In Energy Policy, Too, Size Matters

By Kirkpatrick Sale

A comprehensive global Environmental Sustainability Index (ESI) has been published regularly in recent years, the work of the Yale Center for Environmental Law and Policy and the Center for International Earth Science Information Network at Columbia University. It ranks 146 of the countries of the world according to a range of 76 “data sets,” measuring such things as pollution levels, air and water quality, energy use, biodiversity, population control, and environmental regulations.

It should come as no surprise that, according to the 2005 index (the most recent issued), the leading countries are for the most part relatively small, in both land and population, and relatively cohesive.

The top five:
population square miles GDP per capita
Finland 5.2 million 130,000 $27,300
Norway 4.6 million 125,000 $37,700
Uruguay 3.4 million 68,000 $12,600
Sweden 9.0 million 124,000 $26,800
Iceland 300,000 40,000 $30,900

The United States, for comparison, with 285 million people, 3,794,000 square miles, and a GDP of $37,800, ranks 46th on the index.

Size is a critical factor, because once a country decides it wants to protect its environment and diversify its resources, it will discover there are scales where a government can work reasonably efficiently, with a minimum of waste and corruption, and those where it practically has to be riddled with ineptitude, mismanagement, bureaucratic rigidity, and bribery. Size matters, and independence – the freedom to act quickly and squarely – matters, too.

Energy use and efficiency is only one of the factors that go into the Environmental Sustainability Index, but it is an important one, and the leading ESI countries offer an interesting look at the kinds of things that the more far-sighted nations are doing these days. None of the top five is wholly perfect, but they each are basically dedicated both to energy self-sufficiency and a primary reliance on renewable fuels – and those are the key to a wise energy future.

Finland is an interesting case, and if self-sufficiency were an important part of the Sustainability Index, it would hardly rank where it does at the top. For Finland depends heavily on imported fuels, chiefly gas and oil from Russia, and has only recently embarked in a serious way on biomass power plants, though it is the most densely forested country in Europe. It supplies only 30 percent of its energy from domestic sources – 19 percent from wood, 7 percent from peat, 2 percent from hydro, and a smidgeon from 30 wind-power plants. The crucial thing, though, is that Finland knows that it needs to wean itself from foreign fuels, and quickly, and has established a national program, one of the first in the world, to promote more local generation, particularly through taxes favoring biomass production, and to increase energy efficiency so as to be less dependent on imports. And experience has shown that when Finland embarks on a plan, it is likely to be carried through with dispatch.

Norway is almost the complete opposite in fuel sources: it is self-sufficient. It has its own oil and gas from the North Sea, and has, incidentally, reduced to zero the emission of hazardous chemicals from the offshore platforms. More than 99 percent of its electricity comes from hydropower, and it is slowly starting on a scheme to develop wind power, which would be a natural given its long Atlantic Ocean coast. Since 1982 the city of Oslo has raised funds from electricity taxes to embark on a large ($110 million) program of energy efficiency in housing, which has seen more than 20,000 houses retrofitted to maximum efficiency. And the measure of the government's commitment to environmental stability is a 16-point National Indicators of Sustainable Development report recently adopted, to be overseen, interestingly, by the Ministry of Finance, since it is in charge of the annual budget and can set the appropriate targets.

Uruguay is a surprising entrant on the sustainability index, and it's a place that is hardly ever mentioned in energy conversations. But it turns out that it is a nation among the highest in literacy, education, social services, political cohesion, and standard of living, with governments that have been committed to energy efficiency since the 1990s. On the minus side, 60 percent of its energy is imported as oil and natural gas from Argentina and Brazil, though the plants that turn that into power are quite modern and efficient. On the plus side, the remaining 40 percent is provided by four hydroelectric plants on the Negro and Uruguay rivers, and that capacity is planned to expand in the next few years. Uruguay had an energy crisis in 2003-2004, when Argentina fell short in its gas production and rainfall levels declined, leaving rivers depleted; but since then it has embarked on efforts to increase self-sufficiency. In March of this year Uruguay set up a government-run system to purchase 60 megawatts of energy from wind, biomass (chiefly wood), and small hydroelectric dams at slightly above market rates to encourage suppliers.

Though all the top nations have strong governmental commitments to the environment, Sweden's stands out. It has established an Environmental Objectives Council that issues annual reports on the country's progress; a Foundation for Strategic Environmental Research that has invested $16 million in research projects; a Ministry of Sustainable Development that oversees energy, housing, climate, conservation, and the like; a Council for Sustainable Development to do similar work by the private sector; and an Environmental Technology Council to coordinate and promote advanced sustainable technologies. At the moment the country gets 20 percent of its total energy budget from biomass – most from its extensive forests – and about 5 percent from wind power. But all renewable energy resources are on a path of research and development, with an annual budget of more than $100 million. And the government has pledged that it will be “oil free” and energy self-sufficient by 2020.

Finally Iceland, whose energy story is so dramatic and important that it makes one wonder why it is only fifth on the sustainability index. For Iceland, of all the developed world, has the largest percentage of its energy – 70 percent – produced by a clean and renewable energy source: geothermal. The plants that use geothermal are pollution-free, as are their wastewaters, and the electricity and hot water they produce are cheap. In addition, Iceland has determinedly embarked on a scheme to have all its cars and diesel-powered fishing fleet run on hydrogen fuel cells; a pilot program begun in 2004 with auto manufacturer DaimlerChrysler is being expanded and tests on prototype ship-borne hydrogen-cells promises that this technology will power the fleet within decades. Iceland may very well become, as its energy minister has declared, the first nation to be entirely free of fossil fuels.

So there they are, and an inspiring lot they turn out to be – nations that care about the environment, have a vision of a sustainable future, are determined to expand renewable energy resources and put money behind the effort, and have comparatively efficient governmental machinery to achieve their goals.

What a contrast to the United States! – which has no comprehensive policy of any kind about energy or the environment, spends nothing to cut back on its massive greenhouse pollution, admits to a gasoline addiction but never plans to kick it, and has a government of such size and corruption – as 9/11, Iraq, Katrina, Medicare drug plan, and Social Security reform acidly prove – that it couldn't carry out a sensible policy even if it ever created one.

Size matters. All the governments of the world, as far as I know, are made up of human beings, and they have a limited and finite capacity to think, to plan, and to act. So it follows that their political and economic scales should be limited and finite. Much can be done at scales smaller than nine million people, particularly in nation-states where politics is serious and incorruptible, as we have seen from the five leading ESI countries.

It would seem to me that a state at a size of half a million or so — say, 620,000 — could do an awful lot to achieve energy self-sufficiency, if it were free to do so.