OPINION/COMMENTARY

Burning Money Produces Scant Energy

So what are we to make of the 1,725-page, $14.6 billion-dollar energy bill now racing toward the president's desk? In the main, the legislation is devoted to production subsidies, tax preferences, research and development projects, and production mandates for a dizzying array of energy fuels, technologies, and industrial sectors. It is built upon the assumption that investors in energy markets are underfunding worthy projects; that politicians have superior insights into these matters; and that the best remedy is to rig the market so that political preferences win out over market preferences. It's of course possible that investors are overlooking some highly attractive energy technologies. But it's unlikely that economically attractive investments will be overlooked for long — they represent, after all, profit opportunities, and capitalists are pretty good at spotting such things. How likely is it that politicians know better than investors what constitutes a "good bet" in energy markets? Based on both common sense and past experience, the answer is —"not likely." But hope springs eternal. Recall that politicians once claimed that nuclear power would be "too cheap to meter" and lavished subsidies upon it. They then asserted that synthetic oil was the wave of the future, and over $80 billion was subsequently flushed down a black hole known as the Synthetic Fuels Corporation. "Soft power" — solar, wind, geothermal, etc. — was said back in the 1970s to be the wave of the future and the likely source of at least 30 percent of our electricity by 2000. We lavished subsidy upon those technologies as well, but today they provide less than 1 percent of our electricity needs....

How to Fix the Endangered Species Act

The Property Rights Foundation of America, under the leadership of President Carole W. LaGrasse, has worked diligently for more than a decade to protect individual freedom against the excesses of environmental activists and rogue government agencies. The foundation has developed a reasonable alternative to the ESA that the public will accept. Its recommendations are as follows:
* Listings of endangered and threatened species should be based solely on independent, peer-reviewed science, conducted by independent scientists not in the employ of either the government or environmental activist organizations. DNA analysis--not just the color of fur or feathers--should be required for recognition of separate species.
* All habitat designated for protection of endangered or threatened species should be reviewed by independent scientists to ensure its quality. Government-owned land should always be favored. Efforts to overlap protected habitat for multiple species should be made.
* All current protected habitat should be inventoried before any new habitat is designated.
* Restrictions on the use of private property for protection of habitat for endangered species should be compensated. Compensation for regulatory takings for endangered species habitat should equal the reduction in fair market value of the affected property.
* A Private Property Rights Ombudsman should be established in the U.S. Department of Interior to represent the interest of property owners.
* Citizens should be allowed to volunteer land for habitat reserves as well as bid on the right to operate such a reserve with appropriate lease compensation.
* The federal Endangered Species Act should be restructured to supersede all state and local endangered, threatened, and rare species protections on private property....

The Bad Tax Bill Within the Bad Energy Bill

Within the just-passed energy bill are tax provisions containing a wide variety of inducements designed to help solve the nation’s energy challenges. According to the Joint Committee on Taxation, the proposed tax measures could cost $11.5 billion through 2015. The real price tag could go even higher, but in any event, Americans will not be getting much in return. In fact, the tax provisions are little more than a collection of old ideas that have never worked, new ideas unlikely to work, and a lot of pork for the energy industry. Some of the tax measures in the energy bill are throwbacks to Jimmy Carter’s energy policy. For example, the bill resurrects tax credits for the purchase of residential solar power introduced by the Carter Administration but later taken off the books by President Reagan. Reagan was right—these tax credits accomplished little. As it turned out, even federally-subsidized solar is unlikely to earn back, in the form of energy savings, the up-front cost of the equipment, and the tax incentives induced many homeowners into making a purchase that they later regretted. Indeed, this often proves to be the case—there almost always is a good reason why the subjects of these tax breaks can’t catch on without government help....

Tree Ring Circus

On June 23, Rep. Barton, chairman of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, sent letters to the climate researchers responsible for developing the notorious “hockey stick” graph, which purports to show a dramatic rise in global temperatures during the 20th century after a millennium of supposedly little change in global temperature. Noting that “sharing data and research results is a basic tenet of open scientific inquiry” and that the hockey stick research was paid for with public funds, Chairman Barton asked Dr. Michael Mann of the University of Virginia for the computer code used to generate the hockey stick graph. Dr. Mann had previously refused to provide his computer code to other climate researchers who had requested it. Dr. Mann apparently decided that he cannot withhold his data and computer code any longer from the public and agreed in a letter to post his data and computer code on the Internet -- but not without squealing about it first. Before Dr. Mann turned over his data, virtually the entire spectrum of global warming alarmists attacked Chairman Barton for requesting access to the data and code. Well, a scientist’s refusal to provide colleagues with his data and methodology is suspicious. Chairman Barton’s request for publicly funded scientific data concerning a major public policy issue isn’t ludicrous; but estimating global temperature data based on a single tree certainly is....

'There is a Use for Violence in Our Movement'

According to FBI Deputy Assistant Director John Lewis, the Earth Liberation Front (ELF) and the Animal Liberation Front (ALF) are "one of today's most serious domestic terrorism threats." Skeptics, including The New York Times editorial page, argue that this threat is over hyped as these groups have confined themselves to property crime, unlike the well-established record of deadly right-wing terrorism. But waiting for terrorist groups to turn to murder is pre-9/11 thinking and the growing violence and sophistication of ALF and ELF are worrisome. The FBI's Lewis testified to the Senate: "Attacks are also growing in frequency and size. Harassing phone calls and vandalism now co-exist with improvised explosive devices and personal threats to employees... Extremists of these movements adhere to strict security measures in both their communications and their operations." The membership is well educated with many graduate students in their ranks. ALF and ELF are a non-hierarchical group with self-forming autonomous cells that are in one-way contact with the "press offices." The press offices provide ideological and practical guidance and participate in conferences where members can be recruited and trained. Cells, in turn, report actions to the press offices by anonymous e-mail. Closing the press offices has limited utility, since it is easy to start another website while breaking up a cell has minimal impact on the movement as a whole. These are not the operations of amateur coffeehouse revolutionaries, but of a sophisticated underground network of dedicated members....

A Bed for Congress

After all the hard work Congress has just done putting a mammoth energy bill into shape, and rushing it into law, the men and women of Congress need a rest. They should try a very special bed, that of Procrustes. The mythic Procrustes offered passers-by a free rest. Procrustes' bed fit everyone, you see, because he fit everyone to the size of the bed. If you were short, he stretched you. If you were tall, he lopped off your feet. Perfect for Congress. Nearly every time it passes a piece of legislation, it makes such a bed. To encourage renewable resources, the energy bill requires utilities to produce at least 10 percent of their electricity with renewable fuels by 2020. Trouble is, not every region is the same. Some regions have quite a bit of ability to produce renewable fuels, like vegetable oil, or access a constant source of energy like the wind. Others do not. But hey: with Congress, every utility gets the same requirements....

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