Hot air rising

摘要

It must be the most boring topic in the world. Mention hydrocarbon scarcity or carbon emissions at a dinner party, and people could question your sanity (probably correctly). Until recently the electricity grid was hardly a door opener either. So it is something of a surprise, then, to see Congress suddenly enamoured of the subject of energy. After years of debate and delay, America is finally coining to grips with energy policy. Republicans spent the week trying to reconcile the Senate and House versions of a massive energy bill. Democrats groused that they were being shut out from this process just as they had been excluded by Dick Cheney's energy task-force (which this week vowed to go to the Supreme Court to avoid revealing which fat cats from the industry it had consulted). George Bush, for his part, travelled to a coal plant in Michigan on September 15th to trumpet the supposed greenness of his policies. The next day, he met utility bosses at the White House to promote his controversial "Clear Skies" proposal for reducing power-plant emissions.