Two recent stories on hardships ordinary Americans face from high energy costs highlight profound philosophical differences between McCain and Obama in how each approaches energy policy. The tire pressure exchange is a metaphor for this debate, but our media, mesmerized by sound bites and celebrity ads, can’t seem to explain this to the American public.
The LA Times reported Thursday on the alarming number of utility shut-offs occurring nationwide, with consumers unable to pay summer electricity bills.
In Michigan, which had the nation’s highest unemployment rate in June — 8.5% — Detroit-based DTE Energy reported a 56% increase in utility shut-offs for nonpayment of bills for the first five months of this year compared with the same period a year ago.
Southern California Edison Co. reported that service was shut off to about 165,000 of its 4.8 million customer accounts from January through May this year, a 14% increase from the same period in 2007.
The Boston Globe reports similar grim prospects will face consumers next winter when high fuel oil and natural gas prices drive up heating bills.
The increase will have an especially dramatic impact on the nearly 1 million households that are heated with oil, which now sells for about $4.70 a gallon, up from $2.59 a year ago, according to the Massachusetts Department of Energy Resources.
Heating costs are expected to keep rising, the report says. The state’s average household oil bill next year could top $3,000, according to the report by the UMass Donahue Institute, a university think tank. All told, consumers can expect to spend $4.45 billion for gas and oil heat in 2009 – a $469 million increase from 2008.
Low and moderate income Americans deperately need relief from high energy bills. With no near term supply solutions to drive down prices, consumers can most quickly benefit by reducing demand, which immediately lowers energy bills and attacks prices. Low-income consumers also need direct financial assistance, either through tax rebates or direct subsidies via Low Income Energy Assistance Programs. (Obama’s plans include both.)
The recent McCain/Obama exchanges about "drill here, drill now" versus properly inflating your tires symbolize how each approaches these problems. McCain and a unified Republican chorus are engaging in what Paul Krugman calls "know-nothing politics," ("stupidity is the best policy"), stamping their feet until we give oil companies rights to drill for more supplies. They scoff at individual measures, denying they accomplish much and belittling Obama for an "energy plan" based only on tire gauges. In the meantime, Republicans repeatedly obstruct efforts to increase LIEAP or tax oil to pay for it.
The McCain/Republican message is clear: ordinary Americans can’t solve their energy problems; only the supply (oil) companies can save us. Individual actions don’t add up to a policy; they’re just a "public service message."
But as Phoenix Woman and others note, Obama is right about the tire gauges. Not only does proper tire inflation achieve significant gasoline savings, it saves more gasoline than McCain’s off-shore drilling produces. And that lesson is true for many other individual actions.
The fact is, intelligent energy policy begins with individual actions, along with government initiatives designed to encourage ordinary people to take lots of little steps that collectively make a huge difference in how much energy we use and how large our energy bills are. Sure, a comprehensive plan also needs big corporations to do big things with lots of government encouragement. That’s all in Obama’s plan. But individual actions are the foundation of a sound plan, not an afterthought.
California radically altered its energy future beginning 30 years ago by encouraging people to make small changes. Replacing light bulbs, checking attic insulation, wrapping water heaters, caulking around windows and doors, using set-back thermostats, proper shading (plant trees!), buying more efficient appliances — these were all encouraged and many required in building codes. And as Bob Herbert notes, Californians now use less energy per capita for heating, cooling and lighting their homes than anyone in America. That made it easier for the supply companies to keep up.
So McCain is not just technically wrong, he’s foolishly wrong about just letting the oil companies "solve" this. Checking your tire pressure is not just smart for you. It and dozen of actions like it are the foundation for a smart, sustainable and more affordable energy policy.
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What we need is a revival of the 70’s public service announcements, such as Schoolhouse Rock and Louie the Lightning Bug. Get simple messages out without the “Clean Coal” spin.
Conservation is going to help in the short term but I can’t imagine what a national nightmare this will be come winter.
Scarecrow!
hey Scarecrow, good to have you with us missed ya in the mornings :D
doesn’t really jibe with that whole personal responsibility meme does it ?
Yes. We’ll have to absord a half billion dollar increase. Congress needs to expand funding for the Low income energy assistance programs, ASAP. NE states have been clamoring for that.
Didn’t that just recently come to a vote and the republicans (with Bush’s encouragement) squashed the possibility of an expansion?
I got an oil delivery I wasn’t supposed to get, broke my bank.
Yet, in the long run, I guess I’m lucky, cause the price I’m paying off now is less than the price oil will be in the Fall.
It’s more “No we can’t” from the Republicans.
I mean, seriously, even if they didn’t know that inflating tires and getting tuneups would save us more gas and money than drilling in 2030 will, what really strikes me here is the idea that once again the “party of small government” is telling the citizenry “there’s nothing you can do to solve your problems. You have to cede more of the country to us and to our largest corporations to keep things going.”
Even if they said “it won’t save us as much as coastal drilling or drilling in ANWR,” they could still say, “But hell yeah! Check those tires! Get those tuneups! It WILL save gas! We all need to work together in this!” It would be something. It would be some sort of recognition that we are a nation, not a collection of buyers and sellers.
Bush I’s 1000 Points of Light was mostly stupid and nowhere near enough, but at least there was some glimmer of the notion that if you’re going to decimate government and tell people that private-sector generosity is the way to build society, you should reward, or at least recognize, when it happens. This bunch can’t stop sneering at the notion of life improving for anyone, nevermind the government improving it.
I have questions that I know are going to sound stupid but I have never lived in the east. What kind of oil do you get, where do you put it to heat your house and how does that work? I would really like to know and thanks in advance for the answer.
it’s heating oil, it’s put into a tank in the basement.
I agree with what you’ve said in your post, Scarcrow, but I think we need to be careful not to blame poor people for being poor, not that that was what you were doing, just a caution. I say that as someone who lives in the basement suite of an over hundred year old house, who doesn’t even own a car and who buys all my clothing from Value Village.
Just my two cents,
Heather
Oil has been coming down lately but this may just been election year manipulation. States in NE might consider surtax on heavy users to help.
LIEAP will have to be expanded or people could die. But then these aren’t the people contributing to the repub coffers
It should be obvious the oil market is manipulated by the oil companies. They have enough storage capacity to keep oil from the market. Their profits, record after record, are unexplained. They say as the world price goes up they revalue their inventory, but the fact remains increases in price find their way to the pump a lot faster than decreases. The oil industry with never ending depletion allowances gets away with the economic equivalent of murder. We’d be better off throwing lots of dollars (the equivalent of the Manhattan Project) on cold fusion production of electricity and something that stores electricity better than batteries.
Sounds too pie in the sky. We have an oil based economy from car salesmen to filling station operators. They can be counted on to oppose anything that may cost them their jobs.
Last evening I was running around doing my errands listening to the radio… they had a news report on the commercial Chapter 7 & 11 filings for Arizona. What I remember was the Chapter 7 filings are up 114% from last year and Chapter 11 was up 98%. What I can’t find or remember is the actual numbers which seemed to be in the 100-thousands…. YET I am seeing new office complexes, apartments and condos being built.
Also seeing projects started months ago looked like nothing has been done all summer. This is odd because here in AZ, I have never seen buildings go up so fast in my life. If I don’t drive by a specific area for a few weeks or months…… and then poof there is a new office complex or some other building..
ok I found it…. Consumer bankruptcies rise in metro Phoenix
I’m not so sure about those things as you appear to be. Car salesmen have been making money off of commissions for most of my life and if they aren’t selling cars, they aren’t making money and that is somewhat independent of the oil business. Especially if the big ticket cars such as SUVs are not selling.
And I believe most filling stations have long made more money on the “mini-mart” side of things than they make from the actually gasoline sales.
I’m old enough to remember when service stations actually provided service (pump the gas, clean the windshield, check the tire pressure, check the oil, and sometimes even get out a little whisk broom and brush out the inside for you).
Nowadays, we pump the gas, check the oil, clean the windows, check the tire pressure and go inside and pay someone exorbitant prices for a soda or half gallon of milk as well as for the high priced gasoline.
I agree. Don’t think I was suggesting blame.
OT Edwards statement: Brief affair told Elizabeth in 06, ashamed , denied story when first cameout because mainly wrong. Volunteers for paternity test. If you want to beat me up beat me up.
Edwards statement:
http://www.wral.com/news/local…..e/3353194/
i still don’t care (none of my business) but I wonder how he thought this wasn’t going to come out (especially with runnning for president and all)
Sorry if it came off wrong; sometimes I hear those blaming voices in my head when they aren’t actually there.
Hugs,
Heather
see you pups later, have to finish up some work here (yeah, I’m back at the Food Bank)
1793 donors have given $121,486 to Accountability Now!
Not bad for a half-day’s work, and it’s not too late for anyone to add their own contributions . . .
McCain is on line at CNN and for your information the Iraq war had nothing to do with the price of oil.. Oh now the Russians are causing deaths in GA
Digg this post
McCain seems to rambling now about an answer having to do with wind, solar and other renewables and he talks about clean coal.
I am hearing alarming anecdotal evidence of people having their electricity cut off. This is not likely to get better any time soon, with the economy sliding downhill.
Energy geek here…more states are getting involved in promoting energy efficiency. Or, the state public service/utilities commissions are “encouraging” utilities to provide energy conservation programs. Oregon, Vermont, and Wisconsin now have statewide programs. Many utilities are finally beginning to offer programs that include financial incentives for residents and businesses to improve the energy efficiency of their homes and businesses. It’s really not rocket science…and, the tire pressure example is perfect, because there are many no and low cost steps we can all take…
This is a great link to find energy efficiency or renewable energy programs in each state…
http://www.dsireusa.org/index……&RE=1
Ok, I’ll stop now. ;)
He’s talking about DHL but I did not hear the question..(potty break) and he wants fairness…wtf
he was made aware of the dhl issue a long time ago in a town hall meeting..the meeting was yesterday..
He voted against the energy bill because they had tax breaks for oil companies and Obama voted for tax breaks for oil companies.. Okay he’s done now but what a sick, sick puppy he is.
and also digg the Money Bomb
yes, and upvote it on reddit
Local and state governments are figuring this out, too. During the Enron-driving energy crises in CA several years ago, a lot of cities started switching all their traffic signals from bulbs to LEDs, as they realized it (a) saved energy, which thanks to Ken Lay’s buddies was in short supply most summer afternoons that year, and (b) saved a ton of money, since the prices had gone up so much.
Saving both energy and money is a good idea for anyone. Sometimes it takes a little up-front money to do it, but a lot of the ideas around pay for themselves in pretty decent time.
Florida Progress has requested a rate hike in order to pay for two nuclear reactors near Crystal River, already the site of one operational reactor. If they ever start construction on either of these two it’ll be time for ELF to get involved.
Heating Oil, delivered by a truck – which will pump generally a couple hundred to five hundred gallons – whatever capacity your tank is. With a typical fill up of say, 350 gallons at 4 dollars a gallon – that would be 1400 for a fill up, which might last one month, depending on how cold the weather gets.
The oil is burned by the furnace to generate steam and hot water.
Did you see “Doctor Zhivago?”
wellf, you’ll never fly again ;)
Good news — today’s Albuquerque Journal (article’s behind the pay-site, sorry) says that natural gas prices now look to be up 10% this winter, versus the 50+% Public Service of New Mexico was forecasting a month ago.
I believe that there are two basic reasons McCain doesn’t get it (it being the fact that conservation is a big part of the answer):
1. Conservation doesn’t directly sell the things that big oil sells. If your car gets 20 mpg instead of 25 mpg, that’s 25% more revenue to Exxon and friends.
1A. In fact, conservation can hurt utilities bottom lines. We’ve got rules before our PRC here in New Mexico that will allow utilities to apply for rate increases (!) in the event that conservation efforts actually work and reduce demand (!!!)
2. They don’t understand that conservation is additive. 300 million people is a lot of people, and reducing usage adds up over time. So, one of two things is true about this fact:
I. They can’t do the addition over customers and time; or,
II. They can do the addition and don’t like the answer’s effect on their bottom line.
It really doesn’t matter how you slice it, you get the effective answer that McSame’s campaign doesn’t get it. Unfortunately, the MSM don’t want to explain that to voters.
BC
Drive by …
Check it out
Windfarm parts turn heads at Port of Sacramento
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More from the egghead blog @ UC Davis
Swopa upstairs
Aloha, Wobbs! Are ya back from Brasilia?
At least this is something people have some control over– turn your thermostat down in winter and up in the summer– especially when you are away from the house.
I can’t understand why there is so little talk about how to conserve energy. I hear a lot of bullshit that if you turn your heat down it will only waste more energy. Talk about stupid!
Well, I’m glad we have a thread going on a substantive topic for once. This energy stuff is boring. We really need to be talking about Edwards’ affair.
In traditional ratemaking, utilities earn money by building things: plants, transmission lines, pipe lines, etc have capital costs that go into rate base that earn a profit — a rate of return. Their operating costs, such as fuel and purchased power are essentially passed through without profit, though there are states with performance incentives if the utilities is smart in buying low, it gets to keep some of the “savings” for its profits.
So if consumers use less electricity or natural gas, that just means the utility doesn’t have as much fuel costs to pass through, and they have no incentive to encourage conservation. In fact, if conservation reduces the demand for new plants, they lose the opportunity build more and put the capital costs into rate base, on which they earn a regulated rate of return, usually 8-10 percent.
So in the 1980s, NRDC, the Californian Energy Commission and others promoted rate reforms that would allow the utilities to “profit” from the investments in energy efficiency and conservation, and once we made it worth their whiles, the utilities in California put in over a billion dollars into conservation investments. It was very successful for a while. When the market restructuring came along in the mid 1990s, it undermined the rationale for that set of reforms. I left about then, but I think the mechanisms are no longer there.
Does installing a solar Electric system as conservation or just me lowering my bill?
1. Any electricity your system generates means that much less electricity you have to purchase; it lowers your bill.
2. If you have two-way net metering (a few states), when you generate more than you’re using, the energy flows back through the meter out into the distribution system and transmission system. If the retail rate is set up properly (almost nowhere), you should be paid for net electricity you produce with the price set at the marginal cost of producing energy in your area. That’s possible but likely not set up in most regions of the US.
3. In some states, you get a tax rebate or credit against the purchase/installation cost of the solar equipment.
These rules vary in every state.
I am In California and I will have a meter that goes both directions and here they give you credit for any excess power you generate at least thats what I have been told…
The metering you’re describing is a huge improvement over what most have now. The California Energy Commission adopted conservation standards for new residential buildings that will require every new home to have that metering. The guy most responsible is Commissioner Art Rosenfeld, who retires this year — he’s an energy hero, along with his staff guy, John Wilson, and the conservation staff at the CEC.
We were lucky to get in on a program from SolarCity.com that allowed us to sign up for a Solar system with nothing down and a guarantee that it will provide the amount of power it is designed for…11K