SOTU 2007: Energy & environment wrap-up

A sham

Posted by David Roberts at 3:40 PM on 24 Jan 2007

It always feels somewhat pointless being a green blogger after a Bush speech. Other than the repeated references to Iran -- which might actually mean something, and not something good -- little Bush said in the SOTU has any policy implications, especially when it comes to energy and environmental issues. The promises are inevitably forgotten, underfunded, or now, blocked by a Dem Congress.

But still -- let's have a look at the energy and environment portions of the speech.

Lots of greens were looking forward to Bush forthrightly acknowledging global warming for the first time in a SOTU. Turns out that happened with a fizzle, not a bang. A grudging reference to "global climate change" was tacked onto the end of the energy section, and Bush rushed past it like someone stepping over dog poop on the sidewalk. "Desultory" is a charitable characterization.

The fact that Bush doesn't take global warming seriously is reflected in his proposals. Nothing he mentioned, even if he meets all his stated goals, will have the slightest effect on climate change.

What about energy? The big splash was "20 in 10," the goal to reduce U.S. gasoline use by 20% in 10 years.

The text of Bush's actual speech is so sketchy and schematic on the proposal as to be incomprehensible. Sadly, taking a closer look at the White House cheat sheet doesn't lift one's spirits. For one thing, the vaunted 20% is a reduction in projected gas use, not current gas use. So it's slower growth, not really a "reduction" at all. Shocking.

There are lots of buzzwords thrown around -- renewable this, efficiency that, wind and solar and etc. -- but the meat of the proposal is twofold:

A slight increase in CAFE (fuel efficiency) standards. This is long, long overdue, but the details of Bush's proposal render it almost counter-productive:

He would take the power to set concrete standards out of Congress's hands and give it to a political appointee at the Dept. of Transportation.
He would dispense with the current fleet-wide standards for cars and institute an "attribute-based" standard, with all its perverse incentives, like he did for light trucks last year.
All increases in standards would come with "escape valves" in case, you know, automakers didn't like it.

A plan to get 35 billion gallons of "renewable and alternative" fuels online by 2017, shaving 15% off of U.S. (projected) gasoline use. A few things to note about this seemingly pleasing proposal:

The real meat is a huge increase in subsidies to corn ethanol -- i.e., subsidies to Big Corn, mainly Archer Daniels Midland. This will enrich a few mega-corporations, enlarge the dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico, please a few midwestern legislators, take a lot of pressure off automakers, and raise the price of food. What it won't do is appreciably reduce greenhouse gas emissions or oil imports.
Yes, yes, he wants to boost research on the more environmentally benign cellulosic ethanol. But follow the money. The research grants are tiny; the subsidies to Big Corn are enormous and growing.
Note the deliberate repetition of "renewable and alternative." Why the awkward phrase? There's a reason behind it, as with most Bush admin. language games: "alternative" was added to include coal-to-liquid fuel, which is anything but renewable, and spews huge amounts of CO2 into the atmosphere. Bush is just one of many spokesflacks attempting to use fears of energy dependence and climate change to enrich the coal industry.

This Washington Post piece is an excellent rundown of the whole sham.

Those who held out hope that Bush would rescue his plunging legacy by doing something significant about America's real "generational challenges" -- climate change and energy security -- have had their hopes shattered once and for all. The rest of us are just waiting for 2009.

(If you want to know what I would have liked to see on energy/environment in the SOTU, see here.)

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If you're wondering ...

... why I'm repeating myself from previous posts, this was mostly written for HuffPo.

grist.org

by David Roberts at 3:49 PM on 24 Jan 2007

Expanding on the President's Intentions:

I just came across these bits from a speech President Bush made Wednesday after his SOTU at a DuPont facility in Delaware working on ethanol production:

From the New York Times: (emphasis added)

After hearing a minilecture on how plants are converted into sugars, and the sugars then distilled into fuel, Mr. Bush, a former Texas oilman who has proclaimed Americans "addicted to oil," lifted up a glass beaker of switchgrass, a perennial grass that looks like hay, and stared into a bank of television cameras to drive his point home.
"What our citizens need to know," Mr. Bush said, with a microbiologist, Armando Byrne, by his side, "is that because of the research you're doing here, with some of their taxpayer dollars, that switchgrass, that can be grown all across America, can end up being made into fuel that powers their automobiles."
Mr. Byrne nodded in agreement.
"That's important," the president declared.

Ok, that's nice, I'm glad to see it was switchgrass in the beaker and not corn, if for nothing else than media focus. Then, looking on the whitehouse page listing the actual text of his speech:

He mentions clean coal:

Part of my request to Congress is going to be, we want to put $2.7 billion of your money to help concerns and smart people develop new ways of powering our homes and powering our automobiles. We're making some progress. Let me just share a couple of things that we're doing. One, we're spending a lot of your money on clean coal technology. The reason why is we've got a lot of coal. If you want to be less dependent on oil from overseas -- and by the way, we import about 60 percent of our oil today. In 1985, it was 27 percent of our oil. So we're becoming exponentially more dependent.

... but does acknowledge the tie between corn-based ethanol and food prices...

However, there is a constraint, and that is, the ethanol use today comes from corn, and we've got hog growers and chicken growers that need corn to feed their animals. And therefore, it's going to be kind of a strain, at some point in time, on the capacity for us to have enough ethanol to be able to make us less dependent on oil. So what you're doing at DuPont becomes vital, and that is cellulosic research.

... points to a $1.6 billion portion of the farm bill for research (presumably into cellulosic ethanol?)...

Secondly, I strongly believe that -- and, by the way, in the farm bill, request in the farm bill, we're going to put $1.6 billion over 10 years to continue this kind of research, as well. But I also strongly believe in the research and development tax credit. I believe the tax code should provide incentives. And one incentive that makes a lot of sense for this country is to incent you to continue to invest your money on research and development. And Congress really needs to make the research and development tax credit permanent

... and specifically mentions plug-in hybrids.

American automobile companies, as well as foreign automobile companies competing for market share here in the United States, understand that's where the consumer mentality is evolving. And they're beginning to spend their own money, as well as help from the federal government, to develop new batteries. It's going to be an exciting time, really, when you think about it, when you're able to drive the first 20 miles in a plug-in hybrid vehicle without one drop of gasoline, which makes the country less dependent on oil.

Lastly, there's something I'm confused about that I'm hoping someone can help me with. Samuel Bodman, Secretary of Energy said in an online discussion: "The Order instructs government agencies to purchase significant portions of their energy from renewable sources."
The actual Executive Order requires that "at least half of the statutorily required renewable energy consumed by the agency in a fiscal year comes from new renewable sources" Does this mean that there won't be any actual increase in renewable energy consumed, just it'll be shifted from existing sources to newly constructed ones? Also what is the current "statutorily required" amount?

Ryan Maloney

by ryanmaloney at 11:39 PM on 24 Jan 2007

My personal hell

Dave, you might be sick of SOTU, but consider my current predicament. I am teaching "Intro to Climate Science," and one of the groups is writing about federal policies concerning GHG emissions. They claim that the Bush admin. is pursuing a "passive yet responsible" policy, then proceed to applaud all of Bush's policies. They neglect to expand on the "passive" part, and when mentioning Kyoto, fail to mention our shameful role.

I pointed out that the amount Bush wants to spend in one year on solar energy research is less than the amount that Exxon-Mobil spends in one day on "energy exploration," and less than the amount that we are spending on the Iraq war in three hours.

I can't take it any more.

On the fuzzy language: I wouldn't bother trying to read too much into it. First, these are people who use "coal" and "nucular" in the same sentence as "renewable." Second, I agree, it sounds like a shift in what kind of renewable energy is used. Which might benefit new technologies a bit, but would not actually increase the amount of renewable energy consumed.

by mihan at 6:44 AM on 25 Jan 2007

Clean coal

It's now a done deal. IGCC and CTL and pumping cO2 all over.

So at least could they ramp it up enough to prevent fuel farming? Or run CTL on wind power to reduce cO2 somewhat? Nope.

Were fuel farming dropped in favor of sequestration by conservation land expansion, all that extra cO2 released by clean coal and liquid fuel from coal could be stored in the soil.

I think it's time for environmentalists to compromise with clean coal in the same way I proposed compromising with nuclear power interests. Groups like NRDC just give away any negotiating position our voters might give us.

My compromise with the nukers: Let 'em build a few experimerntal waste eating reactors at yucca Mountain. In return drop all subsidies for fossil, nuclear, and fuel farming. And use half the corporate welfare savings to fund direct tax credits to home and small business owners who invest in renewable energy and PHEVs.

Compromise with the coal industry: Let 'em build out IGCC and CTL. But give up on fuel farming. Sequester CO2 by expanding conservation land, and power both IGCC and CTL with wind power built on conservation land on the great plains. That way the pumps that capture and filter the mess made in the air and water will be powered by wind.

As a side benefit, once wind is mass produced maybe it will start to replace IGCC? It will be much cheaper.

We need someone other than Robert K jr to negotiate for US. This current crew is not getting us any kind of a bargaining position.

http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog

by amazingdrx at 8:33 AM on 25 Jan 2007

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