Despite all the pressure on him, energy is the perfect area for Barack Obama to do nothing hasty. For decades, activists and foreigners have lamented the fact that the U.S. doesn’t have an energy policy. This is, of course, nonsense. Simply because we don’t have a big E big P Energy Policy doesn’t mean we don’t have one at all. Compared to most other countries, our energy policy is most notable for the things it doesn’t do, as in the doctors’ creed, “First, do no harm.”
And energy policy is now threatening to intersect with economic policy, first, as rising unemployment suggests to many that renewable energy subsidies offer an attractive use of funds but also as the government considers assistance for the US automobile industry (at least the home-grown sections of it).…
Continue ReadingLosing electricity is no fun, whether it is momentary (sensitive equipment can get fried) or for days or weeks, as many of us Houstonians experienced in the wake of Hurricane Ike.
News accounts from Hawaii report that the vacationing President-elect Barack Obama was without power from the early evening until morning due to storms. The Washington Post reported: …
Continue ReadingThere is way too much money being spent on advertising by the major energy companies–at least from the viewpoint of a nonpolitical energy world.
The December 8, 2008, Wall Street Journal, for example, contains a phenomenal 4 1/12 pages of industry ads. For the 20-page front section A, that comes out to about 20%–surely an all-time record. There was a lot of industry advertising back during the energy crises of the highly regulated 1970s, but nothing like this! …
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