Global Warming and Energy Independence

One of the paradoxes in our society today is the tendency of much of the conservative right to deny the existence of man-made global warming. To hear some of them talk, you would think that the anti-global warming movement is an anti-American socialist internationalist plot. That Democratic former Vice-President Al Gore is one of “them” seems to add fuel to the fires of denial. But let’s look at this a little closer.

It’s true that the United States is often presented as the main target for criticism about carbon dioxide emissions. And carbon dioxide contributes to the greenhouse effect that traps the sun’s heat within the earth’s atmosphere. The burning of fossil fuels, chief among them petroleum, releases a great amount of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. And don’t we depend in America greatly on other countries to supply us with this petroleum? And aren’t some of those countries, like Venezuela, Libya, Iran, and Russia, places whose national interests don’t necessarily coincide with ours? And aren’t we embroiled in a seemingly endless war in oil-rich Iraq, prohibitively costly both in terms of lives, injuries, and the enormous financial cost? Would we have been doing this in a country that wasn’t a major oil producer?

Conservatives and liberals alike say that they want the U.S. to be energy-independent. By that, I mean independent of other countries. We shouldn't be so vulnerable about our energy supplies that we feel compelled to mortgage our future in order to forcibly protect them. It’s high time we finally get serious with alternative, renewable sources of energy. And by that I mean water, wind, solar, and fusion. Sources that would not tax our atmosphere with excess amounts of carbon dioxide emissions.

Unfortunately, conservatives, in their proclamations for energy independence, stress exploration, mining, and processing fossil fuels that are on U.S. territory or under coastal waters, while belittling efforts to encourage renewable, relatively clean energy sources. The way I see it is that all we will accomplish by their suggestions is pollute our planet more while keeping us just as dependent on foreign sources as before. It will take great strides in both technological development and national commitment to get us truly energy-independent.

I haven’t mentioned two energy sources that hold some promise for the future: ethanol, and nuclear power. The problem with using corn-based ethanol for energy is that it threatens to drive up the price of grain beyond the point where people who really need it for food can afford it. And nuclear energy, despite the claims of increased safety, still has the problem of what to do with the enormous quantity of slow-decaying radioactive waste that is a by-product. So I would rather see more development with solar, hydrogen, wind, and fusion as a long-term solution, both in terms of making us energy-independent and raising the U.S. to be a world leader in preserving our fragile environment. I don’t see the point in wrecking the planet and getting us entangled in more wars when the end result regarding energy resources is going to be the same!