Energy and Environment

The twin spectres of global warming and energy dependence haunt our nation. Both represent major threats to our economy, to our national security and, ultimately to our freedom. These two problems -- and their solutions -- are intertwined.

Let's get one thing out of the way on global warming: I'm neither a "Chicken Little" nor a "skeptic." No, the sky isn't going to fall tomorrow just because you cruise your old muscle car out of the garage and take a road trip. But yes, there is an overwhelming scientific consensus that global warming is a real phenomenon, that human activity plays a major role in it, and that climate change represents a serious challenge to our way of life.

How do we meet this challenge? As one of my fellow Libertarians, Ernie Hancock of Arizona, likes to say, "the answer is freedom. Now, what was the question?"

Scientists say that the major factor in global climate change is our use of fossil fuels. That's just a fact. But there's another fact that, alongside the first, should tell us something:

Henry Ford designed his Model A, the first mass-produced automobile, to run on what we now call "biodiesel." Specifically, hemp seed oil, but any number of vegetable oils can be used to power engines. It was cheap and, although that wasn't as much of a concern then, it also produced a lot fewer polluting emissions than gasoline. Why did we end up with gasoline? Because government has heavily subsidized the oil industry for more than a century.

The reason renewable, domestically producible fuels aren't "economically feasible" compared to petroleum is that much of the cost of petroleum is hidden. We can start with at least hundreds of billions, possibly trillions, of dollars spent having the US military secure that industry's supplies. You don't pay it at the pump ... but you do pay it.

In the meantime, you're also paying farmers to not produce. Because there's a glut of farm land and farm labor, your tax dollars are spent to prop up prices and subsidize farming. Instead of production goals, farmers work under production ceilings to keep competition from winnowing anyone out. But what if the bulk of American farmland could be put to productive use in an environment where more, rather than less, production was called for and where demand and supply were aligned by a free market? Some farmers would continue to produce food crops, but others would sow crops intended for fuel production.

Remove those two sets of subsidies -- to the petroleum industry and to agriculture -- and see how fast biodiesel and other farm-produced fuels become competitive with gasoline! Even with a 100-year head start on receiving the bulk of research and development funding, petroleum just can't compete if it has to do so on a level playing field.

As a result, we'll have stronger family farms as well as energy that's clean, that's renewable and that can be produced at home.

That last point brings us to the other part of the picture: National security.

Oil supplies are finite, and many of them lie at the end of long supply chains, in countries not reliably friendly to us. Even if we open up offshore drilling and hand over the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge to Exxon as corporate welfare, we're going to remain substantially dependent on foreign oil unless we give up our dependence on oil altogether.

History tells us that dependence on distant energy sources can quickly become a very bad position to be in. See, for example, Germany and Japan in World War II. Our dependence on foreign oil exposes us to economic blackmail and makes us militarily vulnerable.

Overnight change isn't possible -- but if elected president, I could do certain things to get us on track for energy independence.

• I'd ask Congress to approve legislation requiring that all new government procurements of vehicles and weapons systems include a requirement that those items be operable on renewable, domestically producible, fuels -- and that existing fleets be retro-fitted, as possible, to also run on such fuels. This is not a new idea. Under the National Energy Policy Act of 1992, the federal government and state governments are required, in 2006 and after, to operate 75% of their fleets on "alternative fuels." Those alternatives include, but are not limited to, biodiesel and other renewable/domestically producible fuels. It's time to get that to 100% -- and to ditch fossil fuel "alternatives" and gasoline/ethanol blends as meeting those requirements.
• I'd let Congress know that it's time for taxpayer subsidies to the petroleum and agriculture industries to end, and for restrictions on the cultivation of energy crops such as industrial hemp to be lifted. And I'd wield the veto pen versus budgets and legislation that weren't responsive to that goal.
• As Commander in Chief of America's armed forces, I'd ask what military dispositions, deployments and actions were required for America's defense rather than placing our men and women in uniform at the disposal of special interests to act as free versions of "rent-a-cops."

Reduction of net greenhouse emissions is good for the environment, good for our economy, and absolutely necessary to our national security. And cutting the web of subsidies which has kept us dependent on foreign petroleum will be good for our freedom.