The Senate Energy Bill passed yesterday 65-27. It doesn’t warrant an “A” grade because proponents failed to pass

• A requirement for utilities to provide 15 percent of their electric power from renewable sources by 2020, and
• An energy tax package that would have created $30 billion in incentives for renewable power, biofuels, plug-in hybrids, and other clean technologies.

Still, the bill deserves a solid “B” for what is in it. Here are the major components, from the office of Jeff Bingaman (D-NM):

Increases Auto Mileage for First Time in Decades. It raises auto fuel economy to a fleet average of 35 miles per gallon by 2020, a 40% increase over current requirements for cars, SUVs, vans and pickup trucks.

Increases Production of Ethanol. It requires ethanol fuel production to grow to 36 billion gallons a year by 2022, a sevenfold increase over the amount of ethanol processed last year.

Spurs Research on Fuel-Efficient Vehicles. It provides federal grants and loan guarantees to promote research into fuel-efficient vehicles and supports pilot coal-plant projects to capturecarbon dioxide and store it underground.

Saves Taxpayer Dollars By Increasing Energy Efficiency. The bill includes new appliance and lighting efficiency standards plus a requirement that the federal government accelerate use of more efficient lighting in public buildings.

Here are some comments on the Bill, first from Bingaman’s office, then from Richard Lugar’s (R-IN):

Read more

Climate Change Refugees by Jeffrey D. Sachs – Scientific American. Too much water (sea level rise) and too little water (drought) will create hundreds of millions of refugees if we don’t reverse global warming soon.

Lithium Batteries Power Hybrid Cars of Future – Reuters. An article on the battery of the (near) future.

Texas oil tycoon plans largest wind farm – Associated Press. Billionaire T. Boone Pickens is planning 2,000 turbines over 200,000 acres at cost that could reach $6 billion. The project would produce up to 4,000 megawatts of electricity — 50% more than all of Texas produces today (2700 megawatts).

A new study on “Sipping Fuel and Saving Lives: Increasing Fuel Economy without Sacrificing Safety” notes:

The public, automakers, and policymakers have long worried about trade-offs between increased fuel economy in motor vehicles and reduced safety. The conclusion of a broad group of experts on safety and fuel economy in the auto sector is that no trade-off is required. There are a wide variety of technologies and approaches available to advance vehicle fuel economy that have no effect on vehicle safety [and vice versa].

The study by the International Council on Clean Transportation concludes that “Technologies exist today that can improve light-duty vehicle fuel economy by up to 50 percent … with no impact on safety.”

The study has two noteworthy figures. The first shows that higher fuel economy vehicles [green] are some of the safest while low fuel economy vehicles [red] are some of the least safe vehicles driven today — heavy, large trucks and SUVs. Click to enlarge.

Read more