March 10, 2008
BOOK REVIEW: 'Gusher of Lies' Argues Persuasively That Energy Independence is an Impossible Dream
By David M. Kinchen
Huntingtonnews.net Book Critic
Lt. Gen. Russel L. Honore', who famously admonished reporters covering Hurricane Katrina on Sept. 20, 2005 not to get "stuck on stupid," retired this past January. The native of Louisiana, who describes himself as an African-American Creole, could have a great second career telling the politicians -- including all the Presidential candidates past, present and future -- not to get stuck on stupid about "energy independence."
As Robert Bryce points out over and over again in his "Gusher of Lies: The Dangerous Delusions of 'Energy Independence' (PublicAffairs, 384 pages, $26.95) there is no way a nation that consumes fossil-based energy at our rate can become self-sufficient in energy. All the Toyota Priuses in the world won't change the stark fact that there is no substitute for oil, he writes. We've been an importer of petroleum since 1913, and we get most of our imported oil these days from NAFTA neighbors Canada and Mexico.
Even countries with huge reserves of oil and/or natural gas import fossil fuel; Saudi Arabia in 2005 imported 83,000 barrels of gasoline and other refined products a day and Iran, with the world's second largest natural gas reserves imports natural gas! Mexico's reserves are at peak oil or past them and Mexico is becoming an importer of petroleum. Talk about carrying coals to Newcastle, the U.S. -- with hundreds of years of coal reserves -- still imports coal from other countries if the cost of shipping from American mines to power plants exceeds the cost of bringing it in by ship from abroad. The coal we import from places like Colombia, Venezuela, Indonesia, Russia, and even China, Bryce says, is mostly clean-burning low sulphur coal, which helps utilities meet clean air standards.
So why do politicians of the conservative and liberal persuasion alike call for energy independence? They're playing on our fears of another oil embargo, even though previous ones in the 1970s and 1980s didn't work, Bryce says. The same applies when, like Al Gore in his "An Inconvenient Truth" they claim that with ethanol, biodiesel, wind and solar power and conservation, we can become "energy independent." The dirty big secret, Bryce argues, is that ethanol production gobbles up huge quantities of water and the corn used for heavily subsidized ethanol -- which is difficult to find in its E-85 form outside the Midwest -- is corn that can't feed people or cattle.
Bryce, who has written about energy for two decades and is a fellow at the Institute for Energy Research, describes how energy is the ultimate global commodity; if we conserve and use less imported petroleum, China or India or Japan will buy what we don't -- and more -- without quibbling about the price, he says.
The American energy appetite is increasing, not decreasing; by 2030, wind will provide just over 1 percent of all electricity used in the U.S., Bryce says, and solar even less. Bryce himself has solar panels on his house in sunny Austin, TX, but he says he still has to buy electricity off the grid.
I would call Bryce a "Texas Observer Liberal": He's a contributing writer for the progressive magazine. So why does he support more nuclear power plants, which most liberals oppose? Because it's one alternative source of power that works, as the example of France -- which produces the bulk of its electricity from nuclear -- that's why. In Chapter 14, Bryce tells the story of the city owned Austin Energy's investment in the South Texas Project, a 16 percent investment in the two-nuclear reactor project. Liberal opponents -- and Austin is the most liberal city in Texas -- derided the investment in the 1970s and 1980s with jokes like: "Q: What do you have when you have Lassie, Rin Tin Tin, and the South Texas Project? A: Two moneymakers and a dog."
Despite cost overruns and delays, the joke has been turned topsy-turvy, Bryce writes: "...over the past few years, the South Texas Project has emerged as one of the best deals the city of Austin has ever done. For three years in a row, from 2004 to 2006, the plant produced more energy than any other two-nuclear reactor nuclear plant in the country. Austin now gets about 29 percent of its electricity from the nuclear plant and that juice is likely the cheapest power in its portfolio."
Of course, with nuclear power, we are energy independent, aren't we? Think again, Sparky; American nuclear plants import more than 80 percent of the uranium they need, from places like Australia, Brazil, Canada, Kazakhstan, Namibia, Russia and South Africa. The biggest suppliers are Russia and Australia, Bryce says.
OK, how about Coal-to-Liquid (CTL) fuel, synthetic fuel produced by variants of the 1920s-vintage pre-Nazi Germany Fischer-Tropsch process. Bryce points out that South Africa's Sasol, the largest CTL producer, is selling its expertise to, among other countries, China, which has huge coal reserves.
CTL, promoted heavily by West Virginia's Congressional delegation, has major environmental problems, Bryce says. It produces massive amounts of carbon dioxide. Plus, he notes, CTL plants are horrendously expensive; a plant capable of producing 50,000 of CTL fuel per day will likely cost $4.5 billion. Contrast this with an oil refinery producing four times as many barrels and costing $5 billion.
Bryce's "Gusher of Lies" is very readable, well documented and should be required reading by every American dreaming the impossible dream of "energy independence." Especially every American politician.
Publisher's web site: www.publicaffairsbooks.com
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BOOK REVIEW: 'Gusher of Lies' Argues Persuasively That Energy Independence is an Impossible Dream
By David M. Kinchen
Huntingtonnews.net Book Critic
Lt. Gen. Russel L. Honore', who famously admonished reporters covering Hurricane Katrina on Sept. 20, 2005 not to get "stuck on stupid," retired this past January. The native of Louisiana, who describes himself as an African-American Creole, could have a great second career telling the politicians -- including all the Presidential candidates past, present and future -- not to get stuck on stupid about "energy independence."
As Robert Bryce points out over and over again in his "Gusher of Lies: The Dangerous Delusions of 'Energy Independence' (PublicAffairs, 384 pages, $26.95) there is no way a nation that consumes fossil-based energy at our rate can become self-sufficient in energy. All the Toyota Priuses in the world won't change the stark fact that there is no substitute for oil, he writes. We've been an importer of petroleum since 1913, and we get most of our imported oil these days from NAFTA neighbors Canada and Mexico.
Even countries with huge reserves of oil and/or natural gas import fossil fuel; Saudi Arabia in 2005 imported 83,000 barrels of gasoline and other refined products a day and Iran, with the world's second largest natural gas reserves imports natural gas! Mexico's reserves are at peak oil or past them and Mexico is becoming an importer of petroleum. Talk about carrying coals to Newcastle, the U.S. -- with hundreds of years of coal reserves -- still imports coal from other countries if the cost of shipping from American mines to power plants exceeds the cost of bringing it in by ship from abroad. The coal we import from places like Colombia, Venezuela, Indonesia, Russia, and even China, Bryce says, is mostly clean-burning low sulphur coal, which helps utilities meet clean air standards.
So why do politicians of the conservative and liberal persuasion alike call for energy independence? They're playing on our fears of another oil embargo, even though previous ones in the 1970s and 1980s didn't work, Bryce says. The same applies when, like Al Gore in his "An Inconvenient Truth" they claim that with ethanol, biodiesel, wind and solar power and conservation, we can become "energy independent." The dirty big secret, Bryce argues, is that ethanol production gobbles up huge quantities of water and the corn used for heavily subsidized ethanol -- which is difficult to find in its E-85 form outside the Midwest -- is corn that can't feed people or cattle.
Bryce, who has written about energy for two decades and is a fellow at the Institute for Energy Research, describes how energy is the ultimate global commodity; if we conserve and use less imported petroleum, China or India or Japan will buy what we don't -- and more -- without quibbling about the price, he says.
The American energy appetite is increasing, not decreasing; by 2030, wind will provide just over 1 percent of all electricity used in the U.S., Bryce says, and solar even less. Bryce himself has solar panels on his house in sunny Austin, TX, but he says he still has to buy electricity off the grid.
I would call Bryce a "Texas Observer Liberal": He's a contributing writer for the progressive magazine. So why does he support more nuclear power plants, which most liberals oppose? Because it's one alternative source of power that works, as the example of France -- which produces the bulk of its electricity from nuclear -- that's why. In Chapter 14, Bryce tells the story of the city owned Austin Energy's investment in the South Texas Project, a 16 percent investment in the two-nuclear reactor project. Liberal opponents -- and Austin is the most liberal city in Texas -- derided the investment in the 1970s and 1980s with jokes like: "Q: What do you have when you have Lassie, Rin Tin Tin, and the South Texas Project? A: Two moneymakers and a dog."
Despite cost overruns and delays, the joke has been turned topsy-turvy, Bryce writes: "...over the past few years, the South Texas Project has emerged as one of the best deals the city of Austin has ever done. For three years in a row, from 2004 to 2006, the plant produced more energy than any other two-nuclear reactor nuclear plant in the country. Austin now gets about 29 percent of its electricity from the nuclear plant and that juice is likely the cheapest power in its portfolio."
Of course, with nuclear power, we are energy independent, aren't we? Think again, Sparky; American nuclear plants import more than 80 percent of the uranium they need, from places like Australia, Brazil, Canada, Kazakhstan, Namibia, Russia and South Africa. The biggest suppliers are Russia and Australia, Bryce says.
OK, how about Coal-to-Liquid (CTL) fuel, synthetic fuel produced by variants of the 1920s-vintage pre-Nazi Germany Fischer-Tropsch process. Bryce points out that South Africa's Sasol, the largest CTL producer, is selling its expertise to, among other countries, China, which has huge coal reserves.
CTL, promoted heavily by West Virginia's Congressional delegation, has major environmental problems, Bryce says. It produces massive amounts of carbon dioxide. Plus, he notes, CTL plants are horrendously expensive; a plant capable of producing 50,000 of CTL fuel per day will likely cost $4.5 billion. Contrast this with an oil refinery producing four times as many barrels and costing $5 billion.
Bryce's "Gusher of Lies" is very readable, well documented and should be required reading by every American dreaming the impossible dream of "energy independence." Especially every American politician.
Publisher's web site: www.publicaffairsbooks.com
Make HNN Your Homepage (IE Users Only)
