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Thursday, April 28, 2011

Drill or Die


The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) (and later, regions of the Atlantic seaboard) have been federal protected areas since 1960. In 1980, Congress passed the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act, which enlarged the areas protected and included congressional authorization before commercial oil recovery could proceed. Protecting valuable resources for future generations was the vision behind these actions. Yet with fuel prices consuming so much of a family's budget, many people are becoming convinced that the future is now. There appears to be two clear sides to the debate, a closer look, however, questions whether this is the case. A viable third option, rarely discussed, is to reconfigure our county’s energy consumption into a mosaic of alternatives and defer the debate into the future. In 2011, many underexploited forms of energy already exist to satisfy the needs of America well into the future, yet a minority of self-interested men and women actively obfuscate this solution. An investigation into the political and corporate relationships of the loudest of the proponents of drilling reveals a picture filled more with personal interests, than for an energy and geo-politically independent America.

Sources of Energy
More oil as the only solution to our energy needs is by far the loudest voice in print and electronic media. Yet, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, petroleum constitutes just 40% of our nation’s energy use, and of that, only 29% is imported (Appendix 1, Energy Flow 2007, see graphic, right). 

The cost of fuel is most directly affected by global markets based on the price of international oil – not from where it's drilled. Petroleum fuel prices affect every aspect of our economy, from manufacturing the goods and services we need to their final delivery. The price of oil from other countries is not something we control, yet the largest percentage of U.S. private spending is siphoned off into this single division of the economy. This imbalance weakens the economy, exacerbates inflation, creates job losses, and debilitates our geopolitical sovereignty. The problem with the two-argument debate is that it does not allow room for alternatives; either you are for drilling, or you are against it, and this is not constructive. Contrary to the views of persons intimately invested in petroleum’s continued, dominate role in our energy picture, a logical approach to America’s energy needs is to scatter our consumption over many technologies and fuel sources. Realigning the balance of how energy resources are acquired and used should be the primary concern of the American public. 

Prominent public officials such as former Idaho U.S. Republican Senator Larry E. Craig, and Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow and Center for the Defenseof Free Enterprise spokesperson Paul K. Driessen, would have us believe that the only solution to America’s energy needs is to burn more oil. A cursory investigation (see links) of the support behind these men puts into question their motives for strongly arguing in favor of the continued unfettered consumption of oil. 
 Paul K. Driessen’s 2005 article, “Solar and Wind Power Are Unproductive and Environmentally Harmful”  is typical of the pro-oil propaganda his lobbying organization routinely supplies to public officials. In his 2001 article "The False Promise of RenewableEnergy" published by the Heartland Institute, he insists we abandon alternative energy sources in favor of additional drilling. The Heartland organization has a warm sound to it; however, Heartland enjoys oil industry support. According to Greenpeace's ExxonSecrets website, Heartland received $791,500 (unadjusted for inflation) from ExxonMobil between 1998 and 2006. Figures after that are unavailable, as Heartland has since declined from honoring future requests for contributor data.
 Larry E. Craig’s 2004 article, “We Must Stabilize Gas Prices with EnergyProduction” published by Human Events, a weekly, conservative, U.S. magazine, extols the need to keep America firmly on track with oil as a single energy source, and insists that offshore and ANWR drilling will lower the price of fuel. Mr. Craig ignores however, that the price of oil is set internationally, not domestically. Since it is highly unlikely that any U.S. Senator could be unaware of this, the primary intent of his article can have no other intention than to deliberately misinform.
 The basic argument these proponents use against alternative fuels is usually predicated on the idea that any one alternative is insufficient to replace America’s dependence on oil. Since any one will not do it, goes the argument, we should abandon all of them. To quote Mr. Driessen again:
“On a national scale, the environmental impacts of solar and wind power become truly staggering. Former Deputy Energy Secretary Ken Davis has calculated that, to produce the 218 gigawatts of additional electricity America will need by 2010, using only wind or solar power, [my emphasis added] we would have to blanket 9,400,000 acres with windmills or solar panels. That's nearly 10 percent of California ... an area equal to Connecticut, Delaware, and Massachusetts combined.”   
 Since nobody in any alternative fuel industry is currently claiming that ‘their’ energy will replace oil, Mr. Driessen’s pronouncements raise distortion of the facts to a completely new level. The solution that Mr. Driessen dismisses is actually very achievable without creating farms of anything: adding just eight 216 watt solar modules to 50 percent of the roofs of America’s 130 million private homes would create 2,594,225 acres of collection or 63 gigawatts. Using Mr. Driessen’s figures, by 2013, private homes alone could supply 28 percent of the projected energy needs. Adding solar collection to every available roof and business would escalate that number past 50%. 
Rebalancing America’s energy needs cannot be solved with one solution. Since transportation of commodities and goods will be largely dependent on petroleum fuels into the foreseeable future, a paradigm change must begin with automobiles. 
According to the Alternative Fuel Vehicle Institute, alternative fuel vehicles (diesel, electric, hybrid, propane and others) currently constitute less than 4% of America’s automobiles – including fleets. Assuming on average that most daily drivers travel less than 40 miles, this is well within the technological capacity of electric cars available today. Considering only those households that own two or more cars, increasing only the use of electric cars by 50 percent (which effectively burn coal through power plant distributions – a resource America has in plentiful supply) would substantially drive us towards energy independence.
This solution works because the reduction in electrical consumption by homes and business is offset by the increase in transportation usage. American coal jobs are not lost. The only thing actually reduced is foreign petroleum consumption. [Ironically, the most vociferous opposition to electric cars comes from environmentalists that claim the increased use of electricity will further the fouling of the air we breathe. Now, I admit I'm not an expert in these things, but wouldn't it be easier to control pollution at a few central locations, instead of trying to control it from the position of millions of cars like we do now?]
 Many of those opposed to opening the ANWR and Atlantic shelf to drilling offer solutions that the oil camp simply will not accept. Besides the practical alternatives I've already listed above, there is the issue of how current technologies are applied. According to the 2010 DOE Annual Energy Review, in 2009, transportation accounted for only 27 percent of petroleum consumption , yet under economic incentives introduced under both the Clinton and Bush administrations, fuel economy has dropped – not increased, and fuel consumption has skyrocketed as a result. 
 Massachusetts U.S. congressman Edward J. Markey said,
 “According to U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) scientists, if cars, mini-vans, and SUVs improved their average fuel economy just three miles per gallon, we would save more oil within 10 years than would ever be produced from the Refuge. Can we do that? We already did it once. In 1987, the fleetwide average fuel economy topped 26 miles per gallon (MPG), but in the last 13 years, we have slipped back to 24 mpg on average, a level we first reached in 1981. Simply using existing technology will allow us to dramatically increase fuel economy, not just by 3 mpg, but by 15 mpg or more—five times the amount the industry wants to drill out of the Refuge.”
 This is the reason democrats have successfully fought off drilling in these areas to date. It boils down to simple numbers. ANWR and Atlantic coast drilling will neither solve our energy problems nor stave off higher fuel prices. To achieve independence we need to decentralize our use and consumption from any single source of energy. The strategies listed above, along with commercial wind and solar collector farms, and increased use of modern nuclear energy technologies, creates a balanced mosaic of domestic energy consumption, while simultaneously invigorating the economy with new employment opportunities. In his paper, Senator Craig reported that, “$55 billion a year (goes out of) out of America and into oil-producing countries.” Realigning America’s energy needs removes us from the effects of international price increases and keeps America’s economic strength where it belongs, in America, benefitting Americans.


 Sources:



[1]Drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge Will Decrease America's Reliance on Foreign Oil

Table of Contents: Further Readings
"ANWR Oil: An Alternative to War over Oil," The American Enterprise, vol. 13, June 2002, p. 54. Copyright © 2002 by the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research. Reproduced by permission of The American Enterprise, a magazine of Politics, Business, and Culture. On the web at www.TAEmag.com.
Walter J. Hickel served as U.S. secretary of the interior under President Richard Nixon from 1969 to 1974. He was elected governor of Alaska in 1966 and again in 1990.
The coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) in Alaska may contain enough oil to replace all oil imports from Saudi Arabia and Iraq, both unstable Middle East countries with links to terrorists, for a generation. Oil drilling in ANWR will not disturb the migratory caribou herd that congregates in the region from early fall to early May; the caribou will either coexist with the drillers or will simply move to Canada during the calving season. The techniques used to find and develop oil in Alaska are also highly advanced and will have little impact on the environment. Drilling for oil in ANWR will make America both safer and stronger economically.
The Senate Democrats have stubbornly refused to allow any oil exploration along the rim of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) in Alaska.1 Despite this latest vote, however, the issue is not going to go away. Given our continuing precarious dependence on overseas oil suppliers ranging from [former Iraqi president] Saddam Hussein to the Saudis to Venezuela's [Fidel] Castro-clone Hugo Chavez, sensible Americans will continue to press Congress in the months and years ahead to unlock America's great Arctic energy storehouse.
I'm an Alaskan who believes the coastal plain of ANWR should be opened for intelligent exploration of its energy potential. ANWR is owned by all Americans. The very small portion of the refuge with oil potential can be explored and drilled without damaging the environment. At a time when America is dependent for vital energy supplies on overseas oil-producing countries, some of which are allied with terrorist groups, it makes no sense for us to ignore a region within our own borders that could supply up to a third of a trillion dollars worth of domestic energy—enough to replace completely all imports from Saudi Arabia or Iraq for a generation. There are already 171 million acres of land in Alaska fenced off for conservation and wilderness preservation. That's an area larger than the state of Texas.
ANWR's coastal plain, the only part of the refuge where oil is suspected to exist, is a flat and featureless wasteland that experiences some of the harshest weather conditions in the world. Temperatures drop to nearly -70 [degrees] F. There are no forests or trees. At all.
For ten months a year, the plain is covered with snow and ice and is devoid of most living things. Then, for a few weeks, a carpet of lichen and tundra emerges from beneath the snow. During that brief period, the migratory Porcupine caribou herd (named for the Porcupine River), one of Alaska's 20 caribou herds, may graze and calve on the plain. The animals seek breezes from the Beaufort Sea to help them cope with the blizzard of mosquitoes that hatch with the spring.
In 2001, the Porcupine herd didn't calve on the coastal plain. It gave birth to its young many miles to the east, across the Canadian border. It calved in Canada the previous year as well. There is nothing magical about the area.
It's unlikely that exploration and drilling on the coastal plain will harm the caribou. Most biologists expect the animals will react to the presence of human activity the same way the Central Arctic herd adjusted to oil development at Prudhoe Bay (the region to the immediate west of ANWR's coastal plain). That herd has not only survived, but flourished. In 1977, as the Prudhoe region started delivering oil to America's southern 48 states, the Central Arctic caribou herd numbered 6,000; it has since grown to 27,128.
It is important to note that in the Arctic, oil drilling is restricted to the wintertime. And from early fall to early May, the Porcupine herd is not on the coastal plain at all. It roams south to the Porcupine Mountains and east into Canada.
ANWR covers an enormous area—nearly as much as New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, and Connecticut combined. The most beautiful sections of ANWR—8 million acres—are federally mandated wilderness areas where the only tolerated human activity is hiking, backpacking, camping, and rafting. No motorized vehicles are permitted, and no development of any kind is allowed. This wilderness heart of ANWR includes the mountains of the Brooks Range. Journalists often use images of these mountains when describing the coastal plain region and its rich energy supplies, but the Brooks Range will not be touched by development.
The key to America's energy future
When it set up ANWR, Congress recognized that the 1.5 million acre coastal plain possesses unique potential for large oil and gas reserves. It was stipulated that these resources could be developed at any time if Congress so voted. As a result, scientists have studied this area for more than 20 years, and their work has produced estimates of recoverable oil ranging up to 16 billion barrels. Most of these scientists recommend that exploration be allowed.
To compare how much petroleum may lie beneath ANWR, consider that the entire rest of the U.S. contains 21 billion barrels of recoverable oil. The monetary value of ANWR's pumpable oil is projected by the U.S. Energy Information Agency to be between $125 billion and $350 billion. This doesn't even count the region's vast natural gas potential.
How much would an oil reservoir that size, just a few miles from the already-built-and-paid-for trans-Alaska pipeline, mean to America and our energy future? The government estimates the coastal plain could produce 600,000 to 1,900,000 barrels of oil per day. This new source of Alaskan oil could more than supplant all of our annual oil imports from Saudi Arabia or Iraq and ensure that the trans-Alaska oil pipeline would continue to deliver domestically produced energy to American consumers for decades to come.
I have visited many oil-producing regions throughout the world. The production techniques are often primitive and risky, both for the workers and the environment. The technology used in Alaska's Arctic to find and develop oil is the best in the world. When and if development takes place on the ANWR coastal plain, there will be little traceable disturbance. Seismic tests to locate the oil, and the actual drilling after that, will take place in the winter, using ice roads that will melt later. Small gravel drilling pads, only six acres in size, will be used to tap vast fields and will be removed when drilling is complete. Alaska's "North Slope" oil workers take pride in challenging visitors to find any trace of winter work activities after the snow melts.
If oil is discovered in ANWR, the size of the surface area disturbed will be dramatically less than when Prudhoe Bay was developed 30 years ago. Experts estimate that less than 2,000 acres will be touched—out of the 1.5 million acres on the coastal plain, and the 19 million acres in ANWR as a whole.
The opposition to opening ANWR "isn't really economic, humanitarian, or even environmental. It is spiritual," wrote a New York Daily News columnist. "If all the oil in the refuge could be neatly sucked up with a single straw, the naturalists would still oppose it because [to them] human activity in a pristine wilderness is, in itself, an act of desecration."
That is an extreme philosophical position. America's access to energy is a serious national security issue. Over-dependence on foreign oil exposes us to energy blackmail and compromises our ability to protect our citizens and assist our friends in times of crisis. Our goal as Americans must be to produce as much energy as we can for ourselves. This need not undermine efforts to conserve energy nor undercut the push to discover alternate energy sources. We must extend the energy sources that are practical today, even as we pursue possible alternatives for the future.
Rather than shutting down the Alaska pipeline and our other Arctic oil infrastructure we should be linking them to the vast untapped resources that await us on ANWR's coastal plain. That will not only make America safer and stronger economically; it will provide the rest of the world with an environmentally responsible model of how to produce energy the right way.

Footnotes
1. In April 2002 and again in March 2003, the U.S. Senate voted not to allow oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR). As of summer 2003, Alaska senator Lisa Murkowski was attempting to authorize drilling in ANWR through a Senate budget resolution.






[2]Drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge Would Reduce U.S. Dependence on Foreign Oil

Table of Contents: Further Readings
Larry E. Craig, “We Must Stabilize Gas Prices with Energy Production,” Human Events, May 10, 2004. Copyright © 2004 by Human Events, Inc. Reproduced by permission.
Larry E. Craig is a U.S. senator from Idaho.
Cheap and reliable energy is the lifeblood of any flourishing and stable economy. As gas prices continue to rise and political instability in the Middle East worsens, the United States must increase its domestic oil production. The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) in Alaska is estimated to have as much as 16 billion barrels of oil under its coastal plain. Drilling in ANWR will add to national economic output, create jobs, and improve national energy security. Moreover, it will not disrupt the natural habitat of Alaska.
In [an] appearance on "Meet the Press," Sen. John Kerry (D.-Mass.) indicated he was "ready to negotiate" on the CAFE (Corporate Average Fuel Economy) standards that he has proposed in legislation that would raise the average fuel economy standards to 36 miles per gallon (mpg) on the automotive industry. With rising gasoline prices hitting consumers at the pump and continued instability in the Middle East, I have tried to make energy production a point of debate this year in the U.S. Senate.
The President, as most Americans know, understood when he took office that our nation's powerful economy is dependent on cheap and reliable energy and that our growing dependence on foreign sources of energy threatened the stability of our economy—indeed, threatened our national security. Upon taking office he quickly assigned the Vice President [Dick Cheney] to review the status of both world energy markets and our domestic energy needs. The Vice President swiftly and comprehensively completed the task and the President, in May 2001, published his National Energy Policy.
The document contained 105 suggested actions aimed at overhauling our nation's energy policy. More than half of the domestic recommendations in that document are focused on conservation, environmental protection, renewable and alternative energy production, and measures to assist consumers hurt by high-energy prices. The energy bill currently stalled in Congress adopted those recommendations.
Democratic Opposition
Apparently, that was not enough for Sen. Kerry and many other Senate Democrats that continue to oppose energy legislation by refusing to allow an up or down vote on the pending Conference Report for HR 6, "The Energy Policy Act of 2003."1 Ironically, that bill does have a majority in the Senate supporting the bill.
President [George W.] Bush and Sen. Kerry have starkly different views of how best to improve the quantity and reliability of America's energy supplies. For proof, let's take a look at the key elements of their energy proposals. President Bush supports exploration of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) to make use of untapped oil resources in the region. Sen. Kerry favors increasing Corporate Average Fuel Economy, or CAFE, mandates. Deeper examination of those policies shows us that President Bush has a more reliable plan for overcoming the energy challenges America now faces.
Raising CAFE standards would not increase America's energy supply by a single barrel. The possible benefits of higher CAFE standards depend on the reduced use of gasoline in cars. The government measures the fuel economy of every automobile that enters the U.S. market (the number is marked on the sticker you find on new cars) and mandates that the average fuel economy across an automotive company's entire fleet of cars meet a certain target—currently 24 mpg. Sen. Kerry's plan is to raise that average to 36 mpg, in hopes it would lead to less oil consumption in the United States.
Untapped Oil
On the other hand, the U.S. Department of the Interior estimates that at least 9 billion and as many as 16-billion barrels of oil lie untapped under the coastal plain of ANWR. Pumping such vast oil resources to the surface would reduce America's dependence on foreign oil—a situation that currently results in our sending more than $55 billion a year out of America and into oil-producing countries.
Raising CAFE standards or obtaining oil from ANWR would also have a vastly different impact on job creation and economic growth in America.
In a time when our economy is recovering and beginning to add jobs, Sen. Kerry's proposed 50% increase in CAFE standards would cost jobs and reduce economic output. The government's Energy Information Administration estimates that Kerry's increase would lead to 450,000 job losses—most concentrated in the automotive industry. Those massive job losses explain why the United Auto Workers are firmly opposed to raising CAFE standards as drastically as Sen. Kerry proposes.
In addition to job losses, higher CAFE standards would result in $170 billion in lost economic output. Losses to U.S. automakers alone are estimated at about $9 billion.
In contrast, tapping into the oil reserves in ANWR would produce jobs through the construction of temporary facilities to access the coastal plain and to bring up the oil from deep under the surface. American workers would build those facilities and American workers would operate the pumps. All told, developing oil production facilities on the ANWR coastal plain would generate anywhere from 250,000 to more than 700,000 jobs. Unlike Kerry's plan, major labor unions have endorsed the President's plan for ANWR exploration.
Those jobs and the oil we bring to market would also have an extraordinarily positive impact on America's economy. From 1980 to 1994, oil production on the North Slope of Alaska added more than $50 billion to our nation's economy and directly benefited every state in the union. Oil production in ANWR would likely produce equal or greater economic gains.
Higher CAFE standards also pose potential threats to highway safety. Because CAFE by definition mandates certain "average fuel economy" levels, the fuel economy of individual cars in any automaker's fleet may fall above or below that level. Americans love sport utility vehicles (SUVs), which generally get lower fuel economy—often under 20 mpg—and U.S. manufacturers have regained their strong position in the American marketplace by producing SUVs. For that reason, SUVs will continue to be a major presence on American roads.
To balance the low fuel efficiency ratings of SUVs, automakers produce cars with high fuel efficiency—over 30 mpg. The easiest way to do that is to make cars lighter and smaller. However, the drivers of these smaller cars are placed at increasing risk of serious injury or death if they are involved in an accident. The National Academy of Sciences [NAS] found a decade ago that "downweighting" and downsizing vehicles led to as many as 2,600 deaths and 26,000 serious injuries in one year alone. And the NAS stated that "any increase in CAFE as currently structured could produce additional road casualties."
A Minimal Environmental Threat from Drilling
Seizing the oil that lies under the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge would pose no such threat to American drivers. Despite arguments to the contrary, oil production in ANWR would pose little threat to the habitat and animals of Alaska either. Of ANWR's 19-million acres, less than 10%, or 1.5-million acres, would be affected by development. The rest of ANWR would be permanently closed to development of any kind.
Meanwhile, the caribou who make their home in ANWR show no signs of being adversely affected by development. Rather, they seem to be thriving. During operation of the Prudhoe Bay oil production facilities, numbers of a local caribou herd grew from 3,000 to more than 18,000 two decades into production. And most important, the people of Alaska overwhelmingly support development in ANWR, rejecting the spurious claims of extreme environmental activists who have never lived north of Manhattan.
Developing ANWR to make use of America's own untapped oil resources is a far more preferable method of increasing domestic energy production and decreasing our dependence on foreign oil than is raising CAFE standards. Oil production in ANWR will create jobs, add to national economic output, and bolster U.S. energy supplies without threatening the natural habitat of Alaska—or threatening the safety of American drivers and the health of the U.S. automotive industry and its workers.
President Bush is committed to finding the right solutions to America's energy challenges. On ANWR he's hit the mark.

Footnotes
1. The bill did not pass, and Kerry’s amendment lost.


[3]Solar and Wind Power Are Unproductive and  Environmentally Harmful


Table of Contents: Further Readings
"The False Promise of Renewable Energy," www.heartland.org, May 2001. Copyright © 2001 by the Heartland Institute. Reproduced by permission.
Paul K. Driessen is a senior fellow with the Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow and Center for the Defense of Free Enterprise, nonprofit public policy institutes that focus on energy, the environment, economic development and international affairs.[1] [2] [3]
Environmentalists try to prevent oil, gas, coal, and nuclear power development in the United States by arguing that alternatives such as solar collectors and wind mills are superior. In reality, these sources of "green" energy can only provide a fraction of the energy needed to keep the American economy strong. And if solar panels and wind farms were built in the numbers necessary to supply more power, they would create visual blight and environmental harm nearly equal to traditional energy sources.
A cacophony of calumny has greeted suggestions that America begin drilling in Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge [ANWR], Outer Continental Shelf, and other public lands, in search of oil and natural gas, to ease our spreading energy crisis and help rein in prices. The Sierra Club, Senator Barbara Boxer (D-California), and others say drilling is unacceptable and multiple use is "out of the mainstream" of American thought.
Accompanying the chorus of condemnation for fossil fuels, predictable paeans of praise are being warbled for renewable fuels, as the only true, "appropriate" path to energy security. But all renewables are not equal in the eyes of the environmentalists.
·             Hydroelectric power dams up streams, interferes with migratory fish, and impairs the "wilderness experience" of river rafters.
·             Burning wood causes serious air quality problems (hydrocarbons and soot, in particular) and requires that trees be cut down, a definite no-no among greens.
·             Geothermal suffers from the insurmountable problems that natural heat sources are few and far between ... and located near magnificent wonders like Yellowstone, Lassen Volcanic, and Hawaii Volcanoes National Parks.
·             And soaring natural gas prices have sent fertilizer prices into the stratosphere, making biomass more costly to grow and ship than it will fetch on the open market.
So these renewable fuels are no longer quite politically correct, environmentally defensible, economically possible, or socially "responsible."
That leaves us with but two alternatives to the nuclear and fossil fuels that have powered our progress and prosperity for decades. Solar and wind power have long been touted as the answer to prayers for inexhaustible, non-polluting energy sources. But can they live up to their advance billing?
Vast energy farms
Even today, their total contribution stands at less than 0.5 percent of America's energy needs. Aside from their still-high cost, the primary drawbacks for solar and wind power are that they are intermittent; there is no economic way to store the electrical energy for use at night, on cloudy or windless days, and during peak usage hours; and their environmental impacts are significant and negative.
Producing 50 megawatts of electricity using a gas-fired generating plant requires between 2 and 5 acres of land. Getting the same amount from photovoltaics means covering some 1,000 acres with solar panels (assuming a very optimistic 10 watts per square meter (W/m2) or 5 percent peak efficiency), plus access for trucks to clean the panels. Using the sun to meet California's energy needs would require paving over tens of thousands of acres of desert habitat, sacrificing what the Wilderness Society calls "some of the most beautiful landscapes in America," and with it their resident plant and animal life.
A 50 mw wind facility requires even more land: some 4,000 acres (assuming an optimistic 6 W/m2). Even wind power's most ardent supporters grudgingly admit that the notion of thousands of these "futuristic looking" (a euphemism for ugly) towers looming 100 to 200 feet above the rolling hills is not something they yearn to have in their own back yards.
Wind facilities in Texas and California have been called a "visual blight." Residents near Texas' Altamont Pass facility say noise from the turbines is "unbearable."
Vocal California activists have railed for years against offshore oil platforms on the horizon off Santa Barbara. Are we to believe they will find vast "energy farms" of giant windmills more tolerable?
Killing birds
Noise and visual blight are only the beginning of wind power's adverse environmental consequences, however. Even the relatively small number of wind turbines that exist today kill some 500 hawks, vultures, eagles, and other raptors every year, along with thousands of other birds. The Sierra Club has aptly called them "Cuisinarts of the air," and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has actually suggested that wind farm operators might be prosecuted and jailed for killing federally protected birds. How's that for an incentive to get into the business?
On a national scale, the environmental impacts of solar and wind power become truly staggering. Former Deputy Energy Secretary Ken Davis has calculated that, to produce the 218 gigawatts of additional electricity America will need by 2010, using only wind or solar power, we would have to blanket 9,400,000 acres with windmills or solar panels. That's nearly 10 percent of California ... an area equal to Connecticut, Delaware, and Massachusetts combined!
Perhaps some photovoltaic panels will be located on roofs, and some of the land in between windmills can be used for farming and grazing (which [environmentalists] also dislike). However, the total acreage affected by these "Earth-friendly" energy sources would still run into the millions. By contrast, developing the 6 to 16 billion barrels of recoverable oil estimated to be in ANWR's distant coastal plain would disturb only 2,000 acres.
Our nation—and California in particular—has lived in a world of energy alchemy and make-believe for long enough. It's high time we recognized there is no free lunch or magic elixir. Tough decisions must be made if progress, prosperity, and opportunity are not to become only a dim memory.


[4]The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge Should Remain Off-Limits to Oil Drilling


Table of Contents: Further Readings
Edward J. Markey, statement introducing H.R. 770, Washington, DC, February 28, 2001.
Edward J. Markey is a Democratic U.S. congressman from Massachusetts.
Opening the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR), a pristine wilderness area in northern Alaska, to oil exploration and drilling will have adverse environmental impacts and will not solve the problem of U.S. dependence on foreign oil. The section of ANWR presumed to hold oil reserves is a critical habitat for the Porcupine caribou herd; the industrial blight that accompanies oil exploration, such as toxic spills and chemical waste, may destroy the herd's habitat. Using existing technology to increase automobile fuel economy will prove much more effective at reducing dependence on foreign oil than domestic drilling, which will only reduce foreign oil dependence from 56 percent in 2001 to 50 percent in 2011.
One of the most magnificent wildlife reserves [Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR)] in America has been targeted for oil and gas development. It is threatened as never before, and will lose its wild, untrammeled character forever if we do not organize to fight this threat. Today, Representative Nancy Johnson (CT-R) and I are introducing the Morris K. Udall Arctic Wilderness Act of 2001,1 with more than 120 cosponsors, Republican and Democrat, all united in their goal to preserve this precious wilderness in its current pristine, roadless condition for future generations of Americans.2
Protecting a bipartisan legacy
We have a bipartisan legacy to protect, and we take it very seriously. It is a legacy of Republican President [Dwight] Eisenhower, who set aside the core of the Refuge in 1960. It is a legacy of Democratic President [Jimmy] Carter, who expanded it in 1980. It is the legacy of Republican Senator Bill Roth [Delaware] Democratic Representative Bruce Vento [Minnesota], and especially Morris Udall [Arizona-Democrat], who fought so hard to achieve what we propose today, and twice succeeded in shepherding this wilderness proposal through the House of Representatives.
Now is the time to finish the job they began. Now is the time to say "Yes" to setting aside the coastal plain as a fully protected unit of the Wilderness Preservation System.
Every summer, the Arctic coastal plain becomes the focus of one of the last great migratory miracles of nature when 130,000 caribou, the Porcupine caribou herd, start their ancient annual trek, first east away from the plain into Canada, then south and west back into interior Alaska, and finally north in a final push over the mountains and down the river valleys back to the coastal plain, their traditional birthing grounds. This herd, migrating thousands of miles each year and yet funneling into a relatively limited area of tundra, contrasts sharply with the non-migratory Central Arctic herd living near the Prudhoe Bay oil fields.
The coastal plain of the Refuge is the biological heart of the Refuge ecosystem and critical to the survival of a one-of-a-kind migratory species. When you drill in the heart, every other part of the biological system suffers.
The oil industry has placed a bull's eye on the heart of the Refuge and says hold still. This won't hurt. It will only affect a small surface area of your vital organs.
Nevertheless, the oil industry has placed a bull's eye on the very same piece of land that Congress set aside as critical habitat for the caribou. The industry wants to spread the industrial footprint of Prudhoe Bay into a pristine area.
Let's take a look at the industrial footprints that have already been left on the North Slope. Look at Deadhorse and Prudhoe Bay. They are part of a vast industrial complex that generates, on average, one toxic spill a day of oil, or chemicals, or industrial waste of some kind that seeps into the tundra or sits in toxic drilling mud pits. It is one big energy sacrifice zone that already spews more nitrogen oxide pollution into the Arctic air each year than the city of Washington, D.C.
Allowing this industrial blight to ooze into the Refuge would be an unmitigated disaster. It would be as if we had opened up a bottle of black ink and thrown it on the face of the Mona Lisa.
An unnecessary invasion
But why invade this critical habitat for oil if we don't have to? The fact is, it would not only be bad environmental policy, it is totally unnecessary. Here's why.
Fuel economy: According to EPA [U.S. Environmental Protection Agency] scientists, if cars, mini-vans, and SUVs improved their average fuel economy just three miles per gallon, we would save more oil within 10 years than would ever be produced from the Refuge. Can we do that? We already did it once. In 1987, the fleetwide average fuel economy topped 26 miles per gallon [mpg], but in the last 13 years [as of February 2001], we have slipped back to 24 mpg on average, a level we first reached in 1981.
Simply using existing technology will allow us to dramatically increase fuel economy, not just by 3 mpg, but by 15 mpg or more—five times the amount the industry wants to drill out of the Refuge.
Natural gas: The fossil fuel of the future is gas, not gasoline, because it can be used for transportation, heating, and, most importantly, electricity, and it pollutes less than the alternatives. The new economy needs electricity, and it isn't looking to Alaskan oil to generate it. California gets only 1 percent of its electricity from oil; the Nation gets less than 3 percent, while 15 percent already comes from natural gas and it's growing.
Alaska has huge potential reserves of natural gas on the North Slope, particularly around Prudhoe Bay and to the west, in an area that has already been set aside for oil and gas drilling called the National Petroleum Reserve. Moreover, we have significant gas reserves in the lower 48 [states] and the Caribbean. The coastal plain of the Refuge has virtually none.
Oil not in the Refuge: The National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska has been specifically set aside for the production of oil and gas. It is a vast area, 15 times the size of the coastal plain, and relatively under-explored by the industry. Anything found there is just as close to Prudhoe Bay as the Refuge, but can be developed without invading a critical habitat in a national refuge.
In fact, just last October [2000], BP [British Petroleum] announced the discovery of a field in this Reserve that appears to be as large as Kuparuk, the second largest field on the North Slope. While the potential for oil in the Refuge still appears larger than in the Reserve, the Reserve holds much greater promise for natural gas, so that every exploratory well has a greater chance of finding recoverable quantities of one fuel or the other.
Our dependence on foreign oil is real, but we cannot escape it by drilling for oil in the United States. Energy legislation introduced in Congress [in 2001] attempts to set ambitious new goals for independence yet it would only reduce our foreign oil dependence from 56 percent today to 50 percent 10 years from now, which simply underlines the futility of trying to drill our way to independence.
We consume 25 percent of the world's oil but control only 3 percent of the world's reserves. Seventy-six percent of those reserves are in OPEC [Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries], so we will continue to look to foreign suppliers as long as we continue to ignore the fuel economy of our cars and as long as we continue to fuel them with gasoline.
Sensible fuel economy should preclude domestic drilling
The public senses that a drill-in-the-Refuge energy strategy is a loser. Why sacrifice something that can never be recreated, this one-of-a-kind wilderness, simply to avoid something relatively painless—sensible fuel economy?
A 2001 poll, done by Democratic pollster Mark Mellman and Republican pollster Christine Matthews, shows a margin of 52 to 3S percent opposed to drilling for oil in the Refuge.
The public is making clear to Congress that other options should be pursued—not just because the Refuge is so special, but because the other options will succeed where continuing to put a polluting fuel in gas-guzzling automobiles is a recipe for failure.
Sending in the oilrigs to scatter the caribou and shatter the wilderness is what I call "UNIMOG energy policy." You may have heard about the UNIMOG. It is a proposed new SUV that will be 9 feet tall, 71/2 feet long, 3½ inches wider than a Humvee [a type of SUV], weigh 6 tons, and get 10 miles per gallon.
That's the kind of thinking that leads not just to this Refuge, but to every other pristine wilderness area, in a desperate search for yet another drop of oil. And it perpetuates a head-in-the-haze attitude towards polluting our atmosphere with greenhouse gases and continuing our reliance on OPEC oil for the foreseeable future.
Now that our energy woes have forced us to think about the interaction of energy and environmental policy, it is a good time to say "NO" to a UNIMOG energy policy and "YES" to a policy that moves us away from gas-guzzling automobiles to clean-burning fuels, hybrid engines, and much higher efficiency in our energy consumption.
If we adopt the UNIMOG energy policy, we will have failed twice. We will remain just as dependent on oil for our energy future, and we will have hastened the demise of the ancient rhythms of a unique migratory caribou herd in America's last frontier.
We have many choices to make regarding our energy future, but we have very few choices when it comes to industrial pressures on incomparable natural wonders. Let us be clear with the American people that there are places that are so special for their environmental, wilderness, or recreational value that we simply will not drill there as long as alternatives exist.
The Arctic Refuge is Federal land that was set aside for all the people of the United States. It does not belong to the oil companies, it does not belong to one State. It is a public wilderness treasure; we are the trustees.
We do not dam Yosemite Valley [in Central California] for hydropower. We do not stripmine Yellowstone [National Park] for coal. We do not string wind turbines along the edge of the Grand Canyon.
And we should not drill for oil and gas in the Arctic Refuge. We should preserve it, instead, as the magnificent wilderness it has always been, and must always be.

Footnotes
1. As of fall 2003, this bill remained in congressional committee.
2. In April 2002 and again in March 2003, the U.S. Senate voted not to allow oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR). In the fall of 2003, Alaska senator Lisa Murkowski was attempting to authorize drilling in ANWR through a Senate budget resolution.





Addendum


[1] http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Center_for_the_Defense_of_Free_Enterprise  Since the late 1980's, CDFE has been at the center of the 'Wise Use' movement. CDFE was originally founded by Alan Gottlieb July 4, 1976, "the bicentennial of the American Revolution" as CDFE points out in its statement of purpose. [1].
"The Center for the Defense of Free Enterprise's programs include research, publication, conferences, consulting, training and media awareness on threats to free enterprise. We operate a book publishing division, the Free Enterprise Press, to disseminate important investigative and analytical research, and have a variety of programs to help individuals and businesses face free enterprise-related crises," it states. [2]
"CDFE has received national recognition for its programs and services, particularly in tracking the money of non-profit groups opposing free enterprise. Although we receive no government funding, we are dedicated to providing information and assistance to those struggling with government interference and civilian opposition to free enterprise," it states. [3]
In December 1991 Gottlieb, a direct-mail fundraising specialist, told New York Times reporter Timothy Egan that he shifted his focus away from the threat of gun control and Senator Edward M. Kennedy to environmentalism when he realized the fundraising potential.
Gottlieb explained that direct mail fundraising works best when there is "an evil empire" perceived as posing a threat that will prompt mail recipients to contribute. "For us ... the environmental movement has become the perfect bogeyman," Gottlieb said.
In June 1993, Arnold told Washington Times reporter Valerie Richardson that "since the Democrats got into power, our income has doubled."
According to the CLEAR website, CDFE and Ron Arnold, its Executive Vice President, are "considered by many to be the founding and principle strategy-setting forces in the grassroots anti-environmental movement."
In Ron Arnold's essay "Overcoming Ideology" he depicts environmentalists as "eco-ideologists" whose stand "against promoting economic growth, technological progress and a market economy" stands in sharp contrast to the wise use movement's actual stewardship of the land, the water and the air." Environmentalists are portrayed as "eco-fetishists" whose moral self-righteousness is "about the people, but not by or for them."
The Environmental Working Group, in a Wise Use group analysis, says it is ironic that the CDFE website represents a credible, rational opposition to the environmental movement given Arnold's role:
"in developing the radical, polarized and extreme early version of 'wise use' that vilified environmentalism and environmental activists, threatening that his goal was to 'kill the bastards.' (CNN interview, May 30, 1993) The[n] again, Arnold has also been quoted as having said that "Facts don't matter. In politics, perception is reality." (Outside magazine, December, 1991)" [4]

[2] In its 2005 annual return to the Internal Revenue Service, Heartland disclosed its 2005 annual revenue as being $4.52 million while its total expenses were only $2.368 million.

Secrecy on Funding Sources

While Heartland once disclosed its major supporters, it now refuses to publicly disclose who its corporate and foundation funders are

[3] Exxon Funding

Greenpeace's ExxonSecrets website lists Heartland as having received $791,500 (unadjusted for inflation) from ExxonMobil between 1998 and 2006

Saturday, June 5, 2010

Log In to Continue


Steven X, an old schoolmate I’ve reconnected with on Facebook, recently vented derision upon the companies of the travel industry that presume that every traveler is ripe for subjection to a survey, as if a right to his time is some sort of adjunct to his doing business with them. This got me thinking about the often similarly unjustifiable appropriation of our personal time: the login.

I’m talking about the incalculable number of truly insignificant websites that insist you create a logon and password (for security purposes?!) to peruse their site. Sites that sell anything from doggy accessories, to the web extensions of local news outlets, and everything in between.

Steven travels quite a bit so the surveys are his pet peeve, but mine is data-collecting under the guise overreacting, overzealous, or overreaching security policies – almost always trumpeted as a measure implemented “for my safety”.

I've come to take it personally. The audacity of a company to posit that the simple existence of their firm transcribes into an ipso-facto right to my personal details because I wish to enjoin them in custom? I don't think so.

Some people tell me this is not really a problem and that I’m overreacting myself here, however, since I was compelled to create a database to store the logon information of all the websites that I do visit where I cannot escape this info-snare (because I’ve decided that the value of their product or service exceeds my desire for privacy), I can substantiate the volume with real numbers: 174. That’s correct. In my database I have (as of this writing) 174 login/password combinations for accessing sites I’ve had reason to do business with. Some of them legitimately merit security precautions, like my bank accounts. All told my database contains about 25 sites that I would collectively label as sensitive, requiring some sort of coded access; my pharmacy prescription service for example. I’m not talking about those.

I’m referring to the rest of the 149 or so sites I’ve frequented in the last few years that do not pose a security risk. As a rule (marketers, pay attention now please) if I land at a website while searching for something, and the site asks me to create an ‘account’ to continue, they’ve just lost my business. I go to their competitor. For those company officers that have subscribed to the lie given to them by the marketing department, that sign-ons increase sales because it gives the company detailed demographics with which to either tailor their market or methods, I wish to tell you this: you didn’t even know you missed me. Where’s the data for that?

Some sites get it right. They let me choose between ordering online with simply an address and a method of payment, or they let me create an account, often giving back to me information that I might want such as ordering history. Let’s look at some of the others though, I’ll start with utilities. “Utilities,” you ask? Certainly utilities should be secure, right? My answer: why? Why do I need to ‘sign-in” to pay any bill at all? If I know the account number and I have a method of payment, why can’t I just send money to that account? My water company (like everyone else) requires detailed personal information to sign into their site. More information actually, than what was actually required to sign up for water service to begin with. Why do they want my birth date or my mother’s maiden name? Is my water consumption really a security concern somewhere? There’s someone out there trying to calculate the number of baths I’ve taken, is that it? Are the soap and shampoo companies spying on me?

Look at it this way: if you were shopping along main street and, upon trying the door of a shop you were interested in, instead of opening for you to walk in, the door shifts just a crack and you’re instead greeted by a shifty looking individual who, after casting his eyes up and down the street, whispers conspiratorially, “Who are you”, would you enter?

The majority of errant sites that want my personal information do allow me to fill a metaphorical shopping cart before asking for actual details about me - that’s true. But this is where the hairs split because too many of them won’t reveal the deal breaker in any online transaction – taxes and shipping – until I create that account. No way. To do business with me you only need two things: my money and an address. You got me this far only to pull the “create an account to continue” before telling me how much you are actually going to charge me? That’s a transparent attempt at surreptitious data collection, you’ve wasted my time, and for that you’ve just lost another customer.