Dissecting The Energy Bill

Bruce "McQ" McQuain from QandO, guesting over at Right Wing News, takes apart the energy bill that just passed the House of Representatives and examines the real impacts it will have on Americans. It isn't pretty, not at all.

Let's parse this a little, shall we?

It would raise vehicle fuel efficiency (Cafe) standards for the first time in over 30 years, by 40%, to 35 miles per gallon for both cars and light trucks and SUVs.

And that will do what? Increase the price of automobiles. As usual, it's a mandate for which you, not anyone else, get to pay.

Of course loopholes do survive - big loopholes. Dan Becker, an environmental consultant and lawyer and former official with the Sierra Club explains:

“If I am G.M., God forbid, and I produce a certain number of flexible-fuel vehicles capable of running on E85 ethanol, they will be assumed to be running on ethanol 50 percent of the time. So the fuel economy of a 20 m.p.g. truck that is technically capable of running on E85 will essentially be 30 m.p.g.

“Because the auto companies are not as stupid as they look, they have chosen to make most of their flexible-fuel vehicles their least-efficient vehicles. So they get the maximum fuel economy benefit.”

Why aren’t these vehicles running on E85 all the time? Because E85 is hard to find in many states. There are only about 1,200 stations selling E85 nationwide and only nine in New York, according to the Energy Department. Even if you can find E85 the mileage is often about 30 percent worse than with gasoline, because ethanol contains less energy per gallon.

Nevertheless, for more than a decade the federal government has joined the auto industry in what amounts to make-believe. That fantasy continues in this bill. No wonder Mr. Becker calls it the “Energizer bunny of auto industry loopholes.”

Indeed. Flexible-fuel Hummers, oh my.

There is quite a lot more, including a link to the same Smithsonian Magazine article I cited yesterday. The end result of this bill will be enormous increases in the cost of pretty much everything for people in this country. It will also deepen rather than improve the energy problems in this country. The price of energy is about to skyrocket - just as food prices are already. The energy bill is nothing more than a gargantuan tax hike on Americans which will funnel enormous amounts of money to special interests.

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  By feeblemind, Monday, 10 December , 2007 @ 8:02 pm

  Gaius, a friend emailed a news release from ethanol.org today. Their alchemists have determined that (paraphrasing) either an E20 or E30 blend will give better mileage than gasoline. If you are interested, the link is http://www.ethanol.org/news/index.php?newsid=25 Heh. Color me skeptical.

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