"The future of US energy is heating oil," said Pres. Obama to a rapt audience on the grounds of a NJ heating oil storage facility. (image: Nicholas Whitaker via heatingoil.com)

After yesterday’s announcement that the US would expand offshore oil drilling, President Barack Obama dropped another bombshell on the energy world by calling heating oil “the key to America’s future” and pledging to bring heating oil to 10 million more American homes by 2014. To demonstrate his determination on this score, Pres. Obama will be converting the White House to a heating oil system, and dug up the Rose Garden to install a brand-new, 1,000-gallon home heating oil tank. President Obama announced his ambitious plan at a heating oil storage facility in Landon, New Jersey.

As crowds cheered, the President explained the importance of heating oil:

We cannot afford to delay one more day in bringing the citizens of this country the safe, reliable, and affordable heating fuel they deserve. For too long this advance has been held up the partisan squabbles of the past—the time has come to move forward. Heating oil’s high efficiency, low emissions that are getting lower each year, and clear path to 100 percent renewable biodiesel content make it the finest heating fuel in the land. All of America deserves this fuel. We’re starting at the White House, but we’re on our way to your house!

The announcement provoked some flutter in the financial press, as journalists struggled to piece together how heating oil, a close cousin of “oil” oil, was producing so much activity on the trading floor, outperforming metals, gasoline, and crude. Searching for an industry expert willing to explain the frenzy, Bloomberg news could only find the Maine Governor’s Office of Energy Independence and Security:

In Maine, the President’s comments have created a phenomenon. Following the president’s announcement, our office has been flooded with calls from Mainers eager to switch to heating oil for their home heating needs. The excitement has unfortunately led to some unlawful activity in southern Maine, where a band of heating oil marauders is performing involuntary repairs on tanker trucks carrying diesel fuel, flooding the local market with supplies of no.2 oil.

President Obama’s announcement came as surprise to many Americans—especially residents of the West coast and South. Puzzled viewers of the president’s speech in those regions turned to the internet to find out what heating oil is, making “what is heating oil?” the most-searched phrase on Google’s US search engine.

The craze swept the nation in record time, with some citizens driven by their enthusiasm to begin clearing space in their basements and garages on Thursday afternoon to make room for a new heating oil tank.

Following his prepared remarks, the president took questions from the press, and offered some details of how his program, dubbed “Making America Cozier with Oil Heat.” Private citizens will be rewarded with rebates worth 40 percent of the cost of their new oil heat system, including tank and furnace or boiler. New users of heating oil will also receive their first fill-up of the fuel for free, thanks to a cooperative subsidy program administered through the Department of Energy and local state oil dealer associations.

Reached for comment on Air Force One after his speech, the president told HeatingOil.com, “I’m fired up to get more people on board with this great fuel, and I’ll need your help to do it. Keep the good work, and spread the word!”

President Obama gives a speech on energy security at Andrews Air Force Base on Wednesday. (image: nytimes.com)

In a speech delivered at Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland, President Obama announced that the Interior Department would lift bans on oil and natural gas drilling off the coast of the southeastern US and parts of Alaska. Along with the announcement, Obama made a clear effort to cast his decision as a middle road between unchecked drilling and a blanket ban on drilling expansion. Details of the policy reported on Wednesday by the New York Times support this characterization: vast areas of the Atlantic ocean, a section of the Gulf of Mexico, and select areas off the coast of Alaska will be opened, while waters along the entire Pacific US coast and other Alaskan coastal regions will remain off-limits.

In his speech, Obama referred to the compromise decision as a product of careful deliberation on America’s energy security and future energy resources. As such, he tied expanded drilling to an increase in renewable energy use, saying that both resource categories were required to meet US energy needs. “We have less than 2 percent of the world’s oil reserves. We consume more than 20 percent of the world’s oil,” he explained. “And that means drilling alone cannot come close to meeting our long-term energy needs.”

A White House press release offered a more general statement from the President on that subject:

I want to emphasize that this announcement is part of a broader strategy that will move us from an economy that runs on fossil fuels and foreign oil to one that relies on homegrown fuels and clean energy. And the only way this transition will succeed is if it strengthens our economy in the short term and the long term. To fail to recognize this reality would be a mistake.

As proof of this broad and balanced approach, Obama made two announcements on the energy efficiency of vehicles along with the allowance of expanded drilling. In just a few days, he said, the White House would unveil higher fuel efficiency standards for vehicles sold in the US that would amount to saving “1.8 billion barrels of oil.” In addition, the president announced that the federal government would “lead by example” and vastly expand its use of hybrid vehicles:

In order to save energy and taxpayer dollars, my administration—led by Secretary Chu at Energy, as well as Administrator Johnson at GSA—is doubling the number of hybrid vehicles in the federal fleet, even as we seek to reduce the number of cars and trucks used by our government overall.

The Navy’s energy security logo on the F18 fighter jet scheduled to be “the first plane ever to fly faster than the speed of sound on a fuel mix that is half biomass.” (image: navy.mil)

After he emphasized the “sensible” and middle-of-the road nature of the new energy policies, Obama drove home his view of why it is important. He touched on the issues of energy independence and efficiency in the context of national security. He lauded the US Armed Forces for their leadership in energy efficiency, citing huge investments in efficiency measures this year, and pointed to an Air Force F18 fighter jet parked behind him.

This navy fighter jet, appropriately called the Green Hornet, will be flown for the first time in just a few days, on Earth Day. If tests go as planned, it will be the first plane ever to fly faster than the speed of sound on a fuel mix that is half biomass.

As is expected in all major political statements in our current economic climate, Obama peppered his speech with references to energy initiatives creating jobs and growing the national economy. He began his remarks by congratulating his administration on making the “largest investment in clean energy in our nation’s history,” and said the investment was “expected to create or save more than 700,000 jobs across America.” He repeated previous statements that a robust green energy industry in the US is crucial to America’s economic recovery.

Finally, Obama used his administration’s moderate approach to the issue to urge Congress to act on energy reform. He closed his speech with a broad call to action:

I think that we can break out of the broken politics of the past when it comes to our energy policy. I know that we can come together to pass comprehensive energy and climate legislation that’s going to foster new energy—new industries, create millions of new jobs, protect our planet, and help us become more energy independent. That’s what we can do. That is what we must do. And I’m confident that is what we will do.

For American consumers, the new drilling policies will not change much, at least at first. The allowance of drilling in new areas does not mean drilling will begin in the next few years, if at all. According to analysis from the Times, “Much of the oil and gas may not be recoverable at current prices and may be prohibitively expensive even if oil prices spike as they did in the summer of 2008.” The new policy gives oil and natural gas companies the option of drilling in a wider swath of territory, but offers no incentives to begin drilling activity. The lower prices and increased domestic production claimed by drilling supporters, which have been contested by many sources, including the Department of Energy, would not be realized for at least five years, and probably more.

The stricter vehicle efficiency standards will deliver cost savings to American drivers by requiring them to buy less fuel. As Obama put it, “new standards…will reduce our dependence on oil while helping folks spend a little less at the pump.” However, these requirements will only apply to new vehicles and probably won’t go into effect for a few years, so it will only be the new car owners of tomorrow that will see the benefits of higher fuel efficiency mandates.

University of Cincinnati researchers built an artificial photosynthetic foam based on the foam created by the Tungara frog during mating. (image: newsimg.bbc.co.uk)

The Tungara frog is a semi-tropical frog found in Central and South America, and known for creating foam nests that nurture offspring while they develop into tadpoles. Now researchers at the University of Cincinnati have used Tungaras’ foam nests as the basis for the design of their own foam that will conduct artificial photosynthesis, reported PhysOrg.com on Tuesday. Like natural photosynthesis in plants, the artificial foam converts sunlight and carbon dioxide into sugars; those sugars can then be converted into ethanol or other biofuels, according to Assistant Professor David Wendell, one of the researchers.

The foam contains enzymes from plants, bacteria, frogs, and fungi to allow it to conduct photosynthesis. Producing sugars from artificial photosynthesis could avoid several obstacles that confront production of other biofuels. First, the foam is more efficient at converting sunlight to sugar than real plants, because plants have to devote some of their energy toward staying alive. Second, the foam doesn’t need to be planted in soil so it doesn’t compete for land with food production. Third, the foam can be used in high-carbon dioxide areas—such as near coal-burning power plants—where high CO2 levels would essentially drown plants impede natural photosynthesis.

As with most advances in the sometimes-strange world of biofuels research, the next big challenge is using this technology in a large-scale application. Filling your home heating oil tank with fuel produced by foam designed to be like the foam nests of a semi-tropical frog seems like a long shot—but using the ancient remains of dinosaurs and plants to heat our homes and run our sounds a little farfetched, too.

Although gasoline at $7 per gallon seems unthinkable to many Americans, researchers at Harvard’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs say it’s the only way to meet current emissions reduction goals. (image: psychologytoday.com)

On Tuesday, the New York Times’ “Dotearth” blog reported on a forthcoming report by researchers at Harvard that concludes that the only way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from transportation sources would be to push gasoline prices to $7 per gallon. To reach the Obama administration’s goal of cutting greenhouse emissions by 14 percent from 2005 levels in the next 10 years, the report says, the government must simply use taxes to make driving more expensive. The 14 percent goal was included in the Environmental Protection Agency’s fiscal 2010 budget.

The researchers looked at models of different approaches to cutting emissions from the transportation sector, which consumes 70 percent of America’s oil. The researchers determined that how much Americans drive was far more important than how they drive or even the type of cars they use. Without any taxes or other steps to increase the price of gasoline, they warned, “vehicle miles traveled will increase by more than 30 percent between 2010 and 2030.”

The huge political risk associated with jacking up fuel taxes make the possibility of Congress taking action on the issue appear extremely slim, at least at this time. But perhaps circumstances will change in the next 10 years and Americans will not greet $7-per-gallon gasoline with fiery rage but rather with grudging acceptance. If and when that day comes, heating oil users can expect similar taxes on their heating fuel—unless of course they have by then largely switched over to clean burning, renewable biodiesel to keep warm.

President Obama tours the job training center at IBEW headquarters in Lanham, Maryland where he spoke about energy policy and announced new government support for the construction of nuclear power plants. (image: baltimoresun.com)

President Obama once again hammered home his belief that green energy technology development is the most important avenue to economic recovery and a brighter future for America. Speaking at a training center for energy technicians in Maryland yesterday, Obama announced federal loan guarantees that will allow for the construction of a new nuclear power plant in the US for the first time in over 30 years (watch a video of the speech below).

Obama fit the announcement into a larger context, once again calling for comprehensive energy legislation that provides incentives for the energy industry to move away from fossil-fuel sources that produce carbon emissions and toward low- and zero-emissions electricity generation. Although nuclear reactors do produce dangerous waste, they do not produce carbon dioxide or any other greenhouse gas emissions, unlike CO2-spewing coal-powered plants, which generate the bulk of US electricity. Obama framed the move as an embrace of bipartisanship, as many Republicans have favored construction of new nuclear power plants to help meet America’s energy needs.

Early on in his ten-minute speech, Obama mentioned biofuels as an important part of America’s clean energy future, reiterating the support he voiced in his State of the Union speech last month. He also made clear his belief that comprehensive energy reform (including provisions to encourage greenhouse gas emissions reduction and development of renewable energy technology) is a necessary part of American energy evolution. Despite that support, three separate energy reform bills are currently stalled in Congress, with little hope of moving forward any time in the near future.

Much like his State of the Union Speech, Tuesday’s remarks by the President offered renewed support for energy reform but no specifics. Obama’s continued touting of biofuels as a crucial part of the nation’s future energy mix keeps hope alive for future government support for biofuel development. Putting some money behind Obama’s words, the Department of Energy did announce $80 million in funding for biofuel research last month. The current reality, however, is harsher: the domestic biofuel industry is reeling after Congress allowed the $1 per gallon producer credit to expire at the end of 2009, and a renewal of that credit was recently dropped from a Senate bill.

Looking forward, it seems that government funding and incentives for biofuel development will continue, though it will probably be sporadic and relatively focused. Despite Obama’s words, increases in the prices of crude oil, gasoline, and heating oil will likely do more to spur growth in the biofuel industry than will intermittent and unpredictable government support.

For heating oil users waiting for biofuel heating oil to really make a splash in the heating oil market, rest assured that the time will come. But with low oil prices and a slow-moving federal government, that time may be several years or even a decade away.

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President Obama follows through with Copenhagen promise, but the Senate’s role is still unclear. (image: timesonline.co.uk)

In encouraging but slightly underwhelming news, the United States gave formal notice to the UN last week that it would embrace the Copenhagen Accord and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. According to the Guardian, Todd Stern, the State Department envoy for climate change, told the UN that America “could cut carbon emissions by 17% from 2005 levels by 2020.” Of course, he added, such action would be contingent upon Congressional climate change legislation.

The Guardian found the announcement especially encouraging coming on the heels of Wednesday’s State of the Union address, in which President Obama promised to move forward with his energy and climate change agenda. The 2020 commitment is only a first step, to be followed with a 42 percent cut in 2030, and a cut of more than 80 percent by mid-century.

Under the watered-down accord reached in Copenhagen, countries were expected to offer formal proposals of action by January 31. But with an “elastic” deadline, many fear any momentum generated by the Copenhagen talks has fizzled. Obama’s recent pledge to continue with the climate agenda, as well as his embracing the Copenhagen Accord, is hoped to generate some continued movement.

As both the Los Angeles Times and TreeHugger.com pointed out Friday, Obama’s move was somewhat bold since following through with his pledge will be impossible without approval from the Senate. Although the bill has passed in the House, its prospects in the Senate are uncertain amid the debate over healthcare and after the recent special election that took away a Democratic senate seat.

Global reaction to Obama’s UN pledge has been virtually nonexistent, with most news outlets focusing on the news of the national budget released Monday. Besides the obvious importance of economic news in this global recession, it is likely that many see this pledge as nothing more than good intentions. The real news will be if and when the Senate can make it official.

In regards to commitments made by other nations, the Maldives blows everyone out of the water with a promise of 100 percent carbon neutrality by 2020. China has stuck to its course of lowering carbon intensity by 40 to 45 percent by 2020, which would leave it free to infinitely raise emissions, making it very difficult for other developed nations to make compensating cuts. The EU has pledged to cut its emissions by 20 percent by 2020, while India has pledged a carbon intensity reduction of 20–25 percent. Canada has matched the US target of 17 perfect by 2020, and Japan has ambitiously reiterated its plan to “achieve absolute emissions cuts” of 25 percent, providing other developed nations follow suit.

In addition to the Grist article cited above, you can find a comprehensive list of 33 nations and what they have pledged to cut on the US Climate Network’s website.