National Security and Energy Policy
I just got back from a long lunch with a brand new intern here at 2GreenEnergy — Louis de Saint Phalle. A high-powered intellectual (he speaks five languages, and is highly educated, especially in economics and the physical sciences), Louis wants to research and write about a subject close to my heart: the national security implications of energy policy.
I promised that as soon I got home, I’d jot down a some notes on the subject that could inform Louis’ work, and so here are a few ideas for subject matter:
• Oil and terrorism. Many people have noted that the world’s dependence on oil empowers terrorism and other anti-American acts and ideals. Upon investigation, can this idea be supported with facts?
• The oil companies, and their fight to ensure fossil fuels remain the de facto energy policy for as long as possible. Note the Koch Brothers’ efforts to put Mitch McConnell in control of a Republican Senate majority, thus paralyzing any attempt to migrate in the direction of renewables — at least with support from the federal government.
• Chinese/American relations and what this has to do with energy. Obviously, there is a limit to how vocal we can be about their building new coal-fired power plants at the rate of one per week when a) we’re still operating them ourselves, and b) they’re investing far more than we are in renewables.
• Other ramifications of China’s energy policy: their efforts to develop East Africa, their import of coal from Australia and other countries.
• The CATO Institute’s position on foreign oil and national security. CATO representative Jerry Taylor told me, “James Woolsey, Gal Luft and a group of generally neoconservative policy experts have long tried to reduce our reliance on foreign oil. Why? Do you think they went to an NRDC meeting and saw the light? No, they want to rain down bombs on the Middle East and they believe that our reliance on foreign oil inhibits American policy there.” Wow, that’s quite an accusation. But could it be true?
• Efforts to overturn Citizens United. How is this going? What is the most likely outcome, and how, being as specific as possible, is it likely to affect the hegemony of the fossil fuel industry?
• Patriotism. Am I wrong, or is it only a matter of time before the average American wakes up to the fact that he’s been lied to about energy? He’s been told that renewable energy is too expensive and that pushing in this direction is a deliberate effort on the part of the left to impede the purity of free-market capitalism. But the exact opposite is true: America’s failure to embrace clean energy (the industry that will soon come to define the 21st Century) is causing the U.S. to lose relevance on the world economic stage, and it’s ruining our ability to take the moral high-ground.
• Energy shortages as they affect water and food shortages.
• The geopolitical ramifications of hundreds of millions of climate refugees.
• The U.S. military’s demand for renewable energy solutions, due to the lethality of the transport of liquid fuels.
• National security issues associated with an angry electorate. The American people are going to be pretty cheesed off when they realize that, since oil companies essentially own Congress, the average American is being hurt very badly by this 20th Century energy policy. Not only is his health being damaged, but he’s being placed under immense economic hardship. He’s already so furious about the budget deficit that he’s willing to cut food stamps; he’ll go right through the roof when he realizes that the tally of our current wars in the Middle East will exceed $4 trillion.
• Subsidies to the oil companies. How many different kinds are there? How large? What exactly would happen if they were stopped? Where could/should those tens of billions of dollars annually be spent?
• ARPA-E. How good a job is it doing? How fairly are they allocating their funds? What is your #1 suggestion for improvement here?
• National security versus international security. I argue that we can’t separate the needs of the U.S. from those of the rest of the world. Am I being naïve?
• National security versus other imperatives to migrate away from fossil fuels. At the end of the day, how important is national security vis-à-vis climate change, ocean acidification, loss of biodiversity, lung damage, etc?
Louis: again, welcome to the team! I’m very much looking forward to working with you.
