State Of The Union, Sliced and Diced

Note: The following is an item of correction to false and fabricated claims in President Bush's State Of The Union (SOTU) speech from Think Progress.


ON ENERGY:

Bush said: “The best way to break this addiction is through technology. Since 2001, we have spent nearly 10 billion dollars to develop cleaner, cheaper, more reliable alternative energy sources -- and we are on the threshold of incredible advances.”

Fact – Bush pushed for renewable energy cuts in latest budget:
President Bush's FY06 budget request for the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) energy efficiency and renewable energy programs envisioned “reductions totaling nearly $50 million -- an overall cut of roughly four percent.” (Renewable Energy Access, 2/28/05)

Fact – Bush rejected bipartisan plan to set goals for renewable energy:
Last year, President Bush “oppose[d] efforts to include a national renewable energy requirement for utilities in Congress's broad energy legislation.” According to the Union of Concerned Scientists it “is a cost-effective, market-based policy that requires electric utilities to gradually increase their use of renewable energy resources such as wind, solar, and bioenergy,” to between 10 percent and 20 percent by 2020. A 10 percent standard “would have virtually no impact on electricity prices and could save consumers as much as $13.2 billion.” (Reuters, 2/10/05; Union of Concerned Scientists; Union of Concerned Scientists)

Fact – Bush energy bill contained little on renewable energy:
The energy bill supported and signed by President Bush dropped a provision that would have required utilities “to generate at least 10 percent of their electricity through renewable fuels by 2020.” (New York Times, 7/26/05)

Read the rest of the SOTU, Slice and Dice at Think Progress.



The recearch in H2O and other forms of green energy, can't do without the politics. Gouverments has to change the law for it and make desicions about the use of it.

The gouverment of the Netherlands
In the Netherlands is the subject H2O not yet a really great item in the politic. There has been some questions, but a real debate hasn't been there. Some little proposals to make a network of gasstations for H2O, didn't came far. On the other hand is the issue CO2 a big item. There are many attemps to lower the CO2 emission. A short time ago, when the oil prices became very high, the discussion of lowering the taxes on gas became an item. But there weren't made any changes, because of the environmental consequences.

The market of green energy became recently free in the Netherlands. This means that everyone can make their own choices about picking a energy provider. This means that the price of green energy will lower because of the competition. The gouverment has also lower the taxes of green energy, what means that the prices of normal energy and green energy became almost equal. The normal market of energy will come also free. Al these desicions needs to change the use of normal energy into green energy, and that's the best for the emission of CO2.

The politics in the world
Worldwide are many countries working together.
The goal is to reduce global warming. Because of this, there were many different conferences about this. The first and most important conference, what gave a big step in the good direction, was the treaty of Kyoto.
They made plans to lower the emission of CO2.

But the're still countries, like the USA who doesn't want to sign the Kyoto Protocol, even after many confessions. Until now there isn't an agreement…


References:
1. H2: A Solution For The Future
2. Alter Net/Think Progress/The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC)