Centerfield

It's easy to be "left" on environmental issues. But most of us are hypocrites. While we preach about saving the environment and protecting open spaces, we continue to buy gas-guzzling SUVs, own two or three cars, build new houses on expansive tracts that were once forest or farmland, and consume plastic-based products at a phenomenal rate. Do you really need a bread-baking machine when your oven will do the same thing? Can you vacation in a nearby town rather than fly or drive across the country? Can the government find a way to revitalize existing neighborhoods rather than build yet another huge housing development with cookie-cutter homes?

Before the centrist movement can take any stand on the environment, we need to demand that consumers rethink their behavior to determine if WE are actually the cause of those things we complain about.

Excellent point, Steven.

Count me in for drilling in ANWR. Sorry, caribou.

I'd say the "centrist" position on the environment is one of rational cost/benefit analysis. It's not sacrifice-humans-to-save-the-environment attitude of one extreme, nor the sacrifice-everything-for-bigger-profits of the other.

What Oberon said.

Oberon, I do not believe in sacrifice-humans-to-save-everything, either. However, if you want to look at cost/benefit, independent analysis done a couple years back when this issue became big showed that ANWR had maybe a 6-month supply of oil that was about 15 years away from being ready. So the cost is destroying the last pristine wildlife area in our nation, the benefit is minimal, accept of course to the oil companies who so richly reward good republican support.

Steven, you asked all of the questions that environmentalists always ask. Of course consumers are hypocrits about the environment, as we are about most things. What can be done about it and is that a "centrist" stance is my question.

Drilling in ANWR would not "destroy" the entire region. The actual acres of land where drilling occurs would be destroyed, and the putting a big-ass pipe across the entire region would be a problem for caribou, but most of ANWR would be fine.

It's a desolate tundra anyway.

I'd also point out that Alaskans (incluing my relatives up there) are overwhelmingly in favor of drilling in ANWR,

I know Alaskans support drilling there, and I can't say I blame them. I also know drilling would not "destroy" the entire region, but even localized drilling would have a negative effect on the entire ecosystem. As for the repeated "sorry caribou" comments, they are not the only wildlife there, just the ones conservatives like to point out. They rarely mention the damage it could do polar bear populations, as bears are more "cuddly" and draw a stronger public sentiment than caribou. There are also millions of migratory birds that spend time in the region.

At this point, I think opening the area up for drilling has become a matter of pride for conservatives, and stopping it has become a matter of pride for liberals. Any real debate about costs and benefits seems to have ended some time ago. The simple fact that congressional republicans want to include the provision in the budget process instead of in eneregy legislation (which is freaking ridiculous) to avoid a democratic fillibuster in the Senate is proof enough of that.

I guess I would say that this centrist in the short term thinks drilling makes sense to increase production, but in the long term I am opposed to the practice and thinks as a nation we need to progress beyond it. If I where a US Senator I would take the position that Senator Norm Coleman of Minnesota took... I would vote against drilling in ANWR unless I was assured that this administration is going to move us closer to developing alternative energy sources. So far I have seen nothing but lip service on this issue from both parties.

Speaking of alternate energy sources... Do the oil companies have such a stranglehold on the Congress as to be able to stifle the possibility of viable alternatives, or am I being paranoid?

It just seems to me that we should have moved much closer to having something like fuel cells but I can't find valid arguments to support suppression of the technology.

No Heather, you are not... It would take a Bully Pulpit approach. It would take the President of the United States pushing through the Congress that he made a dramatic proposal that would create tax incentives for companies to develop fuel cell technology and other alternatives, reduce the tax loopholes and government giveaways to oil companies in order to create a fair playing field, mandate tougher restrictions on fuel efficiency standards, and provide federal funds to invest in research and development. I am not holding my breath that this issue will be dealt with to the extent it needs to by a President from either party in the near future. Had Kerry convinced me otherwise, it would have been a good reason to vote for him.

We're going to drill. We need the oil. I believe most people will perceive this as in both their economic and national security interest, regardless of the correctness of such a perception. My sense of human nature is that while people love to talk green, they are unwilling to act green unless there's little or no cost to them. This means that only win-win green solutions ever become popular. Most environmental issues are not win-win when viewed through most people's narrow self-interest filters.

I don't think we're going to stop consuming fossil fuels until they are all gone. Hopefully God never gave us enough rope to hang ourselves with on this count. The development of viable alternative energy sources will gain traction when market forces make R&D more profitable. It's starting to happen now.

I invariably get a lot of gripes when I ask "how much difference does it make whether we use up our remaining fossil fuel reserves over the course of 50, 75, 100, or 125 years?

And I get even more gripes when I wonder what the maximum amount of possible damage from burning the remaining reserves will be.

But no one has given me any good answers. I don't pretend to know the answers, but I feel confident that the nature of the true answers should help dictate policy.

So I agree wholeheartedly with Oberon, it's a cost-benefit thing, I give him the credit of the good will he's built up here not to jump on the caribou comment, it's just a joke. Awhile back we had a thread where I dragged on and on about what the word "humane" means. Here's a case that's related. I think our policy is going to be that we'll end up doing what we THINK we need to do based on our combined narrow self-interest filters, but that we'll try to do so as humanely as possible, not rapaciously. I realize that if your are a committed green, this provides no comfort, and may even feel morally wrong. I think it's just the way things work, don't expect it to change, and so accept it for what it is.

Our government was designed by the framers to be intentionally incremental, and there is hardly an issue where this is more evident than in environmental policy. People don't want to pay more in the short-term to achieve long-term benefits. Would a real shift away from oil-dependence and toward cleaner options be in the best interest for the long-run? Yes, and I doubt many would disagree with that, but it would also cost a lot in the near-term, which is unnacceptable to most people and politicians know it.

The ANWR debate isn't just about saving that one area of wilderness (although in my mind that would be enough), it is about weaning ourselves off of oil altogether, which in the long run is better for the economy, as clean energy, once widely available, will be much cheaper to the consumer. Obviouly it would be better for the environment. It would also be better for national security. Can you imagine how different our middle east policies would be if we didn't need their oil? You think we would care as much about having Israel there? Please. You think we would really care about an empty desert at all? There probably wouldn't even be a war on terror at all because we never would have been screwing around over there.

As for "jumping on the caribou comment," I apologize if it was just a joke. Maybe it is the result of being raised by two biologists, but that kind of stuff gets to me.

Mmm...caribou

Hey, I never said we couldn't hunt them! I am from the rural midwest after all, we hunt everything:)

LOL Oberon... When I was visiting Maine and New Brunswick last month, my cousin prepared Moose roast. I found it absolutely delicious!

I agree with Oberon and others that in the short term it makes sense. I also agree with Mathew that it would be better both policy-wise and politically to bundle it together with a healthy incentive to work on alternative energy policies.

The problem with alternative energy sources is that oil is so damned good and cheap as an energy source. It's very portable, efficient, and inexpensive and it seems to me, the only viable candidate at the moment is nuclear power, with all its inherent risks. Hydrogen is our future, but from what I've read, it takes a lot of energy to create it in a viable form.

I hope that if the gov't forms a policy, they follow the great strides that have been accomplished in private space flight using the X Prize as a model. The gov't needs to set strict criteria, put up a huge carrot as a prize, and get the hell out of the way as private enterprise works it out.

In California, I think it's fair to say we wasted resources by assuming a conclusion (e.g. Electric Vehicles) instead of just dictating a criteria (e.g very-low emissions or independence from oil) and letting the market come up with answer.

We use so much oil, instead of alternative energy, because oil is so darn cheap compared to alternatives. Alternative energy becomes more compelling as research lowers its cost and oil prices rise. There is no conspiracy holding back energy generating companies from taking advantage of alternatives, it is ordinary economics. If alternatives lowered their costs and increased profits, the generating companies wouldn't hesitate even one second to take advantage of it.

Arbitrarily abandoning oil for more expensive alternatives would seriously damage the economy. It would hurt jobs, standard of living, money available for social programs and education, everything.

ANWR oil will take years, and won't solve our problems or get us energy independence by itself. But every bit helps, and I really don't see why we shouldn't drill a field the size of an airport in a refuge the size of South Carolina. The Alaskans strongly support it, including the native people of the area.

We need better energy independence for national security, because we all know the unhealthy gymnastics our country has to go through to preserve oil imports. It makes big problems, costs money and lives. It puts us at risk because a disruption in the import supply can quickly trash our economy.

So let's drill in Alaska, let's conserve energy, let's improve efficiency, let's research cleaner coal burning, let's do every bit of everything we can. Nuclear power doesn't produce any greenhouse gasses, let's make more of that too.

Someone up there talked about fuel cells. That's not a large scale producer of energy, its more like a battery. It takes energy to make Hydrogen, that energy has to come somewhere -- a coal, oil, or nuclear power plant. Same thing with electric cars...

There's not a lot more places we can dam, and anyway hydroelectric has environmental problems of its own. Natural gas is definitely tapped out, prices are skyrocketing since we can't increase supply further. Wind and solar aren't cost effective, and don't scale well to produce a good chunk of what we need. It takes energy to make a solar panel, and they only last so many years. So what alternatives do you have in mind to replace oil?

USA has lots and lots of coal, so ongoing research into burning that cleaner could really help. Lots of uranium too, and nuclear power doesn't produce any greenhouse gasses. There's the waste problem, but every energy method has problems... France and Japan get 50 or 80 percent of their energy from Nuclear power, I can't remember which.

Not that you care Susan, considering how often we differ, but I couldn't agree more. Everything on the table, all ideas informed by realism, and with an insistence upon evaluating each suggested energy source's validity by accounting for every single step from beginning to end.

In case anyone doesn't know, we're in the process here in Mass of approving a big wind farm somewhere down in Nantucket Sound. I never saw so many strange bedfellows. I never saw so many people suddenly care so much about birds. I never saw so many free enterprisers extolling regulation and the public trust.

I agree with much of what Susan says, but the Administration has to show some understanding that energy policy has to be more than just drilling for oil or spending money on hydrogen technology that is years in the future. It has to recognize that the science about global warmins isn't just some left-wing fantasy; it doesn't mean blindly accept the Kyoto treaty but at least recognize the problem exists. He needs to be willing to increase fuel standards for SUVs and things like that. I am all for market-based approaches, but there has to some hammer. I am not necessarily against drilling if it is coupled with energy conservation and environmental initiatives to balance things out.

Many of you have mentioned that drilling should be allowed but only if coupled with incentives for exploring and developing more eco-friendly energy sources. I believe this be a great solution; however, the time for it was two years ago when the Democrats could fight for it. With the numbers they have now, the conservatives will throw a few nice-looking policy pieces in about cleaner energy, but it will only be smoke and mirrors to distract from the handout the oil and coal companies will be getting. Democrats were so adamant about beating back any ANWR drilling and so convinced they re-win the Senate (and the Presidency) that they refused to compromise when they could. Now the environment is basically screwed.