Copyright 2000 The Hartford Courant Company
THE
HARTFORD COURANT
March 12, 2000 Sunday, STATEWIDE
SECTION: COMMENTARY; Pg. C2
LENGTH: 605 words
HEADLINE: NO
DIVINE RIGHT TO CHEAP FUEL
BODY:
At his first news
conference of the year last month, President Clinton was asked if Americans have
some kind of divine right to cheap gasoline and cheap heating oil.
It
was a timely question prompted by the panicked reaction of many elected
officials to big price increases in heating oil, especially in the Northeast,
and for gas at the pump.
Mr. Clinton, ever the politician, sloughed off
the divine right reference and said that he wanted the nation to be so much more
energy efficient that future price increases in crude oil or refined products
would have much less impact.
Would that it be so. But the public's
commitment to greater fuel efficiency and to the conservation ethic born at the
time of the OPEC oil embargo in the 1970s is suspect. The public's expectation
that there should always be cheap and plentiful gasoline and heating oil shows
no sign of abating. Here's some evidence of our current collective energy
awareness:
* Members of Congress and others, responding to complaints
about the surge in heating oil prices, are asking Mr. Clinton to begin releasing
part of the nation's Strategic Petroleum Reserve. That's an overreaction. If
anything, the market price has been unrealistically low in recent years.
The strategic reserve -- with only a 60-day supply -- is meant for
emergencies such as war or an embargo. It is not meant to be a tool for
manipulating the market when price increases make constituents uncomfortable.
Mr. Clinton has done the right thing by resisting calls to tap the
reserve and by releasing more federal money to help low-income families pay for
heating oil. Much of that relief comes to the Northeast.
* The public
seems happy with Gov. John G. Rowland's proposed seven-cent reduction in the
state gas tax -- on top of other cuts in recent years. But lower prices for
gasoline -- assuming that the savings reach motorists' pockets -- helps to
encourage greater fuel consumption and thus greater reliance on foreign oil. The
tax cut also deprives the state transportation fund of about $1 billion over 10
years that could be used in part to improve the bus system.
Meanwhile,
Mr. Rowland plans a 15 percent increase in fares for Connecticut Transit riders.
Wrong again. Why penalize mass transit passengers?
* We've lost the
conservation consciousness of the 1970s. Yes, the American automobile fleet is
more fuel-efficient than it was 25 years ago. But for how long? The market for
gas-guzzling sport utility vehicles is thriving. Every fifth vehicle on the road
seems to be a stretch limousine. And houses? Bigger than ever and expensive to
heat and cool. Tax incentives for using alternative energy devices and for
insulating homes have gone the way of the dodo.
Obviously, government
has a role to play when prices soar. It should provide heating subsidies for the
poor, investigate suspected price gouging and fight the cartel of petroleum
exporting countries when it manipulates supplies.
Government should also
reinvigorate the conservation ethic by offering tax incentives to develop more
efficient fuels and imposing even tougher
fuel-efficiency standards on the manufacturers of vehicles. Mr.
Clinton's idea of converting home heating in the Northeast from oil to more
efficient and more plentiful natural gas over the long term is a good one.
Government should stay away from budget policies that encourage
overconsumption of motor fuel and penalize people who use mass transit.
But each individual has a role, too -- principally, to remember that
even when it comes to a commodity that generally has been cheap and plentiful,
there is no free ride.
LOAD-DATE: March 14, 2000
