The Angry Liberal Commentary Archive:
Fuel Cells: How Bush's Oil Buddies Can Cash In
Yesterday, the Bush administration announced the formation of a partnership with U.S. auto manufacturers to speed the development of the fuel cell and its use in cars. Of course, had Al Gore (the winner of the 2000 election, remember?) proposed this sort of thing on the campaign trail, Bush and his petro-pals would have doubled over with laughter, little puffs of exhaust wafting from their nostrils. Be that as it may, Bush has no similar backlash to face. We liberals are guardedly optimistic over the announcement, and since the new program probably won't affect the unborn, NASCAR, or shootin' irons, the conservative intelligentsia need never find out. So what about the government's Board of Directors, a.k.a. Big Oil, you ask? Won't they be angry? Let's look and see how they will remain in control of America even as the nation begins a slow transition away from oil.
Here's what the oil industry gets from Bush's announcement: First of all this program didn't appear out of thin air. It is replacing Clinton/Gore's "Partnership for a New Generation Vehicles" (PNGV) program. This $1.5 billion, eight-year program concentrated on increasing fuel efficiency of conventional autos. Cancellation of this program will forestall fuel efficiency increases during the decade or so that fuel cell vehicles are under development, helping the oil industry to maintain market share for that decade.
Second, efficiency increases under the PNGV were not focused exclusively on the engine. Aerodynamic and weight-savings improvements, which could have been transferred to the next generation of hydrogen-powered cars, are not going to be pursued under the new program. So whether you buy gasoline or hydrogen, Bush's move will help ensure that you wind up buying more of it.
Third, Bush's program also will focus on development of a hydrogen refueling infrastructure to keep the hydrogen-powered cars supplied with fuel. Guess who will be doing the supplying? Under the careful stewardship of the Bush administration, you can bet that the same gas station that over-charged you for gas will over-charge you for hydrogen when the time comes.
The best news for the oil companies in this scenario is as follows: Nobody is going to purchase a hydrogen-powered vehicle until there are a reasonable number of filling stations around that sell hydrogen. And, of course, no filling stations are going to sell hydrogen until there are a reasonable number of hydrogen-powered vehicles on the road to purchase it. This "chicken-and-egg" scenario could easily stall the transition for an additional decade, allowing oil companies to blame "market forces" for their feet-dragging on hydrogen and at the same time continue to sell gas to vehicles that remain inefficient thanks to Bush's cancellation of PNGV.
In short, the name of the game here is control. While the Bush administration scores with the introduction of a fuel cell development initiative, Dubya is in a perfect position to ensure that the transition to a clean-burning fuel is as slow and expensive as the oil companies want it to be. In addition, the lesson learned from the electricity crisis in California has been taken into consideration here: It doesn't really matter what fuel Americans need. As long as Americans need a lot of it, and Bush's campaign contributors are able to control the distribution and set the price, there is joy in Oilville.
