Friday, July 18, 2008

JOHN MCCAIN

'John McCain enters the offshore drilling debate with voters' favor.'

Tucked in this E.J. Dionne column is this line:

In a survey report released last week by Democracy Corps, Democratic pollster Stan Greenberg and strategist James Carville concluded that their party has "not yet advanced a compelling narrative" on the problem of high gas prices and that "John McCain enters the offshore drilling debate with voters' favor."

Most of Dionne's column is three cheers for Al Gore's environmental speech yesterday.

Gore's core assertion is that the technology for alternative fuels — wind, solar and geothermal — is far more advanced than we realize. Pushing that progress further would cut the costs of energy, with Gore insisting that renewables could eventually "give us the equivalent of $1 per gallon gasoline."

"The only way to break free from the burden of rising gasoline prices and electricity rates is to get free" from a process through which we "bid up the price of every last drop of oil and every last lump of coal," he said in the interview. Cheaper electricity, in turn, will speed the onset of electric cars.

Wind, solar, and geothermal are not manners of propelling a vehicle, or at least not for the purposes of a typical American. (Try going to the grocery store in one of those solar cars.) Nor will they be anytime soon. And Dionne's last sentence hints at why we can't switch to electric cars — an expensive transition whenever it's done — too quickly: producing more electric cars before increasing the supply of electricity generation sources would make electricity more expensive.

I don't want to step on the toes of the guys at Planet Gore, but just a few lines in Al's speech to note:

"I don't remember a time in our country when so many things seemed to be going so wrong simultaneously."

As the guys at Fark noted, apparently Gore has "never heard of the Great Depression, the Revolutionary War, the Civil War or the World Wars."

"And by the way, our weather sure is getting strange, isn’t it? There seem to be more tornadoes than in living memory, longer droughts, bigger downpours and record floods."

Note that 2007 saw the fewest tornadoes since 2002. The total for the past six years: 1236, 936, 1375, 1819, 1264, 1106, 1092. So far this year, 859. The ten year average is 1270. From NOAA in 2005: "there has been little trend in the frequency of the strongest tornadoes over the past 55 years."

"Today I challenge our nation to commit to producing 100 percent of our electricity from renewable energy and truly clean carbon-free sources within 10 years."

As of 2006, renewables produced six percent of U.S. electricity. So all we have to do is switch over about ninety-four percent of our current energy sources. Quite a few other environmentalists found Gore's goal unrealistic, with one comparing it to "challenging your 2 year old to finish college by the time she is 12."

Hey, Al? Could we aim for a more modest goal? Like maybe reducing electricity consumption at your Nashville mansion?

Since taking steps to make his home more environmentally-friendly last June, Gore devours an average of 17,768 kWh per month – 1,638 kWh more energy per month than the year before the renovations. By comparison, the average American household consumes 11,040 kWh in an entire year, according to the Energy Information Administration. The cost of Gore’s electric bills over the past year topped $16,533.

Today's Washington Post notes, "As people filed out of the hall, three black cars waited for Gore and his entourage. A young woman walked up to the first one, a Lincoln Town Car, and stuck a handwritten note on the windshield: 'I wish I were a Prius.'"

A 2008 Lincoln Town Car gets 15 miles per gallon in the city, 22 on the highway.

07/18 10:01 AMShare