Tonight I want to have an unpleasant talk with you about a problem unprecedented in our history. With the exception of preventing war, this is the greatest challenge our country will face during our lifetimes. The energy crisis has not yet overwhelmed us, but it will if we do not act quickly.
- President Jimmy Carter’s speech to Congress in 1977.
Four years earlier, the Middle Eastern members of OPEC had imposed a strict oil embargo against the US and Europe as punishment for the West’s support of Israel during the Yom Kippur war. Fuel became scarce, the price of oil quadrupled in just a few months, and in the US fuel was rationed resulting in long lines at filling stations throughout the country.
The speed limit of 55 mph was imposed in 1974 to curb consumption. In 1975, the Strategic Petroleum Reserve was created. And in a 1979 campaign speech, President Carter announced, “I will soon submit legislation to Congress calling for the creation of this nation’s first solar bank, which will help us achieve the crucial goal of 20 percent of our energy coming from solar power by the year 2000.”
The legislation never happened. The Iranian Hostage Crisis consumed the attention of the American people, and Carter lost the election. Shortly after taking office, President Reagan removed the solar panels Carter had installed from the White House, and Congress reversed Carter’s energy policies.
In 1978, one gallon of gas cost $0.63. Today, one gallon costs me about $4.28. By strange coincidence, Exxon Mobile yesterday posted the largest quarterly profit in US history of $11.7 billion.
The problem is not that fuel prices are high. The problem is that we continue to squander opportunities to get ourselves off of our “oil addiction”, as President Bush once called it in a speech.
But that was two years ago. Now he and McCain are pursuing offshore oil drilling and oil exploration in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (Note: McCain is reconsidering his previous opposition to ANWR drilling). The ANWR reserves amount to a reduction of the U.S. dependence on imported foreign oil of between 0.4 and 1.2 percent in the years from 2018 and 2030 (IOW, exploring additional oil reserves will not have a measurable impact for about ten years!). This is not significant enough to affect oil prices, but the argument is that we will be less dependent on imports.
Being less dependent on imports is a great idea! Why don’t we reduce our overall consumption of oil by say 10% over the next ten years? Why don’t we try to become the leader in renewable energy in the world, and simultaneously jump start our stalled economy? Why don’t we try to build 100 mph automobiles instead of drilling for more oil to feed the profit engine of oil companies?
In his book Natural Capitalism: Creating the Next Industrial Revolution
Surely, if we can muster 1% of GDP per year to fight an unpopular war, we can muster 1% of GDP per year to end our dependence on oil altogether. Even if it takes us the next ten or twenty years.
I have been deployed in Iraq! And I tell you that it will be utterly inexcusable if we go to war again in twenty years to secure access to oil. If we don’t implement an aggressive energy policy now, we deserve to decline into historical insignificance.
I’m paying attention, and I’m outraged! You ought to be as well.
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I recommend that you read Zbigniew Brzezinski’s “The Grand Chessboard.”
It will make clear that U.S. motives for invading Iraq, Afghanistan and our overall aggressive foriegn policy are all means for maintaining U.S. world hegemony. Furthermore, our foreign policy works hand-in-hand with our energy policy.