Good morning! Today's lead editorial from the Des Moines Register. A good
step.
Lyle
Des Moines Register Editorial:
Rebuild U.S. energy systems
Ramming a bill through Congress in a few months, however, would invite
political gridlock.
By Register Editorial Board
08/20/2003
------------------------------------------------------------------------
A power plant shuts down in Ohio and the price of gasoline jumps 10 cents a
gallon in Des Moines.
That, more or less, is what happened when last week's power blackout in the
Midwest and Northeast interrupted oil-refinery production. It's one of the
many repercussions rippling through the U.S. economy. The power outage cost
the nation's economy an estimated $6 billion in everything from lost
business to spoiled food.
Economists likened the impact of the blackout to a snowstorm - brief,
expensive, tolerable. Yet the massive failure is a symptom of serious
long-term problems with the nation's energy systems. This is no snowstorm.
It's more like a return of the Ice Age. The difference is that we have it in
our power to do something about it if only our elected leaders have the will
to make tough decisions and be frank with the American people that the
solutions are neither simple nor cheap.
Alas, partisan bickering already has erupted in Congress, where the
Republican leadership and the Bush administration want to roll the
electric-power transmission issue into a comprehensive energy bill by
Thanksgiving. Democrats, meanwhile, want to deal with the blackout
separately. They fear it will get bogged down by hot-button issues like
opening up the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge for oil drilling and auto
fuel-efficiency standards.
Both sides have a point. The energy bill, which sets national energy policy,
is a logical place to address the subject of building a reliable
electric-power supply for the 21st century. Indeed, why was nothing on this
issue in the bill before the blackout? Experts have warned Congress about
the problem for years. But it makes no sense to rush major changes through
in just a few months, either.
The problem revealed by last week's blackout is this: The network of
electric-transmission and distribution lines is inadequate to carry the
growing power demands of businesses and consumers. And because the network
functions with little federal or state regulatory oversight, there is no
meaningful authority to make decisions or discipline wrongdoers. What rules
are in place were inadequate or ignored, according to officials of the North
American Electric Reliability Council, which was created after the famous
1965 New York blackout.
Perhaps the biggest decision ahead is whether the nation intends to complete
the deregulation of energy begun in the 1990s but interrupted by the Enron
meltdown. Some say deregulation is the cause of these problems; others say
it is the cure. Having it both ways does not seem to be working. In any
case, there is no silver bullet. Congress would be crazy to try to ram one
into an energy policy bill already larded with controversial provisions,
certain to create political gridlock.
Americans may scoff watching Iraq struggle to recover basic systems, but we
now see that America's energy infrastructure is surprisingly fragile, too,
and in need of serious investment. We need to rebuild our own country, while
rebuilding others".
*********************
Lyle R. Krewson
Sierra Club Conservation Organizer
6403 Aurora Avenue #3
Des Moines, IA 50322-2862
515/276-8947
515/238-7113 - cel
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