“Great are the powers of electricity,” commented a newspaper story in the late 19th century about the fascinating new energy source. “It makes millionaires. It paints devils’ tails in the air and floats placidly in the waters of the earth. It hides in the air. It creeps into every living thing.” (1)
Electricity is the most utilitarian of energies and the master form of the master resource, as explained below by leading experts and even some critics of energy. Just ask residential users, commercial establishments, or the manufacturing facilities if they want to pay more or less for power.
And so it was distressing to hear Barack Obama in a moment of ‘green’ candor declare that electricity prices would “skyrocket” under a cap-and-trade program to limit carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. In his exact words and phrasing from November 2008:
…You know, when I was asked earlier about the issue of coal, uh, you know — Under my plan of a cap and trade system, electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket.
[Editor note: The other posts in this series are The Great Energy Resource Debate (Part I: Peak Oil was … is here!) and The Great Energy Resource Debate (Part III: Pessimists Turn Optimistic!). Part IV will look at the theoretical case for resource expansionism in light of the preceding posts.]
[Editor note: Part I
http://www.masterresource.org/2011/06/great-resource-debate-iii-new-optimists/
“All oil and gas resources should be carefully husbanded—i.e. extracted as late and as slowly as possible. Our descendents will be grateful. We, too, shall need a long bridge to the future.”
– Amory Lovins, World Energy Strategies: Facts, Issues, and Options (New York: Friends of the Earth International, 1975), p. 127.
Yesterday’s post provided quotations from a variety of sources espousing a pessimistic, closed view of the mineral resource world as it pertains to oil, gas, and even coal.…
[Editor note: The posts in this series are The Great Energy Resource Debate (Part II: Neo-Malthusian Alarmism) and The Great Energy Resource Debate (Part III: Pessimists Turn Optimistic!). Part IV will look at the theoretical case for resource expansionism in light of the preceding posts.]
“It is clear that domestic [U.S.] oil, gas, coal, and nuclear cannot deliver vastly increased supplies, although it is equally clear that these sources cannot be ignored.”
– Robert Stobaugh and Daniel Yergin, “Conclusion: Toward a Balanced Energy Program,” in Stobaugh and Yergin, eds., Energy Future (New York: Random House, 1979), p. 216.
…“The gas lines and rapid increases in oil prices during the first half of 1979 are but symptoms of the underlying oil supply problem—that is, the world can no longer count on increases in oil production to meet its energy needs.”