http://www.hudson-ny.org/2683/energy-politics
American energy policy has always been messed up. It was most messy when the main source of energy was animal muscle and the streets were full of animal by-products. When fossil fuels gradually replaced animal-based energy and the streets got cleaner, public health improved. For the hundred years or so when coal was king, the price in ruined lives and environmental degradation was heavy, but on balance, the changeover to fossil fuels was not a bad thing.
Over the last century and a half, the average standard of living of people throughout the Western world has improved immensely. Even in places such as Asia and Africa, the trickle-down effects, in terms of less hunger and better overall health, were considerable. In some parts of Asia, such as South Korea and Japan, the fossil fuel revolution has given the vast majority of people a lifestyle indistinguishable from that of Western countries.
Today, however, America’s vulnerability to the international oil market is playing havoc with both its foreign policy and its balance of trade. President Barack Obama’s decision to delay the proposed Keystone XL pipeline, which would deliver oil derived from the tar sands of Canada’s Province of Alberta to US refineries, is seen as a blow to the North American energy industry. It is hard to understand why the President, apart from appeasing a small group of public union workers who he is hoping will vote for him in next year’s election, wants the US to import more oil from the Middle East or other unfriendly places and less from Canada.