A Simple Government (15 page)

Look what happened when the Obama administration recently approved the Cape Wind project of 130 windmill-powered turbines off Cape Cod in Massachusetts. This visionary project was supported by the governors of that state, Rhode Island, New York, New Jersey, Delaware, and Maryland, as well as the Sierra Club and Greenpeace. Immediately, rival environmental groups filed lawsuits alleging that the plan violated such statutes as the Endangered Species Act, the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, the Clean Water Act, the Rivers and Harbors Act, and the National Environmental Policy Act. Until we can find a cure for this kind of schizophrenia, we will spend more time tilting at windmills than building them. Right now, the only energy generated by this project is a lot of hot air from lawyers, and I’m afraid that’s one source of renewable energy that we haven’t yet learned to tap.

As I’ve implied already, there is no one answer to our energy problem. It’s also true that, much as I share in the passion for emerging renewable technologies, we’re nowhere near the point at which we’ll be able to discard the old “dinosaurs,” natural gas and coal. The truth is, we will need to rely upon them, at least to some extent, for decades to come. While renewable sources like solar energy, for instance, offer tremendous promise, the technology is not yet refined to the point where its costs are competitive in relation to the amount of energy generated. It’s simply not ready for prime time as a utility-scale generating source, although it will be one day. Meanwhile, one “old” technology that is being looked at with new enthusiasm is nuclear power.

Of the 104 American nuclear power plants operating in thirty-one states and generating about 20 percent of our nation’s electricity, not one emits greenhouse gases. Moreover, contrary to any memories you may have about Three Mile Island, these plants are very safe. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission holds nuclear reactors to higher safety and security standards than plants in any other industry. If, as the Department of Energy predicts, America will need 28 percent more electricity by 2035, I simply don’t see how we can get there without better utilizing the resource of nuclear energy.

That means I strongly agree with former New Jersey governor and EPA chief Christine Todd Whitman, who has pointed out, “Expanding nuclear energy makes both environmental and business sense.” That’s a pretty solid combination.

Not only does nuclear energy emit no greenhouse gases or regulated air pollutants, but its costs, although high on the front end, are extremely competitive with those of other energy sources. To be specific, nuclear power is generated for about two cents per kilowatt-hour, compared to nearly three cents for coal and about five cents for natural gas. Multiply those little figures, of course, and the differences in the long run can become huge. Here’s another important distinction. Unlike gas or coal, which can fluctuate dizzily in price, uranium is bought up years in advance at set prices, making fuel costs a very small percentage of operating costs. What’s more, uranium is both plentiful and readily available from our allies like Canada and Australia.

Of course, as I’ve already suggested, the downside is that it costs more to build a nuclear plant than a coal- or gas-fired facility. Also, in the past, the federal licensing/permitting process to start a new nuclear plant was about as enjoyable as being stuck in one of the nine circles of Dante’s Inferno. It made doing your taxes seem like fun. But both these challenges can be sensibly addressed. Start-up costs would come down if more plants were being built. And the Department of Energy, apparently recognizing that new nuclear plants are needed to replace our nation’s aging fleet, is now working with the industry to streamline the licensing process. Already more than half of all reactors have had to have their licenses extended. If we do nothing, our nuclear capacity will be decommissioned over the coming decades because of age. Considering the increasing need, that’s unacceptable. Bottom line: On a number of fronts, as I hope I’ve shown, new nuclear simply makes sense.

Garbage piling up in landfills, choking the roadside, creating huge dead zones in the world’s oceans . . . Talk about humanity’s footprint. But if we tackle the problem head-on, this very heavy footprint can lead us on a new path toward sustainable energy.

Back in 1985 (that would be a quarter century ago, and counting), New York City approved a plan to build plants that would be able to convert city garbage into power—kind of like a new form of Dumpster diving. Were they effective? No way to know. The plants were never built; the city currently dumps all of its waste in other states. But hope springs eternal in the City That Never Sleeps, I guess, because a former sanitation commissioner, Norman Steisel, and a former director of sanitation policy, Benjamin Miller, are now urging that those plants be built at last. According to their research, burning the city’s nonrecyclable garbage in waste-to-energy plants would provide energy for almost 150,000 households, thus saving almost three million barrels of oil. There’s also, ironically, a potential political plus: This would be a powerful way for New Yorkers to thumb their noses at terrorists whose plots are being supported with our payments for Middle Eastern oil.

Then there’s sewage, which we create in large volume. But if treated, sewage becomes sludge, which burns very efficiently. In a 2007 report, the EPA estimated that if treatment plants nationwide converted sewage into electricity, almost 350,000 households could be powered. In terms of the total emissions that could save, it would be like having almost half a million fewer cars on the road.

If you know me, you know that I firmly believe in a limited federal government (keep it simple) that we can depend on to do a
few
things well. Very well. As President Lincoln said, “The role of government is to do for the people what they cannot do better for themselves.” Amen to that.

But now we’re going to go into deep waters here, pun intended, because the horrific oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010 was a complex event that provoked complex challenges, both scientific and political. First off, let’s not forget that the oil deep beneath those waters is precious and belongs to all of us. And the same goes for the fragile ecosystem of the nearby coast and offshore islands. The oil is there for us to use, but the beaches, wetlands, marshes, and estuaries, along with the plant and animal life they support, are definitely not there for us to destroy in the process. (Remember Roosevelt, the Iroquois, Reagan, and your own good sense.)

Enter the explosion of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig operated by fuel giant BP and the resulting oil spill that devastated the surrounding ecosystem. Never has there been a more telling and relevant example of what can go wrong with offshore drilling. This area in the Gulf of Mexico typically provides 40 percent of the fish in America’s food supply. After the spill, fishermen could not harvest the affected fish, which imperiled the local economy, not to mention the more than four hundred wildlife species that call the Gulf home.

So does this disaster make the case that deepwater drilling should be discontinued? No, it’s somewhat more complicated than that. Consider the following factors:

It soon became clear to all of us, I believe, that BP was more focused on saving time and money than on saving lives and nature. Meanwhile, the response of the utterly inept Obama administration was a disaster that added to the disaster. Clearly not ready for prime time in a crisis, the president was long on photo ops and tough-sounding speechmaking but failed to take the actions that could have accelerated the saving of the Gulf Coast. Appalled by the delays and mistakes, I felt I was watching the equivalent of a major car pileup on the freeway with multiple injuries to which, instead of dispatching ambulances, fire trucks, and paramedics equipped with the “jaws of life,” the authorities sent a vanload of personal-injury lawyers to pass out business cards and drum up some litigation!

Some of you may remember that classic TV public-service spot from the 1970s that featured a lone Indian, Iron Eyes Cody, as part of the “Keep America Beautiful” campaign. As he stands somberly beside the road, someone in a passing car callously tosses out trash that lands at his feet. The close-up on his face reveals tears in his eyes. Simple but powerful.

As other powerful images of human-caused destruction flooded the airwaves after the BP spill, especially wildlife covered in thick coats of petroleum and beaches stained by oil slicks and tar balls, I could almost picture Cody taking it all in. I could also imagine another nature lover on the scene, a man who could often be found about the White House grounds making notes on the birds inhabiting the trees there. I believe old “T.R.” might shed a tear or two at the sight of a brown pelican struggling with the oil-soaked sand clumping in its feathers. After all, he used the power of the Oval Office to create fifty-one federal bird reserves, protecting many specific species, including, yes, the eastern brown pelican. I don’t imagine Teddy weeping for long, though. Instead, I see him swiftly walking (softly, perhaps) to BP headquarters and pulling out that “big stick” he was known to use on occasion.

Sadly, we don’t need to imagine either Iron Eyes Cody or Theodore Roosevelt shedding tears for the Gulf. Unforgettably, we saw over and over on TV news how coastal residents were shedding tears that were all too real. Crying over spilled milk, we’re told, does not make sense. But a million gallons of oil a day? That’s another matter entirely.

Rahm Emanuel, President Obama’s former chief of staff, is fond of saying, “Never let a serious crisis go to waste.” Whatever his political reasons might be for saying this, a case can be made for looking for whatever silver lining can be found in this migrating cloud of oil. Right now, that might seem wishful thinking or downright impossible. But perhaps the nation has been shocked enough by the spill, the most serious environmental disaster we’ve ever suffered, to reevaluate our foolish dependence of fossil fuels, heighten our environmental awareness, redefine the role we expect government to play, and become inspired to create the role we should play ourselves.

So how to proceed? First, as I suggested earlier in this chapter, we should aggressively pursue research and development of alternative sources of energy. Second, we should realistically understand that this vast, oil-dependent nation cannot be freed from the use of fossil fuels by the next election cycle. (In other words, my “green” friends, don’t even bother putting that in your platform just yet.) What we can and must start doing, however, is accelerating a transition from dependence on
foreign
to dependence on
domestic
oil. As it stands now, we are virtual slaves to oil-producing nations in the Middle East whose leaders delight in becoming obscenely wealthy at our expense. This dependence, to say the least, is not necessary to our survival, since we have within our own borders far more oil reserves than the average American thinks. If we made the right choices, we could use these resources to slake our thirst for oil for generations to come. So why don’t we? Well, unfortunately, much of our reserves lie beneath the sea offshore or in areas where drilling, according to many environmentalists, would be unacceptable because of possible damage to the surrounding area. That’s a tough battle, but it must be resolved.

For one thing, the issue is not just about energy; our national security is also deeply involved—in ways that might not be readily apparent. Once in a while, you read something so shocking that it forces you to sit up and say, “Whoa, this is outrageous; this is insane!” That’s exactly what I did when I read Thomas Friedman’s
New York Times
column on July 24, 2010. He reported that retired Brigadier General Steve Anderson, once General Petraeus’s senior logistician in Iraq, explained that “over 1,000 Americans have been killed in Iraq and Afghanistan hauling fuel to air-condition tents and buildings. If our military would simply insulate their structures, it would save billions of dollars and, more importantly, save lives of truck drivers and escorts.” Battlefield casualties, even accidents, are inevitable in war, but I’d hate to be the father of a soldier killed under these easily preventable circumstances.

The story is even more heartbreaking when you consider that our military, while using some 130 million barrels of oil each year, is concerned about the future availability of oil supplies. Because the national-security implications are obvious, the military has made a priority of minimizing its oil dependency by researching other fuel for use in its aircraft and vehicles. To take one promising example of an alternative fuel, analysts have become interested in the potential of algae. Because it basically requires only flat land and sunlight, it should be relatively easy to produce at our bases here and overseas or even out in the field.