ENERGY AND SOCIAL POLICY
Ross, Benjamin
THE POVERTY OF POWER: ENERGY AND THE ECONOMIC CRISIS, by Barry Commoner. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. 314 pp. $10.00. Barry Commoner's book is not merely a comprehensive statement of the...
...THE POVERTY OF POWER: ENERGY AND THE ECONOMIC CRISIS, by Barry Commoner...
...to other countries, and it therefore can lead to underestimates...
...But Commoner's discussion of the energy sources and their use is deeply flawed, in both its technical and economic aspects...
...On the basis of this discussion, with the assistance of unnamed "recent studies," Commoner jumps to the conclusion that within 75 years we will be able to rely on the sun for most or all of our energy...
...Thicker insulation around a pipe furnishes a simple, but not trivial example...
...In fact, in order to build a bomb from reactor fuel without killing himself, this malefactor would need remote-control chemistry labs and machine shops as well as the knowledge earned along with several advanced scientific degrees...
...Since Commoner would rely on domestic oil to supply the bulk of our energy needs until a system to provide solar energy is available, his estimate of how much oil is now left in the U.S...
...Solar energy, then, is advocated as the replacement for oil...
...This departure from traditional socialist aims should lead us to take a closer look at the economic analysis that underlies Commoner's rejection of capitalism...
...And please also be sure to enclose a stamped, selfaddressed envelope...
...The production of solar electricity is discussed at some length, but in terms of technical feasibility...
...But to Marx, the abundance made possible by profit and capital was a glorious achievement...
...He locates the basic flaw in the tendency of the capitalist system to replace laborintensive production methods with capital- and energy-intensive technologies, and he advocates a form of socialism that would return to a laborintensive industrial system...
...Commoner integrates his description of the nation's energy system with a radical analysis of our economic structure...
...It is time to abandon the illusion that our problems can be solved by the use of solar energy and labor-intensive production, and to face the real issues of energy conservation, environmental protection, and economic growth...
...One never knows whether nuclear energy is to be compared with cheap, dirty coal or with relatively clean but expensive oil...
...Commoner severely criticizes the most recent government-supported study of nuclear-reactor safety for comparing risks in the use of nuclear power with natural accidents and risks incurred in the use of man-made devices that kill people one at a time, but not comparing these risks with catastrophic accidents caused by other technologies...
...The significance of this omission becomes clear in the chapter on nuclear power...
...Although Commoner presents many variations, the model always assumes that the cost of nuclear power will forever rise faster than the cost of coal power...
...for Commoner, socialism is the promises's repeal...
...Improved search techniques will effect a rise in the discovery rate, making the underlying trend hard to measure...
...In other words, Commoner main tains that the U.S...
...A book that ranges so widely over little-explored terrain cannot, perhaps, be held to the same standards of precision applying to one that would keep to the well-ploughed fields of past polemics...
...presentation of a few examples must suffice to convey their flavor...
...Faced with so many difficulties, it is hard to see why our hypothetical terrorist would not follow one of many easier and more destructive courses of action available to him...
...He advocates a return to the technologies of the 1940s and asserts that no one would be the poorer...
...Commoner shows that the sun already is an economically attractive source of heat for homes in certain parts of the U.S...
...The amount of petroleum yet to be discovered can be calculated from past discovery rates by assuming that this rate falls off as the amount of undiscovered oil declines...
...For Marx, socialism was the fulfillment of the promise of plenty made by modern industry...
...Energy use, in this view, is closely associated with the capital stock: the more machines we have, the more energy we use...
...Even if this leap is accepted, no proposals are to be found for the 25 years between the exhaustion of our oil and the advent of solar energy...
...He writes that "plutonium can be made into a devastating bomb by one or a few people working with material available from a hardware store and an ordinary laboratory supply house...
...THE SYNTHESIS that concludes the book relates the energy crisis to underlying economic factors...
...The oil companies like to define the discovery rate as the amount of oil found per year...
...Capitalism was doomed, not because it produced too many machines for man's good, as Commoner would have it, but because it was incapable of putting the machines to proper use...
...As it happens, a catastrophe resulting from the collapse of hydroelectric power dams is estimated to be about 1,000 times more likely than a similarly deadly nuclear-reactor accident...
...To produce with less capital and less energy per unit of labor most commonly is to produce less...
...To Our Contributors • When sending manuscripts, please make sure that you do not send your only copy...
...We are led to imagine our malefactor running down to his basement and tossing a block of what has just been called "the most dangerous nuclear material" onto his lathe...
...This economic outlook may explain the book's most notable omission: the lack of any serious discussion of energy conservation in the industrial sector...
...standard of living has not improved since World War II...
...Barry Commoner's book is not merely a comprehensive statement of the environmentalist outlook on the energy crisis...
...is crucial to his entire argument...
...Thus the current capital shortage, unemployment, and the energy crisis all result from this same cause...
...Commoner does recognize that one way out of a capital shortage is through public saving...
...How many people, after all, now could build an automobile engine in their basements from a block of iron...
...In the last 30 years, he says, "what has changed is largely the means of production, rather than the final use value of what is produced...
...Because of these complications, it is difficult to defend any estimate of undiscovered petroleum reserves with much assurance, and it would be foolhardy to base a national energy policy on an overly optimistic estimate...
...He argues that our country has a plentiful supply of clean energy and that there is enough domestic oil to last until solar energy is available...
...This very possible substitution of capital for energy calls into question Commoner's entire argument, whose very basis is the idea that the use of capital and energy must rise and fall together...
...It would take us far afield to deal with all the arguments against nuclear power he has summarized...
...Indeed, Commoner's discussion of nuclear power reads more like a lawyer's brief than a scientific analysis...
...This alternative is rejected, strangely enough for a socialist, as inequitable: it "would relieve the capital shortage by finding the missing capital in the taxpayers' pockets...
...This approach ignores the companies' tendency to shift investment from the U.S...
...Since energy is not really scarce, he asserts, the cause of our present energy problems lies in the economic system...
...Yet, the first graph in the report in question is a comparison of the probability of a nuclear disaster that would kill any given number of people with the probabilities of equally deadly accidents caused by several other technologies...
...Commoner prefers an alternative concept, in which the relevant discovery rate is based on the amount of oil found per foot of exploratory wells drilled...
...the costs are never evaluated...
...Commoner's description of theft of nuclear materials is also misleading...
...This leads to the more optimistic conclusion that the U.S...
...But Commoner's analysis neglects improvements in our ability to predict where oil will be found...
...Stopping nuclear power and doing more solar energy research may be a sufficient energy policy for environmentalists, but it won't do for the left as a whole...
...But neither breadth of coverage nor speed of composition can excuse the fundamental flaws in Commoner's position...
...We cannot get by on domestic oil and solar energy without seriously depressing the living standards of ordinary Americans...
...But this is the kind of model that has a built-in conclusion...
...we need not rely on nuclear power or produce synthetic fuels from coal...
...The Poverty of Power has some merit as an introduction to the technical issues of energy for readers who are unfamiliar with them...
...Industrial civilization is, after all, founded on the substitution of machines for human labor...
...He sees economic conditions as the consequence of mechanistic laws...
...His program will not produce enough energy to meet our needs, since it is based ultimately on a refusal to accept that advanced technology is needed in order to maintain the living standards of ordinary Americans...
...In the absence of such measures, investments are, of course, made largely out of corporate profits...
...This argument leads us to the central flaw of the book: unconcern for economic growth and even for the maintenance of present material standards of living...
...Commoner identifies his economics with Marx's in seeing the substitution of capital for labor as the decisive inner dynamic of the economic system...
...politicians' actions make no difference...
...The environmentalist positions on such current issues as nuclear power, solar energy, and unemployment are thus knit together into a coherent program...
...Commoner opposes nuclear power, but he has not said whether he prefers electricity to be generated from coal or from oil...
...that is, by the government running a budget surplus and investing it...
...The major difficulty in this analysis lies in the definition of the discovery rate...
...Commoner finds that the production of synthetic gas and oil from coal is unnecessary and harmful to the environment...
...Commoner claims that his program would not prevent economic growth, but his argument only weakens his case...
...New York: Alfred A. Knopf...
...Commoner's belief in a socialist economy thus combines a commendable concern about unemployment with disinterest in satisfying the material wants of those already working...
...Out of whose pockets, according to Commoner's analysis, do profits come...
...Commoner's economic argument against nuclear power is based on a model purporting to show that nuclear power will soon be more expensive than coal...
...Commoner argues that the root of our energy and economic problems can be traced to the excessive substitution of capital for labor...
...has enough oil to last 50 years at present consumption rates...
...the policies of the Nixon-Ford administration are not even mentioned...
...The current unemployment is thus traced back to an unavoidable capital shortage...
...He avoids, however, mention of a more immediate and important issue: whether the conventional burning of coal should be rapidly expanded, as projected by present government policy...
...Many of its lesser errors and inconsistencies might have been avoided had more care been taken in the writing...
...In industry, most practical energy conservation measures replace fuel with capital, not labor...
...Only a return to labor-intensive production, he asserts, can reduce capital needs, save energy, and put the jobless to work...
...We will find that his economics are much less radical than one might imagine...
...THE EDITORS In a short chapter on coal, the present and possible uses of the fuel and the environmental problems of its mining and use are ably summarized...
Vol. 24 • January 1977 • No. 1
