Do We Really Want Expensive Experimental And Bureaucratic Mechanisms To Fix Climate Change?

When Diana Furchtgott-Roth “speaks,” we have learned to listen. The articles we use of hers always offer fresh insight on an energy issue. (She does write on other topics too, due CARE’s focus, we only use her pieces that address energy.) A new approach or a unique angle on today’s energy issues are what we hope to offer here in the CARE Blog. Therefore, we use quite a bit of Diana’s work. If you have not read her previous postings here in Comments About Responsible Energy, we encourage you to go back and read them. You, too, will appreciate her commentary.

This one is of particular interest at this time due to its position on the calendar--in between the time when the House passed their version of climate change legislation AKA “cap and trade” and the time when the Senate brings it up for debate. This period in history brings global warming to the forefront. Here Diana postulates that if climate change is a real issue and man-made carbon dioxide is an issue, than the problem would be better solved by going nuclear than by taxing carbon emissions. Here’s a great perspective as represented in her entire article: “A nuclear strategy would avoid the experimental and bureaucratic mechanisms for awarding emissions permits to power plants and other polluters and for monitoring compliance and trading…”

Read on. We think you’ll find her approach to be a great angle to add to your mental database on energy.

It's Time to Go Nuclear
With the Senate committees poised to consider versions of the expensive climate-change bill narrowly approved by the House of Representatives, it's time for the country to take a fresh look at nuclear power, which already generates 20 percent of our electricity.

The Environment and Public Works Committee and the Finance Committee hope to finish drafting a bill before the August recess. Floor debate and a vote will come only after Labor Day, to be followed later in the autumn by House-Senate conference. Whatever the Senate finally does, the process will be contentious and protracted.

Senator Judd Gregg (NH) told me in a telephone conversation that the Senate Republican Conference recommends a national strategy to build 100 nuclear power plants by 2030, in addition to the 104 that are now in operation. "This will clean up the air," he said, "and reduce reliance on foreign oil. This is a much more constructive approach than the climate change bill," which would create limits on carbon-dioxide emissions and a system for trading permits to emit them.

The House bill, if enacted, would raise $847 billion over 10 years while adding $821 billion to federal spending. It is effectively a tax increase with large, negative economic implications. That huge sum would not pay for the additional electric power a growing economy must have. It would be the added cost of curbing climate-warming emissions and of developing energy from renewable fuels.

Nuclear power has its problems, including delays in licensing and substantial up-front costs, but it can generate additional power for economic growth at a cost lower than that of the cap-and-trade bill.
A nuclear strategy would avoid the experimental and bureaucratic mechanisms for awarding emissions permits to power plants and other polluters and for monitoring compliance and trading, as well as compulsory efficiency standards for automobiles and household appliances and mandatory use of renewable fuels, such as wind, solar, biomass, and hydroelectric power.

If we're going to wave goodbye to the invisible hand by spending hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars on wind and solar power, and on giving motorists tax-funded incentives to drive electric cars, then it's reasonable to ask whether subsidies for nuclear power might be less costly and achieve the same environmental results. The answer is probably yes.

The House's planned expenditure of $800 billion could fund 100 nuclear power plants with proven technology and no greenhouse gas emissions. This could be faster and less expensive than new emissions allowances, carbon sequestration, and wind, solar, and biofuel technology.

Despite generating 20% of America's electricity and its role in the U.S. commercial power grid since 1957, nuclear power is not without problems.

Energy is relatively inexpensive to generate once a plant is built, but plant construction requires a capital outlay of $6 billion to $8 billion. Since projects take five years to complete, a substantial portion of the funding is interest. Hence, some government subsidies or loan guarantees are necessary just to fund the project.

Four companies planning nuclear reactors-UniStar Nuclear Energy, NRG Energy, Scana Corporation, and Southern Company-are among those reportedly under consideration for a share in $18.5 billion in federal funding. Due to financial considerations another company, Exelon, announced this week that it is shelving its plans for a new power plant in Texas, and in April AmerenUE abandoned a planned plant in Missouri.

As well as difficulties in funding, delays can be caused by local site-permitting issues. Some communities may welcome the "green" jobs and additional tax revenue provided by a new nuclear power plant, but some will resist. Approval by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission can be made faster than in the past with standardized designs and congressional support.

The issue most familiar to Americans, disposal of spent uranium fuel rods, has generated headlines as Congress has argued about where to store the radioactive waste. How to transport it there safely also is an issue. The prior selection of Yucca Mountain in Nevada has stalled, since President Obama has not allocated any funding for the facility in the 2010 budget.

In this, the United States can learn from France, which generates over 80% of domestic electricity production from atomic energy and prides itself on being in the forefront of the global environmental movement. It reprocesses the spent rods at the power plants and does not have one giant, national storage facility. Local storage and reprocessing avoid transporting nuclear waste across the country.

It's not clear that government funding of energy and environmental projects is necessary. But if that's how Congress wants to spend tax dollars, Americans should press for further development of clean nuclear power.

Diana Furchtgott-Roth is a senior fellow and director of Hudson Institute's Center for Employment Policy. She is the former chief economist at the U.S. Department of Labor.

Advancing The Fears Of Climate Change = More Control

Do you wonder what people from other countries are thinking about America when they look at the shenanigans we are going through surrounding our current economic crisis and the approach to deal with the supposed climate change threat? Especially when other countries that have gone before us are realizing the folly of their ways and ditching their plans?

Here is an interesting view from Australia, from one of the writers for the Whiskey and Gunpowder newsletter. Usually we feature their energy writer Bryon King who was our featured guest on the June CARE Conference Call. Dan Denning may be new to most of the Comments About Responsible Energy Blog readers, But we believe you’ll find his comments of interest.

Cap and Trade: The Death of the Industrial West
Hey, here’s a question to start off with. If Bernie Madoff gets 150 years in prison for running a Ponzi scheme, what do you think the people who designed Social Security and the Superannuation scheme (Australia's version of a retirement or pension plan) ought to get?

And speaking of colossally stupid government programs, you may have seen the news that the U.S. House of Representatives passed a climate change bill on Saturday by a narrow vote of 219-212. The cap-and-trade bill, otherwise known as Waxman-Markey (for the nominal writers of the bill), mandates that U.S. manufacturers and utilities reduce carbon emissions 17% from 2005 levels by 2020 and 83% by 2050.

Under the sausage making process that is the American Congress, the bill was filled with compromises. Congressmen from coal-producing states or states with lots of manufacturing jobs had to be bribed into supporting it through various means. It must now go the Senate, which must pass its own version of the bill.

If the Senate bill is different from the House bill (and it almost always is, given the different agendas in both bodies and the need for more bribes), the two bills go to “reconciliation.” That’s where a committee made of members from both houses settles on a final compromise version of the two bills and sends them back to their respective bodies to be voted on. Then it gets sent to the President to become the law of the land.

By the way you may have missed an amendment to the bill that’s stirred a bit of controversy. It was inserted the night before among the bill’s 1,200 pages, which you can be sure none of America’s elected officials actually read. The amendment placates Congressmen from Rust Belt states who worry about losing even more manufacturing jobs to the developing world (China). It requires the U.S. President to make a “border adjustment” on goods from countries that do not cap or reduce carbon emissions by 2020. It’s a tariff.

Already President Obama has backed off that particular amendment. He says, “At a time when the economy worldwide is still deep in recession and we’ve seen a significant drop in global trade, I think we have to be very careful about sending any protectionist signals out there.” Very careful, sure. But you already did send the signal didn’t you?

For what it’s worth, we think this was all an exercise in political window dressing to get some version of a bill passed. If the Senate and the House actually agree on a climate change bill that puts a high tax on carbon, then the apotheosis of Obama will be complete.

We will take The One at his word, though. Besides, as everyone knows, the real purpose of the bill is not to start a trade war (although it may do so). The purpose is to make conventional energy more expensive AND--in an era of declining government tax receipts and rising liabilities--to create a huge new source of government revenues by taxing carbon. It’s a revenue and power grab by an institution (the Nation state) that finds itself increasingly off-balance.

It’s also a massive project in socioeconomic engineering that ignores the reality (and physics) of energy generation in an industrial society. It’s true the world could benefit from cleaner and cheaper energy. But cleaner and more expensive energy is a recipe for economic suicide. It’s something Western nations seem particularly keen on committing, although we can’t really figure out why. It could be that the global Left simply finds modern life aesthetically ugly and consumerism (with all that pesky individual choice) a vulgarity that should be destroyed via legislation.

But speaking strictly in economic terms, unless a region or a country has ample hydroelectric or geothermal resources, it’s impossible to meet base load electricity needs reliably with renewable energy. Advocates envision a world full of ultra-long life batteries, windmills, and solar farms. But it’s just a fantasy. If the climate bills become law in Australia and America, it will accelerate the deindustrialising of Western economies and mean the transfer of even more manufacturing jobs to the developing world.

Of course maybe that’s just what the architects of these laws want. Who knows? We know they want to tax productive enterprise and make the bulk of the population dependent on government handouts. That makes people compliant and easily controllable. That is big government Utopia. Advancing the fears of climate change is the easiest way to get more control.

We’d expect to see the construction of a lot more natural gas fired power plants in the coming years in the West (although they are more expensive than coal-fired plants). All those re-chargeable plug-in hybrids have to get their electrons from somewhere. If it’s not going to be coal (which will be taxed out of existence), it’s probably going to be cleaner-burning natural gas power plants, powered by both conventional and unconventional gas.

Right now, global LNG capacity is rising and stockpiles are fairly high. But if you keep your eye on the big picture and we see a transition of the world’s power plant fleet from coal to natural gas, it obviously favors gas producers and explorers. Australia is moving ahead by leaps and bounds in this area with conventional offshore production in the North West Shelf and Timor Sea and more unconventional production (hopefully) from coal-seam-gas in Queensland.


Dan Denning, Melbourne, Australia

Dan Denning is the author of 2005’s best-selling The Bull Hunter. A specialist in small-cap stocks, Dan draws on his network of global contacts from his base in Melbourne, Australia, and is a frequent contributor to The Daily Reckoning Australia.

US Government’s Climate Con-Job

This week is a big week in government related news. People are afraid and Congress is making major decisions that will greatly impact our personal lives and America as we know it. Even more startling is the fact that they are rushing these major decisions through, without reading the bill upon which they are voting, and voting under the cloak of darkness in the hope that no one will notice.

It is from this position that the CARE inbox has been inundated with interesting and thought provoking commentary that is worthy of sharing with anyone who might listen. This posting addresses the ongoing debate over climate change. As the American Clean Energy and Security Act is expected to be voted on late Friday, this is a front and center topic.

Americans are being made victims of the biggest con-job and propaganda campaign in US history. It’s vital that they become aware of the facts, so that they can take action.

“Report” On Climate Change Is Deceitful, Scare-Mongering, Bogus Science
Suppose a company doctored data, misrepresented study findings, replaced observations with computer simulations, and hired PR flacks to promote its new “wonder drug.” News stories, congressional hearings and subpoenas would be in overdrive. Fines and jail sentences would follow. And rightly so.

But the standards change when “climate catastrophe” is involved.

The White House has made global warming the centerpiece of its revenue-raising and energy policies. A House of Representatives 1,201-page bill would tax, regulate and penalize all US hydrocarbon energy use, to “save the planet from climate disaster.” The Senate promises an August vote.

But average global temperatures peaked in 1998 and since have fallen slightly, even as carbon dioxide levels continue to climb. Thousands of scientists say CO2 has little effect on planetary temperatures, and there is no climate crisis. Few developed countries are ready to commit economic suicide, by agreeing to reduce their CO2 emissions by a fraction of what the House bill demands for the United States.

Americans are beginning to realize the legislation would cost millions of jobs and trillions of dollars for a hypothetical 0.1 degree F reduction in global temperatures. Most put global warming dead last in a Pew Research list of 20 concerns.

The government’s answer to these inconvenient truths is simple.

Issue another report by government scientists carefully selected to exclude any who don’t subscribe to climate Armageddon. Ignore contrary data and analyses. Crank out more bogus computer-generated worst-case scenarios. Hire an activist media firm that specializes in environmental scare campaigns. And spend tens of millions hyping every imaginable climate disaster:

Rising sea levels, floods in lower Manhattan, California beaches permanently submerged. Ferocious hurricanes, floods and droughts. Food shortages, epidemic diseases, a quadrupling of heat-wave deaths in Chicago. Aged sewer systems convulsing from massive storm runoff. Wildflowers disappearing from Rocky Mountain slopes and polar bears from the Arctic. Leisure time gone, as people struggle to survive.

“Global Climate Change Impacts in the United States” is the “most up-to-date, authoritative, comprehensive” analysis ever done on how human-caused warming affects the United States, deadpans Obama “science” advisor John Holdren.

Actually, it’s the most flagrant attempted con-job and propaganda campaign in US history.

If it helps Congress enact cap-and-tax legislation, it will give activists, courts and bureaucrats control over virtually every aspect of our lives. It will enable them to confiscate hard-earned dollars, convert them to payoffs for activists and companies that get on the climate-crisis bandwagon, consign uncooperative companies and scientists to the ash heap of history, and conceal the exorbitant costs of restrictive energy policies--on families, industries, jobs and transportation--until long after the bill becomes law.

The bogus “report” conflates and confuses human activities and emissions with the powerful natural forces that have caused major and minor climate changes and weather anomalies since the dawn of time--from the Carboniferous Period to the Age of Dinosaurs, from the Big Ice Ages and interglacial periods to the Little Ice Age, Roman and Medieval Warm Periods, Dust Bowl and countless others. It relies on conjecture, conformist thinking and conspicuous elimination of contrary, skeptical, realist scientists and studies that do not support climate cataclysm conjecture and ideology.

The authors “largely ignored” critical comments to earlier drafts and made the final version “even more alarmist” than infamous UN “summaries” of global warming “crises,” says Joseph D’Aleo, first director of meteorology at the Weather Channel and former chairman of the American Meteorological Society’s Weather Analysis and Forecasting Committee. The report is simply “wrong on many of its claims” and marks “an embarrassing episode for the authors and NOAA,” D’Aleo concludes.

University of Colorado environmental studies professor Roger Pielke, Jr. says the report “misrepresents” his own work, makes claims that are not supported by citations provided, relies heavily on analyses that were never peer reviewed, ignores peer-reviewed studies that reach opposite conclusions from those proclaimed by the report, and cites analyses that do not support conclusions rendered.

“I didn’t notice a single recognized hurricane expert in the list of authors,” says NOAA Hurricane Research Division scientist Stanley Goldenberg. The report relies heavily on surface temperature data from monitoring stations located next to parking lots and air conditioning exhaust ports--falsely skewing temperature records upward--other experts noted. It is lead-heavy on assumptions, assertions and speculation--hydrogen-light on evidence.

But the most egregious miscarriage of science in this agit-prop exercise is its near-total dependence on worst-case scenarios conjured up by computer models. That’s where it gets its litany of “Day After Tomorrow” Hollywood disasters.

These climate models have never been validated by actual observations, notes Professor Robert Carter of the Marine Geophysical Laboratory at Australia’s James Cook University. Indeed, Australia’s own climate modeling agency (CSIRO) stresses that climate change scenarios are based on computer models that “involve simplifications of [real world] processes that are not fully understood. Accordingly, no responsibility will be accepted … for the accuracy of forecasts inferred” from its reports.

“Modeling results are interesting--but worthless for setting public policy,” says Carter. But that is exactly how they’re being used.

Sure, it’s conceivable that Antarctica could melt, and cause sea levels to rise 20 feet, as Al Gore and the government con-artists suggest. Greenhouse gases would merely have to increase average annual Antarctic temperatures from their current –50 degrees F to +40 degrees for a century or two, to melt 200,000 cubic miles of South Pole icecaps. A mere 90-degree swing.

That may be as likely as having the planet overrun by raptors and T-rexes cloned from DNA in fossilized mosquitoes. But it’s conceivable. And in the realm of global warming politics, that’s all that matters. As MIT atmospheric physicist Richard Lindzen observes, “global warming has developed so much momentum that it has a life of its own, quite removed from science.”

As one climate activist group put it: “The task … is not to persuade by rational argument.” It is “to work in a more shrewd and contemporary way, using subtle techniques of engagement. The ‘facts’ need to be treated as being so taken-for-granted that they need not be spoken.” The strategy is to treat “climate-friendly activity as a brand that can be sold. This is the route to mass behavior change.”

This is the kind of science, transparency, honesty and accountability we have come to expect over “human-caused climate chaos.”

If the congressional, administration and activist conspirators behind this massive deceit were in the private sector--peddling bogus drugs, rather than bogus science--they’d quickly become convicts. Instead of jail time, though, they’ll probably get bonus checks.

Paul Driessen is senior policy advisor for the Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow (http://www.cfact.org/) and author of Eco-Imperialism: Green power – black death.

What Started the Environmental Craziness?

Following CARE’s active involvement in the Mount Taylor TCP situation and the subsequent frustration, we were pleased to see this piece arrive in our mailbox. There is a general misunderstanding of NEPA and its ramifications by the public and an overall misuse by those who seek to block energy production--or any type of development they do not like.

This was sent to us by Perry Pendley, President and Chief Legal Officer of Mountain States Legal Foundation and author of several books including Warriors for the West. A new source of information for Comments About Responsible Energy. We hope to hear from him more often.

After reading this, you are apt to ask two questions. Who are these “groups?” And, “How can they do this?” Our answer to the first one is the Sierra Club, et al. Lest you think we are just being mean, read what they say, in their own words, about the Mount Taylor issue. Additioanlly, please check out the “Watermelon” section of CARE’s website. In answer to the second question, please CARE’s recent commentary about the current outcome of the Mount Taylor battle and a slightly earlier piece entitled Hypocrisy That Knows No Bounds which includes an interesting quote from Patrick Moore, one of the founders of GreenPeace.

Please print this out and pass it on to anyone you know who might be interested in it. The general public needs to have a more clear idea of what is happening.

NEPA Needs U.S. Supreme Court Intervention
On New Year’s Day 1970, President Richard Nixon signed into law the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), the purposes of which, among other objectives, were to “encourage productive and enjoyable harmony between man and his environment [and] stimulate the health and welfare of man.” NEPA’s most significant single provision was its requirement that federal agencies prepare an environmental study whenever any proposal for “major Federal action” would “significantly affect the quality of the human environment,” in essence, the workshop equivalent of “measure twice, cut once.”

Unfortunately, in the nearly 40 years since its enactment, NEPA has become the weapon of choice for groups and judges to kill activities of which they disapprove. It is not just that NEPA has killed major projects like oil refineries, nuclear power plants, and pre-Katrina improvements to New Orleans’ levees; it also has delayed and thus killed salvage of fire-damaged timber, transfer of a rig from one drilling site to another, and movement of cattle to a different grazing location. Three NEPA cases now in court provide new evidence of NEPA’s pernicious effects.

In 1997, natural gas was discovered on a Bureau of Land Management (BLM) lease in New Mexico. Over the next eight years, the BLM produced thousands of pages of documents, received hundreds of comments, and held scores of meetings and hearings.

In January 2005, it issued an oil and gas plan that allows a maximum surface disturbance of only 1,589 acres in Otero and Sierra Counties from well pads, roads, and pipelines--less than one-tenth of one percent of the total surface area. Because only 141 exploratory wells could be drilled with no more than 84 producing wells, the plan was the BLM’s most restrictive ever. Nonetheless, neither environmental groups nor Governor Bill Richardson was satisfied; they sued. Last month, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit held that the BLM had not taken the “hard look” that NEPA requires and sent the BLM back to the drawing board.

In 2008, in the wake of the Supreme Court’s ruling in District of Columbia v. Heller, as to the right “to keep and bear arms,” and following a request from 51 Senators, the National Park Service (NPS) adopted a new rule regarding the possession of guns in parks and wildlife refuges. That rule--like those of the U.S. Forest Service (USFS) and the BLM--provides, in accordance with principles of federalism, that state law determines whether park visitors may possess guns. Anti-gun groups sued, claiming that the NPS should have conducted a NEPA study to assess the environmental impact. The NPS argued that there was no environmental impact, hence no NEPA requirement. The judge ruled that, because guns will be used for “self-defense against persons and animals,” the NPS’s rule “will obviously have some impact on the environment, whether direct, indirect, or cumulative.” The NPS was sent packing.

In the Allegheny National Forest in northwestern Pennsylvania where oil and gas activity is underway on privately owned resources beneath the federal surface, environmental groups filed a “sweetheart lawsuit” to require the USFS to do a NEPA study when an oil and gas company advises the agency that it is operating in the forest. Notwithstanding that the agency, like every other surface owner, can do nothing short of a lawsuit to deny oil, gas, or mineral owners access to their property, the USFS appears to have concluded that the mere receipt of the notice--as to which it has no discretion and can take no action--is “major federal action” and triggers NEPA. A recent ruling by the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania reaffirming the property rights of oil and gas operators should have ended the USFS’s plans; instead, the agency says it will prevent all oil and gas activity.

What NEPA needs now is an intervention by the U.S. Supreme Court; whether the Court will take such a case remains to be seen.

Are Gasoline Taxes The “Transparent” Way To Reduce Consumption?

For the last two years, CARE has been watching CAFE Standards legislation since alerted to them by Sam Kazman’s June 2007 article entitled "First, Do No Harm to Motorists." Executive Director Marita Noon includes commentary in one of her speeches that touches on CAFE standards and we’ve posted previous comments here from Diana Furchtgott-Roth. Marita wrote a recent opinion editorial following Obama’s announcement about the increase in CAFE Standards. Within a short period of time, this piece from Diana Furchtgott-Roth arrived in CARE’s in box. While it addresses the same topic as the piece distributed through CARE, it takes a totally different--but compatible--angle. CAFE is just one of the onslaught of legislation hitting the American public that limits freedom. If you support private property rights, free-market principles and energy freedom, you’ll want to read on. If you do not support that short shopping list, you need to read on.

Beyond the news element to this story, it also answers a question you may have thought of, “What happened to the family station wagon?” or “When did the station wagon become the SUV?”

What do you think?

Obama Should Ditch Deadly CAFE Standards
Why does President Obama want to preclude Americans from buying bigger, safer, vehicles, mostly made by domestic auto companies, who need all the business they can get? Motorists should be allowed to pay the cost of cars and the fuel to run them, including taxes to reflect costs imposed on society.

Yet earlier this month, using authority granted in the 2007 Energy Act, Mr. Obama announced that automakers will be required to achieve a higher Corporate Average Fuel Economy standard, 35 miles a gallon by 2016, four years earlier than Congress had mandated, rising from 27 MPG now for cars and 22 MPG for light trucks. Enacted in 1975, CAFE requires automakers to calculate average fuel economy--miles per gallon--across their fleets.

Never mind that the 35 MPG CAFE standard, calculated by the Transportation Department, corresponds roughly to a 26 MPG Environmental Protection Agency standard, the measure that is found on window stickers of new cars. This is met already by 29 car models and 36 truck models. Half these trucks and one third of the cars are made by domestic automakers.

This discrepancy in MPG arises because for CAFE the Transportation Department tests the vehicle on a dynamometer, a machine designed to measure fuel intake in a repeatable pattern that is not the same as ordinary driving. This yields better “mileage” than would the EPA measure of driving over the road.

Hence, there was less to Mr. Obama’s announcement than met the eye--or made the headlines.

Whatever the true MPG measure, CAFE standards aren’t the best way to increase it. If Mr. Obama wants Americans to use less gasoline--a goal that many don’t share--he should propose a gasoline tax. Last summer, when the price of gasoline climbed above $4 a gallon, Americans cut back on their driving—with no extra CAFE standards.

Paradoxically, Mr. Obama’s increased CAFE standards may have the unintended effect of encouraging motorists to hold on to their older gas guzzling cars, as new models become more expensive. In contrast, a higher tax would create incentives to turn over the auto fleet more quickly, as drivers choose more fuel-efficient models.

Motorists should be allowed to choose between purchasing more safety with a larger car, or saving fuel by buying a smaller car. Other things being equal, heavier cars will be safer. Data show that fewer fatalities occur when large cars hit each other than when small cars do the same. In crashes between small and large cars, small cars’ occupants are at a disadvantage.

And poor people will be the most likely to get hurt under Mr. Obama’s new regulations. University of California (Santa Barbara) economics professor Stephen DeCanio in a telephone conversation yesterday declared, “CAFE standards are regressive. They put an undue burden on those who are low-income, who will buy cars that are smaller and less safe. Speaking as someone who is in favor of reducing greenhouse gas emissions, CAFE is not the way to go.”

The first CAFE standards, according to a 2002 National Research Council study, resulted in 1,300 to 2,600 more Americans killed on the roads in a typical year, because cars were lighter. If a toy manufacturer had killed that many children in a year the company would go out of business.

After dead motorists, the biggest losers from higher CAFE standards are Americans who prefer large vehicles to carry families, equipment, and pets on daily trips or long vacations.

One reason that Congress does not want to tax gasoline is that taxes are unpopular. People see taxes, whereas they do not observe the costs of CAFE directly. Despite Mr. Obama’s many calls for transparency in government, CAFE standards hide the costs of the regulation, contributing to poor governance.

Furthermore, CAFE regulations yield no revenue that the government could use to make infrastructure investments, engage in research and development, lower income taxes, or cushion the effects of the cost of the emissions reductions on low-income Americans. A gasoline tax, if accompanied by decreases in income taxes, could be revenue neutral. Low-income Americans who do not pay taxes could receive credits from the revenues to be used against the purchase of gasoline.

By yielding to Congress’s unwillingness to raise gasoline taxes and relying on regulations to increase gas mileage, Mr. Obama offers no incentive for manufacturers to exceed the CAFE standard or motorists to reduce their driving. A tax, on the other hand, would create a continuing incentive to improve vehicle MPG and reduce miles driven.

In fact, CAFE standards may have contributed to lowering the fuel efficiency of the personal transportation fleet because light trucks were not covered. Manufacturers developed a new kind of “light truck,” the Sport Utility Vehicle, built on a truck chassis. Many motorists who could not buy large sedans or station wagons due to CAFE turned to SUVs, some of which had lower fuel efficiency than the prohibited sedans.

Automotive fuel efficiency has been rising without stricter CAFE standards as older cars are replaced with newer ones. If Mr. Obama wants Americans to use less fuel, a tax would be simpler, fairer, and more effective.

Diana Furchtgott-Roth is a senior fellow and director of Hudson Institute's Center for Employment Policy. She is the former chief economist at the U.S. Department of Labor.

New Zealand May Go Bust Over Global Warming

As America seems to be heading whole-hog into embracing the idea that global warming is going to ruin the earth and that America is the one to save it, it is worth looking into what this gamble is going to cost us. We cannot trust the wildly-divergent numbers various economists throw around as they seem to be able to manipulate the numbers to suit their purpose. Instead, we can look to what is happening in other countries who have already adopted Kyoto and are about to pay the steep price tag of compliance.

Here, from one of our regular contributors Dennis Avery, is a look at the cost of climate change mandates in New Zealand.

Emperor of Global Warming Has No Clothes
No country in the world would risk as much for “global warming” as New Zealand if it goes ahead with the cap-and-trade energy taxation installed by Helen Clarke’s now-departed Labour Government.

New Zealand’s economy is almost completely dependent on its farm exports: lamb, dairy products, beef and high-end white wines. Half of New Zealand’s carbon emissions come from cattle and sheep. If New Zealand taxes its cows and sheep hundreds of dollars per animal for methane emissions and manure handling fees, Argentina would almost immediately displace New Zealand’s farm exports. Argentina has more grass, more cattle, the potential for more lambs, a surging wine industry--and no Kyoto obligations.

Based on U.S. and Australian “discussions,” a 500-cow dairy might have to pay $250,000 per year for cattle emissions and manure handling permits, plus a hefty increase in its costs for low-carbon electricity and diesel. An Argentine dairy would pay none of these increased costs--and every dollar of cost differential would be a further incentive for Argentine dairymen to expand their exports at the expense of New Zealand.

That would leave Kiwi cities like Auckland and Christchurch without visible means of support.

I said this recently to several New Zealand government ministers and business leaders at a private dinner in Wellington. My message was not welcomed. John Key’s new government seems to understand that New Zealand’s economy would be at terrible risk from carbon taxes--but its voters apparently don’t realize it.

The Clark government told New Zealand voters that the cost of “leading the world” with a carbon tax would be about $150 per year. That figure is laughably low. The British government now admits its new carbon tax law could cost as much as $27,000 per UK family.

The Key government has temporarily suspended the cap-and-trade, but has not dared repeal it. Meanwhile, Australia’s Prime Minister Kevin Rudd is installing his own cap-and-trade, and playing footsie with President Obama on “solidarity” with a U.S. carbon tax. If Australia and the U.S. agreed on some benchmark carbon tax, most New Zealanders would expect their country to join in.

Never mind that the earth’s global warming stopped after 1998 because the sun has gone into a startling quiet period. That’s why New Zealand’s many glaciers have been growing recently instead of receding. Never mind that even full member compliance with Kyoto would “avoid” only about 0.05 degree C of warming over the next 50 years--by the alarmists’ own math.

The urbanites in New Zealand don’t really appreciate the sophisticated management that juggles pastures and feed crops that produce milk, cheese and Merino wool. They love the wine, but don’t understand the massive per-acre investments needed to turn their grapes into award-winning vintages.

Meanwhile, Obama’s U.S. government has just punished New Zealand with trade-distorting dairy export subsidies--because our corn ethanol program has pushed our cost of dairy feed too high. World corn prices have doubled in real terms, and may go higher as our ethanol mandates keep rising. That jacks up the U.S. cost of “alternative fuels” even further--while New Zealand will have to file a well-justified case against America under the World Trade Organization rules.

Ah, what a tangled web we’re weaving, rather than admit the Emperor of Global Warming has no clothes.

Dennis T. Avery is an environmental economist, and a senior fellow for the Hudson Institute in Washington, DC. He was formerly a senior analyst for the Department of State. He is co-author, with S. Fred Singer, of Unstoppable Global Warming Every 1500 Hundred Years, Readers may write him at PO Box 202, Churchville, VA 24421 or email to cgfi@hughes.net.

Choices in Large-scale Electricity Production

Do you agree with this statement: “The working of the nation depends upon a reliable supply of electricity, day and night, winter and summer, quiet days and stormy days”? If you do, you will want to read on. This posting was sent exclusively to CARE from the members Los Alamos Education Group in Los Alamos, NM. Remember Los Alamos is where the atom bomb was developed and where the high school students have the highest IQ in the country (their parents are literally “rocket scientists"). So when scientists and engineers from Los Alamos speak up, we should listen!

This piece is authored specifically by Donald Peterson and William Stratton, who have served CARE with written commentaries in the past and were guests on the radio program CARE organized last fall on uranium mining and nuclear power. Their biographical information can be found below. From their professional and scientific background, here--through the lens of history--they analyze America’s electricity needs for the future and the possible solutions.

This is a through look that is based on in depth study. It is a bit longer than many of the postings here so you may want to print it out for reading later. We at CARE are confident that our Blog readers will find this information to be insight and an important piece in your ongoing energy education. Please let us know what you think!

Powering the National Grid
A few years ago, the National Academy of Sciences polled its members to determine the premier engineering development of the 20th century. Although the candidates are numerous, including the automobile, radio and television, and the airplane, the Academy determined that the most significant engineering accomplishment was the electrification of the nation, essentially providing electricity to nearly every home, business, and industry. The importance of this development is evident from the innumerable applications of electricity, and also from news reports showing the impact of electric interruptions due to disasters of one kind or another. Indeed, it is difficult to imagine being without electric power for an extended period. The working of the nation depends upon a reliable supply of electricity, day and night, winter and summer, quiet days and stormy days. In spite of this accolade for the electrification of the nation, critics exist--voiceing complaints about design, age, reliability, etc. More on this later.

Until the early 1970s, the time of the first oil supply crisis, most of the country’s electrical power was provided by burning coal, with a fraction provided by burning oil because it was cheap at the time. Between about 1905 and 1975, electrical power demand and the production in the U.S. rose at the phenomenal rate of 7% per year, or doubling every decade. This rate only declined for a year or two in the depression, and then accelerated a bit during World War II. Otherwise remained steady at 7% per year. The United States was not unique in experiencing a steady growth in the use of electricity.

However, in the mid-1970s, the annual increase in demand for electricity dropped from 7% a year to one or two percent, even dropping to zero percent for a year or two. A saturation effect had taken place. This reduced growth rate led to the cancellation of plans for new power stations--both coal and nuclear--in large numbers.

During the 1950s the creation of new ideas and development of designs for nuclear power stations had progressed to the point that a dozen or more small (by modern standards) nuclear power reactors were built in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Some of these were experimental in nature and were short lived, but some provided power for several years. However, the experience convinced companies, such as General Electric, Westinghouse, and Babcock and Wilcox that nuclear power could be a competitor to the coal-fired power plants. They were so convinced, they offered bargain rates to build the early large nuclear power stations to get the business started, and the utility industry responded with many orders.

The first large commercial power plant, Oyster Creek in New Jersey, produced 650 megawatts, and was licensed and began operating in 1969. It is now about to receive a license extension of another 20 years, along with most of the other operating nuclear power stations.

By 1980, 60 nuclear power stations were in operation. Between roughly 1965 and 1995, some 112 plants were built, of which 104 are still in operation. These plants provide nearly 20% of all electrical power in the United States. For the electric utilities, the initial burst of enthusiasm was economics--the nuclear plants were less expensive to build and operate than new coal fired plants.

However, shortly after this initial enthusiastic beginning, a number of factors combined to slow this introduction of nuclear power. The operation and maintenance of these new power plants was much more difficult than had been expected and an anti-nuclear movement emerged. Various organizations were created, motivated somewhat by the association of nuclear power with nuclear weapons, but also by some fears predating that time, which can be related back to the discovery of x-rays, radioactivity and the spooky pictures of a hand showing clearly bones inside the flesh. Bad experiences with radium (unregulated) contributed to the unease. (The extensive and accepted use of x-rays for medical and dental diagnostics had no apparent effect on the anti-nuclear movement, perhaps because these uses were not associated with the radiation from the fission process.) Most of the early so-called reactor safety studies were badly done with frightening results. Simultaneously, licensing, financing, and construction time and costs were rising. The expense of new nuclear plants became more than coal plants, and neither was needed because of the lack of demand for more power.

About the same time, President Carter issued an executive order halting nuclear fuel reprocessing due to concerns regarding control of plutonium and proliferation of nuclear weapons. This killed a developing industry (reprocessing of spent fuel), and, more importantly, research and development work to find a better fuel cycle than the Purex process, which was developed and used during and after World War II. (The Purex process was designed to produce pure plutonium, quite unsuited to commercial power applications.)

In the late 1980s and 1990s, when the demand for electrical power began to rise again (at a lower rate), nuclear plants were in disfavor due to expense, regulation, as well as the accidents at Three Mile Island and Chernoble. The fuel of choice became natural gas. These gas plants were inexpensive to build and natural gas was relatively cheap. Natural gas fired power grew to be about 20% of the total U.S. electrical supply, along with 20% for nuclear and 50% for coal.
We are now in the first decade of the 21st century. Fossil fuels, especially coal, have fallen into disfavor because of emission of carbon dioxide--allegedly leading to global warming. Additionally, pollutants are calimed to be responsible for thousands of deaths per year (spread over the whole population and therefore not generally observed like deaths from auto accidents). The demand for electricity is now rising 1½% to 2% per year. Nuclear power is more generally accepted, since it does not suffer from the same pollution problems, and it has compiled a record of decades of reliable, safe service at a relatively low cost. In fact, we believe that some nuclear plants produce the least expensive electricity.

Concomitantly, due primarily to the same concerns about global warming and emissions from coal fired power plants, a so-called “green” movement has emerged and is literally wildly enthusiastic about "renewable" power, such as electric power from sunshine and wind. (There are a few other options, such as power from ocean waves, or the burning of trash, but these are even less proven than wind or solar.)

The total electrical demand of the United States is a mind-boggling 600,000 to 700,000 megawatts (each megawatt is one million watts, or 1000 kilowatts [kw]. To those of us accustomed to thinking in household terms [watts or kilowatts], this is an incomprehensively large amount of power.) We expect the electric industry to provide this power reliably, at a steady, constant voltage and at a price we can afford. If one power station fails, we expect another to be available to take up the load nearly instantaneously. (The system is not perfect and large blackouts do occur, as in the northeast some years ago.)

At an annual rate of increase of 2% per year, demand for electricity will double in 22 years; if only 1.5% per year, the demand will double in 46 years. Considering that our total demand for energy of all kinds and forms is steadily increasing, population is increasing, and the fraction of energy provided by electricity is also increasing, we must plan for the higher rate of growth. We must plan for significantly greater demand for electrical power in the years to come.

Our electricity is produced by coal (50%), natural gas (20%). nuclear (20%) and most of the remaining is water power with very small amounts from solar and wind. These (especially coal) will carry the load for some time to come, but because of problems mentioned above, coal is out of favor and nuclear, wind and solar are candidates. While we have enough coal to last for at least a couple of centuries, the objections to burning more coal are numerous, so we will consider the remaining three sources--nuclear, wind, and solar--quantitatively, as well as we can. We will consider what is required to replace the electricity currently provided by coal--in the US, approximately 300,000 megawatts--with cleaner sources.

We will start with wind power. T. Boone Pickens has proposed to build wind turbines of 1.5 megawatts. More powerful wind turbines have been built, but his proposal is the first one to be considered seriously. In order to produce 300,000 megawatts, 200,000 turbines would be required. However, the operational history of wind turbines has not been good. Operational power is obtained on average only about 1/3 or less of the time, so this means that 600,000 or more would be required in differing locations to replace the electricity now produced by burning coal. The area required for each turbine is about 4 acres, indicating that the turbines would take up 2.4 million acres (3700 square miles). These numbers are enormous. At an estimated cost per turbine of 4 million dollars, the total cost is very large. This cost does not even address costs of revising the gigantic and costly electric power distribution grid to collect power from remote locations and transmit it to population centers one to two thousand miles away, or to maintain backup sources for periods of time with little or no wind. This eventuality is a failure for which we see no solution if we wish to depend on wind. Some of the criticisms of the power grid may derive from problems of this sort.

The wind option is impractical for these, as well as other, reasons.

Solar power has some obvious advantages. Enthusiasts point out that the distributed power over the entire area of the earth is enormous, the intensity is constant, it never fails, and will last for the indefinite future. It seems to be perfect, except for several weaknesses: the power is small per unit area, the earth rotates with nights as well as days, and the seasonal effect must be considered. Further, concepts for storing energy for periods when the sun is not shining are inadequate, very expensive, and do not exist for large arrays.

We will quantify, at least in part, by estimating the area required with the sun directly overhead as occurs on the equator or between the Tropic of Capricorn and the Tropic of Cancer. The Handbook of Chemistry and Physics states that the solar intensity, all frequencies, at the spot facing the sun, vertically overhead is 2 calories per square centimeter per minute. Translated into units more familiar to most of us, the intensity is 1.17 kilowatts per square yard. This energy density is reduced when passing through the atmosphere by molecular absorption, dust, and clouds. The best estimates we’ve found suggest half or a little less reaches the ground. Solar cells, at their current best, convert only 15% of the solar energy to electrical energy. Further, a solar array must include space for maintenance workers and equipment, frames to hold and secure the solar panels, and for equipment to collect and convert the direct current to alternating current. Allowing for all these factors reduces the 1.17 kw per square yard to about 0. 055 kw per square yard for the array of solar cells. (For a rooftop installation of, say 50 square yards, the power output could be up to nearly three kilowatts, enough to power the home comfortably at the middle of the day, but with little for late in the day and nothing, of course, at night without storage). An array of a square mile could produce about 170 megawatts. To replace the power generated by coal (300,000 megawatts) would require 1765 square miles, an impossibly large area. Further, this number is calculated with the sun directly overhead. Allowing for other times of day, and for winter as well as summer, as in the US, would increase the area required by a factor of five to ten or more--and this still does not consider periods of darkness. In short, solar power is completely impractical for large-scale power production, and should be reserved for special applications or for remote sites for which connection to the grid is too expensive. (A quantitative evaluation of costs for solar installation in a home was published in the Albuquerque Journal, January 15, 2009. The cost was prohibitive.)

This leaves nuclear power: We will assume that each new power plant will provide about 1500 electric megawatts. (The French and the Finns are each building pressurized water reactors of 1600 megawatts, and two similar plants are planned for China. The economies of scale keep driving the unit power level higher). In order to replace 300,000 megawatts from coal, construction of 200 such new nuclear power stations would be required. The record of the last century (and recent history) clearly demonstrates that this is feasible. For example, the French built 50-55 nuclear power plants in 20-25 years starting in the mid-1970s, all of which operate steadily and safely, and provide about 80% of their total electrical power supply. The US constructed 112 in about the same time; 104 are still operating. Since the turn of the century more than 30 new nuclear power stations have been completed worldwide and more are planned.

Some problems must be resolved in order to make such an expansion possible in the U.S. A problem (really a perceived and artificial problem) is that of spent fuel. Two possible solutions have evolved. The first and operative solution is to store the fuel, first in fuel storage pools for a few years until air-cooling is adequate, then move the spent fuel to concrete pads and place it in concrete and/or steel containers. The containers are too heavy to move without the heavy equipment, and the fuel is too hot, both thermally and radioactively, to work with without special equipment. This reduces the concerns regarding security. The area required for such a system is miniscule and the cost cannot be large. This is the current solution.

The second solution is to bury the fuel, suitably contained, in sites such as the one under construction at Yucca Mountain in Nevada. This project has been underway for years at a cost of billions of dollars, and is still incomplete. It is not a workable solution. No fuel has been stored here, nor will any be for years to come--especially now that Obama has killed the project. The authors regard Yucca Mountain as a complete waste and a mistake.

The best solution is to store fuel at the site of creation (the power station) or at a central storage facility, placed where a recycle or reprocess plant will someday be constructed. This process has been satisfactory for decades (certainly since the 1960s) and will continue to be satisfactory for decades and decades more. Ultimately, the fissionable materials remaining in the fuel (primarily uranium and transuranics) will be used in fast neutron reactors after recycle to remove the fission products. The country can not afford to throw away the 90+ % of the energy from the original fuel which remains in the "spent” fuel.

During the presidential campaign, Senator McCain presented a proposal for 45 new nuclear power stations. In this light, his proposal was far too modest. By the time 200 nuclear power stations are built to phase out coal-fired power, more will be needed, but that can be faced when the time comes. The first few plants will be expensive as, essentially, a specialized, new construction industry must be recreated. Welders, pipefitters, electricians, etc must become accustomed to the rigorous inspections conductedby the nuclear regulatory industry. A forging plant for pressure vessels must be built.

The conclusion of this brief study is that humanity has only two choices for the large scale production of electricity. These two are coal-fired or nuclear power. It should be obvious that our national choice should be the same as the one made by France about 35 years ago. We should build nuclear power stations as fast as practicable. The first few plants will be expensive and will require time. Creating a power system that is pollution free and emits no carbon dioxide will require at least a half century. We can start no sooner than now. We can do it; we must do it.

Bill Stratton has a PhD from the University of Minnesota. He is a retired reactor safety expert with extensive advisory service to the Nuclear Regulatory Commision. As a consultant to the President's Kemeny Commission, he was instrumental in explaining the minimal radiation release from Three Mile Island.

Don Petersen has a PhD from the University of Chicago. He is a retired radiation biologist involved with health effects of radiation, neutron dosimetry and effects of neutrons and alpha particles. He has had first hand experience with investigation, description and reporting of radiation accidents involving injury and fatality.