The bad oil on Bush's energy plan

By GAY ALCORN Thursday 17 May 2001

Last week, President George Bush's spokesman Ari Fleischer was asked whether Americans needed to "correct our lifestyles" to solve what the administration calls an "energy crisis" in the United States. That would be America's love affair with four-wheel-drives and its desire for ever-bigger houses with year-round air-conditioning and heating.

"That's a big no," Fleischer replied. "The President believes that it's an American way of life, and that it should be the goal of policy makers to protect the American way of life. The American way of life is a blessed one."

So Americans could go on consuming more energy than any other country? "The President believes that the American people are very wise and that, given the right incentives, they will ... make their own right determinations about how much they can conserve."

Bush will unveil his energy policy tomorrow, after a four-month review by Vice-President Dick Cheney. This will be no government-led endorsement of American sacrifice. There is a virtual consensus that the American taste for abundance is unlimited, and woe befall a government that seeks to curb it.

Not that this government is so minded. The President, Vice-President and Commerce Secretary are former oil executives. Bush's national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, had an oil tanker named after her. The energy industry contributed $US25 million ($A48 million) to the Republican Party in last year's elections. By instinct and experience, these are dig-and-drill types, not tree-huggers.

The policy is coming at an acutely sensitive time, with petrol prices now at an average of $US1.70 a gallon, up from $1.57 last month. (That's still modest compared with, in real terms, $3 during the 1970s oil crisis.) California is suffering rolling power blackouts and consumers face energy bills 60 per cent higher than last summer. None of this is the administration's fault but, as the President has acknowledged, he'll get the blame. Nothing gets Americans so indignant as having to pay more for gasoline.

The strategy is expected to contain a few environmental sweeteners Bush calls it "21st century conservation" but its theme will be increasing the supply of energy, not reducing demand. There will be between 1300 and 1900 new power plants in the next 20 years, or about one a week. There will be more coal mines, more oil refineries, more gas pipelines and even more nuclear reactors. Environmental standards will be relaxed and the administration will urge drilling for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

What is striking about the US debate is the shadow cast by former president Jimmy Carter, who donned cardigans and turned the thermostat down in the White House when petrol prices surged after the Arab oil embargo in the '70s. The crisis would, Carter said, "demand that we make sacrifices and changes in every life". Americans declined.

America has 4 per cent of the world's population using 25 per cent of the world's energy, and reducing consumption is for wimps. Cheney has the gift of plain speech. "Conservation may be a sign of personal virtue," he said last month, "but it is not a sufficient basis for a sound, comprehensive energy policy."

What appears to have happened is that industry failed to quickly anticipate the explosion in popularity of four-wheel-drives, or sport utility vehicles, in the 1990s. Fuel-efficient cars were in vogue after the '70s oil crisis, but SUVs, great big gas-guzzlers, are a key reason for the steadily increasing demand for energy. SUVs, mini-vans and utilities make up 43 per cent of the market, up from 30 per cent a decade ago.

The administration has been criticised for its enthusiasm for macho, industry-friendly solutions, and Bush is keen to emphasise new technologies as one answer to preserving the American lifestyle. "Some think that conservation means doing without," he said. "That does not have to be the case."

Sensors could turn off lights in buildings when people left a room, he said, by way of example.

But few believe this administration sees new efficiencies as a major or equal part of its strategy. Bush's proposed budget would cut 30 per cent from funding for research and development of energy efficiency. The administration has barely mentioned a report from its own Energy Department, which estimated efficiency measures could eliminate the need for 610 of the 1300 power plants Cheney wants. Just make appliances such as air-conditioners and clothes-dryers more efficient, it said, and there'd be no need for 180 new plants. Conservationists complain they got not one face-to-face meeting with Cheney during his review, whereas the energy industry is getting its wish list.

Nobody in the US denies the need for more exploration and new plants, but it's hard not to smell the whiff of ideology about the oilmen's game plan.

E-mail: galcorn@attglobal.net

This story was found at: http://www.theage.com.au/news/2001/05/17/FFXGKF5ZRMC.html

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), May 16, 2001

Answers

Now there's a real left wing piece if I ever read one--turning a virtue (oil business experience) into rascalism, with, of course, ruinaton of the environment as the true intent.

-- JackW (jpayne@webtv.net), May 17, 2001.

As the summer of 01 wears on I expect less and less resistence from the environmentalists. Even they have to face the reality that conservation alone cannot solve this monumental problem. I think they will finally get it through their heads that Americans like their SUV's and do not wish to live by candlelight in caves.

-- Uncle Fred (dogboy45@bigfoot.com), May 17, 2001.

If I give up my SUV, I have to live in a cave with candles? Gosh, and I thought that if I turned in my gas-guzzler for something more efficient, I would be more likely to have electric light in my house.

We're getting ready to build a straw-bale house. It will look like one of those really old stone farmhouses with really thick walls (think: lots of window seats for sunning in with a cup of cocoa). We expect our heating/cooling bills to drop to near zero, regardless of the price of electricity and propane. So we'll have "extra" money with which to buy stuff other than electricity and propane. Sounds like an increase in standard of living to me.

-- L. Hunter Cassells (mellyrn@castlemark-honey.com), May 17, 2001.