Time to discard fifty years of energy myths

OPINION BY MATTHEW R. SIMMONS AND STEWART UDALL

This summer’s hurricanes have triggered the most serious energy emergency in the nation’s history. With gasoline, natural gas and heating oil at near-record highs, many families face the chilly prospect of much higher energy bills in the future. The entire economy is at risk, but airlines, tourism, farmers, small business, seniors and the poor are particularly threatened.

Katrina and Rita ravaged the Gulf of Mexico’s petroleum infrastructure, but a larger, more daunting crisis was already on the horizon.
To craft an intelligent response, we must begin by discarding 50 years of energy myths. Because our continent had huge reserves of oil, coal and natural gas, Americans have nurtured a set of energy illusions that have now come home, in biblical fashion, to haunt us.

The most dangerous myth is that cheap energy is our birthright, that the well would never run dry.

Arizona Daily Star