Energy Blog

Probably the most intimidating aspect of acting as a representative for Obama was answering the questions. Some of them intrigued me. For instance, Samema asked the position of the Obama-Biden campaign on coal utilization. Why does Biden say no to coal, while it is very apparent that Obama fully supports use of America’s most abundant natural resource (for energy)? After some research, I found that although Biden has disagreed with Obama on the use of coal in the U.S. there is more to his statements. Biden does not agree with the tactics used in China to develop coal plants. The technology over there is outdated, and so Biden does want coal technologies in the U.S. as long as they are CLEAN coal technologies. Biden has even connected coal with the use of hybrid plug-in cars, one repeated facet of the New Energy for America Plan-.“Where’s that [electricity] come from? That comes from a utility. What do utilities burn? They burn coal mostly.”

Also, Emily asked why oil companies weren’t leasing on land they already have, in response to the Use it or Lose it (if a company does not drill on their land, they have to turn it over to the government so it can be allocated to another company, etc.) tactic that constitutes New Energy For America. It’s actually a bit more complicated than I thought it would be because there are plenty of reasons I didn’t even consider. After some research, I found the following. First of all, the land may not even have oil under it. The federal government doesn’t even know if the land they lease has oil under it- they lease it out for oil companies to speculate this, and determine it themselves. And why does it come out to so many acres of unused land? Oil companies have to not only purchase the plot where the oil is to be drilled, but also all the surrounding land around it. Other reasons also prevent use of land. Shortage of drill rigs prevents oil companies from going in and drilling- apparently drill rigs are leased for years at a time too.

I found this great article on New York Times Science Section discussing Presidential Candidates position on science issues.
Link: Presidential Candidates Position on Science Issues

And this picture was just for fun … (nothing to do with the above link)