George W. Bush

FutureGen was 'nothing more than a public relations ploy,' House study finds

In a stunning new report [PDF], two House Committees demonstrate that the Bush administration was never serious about FutureGen NeverGen, the "centerpiece" of its effort to develop "clean coal" technology. Turns out centerpieces are largely decorative.

Climate Progress has previously documented that the coal industry itself has never taken seriously the development of the one technology that could save the industry from extinction in the face of humanity's urgent need slash CO2 emissions sharply and avoid its own self-destruction [see here].

Now we learn the same was true of the Bush Administration. We learn that they killed FutureGen even after Department of Energy staff explained the implications: "affordable coal fueled CCS plants would be delayed at least 10 years" deferring "widespread deployment of CCS" until after 2030.

That means the whole "clean coal" or carbon capture and storage (CCS) effort of the past decade was an intentional fraud by all parties concerned -- and nobody should be allowed to use the absence of demonstrated CCS technology today as an excuse for weakening near-term CO2 targets or for giving the coal industry another decade to (fatally) delay serious climate action.

As the shocking House press release reveals:

In an effort to kill the FutureGen project, top officials at the Department of Energy knowingly used inaccurate project cost figures and promoted an alternative plan that career staff repeatedly warned them would not work, according to a majority staff report to Science and Technology Committee Chairman Bart Gordon (D-TN) and Investigations and Oversight Subcommittee Chairman Brad Miller (D-NC).

FutureGen was a highly-touted initiative announced by President George W. Bush in February of 2003 to demonstrate that coal could be changed from an environmentally challenging energy resource into an environmentally benign one by sequestering carbon dioxide emissions and eliminating other pollutants.... It would have been the first plant of this type in the world. But in January of 2008, former Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman pulled the plug on the project, reconfiguring it as a privately funded initiative with limited government subsidies. To date, nothing has come of this new initiative.

"To knowingly abandon a program that held out the hope of making a real impact in the effort to reduce greenhouse gases from coal in favor of another program that held out no hope at all-not commercially and not to provide technological innovation to capture and sequester carbon-is inexcusable," said Gordon. "All we have to show for 'Plan B' is lost time and an abandoned global leadership role."

"DOE officials knew that they were manipulating the numbers, and that the 'restructured' FutureGen would not accomplish what had been planned, but they went ahead anyway," said Subcommittee Chairman Miller. "In the process, they lost the participation of China and India, which are some of the largest users of coal in the world. The damage to U.S. leadership on "clean coal" technology, and climate change generally, cannot be overstated."

I had thought, like many others, that the Bush administration was simply incompetent in its management of the program (see here). But this wasn't benign neglect, it was malign neglect.

The entire report [PDF] is worth reading if you can stomach the Administration's audacity (of hopelessness), but let me pull out some of the highlights:

Opportunity for a defining moment

The inauguration of Barack Obama as the 44th President of the United States is a defining moment in American history. For most Americans and countless others around the world, this is an inspiring political transition. The question we must face, however, is whether compelling inspiration will lead to effective action. As I wrote in a Boston Globe op-ed (November 12, 2008) one week after election day, environment and energy issues -- particularly climate change policy -- provide a microcosm of the forces that are shaping and will shape the actions of the new administration and Congress.

About eight years ago, President-elect George W. Bush promised to be President for all the people, not just those who had voted him into office. Bush's ability as Texas governor to bridge differences across the political aisle provided cause for optimism.

But hope for a centrist and sensible presidency dissolved under the influence of White House political operative Karl Rove and Vice President Dick Cheney. The Bush Administration moved not to the center, but toward solidifying its base on the political right. Nowhere was this more apparent than in energy and environmental policy, with Vice President Cheney running energy policy, and EPA Administrator Christie Whitman virtually driven from office.

Obama halts Bush's final rules

In one of his first acts, President Barack Obama, through his Chief of Staff, Rahm Emanuel, "ordered a halt to all pending federal regulations until the new White House team conducts a legal and policy review of the last-minute Bush administration rules," E&E Daily reports ($ub. req'd).

It also turns out that Congress, with simply majorities, can toss any rule within 60 legislative days -- and that goes as far back as "May or June 2008."

Regulation junkies -- you know who you are -- can read Emanuel's memo here [PDF].

Reports E&E Daily:

Rahm Emanuel's memo could lead to the reversal of dozens of energy and environmental measures advanced in Bush's waning days, including standards addressing mountaintop mining, air pollution permits, logging in the West, an exemption for factory farms from Superfund reporting requirements and endangered species.

The story concludes with background and more details:

Eight more environmental Bushisms

George W. Bush is, by far, the greatest mistake ever made by the American people -- or was that by Gore for running such an inadequate campaign, or by Ralph Nader for running at all or at least by one idiot in South Florida who designed the butterfly ballot, or by the Supreme Court (Note to self: let it go, let it go, let it go, on this day of all days).

It is amusing to read the delusionary op-eds of conservatives who think Bush's legacy will be determined by Iraq, and therefore Bush will be vindicated and rehabilitated by history. Not!

Even if we could forget Katrina, torture, Guantánamo, Abu Ghraib, and the worst economy since the great depression, his legacy, with a near-absolute certainty, will be set by his policy of wanton climate destruction (see "the Worst President in American History") -- unless, of course, Barack Obama can somehow put us on a truly sustainable path, but that rejection of everything Bush stood for will hardly rehabilitate W. Quite the reverse.

Anyway, the real point of this final post on Bush -- final at least until the media or the Obama team uncover yet another unbelievable environmentally destructive thing he did that we are as yet unaware of -- is to share a list of eight environmental Bushisms I just found to make my list of the top 25 Bushisms of all time complete:

The four global warming impact studies Bush tried to bury in his final days

NOTE TO U.S. MEDIA: Please don't fall for the Bush administration's final climate trick -- don't ignore these important studies.

-----

Normally, when an administration wants to bury bad news -- such as a government report it doesn't like -- the story gets released Friday afternoon. That ensures minimal media coverage. For news it really doesn't like, the Friday of a three-day weekend is ideal.

So what subject matter is so abhorrent it would motivate the Bush administration to release multiple reports simultaneously the Friday before the four-day weekend that culminates in their loss of power, and when they can be certain the media will be focused on other matters?

Answer: The impact of human-caused global warming on Americans -- arguably the single most taboo subject in the entire Bush administration. For eight years they have avoided their statutory obligation to detail the impacts of climate change on this country. And they have systematically muzzled government climate scientists from discussing those impacts with the public or the media.

It was easier to find people in the Bush administration to talk about torture or warrantless wiretaps, than it was to get someone to speak on (or off) the record on the likely impact of Bush's policy of unrestricted greenhouse gas emissions on Americans.

On Friday January 16, the U.S. Climate Change Science Program actually released four major Synthesis and Assessment reports. You may remember the last report the CCSP released -- U.S. Geological Survey stunner: Sea-level rise in 2100 will likely "substantially exceed" IPCC projections, SW faces "permanent drying" by 2050. I was told by scientists knowledgeable about the CCSP process that all of the major impact reports were slowed down in the review process to make sure they came out after the election.

So what are the reports the Bushies have tried to bury? From the CCSP website:

Goodbye to all that

Grist pulled no punches in covering all of George Bush's dirt

  A movie no one would make.   Imagine that back in 1999 you were a Hollywood studio executive and a movie producer brought you the following pitch: A bumbling, incurious child of privilege wastes his youth on Oedipal rebellion. After stumbling through a series of failed business ventures and an undistinguished stint as governor […]

Eight years of Bush’s environmental actions — the good, the bad, and the ugly

Grist came of age over the past eight years, so it seems only fitting to compile George W. Bush’s environmental legacy in one place. From abandoning Kyoto to censoring climate science, all the bad (and, wherever we could find it, the good) is here. Note: This timeline is based on Grist’s extensive coverage of the […]

Eight years of Bush inaction leave Obama with a near-impossible challenge

Given the sheer number of candidates for “worst legacy of the Bush years,” it may seem perverse to pick the hundreds of coal-fired power plants that have opened across China during his administration. But given their cumulative effect — quite possibly the concrete block that broke the climate-camel’s already straining back — I think they […]