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Solution to Greenhouse Gases Is New Nuclear Plants, Bush Says
Jim Rutenberg, NY TImes
LIMERICK, Pa. — With Democrats seizing the national stage on gasoline prices and the environment, President Bush came here Wednesday to take it back, calling for the construction of more nuclear power plants to help reduce the greenhouse gases believed to contribute to global warming.
“Let’s quit the debate about whether greenhouse gases are caused by mankind or by natural causes; let’s just focus on technologies that deal with the issue,” Mr. Bush told workers at the Limerick Generating Station, a nuclear power plant here in Montgomery County. “Nuclear power will help us deal with the issue of greenhouse gases.”
Since the 2000 presidential campaign, Democrats have accused Mr. Bush, who grew up in the Texas oil country and was in the business, of being too cozy with the petroleum industry. He and his fellow Republicans had previously shrugged off such charges, as well as those from environmental groups that his administration was ignoring scientific findings on global warming and human involvement in its causes.
…Speaking in front of this hamlet’s twin nuclear cooling towers on Wednesday, Mr. Bush promoted the 2005 energy bill he signed into law, which provides tax incentives, loan guarantees and federal risk insurance for companies building nuclear plants. Before the law, he said, only 2 companies were considering building plants, but now 16 are.
“For the sake of economic security and national security,” he said, “the United States of America must aggressively move forward with the construction of nuclear power plants.”
(25 May 2006)
NY’s Spitzer On Energy, Environment, Transportation
AUTHOR, The Oil Drum (NYC)
Eliot Spitzer is way up in the polls for the Democratic nomination for Governor – he now leads Nassau County Executive Tom Suozzi by 63 percentage points. And with the Republicans divided between Weld and Faso, with Faso now likely to run an insurgent Conservative Party run if he doesn’t get the GOP nod, Spitzer looks likely to win in a walk in November.
That means his stance on energy, environmental and transportation issues will be very important to all New Yorkers. The Governor controls many of the state authorities like the MTA, Tri-boro bridge authority, the NY half of the Port Authority and controls a massive $100 Billion state budget. In some recent speeches, he has started to stake out his policy positions on some very important issues that TODers often talk about.
In late March, Spitzer made a major policy address talking about his committment to the environment and a 5 point plan on energy…
…overall I think Spitzer has a lot of potential to be a good peak oil governor for NY, but it remains to be seen if he will follow the lead of other NY politicians and pander to the upstate motorists about the gas tax, congestion pricing, highway tolls and other subsidies for energy consumption.
(25 May 2006)
Bartlett Opposes drilling in ANWR
Rep. Roscoe Bartlett, press release
Washington, DC – Congressman Roscoe Bartlett spoke in opposition to a bill, H.R. 5429, that would open the Antarctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) for oil drilling. He said:
In the past year, two major studies were done for the federal government, one for the Department of Energy and one by the Army Corps of Engineers Both said that we were at peak oil — when the maximum oil production capacity in the world will be reached — and that the consequences would be devastating.
America has only 2 percent of the world’s known oil reserves.” We produce 8 percent and consume 25 percent of the oil produced worldwide and import close to 2/3 of the oil we use. With those statistics in mind, I am having trouble understanding how it is in our national security interest to use up our little bit of oil as quickly as we can.
If we could pump ANWR tomorrow, what would we do the day after tomorrow?
We are saddling our children and grandchildren with an unconscionable debt. We should not deny them access to these finite energy sources.Drilling in ANWR is not the right thing to do at this time.
(25 May 2006)
