Cato Scholar Comments on New Energy Bill

Cato Institute ^ | December 19, 2007 | Jerry Taylor

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

The energy bill to be signed by the president today is arguably the worst piece of energy legislation ever enacted into law. It will substantially increase the price of automobiles, increase highway fatalities, increase fuel prices, worsen air pollution, and force consumers to buy products (like super-efficient light bulbs) that they manifestly -- and for very good reason -- do not want to buy. It will transfer huge amounts of wealth from the consumer to the farm lobby in the course of promoting a dubious product -- ethanol -- that will make energy supplies less reliable and greenhouse gas emission higher than necessary.

[tryon1ja]

Dimmer switches don’t work on fluorescent light bulbs, in fact aren't allowed.

WRONG!

Dimmer switches are available for fluorescent light fixtures. They have been for a very long time. The used to be expensive but of late are being more reasonably priced.

[Psycho_Bunny]

Bush........what a jerk HE’S turned out to be.

[NVDave]

I don’t doubt that he writes well about economics.

What really lights me up is when these think tank types start trying to recommend solutions that are just clearly not going to work.

For example, here’s my energy plan, in a nutshell:

Provide tax incentives to convert the US auto fleet to diesel engines ASAP. Provide more incentives for the oil industry to double the output of diesel fuel(s) in the same time period.

All this babbling about hybrids, itty-bitty cars, etc — all mental masturbation. All of it. If I were in power and could force a solution down upon the country to save fuel, it would be the modern, computer-controlled diesel engine. We’d see the efficiency of engines in cars go from 29% (the typical gasoline engine) to 40% in one leap, with a minimal amount of consternation among both the auto manufactures and consumers.

Next solution: Use the fact we have ethanol in our gasoline to make an assumption that we have increased octane ratings in our fuels. Mandate higher compression ratios on new gasoline engines (for those autos that don’t convert to turbodiesels) and increase the fuel efficiency of gasoline engines by using a Miller cycle instead of the Otto cycle. Toyota is already using the Miller cycle engine in the Prius. There’s no requirement we use the hybrid crap to save fuel.

There’s well known, absolutely sound ideas out there that engineers know for a rock-solid fact will work, will be accepted by the marketplace, etc. But these people in DC - politicians, think tank wonks, environmentalists, etc — all think they know more than engineers about physics, math and putting products out into the marketplace.

All these people who assume they know something about the subject are pissing off those of us who actually do know something about the subject.

[petitfour]

As hubby said earlier tonight, “We may as well be (pooping) upriver.” This was in reference to the insane corn-based ethanol mandate in this horrible legislation. You don’t burn FOOD for fuel.

[businessprofessor]

You seem disconnected with the marketplace. Price and profit move the market place. Mandates are not needed and will be counter productive. There is plenty of incentive to find new sources of oil and substitutes for oil. Consumers are demanding more fuel efficient vehicles.

You just want to substitute your judgment for Congressional judgment. The market place is bigger and wiser than any central planner. I have nothing against your ideas except that your response implies that you want to mandate your solutions.

[Tom the Redhunter]

I'm not so sure that the details of this legislation are the right way to go, but I absolutely disagee with the assertion that we don't need to do anything to reduce our petroleum consumption. Understand that I say this NOT out of a concern for "global warming" (which I think is pretty much a fraud) but rather because right now our petroleum consumption funds terrorism and radical Islam. We send huge amounts of money to the Wahhabists of Saudi Arabia who use that money to undermine the West. Consider this statement by former Director of the CIA James Woolsey, in testimony before the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations on November 16, 2005

"Estimates of the amount spent by the Saudis in the last 30 years spreading Wahhabi beliefs throughout the world vary from $70 billion to $100 billion. Furthermore, some oil-rich families of the Greater Middle East fund terrorist groups directly. The spread of Wahhabi doctrine fanatically hostile to Shiite and Suffi Muslims, Jews, Christians, women, modernity, and much else plays a major role with respect to Islamist terrorist groups: a role similar to that played by angry German nationalism with respect to Nazism in the decades after World War I. Not all angry German nationalists became Nazis and not all those schooled in Wahhabi beliefs become terrorists, but in each case the broader doctrine of hatred has provided the soil in which the particular totalitarian movement has grown. Whether in lectures in the madrassas of Pakistan, in textbooks printed by Wahhabis for Indonesian schoolchildren, or on bookshelves of mosques in the US, the hatred spread by Wahhabis and funded by oil is evident and influential. On all points except allegiance to the Saudi state Wahhabi and al Qaeda beliefs are essentially the same."

In other words: Saudi Arabia = al Qaeda So we have simply got to reduce our dependence on foreign oil. I'm all for drilling in ANWAR and off of the Florida coast, but simple mathmatics prove that neither of these will make much difference. I don't have time to go through all of the criticisms of the Cato scholar, but will briefly address the safety issue. Sure, smaller cars are more at risk today, but only because some people insist on driving huge SUVs. If everyone drove a smaller car, we'd all be equal. Now, maybe this energy bill isn't the right way to go. Maybe instead of increasing CAFE standards we ought to slap a $3 or $4 dollar tax on each gallon of gas. Maybe we ought to invest more in Flexible Fuel Vehicles. Whatever, I'm open to suggestions. But my bottom line is that right now we're funding terrorism and Islamic fascism and we need to find a way to stop it.

[mrmargaritaville]

and the US Federal Govt, the largest owner of buildings in the world does very little to make those buildings energy efficient.
-The building are not built tight enough, there is far too much energy wasted due to air infiltration.
-There is NO reason to AC any federal building in DOE climate zones 5-7
-There is No reason to heat any federal building in DOE climate zones 1,2
Point is, before the government starts to mandate energy efficiency for the private sector it needs to get it’s own house in order.

[NVDave]

The problem is that we already have regulation and mandates in the marketplace, put in place by the CARB (California Air Resources Board) who has an avowed agenda to a) get rid of diesels and b) spend our nation’s efforts and our carmaker’s efforts in fruitless and stupid distractions like “Zero Emissions Vehicles” (ie, electric cars) and so on.

These idiots in California have been jamming their mandates down upon the markets since about 1990, and using their outsized population and car consumption to warp the market.

OK, since most people would consider my *other* idea to deal with this problem (turn all of California’s urban areas into bombing ranges for strategic bombers, the USAF and USN, and turn loose the land in Utah and Nevada the USAF and USN are using back into the accessible land) a bit extreme, well, using smarter regulation to trump dumber regulation is a win.

The trouble with free market dogma is that there IS NO SUCH THING AS A FREE MARKET IN THIS COUNTRY. Absent an ability to shoot politicians (and I mean all politicians) without legal penalty, there will be no way to create a free market. Doesn’t matter which party we’re talking about. They simply cannot resist pandering to to the press to appear that they are “doing something!”

Yea, I’ll substitute my judgment for Congressional judgment. I know my IQ is higher and I’m not a grifter, thief or pervert which puts me miles ahead of any member of Congress in terms of adult judgment.

[NVDave]

We’ve burned food for fuel before. People just have far too short a memory to remember when.

We used to have more acres devoted to “food as fuel” 100 years ago than we have today. And I’ll wager when diesel fuel gets to $15/gal, we’ll see acres planted into the same “food as fuel” crops as 100 years ago again.

[NVDave]

FYI - it isn’t so much that there is a special dimmer switch — you just need to have the correct ballast in the fluorescent light fixture and wha-la! Dimmed lights.

Here’s a URL to a typical product:

http://www.lutron.com/CMS400/page.aspx?id=6491

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

Maybe instead of increasing CAFE standards we ought to slap a $3 or $4 dollar tax on each gallon of gas.

That's how I'd do it, if the need is that urgent. I'd also tariff all oil from foreign sources. And I'd use the money to bulldoze every frickin' Saudi-funded madrassa in this country and help other countries do the same.

(Because, with taxes, you see, people still have a choice as to what to buy or use. The taxes simply render some choices less palatable than before.)

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

Oh, and I’d also bulldoze every radical and/or Saudi-funded mosque as well, and deport every radical muslim in the country. A wise use of our fuel taxes to gain the upper hand in the WOT.

[businessprofessor]

A $4 tax per gallon sounds like a great solution. It sure has helped Europeans with their transportation needs.

You are replacing one bad idea (CAFE standards) with an even worse idea. A tax increase will force people to drive less, increase the costs of goods and services, and provide more revenue for rat politicians to spend on their Utopian dreams. A tax increase will not increase our energy supplies or increase energy efficiency. Here is my suggestion: allow private industry to develop our energy supplies, refinery capacity, and distribution capacity along with petroleum substitutes that the market will accept. In 10 years, I predict that the problem would be solved.

[MHT]

GE and Phillips, the beneficiaries of the light bulb bs as we now HAVE to buy the most expensive ones they make.

[MHT]

This is to the light bulb what the low-water law did to the toilet. Flush it five times to do the job one flush should have done. What is going to happen to all the lighting we now use. Sconces, chandeliers--commercial and residential. These bulbs can't be dimmed, use timers, be created with multi-watt options. This is absolutely disastrous. And those white things DO NOT last seven years. I spent $15 on one that didn't make it six months muchless 6 years! And they break and create their own environmental risks.

I am thinking of cleaning out a room and filling it will bulbs over the next four years.

[MHT]

And what about the expense of replacing massive numbers of chandeliers and sconces that are used residentially and commercially? And those fluorescent lights are going to create ambiance? What about stage lights--it will be fun to watch a play in fluorescent glow. What about people who need the brightness of 100-watt bulbs to read because they are older and don't see as well in the dim-watted rooms with 60-watt bulbs? What about the ability to dim a light for night-light use? What about appliance bulbs that light microwaves and dryers? If this was such a great idea and such a savings, the marketplace would have been going that direction in the first place.

I've bought those pig-tailed lights for good money with the expectation of lasting years. They didn't even last months. Slightly longer than my other bulbs--but not 60x longer as their price was 60 times greater. And the glow was not worth the difference.

[MHT]

I cannot imagine businesses like hotels and country clubs, as well as householders, being will to replace thousands of chandeliers and sconces to use these bulbs. Can you imagine the expense of having to replace all the lamps in your house in the next four years? They can't be dimmed so can you imagine a hotel ballroom in full fluorescent glow. It will make all the wedding parties look just great. I have paid $15 for one and it lasted six months, not six years...and I replaced it with a 25-cent incandescent which lasted just about as long. I am thinking of clearing out a room and filling it with bulbs to last me for the rest of my life. Maybe Canada will export chandelier bulbs like they export good toilets.

Once people figure this out, it may be a big enough election issue to switch Congress in hopes of its reversal.

[MHT]

Some things Bush has been great about—some things he just doesn’t get. Amnesty and this stupid, stupid legislation. Talk about something that should have been vetoed. This is disastrous. Unless he thinks that Hillary is going to get the blame in 2012 when we all have to pay $60 for a four-pack of lightbulbs.

[AFreeBird]

No, they will do like they did when they mandated that toilets could only use a prescribed amount of water to flush. You no longer can buy toilets that use the old amount of water. Soon, you will no longer be able to buy the incandescent light bulb. It will go the way of the dial phone, the record player and the soon to be VHS player.

Hmmm, illogical argument.

The dial phone, record player, and soon to be VHS recorder were replaced by market forces. Not mandated by gooberment.

[Jotmo]

Has anyone considered Christmas lights? CF Christmas light strings do not exist.

LED's? How much will that cost?

This is all so inane since, IMO, LED's will eventually replace the old incandescent bulb in the same way DVDs have replaced VHS. They are far more efficient that even CFs. If we'd just let the market work, it'd take care of it.