EDITORIAL

Beyond Petroleum?

CREDIT: (RIGHT) PHOTOS.COM

REMEMBER SOME YEARS BACK, WHEN BRITISH PETROLEUM CLAIMED THAT ITS INITIALS STOOD FOR

Beyond Petroleum? Its competitors were furious at the suggestion that it was leading the
push toward renewable energy. Now that BP is responsible for an oil spill that is ruining
beaches, livelihoods, and wildlife, these same competitors are telling U.S. senators that We
would not have drilled the well that way. Believe that or not, Beyond Petroleum could be
the right slogan for the policy changes needed to end the U.S. national addiction to oil. That
outcome will require a mix of solutions involving the Congress, the American public, businesses, the Administration, and environmental organizationsall driven by passionate conviction about the need for change.
This isnt exactly new. In 1977, President Carter referred to dealing with the energy crisis by
ending the countrys dependence on oil as the moral equivalent of war. Despite an epidemic
of gasoline lines in 1978 and 1979, the moral equivalent imperative
failed, leaving the United States in the middle of another oil crisis quite
different from the one that Carter faced. The contemporary challenge
is not that there isnt enough oil; there is far too much of it. Oil has
produced environmental devastation on Gulf shores, more of the same
in Amazonian forests, emissions from transportation systems that
endanger public health, and supplies managed by nation-states that
threaten global security. The abuses that result from an overdependence
on oil amount to a national crisis, and its resolution will depend on
cooperative actions taken by government, industry, and the public.
The government needs to take action at the administrative level:
through subsidies for investment in renewable energy, research grants
for solar and wind applications, the green jobs needed to do that work,
and policy support for vehicle electrication. Those actions require no
new statutes; neither does the needed regulation of existing coal-red
power plants by the Environmental Protection Agency. But legislative hopes died when the
Senate majority leader killed hopes for a climate-energy bill. Eventually, dealing with those
together will be necessary to reduce carbon intensity by changing the energy mix. Businesses
and environmental organizations such as the Sierra Club should work with government to
resolve struggles over large-scale renewable energy projects on public lands. Large solarthermal units or wind farms require space; so do the transmission lines needed to connect wind
or solar sources with the power grid. These climate-worthy projects may affect areas that even
their proponents treasure for other uses: recreation, wildlife conservation, or the protection
of endangered species. Resolution will involve government agencies (the Departments of
Energy and the Interior) that may have different interests in the outcome.
And because oil dependence is so tightly linked to the transportation sector, reducing oil
dependence requires increasing vehicle efciency using current technologies: lowering weight
and improving engines and aerodynamics. Biofuels dont really mitigate carbon emissions
and have brought new problems to the food sector. But burning biomass to produce electricity,
if carbon costs are carefully considered, could encourage vehicle electrication. For electric
charging, tax structures that take account of carbon emissions will be needed, and road-use
taxes comparable to those now paid only by the gasoline tax will probably be assessed as well.
Finally, there is a pressing need for incentives to drive investments in public transportation as
well as in smart community designs that shorten the trip between home and job.
Coal and oilthe real Axis of Evil in the United States todaypresent a major challenge
in the context of climate change. The nation has taken strong actions to reduce coal-red
power, yet it faces an electric power marketplace dominated by coal that may discourage
vehicle electrication. And the current Gulf situation raises the ante on getting Beyond
Petroleum. When BP rst said that, they didnt really mean it but we should!

Downloaded from www.sciencemag.org on October 8, 2014

Donald Kennedy is
Editor Emeritus
of Science.

Donald Kennedy

10.1126/science.1194561

www.sciencemag.org SCIENCE VOL 329 13 AUGUST 2010

Published by AAAS

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