The Stealth Green Revolution

(edited for copyright purposes-proud patiot Moderator Democratic Underground)

http://first100days.theatlantic.com/2009/04/100_days_greener.php


The Stealth Green Revolution
by Joshua Green


A hundred years from now, Barack Obama's first hundred days may be remembered more for his energy policy than for his bank bailouts-at least if things go according to plan. Without a great deal of fanfare or attention, Obama has made significant progress toward overhauling our national energy policy on a scale that's never before been attempted.

For the last century or so, the government's approach to energy, especially electricity, has been to encourage its production as plentifully and cheaply as possible. This has been achieved mainly by burning fossil fuels, which, as we all now know, has created a wee problem in the form of massive carbon emissions that are heating up the planet and threatening catastrophe. On the campaign trail, Obama pledged to move the United States to a greener economy (thereby vastly reducing the amount of greenhouse gas emissions), and in so doing, serve as an example to developing countries like China and India which, along with the United States, are the world's major carbon emitters.

Like so much else, Obama's energy plan has been overshadowed by the financial crisis. That has affected the sales pitch-though not the substance-of what he's attempting to do. Obama's plan can be thought of as having three major components: the federal energy incentives, the energy bill that Congress will tackle this summer, and the carbon cap-and-trade system featured in his budget and in legislation recently introduced by House Energy & Commerce Chairman Henry Waxman.

Obama cannily used the stimulus to push through the first part of his plan. Though it was sold as a "jobs" package to goose the economy, it was also a massive down payment on his energy agenda, since it included $38 billion in grants and $127 billion in loan guarantees to support "clean" technology. With all the billions and trillions Washington is allotting to this or that ailing bank or insurance company these days, it's important to have some perspective on how big a figure $38 billion really is when you're talking about energy. According to a recent study by the consulting firm Management Information Services, between 1950 and 2006, the government disbursed about $725 billion in federal energy incentives, mostly to oil, coal and gas. Renewables like wind and solar received only $45 billion. Give or take a few billion, Obama had matched that by Day 29 of his administration.