Obama’s Energy Program Will Need Some Magic
While many of his supporters have voiced sharp disappointment in Obama’s position on civil rights, their response to his administration’s actions relating to energy has manifested primarily as a low grumble. But since he finally brought forth his energy policy on the evening of March 29th, the grumble has risen to a low roar. A careful reading of the text reveals that there is fuel for all sides: it is big on pragmatism, low on vision, and high on reminding us of what can’t be done. In between the main points there are a few subtle ones that are easily missed. In other words, it is pure Obama.
Most of the anger pours over his support of fossil fuels, especially through the issuance of new drilling permits, in waters both shallow and deep. The protest turns into a cry of indignation at his assumption that nuclear power should still be a way to go. Scorn drizzles over his inclusion of natural gas and coal as fuels we will continue to use to generate electricity.
His critics are right on all counts. But it is more the lack of a grander vision that they find galling. Yes, we are stuck with oil for a foreseeable time, but we want our leader to see beyond that. Of course, Nixon did. At the 1973 energy crisis he put in place policies that he believed would end our dependence on foreign oil in 20 years. Carter did the same, looking to 2000, but neither of them foresaw that our dependence on foreign oil would increase from the 10 per cent we imported in 1970 to the 50+ per cent we import today. So even though we thirst for vision, it has left our glass less than half full.
A large part of the problem is that Obama treats Americans very much like George W. Bush did: a population that needs to be pleased and appeased, rather than a people who can be called on for a joint effort – giving Americans only a passive kind of power, the kind children have over their parents. In contrast, it is notable that Nixon, faced with OPEC’s embargo, went on television and immediately asked all Americans to sacrifice; to drive no more than 55 miles an hour and to drive less, to turn down their thermostats, to turn off unused lights. Americans complied: the following year, when oil started to flow again, demand had fallen by about 20 per cent. Jimmy Carter did the same in response to the 1979 oil crisis, with a speech that assumed that the difference the policy would make would not depend on what happened in Washington, but “in every town and every factory, in every home and on every highway and every farm.” The results were negative not because their visions were not possible, but because they were not followed through.
Of course, Obama’s speech pleases no one. For his supporters, a dozen drilling permits are twelve too many. For his opponents, they are a measly drop in the bucket when we should be ravaging the Alaskan wilderness. With regard to drilling, what his supporters probably didn’t notice is that he said his administration is “pushing” the oil industry to use what they already have: “tens of millions of acres of leases where it’s not producing a drop.” It is a signal that while he may permit them to drill on land they already have, they are not getting the rest of Alaska on his watch. He also pointed out that the U.S. only has 2 per cent of the worlds proven oil reserves, and extracting every drop will not make the big difference.
So it is understandable that his call for safe gas drilling brings accusations of caving to the industry, which would like to frack the entire 800-mile stretch of the Marcellus Shale to smithereens. Pressed on climate change on one side and by Japan’s nuclear disaster on the other, it is not surprising he put in a good word for nuclear power, although it’s pretty clear that he could have saved some political capital on that score. It’s not going to happen during his term.
Looking at the speech as a whole, it is interesting to see what gets space and what doesn’t. While oil gets several paragraphs, gas gets only two. Biofuels, especially biomass and a bio-fueled military, get four. Fuel efficiency and better cars get six. Coal gets a one-word mention and climate change/global warming is notable by its absence.
As part of his wrap, Obama made a point most of us have forgotten. “In the 1980’s, America was home to more than 80 per cent of the world’s wind capacity and 90 per cent of its solar capacity. We owned the clean energy economy…..Other countries are exporting technology we pioneered and chasing the jobs that come with it because they know that the countries that lead the 21st Century clean energy economy will be the countries that lead the 21st Century global economy. I want America to be that nation.”
He will have to steer us through a lost 25 years of catch-up, since we dropped the ball during the Reagan years. He faces an implacable corporate and political opposition. His supporter/critics have strong points, but they will need to find a way to temper their criticism with support of his alternatives, or the whole thing will go down a chute that is already greased with oil.