Drilling to the Facts

The Washington Post published an editorial on offshore drilling and it posits a few interesting details.

The one I'm most curious about is where the editorial staff concludes that offshore drilling would divert attention away from developing alternative energy sources and that the Bush Administration has been lax in this department from the get-go.

The strongest argument against drilling is that it could distract the country from a pursuit of alternative sources of energy. There's no question that the administration has been lax on that front. True leadership would emphasize both alternative sources and rational approaches to developing oil and natural gas. No, the United States cannot drill its way to energy independence.

What exactly is the proof that the country hasn't pushed alternative energy? Do we have a comparison to see whether some other country has developed alternative energy to a greater extent than the US over the same time period? Does the Washington Post believe that the market cannot solve the problem and that the government must be the one to impose solutions?

Throwing money at a problem will not solve it. Letting the market come to the solution can. Throwing off needless regulations and red tape can lead to innovation and solutions quicker than windfall profits taxes proposed by Democrats and the Obama campaign can suck the life out of energy companies.

Or, would that expose the Democrats for their eco-hypocrisy and zero-energy growth policies? You know, the ones that refuse to let nuclear power plants be built, thwart siting of new power facilities, including hydro, wind, and solar because it might affect the local habitat or spoil the view at the shore when such facilities are built over the horizon?

The EU has been pushing the eco-leftist global warming mantra for years, and accepted the Kyoto Protocols. In the intervening years, their emissions have increased and they've missed their targets.

Far from developing alternative energy, they're increasingly reliant on oil and fossil fuels. That's why the conflict in Georgia has the Europeans over a barrel. Germany is rethinking shutting down its remaining nuclear power plants because they simply can't afford to do so. They would have a power shortage and require importing power generated elsewhere from sources that emit all manner of pollutants - particulates and COx.

The Germans had announced in 2000 that they would eventually shutter those power plants. To make up the difference in power capacity, the Germans are looking to build coal fired plants. Lots of them. So much for being green. So much for finding the eco-alternative.

Alternative power is a pipe dream in Europe despite the higher taxes and fees on motor fuels to convince people to use less. All the revenues generated by taxes and fees on motor fuels isn't leading to new innovations in Europe, despite the claims that they're more environmentally conscious than here in the US.

That should be the lesson here in the US. Money isn't the problem. The oil companies aren't the problem. It's that the technology hasn't reached a point where it is competitive with fossil fuel energy production, and if you want to find a green alternative, you run afoul of the NIMBY and eco-leftists who refuse to allow construction of new nuclear plants or anything else for that matter.