There are a lot of misconceptions about conservatives and energy policy out there, most of them perpetrated by a media which hates us enough not to take the time to really explore our positions, or environmental organizations which have a financial stake in making sure their useful idiots in the media and the general public don't really understand them either.
First of all, "Drill Baby Drill," may be a bit of mantra but it's not a policy position. It's also used to beat conservatives about the head and shoulders and over simplify our positions.
First you must understand that conservatives see energy policy and national security as inextricably linked. The entire world economy runs on fossil fuels, and we are the largest economy in the world and therefore the largest user of such. Now while it is not true that the majority of our oil comes from the Middle East -- most of our imports are from Mexico and Canada and the majority of the oil we use comes from domestic production -- it is true that a strategically significant portion does come from countries that frankly don't like us much. Moreover, the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, better known as OPEC, had, until recently, a virtual stranglehold on the price.
As we've seen the last few years, when oil pops over $100 a barrel it does bad things to gas prices and to our economy. So to someone who is concerned about national security it would seem a bad idea to have us be dependent upon a foreign power for a strategic resource such as oil. Or to have a potentially hostile power have control of the price of said resource. So from that standpoint, and given that we have enormous reserves easily accessible off shore, in shale deposits and sitting in Alaska, it would seem silly not to tap these -- especially if it would free us from dependence upon foreign oil and the risks that entails. The gas lines in the 1970s anyone?
It is also far from true that conservatives are not interested in alternative energy. We welcome it. Had it been up to us this country would have been on safe, clean nuclear power decades ago. It wasn't conservatives who stopped the construction of the plants the left's beloved French have build in droves and use for 85 percent of their power.
Getting back to the national security issue, once again, anything that would free us from dependence on a foreign power for the energy we need is a Good Thingâ„¢. Conservatives would love to see more research into alternative fuels.
The problem is most of the "solutions" the left has pushed are nothing of the sort. Technologies like wind and solar are too weather dependent and take up enormous amounts of land. Electric cars are neat and all, but merely export the pollution from the tail pipe to the power plant. The environuts never seem to understand electricity must be generated it doesn't magically appear in that wall thingy. Since we're not allowed to build nuclear plants which are clean that means coal and natural gas plants. (As an aside, environmentalists also keep blocking wind and solar plants, one begins to think they hate technology and humans, but that's another column.) Which means the U.S., which is the Saudi Arabia of coal (as another aside we actually have more proven reserves of oil than the Saudis if the green weenies would just let us get at it,) has to blow the tops off mountains so some Los Angeles yuppie can drive his Chevy Volt and feel smug about his environmental consciousness. (Let's not get into the number of toxic chemicals that went into making that car, the disposal hazards or the waste generated when they have to recycle the batteries in that thing either.)
Hydrogen is a possible alternative but there's no distribution infrastructure and there are some real hazards involved in storing a fuel source that leaks through pretty much anything and is many times more volatile than gasoline, which, it must be noted, is an almost perfect storage medium for the energy needed to power a car. It's very stable and highly compact for the density of energy stored.
Ethanol was never anything but a convenient political club with which to beat the right. It's not cost effective without major subsidies, using it drives up the price of food, as corn is used in nearly every food product on the shelves and it would take a farm the size of Texas to produce enough corn alcohol to replace even 10 percent of our gasoline usage. (Yes I know Brazil uses ethanol made from sugarcane almost exclusively. However, those that point that out fail to note Brazil has nothing like the number of people or cars on the road we have, ethanol is simply not an option.)
So what it comes down to, is for right now, and for the foreseeable future -- barring some paradigm-shifting breakthrough, oil, coal and natural gas will continue to provide most of our energy needs. Conservatives very much want new energy sources, both from a national security standpoint and also from an environmental one -- we don't want dirty air or water any more than the greens do. What we do want, while we're investing in research in alternative sources, is to take advantage of the resources we have available, so that we don't have to give up our security to people who are willing to fly fully-loaded 747s into buildings to score political points.
All IMHO, of course.
(Patrick Richardson is the Managing Editor of the Miami News-Record and miamiok.com, he can be emailed at pat.richardson@miaminewsrecord.com)
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