Much Talk, Mostly Low Key, About Energy Independence - New York Times

Much Talk, Mostly Low Key, About Energy Independence - New York Times:

A comprehensive view of factors inherent in an oil economy in this piece from the Times. Conclusion: there are no easy answers. All will take time and national commitment, the same intense commitment and discipline we must begin to forge to prevent the Medicare, Social Security and Medicaid entitlement programs from overtaking our national budgets.

We lack the political and national will to get these mega-problems under control because the inertia of the "will of the people" and the politics of power cannot forge a consensus for action. This is NOT like putting a man on the moon, the comparison that is so frequently touted. Why? Because there is no pinnacle point of success that is visible and that we can celebrate. People don't pay any attention to the fact that we reach a point after several years where we import no oil. They could care less in a 'me' culture saturated by entertainment and sports.

The Sierra Club and others advocate for increasing the vehicle mileage standards to 40 mpg by 2010. A worthy goal not likely to happen. Another proposal they sponsor is a federal bail out of U.S. auto companies on condition that they build cars to the new standards. Always omitted from these proposals is the cost and price of these new vehicles. Nevertheless, these policy proposals serve a valuable goal to encourage the national debate.

"Most eye-catching among the new measures was the call to replace 75 percent of imported oil from the Middle East by 2025. Such an objective is nonthreatening to the oil industries controlled by the regimes of that region, given the rising economies of China and India. Oil is a fungible commodity that is bought and sold on a global market, so other countries could easily take the place of the United States as buyers of Saudi oil.
In fact, the administration may have avoided measures to aggressively curb oil consumption because it understands such moves might end up weakening American and European oil companies. Since each barrel of oil enters into a global pool that is traded daily, higher-cost producers — in places like the tar sands of Alberta, the North Sea off Britain or Norway, or the Gulf of Mexico in the United States — would be the first to halt production if the United States were to lower its oil purchases and thus ease market prices."