Clean Tech: The Truly Conservative Choice

We need to move fast to clean tech and we need to start now.

I just finished watching Matt Damon in The Green Zone.  The movie’s story was drawn from events surrounding the justification for the US invasion of Iraq. 

Agitating a fear-frenzy after the 9/11 attacks, the Bush administration “found” its evidence for huge stores of chemical and nuclear weapons held in Iraq (weapons of mass destruction).  Their only problem was with the source of this evidence.  The informant named “Curveball” was deemed unreliable by the Germans, and this person was never even interviewed by the US, much less ever identified.  Then came the unsubstantiated assertion that Saddam was aligned with Al-Qaeda and therefore a grave threat to the United States.

It is truly amazing how the American people and the American Congress fell for these coercions, albeit during a state of shock.  Yet we can understand how fear works.  The consequences of deciding to invade Iraq are no less shocking.  Looking at the war from an economic standpoint, it will end up costing $3.4 trillion dollars, or about $30,000 per average US household.

This is an unacceptably high price for American families to shoulder, considering that not a dime of it was lying around in excess cash.  Debt had to be sold to finance the war.  That spending had no visible return on investment and was therefore irresponsible.  It was by no means “conservative”.  If anyone calls himself or herself a Conservative, check the facts first. 

Another bogusly fabricated agenda is being introduced in the US today by some of these same wolves in sheep’s clothing, and it is about to cost the US more jobs and money.

I am talking about the whole pro fossil fuel movement.  Its lobbyists are attempting to tell you that clean technology is a weapon of mass (financial) destruction, and that the federal government and states better do things the same old way, even burn more oil and coal.  They are basically capitalizing upon people’s shock about our Great Recession to bolster Big Oil (arguably the same root interests that acted to create a post-9/11 frenzy).

But we have heard from the pro fossil fuel folks many times.

In 1970, before Richard Nixon signed the Clean Air Act, these naysayers predicted that entire US industries would collapse.  Here 40 years later, it has been estimated that the benefits of the Act have outweighed the implementation costs by 40:1.  In effect this was a very conservative piece of legislation.

Behind the current headlines of “drill, baby, drill” lies the subtext of “subsidize, baby, subsidize”.  It is estimated that the US subsidizes oil and coal 10:1 over clean technology.  Why businesses that have been around more than a century need any subsidies at all, is baffling.

The US needs to be supporting the future, not the past.  That’s the American Way, after all.

The past is dirty skies, mercury-laden oceans, rising atmospheric carbon dioxide, respiratory complications and noise pollution.  These all cost society dearly in real dollars.

The future is clean.  Clean air, clean water, nearly silent electric motors inside automobiles and machinery. The future belongs to our kids, and our grandchildren.

Everyone knows it will take a concerted effort to get there.  Government itself needs to set the example by working in concert with industry to get clean.  This is happening in places as diverse as China, Ethiopia, Germany, and Brazil — all of whom have faster GDP growth than the US.  It is interesting to note that the countries scorning investment in clean tech include Russia and Venezuela — run by petrol-dictators and known for corruption and government repression.

Initiatives like Proposition 23 in California (“the dirty air proposition”) need to be squashed, because this is not the time to take steps backward.  The US needs to be competitive by retaining and attracting talent, on an ever-shrinking planet where quality of life and sustainable growth are crucial for our prosperity.

The time is now to get out of the fear-based mentality and keep on the clean tech path.  This responsible and economically sound approach to both domestic and international policy is how I suggest “conservative values” should be (re)defined.  Obviously, every American, regardless of political affiliation, has a natural stake in this conservative outlook: sustainability is not a political question at all.

Fortunately, sustainability is much simpler — it’s about our common stake in continued life on earth.