From Thomas Paine’s Corner
By Steven Jonas

It is often said that the United States “has no energy policy,” that we “need to develop one as quickly as possible,” and that it should be based on alternate fuels and more importantly, alternative and renewable energy sources. The first part is true. The second should read “we need to develop a new one.” The third is of course correct. As we enter an era of debate on and development of a new energy policy, it is very important to understand these facts. If and when we develop a new one, we would not be substituting something for nothing. Rather we would be replacing the current energy policy with another one. Further, the new one would be highly antithetical to the interests (to say nothing of the profits) of the developers and defenders of the old one. They would (and indeed will) constitute a very powerful enemy of change. It is impossible to estimate just how far they will go in defending their interests. But these folks have fought dirty in the past and there is no reason to believe that they will change their stripes anytime soon. However, no old policy can be changed to a new one if one does not clearly understand just what the present one is.

The present U.S. energy policy is not written down, at least not in publicly available sources. The clearest statement/description of what it is currently is to be found, if one were to somehow gain access to it, in the notes/reports of the meetings of the Cheney Secret Energy Task Force. It is known to have started meeting right after the 2000 election. Since Cheney made it clear from the time that word of the first meeting or two leaked out that no records of the meeting(s) would be released and was obviously very unhappy that there was any public knowledge that the meeting(s) had even occurred, it is left to speculation as to whether there were further meetings. Since the subject is highly complex, it is highly likely that there were. One thing is certain. The known and unknown records of any and all such meetings will have either been destroyed or removed to an undisclosed location safer than Yucca Flats by the time the Obama Administration takes office. Nevertheless, its basic components are clearly discernable by looking at the history of energy production and use in the United States.

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