If I were the king of energy for a day | Flaster Greenberg PC

During the recent Senate hearings on energy and the Biden administration’s nominations to the U.S. Department of Energy, some of the most interesting questions came from Senator John Kennedy of Louisiana.

Kennedy often asks potential candidates, “If you were energy king for a day, what five specific things would you do to protect yourself from climate change?” Senator Kennedy almost never receives a direct answer. Many of the responses come in the form of “word salad” from people who love to criticize but rarely have concrete suggestions on how to address human-induced climate change and encourage decarbonization.

What would your list be? Here is mine:

Build America’s natural gas pipeline transportation system. At first glance, this sounds illogical, because for many people our ultimate goal is to eliminate fossil fuels, not to increase their use. However, the transition from coal to natural gas has had the greatest impact on the country’s carbon footprint, so we should work to convert more oil and coal to natural gas until we are ready to fully transition to renewable energy sources. Moreover, such a transition would dramatically increase our energy availability and overall energy security, which bodes well for our ability to influence this transition.
Streamline the permitting process for energy projects, especially clean energy and SMR nuclear reactors. SMRs are much smaller than conventional reactors of the past (so we don’t have to radically change the electrical infrastructure to site and build them), safer (so they can’t run away because of the passive reactor design), and energy dense (from a kWh/acre perspective), not to mention highly reliable and essentially emission-free. Using SMRs, we can also create a more distributed grid (like solar and wind have done), but much more reliable and controlled for load balancing. When it comes to the renewable energy permitting process, it’s a strange phenomenon that while so many people are insisting that we immediately switch from carbon fuels to renewable energy like solar and wind, these same people often oppose trying to site a wind or solar farm in their area. For many of these so-called environmentalists, the NIMBY factor outweighs their desire to save the planet. But we must be careful not to simply repeat Germany in the 2010s and try to authorize only renewable energy projects to the exclusion of all else. This overly narrow approach, ignoring the economic realities of the market, has led to ultimate disaster in this country and would do the same here. Finally, as part of this streamlining, we must amend Section 401 of the Clean Water Act to ensure that any state review of federal permits for projects such as interstate pipelines, national grid upgrades, and the like, can be reviewed only by the individual states for purely local environmental concerns and issues, and not be subject to the vested interests of any one state or to political considerations overriding the interests of other states. Governor Andrew Cuomo of New York infamously used this relatively minor provision of the Clean Water Act against its original purpose, effectively dictating energy policy for the entire Northeast at the expense of the sometimes conflicting policies and energy needs of some of New York’s neighboring states.
Divide the university into two tracks (like in Germany), technical/applied and academic/research. Much of what is taught in higher education in STEM fields does not apply to the work many of us actually do, nor does it build our problem-solving and application skills. Much of this “other stuff” learning would be better left to those who want to develop the academic/research side of the universe, while the technology/application side is trained in what is directly useful and practical. Additionally, I would make all other liberal arts classes optional. Theoretically, this would reduce costs for those who want them to pursue STEM degrees while also creating an economically and socially useful workforce. More useful employees can, in turn, generate new business in high-value areas. Additionally, academics can continue to focus on being academics if they wish. This would mean little change for them at all. But the whole point is to improve the overall STEM workforce while keeping the costs of creating them low. We must always remember that one of the best ways to fight climate change is with the economic and technological power to do whatever it takes to deal with it. For this to happen, we need many more people trained in STEM.
Be prepared to spend tens of billions of dollars to expand, modernize, and strengthen our energy grids. Without this level of commitment and spending, we have no real chance of making the transition to renewable energy, which is our main goal. In addition to expanding the grid, we need to make them smarter so that they can effectively turn off or turn off areas that are unlikely to use energy at any given time, and quickly transfer unused energy to those areas where it will be needed most, all at the lowest cost.
Identify and locate the rare earths we will need to achieve the energy transition and secure the energy supplies we need. This goes hand in hand with military readiness and the ability to defend our nation against those who would harm us through attacks on our national energy system or otherwise. With all due respect to those who believe in a transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy as we return to an isolationist foreign policy, these two concepts are mutually exclusive and self-defeating.

Of course, everyone will have their own list. Ultimately, I think Senator Kennedy is saying that without specific proposals, talking in generalities and platitudes is of limited use. If we are really going to make an impact on human-caused climate change, we need to put forward specific ideas, discuss them, determine how they will be implemented, and follow through with specific policies and actions, rather than acting like the problem doesn’t exist or shouting, “Just stop it!” without offering anything practical in return.

If only I were the Energy King.