Monday, March 27, 2006
Reckless Energy Agenda 8/29/05
Dear Editor,
We know that maintaining our national security will require reducing our dependence on foreign oil. But the Administration is using the current crisis to push through a reckless energy agenda, that gives billions to the already unbelievably mega rich oil companies and the nuclear industry, but gives little to the alternatives.
They want to drill in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, which will not improve America's security. Even the conservative Cato Institute has called President Bush's claim that Arctic oil would reduce gas prices or American dependency on foreign oil "not just nonsense, but nonsense on stilts."
There is a quick and easy way to reduce our dependency fast. Since 40 percent of the oil used by America, fuels light trucks and cars, an increase in mileage per gallon, called CAFE - could have a dramatic impact, but the Administration has offered nothing but platitudes in this area. In the late 1970's, President Jimmy Carter implemented CAFE standards to combat an oil shortage driven by policies OPEC. The standards raised fuel efficiency in American cars by 7.6 miles a gallon over six years, causing oil imports from the Persian Gulf to fall by 87 percent. Our economy grew by 27 percent during that period. Detroit, predictably, figured out how to build more fuel-efficient cars largely without reductions in size, comfort or power. The CAFE standards worked so well that they produced an oil glut by 1986. That's when the Reagan administration intervened to rescue America's domestic oil industry from gasoline price collapse. Ronald Reagan's rollback of CAFE standards caused America, in that year, to double oil imports from the Persian Gulf nations and to burn more oil than is in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
We know that maintaining our national security will require reducing our dependence on foreign oil. But the Administration is using the current crisis to push through a reckless energy agenda, that gives billions to the already unbelievably mega rich oil companies and the nuclear industry, but gives little to the alternatives.
They want to drill in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, which will not improve America's security. Even the conservative Cato Institute has called President Bush's claim that Arctic oil would reduce gas prices or American dependency on foreign oil "not just nonsense, but nonsense on stilts."
There is a quick and easy way to reduce our dependency fast. Since 40 percent of the oil used by America, fuels light trucks and cars, an increase in mileage per gallon, called CAFE - could have a dramatic impact, but the Administration has offered nothing but platitudes in this area. In the late 1970's, President Jimmy Carter implemented CAFE standards to combat an oil shortage driven by policies OPEC. The standards raised fuel efficiency in American cars by 7.6 miles a gallon over six years, causing oil imports from the Persian Gulf to fall by 87 percent. Our economy grew by 27 percent during that period. Detroit, predictably, figured out how to build more fuel-efficient cars largely without reductions in size, comfort or power. The CAFE standards worked so well that they produced an oil glut by 1986. That's when the Reagan administration intervened to rescue America's domestic oil industry from gasoline price collapse. Ronald Reagan's rollback of CAFE standards caused America, in that year, to double oil imports from the Persian Gulf nations and to burn more oil than is in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
# posted by Florence Vincent @ 4:53 PM 
