International Herald Tribune

Dec. 9, 2004

WASHINGTON -- Trying to break a deadlock on energy policy, a diverse group of environmentalists, academics and former government officials published a report on Wednesday that presents strategies for making the United States cleaner, more competitive and less vulnerable to energy shocks.

The strategies, intended to be the basis for action by Congress, include policies that are generally anathema to at least some of the constituencies represented by members of the group.

It says the government should force increases in efficiency in cars and electrical equipment, stimulate global oil production, regulate greenhouse gas emissions with a trading system, rapidly expand a new method of burning coal and explore a revival of nuclear power.

The study, a two-year private effort that cost $5 million and is titled "Ending the Energy Stalemate," is intended to be a package-deal blueprint, akin to a Ford Foundation report 30 years ago that first suggested vehicle mileage standards and a national petroleum reserve.

"There are people in this group who would not have endorsed one part if not for corresponding parts," said William Reilly, a co-chairman of the study and, under President George H.W. Bush, Environmental Protection Agency administrator in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

"I'm a lifelong conservationist," Reilly said, "and 10 or 12 years ago would not have imagined myself advancing the future of coal."

The group, the National Commission on Energy Policy, was financed by the Hewlett Foundation and other private sources. John Holdren, a professor of environmental policy at Harvard and also a co-chairman, said that with the pressures of the presidential election over, the combination of high prices for oil and natural gas and "the way things evolved in Iraq" might make the country "more ready in principle for this sort of package."

The third co-chairman was John Rowe, chairman of Exelon, a big power company; members of the group included R. James Woolsey, a former director of central intelligence, and Martin Zimmerman, a vice president at Ford Motor.

The group's report suggests sharp increases in fuel economy requirements, and letting automakers buy and sell mileage credits in much the same way utilities now trade the right to emit pollution. It calls for a similar cap-and-trade system for limiting greenhouse gas emissions, with a price limit on the value of a ton of emissions, to avoid stunting economic growth.

The group calls for spending $2 billion to build one or two sample nuclear reactors using advanced technology. It also supports building electricity plants that cook coal to produce combustible gases, which are then burned in turbines like those used at natural gas plants. This approach leaves open the possibility that carbon dioxide can be captured to prevent global warming.

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National Commission on Energy Policy