Videos: John Edwards is a nuke power Luddite; Obama explains his energy bill vote
posted at 10:30 am on January 16, 2008 by Bryan
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These clips are from last night’s Democrat debate. In the first, John Edwards is asked about energy. He opposes building new nuclear power plants but also opposes US exploration and exploitation of new domestic fossil fuel sources. Leaving…what, exactly, to provide for our growing energy needs? Edwards favors the usual liberal bromides, biofuels, wind and solar. But left out of his answer is that increasing biofuel use is both inefficient (you have to put more energy into creating the biofuel than you get out of it) and puts more pressure on our food supply, which will drive up the price of staple foods. Solar hasn’t yet become efficient enough to become a dominant energy source, and the large windmills that are necessary to increase wind power use create their own environmental issues and are opposed for aesthetic reasons by liberals like the Kennedy clan. Edwards ends up opposing even doubling the number of worldwide nuclear power plants if that were possible, because it would “only” deal with 1/7th of the world’s greenhouse gas problem. But isn’t that quite a lot of capacity and quite a lot of effect on greenhouse gases that Edwards would unilaterally turn down?
And Edwards even opposes building new domestic coal fired power plants, not for any energy reason, but for environmental reasons.
The other silly part of Edwards’ answer is his insistence that the oil companies have a stranglehold on US energy policy. The fact is, we’re not exploring and exploiting all of our potential domestic resources, and we’re allowing the Cubans to allow the Chinese to explore oil sources 50 miles off our coast. The oil companies are wealthy and they are powerful, but it’s hard to factually argue that they have a stranglehold on our energy policies. We haven’t built new oil refineries in the US in decades. We can’t explore ANWR even though the people of Alaska favor that. We’re not building oil drills off the coast of California and Florida. All of that is tied to environmentalist concerns, not the oil companies, and that’s the reason we are so dependent on foreign sources of oil.
Here’s Obama’s answer to why he voted in favor of the energy bill. Obama recognizes that there needs to be a balance between energy and environmental needs. His cap & trade idea is similar to McCain’s, though, and according to the Heritage Foundation, would raise the cost of energy for very little environmental gain.
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Why not offshore nuke plants with oil drilling rigs at each corner, and windmills and solar panels attached?
Let’s get off the dime, big time.
profitsbeard on January 16, 2008 at 10:37 AM
I’m with profitsbeard. Off-shore nuke plants surrounded by farmed salmon so the flesh is really pink!
thejackal on January 16, 2008 at 10:39 AM
The first 45 minutes was a slimy love fest. They didn’t even challenge each other with straight faces.
In fact, how did the moderators keep straight faces with some of Edward’s answers. He sounded like some ill-informed teenager trying to tell you about the world.
geckomon on January 16, 2008 at 10:40 AM
Carbon credits! Oh…sorry. Wrong GW talking point.
Details, details…
amerpundit on January 16, 2008 at 10:41 AM
Hey Sen. Edwards, are you gonna put a solar roof on that massive mansion of yours? Do you have a wind-powered car or something? Get a freaking clue.
CP on January 16, 2008 at 10:43 AM
that’s democratics for ya.
they’re the same on social security. have you ever tried googling “there is no crisis”?
jummy on January 16, 2008 at 10:44 AM
Vote for me. I the dumbest s.o.b. you’ll ever see, but I can talk my way into a corner faster than a hummingbird sucks sugar-water.
I have a feeling the Democrat nominee will flat our refuse to debate the Republican nominee… for obvious reasons.
Griz on January 16, 2008 at 10:45 AM
Nail on head. Home run. 4-bagger. He scores. Touchdown.
Griz on January 16, 2008 at 10:46 AM
In all seriousness, I’ve been looking at alternative energy sources for my house over the past few months. The problem with solar isn’t its inefficiency. It’s the EXPENSE! OMG, to put enough panels on my house to make my electric bill zero and payoff the panels is just an insane amount of money. Even if they were more efficient and I needed fewer, the cost would be expected to parallel the increase in efficiency. Whether it’s 100 panels at $100 a piece or 10 unbelievably efficient panels at $1000 each, the cost is too high. Even govt subsidies make it unreasonable. The same is true for a home geothermal heating or power setup. The cost is too high, and subsidies aren’t enough. Home wind has some potential as there’s some small, efficient, new designs that aren’t that hard on the eyes either, but again…the cost. Sorry, but $100 a month in electric or $25000 for some sort of alternative setup just isn’t a choice. I go with the $100 a month. The way to get alternative energy resources bought and online is to lower the cost, and that means increasing the subsidies imo. Dems love ranting about the cost of the Iraq War. Ok, but let’s take the pork spending for one year and instead of $200bn (+- I dunno how much!), and put a few solar panels or new wind turbines on every office, every Home Depot, every mall, and as many houses as possible. Bammo, the cost of production and installation drops, and the US could export electricity! I would LOVE to do this, but Congress prefers their pork. Inefficiency is secondary. Production and installation costs are what need to decrease. Think of it like this… Detroit can make the most fuel efficient car in the world, but if it costs $100g to buy…no one’s gonna buy it.
scottm on January 16, 2008 at 10:51 AM
Edwards plan is to make Kucinich ambassador to the System Lords and get us somma dat that Naquida.
-0The Cat
MirCat on January 16, 2008 at 10:53 AM
Why cant we just run on bunny hugs and love? =( You bastard right wingers are so mean.
Dash on January 16, 2008 at 10:59 AM
This is why I love this site!!!
thejackal on January 16, 2008 at 11:00 AM
Not to mention it still gets burned, so it still creates similar pollution that the envirowhackos want to avoid.
snickelfritz on January 16, 2008 at 11:02 AM
Ignorance of the energy industry in epidemic in political circles. They want independence but no drilling or no nukes or no coal. Wind, solar or biofuels all sound great but have not real chance in the high energy demand production and living systems we have developed over the last century. These guys spew eco palatudes with no real knowlege of the problems, engineering or physics involved with solution.
jimwesty on January 16, 2008 at 11:04 AM
I prefer the junkman’s take:
I’d like to see the government get out of the way of the energy business.
Start with not favoring one technology over another, especially esoteric souces that have huge drawbacks.
Wind works great, as long as the wind blows
Solar is expesive and only works half the day
Nuclear has the advantage of producing alot of power in a small footprint, but also is an all or nothing proposition and has a long term waste problem. If only congress would allow reprocessing, recycling, and reuse to go along with a permanent solution for dealing with the end waste product.
Hydro is great, but there are a finite number of rivers that can be dammed, and approval is harder and harder to get.
Fossil Fuel burning has the advantage of the best on-demand power production, but is opposed by the AGW crowd on the basis of CO2 production.
Tidal shows promise, but no one has build a suitable production facility, and transmission might be an issue.
Micropower generation is a good idea, but is hideously cost inefficient.
are there any I missed?
Canadian Imperialist Running Dog on January 16, 2008 at 11:06 AM
Edwards wouldn’t know the first thing about oil even if he needed need the wax for his glossy sheen!
Bryan… Actually people here are looking at the new Natrual Gas Pipeline and have ANWR on the back burner. The NGP is a worry up here concerning TranCanada, the State of Alaska and what is to come and how long. ANWR will take more then 10 yrs to develope and get online with a pipeline ran to it.
And the Obamamessiah…. he kept stalling and saying it was cleaner and that it was for the enviroment. How about being more cost effective? Ugh I hate when they say something and have no clue concerning it.
upinak on January 16, 2008 at 11:07 AM
I just love watching Silky’s face when a question is being addressed to him. He’s the picture of smugness.
swami on January 16, 2008 at 11:09 AM
Scott there is all kinds of “alternatives”, solar panel are just one and used mainly right now to heat peoples water heaters for showers and such. It has dropped many people’s electric/gas bill on just that alone about half.
I am looking into it myself, plus a few wind powered and so on. You have to start from the bottom to get where you want.
upinak on January 16, 2008 at 11:11 AM
See Bryan, it’ll only deal with 1/7th of the globe’s greenhouse gas problem, not 6/7ths.
If you can’t get it all instantly, it’s bad policy. That’s why Democrats magic wand theories and ideas are such great policy ideas. Realistic and instant!
Hoodlumman on January 16, 2008 at 11:15 AM
Well there’s only one solution to expensive solar cells! Mandatory installation! If everyone must have solar panels on their homes then the cost is bound to come down, right? So we need the government to make homeowners/builders install solar panels on all American homes. Right?
/sarc
Of course there are other options!
Browncoatone on January 16, 2008 at 11:15 AM
So a guy with a 25 THOUSAND SQUARE FOOT house is going to tell us all about energy consumption.
He might be the biggest asshole in both races, and that’s saying something.
benrand on January 16, 2008 at 11:21 AM
Yeah…I like that: mandatory installation. I’ve got an old solar power electronics experiment kit from Radio Shack down the basement. Woohoo! I can feel the write off comin already!
The point about solar only working half the day is a good one, but kinda doubles its efficiency if you think about it in a half full kinda way. Point remains, until solar cell panels or home hydro, or whatever get bought en masse (or until hybrid cars get bought en masse) the production cost/purchase cost will not come down and they won’t be viable.
My favorite home micropower idea so far is a giant tank collecting rainwater runoff that-when filled-opens a valve and then spins a small hydro turbine. Some cool YouTube vids on the turbines out there. Again, only viable in some areas, and not a round the clock gig, but cost effective. Tank is under $1000, connecting to grid and getting generator under $3000. Couple that with the alternative energy resource tax incentives…and I’m considering giving it a try. It won’t power the house year round, but it’d slash my electric big time. What gets my mind racing is that it would all fit discreetly in a tool shed. Now, if the 87 homes in my suburban Americana were to all have such sheds…wouldn’t that do a lot for cutting energy use? I dream of the homeowner’s association paying for it too-well, ok, that’s pure-on fantasy, but guy’s gotta dream. That’s where we get back down to bunny hugs huh?
scottm on January 16, 2008 at 11:27 AM
The problem with Wind, or solar, is that it is NOT consistant.
It creates energy some of the time, but you still need enough infrastructure to pull the load when it is not producing…
So the Capital costs for the infrastructure, which is a LARGE part of cost, remains.
Today, I have 4 inches of global warming on my roof here in Denver… solar power would not be working, so I would still be pulling everything from the infrastructure of the grid, which the power companies would have to pay for…
BUT, I would pull less energy on a good day, lowering the revenue the energy company pulls in…
So, end result? Higher energy costs as the Energy companys would have to support the entire infrastructure for those bad weather days.
Horrible economics.
Romeo13 on January 16, 2008 at 12:27 PM
Absolutely right. Nobody gets more vitriol slung at them than the oil companies. Yeah they are big, powerful and rich companies because oil is an EXTREMELY important commodity and without the refining that the oil companies do, our economy wouldn’t have the energy it needs to run. So if we really want to lower oil prices, let’s build more refineries instead of depending on getting oil from ***holes like Hugo Chavez. I also say we should start building new nuclear plants. Incredible research is being done to possibly build “passively” safe plants, which in case of emergencies will automatically shut down based on the laws of physics requiring no human intervention. France is 80% nuclear, I don’t see why we shouldn’t be also.
mattyj86 on January 16, 2008 at 1:03 PM
Edwards is toast and it’s actually a little sad watching him soldier on. What drives him on is his inner fear that in a few weeks, he will be off the main stage forever and he will left passing out his business card at the Siler City Kiwanis Club. I found it hilarious that he tried to explain why he now opposes putting nuclear waste in Yucca. He said that there is “new science” but failed to say what it is. What articles did he read that changed his mind? What books did he read? Of course if asked he could not tell you. The guy is so transparent.
Larraby on January 16, 2008 at 1:26 PM
And what does Mr. Edwards power his mansion by?
ThePrez on January 16, 2008 at 1:50 PM
I read an interesting discussion on a milblog a few years ago where they advocated building lots of little nuke plants all over the country just like the nuke plants on our aircraft carriers. Mass produce them and make them identicle. Staff them with only former Navy nuke personnel. Every plant the same so parts and employees could be freely exchanged.
It sounded like a really good idea to me and, believe it or not… why don’t we give France a ring and ask them how they store their waste?
Babs on January 16, 2008 at 2:48 PM
The democrats have ZERO credibility on energy policy.
That is a good thing because when our nominee (Huckabee) goes against their nominee (Hillary), Energy Independence will be a major deciding issue and Huckabee will slaughter the Hildebeast.
HaraldHardrada on January 16, 2008 at 4:02 PM
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