American Energy Independence - Report Example

American Energy Independence Introduction The United s of America is the world’s third largest producer of crude oil products. However, the production level is not sufficient to satisfy the large domestic market, with high demand mainly being associated with transport fuels. As such, the country can hardly export any oil, while it relies on other oil producing countries to satisfy its domestic market. Yet political and economic analysts read more to the net state of imports than just the business of importing oil – they argue that the U.S. needs to establish itself as an energy independent country in order to avoid dependency on unstable foreign powers. In essence, the argument revolves around the foreseeable political instability in the major oil partners of the U.S. If this dream is achieved, the next phase will be to establish itself as an oil exporter, potential that technocrats believe the country has. The Situation: General Outlook While Canada has established herself as a major oil exporter to the U.S., it remains the most stable of the pool of nations that supply the country with oil on a relative basis. More worrying are the terrorism affected Nigeria and the exceedingly unstable Middle Eastern powers of Saudi Arabia, Qatar, among others. In fact, striking a sustainable balance in the supply of products from these countries takes more than simply ordering; it is claimed that these countries have at times been unable to sustain constant supply due to internal and external factors, majorly touching on political instability and fighting in the Gulf region (Lorenzetti, par 7). Whenever such happens, the supplies fall below demand, resulting in a chaotic situation of sudden and sharp price hikes, grounding of vehicles and lack of fuel to run machines and equipment that rely on oil products. The net effects are extensive losses for U.S. firms occasioned by low productivity, unstable/ hiked commodity prices, rising inflation, and high transportation costs. The situation aggregates into a series of economic upsets, undermining productivity and slowing economic growth. These impacts have triggered debate around seeking alternative energy supply avenues that will reduce the drastic effects of reliance on foreign supply of the essential commodity. In the minds of Americans are the numerous crises that have occasioned such impaired supply trends, including the 1973 and 1979 oil and energy crises respectively (Manyika et al, 4). Ethical Considerations and Assessment of the Effects of the Move to Make the U.S. Energy Independent The ‘Friendship’ Factor In his article ‘What if we never run out of oil’ published in The Atlantic, Mann visualizes a situation where the country optimally utilizes fracking and methane hydrate to shut down all oil supplies. Like every other country, the U.S. belongs to a pool of nations that work together in a coordinated system. That is, it has trade partners, allies with which it shares its vision, and enemies. The current state of net importation of oil/ petroleum products is largely created by the demonstrated ability to partner with other oil producing states. Being self-reliant in this sector would imply that the trade partnership dies off, mainly because the country no longer needs the imports it has been receiving for decades. With this, the friendship thereof, and the important role it plays in the growth and development of these nations will likely have reduced or even ended. This is a weighty matter in the spheres of international relations. If this happens, the U.S. will have lost some of its long-term partners. More so, strategic partners who have often helped in maintenance of peace in the volatile Middle East and North Africa. The situation is compounded by the fact that besides oil, the oil-rich countries of the Middle East and North Africa (which combined account for a significant amount of the total oil supplies to the country) have very little else to offer. Without a doubt, being one of their leading trade partners, the sudden turn of events will upset their budgets and national plans. If they cannot fix the gap immediately, their citizens are likely to run into poverty within a short period of time. The U.S. government, as mandated by the constitution of the federation, is tasked with taking care of the lives and welfare of its citizens. This implies that should there be two or more choices to make, where one suggests abdicating the role of meeting the above stated primary role to the U.S. citizenry, the government will have no choice but to stick to the constitutionally given mandate. On the other hand, the government has the delicate case of, on behalf of the U.S. citizenry, and for purposes of friendship, recognizing the role these partner countries have played over time, especially bearing in mind that they are not only trade partners but also strategic peace and anti-terrorism partners. Under no constitutional obligations as mentioned above, the country would definitely take bold steps to ensure their economic outlooks are not severely disrupted. These considerations bring up the first ethical considerations in the foreseeable energy independence for the country: will the country embark on sustaining a similar balance with the trade importers, move to ensure self-sufficiency and consequently save just its economy? Is there a possibility for striking a balance between these two important queries? Anderson (par 6) believes that just by saving the amount used in importing oil, the country will have saved up to 2% of its current annual GDP. On the other hand, halting the imports will have deprived the countries that import oil up to USD 360 billion for each year trade fails, based on current estimates (Anderson, par 5). But who stands to lose more? Will the U.S. still need its present oil suppliers up to twenty years from now? Apparently, there is consensus that the country will have fulfilled its dream of domestically-instigated energy sufficiency (Anderson, par 2). Being a global leader, the U.S. has strategic interests in every part of the globe. Besides, the country is the leading global military power, and it remains important to not initiate any processes that could jeopardize its peace initiatives. As indicated earlier, economic failure occasioned by shrinking market share for their oil could destabilize the Middle East countries, thereby hurting the national ambitions of the country. It is important to consider that millions of Americans are working and living in these countries, meaning the constitutional mandate stated above has implications beyond the country’s borders. Health and Environmental Factors Surrounding Fracking/ Development of Natural Gas Production of oil through fracking and development of natural gas through fracking are processes that have massive environmental implications. The processes lead to massive emission of greenhouse gases which have been associated with changing environmental conditions (Mann, par 10). However, underscoring the fact that continued production using the advanced processes such as fracking will eventually benefit from technological advances that will reduce the rate of greenhouse gas emission, Mann noted that crude oil production in the U.S. oil wells was initially occasioned by massive losses of the same oil, which led to unnecessarily high emissions of the harmful gases. However, there is no guarantee that these harmful emissions will cease the present high rates of greenhouse gas emissions. Besides, managing other byproducts of the two processes has not been particularly well thought out, and the level of wastage is still quite high (Mintz, par 2; Steffy, par 7). By extension, direct inhalation or contact with some of the emissions leads to increased health risks (Mintz, par 5). For instance, where fracking happens off the river banks, it is highly likely that the water will end up contaminated, especially if proper regulation is not done. Consumption of such water puts users at a significantly elevated health risk. Considering the above facts, the government again finds itself in a tight position sorting out a trade-off between economic benefits and health risks emanating from the two processes (Manyika et al, 9). Importantly, calculating/ establishing a suitable trade-off between the two aspects is extremely tricky, and considerably inappropriate. A trade-off means that in reaching a final decision, the government has inevitably put the lives of millions of Americans at risk through oil production health complications. Must we sacrifice the health and lives of the people in order to sustain a vibrant economy? Again, this question proves difficult to answer. But Mann provided a hint into how we could visualize such a situation. According to him, dozens of processes are already proving harmful and dangerous to human, animal and plant health, as much as they regularly contaminate the environment. We see a situation where if the government fails to adopt technology as advised in Mann’s article, the U.S. will remain shackled in the attempts to become self-dependent in energy production. The negative effects that come with reliance on external sources of energy will remain intact, and continue to cause negative ripples such as high inflations rates and commodity shortage due to hampered productivity. The government will appear to have failed in its mandate to protect Americans from devastating effects of global forces, including the influence of foreign nations. On the other hand, if the government commits to fracking and people’s health is affected, a similar judgment will be passed. It is a delicate balance that the government must walk. If we adopted Mann’s conclusion as a guiding factor in this case, it is safe to imply that despite the ethical concerns, it is better to explore every possible option (starting with the already known generation of natural gas and fracking) since the processes have not been proven to significantly increase environmental harm beyond what predecessor methods have. Conclusion Fracking and development of natural gas from the seabed as suggested by Mann are two processes that have such a high potential that the U.S. could transform into an independent energy producer. However, the two processes come with numerous challenges, among them health, environmental, and international relations challenges. Being a global power, the U.S. will continue to place some degree of interest in her strategic partnerships with other countries, which makes it harder to opt out of the current oil trade business with Gulf, Middle East and African countries. Similarly, abdicating the fracking and natural gas production exercises could be misguided (despite the ethical issues surrounding the issue) based on the difference between the current levels of greenhouse gases and other waste emission and those likely to be caused by the two processes. Generally, the country has achieved its present status in these two respect by partially asserting its ethical roles in both situations, which serves as the precedent to determine its continuation with the intended exercise. Works Cited Anderson, Richard. How American Energy Independence Could Change the World. BBC. (April 3, 2014). Web. http://www.bbc.com/news/business-23151813. Lorenzetti, Laura. U.S. Inching Closer to Energy Independence as Oil Imports Shrink. Fortune. (August 6, 2014). Web. http://fortune.com/2014/08/06/u-s-inching-closer-to-energy-independence-as-oil-imports-shrink/. Manyika, James, Michael Chui, Jacques Bughin, Richard Dobbs, Peter Bisson and Alex Marrs. Disruptive Technologies: Advances That Will Transform Life, Business, and the Global Economy. (2013). New York: McKinsey & Company. Print. Mann, Charles C. What if We Never Run Out of Oil? The Atlantic. (May 2013). Web. http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2013/05/what-if-we-never-run-out-of-oil/309294/. Mintz, Steven. The Ethics of Fracking: A Cost Benefit Analysis of Fracking. Ethics Sage. (2011). Web. http://www.ethicssage.com/2011/12/the-ethics-of-fracking.html. Steffy, Loren. Is This What ‘Energy Independence’ Is Supposed to Look Like? Forbes. (January 12, 2014). Web. http://www.forbes.com/sites/lorensteffy/2014/12/01/is-this-what-energy-independence-is-supposed-to-look-like/. Read More