raise the price of gas. How long will they get away with having their cake and eating it, too?