As the Great Oil Gush of 2010 continues we look to our elected leaders for solutions, consolation, inspiration and really good sound bites. Right there on the ol’ Gulf Coast, down around Mississippi way there’s a man by the name of Gene Taylor, Democrat, Member of the House of Representatives. Congressman Taylor hustled up a Coast Guard plane ride to get a good look at the millions of gallons of oil headed into the shores, estuaries and highly profitable fishing grounds. After investigation he offered these soon-to-be-regretted words: “It’s not as bad as I thought it’d be.” Expounding on the fruits of his research Rep. Taylor concluded, “A lot of people are scared and I don’t think they should be.” The oil, you see, will break up naturally and even looks like a rainbow on the water with patches of “chocolate milk.”

I don’t think the fishermen of Prince William Sound, among others, would give the “break down naturally” theory a positive response. They still have to deal with oil on the beach after 20 years.

Not to be outdone, right there on the ol’ Long Island Sound, down around Connecticut way there’s another man of the people who goes by the name of Joe Lieberman, U.S. Senator. Being an expert in political matters he informs us that there are larger concerns to be heeded in the halls of democracy than a complete disaster that killed 11 people, will destroy millions of animals and leave coastal communities in poverty. As reported in the May 4 edition of Congress Daily Joe the Senator waves us on in “nothing to see here” fashion when he insists that a bill to save the climate needs to have pro-drilling language that would codify oil development 75 miles off the Atlantic coast. “There were good reasons for us to put in offshore drilling, and this terrible accident is very rare in drilling,” Lieberman said. “I mean, accidents happen. You learn from them and you try to make sure they don’t happen again.” This from a man who fought for years to permanently ban oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. 

It appears the Senate vote counting will need to be re-visited as Sen. Bill Nelson (FL-former astronaut) has vowed to filibuster any legislation that allows new offshore oil drilling.

Only Rush Limbaugh’s fevered imagination could have hatched the idea that environmentalists caused the Deepwater Horizon oil spill:

RUSH: I want to get back to the timing of the blowing up, the explosion out there in the Gulf of Mexico of this oil rig. Since they’re sending SWAT teams down there now this changes the whole perspective of this. Now, lest we forget, ladies and gentlemen, the carbon tax bill, cap and trade that was scheduled to be announced on Earth Day. I remember that. And then it was postponed for a couple of days later after Earth Day, and then of course immigration has now moved in front of it. But this bill, the cap-and-trade bill, was strongly criticized by hardcore environmentalist wackos because it supposedly allowed more offshore drilling and nuclear plants, nuclear plant investment. So, since they’re sending SWAT teams down there, folks, since they’re sending SWAT teams to inspect the other rigs, what better way to head off more oil drilling, nuclear plants, than by blowing up a rig? I’m just noting the timing here.

Really, he said it.

Texas Governor Rick Perry has a different suspect:  God. An observation that has been treated with some derision even in Texas.

While the list of direct suspects is long and includes government regulators, British Petroleum, the actual operators of the drilling rig and Halliburton.

However, it is very clear that all of us who drive cars bear some responsibility here. The fundamental truth is that as long as humanity is in the business of piercing the protective shell of the earth and pulling out oil there will be calamities like the one  currently unfolding in the Gulf of Mexico.  As Lisa Margonelli of the New America Foundation, correctly, recently wrote in the New York Times: “All oil comes from someone’s backyard, and when we don’t reduce the amount of oil we consume, and refuse to drill at home, we end up getting people to drill for us in Kazakhstan, Angola and Nigeria — places without America’s strong environmental safeguards or the resources to enforce them.”

Yes, we need to stop drilling off the shores of the United States.  But we need to also recognize that so long as we consume oil in anything like current quantities there will be spills somewhere and (not incidentally) we will continue to put dangerous greenhouse gases causing global warming into the atmosphere.

And where do we use oil in the U.S. ?  The federal government reports that the answer is that 71% of our petroleum use is “for transportation” – in our cars, trucks and airplanes.

As CLF noted in our “5 Steps in 5 Years” Climate Vision, the state and federal governments are literally paving the way  towards a car-dependent future by spending 75 percent of our transportation capital budgets on roads and highways and 25 percent on transit.  To be blunt, the old hiker slogan has some truth to it – that “The Road to Hell is Paved.”

So the next time you are in the drivers seat of a gasoline powered vehicle take a look at yourself in the rear view mirror and stop to consider your own complicity in what is unfolding in the Gulf.  But don’t be paralyzed by guilt – take action.  Urge your elected representatives to pass comprehensive climate legislation and to make a massive investment in transit and smart, livable and walkable communities.

Understandably, the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico (which seems to be the first oil spill to have a Facebook page) has been the subject of intense interest on this blog (repeatedly), in New Orleans (which incredibly finds itself in the cross-hairs of ANOTHER disaster) and in nearby Florida, where brilliant and acerbic environmentalist Carl Hiaasen (buy his books, especially the ones for kids) makes his mark on the subject.

But here is a different angle on the disaster. Consider the recent episode here in New England where a quarter of the population of Right Whales were spotted feeding in an area where whales are not normally found. This reminds us that putting an inherently dangerous activity like oil and gas drilling anywhere in the ocean is like playing Russian roulette with the lives of the animals that live in the ocean and our oceans generally.  A lesson that is playing out among the sea turtles who rely on the Gulf of Mexico as a safe place to reproduce.

So what can we do? The first thing is to not open up even more of our coastline to drilling, especially as part of a climate bill that is intended to protect and restore our environment. But the ultimate answer is to reduce use of , and therefore demand for, oil. And that means, more than anything else, reducing our gasoline consumption. How do we do that? Building smart walkable communities with transit options and using far more efficient cars would be a great start.

We have the seen the enemy and it is us . . . but it doesn’t have to be that way forever.

Increased wind speed late yesterday started putting oil on Gulf Coast beaches about 10:00pm last night. Our colleagues at the Gulf Restoration Network are working hard to deal with the oil onslaught. The federal government is stepping up their response and making sure we all know they are. White House political chief David Axelrod announced this morning that they are putting off any new drilling until the administration conducts an “adequate review.” Let’s hope that means at least an immediate moratorium for the Atlantic coast and the Arctic, where drilling could go forward this summer. (Could you imagine a similar spill scenario that occurs under Arctic sheet ice? With no oil booms, skimmer boats, 100-ton steel caps or airplanes dumping “dispersants” in sight?) Sen. Bill Nelson of Florida has already announced he will introduce legislation to ban drilling off the coast of Florida, and Senate Dems are becoming more vocal against the starkly illustrated threats of drilling. It seems like the political currents might be shifting.

Ocean currents are themselves fascinating forces of nature. The currents and internal waves in the Gulf of Maine and Georges Bank are what help to make New England’s ocean so incredibly productive. The currents are corridors of life for all ocean wildlife from migrating whales to free-floating larvae. They also connect the kelp on the coasts to the deepwater corals in far offshore canyons. CLF has fought hard in the past and again in recent years to make sure Georges Bank was protected from oil drilling, but really Georges Bank is just as threatened by oil drilling that occurs off the coast of Maryland, not to mention across the Canadian border.  So, when you are looking south to the unfolding disaster in the Gulf of Mexico don’t forget to look to the north to see what our Canadian neighbors are proposing.

What is there to say about the latest oil spill disaster? My first few attempts at writing would have had to been translated into cartoon epithets  – “^%*) BP oil $#(*^~ %&#*!!”

What we did predict and now know is that: A) the impacts will continue to get worse, B) the experts who promised time and again that they could handle a spill of this type clearly have no clue how to stop the mess or clean it up, and, C) the government that was supposed to provide adult supervision oversight has largely left it to the industry experts. However, the oil industry safety awards program was cancelled this week so they could focus on the tragedy at hand.

As best we know around 5000 barrels of oil a day are flowing out now. Recent predictions are that it could wash across the Gulf of Mexico, into the Florida Keys and up the Atlantic coast of Florida. Over 30% of the “chemical dispersant” that exists in the world is being used in the Gulf of Mexico right now. The Coast Guard is experimenting with open sea burning of several hundred gallons of oil at a time. BP Oil says they are spending $6 million a day on the spill. Wow. Six million a day. That’s a lot of money. I wonder if it includes this week’s American Petroleum Industry lobby week?

An hour ago in the White House Rose Garden President Obama promised the full effort of the US Government to help clean up the spill. Pay now or pay later, friends. The cost of oil is very predictable and always going up.

Yesterday, Interior Secretary Salazar gave us a glimpse of our clean energy future by announcing his approval of the Cape Wind project. CLF has worked tirelessly on this project for many years, and the decision was momentous for our organization and others in the environmental, labor and business communities who recognize Cape Wind’s enormous potential for our region and our country.

However, as Governor Patrick cautioned a room of enthusiastic Cape Wind supporters after the announcement, thoughtful people can and will disagree on projects like Cape Wind. It is both an asset and a challenge for New England that our landscape, and even our seascape, is small. Every project will impact somebody. By virtue of our physical proximity we are, quite literally, all in this together. And so, more than any other region in the country perhaps, New Englanders must have a shared vision for our energy future.

That future, as Secretary Salazar said poignantly yesterday, will be built on clean energy. We will have more wind power, off- and on-shore. We will have more solar and geothermal power, where it makes sense. We will increase energy efficiency, which makes sense everywhere. We will reduce our use of fossil fuels in general and coal in particular. We will grow our economy, create new jobs and support a high quality of life and the environment.

New England is the perfect place to start. We are good at using our landscape in thrifty ways to live well and in close connection to nature. CLF is committed to a vision of an energy future that will meet our reasonable needs, keep the lights on at reasonable cost, and cause minimal harm to the environment. It is a vision we believe that most New Englanders will embrace. As with Cape Wind, we will not stop until that vision becomes reality. Then we will show the rest of the nation and the world how it’s done.

Thank you for your continued support.

Sincerely,
John Kassel

In the spirit of the Federal rebates for efficient appliances discussed in a prior post this  message just came in from Jack Ruderman, the Director of the Sustainable Energy Division at the New Hampshire Public Utilities Commission:

Friends – I am delighted to report that the Commission is now accepting applications for the residential solar hot water rebate program.  Two rebates are offered:  a State rebate of $600, $750, or $900 depending on system output, and a federal appliance rebate of $750 per system.  The State rebate is funded by New Hampshire’s Renewable Energy Fund, while the federal rebate is funded with federal stimulus funds made available by the Office of Energy and Planning.  There is enough funding available from both sources to provide rebates for up to 660 systems over the next two years.

We anticipate that this program will lead to a surge in demand for solar water heating systems and will create new jobs in the alternative energy sector, while also reducing our dependence on fossil fuels and cutting emissions of greenhouse gasses.  This program will complement the Commission’s existing rebate program for residential solar electric and wind systems, which to date has received 285 applications for renewable energy systems across the state, and has created new business for 129 alternative energy businesses and electricians.

The Commission’s Order approving this program is attached.   The rebate applications are posted on the Commission’s website and can also be accessed directly with these links: State Solar Water Heating Application; Federal Solar water Heating Application; Step 2 Solar Water Heating Application

Many thanks to all of the stakeholders who participated in the public comment process and provided valuable input and feedback on the design of this program.

And please stay tuned – we will be bringing additional rebate programs on line over the next several months – one for commercial scale renewable energy systems and another for residential wood pellet heating systems.

Happy Earth Day!

Note that Mr. Ruderman tells us that only 660 systems will be paid for across New Hampshire by this program so if you want to heat your water without burning some fossil fuels then act now.

As implementation of the energy efficiency funding in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act continues to roll forward a window is about to open that will allow buyers of energy efficient appliances to receive substantial rebates.

There is real concern that these programs could prove so popular that the window for getting the rebates will open and close very quickly.  Some states, like Massachusetts, are offering the opportunity to reserve a chance to reserve the rebates  ($250 per dishwasher, $200 per refrigerator, $175 per clothes washer and $50 per freezer) in advance – the Online Reservation Tool to make that happen is scheduled to “go live” at 10:00 AM on April 22, although you can check at the same web page to see what stores are pre-qualified (pretty much all appliance sellers, although note that Boston neighborhoods like Dorchester are listed separately in the alphabetical list of stores) and what models will earn you a rebate.

Some states, like Rhode Island, have given out all their rebate funds – in that case people replacing appliances ruined in flooded basements may have played a role.

To see what the story is in your state click on your state on this map on the U.S. Department of Energy Website.

And if you are buying an energy efficient appliance after these particular rebates are exhausted (they only work in pre-qualified physical stores) or just want to pick up some really cool light bulbs be sure to take a look at the CLF online store operated by the Energy Federation featuring the best of all such stuff and where every purchase benefits CLF.

If President Obama can make the case that “insulation is sexy stuff” in a moment captured on video then we can say that providing the residents of Massachusetts with the chance to save money while staying warm in the winter is sexy as well.

The situation is simple – the federal government sets minimum efficiency standards for furnaces.  If a state wants to have tougher rules, ensuring that furnaces sold in that state use less fuel and produce less global warming pollution, it must ask permission from the feds to do so.  Massachusetts has done so.

CLF submitted a letter in support of this request by Massachusetts.  Among other things we noted the high numbers of renters in Massachusetts compared to the national average and how renters can’t choose the furnace that heats their home, making minimal efficiency standards all the more important.

Ok, we admit this isn’t really sexy.  But it is very important and CLF is proud to be doing this kind of effort in alliance with the consumer advocates at the National Consumer Law Center (who happen to be housed in offices right across the street from CLF’s Boston office) and the experts at the Appliance Standards Awareness Project.