Four Better Options Than Drilling in Alaska
Posted on: Friday, 16 May 2008, 09:00 CDT
If you oppose drilling in the Arctic Refuge, if you think Washington has stood idly by for the past five years as the price of oil quadrupled, if you think America is hooked on oil, if you offer substitutes without endorsing oil development almost everywhere -- you must be radical, "anti-oil," an industry-hater, an environmentalist against capitalism. (No matter that environmentalists have supported an Alaska natural gas pipeline for years while industry and government dithered.)
President Bush's recently announced energy proposals center on opening the Arctic Refuge to oil development. It would provide, in his wildest dreams, a million barrels a day 10 years from now. Sen. Pete Domenici's new energy bill, released a day later, features the same tired gambit, representing the conservatives' main response to today's crisis.
Way too little, way too late, and way foul of the right field line.
Arctic oil, starting tomorrow, would reduce foreign oil dependence (including gasoline) from 65 percent to perhaps a little over 60 percent. But it won't start tomorrow. Cutting the addiction is where Congress should spend its time. If we do energy policy right, we won't need Arctic oil.
The vaunted "Energy Policy Acts" of recent years were baby steps and Band-Aids, handing out tens of billions for nuclear energy and oil and gas while trickling temporary, minor incentives for renewable energy production. Add them up. Look around. If these energy acts were as great as the gridlockers say, would Congress still be fighting over a one-year extension of tax credits needed for wind and solar development? Would we be looking at $125 oil?
It's time for a fast-acting, comprehensive energy policy, including:
1. Fuel-switching. America uses two-thirds of its oil for transportation, which is 97 percent dependent on liquid fuels. Chevy, Toyota, Tesla, and a Norwegian company spun off from Ford will offer plug-in electric cars in the next year or two. Buyers will save 80 percent on fuel, charging up overnight instead of going to the service station. Imagine Congress offering an $8,000 to $10,000 instant rebate to try out viable, tested, plug-in technology that will move you 40 miles a day (farther if you buy a plug-in hybrid with a conventional motor too). Congress has subsidized domestic oil production with vast subsidies for decades; why not subsidize consumers to buy cars that don't need oil?
2. Adding significant renewable energy to the electric grid. We should take savings from buying less foreign oil and invest in the wind, solar and geothermal energy so plentiful in the United States. Today they are, at most, 2 percent of our electricity (compared to nuclear at 20 percent). They should be at least 25 percent by 2020. We'll never buy fuel again, and there's no dangerous waste from renewable energy.
3. Alternative liquid fuels. Instead of using food crops such as corn to create liquid fuels, we should convert wood and agricultural wastes, alongside highly efficient new crops such as algae, to biodiesel and ethanol. A hybrid plugin car or truck with an ultraclean biodiesel engine will be far-ranging, zero-carbon, affordable and long-lasting, with almost none of the noise and smoke of older diesels.
4. Energy efficiency. Using more efficient lights, appliances, motors and materials, we could cut energy demand by 20-40 percent in the next decade. It's cost-effective now and prevents expensive energy demand in the future. The fuel economy increases adopted by Congress last year are minor compared to Japan's and Europe's, providing only about half the fuel economy benefit of new tailpipe standards adopted by New Mexico and other states. Costlier cars? Slightly -- but good for consumers who will save thousands in annual fuel costs. People who buy a 50 mile-pergallon car should get a large instant rebate, too.
Instead, we argue about opening the Arctic Refuge. Increased oil production shouldn't be discussed till the alternatives are growing fast and strong. The proponents of Arctic and coastal drilling owe us substantive action on alternatives first, not as an afterthought.
The conservatives these days aren't the pro-oil people. Real conservatives look at facts, want functional markets, recognize oil addiction and want to break it, and see that ineffective oil production handouts could be used to sharply reduce demand, creating competition and consumer choice. The system defended by so-called conservatives got us into this situation. Defending the status quo is radical. Let's try something that instead rewards consumers who want to save energy and money. |
