More Iron Denominator Stuff

In my constant search for energy policy stuff, I recently stumbled across the Institute for Analysis of Global Security, a security consultant firm that specializes in the security aspects of energy policy, i.e. why America has had at least one carrier group in the Persian Gulf for fifty years. They have a proposal titled "Set America Free" (warning - PDF file), in which they propose a number of different policies, feasible today, that would all but eliminate America's need for oil, and totally eliminate the need for imported oil.

The two most important parts to their plan are Plug-in Hybrid Cars and Flexible-Fuel vehicles. Plug-in Hybrids are basically hybrids like todays Priuses and Insights, except that they plug in at night and at work to recharge slightly larger batteries. This lets them go 100km without engaging the internal-combustion side of their hybrid engine. This means that upwards of 90% of daily commutes would be essentially oil-free. You would still be able to drive long distances should you so desire, but there's no reason to feel guilty about your commute - or rather, not quite as guilty, given that most electricity in the US is produced from coal. At least you're not cutting Al Qaeda a check everytime you start your car!

The other side is designing cars that can run on gasoline, ethanol, and methanol, or any mixture thereof. Again, this is something we can do now, so that we begin converting our cars off of gasoline as new technologies lower the price of ethanol and methanol. This can have some pretty drastic results quickly - for example, a Hybrid car that got 50 mpg and was fueled by E85 (the US standard ethanol mixture - 85% ethanol, 15% gas) would get essentially 335 miles to a gallon of gasoline - with ethanol or methanol making the difference. Obviously, this is a huge decrease in the gasoline consumption. This, however, only applies to the US car fleet - roughly 65% of the US's oil consumption. Another 20% comes from the trucking industry. The smartest solution here is probably simply to reinvest in rail - trains are, believe it or not, roughly nine times more efficient per ton moved than trucks. A move back to rail is hampered however by our current lackluster investment in our rail lines. Alternately, non-oil diesel fuels could power trucks.

I really like the IAGS's ideas, but they're rather single-minded towards reducing US energy imports - something I support, but they advocate producing Methanol from coal, something that sounds kind of insane to me, given the problems we're already having with climate change. They do, however, also recognize the potential of biofuels. On that note, I'm reposting a link I emailed around a few months ago about the new potential for cellulosic ethanol. Ethanol from dedicated crops and waste could almost certainly meet the needs of a nation that used plug-in, flexibly fueled hybrids. I suppose the thing that makes me most angry when I read this stuff is that some aspects of this - hybrid cars in particular, plug in or otherwise - have been around for decades. If we'd paid attention to the lessons of the1970s, people would today be asking "Climate Change what?" and "Osama bin Who?". Instead, because of our own stupidity, we're in a huge mess.