Energy: just a drop in the bucket

As a voter who is concerned about environmental issues, I want to know how each candidate plans to address problems such as increasing drought, alternative energy sources, America's impact on global warming, etc.  I'm exploring Obama and Romney's sites and I keep asking myself, "Where are the environmental platforms?"  The tab for "Energy" under each candidate's list of issues is the closest option.  The fact that each candidate does not directly address the pressing environmental issues we currently face tells me two things: a.) to them, environmental issues fall under the same umbrella as their energy platforms, and b.) making a platform to amend/prevent further damage we have done to the planet would cost them the election.  Energy is only a piece of a larger environmental puzzle we currently face today.  The lack of a comprehensive platform on both sides is very disconcerting for America's future, especially considering that our lifestyle has the largest environmental impact on the rest of the world.  

Aside from Romney and Obama's failure to mention environmental issues not related to energy, both platforms share some similarities.  Both energy plans emphasize America's abundance in carbon-based resources and make it clear that we should be getting as much from them as we can.  The measures they want to take to use these resources will hopefully end up in what they both refer to as "energy independence".  They also claim that both plans will result in more jobs for Americans.  Job creation seems to be the bottom line of each energy platform since the economy has taken the stage as the number one issue voters are concerned about in this election.    

While both candidates discuss oil and natural gas in their platforms, they both touch on other energy sources in different ways.  For example, Obama's plan seeks to increase wind and solar production while Romney claims that these sources have, "failed to become economically viable."  Romney on the other hand seems to be pushing future investment and deregulation of nuclear energy sources, when Obama doesn't mention this type of energy at all in his platform.  I had expected both candidates to mention the coal industry, but to my surprise, Romney only pointed out how the Obama administration is anti-coal and doesn't discuss it any further.  Obama makes sure to show how he has increased investment in "clean coal" as opposed to just regular coal mining.  I'm a bit of a clean coal skeptic, so as far as I'm concerned, neither candidate shows a strong view on what direction the coal industry should take.

Environmental issues tend to be the empty promises candidates make that will occur within a certain time frame and never happen.  This is evident in the language shown in Obama's platform such as, "development of our near 100-year supply of natural gas, which could support more than 600,000 new jobs by the end of the decade" just doesn't seem firm, and I really have a hard time believing that many new positions in the natural gas industry could be created in a decade.  The same goes for Romney in his goal for "North American energy independence by 2020."  This all depends on how our relationships with the major oil producers continues to evolve as well as America's appetite for oil within the next ten years.  Oil independence in eight years seems to be a huge stretch, and is most likely not happening any time soon.

In both platforms, these grand goals need to be downsized.  I know the candidates are doing it just to win votes, but realistically, energy independence by 2020 and a surge of "green" jobs within the next few years seem to be exaggerated claims.  I would also appreciate a broader environmental platform, which can include other topics such as pollution and global warming, which are closely related to points brought up in these energy proposals.

Destructive Assumptions

            What is striking about both Romney and Obama’s energy plans is not necessary what is included in the plans but what is excluded: a thorough discussion of environmental sustainability. While both campaigns discuss the environment in their energy platforms, neither give us a clear picture of what they believe the environment is or what they relationship between the state and the environment should be.

This is most evident in Romney’s plan, which is merely titled “Energy.” The environment is mentioned several times in the platform when Romney, mostly in the context of the “environmental” laws or regulations that Romney fears tend to stifle industry. At one point Romney states that he will “make every effort to safeguard the environment” but quickly throws in the caveat that “he be mindful at every step of also protecting the jobs of American workers.” It is unclear both what he means by being “safeguarded” and how he intends to strike the balance between protecting jobs and the environment.

In general it appears that Romney conceives the environment as a function of the economy. It is a resource for the American people to use. The country was blessed enough to have a “cornucopia” of carbon-based energy reserves and Barrack Obama is being both unpatriotic and a job-destroyer by not allowing them to be fully exploited. Most importantly, he makes no reference to the degradation of the natural environment, global warming, or the finite nature of carbon-based resources. These inconveniences are entirely written out of the narrative to allow for the construction of his cornucopia of resources narrative.  

Obama’s plan includes more reference to the environment and environmental protection then Romney’s but is still dominated by an economic perspective. Obama discusses how he has increased regulation of environmental hazards such as mercury and how he expanded conservation efforts but declines to discuss any other environmental concerns such as global warming, extinction, or environmentally sustainable agriculture. Further, Obama justifies his alternative energy initiatives not by toting their environmental benefit but by arguing that they will create more jobs and free us from foreign oil. Although Obama declines to give us a clear picture of what he views the relationship between government, the economy, and government, he appears to believe that environmental problems are really regulatory problems. Our current system can be tweaked with regulations to prevent environmental destruction; no systemic changes are necessary.

Both candidates hold on dearly to the idea that in order for our country to progress, its economy must constantly expand. This idea is the focal point of both campaigns energy platforms. For Romney the goal is to do what’s best for the economy irrespective of the environment, while for Obama the goal is to what’s best for the economy while correcting for environmental damage using regulations. These two assumptions, that progress necessarily means GDP growth and that environmental problems are fundamentally economic problems, are detrimental to the extent that they exclude any robust discussion about sustainability and the  between relationship humans and the natural environment.

 If we can move beyond these assumptions we might eventually be able to hold serious political discussions about sustainability, growth, species die off, carbon emission and other important environmental issues, but at this point it seems unlikely. However, it is important to note that political discourse and assumptions are mutable; they can be challenged and altered. Perhaps this is role of environmental activism, to challenge and subvert these dominant assumptions to create a space for productive discussion.

Winning Gaia's Vote

It is September of 2012, and we are less than two months from the November 6th Presidential Elections.  The battle for Captain America rages on between the Romney and Obama camps as the nation watches - but is either candidate looking out for the largest non-voting enabler and provider of their campaigns; the earth herself?

President Barack Obama

On his campaign page, one of the eight issues the Obama/Biden camp lists is titled Energy and the Environment.

The web design of this page is certainly inviting, with myriad charts, diagrams and videos all pointing to the great work President Obama has done over the past four years to make our world cleaner.  Inevitably, all of the charts for  Oil, Natural Gas, Bio-fuels, Wind Energy, and Solar energy show improvement under President Obama.

These charts, and the words that accompany them are aimed at showing how these new energies are providing jobs and bring America closer to energy independence, though, and are void of any reference to the broader environmental effects.   The tagline for Obama's "all of the above" strategy is "to develop every available source of American energy while making sure we never have to choose between protecting our environment and strengthening our economy" (Source: www.barackobama.com).

Under the Fuel Economy section of the Obama campaign's Energy and Environment, there is mention that:

"The Obama administration’s groundbreaking standards for cars and light trucks will save families roughly $8,200 at the pump per vehicle by 2025. The standards will also cut in half vehicles’ greenhouse gas pollution, reducing a major cause of climate change."

So at least our President incumbent mentions the environmental buzzwords "greenhouse gas" and "climate change".  There is also mention in investments in clean coal and "carbon capture and sequestration research", but no further data beyond initiatives implemented and long term goals set.  

In sum, the President's energy and environment platform looks pretty and is directed towards the grievances of the simple american voters: high gas prices, high energy prices, unemployment, and direct health effects (such as heart attacks and asthma) rather than global environmental dangers and proposed solutions.  This platform is not designed to educate, inform or even vaguely alert voters to the global environmental challenges we face in the future, but is instead intended to be a message of progress, pointing to the brighter, cleaner path President Obama has set the American public on for the future.  And of course this make complete sense.  Voters don't want to be told that we are approaching - or have passed - the carrying capacity of our planet.   They don't want to be told about the thousands of species that have become extinct, they don't want to see pictures of forests mowed down or rivers turned toxic by pollutants.  President Barack Obama won the 2008 election on a message of hope - he surely hopes to do the same in 2012. 


Mitt Romney


Romney's equivalent to President Obama's Environment and Energy platform is titled, simply, Energy.

The tagline for Romney's page is "Energy: Pro-Jobs, Pro-Market, Pro-American"  and his platform focuses on the economic and industrial side of the energy issue.  The headers of Romney's energy platform are simply, "Obama's Failure" and "Mitt's Plan".

According to the Romney camp, "the first three years of the Obama administration have witnessed energy and environmental policies that have stifled the domestic energy sector.  In thrall to the environmentalist lobby and its dogmas, the President and the regulatory bodies under his control have taken measures to limit energy exploration and restrict development in ways that sap economic performance  curtail growth, and kill jobs" (Source: mittromney.com).

The Romney spin on the investments made into alternative energy is that "the Obama administration wages war against oil and coal, [and] it has been spending billions of dollars on alternative energy forms and touring its creation of "green" jobs...the "green" technologies are typically far too expensive to compete in the marketplace".

Once finished the obligatory bashing of the other side, "Mitt's Plan" boils down to bulleted points under bolded goals of "Significant Regulatory Reform", "Increasing Production", and "Research and Development".

After reading his plan, Romney seems to be in the Cornucopian camp of environmentalists, and seems to have no thought that our planet is a finite resource.  If Obama's platform wanted to keep voters feeling warm and fuzzy about the American environmental future, Romney would rather his voters not even consider that we might have environmental issues.  He makes no mention of greenhouse gases, or climate change - barely even uses the word environment outside of his attack on Obama and in regard to ensuring environmental laws account for cost.

The Verdict

In truth, it would be hard for environmentalists in most camps to support either energy platform.  Neither candidate puts emphasis on the environmental challenges we face as a nation or global community, and neither candidate recognizes the stark immediacy of the degradation threat.

If Obama's platform is disappointing in its references to our actual environmental state, Romney's cornucopian, market liberalist platform is terrifying.  Under his "Significant Regulatory Reform" heading, he is planning to "Amend the Clean Air Act to exclude carbon dioxide from its purview".

 Carbon emissions are, as I am coming to understand it, one of the most significant and alarming factors contributing to climate change.  The atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration in parts per million that currently sits at 387ppm is warming that planet, and it is rising (Source: A Safe Operating Space for Humanity, 2009, Johan Rockstrom).  So far it seems that the "safe" proposed boundary to draw back down to is around 350ppm, though the pre-industrial number is 280ppm; that is, before humans were around, 280ppm was the planet's natural balance.

The planet is already above the proposed "safe" boundary, and Romney's planned removal of carbon dioxide from the Clean Air Act is certainly not going to slow down carbon dioxide emissions.

On November 6th, the American public will decide who leads them for the next four years.  If the planet earth were given a vote, I don't think she would pick either candidate.