As you have probably heard by now, Al Gore delivered his speech on "A Generational Challenge to Repower America," in Washington, D.C. today. Gore was noticeably trimmer and very presidential up amongst the American flags and backdrop of DAR Constitution Hall. Before he launched into his motivational talk, he gave a shout out to the VIP section -- a bipartisan array of senators and congressmen, musician Will.i.am, and Libertarian presidential candidate Bob Barr.
His vision wasn't just about tackling climate change, but instead a fundamental restructuring of our current energy plan, or lack thereof, for our own national and economic security. Gore received thunderous applause when he challenged our current operating procedure, such as how, "We're borrowing money from China to buy oil from the Persian Gulf," and calling on Americans to buck the status quo.
Gore's best received talking points were those that spoke to every American: the need for keeping jobs in the US while creating new ones, for keeping the country's resources at home (rather than fighting in "dangerous regions that just happen to have large oil supplies"), and ensuring new jobs for those displaced by the transition.
He also acknowledged the nation's collective ADD when explaining why he chose 10 years, and pointed out that after JFK promised to have a man on the moon in 10 years, it only took 8 years and 2 months.
Its hard to find fault with Gore's optimism and insinuation that if we follow his plan, not only will the economy rebound, but so will our international standing. But, while his speech may have been inspiring, Gore didn't talk about specifics -- what steps he was going to take to ensure his plan was implemented, how much is it going to cost, and how he plans on telling those invested in oil, gas and coal extraction that they no longer can access and sell their fossil fuels.
But such concerns were not shared by the rest of the audience, who gave Gore an extended standing ovation as he left the stage to U2's 'Beautiful Day'.
There was no Q&A period, so we had to go to the WeCanSolveIt.com website to get a response to Newt Gingrich's apparent conflict of interest. The Alliance for Climate Protections' Brian Hardwick wrote: "Clearly we have a fundamental disagreement on how to address our energy and climate challenges. We don't have plans to run the ad featuring Nancy Pelosi and Newt Gingrich in the future."
We contacted American Solutions for Winning the Future for comment, but have not yet heard back. We'll let you know if that changes.
In a few hours, Al Gore is scheduled to give a major speech in Washington, D.C., where, in the words of the We Campaign, the Nobel Laureate will issue a major challenge, "essentially pressing the reset button on how we think about energy and climate ... It will propose a means of tapping America’s innovative skills to build a more secure energy future."
Sounds like a big deal, which is why EnviroWonk writer Samantha Hulkower is currently en route to Constitution Hall, and will report back on the details later this afternoon.
We're hoping the former Veep takes questions, and especially hoping that one of those questions has to do with why the former House Speaker -- seen above doing his best to force a smile next to the current House Speaker in one of those ubiquitous couch ads -- is still allowed to promote Gore's We Campaign.
We ask because ever since deciding not to run for president, Newt Gingrich has been busy with a group of his own -- American Solutions for Winning the Future -- of which he is chairman. The group's slogan is "Drill Here, Drill Now, Pay Less," which is not a talking point you'll find anywhere on the We Campaign's site. The mission of American Solutions is to "urge Congress to act immediately to lower gas prices by authorizing the exploration of proven energy reserves ..." Not surprisingly, as the Alaskan Wilderness League discovered, the group is funded almost entirely by Big Oil interests.
So what we have here is a disconnect. When Newt smiles at Pelosi and says in the We Campaign ad that "our country must take action to address climate change," we're pretty sure that American Solutions isn't what the group had in mind when they asked Gingrich to take part in one of these odd couple commercials.
In his New York Times blog, Andy Revkin wonders this morning whether he gave Gingrich too much credit: "I gave the former (and future?) politician the benefit of the doubt last year when I covered his call for conservatives to moderate their approach to the environment. Joe Romm (and others) excoriated me (and others) for not recognizing a wolf in sheep’s clothing. Is Mr. Gingrich proving them right?"
Word is that Gore will challenge the nation this morning to produce every kilowatt of electricity through alternative energy sources within 10 years. He will not challenge Americans to drill wherever it is possible. In other words, it might be time to delete some of the promotional material from the We Campaign site.
Part IV of EnviroWonk writer Samantha's Hulkower's day at the National Integrity in Science Conference in D.C. last week. Check out her previous posts on the big event here, here and here.
After starting the day with two panels on weighty topics, we were looking forward to lunch -- not just because of free food, but because our brains needed a break from the horrible truth of reality.
But we could hardly be disappointed by the speech given by NASA scientist Jim Hansen, because this guy was speaking out about climate change - political appointees be damned! - since before it was cool.
Hansen laid to waste most of the skeptics arguments, and said that the only real knowledge gap regarding climate science is "between what the scientists know and what the policy makers understand." That's right politicians, he's calling you dumb.
Hansen's sees two main hurdles to sound climate policy:
fossil fuel interests
young people, who will actually be alive when things get really bad, and animals don't (generally) vote
Rising gas prices are affecting pretty much everyone these days, and farmers are no different. But farmers in New York, the Schenectady Gazette reported last weekend, are in more of a bind because of a state tax law that makes them seek reimbursement for taxes on fuel.
The Gazette reported that while farmers in New York are generally exempt from taxes on goods for their operations like diesel fuel and feed for animals, EPA’s 2007 rule forcing farmers to use clean diesel means they pay taxes on their fuel and then seek reimbursement. One farmer interviewed for the piece, who said he can spend up to $30,000 per month on diesel, told the Gazette it took him some four months to get reimbursed. Not that it's really a parallel, but it took us a good three months to get our economic stimulus check from the feds.
New York lawmakers tried on several occasions to amend the tax code last year, but none were successful.
And today, the Southeast Missourian and the AP wrote about how farmers are adapting to higher diesel costs in the Midwest. The paper saw more farmers using electricity to power irrigation equipment, which uses less energy and costs less than diesel.
EnviroWonk writer Samantha Hulkower attended last week's National Integrity in Science Conference in D.C. Check out her previous posts on the big event here and here.
After the day's first panel, we moved on to a discussion about Curbing Industry Influence Over Regulatory Science. This panel portended to be at least marginally more depressing than the previous one, seeing as how this administration seems to be little more than a series of revelations of how industry insiders and former lobbyists are shaping policy and enforcement.
Moderator Reece Rushing from the Center for American Progress pointed out that ironically, product recalls, food poisonings, pet deaths, etc. show the public the real need for greater scientific oversight of regulations, because who wants to have to risk a case of salmonella every time they eat salsa?
The takeaway point from this discussion was the Bush Administration seems to be missing the point of a small, unobtrusive government when OMB gets involved in virtually every proposed regulation, using political appointees to override the decisions of trained scientists. The arbitrary cost-benefit analysis popularized during Regan's term, to determine whether a project is worth investing in or to clean-up waste, does not make for good policy, and politicians should just leave important decisions, like how much carcinogen in your drinking water is too much, to the experts.
During the Q&A, an EPA pesticides scientist told the audience how she asked to take a training day to attend the conference, and her higher-ups said no, because "this is not a legitimate scientific conference." We think that's pretty harsh coming from an Agency that can't even get its emails read by the White House.
What, you thought alternative energy companies were somehow exempt from shady business deals and crooked behavior?
Sorry to burst your bubble, but New York Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo said this week that his office is investigating two wind power companies over allegations of "improper relations between the companies and local officials," in addition to other questionable practices.
Yesterday, Cuomo's office served subpoenas on First Wind and Noble Environmental Power, both of which are in the process of developing wind farms in several Western New York counties. Among the allegations: the companies illegally obtained land-use agreements with local officials, gave bribes and other benefits to those officials, and entered into anti-competitive agreements.
No word on how much officials money changed hands or what "other benefits" may entail, but opponents of the windmill projects have said that communities are not being told of proposed wind farms until they’re already approved. Yes, that does sound a little shady.
Cuomo almost sounded apologetic, saying in a statement yesterday that the use of wind power should "be encouraged to help clean our aid and end our reliance on fossil fuels." But he added that "if dirty tricks are used to facilitate even clean-energy projects, my office will put a stop to it."
Texas Governor Rick Perry has a beef with the EPA’s new Renewable Fuel Standards. The Republican governor, as well as four dozen U.S. House members and two dozen senators (including John McCain), have written to the EPA chief requesting a 50 percent waiver of ethanol mandates, claiming the quotas will further harm cattle and chicken industries by raising feed prices.
Initially, a spring study by Texas A&M showed that a waiver on ethanol quotas would not reduce the price of corn in the U.S. However, upon request by Perry, A&M reanalyzed their data in light of the Midwest floods, and unsurprisingly, they found that a waiver would indeed drastically reduce the price of corn.
Researchers estimate that 43 percent of all corn grown in the United States will be for ethanol by 2016. It’s hard to imagine that this conversion has not already been raising corn prices for livestock producers. Unfortunately though, Perry’s request, apparently reasonable in its basis, is a tad spoiled by a $100,000 donation that the Perry-led Republican Governor's Association received from chicken magnate Lonnie “Bo” Pilgrim.
EPA's decision on the waiver of all states' ethanol production quotas is expected by July 23rd.
EnviroWonk writer Samantha Hulkower attended last week's Center for Science in the Public Interest's Fourth National Integrity in Science Conference in D.C. Click here for her first post on the big event.
The day began with a panel discussion on a familiar topic -- dismantling the "debate" of climate science. But the talk quickly devolved from the typical "things suck" to the "we're so screwed," which is always a nice way to start the morning.
The first speaker, IPCC scientist Anthony Broccoli, talked about what was considered known (the planet is warming and it's because of humans), made clear what they don't know (will hurricanes become more intense but less frequent?), and emphasized that uncertainty works both ways. Sure, the predicted effects could be less intense than predicted ... but they could also be much worse, which is something the skeptics like to ignore.
The discussion moved on to oil, with former DOE career employee Robert Hirsch describing his 2005 Dept of Energy Peak Oil report, in which he prophesied that a decline in world oil production would lead to a surge in price, and that would result in economic contraction. The report suggested that a recession would follow, and oil would become the government's top priority. Hmmmm, sort of sounds a little like right now, doesn't it? Hirsch highlighted some important aspects that are often overlooked, such as:
It's being called an "energy crisis", but really its a liquid fuels problem.
most existing oil fields are in decline and new reserves are needed to maintain current production.
Even if we switch to battery powered cars tomorrow, there are still millions of cars, trucks, airplanes, etc., that use oil and will continue to use oil throughout their life.
We're 1-4 years away from a decline in world oil production.
Everyone was noticeably depressed at this point, so Hirsch left us with an uplifting thought: "I'm an optimist, we're going to get through this, but it is going to be a very painful future." Thanks.
As you probably heard, President Bush lifted the Executive Order on offshore oil drilling yesterday -- the same one his father happened to have executively ordered. Even though he's the decider, Bush's decision to lift the EO is, thankfully, largely symbolic. Congress has its own ban that it has renewed every year since 1980, long before the Bush 41 EO.
This morning, Bush held a rare press conference where he actually answered questions on the EO, in addition to the mortgage crisis, trade, and other issues. Below is our live blogging of the questions that pertained to drilling.
Bush's speech was short, and he spent only a few minutes addressing the EO. He did manage a few jabs at the Democrats, saying, "the only thing standing between the American people and these vast oil resources is Congress" and "as soon as Congress lifts these bans we can get the oil from the sea floor to the refiners and the American people."
He highlighted "responsible offshore exploration" that is possible due to his favorite "new technologies". But the phrase rings hollow in our ears -- sort of like "clean coal". His final, motivational words: "Bottom line is this, we're going through a tough time."
The Q&A is essentially verbatim- our thoughts (are in parenthesis).
Q: Gas prices are approaching $5 a gallon, offshore drilling will take time to get running, what are you gonna do about gas prices now?
A:Gas prices are reflected in the price of crude oil, and therefore it makes sense to me to say to the world we're going to use new technology to explore offshore, in ANWR, in shale -- there is no immediate fix. If I had a magic wand I would use it, but I don't have a magic wand. Tapping into the Strategic Petroleum Reserve doesn't address the fundamental issues (he's right) -- and it's what I've been saying since I was president -- alternative energies and drilling for more oil (except the only "alternative" to hydrocarbons he mentions the whole time is nuclear). If we followed my energy plan from the beginning right now we'd be using more of our own oil and sending less money overseas.
Yeah, OK, we can be the change that we want to see in the world. But unless powerful people in powerful positions want to be that change as well, nothing's going to change.
So now, finally, there's a place where you can go for news and analysis of politics from an environmental perspective.
.jpg)
