Ignoring Innovation

Ignoring Innovation

by Roger Pielke, Jr.

The "iron law of climate change" says that this challenge cannot be achieved by making energy substantially more expensive. Across the world in countries rich and poor, people have repeatedly indicated that while they will pay some price for environmental objectives, that willingness has its limits.
Into this context comes The Power Surge: Energy, Opportunity, and the Battle for America’s Future, a new book by Michael Levi of the Council on Foreign Relations. In it he notes that in 2012 only 5 percent of Americans favored both expanding fossil fuel supplies and developing alternative energy sources. The vast majority of public opinion on energy development, he reports, is split across predictable partisan lines.
Levi makes a strong case for the 5 percent — for what he calls a “most-of-the-above strategy.” Levi’s tight analysis helps to explain why such an approach has emerged from Washington during the most recent two presidential administrations, if not with the clarity and rationality that Levi would prefer.
At the same time the book’s narrow focus on the United States leaves a big gap in the analysis, which shows up in a rather muddled approach to climate change and neglect of the global energy access challenge.http://thebreakthrough.org/index.php/voices/roger-pielke-jr/muddling-the-energy-challenge/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+thebreakthrough+%28The+Breakthrough+Institute+Full+Site+RSS%29&utm_content=Google+Reader