24 January 2007
Bush Urges Cuts in Gasoline Use, More Biofuel Production
Energy initiative depends on new technologies
Washington – President Bush is calling for development and production of fuels and automobiles that would decrease the use of oil in the United States, making the country less dependent on oil imports and helping it confront the threat of climate change.
In his January 23 State of the Union address to Congress, Bush presented the plan to cut in the United States by 20 percent in the next 10 years annual gasoline usage from projected volume -- not from current levels -- through mandatory use of alternative and renewable fuels, mostly biofuels, and increased automobile fuel-economy standards. (See related article.)
He said these and other goals could be achieved primarily through development of new technologies.
“America is on the verge of technological breakthroughs that will enable us to live our lives less dependent on oil,” the president said. “And these technologies will help us be better stewards of the environment, and they will help us to confront the serious challenge of global climate change.”
Speaking January 24 at a plant of chemical giant DuPont, Bush said he is particularly encouraged by a possibility of producing ethanol from switchgrass, wood chips and agricultural waste. Ethanol derived from maize, the most prevalent U.S. source of that fuel, does not yield as significant energy and ecological benefits as those provided by ethanol derived from other biomaterials, according to experts. If mass-produced, maize-based ethanol also could affect prices of maize-based food and feed products.
During his State of the Union speech, Bush said his initiative would be environmentally responsible by halting the projected growth of carbon dioxide emissions from automobiles.
Carbon dioxide constitutes the bulk of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, which are believed to contribute to global climate change.
Under the proposal, annual U.S. auto carbon emissions would be cut by 10 percent through 2017. This reduction would add to the existing plan to decrease GHG intensity of the U.S. economy by 18 percent through 2012, the White House said. The GHG intensity is defined as an amount of GHG emissions per unit of gross domestic product.
The plan calls for a 500 percent increase by 2017, to nearly 144 billion liters, the target amount of alternative fuels that must be added to gasoline. Current law says that gasoline must include 28.4 billion liters of renewable fuels by 2012. The new plan also would apply more stringent fuel-economy standards to passenger cars and increase further such standards for light trucks and sport utility vehicles.
Bush also proposed pumping into the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve enough oil to equal approximately three months of imports.
The president said he expects most of alternative fuels to be produced domestically. However, a fact sheet released by the White House said that importing those fuels “also increases the diversity of fuel sources, which further increases our energy security.”
In a related action, the president January 24 issued an executive order that requires federal agencies to reduce their energy intensity by 30 percent through 2015, expand use of renewable sources of energy, reduce water consumption and follow other environmentally friendly policies.
The president’s energy initiative drew mixed reactions from Democratic lawmakers, who are pushing through Congress energy- and climate-related plans of their own. The House of Representatives already has approved a bill that would shift $14 billion in royalties and tax incentives from oil companies to a newly created alternative-energy fund. Several bills already moving through the Senate would place mandatory limits on GHG emissions, a scheme that the president repeatedly has rejected because he believes it would hurt the economy.
However, some large U.S. companies such as Alcoa, DuPont and General Electric recently joined environmental organizations in urging Bush to support such limits.
For additional details, see a transcript of the State of the Union address and a fact sheet on the energy proposals in that address.
The full text of the January 24 executive order is available on the White House Web site.
For more information on U.S. policies, see Climate Change and Clean Energy.
(Distributed by the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)
