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Thursday, April 22, 2010

Was the VA Duped?

As I was watching TV yesterday an ad sponsored by a VA organization came on the screen. It had a Iraq war veteran narrating a video showing an IED blowing up a Humvee. He said this is how he was wounded and then elaborated on the deadly nature of these devices and how they were being made in Iran and supplied to AQI. He then said that every $1 increase in the price of oil provides $1billion to Iran to keep making these weapons. I don't know if this was a true statement but as an exporter Iran clearly benefits from higher crude oil prices.

Up to this point I'm thinking OK where is this headed? Then the background picture shifts to a wind farm and the narrator says we need to shift to renewable energy to reduce our demand for oil so that Iran's IED piggy bank is short changed. I about flew out of my chair. As posited in earlier posts on this blog, with the exception of emergency back-up diesel or gasoline power generators, the US does NOT consume oil in the production of electricity!! Thus the juxtaposition of a wind farm with an appeal to reduce our consumption of oil was and is a non sequitur. As also previously stated in this blog the only way that wind energy can be used to reduce our dependence on oil is to put sails on cars and trucks.

I am not sure what angers me most. That this VA organization allowed itself to be used for a blatantly emotional and false appeal that shifting to alternative energy for electricity production will help protect out troops, or that the sponsors cynically ran this ad with the expectation that the average person doesn't understand that all these wind turbines do absolutely nothing to stem the US use of oil for transportation.

The ignorance, cynicism, demagoguery and just plain stupidity that surrounds the US energy infrastructure and policy making process is simply stunning.

Just to be clear I am in favor of wind, nuclear, solar and hydro as relatively carbon free technologies for the production of electricity. What I object to is the implication that these sources of electric power will affect the demand for oil in this country. This includes the T Boone Pikens ads that ran a year or so ago making the same false claim about the virtues of wind energy. (BTW T Boone has since gone very quiet on this subject.) My solution to reducing our dependence on foreign oil is more domestic drilling and a national commitment to more nuclear power plants in parallel with the rapid development of an all electric ground transportation system. It is the only solution that makes sense.

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