A Doable Energy Future

09/12/2010 05:49:42 PM

We all agree: there is an urgent need to stop burning oil from hostile and dangerous places. This agreement is all the consensus we need to implement an effective energy policy.

But we're so busy arguing about the things on which we don't agree that we have no energy policy at all. Some believe the most important reason not to burn so much oil is that the resulting CO2 emissions are leading to global warming. Others are more concerned about the economic consequences of sending so much money out of the country (and may even be skeptical about global warming or its cause). Still others see the true cost of foreign oil as the danger in making our enemies wealthy and the sacrifices of our soldiers in Mideast wars.

We can argue until the cows come home over whether climate change, unfavorable economics, or global terror are the most important reason to reduce our use of oil from hostile places. Or we can agree that we all want to see the need for these imports to end and it doesn't really matter whether we agree why. Once we stop worrying about each other's motives and start working towards a common goal, we can achieve that goal.

In 2008 the United States had net imports of 56% of the oil we used. Almost 20% of our supply is from North America; so we need to reduce 46% or about 9 million barrels PER DAY from our 2008 consumption to eliminate the need for importing oil from outside North America – assuming our domestic production stays level. Ironically, the economy has helped some with that. Our daily usage of oil in 2009 was down over 800,000 barrels per day; exports actually declined even further because domestic production increased. (All data for this paragraph is from the US Energy Information Administration http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/country/country_energy_data.cfm?fips=US).

Here in Vermont we'd like to act locally. That's good because we use more than our share of oil for both home heating and transportation. A typical Vermont household gets about 16% of its energy from electricity, 53% from home heating oil, and 31% from gasoline. From a carbon budget point of view, it's worse: only 8% of the 42,663 lbs of CO2 the average Vermont household generates annually comes from use of electricity, 61% comes from heating, and 31% from driving. (more on this here).

Since one third of our electricity comes from Vermont Yankee and another third from HydroQuebec, only the remaining third is generated from fossil fuel and most of that from natural gas which is both cleaner than oil in many ways and doesn't come from dangerous places. So reducing our use of electricity doesn't help us towards our shared goal of reducing oil usage by 46%; it doesn't substantially reduce atmospheric emissions, reduce imports from outside North America, or slow the flow of funds to the Mideast.

But reducing our use of oil gets at all our goals. Before we do that, though, to keep our consensus, we have to agree on some constraints:

  1. We will reduce oil use in a way which also reduce CO2. For example, heating with coal instead of oil doesn't qualify.
  2. We will reduce our use of oil in a way which is good for the economy; raising the price of transportation, heating, or electricity significantly is out of bounds.
  3. We're not going to make significant progress with government incentives; the money for them is drying up fast at both the state and federal level; past incentives are part of the problem more than their part of the solution.
  4. Although conservation is important and useful, people will continue to insist on the freedom to go to work and play and to heat and cool their homes.

 

So, within the constraints, here are some of the things we can do to directly decrease oil use:

 

  1. Install solar hot water on south-facing rooftops. Even in Vermont and even without incentives, there is a solid economic payback for this technology wherever there is a good site and relatively consistent demand for hot water.
  2. Extend our natural gas pipeline and run both vehicles and heating plants on it.
  3. Insulate; heating the outdoors doesn't make much sense.
  4. Install ground source heat pumps. Although the retrofit cost is fairly high and not every location is suitable, once heat pumps are installed they are efficient enough so that, at today's price of electricity, the cost to heat is less than it would be with $1.50/gallon oil. Payback less than ten years; much less if used for cooling as well.
  5. Take advantage of upcoming Smart Grid technology to use MORE green, cheap offpeak electricity including a return to electric storage heat.
  6. When prices come down (or if you're not price sensitive), buy electric cars for most commuting and fleet use; they are already cheaper to operate than gas and will get relatively cheaper with deep offpeak discounts for charging.
  7. Eliminate government incentives for all sources of energy (will help with the deficit, too). The oil incentives are mostly federal so we can't do that here; but we can stop driving up the cost of electricity through subsidies which get added to everyone's electric bill. We WANT people to use more electricity.
  8. Once the state government gets out of the incentive business, it can lead by doing all of the above for its own properties through competitive bidding. That'll help develop the support industries needed to install new technologies and lead to a proliferation of charging stations for electric cars.

 

We have a lot going for us: the electrical Smart Grid already being built in Vermont, our environmental ethic, the cheap clean energy we now have available (including both Yankee and HydroQuebec, which is expanding its capacity), and a mix of other renewable sources. If we stick to our consensus, we can eliminate 50% of our oil use in ten years – and be the richer for it in every sense of the word.