"Commentary"-Obama & Energy
Tuesday, January 20, 2009SUSIE GHARIB: Tonight's commentator says the new president can blaze a new trail when it comes to energy policy. Here's John Hofmeister, founder and CEO of Citizens for Affordable Energy and former president of Shell Oil.
JOHN HOFMEISTER, FOUNDER & CEO, CITIZENS FOR AFFORDABLE ENERGY: Congratulations to President-Elect Obama and thanks in advance for your leadership on energy and environmental policy. As you decide what's best, I applaud you for your bold initiatives on alternative energies, including bio-fuels, wind and solar and the green jobs that will be created to support these innovations. The nation will benefit. New electrons, new fuels and new employment for many thousands of Americans in domestic energy jobs will help our economy recover. Please, however, do not forget we need investments in the remaining 90 percent of our energy base and the environmental issues created by traditional fossil sources. With over 50 percent of our electricity coming from plants that are more than 30 years old, with the majority of 102 nuclear plants approaching the ends of their normal life, more attention must be paid to the nation's fossil and nuclear energy capacity. We need more fossil energy to meet future demand and we should develop it with new environmental requirements to reduce gaseous waste with a new cap and trade policy. Likewise with 250 million cars on the road today and millions more in the future which will only run on gasoline, we need to plan where our future crude oil supplies come from. You are to be applauded if we end our reliance on oil from the Middle East. But we can only do so if we develop more domestic oil and gas resources in areas that have been off limits for most of the last 30 years. Citizens for Affordable Energy looks forward to helping you and the American people succeed by addressing the entirety of our energy and environmental future. I'm John Hofmeister.
