Obama's Energy Plans Fail to Address Our Water Woes

By Kyle Rabin, Network For New Energy Choices. Posted December 12, 2008.

In a matter of weeks the Obama Administration will propose legislation to address the nation’s environmental and employment problems, with an energy plan that promotes both alternative energy and green jobs.  But while Obama’s plan details a genuine commitment to clean energy and addressing climate change, it is silent on the related implications for the nation’s water supply. Today’s New York Times includes a letter from Network For New Energy Choices (NNEC) on this issue, which you can read here, but much more reporting needs to be done as the President-elect prepares to appoint his energy and environmental team.

While scientific and industry experts understand the often devastating conflict between energy production and water protection, energy needs are routinely discussed without reference to water in our legislative and public policy debates. As he prepares to take office, Obama and his advisors should be urged to incorporate the fact that the U.S. is quickly running out of fresh water into their plans for new power plants and increasing biofuels production.

Almost half the water used in the U.S. today goes to thermo-electric power plants, with a typical coal-fired plant requiring close to 300 million gallons each day just to operate. In state after state, it is increasingly common for power plants to be shut down or denied permits because of the threat they pose to water resources. While Obama’s energy plan calls for the development of large-scale “clean coal” power plants, the U.S. Department of Energy reports that use of this technology will increase a plant’s water use by 90 percent. In other words, a coal-fired power plant that currently uses 12 million gallons an hour will use 22.8 gallons an hour if it converts to “clean coal,” which involves removing carbon gas during the energy production process and storing it underground.

Power plants also have devastating effects on aquatic life, as exemplified in a case that was argued before the U.S. Supreme Court December 2. In this particular case, a power company is fighting an interpretation of the Clean Water Act that would require it to install technology to stop the slaughter of billions of fish, fish larvae, and other aquatic creatures each year. With the depletion of fish stocks from our rivers and oceans, the commercial fishing industry drying up, and the alarming environmental costs of ocean fish farming, the huge role of power plants in exacerbating this crisis is another issue for the new administration to address as quickly as possible.

And then we have biofuels. As a senator, Obama was a strong supporter of biofuels, including voting for tax credits and biofuels infrastructure legislation. His current energy plan calls for the increase of the federal renewable fuel mandate to include 60 billion gallons of “advanced biofuels” by 2030. Obama’s plan stipulates that advances in biofuels include the use of sustainable feed-stocks, which would presumably move us away from corn ethanol. That’s an important point because the increase of corn production under the pressures of the ethanol market can seriously threaten scarce water resources as corn crops are expanded to drier areas of the country. In addition, agricultural runoff from the Midwest corn-belt has created a huge “dead zone” in the Gulf of Mexico that continues to expand each year. You can read NNEC’s recent letter about this issue here. You can read our report on biofuels here.

See more stories tagged with: energy, water, obama, biofuel, coal

Kyle Rabin is the director of Network for New Energy Choices.

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