Old Wizard

Three Things Obama Will Do to Advance Alternative Energy

Frflyer, Even if all your facts are correct, you have to address the timeline. How long will it take using only solar and wind to replace all the coal electrical generation in the US and to import 10m barrels of oil/day less. This timeline and the consistent funding required should be analyzed. We can't believe we have 20 years to achieve the goals I discussed above, because we won't exist as we have come to know our way of life, if it takes that long. In cape cod, the cape wind project is 5 years old and because of largely political opposition based on rather flimsy aesthetic reasons is less than half way through the licensing process and they have already spent 50m on paper and legal costs. This project would essentially replace much of the electricity generated by an oil-fired generation facility that uses 15m barrels of oil a year. Urgency on the part of our politicians and our more influential citizens doesn't seem to be present. Cost-effective arguments dim, if one believes that dependence on foreign oil is not an option and that if we don't solve this problem quickly our nation's future is in the balance. As with everything, the implementation plan requires treatment of all the variables in sufficient detail, if it is going to have a chance to succeed. That is why I advocate significant pilot projects,jump-started by a significant amout of any stimulus package. Three wind and solar projects and at least one spider monorail transportation system for city suburban multiplexes enabled and funded. These would require 200 to 250b and should have a five year completion horizon.

Three Things Obama Will Do to Advance Alternative Energy

Discussion is very illuminating in that most are partially right and also partially wrong or at least not verifiable. I believe that the Obama plan will spend at least 100 billion as their first move on wpa projects that the states have lined up because the "new energy" plan has no real details and the pressure to put people to work doing something will drive the first group of actions of the new administration. I think that a real push to wind and solar should occur immediately by announcing significant pilot projects in significant metro areas. These projects will drive changes to the electric grid and highlight where R&D could usefully be spent to gain economic efficiency. Building more roads makes no sense:; instead we should be looking at mono-rail spider transportation networks for our large city suburban metroplexes. Short range and long range goals for less foreign oil importation should drive the plan. I suggest 5 million barrels/day less in 5 years and 10m/day less in 8 years. These goals will force an implementable plan with consistent funding and take the whole subject out of the realm of soaring rhetoric and into constructive achievability. Demand destruction due to lack of growth or large increased taxation on gas and oil should not be allowed to count as achievement of the above goals. I am suspicious of the team announced because of their over emphasis on global warming and environmental factors which might achieve the above goals at the expense of growth, Dr.Chu's emhasis on R&D rather than significant pilot projects and Obama's plan to only spend 15b/ year. Those of you who think the war in Iraq has backrupted the country should understand that by far most of the money spent there was spent with american companies and on americans, independent of whether or not you think the war was a mistake or whether or not our energy policiy has been wrong for at least 2 generations. The greed of much of our financial services industries, the downright irresponsible lending practices of the last 12 years,and the negative current acount balances [now approaching 1 trillion/yr] over more than a generation make the money spent on the war look like the pimple on the back of a hippopotamus. That said a real and urgent drive to energy independence is all good if it leads to new and not make work jobs, less dependence on hostile suppliers,new products made in america,balancing of our current account, helpful to a clean environment and a foreign policy not warped by our dependence on foreign oil.