Energy and the Environment

Recent changes in energy prices reflect changes in the order of the world. World oil production barely matches oil consumption. Oil demand from China and other places climbs rapidly. We face rapidly increasing foreign competition for buying foreign oil. Prudent Americans must expect that in the future energy is unlikely to be cheap.

America cannot end its need for foreign oil by drilling more oil wells. We're long since peaked out. The north Alaska fields are not that large, and are many years from coming on-line if we choose to use them. Nor can we readily replace oil with agricultural products. Ethanol from corn is primarily a government boondoggle: The energy needed to distill the ethanol is roughly the same as the energy recovered. Molecular biology may eventually transform the situation, but the future date is unpredictable.

It is now quite certain that burning of fossil fuels is changing the weather. The earth has become markedly warmer in the last 20 years. Some areas become drier; others become damper. In colder areas, growing seasons become longer. In the long run, unchecked global warming will increase ocean levels, creating enormous property damage.

Attacks on scientific global warming observations have substantially passed their time. Many attacks are a political waste product, resulting from 1970s feuds between Republicans and environmentalists over air and water pollution. The feuds are so ingrained that they are being recycled.

We do not need hysterical responses to these challenges. We will need to change how we do things. We do not need to make huge changes in our way of life. We will still live where we want, if we choose in uncrowded, quiet neighborhoods. We will still drive where we want at affordable prices.

What should we do?

All too many politicians view energy and the environment as an opportunity to run your life for you. I'm not going to try to run your life. On the other hand, many Americans want their government to intervene in the market, so that they get cheap energy while someone else pays the bill. I'm not going to try to protect you from reality, either.

What should the Federal government do about the energy issue?

First, Uncle Sam should focus on sensible actions he can actually take. We should move toward eliminating the government's own demand for foreign oil, thereby freeing oil for everyone else. That's a national security issue. It protects our military strength. It's also a financial issue; in the long run, ending foreign oil dependence reduces the cost of government. It won't happen overnight. In part, we reduce oil demand by shrinking the size of government and ending foreign military adventures. In substantial part, we reduce oil demand by replacing other energy sources used by the Federal Government with renewable energy sources. The replacement will not be complete in a year, or even in a decade. We need to make a start.

I am not proposing that the Federal government should build its own windmills. I am proposing it should become a customer for new, private sources of renewable energy, purchased at predictable prices in predictable increments through long-term contracts. Those purchases are to carry out the normal processes of government, not to provide graft for political donors of corrupt Congressmen. These purchases will be predictable income that motivates competent private research and investment.

The Federal government uses energy in forms (e.g., jet fuel) for which renewable energy is inappropriate. Energy trading solves this gap for the next few decades.

Second, we should realize that as energy prices continue to climb the motive for private investment in alternative energies and energy conservation will also climb. There are many market solutions, at least if Uncle Sam does not tamper too much with them. I am not going to predict which solutions will turn out to be the most effective. That's not the President's job.

Third, if oil production is peaking, as appears to be the case, then CO2 production from the burning of oil will also peak. The public's willingness to buy energy from alternative sources, as they become cheaper than the alternatives, not only holds down petroleum prices, it tends to reduce global warming.

Fourth, a modest bit of realism on automobile efficiency standards. The reasonable number is gallons per mile, not miles per gallon. To drive 1000 miles, a 10MPG car needs 100 gallons of gas. A 25MPG car needs only 40 gallons. That's a 60 gallon savings. Automobiles may well become more efficient than they are today, but the larger part of the energy savings from better cars has already been obtained. Energy savings from better highways, improved cargo transport, and fewer traffic jams may still make a difference.

Finally, Americans have always been creative and ingenious. We should be ready for totally outside-the-box solutions as radical as the Segway and the Moller Skycar. I don't know which solutions we will choose in the end, but I am confident that my fellow Americans will find them.

I've given you some sensible libertarian solutions to American challenges. The libertarian solutions don't try to run your life for you. The libertarian solutions don't try to empty your wallet to hide you from reality.

Remember:

For more of the same, vote Democratic or Republican.
For real change for the better, vote Libertarian.
Please join the Libertarian revolution, the revolution for peace, liberty, and prosperity.

George Phillies

http://www.phillies2008.com

Aside: For those of you who like numbers, http://www1.eere.energy.gov/femp/pdfs/annrep04.pdf gives the energy consumption of the United States government, divided between types of use and type of power source, with totals and grand totals. In recent years, the Federal government consumed about 1.2 quadrillion British Thermal Units of energy. (A quadrillion is a million billions.) That's approximately a quintillion Joules. (How much is a Joule? A one hundred watt light bulb uses a hundred Joules every second, or 360,000 Joules of energy every hour.) The Federal government consumes 38 billion Joules per second, on the average. A Joule per Second is a Watt, just like the Watts on your light bulb.

The Federal government thus averages 38 billion watts of power consumption, including liquid fuels. A representative large wind turbine generates 2 million watts of power, but only when the wind is right, so that a 2 million watt maximum capacity wind turbine might average 500 kilowatts delivered. If you do the calculation, you'll find that replacing the Federal government's dependence on fossil and other fuels will require 80,000 large commercial wind turbines, which at 2 million dollars a unit would cost 160 billion dollars. Actually, you cannot go down to your local hardware store and buy them; the manufacturing capacity to build many turbines does not yet exist. Indeed, the United States at the moment produces only a small fraction of the wind power that I am proposing.

I am not proposing that the Federal government buy the turbines. That's not a Libertarian solution. The Federal government should buy the power that it needs, from private sources, and let the free market handle the manufacturing, deployment, and so forth. Wind power is at most no more expensive than oil-fueled power, so the Federal government will save money through the purchases.

Wind Power is an example; a case can also be made for concentrating solar.  Solar photovoltaic is also a possibility, though it remains expensive. I do the numbers for wind because the results are straightforward. There are several options for energy storage; the market can resolve these.

A case can be made for atomic--uranium remains economical even if the price/pound is astronomical, at which point supplies of uranium are huge.  Promises for hydrogen fusion remain promises.

I have been emphatically negative about people who have bought into right-wing claims that there is no global warming.  They are wrong, and global-warming-deniers are no help to the libertarian movement.