Ending Dirty Energy Policy

Climate change presents the United States, and the world, with regulatory problems of a magnitude, complexity and scope unseen before. The United States, however, particularly after the mid-term elections of 2010, lacks the political will necessary to aggressively address climate change. Most current books focus on climate change. Ending Dirty Energy Policy argues that the US will not adequately address climate change until it transforms its fossil fuel energy policy. Yet there are signs that the country will support the transformation of its century-old energy policy from one that is dependent on fossil fuels to a low-carbon energy portfolio. A transformative energy policy that favors energy efficiency and renewable resources can occur only after the US has abandoned the traditional fossil fuel energy policy, has redesigned regulatory systems to open new markets and promoted competition among new energy providers, and has stimulated private-sector commercial and venture capital investment in energy innovations that can be brought to commercial scale and marketability.

Argues that the United States will not adequately address climate change until it transforms its fossil fuel energy policy.

The American electric utility system is quietly falling apart. Once taken for granted, the industry has become increasingly unstable, fragmented, unreliable, insecure, inefficient, expensive, and harmful to our environment and public health. According to Sovacool, the fix for this ugly array of problems lies not in nuclear power or clean coal, but in renewable energy systems that produce few harmful byproducts, relieve congestion on the transmission grid, require less maintenance, are not subject to price volatility, and enhance the security of the national energy system from natural catastrophe, terrorist attack, and dependence on supply from hostile and unstable regions of the world. Here arises The Dirty Energy Dilemma: If renewable energy systems deliver such impressive benefits, why are they languishing at the margins of the American energy portfolio? And why does the United States lag so far behind Europe, where conversion to renewable energy systems has already taken off in a big way? Corporate media parrot industry PR that renewable technologies just aren't ready for prime time. But Sovacool marshals extensive field research to show that the only barrier blocking the conversion of a significant proportion of the U.S. energy portfolio to renewables is not technological—the technology is there—but institutional. Public utility commissioners, utility managers, system operators, business owners, and ordinary consumers are hobbled by organizational conservatism, technical incompatibility, legal inertia, weak and inconsistent political incentives, ill-founded prejudices, and apathy. The author argues that significant conversion to technologically proven clean energy systems can happen only if we adopt and implement a whole new set of policies that will target and dismantle the insidious social barriers that are presently blocking decisions that would so obviously benefit society.

Forty years of energy incompetence: villains, failures of leadership, and missed opportunities.

Hitting the Wall examines the combination of two intractable energy problems of our age: the peaking of global oil production and the overloading of the atmosphere with greenhouse gases. Both emerge from the overconsumption of fossil fuels and solving one problem helps solve the other. The misinformation campaign about climate change is discussed as is the role that noncarbon energy solutions can play. There are nine major components in the proposed noncarbon strategy including energy efficiency and renewable energy. Economics and realistic restraints are considered and the total carbon reduction by 2030 is evaluated, and the results show that this strategy will reduce the carbon emission in the United States to be on track to an 80% reduction in 2050. The prospects for “clean” coal and “acceptable” nuclear are considered, and there is some hope that they would be used in an interim role. Although there are significant technical challenges to assembling these new energy systems, the primary difficulty lies in the political arena. A multigenerational strategy is needed to guide our actions over the next century. Garnering long-term multiadministration coherent policies to put the elements of any proposed strategy in place, is a relatively rare occurrence in the United States. More common is the reversal of one policy by the next administration with counterproductive results. A framework for politically stable action is developed using the framework of “energy tribes” where all the disparate voices in the energy debate are included and considered in a “messy process.” This book provides hope that our descendants in the next century will live in a world that would be familiar to us. This can only be achieved if the United States plays an active leadership role in maintaining climatic balance. Table of Contents: Introduction / The End of Cheap Oil / Carbon - Too Much of a Good Thing / Carbonless Energy Options / Conventional Energy / Policy for Whom? / Call to Arms / References

Clean Power Politics explains clean energy policy and the need for a successful transition to clean energy in the future.

This book examines welsh perspectives on the search for sustainable law and policy solutions to modern environmental threats.