Launch of America’s Energy Choices
Earlier today, ASP officially launched a new white paper “America’s Energy Choices” . This report marks an effort by ASP to begin to outline a new way of looking at how America uses and produces energy. To mark the launch, we held a lunch here at ASP’s offices where I presented the major findings of the report.
The reason we had for putting this comprehensive report together is that I see a disconnect in the way America talks about energy. The problem with American discourse on energy today is that arguments about energy are too often based on which will ‘sell’ the best in order to fit a decision already made. These argument are not meant to be balanced – they are poll-driven and appeal to people’s basest fears and desires. The report says that, instead, policymakers should look at the all options and weigh the trade-offs for each. Because the truth is there are trade-offs – decision makers should not pretend there are silver bullets that will automatically bring cheap, clean, domestic energy to all.
In the report, I maintain that the proper way to address the debate about energy is to balance three main concerns:
1. Energy Security
2. Economic Stability
3. Environmental Sustainability
There are three broad categories of energy the U.S. has to choose from, including: fossil fuels, nuclear energy, and renewable power. Within each of those categories is a range of several choices.
Over the next few days, I will do a series of posts on my personal blog (http://andrew-holland.blogspot.com/) expanding on how each energy choice I brought up in the report matches up with the three main concerns above. In the meantime, I would encourage you to take ASP’s online poll to show how you would prioritize America’s Energy Choices, just click here.
