An artist I know has been predicting doom for civilization because we depend too heavily on electrical energy and it cannot last forever at the levels we consume it here in the US. He religiously turns off lights and other machines in other people’s spaces and rants about how offensive he finds, for example, video art, because after we have no more electricity, it will be totally useless. I used to think he was a bit obsessive. Then I watched Power Trip, the PBS special on the energy situation in the former Soviet Republic of Georgia, and I got a glimpse of the future my artist friend has seen coming for years.
AES Telasi was, until the Enron scandals in 2002 led to plummeting stock in the energy sector and essentially put them out of business, trying to bring contemporary energy systems and reliability to this ancient part of the world. Its story there put into sharp focus for me what’s at stake with regards to our own energy consumption practices:
POWER TRIP details AES-Telasi’s mounting frustrations: Tbilisi residents blamed the company for not supplying power, but there was not enough power available because the country’s corrupt elite often stole electricity without paying for it. Continued struggles with Russia were also an issue. Georgia’s president at the time, Eduard Shevardnadze, remained at odds with the Russian government, especially over Russian access to the region’s oil. Georgia’s location made it an effective gateway to the oil- and gas-rich states to the west. Some Georgians believe that Russia allowed energy debts to accumulate on purpose, then demanded a handover of strategic assets as repayment, thus creating a Russian monopoly of the region’s natural gas supply—a position that would allow it political leverage over Georgia.
When President Shevardnadze threatened to expel Russian troops from Georgian soil, the Russians shut down the natural gas supply. Because gas-powered thermal generation plants provide Georgia with most of its electricity during the winter, AES-Telasi had no energy to distribute. AES was forced to shut down and the country was plunged into darkness.
Most of the story folks were only experiencing partial blackouts; they had electricity for a few hours each day. Even then though, the scenes of elderly residents begging the energy company to turn their electricity back on, of crowds in the streets attacking the cars of AES employees, of the charred body of a man who broke into a transformer station, trying to steal electricity for his home, illustrated vividly what "energy" has come to mean in our contemporary world. In one very chilling scene an AES employee laughs about how they tried to force the local airport to pay its outstanding bill by shutting down their electricity while an incoming plane was trying to land. The airport somehow found the money and paid the bill immediately, and AES turned it back on, which is what made the employee laugh, but what if they hadn’t? And it got worse.
Now, the solution to keeping that from happening here in the US, some would argue, is to exploit every square inch of our existing natural resources (and the totally soulless Bureau of Land Management [BLM] is apparently working overtime to do just that). But clearly a more rational, long-term, and responsible approach is for everyone to use less energy. Conservation: it’s an idea who’s time has come…again. Of course green-minded Americans have been banging that drum for deaf ears for years, but finally, in the US, greens are finding an unexpected ally in their thankless battle, NeoCons:
Neocons and greens first hitched up in the fall, when they jointly backed a proposal put forward by the Institute for the Analysis of Global Security, a Washington-based think tank that tracks energy and security issues. ([James Woolsey, the former director of the Central Intelligence Agency and staunch backer of the Iraq war] is on the IAGS advisory board.) The IAGS plan proposes that the federal government invest $12 billion to: encourage auto makers to build more efficient cars and consumers to buy them; develop industrial facilities to produce plant-based fuels like ethanol; and promote fuel cells for commercial use. The IAGS plan is keen on "plug-in hybrid vehicles," which use internal combustion engines in conjunction with electric motors that are powered by batteries charged by current from standard electric outlets.
The Natural Resources Defense Council and the American Council on Renewable Energy (Woolsey is on the latter’s advisory board, too) both endorsed the IAGS plan. The environmental groups, who have been in the weeds ever since George W. Bush moved in at 1600 Pennsylvania, are happy for any help they can get. "It’s a wonderful confluence. We agree on the same goals, even if it’s for different reasons," says Deron Lovaas, the NRDC’s point-man on auto issues.
The "different reasons" Lovaas refers to are (on the green side) saving the planet and (on the NeoCon side) "to reduce the flow of American dollars to oil-rich Islamic theocracies, Saudi Arabia in particular." Whatever their motivation, their help is welcome.
The aversion to Federal promotion of conservation, however, seems to be that it does little to line the pockets of those currently in power. Consider the case of New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson who is waging a fierce battle against the BLM , who refuse to compromise in their desire to open up over 2 million acres of acres of New Mexico’s sensitive Otero Mesa region for exploration. The really sickening part of the BLM’s resistance and apparent "we’ll ravage as much of the landscape as we wish" attitude is that the energy companies don’t have the resources to exploit the leases they already have. They’re gobbling up leases now because they have an administration unwilling to stop them. Quite the contrary, one willing to help them. From the New York Times:
It is not as if the companies have no place else to go. Even the B.L.M. concedes that fully 85 percent of the oil and gas on federal lands is already available for leasing and development. Meanwhile, a Wilderness Society analysis suggests that the industry may not have the resources to exploit leases it already owns. Only one-fourth of the 42 million acres of B.L.M. land under lease is actually being developed.
I’d never imagine I’d write this, but I hope the NeoCon’s can influence the rest of the conservatives in the country. At least in this respect. If not, it may not be long before we’re only able to blog a few hours each day. (And yes, that’s a bad thing.)
Heh. I’m pro-conservation (I think somewhere I had a post on it…. ahh here it is . The idea that conservation and conservatism are naturally opposed never made sense to me. Like trying to keep poor people from starving, conservation strikes me as something that left and right can have fun fights over means but should have broad agreement about ends.
Well, in the darkness of blackouts all cats are gray, therefore the strangeness of our bedfellows … or something like that.
conservation strikes me as something that left and right can have fun fights over means but should have broad agreement about ends.
totally agree
I sense that the current Administration, however, views “conservation” the same way McDonald’s views “dieting.”
Um, so where do conservatives stand on outsourcing?
In terms of it being another way our tax-dollars are flowing outward?
I mean dollars, not just tax-dollars, sorry.
votermom?
Can you connect the dots on that better? How are “tax dollars” connected to conservation?
It was a typo, Edward, sorry. Here’s my questions, not related to conservation at all, but to things that the left and the right might actually agree on.
What does the right think about the outsourcing/ off-shoring of jobs?
votermom, the right, and I guess many or most economists, think off-shoring is neutral or good for our economy, and esp. good for the foreign countries involved. See Dan Drezner’s excellent center-right blog for tons of discussion.
Er . . . just to pick a nit, we are not going to run out of “electricity.” We may run out of certain means of generating it, but that simply means we have to find other — hopefully renewable — means of generating it. (Although some parties on all sides are going to have to budge from formerly recalcitrant positions. Some additional nuclear capacity may have to be involved, the snobs on Martha’s Vineyard may need to put up with wind generators in their field of view, etc.)
There was an interesting editorial in, of all places, the 01/05 issue of Compliance Week (a publication targeting CEOs, IROs and others responsible for SEC compliance at corporations) discussing the shareholder value of being green; specifically, of not only conservation-minded facilities upgrades and employee incentive programs*, but of simple things like not profligately leaving the lights in your buildings on all night. There are two strip centers near my apartment, and both leave a boatload of lights on all night, every night. One of them doesn’t even have active tenants yet — it’s still under construction. But in their efforts to start letting people know, “We’re here!” the soon-to-be-open Wegman’s, Starbucks, Quiznos, and Provident Bank all leave their signage and interior lights on all the time. (Which, as it happens, shine directly into my bedroom window, interfering with sleep.) Making me even more pissy, the Fairfax County Government Center is about 500 yards up the street, and it leaves the lights on all night too. Grrrrrrrr.
I encourage everyone to write both the tenants of shopping centers like this, and the property managers, urging them to turn the lights off when nobody could possibly be shopping there.
*One company specifically mentioned is Hyperion Solutions, which instituted a $5,000 rewards program for employees who purchase fuel-efficient cars — using any technology — that get at least 45 mpg. Another, Genzyme, made facilities upgrades that resulted in 38% less energy usage and 32% less water usage. That translates directly into shareholder value. It’s a good piece — I’ll excerpt from it if anyone wants to read it.
“Like trying to keep poor people from starving, conservation strikes me as something that left and right can have fun fights over means but should have broad agreement about ends.”
Ah, Sebastian, we’ll bring you over to the dark side yet 😉
Great post, Edward.
votermom,
According to this:
Each dollar that a US company spends on outsourcing a service job to India generates an estimated 1.13 USD in net value for the US, according to a recent study in the current edition of the Milken Institute Review (reg. req’d). The study also estimated that India gains 0.33 USD in net value from local wages, profits earned by local outsourcing companies and their suppliers, and taxes collected from all the local companies involved in the operation.
votermom: my sense is that outsourcing is already one of those issues that defies left/right divisions. Some people on the left think it’s fine, probably with an added bit about the need to help workers with any transitions they need to make from one industry to another, and also about the need for serious investment in order to help ensure that when the dust settles our competitive global niche is a good one. Some people on the right think it’s awful (I expect Pat Buchanan does, for instance, though I don’t feel like doing the work needed to find out.) (And there’s always Lou Dobbs.)
Thanks Stan & rilkefan.
But what about wages lost, and therefore decreased local consumption and decreaed tax revenue?
PS Stan , that link doesn’t work for me, just brings me back here
Er . . . just to pick a nit, we are not going to run out of “electricity.”
Good point. The Power Trip piece had a bit where an AES executive explained to a camera, for the sake of boradcasting to the former Soviet citizens who didn’t understand why they now had to pay for something they had received for free for as long as they could remember. He repeated slowly and patiently that he needed to buy gas to burn to generate the electricity. If he has no gas (and that costs money) he could not generate electricity.
There were dozens of heartbreaking segments with sincere elderly people arguing that AES should just make an exception in their case because they were poor and couldn’t afford the electricity. AES, of course, said no.
Heh. At least, we’re not going to run out of electrons. What may go away is the potential (please, I didn’t mean it) to get them moving.
votermom,
Oops, sorry. Try here – http://polls.yahoo.com/public/archives/57019568/p-quote-379
votermom: the argument for outsourcing being OK goes: the reason outsourcing happens is that we have increased trade across national borders in general. When jobs go overseas, if we consider it in isolation then it’s bad for the workers who lose their jobs, but good for the consumers who get to buy cheaper goods. And this can be a lot of consumers — e.g., if memory serves we are all (in the US) paying much higher prices for sugar than we would if we weren’t protecting our sugar industry (FL politics again), and a lot of people buy sugar.
But if we don’t consider it in isolation, but instead ask about global trade as a whole, then we have to consider not just the people who lose their jobs and so won’t be paying taxes, but also the people who will get jobs they wouldn’t otherwise have had making goods to export, and so will add to tax revenues. Also, as before, the various consumers who should be paying lower prices for the things they buy.
All this being said, you can accept the general point while still thinking that, as far as trade agreements go, the devil is in the details. For instance, since I really do not want American workers to have to compete with people using slave labor, and I do not want to provide incentives for people to use slave labor. So I’d support incorporating a ban on it in trade agreements, as (I suspect) would most people. I would support incorporating labor and environmental standards (I will just say this without getting into details, as that would take too much time), for similar though less extreme reasons: I want globalization to lift all boats, not start a race to the bottom, and I think that the terms of global trade agreements can be set in such a way as to provide incentives for this to happen.
Probably more of an answer than you wanted, but oh well 😉
oh, and votermom: when I said this:
“we have to consider not just the people who lose their jobs and so won’t be paying taxes, but also the people who will get jobs they wouldn’t otherwise have had making goods to export, and so will add to tax revenues.”
I should have added that according to standard economic theory, there will normally be more people with new jobs than people who lost jobs. This doesn’t help the people who lost jobs, which is why (somewhere, earlier) I said that I think we should do what we can to help people who are laid off to make the transition to a new job smoothly.
Probably more of an answer than you wanted
No, that’s perfect, actually. I feel a bit guilty to Edward about going off-topic from energy and the environment, though.
back to your earlier post:
my sense is that outsourcing is already one of those issues that defies left/right divisions
Any bets that one’s view of it ties to one’s personal experience with the phenomenon? 🙂
That corrupt governments and institutions make a lot of money on oil is hardly an observation unique to the neocons. And it is hardly unique to neocons that reducing oil consumption would help on this, and would also reduce the trade deficit. The only ones against doing anything about it are the hard-core libertarians and any politician too cowardly to talk about oil consumption taxes. Oh, right….
If I weren’t using dialup, I’d link to the appropriate cartoon at Mark Fiore… hardly a neocon!
I sense that the current Administration, however, views “conservation” the same way McDonald’s views “dieting.”
That would be nice… These days McDonals has adapted its offerings quite well to dieting 😉
Improved auto efficiency is great, and I’m all for cleaner fuels. But isn’t improving infrastructure another key element in conservation? Not just expanding the economy but making better and cleaner what already exists?
I’m thrilled to see that more people are starting to recognize that conservation can occur without inconveniencing people. Hybrid cars are really a good step in the right direction, and if we can create a Prius snob for every Hummer devotee, we’re surely making some progress.
I do wonder, however, how compatible economic expansion is with environmental conservation. Radical greens would argue that expansion (economic and otherwise) has destroyed any hopes of conserving resources and wilderness for future generations. Moderates have always balanced the abstract goals of conservation with the generally acknowledged need to expand the economy (as Christine Todd Whitman notably did in her Leonard Lopate interview [WNYC] this afternoon).
Perhaps I don’t quite understand the economic policy of the neo-cons. They are more reputed for their polical Ideals than their economic policy, after all, so if someone can explain the neo-conservative economic vision, I’d be grateful.