Gas too Expensive? Dump Environmental Rules.
by Lloyd Alter, Toronto on 04.25.06
This makes so much sense: President Bush just ordered a temporary suspension of environmental rules for gasoline, making it easier for refiners to meet demand and possibly dampen prices at the pump. According to Yahoo News, Easing the environment rules will allow refiners greater flexibility in providing oil supplies since they will not have to use certain additives such as ethanol to meet clean air standards. Where did he announce this? at a speech in front of the Ethanol lobby group- kind of like announcing gun registration at an NRA convention. "Our addiction to oil is a matter of national security concerns," the president said in a speech to the Renewable Fuels Association, which advocates alternate energy sources. "After all, today we get about 60 percent of our oil from foreign countries. That's up from 20 years ago, where about 25 percent of our oil came from foreign countries." We suppose those pesky scrubbers needed for high sulphur coal will be next to go. Read also the remarkable statement on ethanol below the fold- more on this later.::Yahoo News Thanks Brenton
From President Bush's speech:
Amazing, isn't it? Without much cost, your automobile can be converted to be able to burn fuel with 85 percent ethanol or a product made from corn grown right here in America.
Ethanol is a versatile fuel. And the benefits are easy to recognize when you think about it.
One, the use of ethanol in automobiles is good for the agricultural sector. I'm one of these people who believes when the agricultural sector is strong, America is strong.
The way I like to put it would be — it's a good thing when a president can sit there and say, gosh, we've got a lot of corn. And that means we're less dependent on foreign sources of oil.
Years back, they'd say, oh, gosh, we've got a lot of corn and worried about the price.
Ethanol is good for our rural communities. It's good economic development for rural America. You know, new bio-refinery construction creates jobs and local tax revenues. When the family farmer's doing well, it's good for the local merchants.
Ethanol is good for the environment. I keep emphasizing that we can be good stewards of our environment and at the same time continue with our economic expansion. And ethanol will help meet that strategy.
You don't have to choose between good environment and good economics. You can have both by the use of technology. And ethanol is an example of what I'm talking about. And ethanol's good for drivers. Ethanol is homegrown. Ethanol will replace gasoline consumption.
Ethanol's good for the whole country. And we've been ... I thought you'd like that.
The ethanol industry is booming. It must be exciting to have worked for as long as you have on encouraging alternative sources of energy and then all of a sudden see the work come to fruition.
Last year, America used a record 4 billion gallons of ethanol. There are now 97 ethanol refineries in our country, and nine of those are expanding and 35 more are under construction. The ethanol industry is on the move, and America is better off for it.
Many of these refineries are in the Midwest — the Midwest because that is where the source — you know, the feed stock for ethanol comes from.
BUSH: That happens to be corn.
I don't like hearing about suspending any EPA regs but I read an article that explains why it'll really help the consumer. On the east coast they were using MTBE as an additive in gas but now must use ethonol as the oxygenate for cleaner burning gas due to a ban. Regular readers should know about MTBEs problems.
Ethonol has 2 problems: 1. it must be trucked rather than sent in a pipeline because it absorbs water and 2. it's a solvent that will strip corrosion and impurities that build up inside gasoline storage tanks, allowing them to mingle with gasoline supplies. That means terminal operators must drain giant tanks that hold gasoline stocks and scrub out the impurities before they can be refilled with ethanol-enriched gasoline.
Long term these are not problems that will stand in the way of ethonol or EPA regs but these transisional costs were coming at the same time that other factors are driving up prices.
Please don't think I'm defending Bush but I feel the whole story needs to be told. Higher fuel prices will also = higher prices in the stores so even if you don't drive it's your issue too. Too bad air quality will be the trade off. It may not be that bad however because since the terminal operators have to switch over anyway they will still do it, this just allows them to ship some straight gas and clean one tank at a time and not have to do it all at once which causes the costly shutdowns and supply problems.
The scary thing? People will support this. "Gas is expensive, so we need to relax regulations so I can drive again."
Again, the Republicans propose the easy way out and it's going to get lapped up.
Also, you can't convert a car to run E85 without breaking the law. I just googled it and there's no way to do it.
I think Republicans take pleasure in harming the environment.
Appearances matter more than substance. We already know that so this was predictable. In spot markets for gasoline there can be shortages caused by low supplies of particular gasoline formulations needed to reduce the formation of carbon monoxide in exhaust. THis can happen any time of the year with a refinery BOOM, or pipeline leak, and can be managed by granting an immediate temporary exemption for affected regions, as was done last summer and the summer before. Carte blanch exemption is unneeded in otherwords. By making it nation wide we are certain to have worse summer air quality in several urbanized areas that were not experiencing a gasoline shortage.
Incidentally, the higher the cost of a gallon of gasoline, the smaller the percentage can be attributed to environmental regulations. THe refineries already have their permits and pollution controls and their fixed price is amortised save for the energy needed to run them which is NOT gasoline.
Yup, way to many systems need to be changed to make a car E85 ready to make it pratical anyway.
I just saw a cable news report that was playing in the break room at work. One thing that's making fuel more expensive is tight ethonol supplies so it is being imported. To protect farmers this ethonol has a 0.50 a gallon duty on it. Hello idiots in washington, how about repealing this for the summer, since we can't make enought to satisfy demand now it isn't gonna hurt the farmers. So many puzzel pieces go into gas prices it makes my head hurt. I still understand about the distributors problems with the switch to ethonol from MTBE and since some stations did run out of fuel it is a big deal. Icelander sadly the envronment loses to peoples need for fuel this time. The watchdogs better make sure the rules come back into force ASAP.
Wait, I thought The Onion only published their new stories on Wednesdays....
I say this on CNN and wished i could commit there, luckly you guys brought this up. Imagine that Bush is using a band-aid solution to a giant problem.
hello !?
The production of ethanol is actually more harmful than beneficial to the environment - it is energy inefficient (fertilizers, processing, transportation) and uses lots of chemicals.
http://www.news.cornell.edu/stories/July05/ethanol.toocostly.ssl.html
And when will someone finally point out that the oil independence is not real when people talk about Hydrogen Economy !? Hydrogen is made from natural gas and oil via steam reforming ! True, only 16% of the gas is imported today in USA, but shifting to H2 economy will increase the demand a lot. Not to mention the billions needed to switch the infrastructure.
http://www.uic.com.au/nip73.htm
Yeah I guess high gas prices effect me too even though I only ride my bike. In addition to the environmental benefits of current (I would say high but $3 is nothing compared to the rest of the world) gas prices the cost of everything non-local will jump and force people to consume less. It allows for locally produced vital items to be more reasonable and frivolous non-local items to be less accessible. Eventually we might even get so tired of high gas prices we’ll do something about it and find some alternatives. Big ups for high gas prices and decentralization.
It could be worse... This could be an election year for him.
I wonder what the Q&A session was like afterwards?
(politics before the environment? say whaaa????)
Getting rid of those EPA rules permanently is a good first step. The next best things to do are let companies build more refineries. I think the newest is 30 years old.
Then let's drill in the Gulf and ANWR. I think even in ANWR it would still leave 96% of the land there untouched.
Umm....yeah. You know, you might have the wrong blog.
Not to mention that oil companies are having record profits. If they're not going to incorporate externalized costs (such as pollution, associated health problems, hegemony) they ought at least take their place as the true price gougers.
And take their rightful place as the recipients of regulation forcing appropriate taxation and/or an end to price fixing.
Although the imporation of Ethanol is interesting.. And I agree that high gas prices are good for reducing consumption and personally wouldn't be opposed.
what ever happened to that turkey 'waste' that got turned into fuel. wont that help?
j/k after 9/11 he had to be lax on our rights, after katrina he had to be lax on proper (living) wages and now moments befopre oil peaks and now its time to relax the laws yet again... see a trend?
The oil industry is one of the biggest donors to Republican election campaigns. In 2004, the industry gave 80 percent of its $26 million in campaign donations to Republican candidates, including $2.6 million to Bush. That was the Republicans' biggest share in at least a decade, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a Washington-based research group.
In 2005, the industry gave 84 percent of $7 million to the Republicans, and the top 20 congressional recipients of the industry's giving were all Republicans.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000103&sid=adSVuSrAsIfo&refer=us
BTW i don't agree with the link posted by ETA. please refer to the paragraph in the link below entitled "Ethanol Under Fire".
http://www.journeytoforever.org/ethanol_energy.html
this page has many different links to studies that show ethanol to have a positive net energy. of course if you assume the worst you could definately make it have a negative net energy. It is all in the farming practices. My point is it can be produced efficiently so you shouldn't throw your hands in the air and say oh well, guess we should try something else and give up on it just because you read one article that says we should.
on a side note, i'm not sure how converting a car to run on E85 is illegal. It's not that tough to convert gasoline cars to run on E85. People convert race cars to run on methanol/ethanol all the time. The biggest difference between gas and ethanol is the fuel air mixture. this means the computer needs to be reprogramed and the fuel injectors have to be replaced with higher flow injectors. There may be some other modifications too, but i still don't see how this breaks any laws.
One last remark, i don't think ethanol is THE solution, but i do think it is one of many solutions to come. Including my personal favorite, biodiesel.
gawd!
your paying 79US cents (101.73AU cents) a liter
per liter here we are paying 123 AU cents (90US cents)
Geez, I wish our petrol was that cheap again. and americans are complaining of petrol prices.. geez poor them for paying so freeking much!
I believe President Bush should include objectives highlighted in the Natural Resources Defense Council Energy Plan. The highlighted objectives are as follows.
1) Congress should enact a national commitment to save at least 2.5 million barrels of oil per day in 2015 and 10 million barrels per day by 2025.
2) American manufacturers continue to research and develop plus sell the most energy-efficient cars and trucks. At the sametime, American farmers grow crops for new biofuels.
3) Congress enact a package of federal financial incentives and minimum standards for energy efficient products and buildings contained in the Snowe-Feinstein bill in the Senate and the Cunningham-Markey bill in the House.
4) Clean energy such as wind, solar, and biomass provides electricity without damaging the environment or releasing dangerous air pollution. In order to ensure that all Americans can take advantage of these clean resources, NRDC endorses a federal renewable portfolio standard to require electricity providers to include a minimum level of clean energy resources in the electricity mix they deliver to their customers. We also recommend extending the renewable-energy production tax credit to keep renewables on their continued march to cost-competitiveness.
When you get-a-chance, I highly recommend reading the Natural Resources Defense Council Energy Plan. Its very informative.
Source:
http://www.nrdc.org/air/energy/rep/repinx.asp
And then there is the report by Senator Ron Wyden about how in the 90s, the oil industry purposely shut down their own refineries because prices weren't high enough.
http://wyden.senate.gov/leg_issues/reports/wyden_oil_report.pdf
You just can't make this kind of stuff up. This is more than scary -- it's just plain stupid! The EPA regulations are already a bit too loose, and now he's gone and suspended them! Wow. And just think, we have almost three years more of this madness to look forward to.
Man you guys will jump over Bush no matter what he does. He was the one that pushed for the law to have ethanol replace the other additives. Was that mentioned by anyone here? Nope! He is far from perfect but I think he is doing the right thing here. There are gas shortages all over the place now and these moves will help with that in the short term.
The “Small Kindness” Perception
In threatening and survival situations, we look for evidence of hope – a small sign that the situation may improve. When an abuser/controller shows the victim some small kindness, even though it is to the abusers benefit as well, the victim interprets that small kindness as a positive trait of the captor. In criminal/war hostage situations, letting the victim live is often enough. Small behaviors, such as allowing a bathroom visit or providing food/water, are enough to strengthen the Stockholm Syndrome in criminal hostage events.
http://counsellingresource.com/quizzes/stockholm/index.html
Haven't had time to read it all yet, but there's a pretty big discussion about this over at the Oil Drum.
Hey, what you guys moaning at?? Now £1 a litre here in England!
its temporary. the immediete transition to ethenol has obvious problems. we've made the initial step stop getting angry because the president is trying to avoid a national fuel crisis! I understand that we need these efforts but it doesn't do any good for the economy to fall apart because people can't get gas because the station ran out
Gasoline in Spain and Finland is at about $1.25 a liter. These countries are not suspending any environmental laws because of it.
The only way Americans in general will start getting serious about consuming less gasoline is if it costs a lot. And I mean a lot. A lot more than what it costs now in the US. The most effective way of convincing Americans to reduce energy consumption is not through legislation, or speeches, or moral guilt tripping - it is through high prices. The higher the better. It will take a SEVERE crisis in energy prices before Americans open their eyes. And for those about to ask: We're not in a crisis now? The answer is no. You'll know when the crisis is severe when Americans talk more like the Swedes and start demanding an oil-free economy, rather than trying to find ways to lower gas prices so that they can continue guzzling it uncontrollably.
Heating oil consumption in the sates is holding steady at about 3% of all oil consumed. Natural gas consumption is way up, and the US imports Natural gas. Propane is also part of the equation. To lower dependence on oil the US needs to eliminate the use of oil for heating, reduce the use of natural gas for heating, and make air conditioning more efficient.
Raising gasoline prices by a dollar a gallon would go a long way as well. The tax revenue from this could pay for Iraq.
SUV/Truck owners are still living in a fantasy that prices will come down and paying off their loans on gas guzzlers. Short term fixes are just not available, as demonstrated by the ethanol supply shortfalls. The signal to noise ratio on this entire topic is very low indeed. The prospect for another bad hurricane season are more relevant. What will the President do to ensure more fuel is stockpiled for that eventuality, regardless of its composition?
I forgot to add how wwe can get rid of fossil fuel heat - install geothermal and nuclear power to run them.
--Tom
I read an article last week that said the problem isn't with MTBE being banned, its that the oil companies wanted liability protection for the MTBE producers in the energy bill last year. Congress made it clear they would never give that protection, so now the oil companies are scrambling to stop using MTBE. Its a de facto ban I guess.
The only thing that will truly change consumer and corporate behavior is really expensive oil. At $5/gallon, consumers would demand more efficient cars, people would ride/walk more, development would return to cities and walkable suburbs, etc. It would be painful for many, but in the long term, America would be happier and healthier for it. People adapt very quickly, actually, to prevailing conditions. Americans are just plain spoiled - if you don't believe it, visit another country
The irony of all this complaining is how we of tender heart always are looking out for the little guy and the little guy is exactly who is hurting the most. You think Sorros and Gates are hurting because of fuel prices? The funny thing is, the left attacks Bush for gas prices being high, then attacks him for doing anything about it.
We all get freaked out when taxes are cut becasue those that pay the most taxes (the wealthy) get the biggest breaks. But there are those that are advocating an additional tax on fuel of $1 per gallon. That is a direct tax on the poor. It will affect them more than anyone else. It will also affect low wage earners at businesses that are just getting by. Loss of jobs, a direct negative impact on the poor...are we sure this is TreeHugger? Are we overlooking other causes (fighting for the down trodden)to prop up another (disdain of all thing fossil fuel)?
I'm not trying to be irritating but maybe we shoud think about more than one issue at a time.
I get a bit tired of the sniping from foreigners that their gas is much more expensive than ours, especially on Treehugger.
US gas is massively subsidized precisely BECAUSE our society is so car-dependent; if the UK had systematically gutted its transit infrastructure and built giant sprawling suburbs everywhere, their government would also have no choice but to keep gas artificially cheap.
What's more, it can be taken as a given that the readership of this site does everything they can to reduce their reliance on oil, and as a result, no one here is really complaining about the PRICE of gas, but the AVAILABILITY of it.
I am lucky to be able to take public transit to work and live in a functional city, but plenty of my friends live in suburbs where they have no choice but to own one or more cars, and few of them can afford to buy a Prius rather than just budgeting more for gas.
Let's focus on a solution, rather than on pointless out-of-context cost-of-living comparisons. Yes, we all know that a gallon of gas is cheaper than a gallon of perfume, too. No one cares.
Did anyone notice another thing he called for. To eliminate the limits on the hybrid tax credit so that more people will be encouraged to buy hybrids.
Mike's right, the EPA regs. thing is a temp. move to bring down gas prices. As I said before the switchover cost from MTBE to ethonol as the oxygenate one driver of the price. Again too bad it's at the expense of air quality.
Bush said "Without much cost, your automobile can be converted to be able to burn fuel with 85 percent ethanol or a product made from corn grown right here in America."
So where are these after-market conversion kits? I haven't seen a single one. Has anyone seen a company that makes them?
BioDiesel and Hydrogen. Simple solutions. The research into creating BioDiesel out of alge is very cool. Lets get farmers to grow our fuel. The age of cheap oil is over. Time to get inventive again in America, turn off the TV and get busy.
Even after unleaded gasoline became mandated in the mid 70s, the US as a whole had just a few different blends of fuels for vehicles. Today, thanks to all the different state and local laws we have some 50-odd blends of gasoline being created by fewer refineries than we had 35 years ago.
Excessive goverment regulation DOES have an effect on the consumer!
I hear what you are saying jwer, but unfortunately a lot of the UK too is suburb/car based now, and yet at $8 a gallon there are more (and bigger) cars than ever on the road.
I've gone from living in a rural area and commuting 50 miles a day by car to living 3 miles away and cycling. I now regret the amount of fuel and energy I consumed but unfortunately the car allowed me to get a job I simply couldn't have in my village! We've all been sold the car for 100 years and it will be a very hard habit to break long term.
I just want to say that this whole oil price gouging thing is a giant load of crap. Oil companies are seeing demand that far outpaces supply. The only thing they can do is raise the price. In fact, since I don't drive very much, and I am a big supporter of alternative energy sources, I think rising gas prices are great. Anything that causes people to use less gas is good. On the other hand, this whole ethanol thing really has nothing to do with environmentalism anyway. Adding EtOH to gas is just an indirect way to subsidize American farmers who grow more corn than we can eat/use.
SEAN / MONK:
I wish I could agree with you.
Unfortunatelly it's not only one article discussing the economy and environmental impact of the ethanol production. I happen to work for one of them companies developing refinery and petrochemical technologies. Can't help but read the data (makes me want to quit my job :-). We also had recently both someone from Brazil talking about their BioDiesel program (not corn based!) as well as the director of the Basic Research at DOE (Dept. of Energy). I also follow the work of many green research groups around the world, many of which come and give presentations here.
The basic line - don't rely that there will be renewable economic solution in the next 10 years. Which could be too late, if the Oil Peak Production was indeed 2005 and not inthe future as some predict. And even if the peak is as far as 2030, things are quite dark on the energy sector...
And JWER, the foreigners are right to have issue with the USA dotations for oil. I am a foreigner in the USA and feel quite unhappy about the infrastructure of the area where we live, which does not allow me or my wife to use public transportation. I try to bike to work, but the majority of the US population does not. And this is not an excuse to give them cheap oil which allows them to drive less and less economic vehicles. So I agree with the point made by the others.
heh, people complain about them removing environmental stuff. I could care less, as long as the gas is cheap. I'll die far before it would matter, and the future generations can figure out their own solution.
Finally, someone standing up to the environmentalist whackos out there. First, temporarily suspend the regs, then make it permanent. Then start drilling offshore & in Alaska. Next throw out the regulations preventing new refineries from being built. Then we'll get somewhere.
Wow, that's really creative - coming to a site called Treehugger and saying absurdly inflammatory things about environmentalism to try and get a rise out of people. Never seen that before.