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We Need President Obama’s International Leadership on Energy Diplomacy Rather than Governor Romney’s “Pull up the Drawbridge” Approach

Posted by: Liz Barratt-Brown -

Last night’s Presidential debate on foreign policy should have included a question on climate change which is one of the greatest foreign policy challenges and security risks facing the United States and communities around the world. A question would have been especially timely , given the recent foreign policy speech where Secretary of State Hillary Clinton laid it on the line: “Energy cuts across the entirety of U.S. foreign policy….Transformation to cleaner energy is central to reducing the world’s carbon emissions and it is core to a strong 21st Century global economy.”

Let’s look at some of the key differences between the candidates when it comes to energy diplomacy and climate change. Governor Romney has a “pull up the drawbridge” approach to energy and ridicules climate change. President Obama has already built a track record of actions to promote clean energy and reduce our dependence on fuels that worsen climate change.

Secretary Clinton set up the issue in her speech, saying, “This is a moment of profound change.  Countries that once weren’t major consumers are. Countries that used to depend on others for their energy are now producers.  How will this shape world events?  Who will benefit, and who will not?  How will it affect the climate, people’s economic conditions, the strength of young democracies?”

She emphasized the need for American leadership, continuing, “All of this is unknown.  The answers to these questions are being written right now, and we intend to play a major role in writing them.  We have no choice.  We have to be involved everywhere in the world. The future security and prosperity of our nation and the rest of the world hangs in the balance.”

The Administration is not mincing words here. 

This contrasts sharply with Governor Romney, who has relentlessly pursued a single minded energy focus on North America that boils down to an ‘extract our own resources and pull up the drawbridge’ approach. And he pays lip service to clean energy, but does not have a plan to advance it and would cut important tax credits for renewables.

If we continue with our reliance on ever dirtier forms of fossil fuels, our North American landscapes as we know them will change, carbon pollution will edge us closer to irreversible climate change, and important opportunities to promote clean energy both in the U.S. and abroad will be lost.

Take the proposed massive tar sands oil pipeline, Keystone XL, which Governor Romney has said he would approve.  Not only would this be primarily an export oriented pipeline, greatly diminishing claimed energy security benefits, it is a dirty energy pipeline and not the path to U.S. economic leadership.  As Secretary Clinton reminds us, trillions of dollars will be invested in the next 25 years in generating and transmitting energy globally.  Now is the time for the U.S. to position ourselves as a leader and secure these clean energy opportunities.

The repercussions of climate change are real and are affecting our economic well-being at home and our security abroad. In a year of extreme weather, more and more Americans now understand the impacts of climate change in their communities.  A recent PEW poll found that 67% of the public understands that there is solid evidence the planet is heating up.  And more and more Americans can see how the kinds of changes climate change will bring can hit home – just ask the ranchers in Texas who had to sell their livestock because of the crippling drought.    

 Governor Romney’s response is to ridicule climate change, and his running mate is a long-time climate denier.  But climate change is no laughing matter to Americans and to our allies. 

There is another path.

President Obama has taken critical steps to reduce U.S. oil use through new clean car standards that will also save Americans money and to control carbon pollution by proposing carbon limits on new power plants.  As Secretary Clinton made clear, “Energy is essential to how we will power our economy and manage our environment in the 21st Century.  We therefore have an interest in promoting new technologies and new sources of energy – especially including renewables – to reduce pollution, diversify global energy supply, create jobs, and address the very real threat of climate change.”

That is a future worth looking forward to.

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Why “that pipeline from Canada” Won’t Deliver the 21st Century Energy Policy America Needs

Posted by: Liz Barratt-Brown -

In last night’s town hall debate, Governor Romney suggested that the President was wrong in rejecting “that pipeline from Canada.” Governor Romney was referring to the proposed Keystone XL tar sands pipeline that benefits the oil industry by linking tar sands to the deepwater ports of the Gulf Coast while putting our climate, fresh water and lands at risk.  But it was the governor who was wrong in equating this tar sands pipeline to attaining North American energy independence. 

Putting energy use in the rest of North America aside, the reality is that neither this tar sands pipeline, nor drilling on our public and private lands and off our coasts, is going to deliver the U.S. “energy independence”.  As the president rightly said the path to energy independence is found in reducing our demand for fossil fuels.  Only by reducing our demand for fossil fuels – using energy efficiently – and growing our use of clean, homegrown energy can we come closer to energy independence.  Relying on a dirty tar sands oil pipeline from Canada is nothing but a pipedream. And here’s why:

1)      Keystone XL and tar sands oil will not make the U.S. more energy independent:  Governor Romney implied that bringing the tar sands pipeline down from Canada will make us more energy independent.  But the reality is that, as long as we are dependent on oil, we will be vulnerable to the price and political volatility of this globally traded commodity. That is why military leaders, like Retired General Steven Anderson, General Petraeus’ right hand in Iraq, have said that this pipeline will do nothing to increase U.S.  energy security.  Additionally, it will allow, for the first time, large quantities of tar sands oil to reach the global market through the Gulf of Mexico.  Once it reaches the Gulf, the oil industry has made its desire clear to export tar sands  all over the world, undercutting the argument that this as a new source of oil for the U.S.

2)      Keystone XL will not provide the nation-wide jobs essential to a sustained recovery:  Governor Romney referred to “energy independence” as a key piece of his plan for economic recovery. The reality is that for this pipeline project he is using highly inflated job figures.  The pipeline company itself has estimated that there would be 6,000 jobs created in building the pipeline and only a few hundred in maintaining it.  And even those numbers are overstated.  Studies by Cornell University found that there would be 2500-4650 jobs created in construction (many of which have already been created in laying the pipe and other preparations) and that the risks of spills could wipe out many more jobs in agriculture, tourism and other sectors.  Orders of magnitude more jobs are being created in clean energy –  The Peri Institute at U. Mass estimates 2 million jobs can be created with programs to boost private and public investment in retrofitting buildings, improving energy efficiency, expanding mass transit and freight rail, constructing ‘smart’ electrical grid transmission systems, and investing in wind, solar, and next-generation biofuels.

3)      Keystone XL will not lower gas prices and may even increase them:  Governor Romney implied that the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline would bring our gas prices down.  But analysts like Michael Levi of the Council on Foreign Relations has repeatedly stated that the pipeline will do nothing to change the global price of oil or our gas prices.  The reality is that the price of oil is set on the global market.  When gas prices spike, Canada does not give the U.S. a break on the price of oil.  So relying on a pipeline from Canada to reduce gas prices makes little sense. In fact, leading oil economists predict that the pipeline will actually increase gas prices by diverting oil from the Midwest to the Gulf.  Tar sands oil sells for less than lighter crudes in the Midwest because of the cost of refining it.  By moving it to the Gulf,  gas prices will actually increase in the Midwest. And once it gets to an international port in the Gulf, the price will be determined by the highest bidder. In other words, savings in the pockets of Midwesterners today will be profits in the pockets of the oil industry tomorrow.

The president made it clear last night that the issue isn’t about building one more pipeline, saying we’ve built enough pipelines to wrap around the entire earth once.  He said the real focus should be on the kind of energy policy makes us more secure and that helps create high paying jobs in the manufacturing sector –referring to the thousands of jobs building wind turbines in Colorado and Iowa. The president underscored that this is an energy future we need to win.

Building “that pipeline from Canada”, as Governor Romney has promised to approve on day one, won’t deliver the 21st century energy policy we need, it will take us dangerously backwards, putting that energy future we need to win at risk. 

 

 

 

 

Keystone XL Tar Sands Pipeline Could be Topic of Debate Tonight

Posted by: Liz Barratt-Brown -

As the country readies for the first Presidential debate tonight, the campaigns are busy spinning the issues.  One of the issues is the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline, a massive pipeline proposal that would cut through the heartland of America carrying toxic tar sands oil from Canada to the Gulf coast.   It has come to symbolize the choice we face today as a nation – deepen our dependence on fossil fuels or move to a clean energy future. 

Governor Romney has said the pipeline is a top priority of his energy plan and he has gone so far as to say that he’ll build the pipeline with his own hands if he has to.  His campaign has frequently mentioned Keystone XL as a potential debate topic.  

Today, the Obama campaign put out a memo that mentions Keystone XL first in a list of failed policies underpinning Romney’s plan to make America energy independent. 

So, why is this such an important issue?

First, this pipeline will accelerate the extraction of dirty tar sands oil in Alberta, Canada. Producing tar sands oil takes huge amounts of energy and leaves vast areas a wasteland.  Increasing our reliance on this oil will make it extremely difficult to offset the worst of global warming.  Filling the pipeline is equal to putting nearly 5 million more cars on the road or building 7 new coal fired power plants.  More than 10, 000 people surrounded the White House last November asking the President to consider the climate impacts associated with the pipeline.

Second, this is a really massive proposal. The tar sands pipeline would carry bitumen, the dirtiest oil on the planet, under high pressure across over 2000 waterways, including one of our largest sources of drinking and irrigation water, the Ogallala aquifer.  Farmers and ranchers across the Plain States are up in arms about spills into their water supplies.

Third, after travelling 1,700 miles, the bitumen would be refined and could be sent anywhere in the world.  In other words, we get the risk but not the oil.  Ironically, while Governor Romney says that if we don’t take this oil, China will, this pipeline could in fact be used to send oil to China. Military leaders, including General Petraeus’ right hand in Iraq, have said that this pipeline will do nothing to increase our energy security.

President Obama put it best when he said that doubling the fuel efficiency standards saves the equivalent of all the oil that would be pumped through the Keystone XL pipeline for 45 years.   This is a clean energy future that relies on American ingenuity rather than destroying our lands. 

What is the status of the pipeline?

The State Department is tasked with the permitting of the pipeline since it crosses an international border.  For over two years, the risks of the pipeline have been debated with attention focused on potential catastrophic spills into the Ogallala aquifer in Nebraska.  Last fall, the President announced that a new route must be found and that additional safety and environmental issues needed to be considered before the pipeline could be approved. 

House Republicans, incensed over the delay in permitting the pipeline, attached a rider to the tax holiday extension late in December forcing the President to make a decision by the end of February.  In January, the President rejected the pipeline permit, saying that it would be irresponsible to permit a pipeline that had no route and for which the review was not concluded.   A new proposal has been made but all the contentious issues still remain. 

What about jobs and gas prices?

Yesterday, Congressman Ryan alluded to the jobs that would be created in building Keystone XL pipelinewill be created.  But the pipeline company itself has estimated that there would be 6,000 jobs created and even those numbers are overstated.  According to the pipeline company, only a few hundred jobs would be created for the long term.   Studies by Cornell University find the risks of spills could wipe out many more jobs in agriculture, tourism and other sectors.

And as for gas prices, economists believe that the pipeline will actually increase gas prices by diverting oil from the Midwest to the Gulf.   Right now, tar sands oil sells for less than lighter crudes in the Midwest because of the cost of refining it.  By moving it to the Gulf, experts expect the price of gas will actually increase in the Midwest.  And gas prices will not fall in the Gulf because the price for tar sands oil is expected to increase once it gets to an international port where highest bidder controls who gets the oil.  In other words, savings in the pockets of Midwesterners today will be profits in the pockets of the oil industry tomorrow.

In sum –

Governor Romney’s position has always been clear – his energy plans relies on reckless development of Canadian tar sands oil rather than on reducing our demand for oil and developing new and cleaner energy sources right here in America.

Building the pipeline will not generate thousands of jobs. It will not put America back on the road to recovery.  It will not make America more energy independent.  Instead, it will put the American public at risk of a catastrophic spill and it will deepen our addiction to a very dirty oil at a time that we can ill afford to do so.

Governor Romney has stated that he would approve the pipeline in his first day in office.  That would contravene decades of both Republican and Democratic Administrations that have followed the review process laid out in the governing Executive Order, and put at risk the health and safety of the American public.

The Keystone XL tar sands pipeline is for the benefit of Canadian industry and Big Oil.  It will not benefit America.

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