THE time is ripe for a green revolution – and President-elect Obama is poised to lead America’s Declaration of Energy Independence.
“If climate change and our dependence on foreign oil are left unaddressed, we will continue to weaken our economy and threaten our national security,” Obama told the nation’s governors during a recent green conference.
“Delay is no longer an option. Denial is no longer an acceptable response.”
Obama is laying the foundation to wean America off its addiction to fossil fuels from the Middle East. He’s already talked about funding “green jobs” during the economic downturn.
“His greatest opportunity is to reduce dependence on foreign oil and improve national security and economic security,” said lobbyist Eric Burgeson, a former top Energy Department official.
“Obama has got some good opportunities before him to change the game on how this country uses and produces energy,” he said.
Americans were angry when gas at the pump skyrocketed to $4 a gallon over the summer, and they even backed offshore domestic oil-drilling as part of an effort to reduce reliance on foreign petroleum.
Prices have since plummeted to under $2 with the recession, but motorists realize they’re hostage to price fluctuations because the US gets most of its oil from foreign sources, including countries that finance and back terrorism.
Obama and Congress can’t afford to wait, many argue, or America will lose out on clean energy jobs in the new economy. “The Chinese are building windmills and building wind turbines and shipping them here,” notes Michael Allegretti, government-relations director of the Climate Group.
“[Obama] won’t let this historic opportunity go to the wayside. There are an enormous amount of opportunities on the table,” Allegretti said.
Alternative-power companies (wind, solar and biofuels) see Obama as the catalyst to ignite private investment in green technology. “People in the wind industry are excited about President Obama,” said Curt Pawlisch, a Wisconsin lawyer representing windmill makers. “Obama is going to move this country in a radically different direction to create cleaner energy and jobs.”
Obama proposes spending $15 billion a year to spur production in greener energy production. His stimulus plan aims to double the production of renewable energy production in three years. “We’ll invest in solar, wind power and next-generation biofuels. We’ll tap nuclear power while making sure it is safe. And we’ll develop clean coal technologies,” said the president-elect.
Obama was cool to offshore drilling during the campaign, arguing that America, with just 3 percent of the world’s oil reserves, “cannot drill its way to energy security.” And he hedged on expanding nuclear power as a carbon-free alternative. Where John McCain called for building 45 nuclear power plants, Obama only said boosting nuclear power is an option, if radioactive waste can be stored safely.
He does support other ways to increase America’s energy supply, including building a massive natural-gas pipeline in Alaska. And, with pollution-spewing coal plants generating much of our electricity, Obama wants to fund research to develop technologies to make coal cleaner.
His green plan aims to have 10 percent of US energy production come from renewable sources by 2012, and 25 percent by 2020. And he wants to eliminate oil imports from the Middle East and Venezuela within 10 years.
Eco-friendly cars would get 150 miles per gallon by 2015 under the new White House’s marching orders and new low-carbon-fuel standards. He’d provide a $7,000 tax credit to help put 1 million plug-in hybrids and other green cars on the road by then.
By 2013, automakers would be required to produce flex-fuel cars that can run on biofuels, such as ethanol.
But because of the fragile economy, the new president may not push his most controversial measures: imposing a carbon tax on power producers to dramatically cut greenhouse gases or imposing stricter rules to force cash-strapped automakers to make more fuel-efficient cars.
“There’s going to be a slowdown for sure,” said Climate Group’s Allegretti.
Critics say Obama’s green plan is impractical and Pollyannaish in the current economic climate.
“We don’t have the technology to do this on a large scale. Wind power is not ready yet. Solar energy is way behind. We don’t have alternative energy sources of sufficient magnitude to replace 70 percent of carbon-based energies,” said David Kreutzer, an energy economist at the conservative-leaning Heritage Foundation.
Frank Maisano of the Electric Reliability Coordinating Council agreed, saying Obama’s team is underestimating Not-In-My-Back-Yard opposition even to offshore wind farms. Even if all these green alternatives were available, he said, the country lacks an electrical-grid system to move the electricity from one place to another. “People oppose wind projects, and they oppose the transmission lines that carry the wind,” Maisano warned.
The recession has halted green projects, he added: “I have a wind developer in Maryland who has a permit for a wind project. But he can’t get the financing to do it.”
Obama insists he’s not tilting at windmills – but will actually build them.
His stimulus package includes funding to upgrade the grid system and electrical lines “to protect our power sources from blackout or attack, and deliver clean, alternative forms of energy to every corner of our nation.”
He’s also focusing on ways to improve energy efficiency and cut consumption – which is easier and less costly than expanding the energy supply. Aside from building a new grid, the conservation measures include modernizing buildings and insulating homes.
“Obama has the potential to be a green president, but he will have to be pushed and prodded by people who want a green revolution,” said Larry Shapiro, program director of the Rockefeller Foundation, which funds green initiatives.
“He’s vastly, vastly, vastly better than George Bush. But that doesn’t mean he won’t be subjected to pressures” from industries that pollute, Shapiro said. “We think there is a lot of promise there, but we don’t know what he’s going to do.”
