Posts from — January 2009

[A scientist was addressing a luncheon gathering and mentioned that the sun would burn out in 4 billion years.  A woman in the front, alarmed, asked him to repeat the number, which he did.  "Thank goodness!" she exclaimed, "I thought you said 'million'"  Traditional physicist joke.]

Many of those writing on oil markets, energy security, commodity prices, and energy policy often cite, with great authority, the fact that “X is finite.” This can be seen both in the general press, such as the recent story in the New York Times on Abu Dhabi’s effort to diversify away from oil revenue, and in more detailed reports, such as the one written for the Army: “Energy Trends and Their Implication for US Army Installations.”

 In the words of Vijay Vaitheeswaran of the Economist, “So what?”  [Read more →]

Investment in energy-efficient light bulbs would, in 5 years, save more than 5 times as much energy as an equal investment in a wind turbine would produce in 20 years.

This fact is clearly demonstrated with simple arithmetic! [Read more →]

Also in USA Today, it’s reported that the Mineral Management Service has given the green light to the Cape Wind project, which has been fought by the Kennedy’s as a visual blight from the giant Kennedy Compound. The MMS announced that it sees no major environmental problems with the project, which would take it one step closer to actual development.

Cape wind would put up about 130 windmills on about 25 square miles of ocean. The wind turbines would be 400 feet tall with a blade pointing upward. supposedly, Cape Wind could produce 75% of Cape Cod’s power demand, though my bet is they’re talking about installed capacity, rather than actual probable power generation from fickle winds). Fighting Cape Wind has been a family exercise for the Kennedys, with Robert Kennedy Jr. (Senior attorney at NRDC) joining up with Ted Kennedy to wage the fight.

Ah, renewables are all in good fun, until they’re in your back yard, or might interfere with your view of the annual family regatta.

According to USA Today, the energy elements of Obama’s “stimulus” package add up to about $58 billion. He’d use $32 billion to fund a smart electricity grid;$20 billion for Renewable energy tax cuts and a tax credit for research on energy efficiency and clean energy, plus a multiyear extension of the green energy production tax credit; and $6 billion to weatherize modest-income homes.

There’s not all bad here. [Read more →]

Last week I blogged about the news accounts of ExxonMobil’s coming out in favor of a carbon tax. I was too hasty. I should have read Rex Tillerson’s speech first–and very carefully. Mr. Tillerson did not call for a carbon tax as reported in the Wall Street Journal. Deep in his speech, Tillerson argued that carbon taxation is better than cap-and-trade as a regulatory program.

[Read more →]

There are a lot of good reasons to be suspicious of regulators who claim to be guardians of the truth, but every now and then they get something right. The United Kingdom’s Advertising Standards Authority (ASA, http://www.asa.org.uk) is that country’s equivalent of the Federal Trade Commission, with jurisdiction over false advertising. Last month, the ASA reached a settlement with the British Wind Energy Association acting as agent for the country’s wind generators. Two months earlier, a local anti-wind group filed a complaint at the ASA against Npower, a subsidiary of Germany’s RWE. Npower’s advertising claimed that every kilowatt-hour of wind power displaced 860 grams of CO2 emissions from fossil-fuel power plants. The ASA determined that the amount was badly overstated. [Read more →]

From time to time, John Holdren has acknowledged that plentiful, affordable, reliable energy is vital to human well being. Indeed, there is no going back to an energy-poor world. (Remember: caveman energy was 100% renewable.)

When Holdren or Obama advocates policies that risk making energy artificially scarce or less reliable, these words can be used to argue for nonregulatory approaches to energy policy:

“Virtually all of the benefits that now seem necessary to the ‘American way’ have required vast amounts of energy. Energy, in short, has been our ultimate raw material, for our commitment to economic growth has also been a commitment to the use of steadily increasing amounts of energy necessary to the production of goods and services.”

    -  John Holdren and Philip Herrera, Energy (San Francisco: Sierra Club, 1971), p. 10.

“When energy is scarce or expensive, people can suffer material deprivation and economic hardship.”

    -  John Holdren, “Population and the Energy Problem,” Population and Environment: A Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies, Spring 1991, p. 231.

“Energy is an indispensable ingredient of material prosperity. . . . Where and when energy is in short supply or too expensive, people suffer from lack of direct energy services (such as cooking, heating, lighting, and transport) and from inflation, unemployment, and reduced economic output.”

    -  John Holdren, Population and the Energy Problem,” Population and Environment: A Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies, Spring 1991, p. 232.

“Supplying energy to the economy contributes to the production of a stream of economic goods and services generally supportive of well-being.”

    -  John Holdren, “Coal in Context: Its Role in the National Energy Future,” University of Houston Law Review, July 1978, p. 1089.

“A reliable and affordable supply of energy is absolutely critical to maintaining and expanding economic prosperity where such prosperity already exists and to creating it where it does not.”

     -  John Holdren, “Memorandum to the President: The Energy-Climate Challenge,” in Donald Kennedy and John Riggs, eds., U.S. Policy and the Global Environment: Memos to the President (Washington, D.C.: The Aspen Institute, 2000), p. 21.

“Affordable energy in ample quantities is the lifeblood of the industrial societies and a prerequisite for the economic development of the others.”

     -  John Holdren, “Meeting the Energy Challenge,” Science, February 9, 2001, p. 945.

Judging from the above, John Holdren is a candidate to join the master resource club. Now, can he come around to view energy and climate in non-alarmist terms so that government does not pick winners and losers at the expense of taxpayers, ratepayers, and consumers?

Apparently, an increase in offshore drilling is still on the policy table, which suggests Obama is taking a more rational approach to energy policy than many of his colleagues.  Without question, offshore drilling cannot provide ‘energy independence’ (a ludicrous concept, but that’s for another day), but there are numerous benefits and only a trivial downside. [Read more →]

A recent story (http://liberty.pacificresearch.org/blog/sid.green-jobs) notes layoffs in the renewable energy business and laments the oft-heard call for expenditures on ‘green jobs’.  The author notes the potential ‘explosion’  in clean jobs, but also the wasteful practice of low productivity investment.  Solar power especially is very expensive and hardly a cost-effective way to spend taxpayer or consumer money.

Amazingly, a number of Congressional leaders such as Harry Reid and Bernie Sanders point to the struggles the public has had with higher energy costs, and then turn to renewable energy as a solution, without mentioning its (higher) cost.  This is rather like Marie Antoinette’s supposed comment that the poor who had no bread should eat cake.  Arguing for ‘clean’ energy over ‘dirty’ energy is one thing, but proposing to solve the problem of expensive energy with even more expensive (but ostensibly cleaner) energy is at best disingenuous.

Today’s Houston Chronicle has two takes on the recent decision by hometown Dynegy to pull back from participating in the construction of new coal plants and concentrate on expanding capacity at its existing plants. [Read more →]