Having started out as a Sustainable Development Media Think Tank, we
found very soon that we must first concentrate on the energy factor -
because of the way this topic is treated by some world leaders; it led
to the phenomena of
CLIMATE CHANGE / GLOBAL WARMING that are causing irreversible,
negative, changes to planet earth. We are very frustrated that we had
to deviate from what we thought was our main “raison d’etre”, but we
never forgot our main ideas.

With above in mind, we looked at the President’s speech and we found
in it nothing - zero!
Nevertheless, we think it was a very important speech, and we shall
explain.

The President’s speech was basically in two large parts: the first
part was on national security. This part was tough, clear, principled,
and well reasoned. We have nevertheless comments on what brought us to
where we are now - in this security mess - and our comments on this
part will become clear when we proceed further with our review.

The second part of the President’s list was a laundry list. I
started
to lose attention, and jumped up when I heard the President say;
“AMERICA IS ADDICTED TO OIL.” Now, here he started talking. He actually
used words we used before on our website and which Thomas Friedman
started to use lately; this was the first time someone from the White
House showed that they also know what really goes on. We shall now
concentrate our attention to this point. We think it important because
it is like Aladdin having let out the jinni from his box. It will never
go back, and the jinni will continue his own development, even if the
White House will decide later that this was the wrong idea to present
before its constituency in the Party. After all, President Bush spent
much of his business career in the oil business - ventures Arbusto,
Spectrum 7, and Harken, come to mind - the word “addicted” heard from
him is baffling. If Americans are addicts, then, to follow the
metaphor, Bush himself was a drug dealer, pusher, a kingpin. Further,
his statement seems also to imply that our desire to use oil is
something that is not just uncontrollable but also shameful. The
message is that we must kick the habit; but he did not say a word about
reducing demand for energy. He said nothing about conservation, nothing
about changing our habits the way we do things - really he continued
only in a way he wants to supply us with methadone, to replace the
drugs, without really weaning us away from the addiction itself. Was
this for real?

Paul Koring, in the Canadian Globe and Mail, quotes from Bush, part
one: “The road of isolationism and protectionism may seem broad and
inviting, yet it ends in danger and decline,” then - “The only way to
protect our people … the only way to secure peace … the only way to
control our destiny is by our leadership, so the United States of
America will continue to lead.”

John Podhoretz, a politically conservative, wrote in the New York
Post article titled “A Minor Speech, But a Major Plus”: “Substantively,
the State of the Union message was pretty much a bust - with an
entitlements commission here, a competitiveness initiative there, here
a commission, there an initiative,everywhere a commission and an
initiative. Rhetorically, it wasn’t all that memorable - save for his
line about America being addicted to oil, which was catchy but
essentially pointless. But, politically, it had two virtues. First it
was Hippocratic: Nothing he proposed last night will do any harm to
him. Whether Commission A or Initiative B is welcomed or rejected by
Congress, it won’t matter much. Its second virtue was that it allowed
him to spend a good deal of time reassuring a nervous public that he
was focused on the primary task at hand.” As said, we believe that the
talk of addiction will indeed matter, though not as intended.

The “Independent” of London finds in the speech “two statements of
completely opposite meaning”:

• on the conflict in Iraq - “We are in this fight to win, and we
  are winning” and then

• “we are addicted to oil … we must make our dependence on
  Middle
  Eastern oil a thing of the past.”

So what were the few words of this years’ State of the Union that
were different from previous pronouncements?

The President said:

“KEEPING AMERICA COMPETITIVE REQUIRES AFFORDABLE
ENERGY. AND HERE WE HAVE A SERIOUS PROBLEM. AMERICA IS ADDICTED TO OIL,
WHICH IS OFTEN IMPORTED FROM UNSTABLE PARTS OF THE WORLD. THE BEST WAY
TO BREAK THIS ADDICTION IS THROUGH TECHNOLOGY. SINCE 2001 WE HAVE SPENT
NEARLY $10 BILLION TO DEVELOP CLEANER AND MORE RELIABLE ALTERNATIVE
ENERGY SOURCES. AND WE ARE ON THE THRESHOLD OF INCREDIBLE ADVANCES. SO
TONIGHT, I ANNOUNCE THE ADVANCED ENERGY INITIATIVE, A 22% INCREASE IN
CLEAN-ENERGY RESEARCH AT THE DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY TO PUSH FOR
BREAKTHROUGHS IN TWO VITAL AREAS. TO CHANGE HOW WE POWER OUR HOMES AND
OFFICES, WE WILL INVEST MORE IN ZERO-EMISSION COAL-FIRED PLANTS,
REVOLUTIONARY SOLAR AND WIND TECHNOLOGIES AND CLEAN, SAFE NUCLEAR
ENERGY.

WE MUST ALSO CHANGE HOW WE POWER OUR AUTOMOBILES. WE WILL INCREASE
OUR RESEARCH IN BETTER BATTERIES FOR HYBRID AND ELECTRIC CARS AND IN
POLLUTION-FREE CARS THAT RUN ON HYDROGEN. WE WILL ALSO FUND ADDITIONAL
RESEARCH IN CUTTING-EDGE METHODS OF PRODUCING ETHANOL, NOT JUST FROM
CORN BUT FROM WOOD CHIPS AND STALKS OR SWITCH GRASS. OUR GOAL IS TO
MAKE THIS NEW KIND OF ETHANOL PRACTICAL AND COMPETITIVE WITHIN SIX
YEARS.

BREAKTHROUGHS ON THIS AND OTHER NEW TECHNOLOGIES WILL HELP US REACH
ANOTHER GREAT GOAL. TO REPLACE MORE THAN 75% OF OUR OIL IMPORTS FROM
THE MIDDLE EAST BY 2025. BY APPLYING THE TALENT AND TECHNOLOGY OF
AMERICA., THIS COUNTRY CAN DRAMATICALLY IMPROVE OUR ENVIRONMENT, MOVE
BEYOND A PETROLEUM-BASED ECONOMY AND MAKE OUR DEPENDENCE ON MIDDLE
EASTERN OIL A THING OF THE PAST… TONIGHT I ANNOUNCE THE AMERICAN
COMPETITIVENESS INITIATIVE, TO ENCOURAGE INNOVATION THROUGHOUT OUR
ECONOMY AND TO GIVE OUR NATION’S CHILDREN A FIRM GROUNDING IN MATH AND
SCIENCE.”

The reaction to the President’s speech, according to an immediate CNN
poll was:

48% - very positive

27% - somewhat positive

14% - somewhat negative

9% - very negative

2% - mixed feelings

Actually, where do the US imported oil and oil products come from?
We will use here the last available data which are for 2004:

OPEC countries 43.4%
   as follows:
   Middle
East Gulf States 19%

   other OPEC (Algeria, Libya, Nigeria, Venezuela)total 24.4%

non-OPEC countries 56.6%

   as follows:
   Canada 16.3%,

   Mexico
12.6%,

   UK 2.9%

   other non-OPEC (Angola, Russia, Virgin Islands) total 24.8%

The President’s call to slash by 75% from the 19% of imports that
come from the Middle East (these are actually 11% from the total US
consumption of oil - obviously all the figures are different for the
projected years - 19 years into the future) without saying a word about
inducing decreased demand by using regulatory and taxation methods, can
only be decried as discriminatory by the powerful Ambassadors from the
Middle East, and obviously they obliged already by making this sort of
claims. On the other hand, the oil industry in Washington, and their
friends from the Canadian Provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan, did,
as expected, claim already that they can fill in the breech. In effect
I just was informed that the Minister of Industry and Resources of one
of the Provinces will speak to the New York based Energy Forum this
month. The industry will clearly point out that they can solve the
problems by themselves, and should be allowed to do business as usual -
the danger is that they may actually succeed in continuing Washington’s
inaction. Even money spent does rarely produce results in Washington
unless there is the appropriate will.

The goal of replacing oil with renewables, provided there is no
increase in consumption, could inded also help further the unstated
goal of decreasing CO2 emissions. To get there, besides the
introduction of concepts of conservation of resources, it must be made
clear that only the change of venue of the imports of oil to the US is
also recognized as a non-solution. Replacing the US as client of Middle
Eastern oil by the Chinese does in itself not further even the
political goals that the president had in his mind. In short, he must
step forward and embrace also the environmental goals.

Mr. President, Sweden just committed itself to stop using oil by
2020. Could we train our minds in that direction also?

Talking technology, when addressing the subject of ethanol, the US
could learn a lot from Brazil. They have a commercially viable
production of biofuels, and appropriate motor vehicles, they started 25
years ago. Just think of this, that while Ford Motor Company was
selling vehicles that used 85% ethanol - 15% gasoline, and 20% ethanol
- 80% gasoline, fuel mixtures required by regulatory agencies in
Brazil, they were testifying on Capitol Hill, in Washington DC, that
even a mixture of 10% ethanol - 90% gasoline was going to harm the
vehicle they were selling in the US - was that corporate honesty, or
oil industry Machiavelism? On the subject of cellulose, The technology
development was a black hole in Washington for the last 25 years. It
was used to pass money to universities, but no results were seemingly
requested. Instead of using corn to make alcohol, we dished out funds
in order to stole what we could have done a long time ago - this just
because the oil folks did not want to share the market with biofuels.
Reuthers is full these last two days with ethanol releases - some
coming from Sao Paulo. We will get back to this and much more in
following articles.

John Marburger, Director of Science and Technology Policy, the White
House, said: “The Comprehensive Energy Plan mentioned in the State of
the Union is a science based plan that reduces dependence on foreign
oil (mostly used in transportation) and introduces alternative energy
sources and cleaner, carbon-free production of electricity. The Plan
will reduce the need for gasoline by a combination of technical
improvements including ethanol, hybrid vehicles, “plug-in” cars based
on better batteries, and eventually hydrogen fueled cars. Electricity
production technologies using solar, wind, and nuclear power and are
all close to breakthroughs that will transform the energy profile of
the nation.”
We hope he is right.

The Wall Street Journal had it right this time - they flatly
declared; ” History shows government energy programs tend not to work
and that ‘the only way we’ve ever cut back on imported oil is in
response to higher prices” - this as per an article in the libertarian
Reason Magazine by science correspondent, Ronald Bailey. Reuthers
reports from London that US taxes on oil account for about 23% of the
price of gasoline, whereas in Europe taxes - and prices - are much
higher. “British consumers pay nearly 68% tax on gasoline.” And this is
the rub - no regulation, no taxation - you get also thus - no execution
of stated goals.

The Democrat’s response was just as anemic, in substance, as the
President’s speech. From Governor Tim Kaine’s presentation, regarding
our issue here, I found only, starting with “There’s a better way”, the
only paragraph is as follows: “Last summer, I joined Democrats in
Washington and in other states in calling on oil companies to share in
our sacrifice and return some of their record- breaking excess profits.
Democrats at both the state and national levels are leading the way on
energy reforms, calling for greater public investments for alternative,
advanced energy technologies. These investments will promote energy
independence, boost our nation’s economy, create jobs, and strengthen
national security.” So, where is the beef? How does this show advantage
over the President’s speech? Where is the tax? Are they also afraid to
take a real stand? Have they read for ideas the Thomas Friedman many
recent articles?

Even as anemic as this material is, it nevertheless found its
detractors from among the oil industry institutions, and here I will
only bring attention to Elizabeth Bumiller’s article in the February 2,
2006 New York Times “Bush’s Goals on Energy Quickly Find Obstacles.”
Also the New York Sun had a February 2, 2006 article: ” Bush Energy
Plan Irks Critics From Free Market Camp: Waste Seen in Subsidy Schemes
to Develop Alternative Fuels.” I will nevertheless go over a few Thomas
Friedman points in “Addicted to Oil” of February 1, 2006.

Since 9/11 the Arab-Muslim world - “Has brought to power hard-line
Islamic fundamentalists in Iraq, Palestine, and Iran, and paved the way
for a record showing by the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt. If we keep
this up, in a few years Muslim clerics will be in power from Morocco to
the border of India. God bless America. But is this all America’s
doing? Not really. It’s actually the product of 50 years of petrolism -
or petroleum-based politics - in the Arab-Muslim world … In the Arab
world, oil and authoritarianism are inextricably linked.”