SOTU: Parsing Obama's 'Clean Energy' Promises

The sound of the president's silence on climate change and the BP oil disaster was deafening.

Tellingly, President Barack Obama didn't utter the two words "climate change" once in his State of the Union speech. He did, however, mention "clean energy" several times.

Read these sentences carefully:

So tonight, I challenge you to join me in setting a new goal: by 2035, 80 percent of America's electricity will come from clean-energy sources. Some folks want wind and solar. Others want nuclear, clean coal, and natural gas. To meet this goal, we will need them all -- and I urge Democrats and Republicans to work together to make it happen.

What's happening behind the scenes is that Democrats and Republicans believe that a so-called "clean energy standard" is the way forward on climate change. It takes the word "standard," which environmentalists had successfully paired up with the two words "renewable energy" -- as in "renewable energy standard," and perverts its meaning. What once meant a renewable energy target that the nation should shoot for -- reliance on wind, solar, and other truly clean, renewable energy -- is now becoming conflated with the same old dirty energy of the past: coal, nuclear power, and natural gas.

Code for 'Clean Coal'

But what Obama suggests is that this is a divide to be bridged, that we can move forward with all the old, dirty forms of energy, and maybe add in some wind and solar. The truth is that "clean energy" in this instance is code for "clean coal" (an oxymoron if there ever was one), gas and nuclear power. And "clean coal" and nuclear power are so expensive that they'll starve truly clean energy options in the cradle, and will saddle future generations with debt, radioactive waste, and climate chaos.

The other goal Obama mentioned that has climate implications is high-speed rail. As oil becomes more expensive, this form of transportation will be desperately needed. So hearing this commitment -- "within 25 years, our goal is to give 80 percent of Americans access to high-speed rail, which could allow you go places in half the time it takes to travel by car" -- is welcome news. Will Congress follow through with funding for such a bold initiative? Don't hold your breath.

So, too, his mention of "one million electric cars" coming online is good news, but only if we have a grid that's largely powered by clean and renewable energy. Otherwise, it simply means a greater growth in greenhouse gas emissions.

It's worth noting that Obama made no mention of the state of scientific integrity and openness within his administration, despite making clear in his inaugural address two years ago that science had become politicized to the point of interference with sound scientific policy. Today, scientific openness remains almost as constrained as it was under the previous administration, when climate scientists were muzzled by their media handlers. Obama must take this issue on from his bully pulpit, and not leave it to the Office of Management and Budget to determine what science passes the "cost-benefit" evaluation of economists and what remains off limits for public discussion.

Scrapping Subsidies

Obama did propose ending subsidies for oil companies, adding, "I don't know if you've noticed, but they're doing just fine on their own." He also offered a catchy slogan: "Instead of subsidizing yesterday's energy, let's invest in tomorrow's."

However, as long as the Citizens United Supreme Court ruling stands allowing unlimited campaign contributions from corporations, including large oil companies, it's unlikely that Congress will embrace this proposal.

Obama made no mention of the worst oil spill in U.S. history which occurred less than a year ago. It's also worth noting that the recommendations that emerged from the oil spill commission's findings on the BP oil disaster will require a Congress not beholden to the oil industry to act on those recommendations. Without action, a catastrophe like the BP disaster is likely to recur, according to the commission.

Yet by staying silent on this spill, on the commission's findings, as well as on the disastrous public health and environmental fallout that persists today as a result of the EPA's decision to allow dispersants to be used in the Gulf of Mexico, Obama has let down thousands of fisher-folk and others in the region who are paying for this disaster with their livelihoods and their health.

 

Follow Daphne Wysham on Twitter: www.twitter.com/daphnewysham

Comments

[dragonmaster]

06:21 PM on 01/27/2011

Obama seems like he is grasping for strawman for a problem that James Hansen of NASA recently said- we have entered a period of 'Dangerous Climate Change' . If this is Obama's solution for the problems we are now facing, we are indeed in very deep trouble.

[joevecchio]

04:57 PM on 01/27/2011

the subs to BIG oil are small. Break it down for us. We have 14 billion more for GM. So how does the subs to big oil stop alternatives and EV's? Obama bought his 4th SUV and not a 40mpg Geo Metro or Aveo. Big oil didn't make Rachel Maddow buy her 17mpg truck, did it?

Senator kerry and my liberal neighbors didn't buy a 40mpg Fit. They bought Escalades and a 19mph BMWs.
Went to a Sierra Club meeting and we filmed SUVs and Luxury cars. Why no small cars?

Democrats are half the population so we should be responsibility for the 4 million barrels a day we use to power our cars. Why didn't Obama, who I voted for, ask us liberals to drive smaller cars? My congressman's fundraisers drove big SUVs. How did Big oil make them buy these fuel inefficient cars that will be on the road for ten years. Where do you want to get the gas from in 2020? Nigeria? Angola?

Do you know how polluting mining for the rear earth materials for EVs is? Neodymium. Magnets?

Us liberals are hypocrits. If Obama hates subs for B.O. then why did he buy his 4th SUV???

Why blame it all on Big Oil? And you are woried about the UNITED CITIZEN'S case. What an excuse.... MTV pollutes more than Exxon....

Joe Vecchio liberal film maker.

[David Kearns]

07:50 AM on 01/27/2011

Peak Oil also was not addressed, but then it seldom is for the same reasons mentioned here in this excellent article. Before we get to a situation where greenhouse gases are absolutely choking the environment, we are going to run out of oil. And as with the financial crisis, there is no plan other than highway robbery and the throat slit of the world citizenry down the end of a very dark road.
http://blackgulf.blogspot.com/2011/01/clean-energy-by-2035.html

[David Kearns]

07:45 AM on 01/27/2011

Excellent article. I will massively share.

[Richard2]

05:58 PM on 01/26/2011

"The sound of the president's silence on climate change and the BP oil disaster was deafening."

Persons in the environmental movement should take note. Given the necessary wheeling and dealing that will occur between the President and the GOP in the House, how much effort will the President make to battle the GOP on climate issues? It is probable that President Obama will concede many climate change points to the GOP, in return for favors in other areas. Basically CAGW is something believed in by a small portion of the public, and not supported by observations in the real world, or by objective, open scientific enquiry. So the President will trade what may not even exist, the CO2 driven Global Warming agenda, for other things which are real.

The real question is what will the GOP ask for? The defunding of the IPCC, which produced the discredited 2007 IPCC report? The reform of the NASA climate data manipulation scandal? The defunding of efforts that are not objective science, but rather biased climate "education" efforts?
The requirement that all researchers receiving Federal money publish all their data and provide open access to the public to review it?

[Truth-Seeker]

03:02 PM on 01/26/2011

Very good points especially about "clean coal", gas and nuclear. Also, you are one of the few people to still be concerned about the handling of the Gulf disaster and what we are supposed to have learned to prevent another disaster but haven't. I have been calling for BP and/or the Coast Guard to release that massive database of ideas for doing just that, that they collected through the end of June but are now acting as though this never even existed (and the news media is just playing along). Maybe you should also get involved with my effort to get BP's, now, "secret database", released to the public, so that journalists and independent scientists can have a look at whet was in it. Obama asked scientists and engineers to contribute ideas to it, but has never again talked about this, since the end of the disaster. What's the deal with that? Also, the administration never even thanked the tens of thousands of citizen "brain stormers" - kind of rude, wasn't it?

I'd also like to know what Thad Allen & the DOE knew and "when they it".

[Oh Yes]

01:49 PM on 01/26/2011

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