Get Energy Smart! NOW!

Senator Ben Cardin (D-MD) has a must read OPED in the Baltimore Sun today. The title provides a realist’s truth:

Gulf spill a lesson nation must heed: Clean energy legislation will protect our coasts, create jobs

Let us be clear: Cardin’s OPED is not earth shattering revelation, bringing out the meaning of life in some way that has never occurred before, but is simply powerful truth coming from one of the club of 100, the U.S. Senate, a club which has collectively stubbornly refused to move the nation forward toward a more prosperous, climate-friendly future. Senator Cardin merits praise and notice for stepping out with a strong media piece laying out reasons why we should move forward to something better.

Let’s take a look at some of his piece which included many simple, if painful, truths from its opening words:

The catastrophic oil spill ravaging the Gulf of Mexico and bearing down on coastal states is another reminder: America’s current energy policy is a disaster.

There are too many who are ready to wrap themselves in false patriotism, seeing America best at everything when analysis and statistics make it clear that we’ve allowed ourselves to fall behind in so many important (measurable) ways from our mediocre health care system to increasingly serious gaps between the richest and poorest among us (more like Haiti than Europe or Japan) to inadequacies in our educational system to … It is difficult, it seems, for a politician to state clearly when the United States isn’t on top of the world. Senator Cardin states a simple truth: our “energy policy is a disaster.”

We need to break our dangerous addiction to oil and promote safe and clean sources of power and fuel — and we need to begin today.

Yes.

Senator Cardin, no disagreement here.

And not only should we do this, we can do this. There is no reason to peg our future on ‘the sun will come out tomorrow’ with some amazing invention that will rescue us all. We don’t need some magic Silver Bullet, we have the tools to start and get a long way to where we need to go:

• Feedback systems on cars: 500,000 to 1,000,000 barrels/day reduction in daily US oil demand by 2015
• Electrification of rail: 1,500,000 to 2,500,000 barrels/day reduction in daily US oil demand by 2020
• Improvements in traffic management: 250,000 barrels / day reduction in daily US oil demand by 2014
• Aggressive telecommuting and flex-time/alternative schedule support: >250,000 barrels/day in reduced demand by 2015
• Energy efficiency program targeted at oil-heated homes: 50,000 barrels/day in reduced demand by 2012

And … the list of viable and meaningful tools to reduce our energy demand are long and solid (and should not include an aggressive turn to another fossil foolish addiction of natural gas for transportation).

Very simply, let us (let the U.S.) target just Five Percent a Year.

• Cut oil use five percent every year
• Cut coal-fired electricity by five percent of 2010 levels.
• Cut US greenhouse gas emissions five percent

Via the 5% solution, by 2030 the United States will:

• End, 100%, oil imports.
• End, 100%, the burning of coal for electricity
• Reduce climate emissions by 65+ percent from 1990 levels
• Improve the US trade balance by five percent of gross domestic product (due to eliminating oil imports)
• Cut health care impacts from fossil fuel use by 50%
• Improve productivity, per decade, by at least 5% above ‘business as usual’
• Cut employment below 5% by 2015 and maintain unemployment levels below 5% through 2030.

And … well … additional benefits.

Senator Cardin understands the costs of our fossil foolish addictions.

Offshore drilling …

it’s become painfully clear that there is no satisfactory remedy for the economic and environmental devastation that follows the blowout of an offshore oil rig.

Coal …

Today, coal-fired power plants spew dangerous pollution into our atmosphere.

Sending $s overseas for oil …

Every day, we send nearly $1 billion overseas to purchase foreign oil. Too many of those petro-dollars end up funding terrorists who hate America and make the world less safe every day.

Security risks …

Today’s energy policy contributes to international instability, which is why the Department of Defense is so alarmed and leading military officials have called for a fundamental change in direction. Today’s energy policy also hurts our economy by sending our wealth abroad at a time when other nations, like China, are making major investments in wind and solar power. The more than $300 billion that we send overseas annually to satisfy our oil appetite should be spent here at home on sustainable energy sources and implementing energy efficiency measures.

And, Cardin understands that the solutions to our problems require us to stop looking beneath our legs for solutions.

Of course, proponents of offshore drilling like to tout it as a way to reduce our dependence foreign oil. But the fact is, we can’t drill our way to energy security.

Instead, we have to look above our shoulders and between our ears.

We have to find a better way.

And, Cardin calls on his colleagues in that exclusive club of 100 to act.

Now it’s time for the full Senate to act. We need to pass comprehensive clean energy legislation that will make our economy stronger and our country more secure.

The environmental damage we are causing with our current energy policy is on stark display in the Gulf of Mexico today. The unseen greenhouse pollution that is fouling our planet is even more threatening.

A responsible energy policy can put America back in control of its economic future and make the world a safer place. It can turn down the temperature on climate change. And it can do one more thing. It can help ensure the sanctity of our treasured coastal resources, like Assateague National Seashore and the Chesapeake Bay. As we’re now being reminded in the horrific stories and images from the Gulf, that’s critical too. Once squandered or despoiled, they can never be replaced.

It’s time to work together in a bipartisan way to enact a clean and sustainable energy plan that takes us into the 21st Century strong and secure. We have the opportunity to redesign our energy policy so that it enhances national security, boosts our economy and preserves our environment. The choice is ours.

Yes, “the choice is ours” …