President George W. Bush was neither the first nor will he be the last person to cite America’s “addiction” to oil. Just two years before that State of the Union speech, Kurt Vonnegut Jr. wrote, “Here’s what I think the truth is: We are all addicts of fossil fuels in a state of denial, about to face cold turkey.”
Whether used by the President or one of his critics, it’s a powerful and graphic metaphor. Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem to be helping. Like most addicts, will we have to “hit bottom” before we take steps to sober up? Let us hope not.
Human beings can survive without opiates, alcohol, chocolate, tobacco and many other substances to which we claim addiction. But at this point in history, can human beings survive without energy? The amount of energy contained in fossil fuels has made it possible to grow the human population to nearly seven billion people. To say we are “addicted” to oil is to say we are “addicted” to food, much of which is produced using petrochemical fertilizers and transported by petroleum-powered planes, trains, and trucks. Or we are “addicted” to shelter, in the form of heated homes. Or we are “addicted” to water, pumped from the ground or desalinated from the sea or diverted through massive construction projects.
Can we survive without clean water? Can we survive without shelter? Can we survive without food? Obviously not – we are dependent on food, water and shelter. And these things were certainly available before the age of oil – for less than a billion people. To imagine the planet free of its “addiction” to fossil fuels merely requires imagining which five or six billion people to get rid of. Otherwise, we need to find far more effective alternative energy sources than are currently understood.
And therein lies the problem – there seems to be no sense of urgency or commitment in addressing America’s energy future. While China builds the fastest bullet train in the world as evidence of its “Green Leap Forward,” America stands paralyzed like a deer in headlights, watching the impending train wreck when demand for oil again outstrips supply, and prices skyrocket. The oil price run-up in 2008 ended in a deep and dangerous recession. If this was a preview of things to come, what actions should be taken now?
As reported in the Wall Street Journal reported on January 7, 2010, if not for the worldwide recession, the United Kingdom would have faced severe, potentially life-threatening energy shortages this winter. The downside of economic recovery will be increased competition for resources. As the economy improves, energy security strategies will dominate international relations, and many conflicts await us. “Cold turkey” should not be an option, because the possible consequences of energy shortages include an economic downturn that will make the recent recession look like a minor checkbook error.
We need to manage our dependency on the hard road to independence. Some combination of conservation – through altered lifestyles and greater efficiencies – and alternative energy will help, but the task before us is immense. Even with as-yet-uncommitted capital and government subsidies devoted to wind, solar, geothermal and other alternatives, these technologies have barely put a dent in the world’s energy needs, and there are no signs of this changing in the foreseeable future.
Even if we fully embrace natural gas (currently far more economical than wind power) as an opportunity to create jobs, tax revenues and energy independence, it is ultimately a stopgap measure, but it seems to us a move in the right direction. According to Thomas Friedman in the New York Times, “The Beijing leadership clearly understands that the E.T. – Energy Technology – revolution is both a necessity and an opportunity, and they do not intend to miss it.” Do we? China’s energy policy is creating jobs and providing an improved standard of living for its people. Is ours?
If we must cling to the addiction metaphor, then one way to get sober is to get busy. We need to act NOW to avert an energy train wreck in America’s future. The President promised energy independence in ten years, but investment in renewable energy is a fraction of what it was two years ago. Congress let the biodiesel tax incentive lapse, and activists all over the country successfully prevent nuclear and wind projects from going forward. We need a Manhattan Project sense of urgency and commitment in our quest for energy independence. The stakes are no less than they were in WWII – when will our resolve rise to the challenge?