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that we are enriching governments that we ought not to be, and I think alternative energy sources are important to develop.

At the same time I think it is not only silly but also a disgrace that we do not develop our own oil resources for fear of disfiguring a pristine meadow next door to a herd of moose.

Until this country shows a will to develop our own oil potential, it doesn't seem likely that you will find much support for a dramatic conservation of oil or for the development of alternative sources.

Just my humble opinion.

Looks good, Congressman. I'm particularly pleased with the looks of subsection 3, and I love the idea of making the Federal government account for its oil usage in the aggregate and by department.

With that said, I'm not so sure about ethanol. My understanding is that more net energy goes into its production than is extracted for use as fuel. Am I wrong?

...opening up ANWR to oil drilling?

How about the Federal OCS offshore Georgia?

To offer a big tax cut, and even a small subsidy, to any corporation to build a large coal/fuel conversion plant. Coal is something we have in great abundance and is cheap. The technology exists to make an enviromentaly safe plant, but to make it economicaly feasible it has to have a large output. That requires a huge investment.

  The government could help to allay some of the costs for this initial investment.

Nicely done, seems very sensible, but I also have concerns about current ethanol efficiency.

And when it comes to educating the consumer about tires, put out the word on Run-Flats.  Saving the petroleum needed for the rubber for spare tires and opening up that extra space and weight will make room for other features (AWD, for example) that will also help save fuel.

Figure out a fina answer for nuclear waste and get those plants built and online.

As far as America's over-reliance, I agree.  We should Trust that our sources will continue to supply us, but never Depend on it.  We need, at the very least, a solid back-up plan that we can swing into motion with minimal interruption to our economy.  Even without political or economic pressure from abroad, those sources won't last forever...

I'm all for energy savings, congressman, and I appreciate your efforts with this bill.  However, America learned through the Katrina, Rita, and Wilma aftermaths that there is simply not enough domestic production and supply capacity to satisfy the energy market.  We simply cannot conserve our way out of this problem, as the Vice-President is fond of saying.  We need to produce more here at home while conserving and developing alternative supplies.  

How about a bill that opens up federal lands in Wyoming, Utah, and Montana to drilling.  I've heard reports that the oil shale in that part of the country contains more oil than the whole of Saudi Arabia.  Is this true?  Even if it isn't and there is only a tenth of the known Saudi deposits it would be worth developing.  And, it can be done in an environmentally safe way.

How about a bill that allows exploration and drilling off the coast of Florida and the eastern seaboard beyond the horizon?  We've had oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico forever and there haven't been any significant impacts on the ecosystem or tourism in the gulf region.  Surely we can do the same off the coast of New Jersey.  And what about the west coast?  We know there is oil in the Pacific off of California.  Why not tap into it?

Congressman, I am not an expert on energy, but I can tell you that a two legged stool cannot stand.  Development of a reliable domestic supply of oil and gas is the third leg to the stool you are proposing with this bill.  The others are conservation and development of alternatives.  Your bill seems like a good start, now make it stronger.

Mr Kingston's proposal is a decent start in that it could put our energy problem back in the spotlight, but I don't see much that's new.  Also, the time frame is too long, and the goals are too short.  If we're going to do something of real substance about the problem, then let's challenge ourselves to meet that problem head-on and do as much as possible as soon as possible.

We have a great history of doing big things.  Leading the world to where we can all get the Petroleum Monkey off our backs would be the biggest thing yet.

Everything I've ever heard says that we cannot replace petroleum with ethanol for our transportation needs.  It can supplement, sure, but not replace, so its kind of a dead end.  But the real problem is the last bullet point.  Hydrogen and electric cars don't really solve our energy problem, they just move it to a different place.  We need non-fossil fuel methods of energy production (like nuclear) to make these solutions work.  Why isn't nuclear in the proposal.  It is high time the anti-science left (heh) gets their FUD smacked down by fact in the public's consciousness.

Seeing as government has never been able to determine the fuel de jour, why start now?  Get the government out of the energy business (both production and consumption side) and let consumers decide what is best.  I don't want a tax break for the type of car I buy, I just want a tax break.

Goals are pointless without a plan to get there.  How exactly is government to control demand for Ethanol?

Personally, I think the number one priority of anyone who wants to replace gasoline should be to build a better battery.  When we get better batteries, we can run electric cars the way we run gas-powered cars today.  Electric cars today are so bad that even hybrids, which have gas as an option, can't succeed without government subsidy.

Then, once we get a better battery, demand for elecricity on the grids will go up.  So, the number two priority should be to get more nulcear power plants built.  Fission today can produce the energy we need, unlike experimental or underdeveloped technologies like solar power.

What about favoring the construction of nuclear power plants? For once, we could follow the lead of the French, who have very little oil, and get 80% of their electricity from nuclear power plants.

Nuclear power plants cost more to build than fossil-fuel plants, and require greater security, but fuel costs are minimal, and fuel supply is virtually limitless.

Every kilowatthour of electricity generated by a nuclear power plant means less electricity generated by burning coal, natural gas, or oil. This can divert natural gas usage to home heating (or synthetic fuels), and reduce the amount of oil burned to heat homes (U.S. supplies of natural gas are more plentiful than oil, but we're wasting it on electricity production).

Another idea for conserving oil would be to offer significant tax breaks for homeowners (and apartment landlords) who convert from oil heat to natural gas heat, which is cleaner and more efficient.

Another energy-saving measure would be to offer significant tax credits to electrical power plants who install "co-generation" facilities to recover waste heat from hot water produced in electricity generation. I've seen demonstrations of systems which use the hot water and flue gases as a growth medium for algae which can produce bio-diesel from photosynthesis (which also reduces CO2 emissions). I don't know whether or not this is the best or most efficient idea, but

tax credits against the capital costs of energy-recovery systems (based on the amount of energy recovered) would help push "market forces" in the right direction, toward the most efficient and viable technologies.  

We also need to reduce restrictions on offshore oil and gas drilling, including off the coast of states which right now prohibit it entirely. If environmentally-sensitive people are worried about oil slicks from offshore rigs, they should consider: how many oil slicks were produced by hurricanes Katrina and Rita, which were both Category 5 in the Gulf of Mexico? Zero! If the oil rigs are required to observe the safety standards used in the Gulf of Mexico, why not promote drilling off the coasts of Florida or California?

I agree that it is time for big ideas on energy issues, and we need to carefully weigh the FACTS (not the spin) about efficiency of alternative energy, and possible environmental damage from oil drilling. How many people know that the caribou population has actually INCREASED since the Alaska pipeline was put through? How many people have read Congressman Dana Rohrabacher's (R-CA) report about abundant fish life near offshore drilling rigs? Maybe the caribou and the fish know more about the benefits of oil drilling than the "environmental" lobby in Congress!

I wish you the best of success with your proposal, and hope that other "big ideas" can be incorporated into a major energy-saving bill that can pass both houses of Congress. While some of these "big ideas" might cost money, there could be substantial savings from using energy we have HERE rather than depending on expensive imports from unstable countries, some of whose people hate us.

Is in Colorado and Utah - enough oil shale there (and in Alberta) to handle energy needs for years.  And Shell has a process that makes it viable at $30 a barrel.

I say we go for it.

This plan could have been written by Ted Kennedy. It puts no trust in market forces, assumes that Washington beaurocrats can make better decisions than the market, and cripples future generation with bad decisions made today. Sorry, sir, but you're about 70 years late for govermental 5 year plans to have currency.

Goals are fine, except they require guys in some Washington office to determine how they're going to be me. Which pieces of the economy will have to be taxed and regulated? Which Georgia companies do you propose to be shut down to meet these dictates? These Kyoto-Lite goals shouldn't come from the Republican party.

Every federal project is already held up by way too many well meaning reporting and scoring requirements. Why would you add more cost to an already bloated procurement process by adding another layer of Washington "help"? And why, pray tell, would congress try to meddle in whether an independent agency like the Post office offers Saturday mail delivery?

Lack of faith in the private sector is the core tenant of this entire proposal, and it can be seen nowhere better than here. The market is pushing companies to introduce hybrid technology, and the market will tell them how to do it. No amount of heavy handed government meddling will speed that process. Do you really think you know better than Ford or Toyota how or whether to introduce a certain technology?

Not more ethanol subsidies. We subsidize the growth of corn way beyond any realm of reality now. And still to contributes nothing to our overall energy needs. Study after study has shown that ethanol is a horrible investment when it comes to energy gain. Ethanol subsidies have been the one size fits all answer from Washington for 20 years now. Don't you think it's time to give it a rest and let the market (and not ADM) decide whether that's viable?

More government regulation, more feel-good government intervention that comes between useless and harmful. You have absolutely no confidence in market mechanisms, do you?

Add truck manufacturers to the list of folks that Washington has no faith in to make the right decisions.

So --- it's not enough to subsidize ethanol at every step of the production process from the farm through refining to distribution. We need to subsidize it at the retail point of purchase? That's absurd.

This proposal mirrors the disastrous energy policies we saw from another Georgian back in the 1970's. At that time conservatives rebelled at the lack of faith that market mechanisms to solve problems. We were right then, and these big government solutions are still the wrong prescription for America's energy problems.

It's especially painful that they would be introduced by a Republican.

I agree, it's definitely time to wean America off its oil dependence.

I'd just like to congratulate you on trying to move forward, and warn you to bring your boxing gloves and your mouthpiece...you might not find a very warm welcome for your legislation in Congress.

But fight the good fight.  America needs it.  You'll have this citizen's support.

Sure energy independence is necessary but there is no shortage of American oil; it's just a bit tricky at getting at in part because of our environmental placations and in part because of this:

http://rightfaith.blogspot.com/2005/09/oil-lots-and-lots-and-lots-of-us-oil
.html

Numbers 1 and 2 just sound like more government paperwork.  Number 4 sounds like more goals, paperwork, and bureaucracy.  They sound fine but where are the steps to acheive this goal?

Number 3 sounds great to me too, but then who subsidizes this cost?  Debt?  Increase in taxes?

Alternative sources of energy sound great, but until the market demand increases (which oil companies are sure to prevent until they are good and ready), I simply don't see it happening.

My suggestion is to find a way to get at the shale oil in mid-America.  Then, we have oil independence.

It's good to see someone take a position but I have several 'quibbles.'

Ethanol? Ethanol is a net negative energy source, it takes more energy to produce a gallon of ethanol than it give up when used. But clearly we are not going to wean Congres way from the almost religious comittment to Ethanol. As noted earlier, how do you control demand? The government has only two ways to do that: taxes and by fiat. Mandatory conversion to Ethanol would turn out like just about every other government mandated program, a failure. If you insist on Ethanol how about a significant reduction in fuel taxes for Ethanol users.

No mention of nuclear? We cannot keep putting this off in hopes that some magic 'cold fusion' bullet will arrive. Time to 'belly up to the bar', tell the environmentalists "too bad," and start building some state-of-the-art nuclear plants. The modern 'pebble bed' reactor design is a major step forward and we ought to capitalize on it.

Domestic drilling? Let's cut the nonsense and open up ANWR and offshore drilling.

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Buckland hits it right on the head here.  Apparently the House GOP has forgotten what the word 'markets' means.  Instead of meaningfully deregulating nuclear plant and environmentalist straitjacket regs, it's just more subsidies, more subsidies, more market-distorting subsidies...and it's just a pure coincidence that most of these subsidies are going to our favorites, pretending to solve problems while continuing to cheat the base that has worked for so long to elect them.  This is deceit, corruption and condescension speaking, not honesty or conservatism.

It's unbelievable to me that the House GOP doesn't see this.  The tragedy about November 2006 won't be that the Republicans will suffer so much--it was that it was so obvious from so far away, and the House GOP was too drunk on spending to see it at all.

Congressman Kingston is symptomatic of the GOP Congress's current malaise, and a disgrace to the RedState name and grassroots conservatives who have supported him.

makes too much sense.  Given new drilling technology and fast developing ones, add in the expanse of U.S. land mass and offshore drilling,consider the people of Alaska want more drilling not less,and get the caribou out of your head, unless you have romantic inclinations, and we can obtain for ourselve ample breathing space.  Ethanol? That's been around since my grand mother got her first kiss.  Conservation,if we're not careful they'll have us driving around in cardboard cars and I trust the conservation and opportunities of Pricing rather than some GS 11 sleeping at his desk in Washington.  Get that man a pillow and check on his next automatic step increase!

but to handle the larger investments needed for these facilities, we just need to loosen state public utility rate rules so that utilities do not have to choose the cheapest technology, but can look at discounted net present values.

We JUST PASSED an energy bill.  Isn't it a little bit of a red flag that just after we finally pass this energy bill, that America has supposedly been crying out for for years, all of a sudden it's time to lay some big ideas on the table?  These issues sound like the exact things that should have been debated BEFORE the energy bill was passed.

It's just further evidence that the "energy bill" was nothing more than a big hunk of useless pork.  No wonder it was routinely castigated from both the Left and the Right.  The debate on the energy bill would have been a great time for the GOP majority to stand up and say "wait a minute... we're discussing all the wrong things here."

On a side note, what is amusing about today's political climate is that today the Republicans will introduce a bill chock full of classic liberal ideas, and tomorrow they will hold a press conference to say Democrats have no ideas.

the environmentalists and other scare mongers have been way too influential with nuclear power generation.  Heck, even the French have, IIRC, a huge portion of their electricity generated with nuclear power.  

Also agree on ethanol, it's the price we pay for having Grassley as chairman of the finance committee (and for America's continuing romance with farmers, get over it), along with massive farm subsidies.

I'm a little conflicted on domestic drilling.  I'd rather we use up their oil first and keep ours until it's truly needed.  OTOH, I don't like the fact that we have to be nice to the Saudis, et al. all the time (and all the associated problems that generates).

government!  The above post is exactly right.  Most government programs are boondogles for one state or industry or another, create too much market interference, and do not create consistent long-term incentives to elicit investment.  

The government should not be micromanaging, but should recognize that the real sources of our " energy problem" are market failure - petroleum prices do not reflect any of the defense and security costs that we pay in the forms of a tremendous military expenditures, lives of soldiers, and hostility abroad.  The way to address this problem, while addressing buget issues as well, is to shift these costs from the general taxpayer (and our children) to where they belong - petroleum users.  In other words, we should be honest enough to say that we need a petroleum import tax - probably with a graduated introduction that gives people a forewarning of what is coming around the corner.

The market inventives created by that will fuel development of new resources at home, new fuel-efficient technologies and change behavior generally, while avoiding government micromanagement and boondoggles like methane, which simply waste energy.

I think there`s a Cato study on this somewhere ... but in any case we can see much more efficient energy use on a BTU/GNP basis in practically every other OECD country, without a significant impact on per capita GNP.  This pill is the medicine we need, not regulation and subsidies by a thousand cuts.

there's no leadership in Congress.   The energy bill that just passed is a sham.    While I may disagree with which policies we achieve it, energy self sufficiency is a necessity.   I don't think it would be good for our economy or our national security for our government to sit on its hands while market forces determine our fuel choices.    I believe too much is at stake.

It was as if "pass an energy bill" was an item on the to-do list, and now they can check it off.  The substance of what actually went into that energy bill didn't seem particularly important to any of them.

Energy issues are not a result of market failure. They're a result of markets at work. Demand changes move faster than suppliers can react, causing spikes in price -- in both upwards and downwards directions.

Over the last few years the 2 countries with the largest populations have been competing for natural resources. That's a good thing. The standard of living in both countries have raised considerably in just the last 5 years, making both of these countries more stable politically. The impact is that all natural resources have been getting pricier. Since it takes years to get wells into production (and a decade or more for a refinery) the inevitable result is higher prices. That's not a bug of in an economic system, it's a feature.

Taxes shouldn't be there to influence consumer behavior. They should be there to raise money. Period. Allegedly smart guys in Washington get all tingly with the thought of large taxes that aren't directly seen by the consumer. These taxes would do nothing but punish US consumers and industry to achieve an industrial goal.

The real medicine we need is for government to create a framework where millions of consumers and business people can achieve the optimum solutions for problems. That would include easier licensing of energy producing facilities (including but not limited to nuclear and oil refineries) and better access to government land (Note: the real title is land owned by citizens) for energy extraction (in Alaska, offshore, and other areas).

The last piece that government needs to do after a good framework for business is created is to stay out of the way. These energy proposals have lifetimes that last between 20 years and forever. However energy situations change. Congress is aflutter with these proposals because the price of gas is $2+. Would anybody have cared about this proposal in a time of $1.19 gas? However gas prices surge and then ebb. It's already down 25% from the high a few months ago. The damage of bad proposals will be felt for years, no matter where the prices are.

With all due and appropriate respect Congressman, I have to tell you that I hate almost every single aspect of this proposal.  As you know this is just one knucklehead's opinion (mine, in this case), but hey - you asked!

Briefly,

Establish an aggressive goal to achieve oil savings...

Yea!  We set a goal!  Look, we're doing something!

How do we get there?  Uh, that's for someone else to figure out.

As a certain radio talk-show host of some note might have said in some long-forgotten time - this stinks of symbolism over substance.  Also, it has some dubious similarities to the (deservedly rejected) Kyoto formula - arbitrary targets with no means to get there.  Ugh! and Double-ugh!

Develop better "scoring" requirements for the federal government to take into account the "oil savings"...

Aside from the "internal audit of the federal government's usage" - which is a fantastic idea, long overdue, and should be immediately implemented with gusto - this seems to be entirely inside baseball.  How, precisely, does this impact energy production/consumption other than at the margins?

Provide incentives to consumers...

1. Hybrids are already selling-out as soon as they come in (I purchased my PRIUS in February - had to wait 2-weeks for my actual vehicle to arrive - the one we test-drove sold the day we test-drove it) - we don't need to subsidize them further.
   
   
2. With these proposals, the Federal Government is telling US Auto Manufacturers they don't know how to make cars people want to buy.  GM seems to be getting that message already from the market.  More White-Collar-Welfare isn't going to deliver that message better than the market.
   
   
3. Ditto for truck manufacturers.
   
   
4. Tire efficiency - fine.  Marginal help, but fine.

Embraces new fuel choices...

Dear Lord, not ethanol again!  Please Congressman, I beg you.

It's time for big ideas again

With all due respect again Congressman, they're not here.

Besides, "big ideas" are not what's needed.  What's needed is the will to get nuclear back up and running, explore and extract here @ home, forget the Hail-Mary passes (like fuel cells) proposed recently until the technology and infrastructure are ready, and to - dare I say it - trust the market.

I would like to think those are the sorts of things that would come out of a majority Republican caucus - not this Democrat-lite mixture of subsidy and market distortions.

Again, you asked - and thanks for the opportunity.

Cheers.

I find this argument to be meritless, and no doubt one that is frequented by the oil oligarchs.

I found this interesting argument for ethanol production that dispells the above myth.

The energy balance of ethanol is found by taking the amount of energy contained in a gallon of ethanol (roughly 76,000 Btu) and subtracting the amount of energy that goes into producing a gallon of ethanol. Critics of ethanol have argued that it has a negative net energy value (NEV), meaning that ethanol requires more energy to make than it actually produces. However, over the years numerous studies have shown that ethanol does indeed have a positive NEV. Most recently, a 2002 study by the US Department of Agriculture that accounts for gasoline and diesel fuel use, fertilizers and a variety of other energy inputs in the production, concluded that the energy balance of ethanol is 1.34:1.1 This means that ethanol "yields 34% more energy than it takes to produce it, including growing the corn, harvesting it, transporting it and distilling it into ethanol." These data are consistent with a study by Dr. Bruce Dale, Michigan State University (2002), and a study by Argonne National Laboratory (1999).

Now, I've read that corn may not be the most efficient crop from which to produce ethanol, but I find it quite disengenious that the oil oligarchs continue to spit out the "ethanol is a net energy loser" when countries like Brazil are making it work, and for about half the cost of regular gas for a gallon of gas.  If the cost of production resulted in a net loss on efficiency then the Brazilian govt must be doing one heck of a subsidization of that industry... but such isn't the case, the cost of production and refinement is considerably less, largely because of the net efficiency of distillation.

I don't disagree with your statements on Nuclear energy, but I'm tired of the neomythologies that have been spun by the spin doctors who take their funding from the oil oligarchs and then tell us what they've been told to tell us.

I'm not so sure that the oil industry today is all that dissimilar to the days of Standard Steel.  If it walks like a oligarchy, talks like one it just might be one, and well, if there are only a half-dozen companies setting energy policy by fiat, what in the world does that have to do with free markets any more than Standard Steel had the ability to price fix and distort the market to its own benefit at the end of the 19th century?

Converting coal to gasoline is cheaper than oil to gasoline!

According to the experts, coal to gasoline is cheaper per gallon than from oil if oil costs more than $30 per barrel.(currently above $60 per barrel)

Second, how about instead of a fixed standard miles per gallon which might kill jobs because people love buying larger vehicles, a flexible standard that frees us from foreign oil.

For example a car that travels 12,000 miles per year will use 400 gallons if it gets 30 miles per gallon, and will use 600 gallons if it only gets 20. Require that the automakers produce (or get produced on their behalf) the 200 extra gallons using either coal or ethanol. So if the automaker produced 1 million vehicles, they would have to secure 200 million gallons of domestically produced gasoline from coal or ethanol.  

The automakers could turn around and sell the fuel on the domestic market so the true cost to the automaker simply be the difference between the cost of making the coal or ethanol and the price for which they can sell it. In the above case, suppose the market price for gasoline is $1.50 (current wholesale price without tax) and it cost the automaker $2 per gallon to obtain coal or ethanol gasoline. The cost to the automaker would be $0.50 per gallon with 200 gallons, the total cost would be $100 million or $100 per vehicle they sold. This cost could encourage automakers to produce more efficient vehicles, but even if it did not, at least the gasoline would be produced domestically.

All I see in this proposal are platitudes and pork:

1) Goals are great but yours doesn't recognize that a growing economy consumes more energy. Even as the energy input per unit of GDP of the U.S. economy has declined over the last 30 years, energy consumption has still increased.

2)I would hope that the government would already be looking at reducing "costs" when an expense item increases. With fuel prices having increased  most companies are not just looking at how to reduce fuel usage to reduce expenses but are also looking at what other items might  be reduced to keep costs in line with budgets, and still maintain their services for their customer. COngress has shown no willingness to require this exercise.

3)Higher prices for fuel are already driving consumers and producers to look for different modes of transportation alternatives such as hybrid vehicles and lighter materials. How many billions did the government waste on this item and item number 4 during the last energy crisis in the 1970's? The market will select these items better than the government without wasting my taxpayer dollars.

4) Ethanol is at best an energy wash when one looks at all the energy components needed to produce it, and many studies suggest it is an energy consumer. That doesn't even include looking at all the pesticide and other environmental problems involved in producing it. In regards to electricity, most new power plants built have been natural gas fired. The only problem is natural gas is getting quite expensive because onshore U.S production and reserves are declining. Future natural gas must either come from increasing reliance on the deepwater gulf (more hurricane related problems as well as pipeline constraints), or require the politically hard vote to allow drilling off California, the east coast and Alaska. The dirty little secret the Congressman won't tell you is much of the natural gas rerves are associated with oil fields so drilling ANWR doesn't only open up more oil production but also more gas production. In fact over 30 trillion cubic feet of gas is locked up in Alaska right now at Prudhoe but requires a $24 billion dollar pipeline or expensive LNG plants (liquified natural gas).

Congressman Kingston, come back to me with your plan when you have first addressed allowing the rquired drilling in the U.S., when you have allowed coal to be produced for fluidized coal bed plants (plants with significantly reduced pollution), and when you have allowed additional pipelines, electrical power lines, and LNG plants to be built. These are all things easily under the federal and state governments purview and don't cost the taxpayer anything.

Isn't overregulation also a big problem? Not to mention American crackpotizm, if that's a word? We know that building 50 new nuclear plants would be a tremendous boost to our energy independence. With plenty of electricity available, you can turn anything into anything almost. Make hydrogen. Fill batteries. So, why not come up with a good solid design for a nuclear power plant, with redundant safety and security, and then just build 50 of the exact same thing? Then, the oversight of building all these copies is the oversight of construction quality. The design has been settled. That's where most of our efforts should go. That, and basic conservation. Screw the anti-nuclear crackpots. Nuclear, Nuclear, Nuclear!!!!!!

This is a horrible plan.

How about just letting the market work? If fuel prices are high enough people will buy fuel efficient cars on their own. They don't need any additional incentives.

Ethanol is a great deal for farmers and the producers... but not really for anybody else. E-85 is already readily available here, but the savings from using it (even with all the government subsudies) are non existent. Even when gas was $3 a gallon.

The oil companies will be doing it. They won't need any help from us to start using coal if it really cost half as much as oil currently does. I'll believe those numbers when I see it happening, though.

Automakers are not in the business of making or selling fuel. Why not just nationalize them and have a government agency a few acceptible models to choose from?

The viability of hydrogen power depends on how the hydrogen is produced.

Burning hydrogen yields a tremendous amount of energy (about 50,000 Btu/lb) as compared to most hydrocarbons (about 20,000 Btu/lb), and only emits water vapor as a by-product. But if the hydrogen is produced from fossil fuels, it is not worth the trouble, because the energy obtained from hydrogen, minus the energy used to produce it, is less than the energy obtained by burning the fossil fuel itself.

However, there may be a non-fossil-fuel way to obtain hydrogen. What about using electricity from a nuclear power plant to electrolyze water (separate it into hydrogen and oxygen), then capture the hydrogen on metals as some form of hydride, to be burned later and get the water back?

Hydrogen is definitely clean-burning energy. The problem is, you need nuclear power plants to make it worthwhile. But maybe, with enough brain power, where there's a will, there may be a way. Are there any fuel-cell experts out there that might have any suggestions?

I'm not familiar with any oil company saying ethanol can't be produced efficiently. From what I see it's the ethanol industry industry itself saying it can't be efficient and therefore in need of subsidization.

I think GREATLY increased Ethanol use would be great. But to get there it has to stand on its own economically. If it's so great and can be grown/manufactured for half the cost of gas then there's no need of subsidies.

Therefore remove the ethanol requirements that governments at different levels put in place, remove subsidies for the producers, and let's see how well it works. If it grows to 50% of US transportation energy usage -- great. If it falls to 0% -- also great.

I'm not familiar with the Brazilian model of ethanol production. However anything can be converted to energy use when sufficiently subsidized. The South Africans converted coal to gas back in the 70's, as did the Germans in WWII. However I have no faith the Brazilian engineers can figure out how to do this cost efficiently when the rest of the world can't.

Thanks, an intersting note about the efficiency of ethanol.

I believe if ethanol really became an important energy source, the efficiency of producing it would dramatically improve.  I imagine we could even breed or genetically manipulate new plants.  I've heard talk about sugar beet and sorghum as ethanol crops, but I don't know how they compare to corn.

There are also oil-bearing crops, such as rapeseed and sunflower.  The figures I've seen suggest the energy output of these crops is only about 10 percent of the bioethanol crops though, but again there is room for genetic improvement.  And bio-oil might find uses such as production of plastics and chemicals, if petrolium is ever less available.

the status of the proposed LNG pipeline in Alaska?

I haven't kept up on it since I was in Alaska in 2000, and I haven't had much luck finding new information.  It seems like a project that should have been happening years ago.

Hydrogen is like Ethanol without the checks for the farmers (who often own shares in the ethanol plants as well). It sounds good, but it makes no sense at this point.

So we pretty much have the manufacturing process and plant selection down for that. We've been making booze for a long time. The ATF requires the ethanol producers poison the ethanol with benzene or something before it leaves the plant so people don't drink it.

It could happen...

I do know that alcohol/water reach a constant boiling solution at about 92% alcohol, and benzene has to be added to get rid of that last 8% of the water. However I didn't know that the benzene also serves the purpose of keeping out the "WOW, Tanks full of Everclear" guys. I had always assumed the benzene was taken out later.

Thanks.

regarding the construction of new oil refineries.  Its mostly moonshine (ok, that was a bad pun), in that if a corporation can get the govt (meaning you and me) to fund something then they'll seek funding, regardless of the actual truth or needs of the industry.  

I tend to agree that if ethanol is to work it needs to succeed on its own merits.  If we have a disagreement it is on the merits themselves.

What motivation do they have to make more efficient vehicles?  Why wouldn't they want to maximize profits and try to sell less efficient vehicles so they could sell more gas?

I have never heard of such a thing. Any references on that?

LNG is a horrible item to transport. It requires extremely high pressure and extremely low temperatures. Neither is conducive for long distance pipeline transport.

However that may be why that's not my area. Just not imaginative to solve these problems.

Most of what I think about this has already been posted. I think your effort to try something is great, I also think It is commendable that you are actually asking us for ideas. I do think your energies are misplaced. things like public awareness of tire pressures sounds like its going to be a really expensive project to get those who didnt to read their owners manual to do so. And I doubt the effect will be of any significance.



A lot sounds like more govt spending. How about this?



Deregulation!



The best way to get new inventions created and better efficiencies evolved is to untie the hands of the people who do this stuff best. Also, I hear there are over 40 different "blends" that have to be made for gasoline. That sounds pretty inefficient. I dont know if it is state regulation, if so, then I understand and thats that, but if it is on a federal level it seems like a lot. Letting companies build more refineries, wells, windfarms of the coast of Martha's Vineyard would also be a good step. The best thing is it costs a lot less per taxpayer than a bloated govt project riddled with subsidies.



About Ethanol



Either ethanol is a money loser or it isnt. the market should decide that. Also, I have heard that Brazil is the largest producer of Ethanol in the world. Creating ethanol blends on a large scale will not reduce our foreign dependency if it turns out that it is cheaper to import it from Brazil than to refine it here.



Incentives



I think incentives are great, I have no problem with them, they are the best way the government can get involved in something, the opposite being regulation.



Promoting Alternative Energy



Here is where I have a novel idea that has never been tried. Instead of being in the BUSINESS of alternative energy, PROMOTE investment in existing companies that already are working on it. Companies like FuelCell Energy, Inc. (FCEL) and Plug Power (PLUG) already have fuel cell generators they are selling and are doing lots of research. I know this is a very short list of companies in one industry but you get the idea. This way, instead of raising taxes to do the same research people can invest themselves. If you like wind power, invest in wind, if you like fuel cells, invest in that. Citizens inject research money into a public company by buying shares, and everyone chooses what they want to invest in. The bonus is that they may actually MAKE money on their investment someday. I dont know how this would be done exactly. You obviously couldnt promote specific companies exclusively because then you'd have pay-to-play contribution issues, maybe a website with a big list.



And, when I say promote business I do NOT mean financially. The worst thing would be for government getting their meddling hands into individual businesses more than they are already. I am just saying to get the word out as a source of information. Honestly I think that should be goverment's only purpose in a LOT of areas...instead of another huge building built for the purpose of doling out checks, add a webpage of private resources!



One slightly unrealted item



I know lowering the cost of gas is not on your list but, instead of the pathetic show we just had of Congress dragging in oil execs and asking them how dare they amass windfall profits of about 10 cents a gallon, why dont you ask yourselves why am I paying 43.5 cents a gallon in taxes...to an organization that did NOTHING to produce that gallon of gas? If anything my tax money is just going to help state and federal govt find more ways to impede the process of that gallon getting to market.



thanks for your time.

I didn't mean they were transporting LNG.  My understanding is that they wanted to build a gas pipeline which hooks up to a LNG plant on the south coast of Alaska.

Five years ago it seemed like this was a political football that was getting held up for no good reason.  I seem to remember seeing one study which said that the most efficient solution would actually involve building a pipeline all the way to the lower 48, but no one wanted that because the bulk of the jobs and tax revenues would end up going to Canada instead of Alaska.  I might be completely imagining this.

Either way, I never understood the hold up, and I was wondering where things stand now on the LNG project.

Ethanol fuel is available now and is being used widely in some parts of the US. In fact, you can buy flexi cars now which are already equipped to handle an alcohol/gasoline mix of 85/15.

Does it make more sense to buy that next barrel of fuel from a sugar farmer in Minnesota or from a terrorist-supporting nation?

Brazil offers a real success story - they started down this road of renewable fuels back in the 1960s and now over 40 percent of their cars and trucks run on sugar based Ethanol.

It's not the only solution - but it's one that is available now, is already part of our nation's fuel equation, and will lead to the future.

Congressman Kingston believes that every option needs to be on the table, which is why he recognizes  that we can not drill or carpool our way out of the Middle East.

ANWR and deep sea exploration should both be considered - but all too often - regardless of whether the arguments are right or wrong - those two measures bring down good legislation.

I have a tendency to jump to one interpretation when another may be more reasonable.

Thanks.

Hydrogen is not a fuel that is readily available to us.  It costs energy we get from us plus more for us to produce or amass it in sufficient quantities to use.

So, whatever you propose that we use to fuel the generation of hydrogen gas, is what we might as well use directly to begin with!

That should have read

"It costs us the energy we get from burning it, plus more, to produce or amass [Hydrogen] in quantities sufficient for our uses."

Does it make more sense to buy that next barrel of fuel from a sugar farmer in Minnesota or from a terrorist-supporting nation?

You oughta read a new book, only out since 1776. It goes pretty deeply into the costs of subsidizing local production and how that's a really bad thing for the country. One excellent example was that the push at that time to get grapes to grow in Scotland. I'm sure that people would have rather bought grapes from the Scots than Spaniards. However it wasn't a good idea then, nor is it now.

But since Brazil is such a success story, do I take it that you would be in favor of eliminating all subsidies for ethanol? If it can be successful there surely out businessmen and engineers can figure it out. The logical point of a success is that subsidies are no longer needed. No? Yes? Maybe?

I see with all of the "they do it in Brazil" notes here, I'm going to have to read up on the Brazilian Ethanol Miracle.

Would be that it is relatively straightforward (or it seems so to me, and I must admit to not being a chemist) to generate by way of electrical power and is potentially more useful for mobile, or remote, devices which must consume power. Cars and trucks and so forth.

And the advertising slogan could be, "This is Not Your Father's Nuclear Power Plant", with a picture of Homer Simpson at work, and a red circle-slash over it.   The American left defines nuclear power by caricature and denies its advancement.  This must stop now.  

What if the demand for radioactive ore became so great that terrorists couldn't afford it even if they had access to it? ;)

Liqour is with all the regulation, taxes and tarrifs. That liter of vodka ends up costing about 40x what it costs to produce by the time you buy it.

Our future natural gas problems are much more serious than any problems we might have getting crude or refined fuels. At least we can buy crude from overseas. Natural gas is a real pain to ship overseas. 97% of our supply comes by pipeline.

I looked into this a few months ago and came to the conclusion it can't work economically (at least at these oil prices). Do a search online on the subject and you will probably agree.

It works for Brazil because Sugar Cane is a very good substance to make alcohol from. Brazil also has a good year round climate. Brazil also revamped its entire infrastructure to do so. Our closest substance is Sugar Beets... you may notice that there isn't a state famous for growing sugar beets. Corn you say!... stated simply... corn generally sucks for this.

The funny thing about this is that its really bad for the environment. The production would involve massive land use, increased soil erosion, greenhouse gas production, increased fertilizer use, increased irrigation among others. The enviro-whackos would go crazy!

There is a lot more to hydrogen than how you produce it.

Regardless of the choice of onboard fuel storage (liquid or hydride), we have to create and build a distribution infrastructure parallel to the current petroleum-based infrastructure: processing plants, pipelines, terminals, storage, local delivery, and finally pumping stations to put it in your car. If we go down the liquid hydrogen route all of this to handle a volatile liquid under pressure at minus 400 degrees (the vehicle fueling system has to be safe for everyone from your teenager and 70 year old aunt Sally to handle.) If we go down the metal hydride route the weigh penalty for the vehicle is significant when you consider the amount of usable hydrogen you can pack into a metalic hydride --- which isn't much per unit weight.

And all of this has to exist in parallel, gasoline/diesel vehicles are going to be on the road for a long time to come.

There is a lot to be said for leaving ours in the ground and buring the other guy's oil first.

First, the study is from the Department of Agriculture so I can't say that they may be completely unbiased here :-) My views on the net-negative argument are base on other research and estimates, clearly not the one you cite. Anecdotally, it is hard to see how Ethanol is anything other than a net-negative. Ethanol has a significantly lower specific heat than gasoline and just about anything else except maybe peat moss :-)

the LNG transport and distribution problem a thousand-fold and you've got something close to a nationwide liquid hydrogen fuel distrbution problem.

Congressman, I have a few suggestions:

Tax credits or susidies for people to replace their fuel oil heating systems.  Try to act in concert with the states for these incentives.  Most of the heating oil use seems to be in the supposedly environmentally aware northeast.

Tax credits for buying a more efficient furnace.  My parents bought an 80% efficient (as opposed to something like 98% efficient) gas haeter because the difference would not be made up for 20 years or so.  Or, encourage the manufacturers to only make the more efficient models by saying that in year X heaters have to be at least __% efficient.

Tax credits for people who install more energy efficient windows.  Making buildings more energy efficient might be the biggest (and arguably the easiest) way of reducing energy usage.

Tax credits for those who install solar or wind power.

Congressman Kingston --

Glad to hear you are at work on the energy fleet.

Now, can we see a similar bill that would fund research and plants that burn garbage.

I know that there are some issues with this type of plant, but I also know that if there is one thing that will never be a shortage of in America, it's garbage.

With oil prices on the rise, I can't believe that we're not close to the break even point on trash conversion into energy.

I would agree with you if Hydrogen weren't so explosively flammable in our atmosphere.

It is, though, so it's a lousy choice for a motor vehicle.  Gas burns, but Hydrogen is rocket fuel.

Plus, it leaks out of anything. If this were adopted on a widespread basis, the next thing the Green Weenies would be screaming about would be all the hydrogen emissions.

We don't have enough natural gas production to switch everybody over from heating oil.

What about converting used cooking oil into bio diesel?

Lots of people are starting to sell mini bio-diesel refineries--so the free market probably supports the idea.

If a city would collect all used vegetable oil from the restaurants and manufacturers in town and convert it to bio-diesel they could fuel their city vehicles with it.

On the surface this would seem economical.  They have to dispose of the oil anyway through their waste management system.

Is this already done?  

Seems like a sensible, environmentally friendly and uncomplicated partial solution, requiring no subsidies, which might even pay for itself.

"Does it make more sense to buy that next barrel of fuel from a sugar farmer in Minnesota or from a terrorist-supporting nation?"

Hmmm. . . supporting our enemies, or expending our energy pursuing an ineffective solution, which just happens to be a politically expedient but salable sop to Cargill, Archer-Daniels-Midland, and early primary states. . .

How about supporting domestic oil and gas development, the engineering economy of which no one needs to debate? That's my choice!

Regarding bringing Prudhoe Bay gas to the lower 48, there are 3 options that have been investigated:

1. A pipeline that transports gas to southern Alaska where it is liquiified (LNG) then shipped to the lower 48 where it would be regassified.
   
2. and 3) These two options are similar in that they involve natural gas pipelines (no liquification) running from Prudhoe through Canada to the lower 48. The differences in the two pipelines involves where the pipelines would run as Canada wishes a more expensive line that would allow them to sell their significant natural gas reserves from their arctic areas. One of these two lines looks like it will likely proceed. To make any of these lines economically viable natural gas will have to sell between $3.00 and $5.00 a MCF (thousand cubic feet) at a minimum. This compares to prices in the 1990's where we paid between $1.00 and $2.00 per MCF, but is certainly cheaper than the $12.00 to $13.00 per MCF on the current future markets.

The truth is there are huge gas reserves around the world but natural gas is not easy or cheap to transport. Japan has been importing LNG from around the world for decades but has been paying $3.00 to $5.00 per MCF for that gas.

The U.S. also has problems with its energy infrastructure. Pipleines for oil, gas, products need to be looped, or new lines built. Currently if an oil or product pipeline goes down you are guaranteed shortages in the interior U.S. as well as what you saw in Atlanta. This is a terrorrist dream scenario.

The politicians also won't tell you the real reasons no new refineries have been built in the U.S. for the last 20 years:

1. Refineries have been lousy investments for 30 years returning returns of 4% to 5%. Why put your monies in refineries when you do better with a treasury bill at no risk. Most major oil companies have sold off their refineries not associated with their chemical companies (where returns are volatile but similar to the upstream production end over long periods of time) to small or midmajor companies due to the poor returns and potential large environmental liabiliites.
   
2. New refineries will cost around $2 billion to build and require 150,000 to 200,000 barrels a day to be economical. With U.S. oil production declining and the poor economic returns why build a refinery when it will take at least 5 to 10 years to get approval (if at all) and then you will have to find 150,000 or more barrels a day from foreign sources. WHo's going to take that risk to find that much nonsecure oil, particularily when the exporting companies are already looking to put refineries and chemical plants in their own country. You can blame your politicians for restricting drilling for one part of our refining problem.
   

Trash to energy plants have been economical since the early 1990's and a number have been built. The problem is that the environmentalists don't like them because of potential air pollution problems (overhyped problems in my opinion).

You also have the specter of having to testify to congress and having them try to take your earnings when the refining margins do become worthwhile.

energy bill give subsidies to oil companies? (Please correct me if I'm wrong). If that was the case, I would rather give incentives to car manufacturers to develop hybrid technology, then throw more cash at oil companies.

Great post.  Sounds like the state of play hasn't actually changed that much in 5 years.

Want to solve all the problems surrounding oil?  Its easy, just raise the gas tax 200% or so.  At $5 per gallon, everybody will start on the path of conservation.  And we could use the money to build huge public transport systems!  Our consumption goes down, emissions go down, and the federal coffers overflow with abundance!  You could call it a national security issue to get support.

All sarcasm aside, how about reducing the gas tax?  When the government (fed+state) makes four times more tax on a gallon of gas than the producer makes in profit, seems like they are complicit in keeping the free market from being efficient.  How about ANWR?  Why dance around it?  Attack the stupidity, and get re-elected.  Governance based on fallacy is no governance at all.

Question - Does China plan on reducing their consumption of fossil fuels?  How about India?  Indonesia?  Cheap fuel is one of the engines of economic growth.  Lets buy more of it.

Why not propose something more interesting like a competition with a billion dollar grant award at the end for the first normal car (avail at reg price) to drive from Miami to NY on one normal tank of gas?  How about creating public transportation that is competitive in the market vs the automobile?

We do need big ideas.  But not ones that hinder growth.  Here is a really big idea, get the environmentalist agenda out of the classroom and teach people economics.  Its thirty years later, and most of the solutions require us to pay more, one way or another, and shackling the free market didn't get us any closer to oil independence.

Thanks for the dialog, keep it up!

the key constraint simply being utility commission approvals for the slightly higher upront investment cost:

A plant with the low-pollution, high-efficiency technology demonstrated at the Tampa Electric plant is about 20 percent more expensive to build than a conventional plant that burns pulverized coal. This complicates financing, especially in deregulated markets, while elsewhere utilities must persuade regulators to set aside their customary standard of requiring utilities to use their lowest-cost alternatives.

"

More quotes from a May 2005 NYT article:

The operating savings of such plants start with more efficient combustion: they make use of at least 15 percent more of the energy released by burning coal than conventional plants do, so less fuel is needed. The plants also need about 40 percent less water than conventional coal plants, a significant consideration in arid Western states.

But for some people, including Mr. Rogers and other utility leaders who anticipate stricter pollution limits, the primary virtue of integrated gasification combined-cycle plants is their ability to chemically strip pollutants from gasified coal more efficiently and cost-effectively, before it is burned, rather than trying to filter it out of exhaust.

Proponents say that half of coal's pollutants - including sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides, which contribute to acid rain and smog - can be chemically stripped out before combustion. So can about 95 percent of the mercury in coal, at about a tenth the cost of trying to scrub it from exhaust gases racing up a smokestack.

The biggest long-term draw for gasification technology is its ability to capture carbon before combustion. If greenhouse-gas limits are enacted, that job will be much harder and more expensive to do with conventional coal-fired plants.

USA Today

Electricity Forum

national utility commissions

DOE

and would only add that government regulation is responsible for most of the mess in which we now find ourselves.

We would have oil coming from American sources if not for congressional meddling.  Refineries would be built and producing fuel were it not for the good intentions of our elected reps.

The road to h*ll is paved with good intentions.

unless we convert all of our warm wetlands to sugar cane.

Ethanol from corn is inefficient - and actually wastes petroleum - given all of the petroleum/fertilizer inputs into corn.  Same with sugar beets (for which North Dakota is famous, by the way).

other externalities.  Otherwise, the market works just fine, and the government should not meddle and just keep its porker hands off.

If you do not believe there are externalities - other than NIMBY issues - then there really no problem to solve, is there?  The market must be working fine, and there is nothing for the government to tinker with.

However, the whole point, recognized by all, is that there are very high defense costs and security issues stemming from our high dependence on imported petroleum.  That is the chief reason why we care about the middle east, are trying to promote stability (and democracy) in the region, and have made huge military and aid investments there.  It is why we are also bleeding Americans - from Iraq and Afghanistan to the blowback from our support of the Taliban against the USSR and our maintenance of troops in Saudi Arabia.

The costs are tied to our energy insecurity, and should be borne by those who use imported energy, not washed through the Treasury to all taxpayers generally (or to future generations, in view of our enormous deficits).  A tax on imported fuels is EXACTLY what we need - otherwise, we are simply subsidizing the consumption of foreign fuel and allowing our addiction to it to blindly drive our foreign policy.

Except for this, the government should largely stay out of energy and let the markets work.  There may be some room for governmental involvement on solving siting issues (NIMBY) and on environmental externalities.

The idea to achieve energy independence is a real winner, for the country and politically.

For the sake of our national and economic security, we need to get off of dependency upon fossil fuels as soon as possible.

Bring on the alternative energy sources; that's the only way, that's the most responsible way for the future.

Any politician or political party that jumps on this theme of energy independence will find great favor with the voter.  The time is right...let's seize the opportunity and act and realize our dream of true energy independence.

The key is a long term solution based on finding new alternative energy sources, and ones, that I might add, are more environmentally friendly as a bonus.

Stretching out our reliance on fossil fuels only delays the inevitable.  We need alternative energy as soon as possible.  

Imagine if we had the equivalent of a Manhattan Project to develop feasible alternative energy sources.  That would be a huge benefit to our national security.  For the day that we no longer need oil is the day when the Middle East becomes irrelevant politically, and that is the day that the terrorists are stripped of their power for good.

Before anyone can offer solutions, we need to clearly identify the problem, if any.

It seems to me that posters here have an intuitive sense that the key problem is that the market demands the cheapest source of energy, and that energy is not in the US, but overseas.  As a result, we have an energy insecurity problem stemming from our growing dependence on foreign energy.

How do we solve this problem - by having the government regulate efficiency standards and enact a welter of subsidies for favored industries and states?  I think most of us realize that this hands-on government approach solves no problem but simply feeds pork-barrel politics, with good tax dollars wasted on special interests.

The problem is one of energy insecurity and risk, and that is where we should be focussing.  Otherwise, the government should just keep its hands off and leave decisions to the market, which actually does work very well.

However, I think we all recognize that there are very high defense costs and security issues stemming from our high dependence on imported petroleum.  That is the chief reason why we care about the middle east, are trying very hard to promote stability (and democracy) in the region, and have made huge military and aid investments there.  It is why we are also bleeding Americans - from Iraq and Afghanistan to the blowback we have suffered from our support of the Taliban against the USSR and from our maintenance of troops in Saudi Arabia and elsewhere.

How are we bearing these energy security costs now?  Inefficiently, unfairly and in a manner that encourages greater reliance on foreign oil - we are now washing these costs through the Treasury to all taxpayers generally as well as to our children (since we are not paying as we go, but are borrowing through enormous deficits and shifting the costs to the future).  The result is that the individual and corporate actors who make the decisions that increase our energy insecurity do not bear any of the costs related to that insecurity when they make their decisions on what fuels to purchase and what investments to make.  The net effect?  We are simply subsidizing the consumption of foreign fuel and allowing our addiction to it to blindly drive our foreign policy, all for the benefit of foreign regimes, many of which are not democracies and have views inimicable to our own.

The most rational, efficient and least painful way for us to bear these costs and to reduce our energy insecurity is and has been obvious for a long time, but there are few who have been responsible enough to face this head on.  Simply, defense costs relating to imported fuels should be borne by those who consume them - rather than a plethora of government programs, we simply need a tax on imported fuel.

Except for this, the government should largely stay out of energy and let the markets work.  It is our collective unwillingness to face this issue that has skewed the discussion toward muddle-headed government programs at home and to huge and growing defense spending abroad.

When are we going to stop ignoring the elephant in the room?

Responsible, respected economists have been supporting this position for years, and recent research illustrates how import tariffs could greatly benefit the US.  U. Chicago economist Jayanta Sen recently published a paper that demonstrates that

a tax on crude would transfer wealth of $100+ billion a year from foreign governments to the US consumers, thus providing a major economic stimulus to the economy while at the same time reducing consumption of gas...For a range of demand and supply elasticities, the wealth transfer savings for the United States (which has about one-third of global oil imports) should be in the range of $108 to $152 billion a year.

The new tax revenues to the US government from tax on imported oil ... can be returned to the US consumers as a lump sum, thus providing the economic stimulus. The reduction in crude oil consumption ranges from 7.13% to 10.30% while providing a stimulus (defined as additional purchasing power to consumers) to the economy of $95 billion to $133 billion a year.

As Sen points out in his blog, the US and other oil importing nations could also improve their position by creating a buyers' cartel -

The greatest fallacy in economic times in recent times is the idea that gas prices are market determined and hence the government can do nothing to stop the transfer of wealth from American consumers to government of foreign oil producing countries.

Similar ideas have been put forward in Fortune by Greg Mankiw of Harvard, now Chairman of President Bush's Council of Economic Advisors:  

Cutting income taxes while increasing gasoline taxes would lead to more rapid economic growth, less traffic congestion, safer roads, and reduced risk of global warming--all without jeopardizing long-term fiscal solvency. This may be the closest thing to a free lunch that economics has to offer.

Support is given by the Economist and Business Week; surprisingly, the NYT also has some good editorials here, here, and here.

Cheney, you might remember, actually authored legislation in Congress in 1986 to impose just this sort of import tax, saying "Let us rid ourselves of the fiction that low oil prices are somehow good for the United States."  He was right then, and our troubles since then have shown him to be prophetic.  With an import tax and buyers' cartel, we would not be transferring to foreign regimes the trillions that they use corruptly and to attack us and our friends, and we would not be spending hundreds of billions on defense in the middle east.  Let's stop the bleeding and stop funding middle east madness.

The purpose of my proposal is not necessarily to improve fuel efficiency although I believe under my proposal that they would. My goal is for energy independence. For national security reasons, I believe that it is in the best interest of the United States no longer to depend on gasoline/oil from overseas sources, and improving fuel economy alone is not going to achieve that goal.

Some reports claim that even if every vehicle today achieved the same fuel efficiency of hybrids, in eight years we would return to the same level of fuel consumption.

If the automakers decide to get into the gasoline production business, they will not have as much incentive to reduce emissions, however, if the fuel they produce domestically is used to replace foreign sources of gasoline/oil then the goal of energy independence is possible.

Another goal we might want to achieve is to reduce emissions from vehicles. Many people confuse fuel efficiency with low emissions. Some SUVs that have terrible gas mileage actually have much lower emissions than smaller more fuel-efficient vehicles.

In addition, it is very likely that the internal combustion engine will soon (25 years) be obsolete. Fuel cell technology is making great strides, but will still likely use gasoline as its energy source. Hydrogen is the cleanest fuel source for fuel cells, but progress has been very slow at creating ways to store enough hydrogen for a practical vehicle.

However, even though these fuel cell vehicles will likely use gasoline, their emissions, and fuel economy will be dramatically improved because fuel cells do not burn the gasoline. Fuel cells use a very efficient chemical reaction to create electricity to drive electric motors. This process allows most of the energy content of the gasoline to be utilized. This boosts energy efficiency and since the fuel is not burned, pollution emissions are reduced to virtually zero.

For example, a 250-megawatt fuel cell utility facility produces 5.5 tons of Nitrogen Oxide emissions each year compared to 1484 tons for a new facility. (Fuel Cell utility emissions from FuelCell Energy, Inc. compared to same size facility being built using combustion technology for Maui electric)

the cost of building the plants is very expensive so companies are reluctant to build them. Private companies have to be concerned about earning enough profit to pay back the tremendous upfront costs and would take years to do so. Private companies tend to be reluctant to spend such large sums because of the large risk and the low return such facilites would likely generate, SO.. the government might need to build these facilies. Even though I am a free market conservative, this issue is not an economic issue, it is as a national defense issue and worthy of government intervention.

Ethanol can be made from all of these products, but recent research has shown that perhaps the best crop to grow for ethanol product is switchgrass.  High yields, easy to grow, less fertilizer, it's a perennial, and can grow on less productive soils.

It is interesting to watch as the corn farmer lobby works to influence the adoption and subsidy of ethanol production while research plunges ahead finding better crops than corn.

Hehe, yeah Moonshine.  But industrial ethanol is full of junk.  There are special variants of yeast being developed to generate ethanol for fuel, and believe me, you wouldn't want to make beer or wine with those puppies.

The holy grail of bio-fuel is to find a really cheap way to crack cellulose down to sugar, so it can be consumed or fermented.  Most of the bioenergy in plants is locked up in the cellulose, very tough long-chain polysaccarides.  Here again, necessity is the mother of invention.  When things are economical, engineers have a way of suddenly figuring out problems that previously have just been tinkered with by professors.

But seems to be doing pretty well for powerplants and possibly for residential electric generation. I could see the latter being especially efficient as you would not have the significant power loss currently experience through the power lines from the plant to your house. Ballard has introduced a residential unit in Japan.

Now if they can only get it to heat my house too...

Very informative.

If environmentally-sensitive people are worried about oil slicks from offshore rigs, they should consider: how many oil slicks were produced by hurricanes Katrina and Rita, which were both Category 5 in the Gulf of Mexico? Zero! If the oil rigs are required to observe the safety standards used in the Gulf of Mexico, why not promote drilling off the coasts of Florida or California?

You posted this before. I'll post my answer again:

I LIVE in Florida and the oil slick from the hurricanes has circled my state, destroyed marine life and reefs, and WE CAN'T GET LOCAL OYSTERS ANYMORE. They're all dead and full of black gunk.

Here is a really big idea, get the environmentalist agenda out of the classroom and teach people economics.



That's brilliant!


Now if they could also add a good once-over of the Constitution we'd solve a lot of problems!

It's 6 / 1, which as we all know is 5.9999999999999999999999999999999999999999999.

You are right on point.  We need alternative energy sources NOW.  We have the brains.  We can do it if we try.  So let's get serious and do it.

production has nothing to do with actually producing low cost ethanol. It has everything to do with subsidizing farmers in certain states.

I have worked in the ethanol & coal-fired power industries.  Here's what I can say.

Ethanol production is getting more efficient turning it into a net positive fuel, especially in the larger production facilities.  The subsidies aren't going to be there much longer and the companies that make ethanol know that.  At the current prices of oil, ethanol can compete, unsubsidized.  However, subsidies are helping the smaller producers get off the ground and produce ethanol effeciently.  Also, don't forget that ethanol facilities make more than ethanol, they make a large portion of the livestock feed ingredients that help keep meat & dairy prices reasonable.

Ethanol facilities I'm used to produce 199 proof alcohol and only use benzene to "poison" it so that it is not considered usable for human consumption by the DOT.  I agree that anyone who would want to drink this stuff, given the process, would be nuts.

As far as clean coal uses, it is a regulation nightmare to build any new facility in the U.S. these days thanks to the enviros.  You will spend years filing paperwork, racking up huge fees before you can really even get started on planning the construction.  One of the biggest reasons no one is really doing it, it isn't worth the cost to investors.

Please read "The Hype about Hydrogen" by Joseph Romm. The fuel cell nonsense is all codswallop and a whole lot of time is being wasted on this dangerous fuel source. Remember the Hindenberg and look at all economics hard, hydrogen and fuel cells are a fad, not an economic reality. Do the math and compute the intrastructure costs and examine the safety aspects in detail and it doesn't compute at all

        Coal is the way for USA via gasification or synthetic oil generation and remember that 98% is non-domestic oil by our choice!! It is a scare number thrown out, but most comes from Canada and Mexico, not Middle East and is due to lack of congressional backbone and pandering to special interests. Congress folding and deciding no ANWR and no Federal OCS makes nonsense of fuel conservation claims plus not increasing fuel economy standards sufficiently makes idiots of us all. Ethanol is a small and energy inefficient player and if you want big ideas, Congressman Kingston, think steam not IC engines. Benefits are manifold and Abner Doble had the right idea back in the 30's. Hybrid steam cars overcome all objections to steam and why are you not proposing, please?? Time for big ideas, Congressman, steam and coal is the way based upon my research.

I commend the congressman for getting the dialog going. I too think this is a security issue and not just an environmental one. Having read extensively about Peak Oil in the last year this has become somewhat of a hot button issue with me. Although I am very against subsidies, I do think we need to examine the best ways to achieve energy independence and remove the barriers in the market to let forces work as they should. At the same time, we will be right back in the environmental versus energy producer stagnation if we do not ensure that new energy is created as cleanly as possible.  I think solar is being ignored on this thread to a great extent although a few have mentioned it. The efficiency or solar has increased dramatically. Add to that economies of scale and it becomes viable. Have a look at the links below and you will see that things are happening on that front.

http://www.wired.com/news/planet/0,2782,69528,00.html?tw=wn_tophead_1

http://www.earthtoys.com/emagazine.php?issue_number=05.06.01&article=py
ron

http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,66694,00.html

I'm not closing my eyes to other technologies but I do think energy independence and the, dare say it, ability to produce enough that we end up being the seller instead of the buyer eventually would lead to unparalleled prosperity. We need to consider every possible alternative (including clean nuclear, oil shale deposits, on and off shore drilling...etc). There are pluses and minuses to almost every technology (including oil and natural gas) so burying our heads in the sand and waiting for market forces to react alone is going to lead us through just as much pain as a forced energy policy in the long run.  I guess the point I'm trying to make and can we all agree to not be nay sayers? I get in political arguments all the time with left and right wingers and one thing I say stops them dead in their tracks. I say "Well, what would YOU do?"  After I dismiss the normal answer "Well, I wouldn't do that!", the silence becomes deafening.  Putting up road blocks is not what we should do. We should be seeking solutions, not finding reasons to avoid them.

Re: remember that 98% is non-domestic oil by our choice!

Yes, our choice--but for economic reasons because foreign oil can be extracted cheaper. As for your jeremiad against hydrogen and fuel cells, maybe the technology will be a failure, maybe not. But anything untried is a failure from the beginning, so I see no reason not to try. The idea that today's current technology is sacrosanct and can never be replaced is also a species of Luddism. And the Hindenberg is perfectly irrelavnt since no one is proposing to build a fleet of blimps--or to use explosive gaseous hydrogen at all. Are thgere risks with other forms of hydrogen--sure, but then remember that gasoline is a flammable, sometimes explosive, fuel too.

Well, clearly, you have not bothered to read the recommended source book, so that renders your argument rather specious, doesn't it? And, at $55.00/ barrel, one would think if it is well worth the Canadians and Mexicans time and trouble to extract it, then it would be worth ours. Again, we are not serious about energy if we do not use our domestic resources. So rather than trying an ad hominum reply, simmer down, please, read the suggested book and do your research and just because it is new doesn't make it better or viable, do you remember the Wankel engine, don't you??

          A decent and thoughtful energy policy should be coherent and exploit our own domestic resources be they oil, coal, nuclear, new refineries, pipe lines or natural gas or we can continue to import from Canada and Mexico. Just don't waste my tax money on a fuel cell postulated future, thank you.  

we can do to deflate that mini-me dictator Hugo Chavez I am for.  Wanna see Venezuela, Saudi Arabia, and Kuwait become third world countries in a real hurry?

Brazil does use alky, but made from sugar cane.

1. There is a very large yield difference between ethanol from corn and ethanol from sugar cane.
   
   
2. There seem to be arguments about net energy yield of ethanol production. Figures used in the different studies seem to use different inputs, but the most complete study (at least using the most detailed and comprehensive energy inputs instead of estimates-like the subsequent study that used non-tilling techniques without irrigation for energy useage figures but yield figures from tilled and irrigated fields, oh, and no maintenance or waste handling at all) has ethanol from corn "costing" more energy than what is available at the pump. In other words, by the time the seed and fertilizer companies make the starting products, the farmer tills, plants, fertilizes, irrigates, weeds, harvests, transports the corn and deals with the wastes, and maintains the equipment required to do it again nest year, then the distributer makes the various handling and storage equipment FDA clean and transports the corn, the ethanol plant processes (and disposes of waste, but another of the disagreements comes here), ships to the gasoline mixing and distribution facility, and twice the volumne at a heavier specific gravity is shipped the end user(ethanol has about 62% the btu/gallon that gasoline has and while gas is approx 6.7 lb/gal alky is about 8.9 lb/gal, so almost twice the gallonage at more weight per gallon means the plant has to ship more, and heavier, tankerloads to get the same energy to the pump).
   

So we have a pretty comprehensive report indicating that ethanol requires 1.29:1 more energy (btu or joules, take your pick) to produce and get to the pump as compared to the gas you have put into your tank as an end user. Oh, and last time I had accurate figures, it costs considerably more per gallon (without subsidies or tax breaks) as well as reducing your mileage by almost half the amount used (due to the btu/gal). So, yes oil takes energy to convert crude into gasoline, but the ratio is much better. The only reason alchohol (ethanol or methanol or even isopropyl alchohol) is even remotely "in the hunt" is it is government mandated and subsidized. To the tune that the #s are correct, our energy consumption and overall costs would be less if we left the land fallow and saved the energy used in ethanol production for fuel. Not to mention that the land might not be left fallow and the farm goods grown might be useful elsewhere.

But this is properly called corporate welfare.

For the little farmers who need the help to stay in business, like Archer-Daniels-Midland (or ADM at least want your tax dollars to pay ADM lobbyists to support helpful Congressional elected officials)

Otherwise, why would anyone be concerned?  The market handles complex issues much better than governmental decision-making, by far.  Government meddling may be well-intended, but guaranteed to waste taxpayer money, lead to corruption and boodogles and is simply not as efficient as the market.

Let the market sort through all of the alternatives, as it is already doing.  Subsidies for various "favored" alternatives are a wasteful approach and frequently are not reliable enough to steer investment anyway - Congress frequently takes away subsidies.

If we really think there is a reason for the government to be concerned, then the simplest, most hands-off government approach is best - in this case, a tariff on imported fuels.  This should be set at a level at least enough to cover our related defense costs.  

This simple nudge to price signals will do wonders to influence investment and consumption decisions and to encourage investments in efficiency, cogeneration, new technologies, domestic production and conservation - at much less cost than having the government trying to manage all of this itself.  Micromanagement by the government wastes everyone's time, and is an invitation to corruption and favoritism.  

The government's interest are legitimately simply on protecting our security and boosting our economy - it does this best by letting that greatest of the capitalist tools - the market - work.  The government with the lightest hand is the best government.  We should be very careful NOT to get the government in the business of making choices between technologies.

Revenues raised by the government, besides covering defense, can be cycled back out to consumers through tax decreases, or could be used to fund social security, etc.

If it is worthwhile they will do it. Oil companies have a very long planning horizon. They look 10 and 20 years out all the time. And they aren't scared of capital investment if they know they can earn a decent return on it. They are in a capital intensive business... everything they do costs a lot before they see a dime.

Oil is produced all over the world. Nobody has control over our supply. If they stop selling it to us and sell it to someone else instead, it will mean nothing since the market is global. If they stop selling it entirely (hurting themselves greatly in the process), prices will go up, but that will eventually lower demand and there will always be enough for military operations.

I don't see how oil is any more of a security issue than every other commodity out there. Just about every basic material we import has millitary applications. Where's all the talk about steel, diamond, gold, or palladium independence?

that all of the talk of enegy policy is just BS.  However, it seems everyone  else on this thread has a different view, as well as the administration - otherwise, why are we spending hundreds of billions in the Middle East?  Why are we suffering all of this blowback and the sorrows of empire if not to protect the security of the flow of oil?

If you grant my premise, what are your thoughts on how to allocate the costs?

You have a point but, I do disagree. Oil is a diminishing resource just like any other but, it is essentially the driving force behind our economy and if world demand dropped by 1/3 prices would certainly drop dramatically as well. Not to mention, we could begin to export this new alternative which, while building our coffers, would also serve to further diminish the pockets or those countries where most terrorism is borne. We would also not be subject to being cut off by countries that are clearly hostile to the U.S. (a la Venezuela).

There is so much to this issue that it would be impossible to get into all of it in this thread. I do think a dialog on the subject is extremely important. It's good to see the right talking about it instead of just letting the left make all the suggestions.

Why penalize the American consumer and American industry with higher transport costs?  The absolute last thing our economy needs is government direction of markets and investment.  We can adapt very quickly to oil shocks.  We cannot adapt nearly as well to government price controls, more taxation, and communist-inspired planning such as outlined above.

Other strong nations are just as dependent on cheap Middle East oil as we are.  But they don't need to act as the world's policeman. Foreign policy and cheap oil are only entwined because we've chosen that path.  Rather than make U.S. less competitive - by increasing transport costs - why don't we choose another foreign policy path?

I do not believe we removed Saddam Hussein in order to guarantee cheap oil.  We did so because he was a threat to develop and distribute WMD to our enemies.

We are not occupying Iraq right now to ensure cheap oil.  We're there to prevent a new terrorist state.  And from what I'm hearing from our soldiers, we're doing a damned fine job.  Mainstream media lies.  Our politicians play to those lies rather than fulfill their jobs as statesmen.

It is about transforming the Middle East into a place where it is much harder for terrorism to fester, and much easier for us to deal with it when it does. It is as much a part of the war on terror as Afghanistan was.

People use the security argument whenever it suits them. I've heard the same thing about steel. We need to prop up our steelmakers and keep them in business because it's a national security thing. They've even tried to use that argument when it comes to agribusiness subsidies.

Sure oil is important, but a lot of other stuff is important too and some of it has gone up a lot more in price. The price of metals has skyrocketed the last few years and that affects just about everything (including the price of oil production equipment). I don't see any screaming about that.

Otherwise totally reasonable people just seem to get carried away when the topic of discussion is oil... as evidenced by the popularity of all the black helicopter theories on the oil companies.

I trust the market to work. If there is some magic bullet alternative that can work for $30 a barrel it will be found and produced. If it requires oil be at $200 a barrel to work is it worth wasting taxpayer's money on?

High taxes, regulation, and the incredible level of government spending have a much bigger impact on the economy than oil. Our economy is much less energy dependant then is has been for a long time (pre-WWII) and is getting less so every day.

I won't address your points about the politics of ethanol production, but I have to say that the "negative" energetics of using ethanol as a motor fuel just don't convince me.

You'll never find a reaction that produces more energy than you put in. It might seem that way in the case of fossil fuels because the sun put in the energy eons ago. But that's also whey we call them "fossil" fuels.

And anyway the real point is: what's the value of getting from point A to point B? Ethanol might be a particularly expensive way to achieve that. But if it's better than the alternatives (for some particular definition of "better"), then who cares about the net energy cost?

But I used to drive a grand cherokee, and I seem to recall reading in the user guide that I could use certain grain alchohol mixtures in case of an emergency...  I don't drive the car anymore, but could this be right?

...but I see where you are coming from.  The way I see it, it is tapped, might as well use it.  

But I see the use in not having to fully rely on these middle eastern nations as well.

It is a tough call.  

Build more.

As for the problem of waste, the "burnt" fuel

can still generate power, it just needs a

change in reactor design.

Yes, oil companies do expend large amounts of money to develop oil reserves. However, if you have noticed they are not (the large companies) expending that money on on-shore sources of oil. Why? Because even though these on-shore sites could be profitable, they are not profitable enough for a large company to try to manage.

Coal to oil facilities are a problem for the oil industry to consider because they are likely to provide low return on investment and the technology/costs of generating gasoline from coal is not as well known. That is, the oil companies do not have the same level of expertise in the processing of oil from gasoline.

As a student, I worked during the summers at Mobil Corporation during the late 1980s. During that time, they sold-off most of their on-shore sites because they were not worth the oversight costs; however, for the smaller companies (mostly "mom and pop" type operations) the smaller wells were nicely profitable.

Your first paragraph is a Talking Point - surely you understand that the first Gulf War was about oil, and noticed that bin Laden was driven by that fact that we happened leave a large military presence in Saudi Arabia after that war?  Iraq was about trying to remove a source of regional instability.  It`s precisely because it was not clear that the potential gains were worth the potential costs that GHW Bush and Clinton did not invade Iraq.  We care about stability in the Middle East only because we care about oil and we care about Israel.

I agree that various industry lobbyists will argue security to get their hands in our pocketbooks.  That`s why if we have an energy policy at all, it should be along the lines I propose.

I suggest you follow my earlier links - because of demand inelasticities, alot of the burden of an import tariff would have the effect of transfering money from the oil exporters to the US.  To the extent the burden falls on the US, the receipts can be recycled to maintain stimulus.

manage to build the current infrastucture in a remarkably short period of time (less than a generation) when autombiles came into general use starting about a century ago. Why would it be so prohibitive to build a new infrastructure?

In general, large business enterprises are far more widely held today than at the turn of the 20th C. You run them in order to make your quarter, not for any long term goals.

First: we have to understand the difference between sustainable energy sources and "fossil" sources. Many people have an intuitive sense for this problem because it always comes out in the "negative energy" argument, always applied to ethanol and sometimes applied to hydrogen. Never mind that it doesn't apply to hydrogen, which is an energy carrier not an energy source, and that it's a big red herring anyway.

All energy available to us comes either from the sun, from the binding energy inside of nuclei, or from gravitational/tidal force within the earth. The question is, do we use energy that is being produced at this very moment, or do we transform stored energy that is already latent in some substrate? The ultimate argument against ethanol (leaving aside all the snarks about Iowa farmers and their political caucuses) is that it tries to capture energy as it's produced by the sun. This is the same argument against solar panels and wind. You always come back to an efficiency problem.

Energy sources like gasified coal, nuclear and geothermal (and petroleum and natural gas) all have their problems, but their ultimate advantage is that the energy is already there, so the cost of the solution is all about accessing energy, rather than collecting energy. The sun, or past supernovas, or Earth's gravity have already done the work of collecting the energy. In essence, we're capturing a time-based efficiency.

I happen to be a believer in ethanol because I think technology can solve the efficiency problems  posed by the need to collect the energy from the sun in real time. Since I must be the only such believer in the world outside of Brazil, I'll leave it aside and propose that we look primarily at coal gasification and nuclear. As far as motor fuels are concerned, I think we will be using petroleum derivatives for decades to come as the primary solution. The supply problem will be relaxed by displacement of petroleum usage in non-transportation applications, and also by my second point.....

Radical Efficiency. Our industrial usage of energy is very early stage in the sense that vast amounts of it are wasted at every step of practically every process. Our greatest need for new technology is to improve by an order of magnitude the efficiency of every energy-using process and application there is, starting but not ending with transportation. And this is a far more plausible to goal to work toward because it depends on the kind of incremental refinements that free markets and global capital deployments are brilliant at producing. Advanced software, barely imagined by most people today, will be the most important technology input. And by the way, the country that is the best in the world at innovative software is (drum roll, please)... America.

All the talk about large-minded, bold solutions catalyzed by government action is just that: talk. And that will not change. In this connection, it's interesting but nonproductive to discuss a hydrogen-based infrastructure for transportation. Too many good things need to happen in a coordinated way for that vision to come true. It won't happen.

(DISCLOSURE: This same note was posted on another comment string from Congressman Kingston.)

Friends-

Congressman Kingston is currently crisscrossing his district in Georgia attending events. He thanks you all for your interest and comments. He has asked that I forward a few answers to some of the questions which have been raised.

Please keep your comments coming, Jack truly appreciates the energy and ideas coming in from the blogosphere.

1. WHY DOESN'T THIS LEGISLATION ADDRESS ALL FORMS OF ENERGY, E.G., NUCLEAR, SOLAR, ETC?

Thanks to the hard work of House Chairman Joe Barton (R-Texas), Congress has already passed comprehensive legislation which addresses some, if not all, of these areas. If you have not already, take a minute to READ the President's remarks from August when he signed this legislation. And yes, the Congressman supported this legislation. One area Jack would like to see us do more in is our dependence on oil for our cars and trucks.

2. WHY AREN'T WE EXPLORING IN ANWR/DEEP SEA ETC.?

The Congressman has supported the exploration of ANWR for quite some time, and as the representative who represents the ENTIRE coast of Georgia, he also believes we need to consider deep sea exploration for oil and natural gas. This exploration would be more than 100 miles out to sea and can be done safely and cleanly.

The bottom line is that exploration legislation has been - and will continue to be - a part of  the energy discussion and Mr. Kingston will continue to support it. While some Democrats and some Republicans may not agree with exploration of domestic resources, there are other issues which we can all agree on and we need to get started on them now while there is still time.

The facts are clear regarding domestic resources: America does not have enough proven reserves to sustain our long-term fuel needs. In fact, 78 percent of all proven reserves are in OPEC-nations, and on top of that, 98 percent of proven reserves are OUTSIDE of the United States. Take a look at this graph.

This bill is about bringing alternatives to oil to the market - a balanced approach that includes the clean and safe use of our own natural resources. This bill also recognizes that we can't drill our way out of this problem alone and we can't carpool our way out of this problem we need a balanced approach and new sources of fuel.

DOES THIS BILL INCREASE CAFÉ STANDARDS?

No.  This bill does not change existing CAFE levels for cars and light trucks.  It does establish a new standard for large trucks (above 10,000 pounds) to give truckers the same confidence in the efficiency of the vehicles they buy as consumers have today on cars and light trucks.

DOES THE BILL CHANGE THE ETHANOL RENEWABLE FUEL STANDARD (RFS) FROM H.R. 6?

No. The RFS remains the same. We set a goal of "E10 in 10" beyond the RFS which would more than double the amount of Ethanol used from the levels achieved in the RFS.  We want American drivers to have a choice the next time they fill up between a gallon of oil imported from the Middle East and a gallon of fuel grown by American farmers and produced by American refiners.

WHY LIFT THE TARIFF ON IMPORTED ETHANOL?

Brazil is a real success story - over 40 percent of their cars and trucks run on sugar based Ethanol today - If America is going to reach an E10 standard and beyond we will need a balance of imports and domestic production.  If Brazil can produce a gallon of fuel for 80 cents a gallon why would we want to tax it 53 cents a gallon when we don't tax oil from Iraq or Saudi Arabia?

By reaching a goal of nationwide "E10 in 10" with a guarantee that over 60 percent will be domestic production, we can dramatically expand Ethanol domestic production while cutting oil imports by over 20 billion gallons per year.

John, very sorry I missed your post.  You make an excellent point, I think, here:

Other strong nations are just as dependent on cheap Middle East oil as we are.  But they don't need to act as the world's policeman. Foreign policy and cheap oil are only entwined because we've chosen that path.  Rather than make U.S. less competitive - by increasing transport costs - why don't we choose another foreign policy path?

I agree that if we chose not to play global policeman in the Mideast perhaps we would be facing a much lower defense bill.  However, I think this precisely supports my point - to disengage from the Mideast and the addiction to cheap oil, we should ask the users to pay the costs of defending that use, rather than running it through the general budget - otherwise, we simply subsidize overconsumption.  Making consumers pay the full costs of their actions doesn't make us less competitive, but more so.  

I'm really not interested in going through all of the reasons for our invasion of Iraq here, but am happy to acknowledge that our willingness to tolerate Saddam changed markedly after 9/11.  But the reason we cared about Saddam was precisely his role in a region in which we have vital interests.

I don't think the issue is "Fuel Independence" for the US (we need to be able to buy the cheapest fuel). This strikes me as chauvinism at best. What we need is cheap portable fuels which are economically robust. If we can increase the availability of fuel we can reduce the influence of the Arab middle east. Mr. Steven Denbeste has written literally exhaustively on alternative fuels and anyone serious about energy use must have a read at USSClueless. Ethanol ; Conservation ; Discussions of the flaws ; http://denbeste.nu/cd_log_entries/2002/04/SequesteringCarbon.shtml; and while you are at it try Jane Galt http://www.janegalt.net/blog/archives/004769.html.

Congressman Kingston's proposal looks more like an end run to implement the defunct Kyoto accords with its assumptions that global warming, if it exists, is manmade, not solar driven, and that by the United States and a very few Western Countries cutting CO2 emissions, at great cost, will somehow slow the warming to save the world as we know it before we are reduced to being a country of sustenance farmers. Bigger government will not change the supply of fuel but restrict it and absorb the resources that private industry needs to devote to new sources. We need deregulation of Green Party type controls on oil, gas, coal and nuclear energy.

The following is a point by point comment of the plan.

1. Cutting Oil Usage. We have been cutting oil and other energy usage for 32 years. Without new breakthroughs,
each new cut will come at greater costs. Lighter cars = more fatalities Some costs are hidden. The poorer a country the more it pollutes per $ of GNP. We in fact need cheaper sources of energy in order to pollute less.

2. Scoring Requirements. Generally speaking, the people in Washington seem to be less informed than the average RedStater and more regulation would only give Washington parasites another excuse to spend other peoples money. Besides it would not work. By the way, who can cite any honest debates currently going on?

3. Tax Incentives! Finally a proposal I can get behind. I think tax incentives should be extended to all Americans so they may purchase items that have more utility to them than buying more and bigger government.

4. Why don't you narrow the choices down to the feasible choices of nuclear power, coal, hydro-electric, and additional oil field discoveries/rediscoveries. Deregulation and reversing court activism would go a long way toward making the US more energy independent. The commerce clause must be used to reduce NIMBY protectionism, while government backed insurance may be required for certain industries to flourish.