EV Affirmative: Index
EV Aff: Inherency--1AC....................................................................................................................... 2
EV Aff: Inherency--2AC....................................................................................................................... 3
EV Aff: Solvency--1AC ........................................................................................................................ 4
EV Aff: Solvency--Demonstration Projects .......................................................................................... 5
EV Aff: Solvency--Federal Action Key ................................................................................................. 6
EV Aff: Solvency--Government Action Key ......................................................................................... 7
EV Aff: Solvency--Infrastructure Key ................................................................................................... 8
EV Aff: Solvency--A2 "Alternatives Superior" ...................................................................................... 9
EV Aff: Solvency--A2 "Grid Concerns" .............................................................................................. 10
EV Aff: Solvency--A2 "Public Won't Accept" ...................................................................................... 11
EV Aff: Solvency--A2 "Tech Problems (General)" ............................................................................. 12
EV Aff: Solvency--A2 "Tech Problems (Batteries)" ............................................................................ 13
EV Aff: Solvency--A2 "Tech Problems (Range)"................................................................................ 14
EV Aff: Economy Adv--1AC (1/3) ...................................................................................................... 15
EV Aff: Economy Adv--1AC (2/3) ...................................................................................................... 16
EV Aff: Economy Adv--1AC (3/3) ...................................................................................................... 17
EV Aff: Economy Adv--Auto Industry 2AC......................................................................................... 18
EV Aff: Economy Adv--Competitiveness 2AC (1/3) ........................................................................... 19
EV Aff: Economy Adv--Competitiveness 2AC (2/3) ........................................................................... 20
EV Aff: Economy Adv--Competitiveness 2AC (3/3) ........................................................................... 21
EV Aff: Economy Adv--EVs Solve 2AC ............................................................................................. 22
EV Aff: Oil Adv--1AC (1/2) ................................................................................................................ 23
EV Aff: Oil Adv--1AC (2/2) ................................................................................................................ 24
EV Aff: Oil Adv--Auto Industry Key to Leadership ............................................................................. 25
EV Aff: Oil Adv--EVs Solve (General) 2AC ........................................................................................ 26
EV Aff: Oil Adv--EVs Solve (Price Volatility) 2AC .............................................................................. 27
EV Aff: Oil Adv--Oil Dependence Bad Ext (1/2) ................................................................................. 28
EV Aff: Oil Adv--Oil Dependence Bad Ext (2/2) ................................................................................. 29
EV Aff: Warming Adv--1AC ............................................................................................................... 30
EV Aff: Warming Adv--Warming Now 2AC ........................................................................................ 31
EV Aff: Warming Adv--Warming Bad 2AC......................................................................................... 32
EV Aff: Warming Adv--EVs Solve 2AC .............................................................................................. 33
EV Aff: Warming Adv--A2 "Dirty Energy" ........................................................................................... 34
EV Aff: Add-On--Air Pollution 2AC .................................................................................................... 35
EV Aff: Add-On--Grid Reliability 2AC ................................................................................................ 36
EV Aff: CP Ans--States ..................................................................................................................... 37
EV Aff: DA Ans--Budget .................................................................................................................... 38
EV Aff: DA Ans--Federalism.............................................................................................................. 39
EV Aff: DA Ans--Oil........................................................................................................................... 40
EV Aff: DA Ans--Politics Link Turns .................................................................................................. 41
EV Aff: Inherency--1AC
Observation One: Status Quo
A. Lack of charging outlets is the major barrier for EV market penetration - only 3,300 exist and they
are unevenly distributed
Kemp, 5/25/12 – Senior Market Analyst and writer for Reuters specializing in commodities and energy (John, “Column- Will US Federal Fleet Help Alternative Fuel Switch?,” Reuters,
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/05/25/column-kemp-cars-idUSL5E8GP8YG20120525) // AMG
Federal law defines alternative fuel vehicles broadly to include both those running on alternative fuels
such as compressed natural gas (CNG), liquefied natural gas (LNG), hydrogen and high blend ethanol (E85) as well as
certain qualifying hybrid electric vehicles run on a combination of regular petroleum and electricity (42 USC 13211). In 2010,
there were nearly 1 million vehicles running on alternative fuels in use across the United States , according to the Department of
Energy's Alternative Fuels and Advanced Vehicles Data Center, up from less than 400,000 a decade earlier. In
addition, more than 2 million hybrid electric vehicles had been sold over the same period. Alternative fuelled vehicles are still a
tiny minority of vehicles on U.S. roads, but the number is increasingly rapidly. The problem is that few are actually
filling up with alternatives to gasoline owing to the lack of outlets actually selling alternativefuels such as
E85 or LNG. There were just 10,000 fuelling stations dispensing alternative fuels in 2011 (up from less than 7,000
in 2010). Of those, a little over 3,300 were supplying electricity(six times as many as in 2010 making this the fastest
growing segment of the alternative fuel infrastructure). But less than 1,000 dispensed compressed natural gas, and just 45 dispensed
LNG. Even E85 was available from fewer than 2,500 outlets. In contrast, there are almost 160,000 retail gasoline
stations across the country, and many more private refuelling facilitiesowned by large fleet operators such as UPS,
transit systems, and the federal government. Availability problems are compounded by the uneven distribution of
alternative fuelling stations. There are lots in California, the nation's biggest vehicle market,and another
concentration in the ethanol-producing states of the Midwest such as Illinois, Indiana and Minnesota, but not many in the rest of
the country.
B. Expiration of charging infrastructure tax credits threatens the industry
Heron 11 – journalist, author, online community manager, etc., covering electric vehicles from Silicon Valley (David, “Electric Vehicle charging station tax credits a victim of US Govt budget
battles”, Torque News, 29 Dec 2011, http://www.torquenews.com/1075/electric-vehicle-charging-station-tax-credits-victim-us-govt-budget-battles)//BI
The latest round of theU.S. Federal budget showdown was averted with the deal on the payroll tax cut,but there was
collateral damage with dozens of tax credits that were not extended and are now expiring on Saturday, including three
related to electric vehicles and several more related to biofuel production. The electric car charging infrastructure is
a key to the chicken-and-egg quandary for electric vehicle adoption. The increasing number of electric cars on the
road, means potential businesses and jobs will be created to install and maintain the charging infrastructure. That is, if the pattern of
electric car adoption proceeds without hitch. The last few weeks has seen another of the divisive ugly budget showdowns in Washington
DC. This time a package of tax credits, includingEV Charging Infrastructure credits, got caught up in the battle and
now those credits are expiring on Saturday, December 31, 2011, threatening the nascent EV infrastructure
businesses. Every year sees a cluster of tax credits expire, and Congress routinely attaches tax credit extension provisions to bills
they're working on to extend all or some of the expiring tax credits. This year is no different in that 65 individual tax credits were due to
expire in 2011, the majority expiring on Saturday. One of those was the temporary payroll tax cut that got so much heat earlier this
month. While that one got a two month extension, other provisions did not, and will expire in a couple days. The specific tax
creditsaffecting electric vehicles are* Alternative fuel vehicle refueling property (e.g. tax credit for installing EV
chargers) * Tax credit for EV conversions (Conversion credit for plug-in electric vehicles) * Credit for electric drive motorcycles,
three-wheeled vehicles, and low-speed vehicles The first applies to EV charging infrastructure and is the tax credit which helps pay for
the charging station you have to buy along with the electric car.
EV Aff: Inherency--2AC
Obama has committed us to electrification now, but the policy is not big enough—need a much
more ambitious program
Electrification Coalition, ELECTRIFICATION ROADMAP: REVOLUTIONIZING TRANSPORTATION AND
ACHIEVING ENERGY SECURITY, 11—09, p. 23.
Last year, President Obama established a goal of getting 1 million GEVs onto the road by 2015. His administration has invested
substantial funds from the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act in pursuit of that goal. That investment alone, however, is
insufficient to meet the president’s goal. This Roadmap sets a more ambitious target for electrification that will not only meet the
president’s goal, but achieve the greater goal of ensuring that by 2040, 75 percent of the light duty vehicle miles traveled (VMT) in the
United States will be electric miles. As a result, oil consumption in the light duty fleet would be reduced to just 2.0 mbd, compared to
today’s level of 8.6 mbd. This represents a significant reduction in U.S. oil dependence, and would meaningfully enhance American
economic, environmental, and national security.
PHEV and EV adoption are limited by lack of charging infrastructure, range limits now
MaryAnn Wright, Vice President, Global Technology and Innovation, Johnson Controls, Inc. and Chair, Electric Drive
Transportation Association Testimony before the House Energy Committee, Subcommittee on Energy and Power, CQ
CONGRESSIONAL TESTIMONY, 7—10—12, lexis.
Due to electric drive range limitations, lack of installed charging infrastructure and challenged economics, PHEVs and EVs will continue
to have limited near-term market penetration in the United States. Early adopting consumers are willing to accept these limitations, as
they are motivated by attributes other than cost and performance. And, market opportunity for today's offerings does exist particularly
with owners where a central charging infrastructure is practical along with limited daily miles driven, such as government and private
fleets.
EV Aff: Solvency--1AC
PLAN
The United States federal government should substantially increase it’s investment in
transportation electrification, including a substantial investment in vehicle-to-grid charging
infrastructure. Funding and enforcement are guaranteed
Observation Two: Solvency
A. Federal action is key to electrification—the current policy mishmash fails
Electrification Coalition, ELECTRIFICATION ROADMAP: REVOLUTIONIZING TRANSPORTATION AND
ACHIEVING ENERGY SECURITY, 11—09, p. 63.
The provisions within ACES that deal with vehicle electrification represent an important step forward. Beyond simply providing additional
funding to automakers and greater incentives to consumers, the bill begins to outline a process for deploying electric vehicles in high
concentrations. However, the provisions are not tied to any specific goal for vehicle penetration or future oil abatement. Moreover, the
bill stops short of committing to electrification as a dominant strategy, instead increasing government support for a range of
technologies, including biofuels. This speaks to the fundamental lack of national commitment to electrification. America’s approach
today is haphazard and unfocused, without strategic goals to guide policy either in Congress or in the relevant executive departments.
Without aggressive and coordinated government policy, GEVs will only marginally penetrate the U.S. market over the next decade.
B. Plan ensures widespread adoption of plug-in hybrids and other EVs
Richard Lowenthal, CEO, Coulomb Technologies, Testimony before the Senate Appropriations Committee,
Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development, 2—23—10, lexis.
EV charging stations are designed and manufactured in the United States and distribution is available nationwide. Our products are
"shovel-ready" and require the skills of local electricians and contractors to install, providing jobs nationwide. Each station we install
employs three people for a day. Our company has faced a classic chicken and egg problem. Consumers will not adopt electric drive
technology if they are not confident in their ability to refuel. At the same time, there is little incentive for companies to install charging
infrastructure before the cars arrive. The federal government can play an important role as it considers stimulus spending and other
financial incentives to assist the nascent market for electric vehicle charging infrastructure. Public sector investment in shared charging
infrastructure during the early phases of EV deployment can help overcome consumer range anxiety and enable those who don't have
home charging stations to buy these cars. Policy 6: Public investment in EV infrastructure creates jobs and addresses the chicken-andegg problem.
C. Government re-charging infrastructure is key to spur adoption of EVs
Ron Minsk, Senior Vice President, Securing America’s Energy Future (SAFE), Sam P. Ori, Director of Policy, SAFE
and Sabrina Howell, Senior Policy Analyst, SAFE, “Plugging Cars into the Grid: Why the Government Should Make a
Choice,” ENERGY LAW JOURNAL v. 30, 2009, p. 375-376.
Second, recharging infrastructure must be deployed. Doing so will require the development of a business model that will fund that
infrastructure. It will also require policymakers to address the infrastructure chicken and egg problem. Consumers will not purchase cars
on a wide scale until recharging infrastructure is in place, but there is little incentive to invest in such infrastructure until it is clear that
sufficient cars will be deployed to help recapture the cost of the infrastructure. The government should dedicate significant funds to the
development of recharging infrastructure, at least in a set number of communities in which the government would seek to facilitate the
development of GEV ecosystems. In such localized ecosystems, a sufficient concentration of vehicles would reduce the cost of sales,
repair, and recharging infrastructure to support significant deployment of GEVs. That deployment, in turn, could be used to test both
consumer acceptance and different business models that would attract consumers. By helping to bring down the total cost of owning a
GEV and defining and funding large scale pilot demonstrations, the government can help move the ball forward. At a later point in time,
as the shape of the technology and business models come into sharper focus, the government will have to address regulatory [*376]
issues, such as who, if anyone, will regulate sellers other than traditional utilities of electricity to GEV owners and subject to what rates,
terms and conditions they can sell electricity for GEV charging. There will undoubtedly be other regulatory issues which are not yet even
apparent. At this point, however, we believe that government must first adopt the goal of electrification as a national priority.
EV Aff: Solvency--Demonstration Projects
Community-ecosystem approach will accelerate existing federal electrification efforts
Electrification Coalition, ELECTRIFICATION ROADMAP: REVOLUTIONIZING TRANSPORTATION AND
ACHIEVING ENERGY SECURITY, 11—09, p. 139.
Concentrating government resources in a small number of communities to serve as electrification ecosystems provides the United
States the best opportunity to deploy a large number of GEVs as quickly as possible and achieve President Obama’s goal of placing 1
million electric vehicles on the road by 2015. An ambitious federal initiative to establish Electrification Ecosystems in a number of
American cities is the best path to achieve deployment of gridenabled vehicles at a level consistent with the goals of this Roadmap. An
ecosystem is a group of interdependent entities that work or interact together to accomplish a common task or goal. In the GEV context,
an electrification ecosystem is a region in which each of the elements necessary for the successful deployment of grid-enabled vehicles
is deployed nearly simultaneously in high concentrations. By ensuring that vehicles, infrastructure, and the full network of support
services and technologies arrive in well-defined markets together, ecosystems will provide an invaluable demonstration of the benefits of
integrated electrification architecture. The government has accelerated its support for electric vehicles over the course of this year with
substantial funding for GEV-related activities in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 and additional proposals in
legislation currently pending before Congress. This report, however, proposes an effort that is: Larger and more comprehensive 1. by an
order of magnitude than programs already in place; and 2. More strategically focused than the programs that are underway or proposed
in draft legislation. For instance, in April 2009, the Energy Information Administration updated its energyrelated forecasts to reflect the
expected impact of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. Despite the ambitious GEV-related provisions in the legislation, EIA
estimates that by 2030 there will be only 4.3 million GEVs on the road, representing less than 1.5 percent of the fleet.1 In sharp contrast
to current Department of Energy forecasts, the goals stated in this report call for 14 million GEVs to be on the road by 2020 and more
than 120 million by 2030, a far more ambitious and transformative target. To help meet that goal, this section outlines a set of policies
designed to accomplish the phased implementation of electrification ecosystems in key metropolitan areas throughout the United States.
This plan contrasts sharply with the government’s traditional approach of spreading the initial benefits of its programs evenly across the
country. By focusing the initial deployment of electric vehicles in a small number of communities, ecosystems will address many of the
obstacles to electrification and accelerate the speed with which the nation achieves high rates of GEV penetration by a decade or more.
Federal demonstration projects will drive technology, increase acceptance and facilitate EV rollout
Electrification Coalition, ELECTRIFICATION ROADMAP: REVOLUTIONIZING TRANSPORTATION AND
ACHIEVING ENERGY SECURITY, 11—09, p. 138.
Early adopters will eagerly purchase the first griden-abled vehicles once they hit the market. The primary challenge will be in expanding
the market beyond these narrow groups to the general population of drivers. This will ensure that GEVs have a meaningful impact on
U.S. energy security and that they do not become niche products. To facilitate that process, the government should launch a select
number of electrification ecosystems— communities chosen on a competitive basis in which resources are concentrated in order to
promote the deployment of GEVs. In doing so, a range of market participants can work together to demonstrate that GEVs meet drivers’
needs. Ecosystems will also allow participants to learn which business models work for supplying, selling, and servicing GEVs and help
to create economies of scale. The lessons learned in electrification ecosystems can serve to inform other communities, thereby lowering
the cost of deployment and accelerating national deployment rates.
EV Aff: Solvency--Federal Action Key
Federal efforts are important to widespread adoption
Kathleen Hart, “Automakers Object to Senate Bill Aimed at Expanding Electric Car Market,” SNL ELECTRIC UTILITY
REPORT, 6—28—10, npg.
Clay argued that for electric drive vehicles to contribute meaningfully to the nation's transportation future, long-term federal policies are
needed. "Achieving widespread acceptance of these technologies requires focused efforts to align regulatory efforts; develop a
supporting infrastructure; provide research and development; and provide incentives for consumer adoption and remove other market
barriers.
Congress needs to act to catalyze the EV market
Thad Balkman, General Counsel and VP, External Relations, Phoenix Motorcars, Testimony before the Senate
Energy and Natural Resources Committee, CQ CONGRESSIONAL TESTIMONY, 9—18—08, lexis.
After 32 years of hearings and debate it is time for action. Today, our Nation is perilously dependent upon foreign oil to fuel our cars and
trucks. In June of 2008 the Energy Information Administration reported that in 2007 we imported 12 million barrels of foreign oil each
day. With crude hovering at $100 per barrel Americans sent $120 million per day of their hard-earned wages to foreign countries. This
dependency poses both a security risk and an economic crisis never before experienced by our Nation. The urgent nature of the
problem compels Congressional intervention to finally catalyze the market for electric vehicles. No other near term automotive
technology offers the ability to immediately end dependence on foreign oil, drastically cut smog and global warming emissions, and
avoid a massive decades-long investment in new fuel distribution infrastructure.
Need a focused federal electrification policy—current shotgun approach fails
Electrification Coalition, ELECTRIFICATION ROADMAP: REVOLUTIONIZING TRANSPORTATION AND
ACHIEVING ENERGY SECURITY, 11—09, p. 13.
Finally, current federal policy provides support to a range of fuels designed to displace petroleum as the dominant fuel in the U.S.
transportation system. Electrification offers the fuel diversity, price stability, and emissions benefits needed to meaningfully increase
U.S. energy security. Instead of scattered, inconsistent federal support for a wide variety of alternatives, what is required is a coherent,
focused strategy designed to radically drive down oil consumption in the light-duty fleet. Part of this strategy must be the
acknowledgement that other alternatives, while having value, cannot ultimately revolutionize America’s light-duty fleet and end oil
dependence.
Need a federal commitment to electrification—superior to current multi-fuel shotgun approach
Electrification Coalition, ELECTRIFICATION ROADMAP: REVOLUTIONIZING TRANSPORTATION AND
ACHIEVING ENERGY SECURITY, 11—09, p. 51.
Current federal policy provides support to a range of fuels designed to displace petroleum as the dominant fuel in the U.S. transportation
system. Electrification, though, offers the fuel diversity, price stability, and emissions benefits needed to meaningfully increase U.S.
energy security. Instead of scattered, inconsistent federal support for a wide variety of alternatives, what is required is a coherent,
focused strategy designed to radically drive down oil consumption in the light-duty fleet. Part of this strategy must be the
acknowledgement that other alternatives, while having value, cannot ultimately revolutionize America’s light-duty fleet and end oil
dependence.
Regulatory challenges need to be addressed at the federal level
Richard Lowenthal, CEO, Coulomb Technologies, Testimony before the Senate Appropriations Committee,
Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development, 2—23—10, lexis.
I want to be clear in stressing that these challenges are not technological problems with batteries, vehicles, or chagrining infrastructure.
While ongoing research and development will be critical, battery technology has advanced to the point at which grid-enabled vehicles
will provide consumers with the performance, safety, and durability that they require. To be sure, cost continues to be a factor. However,
it is important to note that based on existing federal tax credits, and at today's gasoline prices, a plug-in hybrid electric vehicle will
already provide consumers with a net economic benefit over the life of the vehicle. Electric vehicles will begin to appear on American
roads and highways within a year. But for electric drive technology to be truly transformative, the market will need assistance in
overcoming a number of challenges. Beyond financial issues, there is a set of regulatory issues that will need to be addressed at the
federal level.
EV Aff: Solvency--Government Action Key
Government investment is the only way we will see the development of the necessary charging
infrastructure
Electrification Coalition, ELECTRIFICATION ROADMAP: REVOLUTIONIZING TRANSPORTATION AND
ACHIEVING ENERGY SECURITY, 11—09, p. 67.
Deploying electric vehicles at scale will require the construction of a network of charging infrastructure, both public and private (home).
The costs for public Level II electric vehicle supply equipment (EVSE) are highly dependent upon location, but currently range up to
$5,000 per unit; Level III chargers will be less prevalent, as they will be used for fast charging, but are significantly more expensive. The
ability for EVSE and charger owners to recoup these costs will depend on utilization rates and whether vendors are allowed to charge a
premium for charging. Entrepreneurship and innovation will surely develop models for profitable operation, but in a country as
geographically diverse and as large as the United States, it is difficult to imagine a scenario in which substantial government investment
would not be required to assist in laying the backbone of the GEV charging network.
Need public charging infrastructure investment—private actors won’t move fast enough
Electrification Coalition, ELECTRIFICATION ROADMAP: REVOLUTIONIZING TRANSPORTATION AND
ACHIEVING ENERGY SECURITY, 11—09, p. 94-95.
Financing public charging infrastructure is a challenge. In the absence of access fees, which make GEVs less cost effective for the user,
it is unclear how the charging infrastructure can be built. The need for public infrastructure is obvious and was reflected in the
Department of Energy’s grant to companies to deploy public EVSEs in several regions. But an important problem is implicit in this
award: who will fund charging infrastructure? The government has shown its willingness to fund the first $100 million of infrastructure,
but the next $10 billion is less likely, especially since the federal government has not yet declared public charging infrastructure to be a
national priority. GEV advocates have suggested that private firms should install public charging infrastructure wherever consumers may
need it. However, what has not been reliably demonstrated is a profitable business model that would encourage anyone in the private
sector to invest in the installation of such a network. In order for plug-in vehicles to be economic for consumers, they need to be able to
charge their vehicles inexpensively; in fact the only way to recover the cost of an expensive battery is to defray it over time with
comparatively cheap electricity. This may serve as an upper bound on the price consumers are willing to pay to charge their vehicles.
The readily available substitute of home charging also places an upper limit on what consumers will be willing to pay—and private
entities therefore could charge—for public charging on a regular basis. This may be why large domestic infrastructure providers such as
Eaton and GE have only hesitantly ventured into this market or avoided it altogether.
Electrification will not happen without substantial public investment
Electrification Coalition, ELECTRIFICATION ROADMAP: REVOLUTIONIZING TRANSPORTATION AND
ACHIEVING ENERGY SECURITY, 11—09, p. 49.
It is, therefore, critically important to distinguish between a goal and a forecast. With appropriate government incentives and a firm longterm commitment, electrified transportation will offer a compelling alternative to the petroleum-based system of today. But what has
been set forward here is not a forecast of adoption based on the status quo policy environment. Electrified transport might achieve some
measure of competitiveness over the coming decades based on oil prices, environmentalism, and innovative entrepreneurship, but it is
unlikely to become the norm in the United States without substantial public investment and transparent political commitment.
Government should act to propel private efforts in transportation electrification
David Crane, President and CEO, NRG Energy, Testimony before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources
Committee, 5—19—11, lexis.
The electric vehicle revolution is happening and it will be driven, as it should be in the United States, by the private sector and by the
American consumer. What the U.S. Government needs to decide is whether it wants to be a catalyst or a hindrance to the accelerated
deployment of electric vehicles. Given the enormous geopolitical and balance of trade benefits to that will inure to the United States as a
result of substantially reduced dependence on foreign oil, we feel strongly that the Government should support and supplement, but not
supersede, the private sector's initiatives in this critical area.
Electrification wil not happen without a federal commitment
Electrification Coalition, ELECTRIFICATION ROADMAP: REVOLUTIONIZING TRANSPORTATION AND
ACHIEVING ENERGY SECURITY, 11—09, p. 49.
Despite these structural challenges, electrification of transportation can succeed in the United States. In order for electrification to deliver
on its full promise, however, the United States must commit to grid-enabled vehicles as the tactical core of a comprehensive oil
abatement strategy. In sum, the federal government must choose electrification as a dominant national strategy for improving energy
security. Fueling 75 percent of VMT with electricity by 2040 will place the nation on a path to stronger economic growth, improved
competitiveness, and enhanced security. But this will not happen unless the government decides to help make it happen.
EV Aff: Solvency--Infrastructure Key
Expanding national charging infrastructure needs to be a policy priority—key to adoption
Brian Wynne, President, Electric Drive Transportation Association, Testimony before the Senate Energy and Natural
Resources Committee, 6—22—10, lexis.
Inside the national and deployment programs, we would like to work with you to ensure specific emphasis on private, in addition to
pubic, recharging infrastructure. Diverse vehicle configurations (battery electric and plug-in hybrids with varying ranges) and diverse
consumer needs will require flexible private and public recharging options. Industry studies confirm, however, that most charging of
plug-in vehicles will be done at primary residences over night. The next greatest opportunity for charging is at the workplace during the
day. We believe that meeting these recharging needs should be an explicit priority for national and localized deployment efforts. We
support directing additional research and technical assistance toward facilitating residential and workplace charging.
Sequencing matters—need to develop infrastructure for PHEVs before we are ready for fully electric
vehicles
Danielle Changala, Research Associate, Institute for Energy and the Environment, University of Vermont and paul
Foley, Global Energy Fellow, Institute for Energy and the Environment, University of Vermont, “The Legal Regime of
Widespread Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicle Adoption: A Vermont Case Study,” ENERGY LAW JOURNAL v. 32, 20 11,
p. 104-105.
The Chevrolet Volt and the Nissan Leaf represent one possible transportation future. Now that PHEVs and EVs are commercially
available, it remains to be seen whether they will ultimately achieve significant market penetration. This will depend, in part, on how
PHEVs and EVs will be integrated into existing legal regimes for the regulation of electricity. Although both the Volt and the Leaf entered
the marketplace in late 2010, this article [*105] primarily focuses on PHEV technology because a purely electric vehicle requires an
extensive infrastructure to supply recharging. Before that more extensive infrastructure is in place, the infrastructure necessary to
support PHEVs would first have to be established.
Need to provide infrastructure to ensure market adoption
Kathleen Hart, “Automakers Object to Senate Bill Aimed at Expanding Electric Car Market,” SNL ELECTRIC UTILITY
REPORT, 6—28—10, npg.
If the United States is to achieve "the energy and environmental security gains the country clearly needs, the manufacturers of this
technology have to see a substantial market for these vehicles in order to justify their investments," Bingaman said in opening a hearing
to consider S 3495, a bill introduced by Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D. The Promoting Electric Vehicles Act of 2010 includes several
provisions that are intended to promote near-term deployment of plug-in electric drive vehicles and to supplement ongoing activities of
the U.S. Department of Energy. Expanding the U.S. market for electric cars will require infrastructure in communities to give consumers
the confidence that electric vehicles will meet their needs, Bingaman said. In addition, consumers must be able to afford the early
vehicles, before manufacturers have achieved economies of scale. "Senator Dorgan's bill contains programs aimed at addressing both
these problems," he added.
Deploying infrastructure is vital to the widespread adoption of EV’s
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), ELECTRIFICATION OF THE TRANSPORTATION SYSTEM, MIT
Energy Initiative Symposium, 4—8—10, p. 4.
Infrastructure and consumer acceptance. All participants agreed that successful penetration of EVs into the transportation market
requires consumer acceptance and infrastructure change as well as achieving competitive cost. Important insight into consumer
acceptance will come from the market reaction to EVs that are now or soon to be introduced: the PHEV Chevy Volt, the BEV Nissan
LEAF, and the BEV Tesla roadster. Consumer reaction to cost, charging time, and range will help point the way forward. Successful EV
market penetration also requires adaption by the electricity system in three ways: (1) assuring there is adequate generation capacity to
meet new demand for transportation and understanding the carbon emission characteristics of the incremental generation capacity, (2)
enabling the transmission and distribution system to adjust to changes in demand from the transportation system, e.g., by charging EVs
using off-peak electricity generation, and (3) developing and deploying an accessible charging infrastructure. Deploying a charging
infrastructure and associated electric vehicle supply equipment (EVSE) is perhaps the most important consideration because of the
large number of issues that need to be addressed: the distribution, extent, and standardization of charging stations, setting limits for
charging time and access rules, as well as regulatory procedures and policies for commercial firms in the distribution market. Evidently,
deciding who pays for the charging infrastructure — the public, utilities, or EV users — and regulating the price for charging vehicles at
residences or central stations is key. The role of various jurisdictions — municipalities, state public utility commissions, and the federal
government — needs to be defined as well as how state department of motor vehicles (DMVs) will inspect EVs.
EV Aff: Solvency--A2 "Alternatives Superior"
Electric vehicles superior—fuel diversity, lower price volatility
Jeff Merkley, U.S. Senator, Testimony before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, FEDERAL
NEWS SERVICE, 5—19—11, lexis.
A number of reasons why investing in electric vehicles is good. First, they promote fuel efficiency. It's a surprise for many that burning
fuels create electricity and delivering electricity to cars is more efficient than actually bringing the fuel in individual cars. So we get more
bang for our energy buck. Second, electric fuels promote fuel diversity, since electricity for cars can be generated from a diverse set of
fuels, including coal, nuclear, natural gas, hydroelectricity, wind, geothermal, solar and so forth. And third, because of that diversity, the
price of electricity has low volatility, insulating America from the type of gasoline price spikes that we're currently experiencing.
EVs are superior to other technology—infrastructure is already in place
Electrification Coalition, ELECTRIFICATION ROADMAP: REVOLUTIONIZING TRANSPORTATION AND
ACHIEVING ENERGY SECURITY, 11—09, p. 39.
Unlike many proposed alternatives to petroleumbased fuels, the nation already has a ubiquitous network of electricity infrastructure. No
doubt, electrification will require additional functionality and increased investment in grid reliability, but the power sector’s infrastructural
backbone—generation, transmission, and distribution—is already in place.
Hydrogen is current an inferior alternative—too many tech obstacles
Electrification Coalition, ELECTRIFICATION ROADMAP: REVOLUTIONIZING TRANSPORTATION AND
ACHIEVING ENERGY SECURITY, 11—09, p. 52.
Commercialization of hydrogen-fueled vehicles, however, faces several obstacles that are far more significant than those facing batterypowered gridenabled vehicles. First, the cost of hydrogen fuel cells is currently in excess of the cost of a comparable battery cell.
Second, reliance on hydrogen would require the construction of an entirely new infrastructure to distribute it to consumers. At the same
time, there is no clear ability to manufacture sufficient quantities of hydrogen to fuel the automotive fleet. And perhaps the largest
obstacle to the development of a hydrogenfueled light-duty fleet is the fact that hydrogen itself is much more expensive than electricity,
and likely always will be. Given the commonality between the vehicle designs, and the possibility of converting grid-connected electric
vehicles to hydrogen fuel cell vehicles by replacing batteries with fuel cells, electrification of the light-duty vehicle fleet is not
incompatible with the deployment of hydrogen fuel cell vehicles at some point in the future. Whether we ultimately move from batteries
to fuel cells to power electric drivetrain vehicles will depend on fuel cell development, their relative efficiencies, and their cost.
Electrification superior to natural gas—lower infrastructure requirements
Electrification Coalition, ELECTRIFICATION ROADMAP: REVOLUTIONIZING TRANSPORTATION AND
ACHIEVING ENERGY SECURITY, 11—09, p. 52.
However, depending on a single fuel for transportation would not appreciably alter the fundamental problem with the existing paradigm.
The advantages of fuel diversity provided by electrification are critical from an energy security perspective. At the same time, using
natural gas in the light-duty fleet would require a significant expansion of distribution and refueling infrastructure. Electrification would
also require infrastructural upgrades, but of a very different—and significantly less substantial—nature.
EV Aff: Solvency--A2 "Grid Concerns"
Grid can accommodate over 100M GEVs via overnight charging
Richard Lowenthal, CEO, Coulomb Technologies, Testimony before the Senate Appropriations Committee,
Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development, 2—23—10, lexis.
For drivers with access to a dedicated outlet, the most convenient time to charge their GEV will be overnight at home. Most passenger
vehicles sit parked during the hours between roughly 8:00 pm and 6:00 am, which could provide ample opportunity to supply consumers
with the charge levels required for typical daily usage of GEVs. Moreover, by concentrating charging during off-peak hours, the electric
power sector could today charge more than 100 million GEVs (if the vehicles were entirely PHEVs, the number could be as high as 160
million) without the need to install significant additional generating capacity. While Level I charging will be an option for some PHEV
owners, most consumers will prefer Level II charging in their homes.
There is plenty of electricity—system has substantial spare capacity
Seifi Ghasemi, Chair CEO, Rockwood Holdings, Testimony before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources
Committee, 5—19—11, lexis.
3) The Power Sector has Substantial Spare Capacity: Because large-scale storage of electricity has historically been impractical, the
U.S. electric power sector is effectively designed as an 'on-demand system.' In practical terms, this has meant that the system is
constructed to be able to meet peak demand from existing generation sources at any time. However, throughout most of a 24-hour day-particularly at night--consumers require significantly less electricity than the system is capable of delivering. Therefore, the U.S. electric
power sector has substantial spare capacity that could be used to power electric vehicles without constructing additional power
generation facilities, assuming charging patterns were appropriately managed.
Grid can already handle overnight charging
Lynn Doan, “We Can Handle Electric Cars, Just Not During the Day,” SNL POWER DAILY, 3—17—10, npg.
If charged overnight, electric cars should pose no threat to the nation's power grids, utilities said. Charging during the day, on the other
hand, is another story. There is no doubt about it, officials say: North America's power grids can handle electric cars. A study released in
November 2009 estimated that British Columbia's grid had enough surplus generation capacity to charge at least 2.4 million electric
vehicles. The U.S. Department of Energy concluded in 2006 that the nation had enough to power 84% of the nation's cars if they were
replaced with plug-in hybrids. The following year, the Electric Power Research Institute and the Natural Resources Defense Council
similarly concluded that the nation's grid could handle plug-ins without strain.
Existing grid can accommodate nighttime charging
Henry Kelly, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary, Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, U.S.
Department of Energy, Testimony before the Senate Appropriations Committee, Subcommittee on Energy and Water
Development, 2—23—10, lexis.
If PHEVs and EVs become a major part of the Nation's transportation system, investments in the Nation's electrical grid need to be
made to support the new demand for electricity. Charging facilities will need to be installed in residences, parking facilities, and other
sites. DOE is working with utilities and other partners to explore how this can best be accomplished. It is expected that PHEV owners
will typically charge their vehicles at night, which will limit the impact on the electric grid and allow consumers to take advantage of offpeak electricity rates. A study by the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory shows that up to 70 percent of the U.S. vehicle fleet could be
comprised of PHEVs without a significant impact on the electric power grid. n15
EV Aff: Solvency--A2 "Public Won't Accept"
People are willing to shift to electric cars—need government support
David Crane, President and CEO, NRG Energy, Testimony before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources
Committee, 5—19—11, lexis.
Like most new technologies, the cost of electric vehicles must come down in order to bring about mass adoption. But we have also
learned through talking with our own customers and many others around the country, that auto buyers are becoming more and more
excited about the value proposition of electric vehicles. Drivers have started to become enamored of the idea of conveniently charging
their electric vehicles in their home overnight while sleeping, filling up their cars with fuel at a fraction of the cost per mile of gasoline,
and the reduced maintenance on a car that requires no oil changes or tune-ups. The growth in demand and supply of electric vehicles
can be accelerated with smart government policies designed both to enhance the convenience of electric vehicle ownership and to
provide direct and indirect financial support aimed at helping consumers and businesses get over the initial high costs of new
technologies like EVs, advanced batteries, and charging networks.
Consumers are willing to pay more for improved fuel economy—surveys prove
Dr. Edward Buiel, Vice President and Chief Technical Officer, Axiom Power International, Testimony before the
Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, CQ CONGRESSIONAL TESTIMONY, 7—23---08, lexis.
Additional important facts from the survey of consumers who were looking to purchase a new vehicle include: 1. 66% of consumers will
chose vehicles that reduces their monthly fuel expense. 2. 75% of consumers said they would consider paying $1,500 more for a vehicle
that achieves 30% better fuel economy. 3. 25% of consumers are willing to pay $2,000 or more extra for a vehicle that is significantly
better for the environment. 4. 25% of consumers surveyed expressed a willingness to pay $2000 or more above the cost of an HEV to
purchase a PHEV (roughly $4500 more than a normal combustion engine vehicle) The main conclusions from this study is that
consumers are willing to pay more for technologies that achieve better fuel economy and are better for the environment. However, the
amount they are willing to pay is only $1500-2000 for conventional ICE and HEV technologies and up to $4500 (25% of consumers) for
a vehicle that would spend a larger portion of time in an electric only mode of operation.
PHEV’s will become cost competitive soon—decline in battery costs, likely increase in future fuel
prices
Danielle Changala, Research Associate, Institute for Energy and the Environment, University of Vermont and paul
Foley, Global Energy Fellow, Institute for Energy and the Environment, University of Vermont, “The Legal Regime of
Widespread Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicle Adoption: A Vermont Case Study,” ENERGY LAW JOURNAL v. 32, 20 11,
p. 107.
Despite the NAS' findings, future technological, economic, and political developments might substantially reduce the cost of PHEVs
relative to conventional automobiles. The NAS estimates that the cost of Li-ion batteries will decline by 35% by 2020 - even though it
foresees no breakthroughs in battery technology. n49 Moreover, the NAS' conclusion that PHEV-40s will not be cost-competitive with
conventional vehicles until 2040 assumes gasoline prices at $ 4 per gallon or less. n50 Global market forces and political developments
in the next decade, such as further EPA regulation of greenhouse gas emissions, could increase gasoline prices significantly above that
level. n51 Transportation costs already constitute over 15% of annual income in northeast households. n52 A severe spike in gasoline
prices, to well beyond $ 4 per gallon, would therefore make PHEVs far more attractive to Vermont consumers.
EV Aff: Solvency--A2 "Tech Problems (General)"
Strong policy commitment, innovation will overcome any tech barriers
Electrification Coalition, ELECTRIFICATION ROADMAP: REVOLUTIONIZING TRANSPORTATION AND
ACHIEVING ENERGY SECURITY, 11—09, p. 66.
The successful deployment of GEVs faces a range of challenges. Early GEV batteries will have limited range, may take hours to charge,
and will add significantly to vehicle cost. Vehicle charging infrastructure is non-existent, and consumers may hesitate to accept new
technology. Yet, each of these challenges can be overcome to achieve widespread, large-scale deployment of gridenabled vehicles in
the near future. Policy support and innovative business models will drive down battery costs and work to deploy adequate charging
infrastructure. The electrical grid reaches most corners of the nation, and only upgrades to the last few feet of wire are required to
deploy vehicle chargers in mass. The electric power industry has the capacity to generate and transmit most of the power that will be
needed to charge GEVs, certainly in the early to middle stages of deployment. Over the long term, smart-grid technology will manage
vehicle-to-grid interface while enhancing the overall consumer experience.
PHEVs are available—over a dozen models will be introduced before the end of 2012
MaryAnn Wright, Vice President, Global Technology and Innovation, Johnson Controls, Inc. and Chair, Electric Drive
Transportation Association Testimony before the House Energy Committee, Subcommittee on Energy and Power, CQ
CONGRESSIONAL TESTIMONY, 7—10—12, lexis.
While widespread EV adoption is not imminent, global automakers are making significant investments and launching many vehicles to
demonstrate technology feasibility and gain real-world understanding of the advantages and challenges of these vehicles, while building
market credibility and acceptance. In fact, electric drive vehicles are being introduced across many vehicle segments including
passenger cars, commercial trucks, buses, tractors, and ground support equipment. More than a dozen plug-in electric drive vehicles
will be on sale by the end of 2012.
Many EV models will be available in the near future
Seifi Ghasemi, Chair CEO, Rockwood Holdings, Testimony before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources
Committee, 5—19—11, lexis.
Based on these and other advantages, a wide array of automakers is beginning to introduce grid-enabled vehicles into the marketplace.
There are important differences in drivetrain architectures, with some vehicles relying solely on battery power (electric vehicles, or EVs)
and others augmented by liquid fuels as well (plug-in hybrid electric vehicles, or PHEVs). All told, automakers worldwide are developing
dozens of plug-in hybrid and electric vehicles. By 2013, more than 40 models could be available to consumers. From just a handful of
units introduced in 2010, the industry is beginning to scale up. Announced North American production capacity will exceed 100,000
vehicles in 2012 and 350,000 by 2014. (These figures do not include trucks.) Additional volumes will reach the U.S. market from OEM
plants overseas, particularly in the next two years.
EV tech is ready
Electrification Coalition, ELECTRIFICATION ROADMAP: REVOLUTIONIZING TRANSPORTATION AND
ACHIEVING ENERGY SECURITY, 11—09, p. 39.
In order to harness the strategic advantages of the electric power sector in the light-duty vehicle fleet, vehicles that can be propelled by
electricity must be available to consumers. In fact, the technology for such vehicles has advanced rapidly in recent years. Though
important challenges remain, the global automotive industry has invested heavily in highly-efficient electric drive vehicles that use
reduced quantities of petroleum in order to meet consumer demand in an era of high fuel prices, and to comply with increasingly
stringent regulations that restrict tailpipe CO2 emissions. A variety of technologies employing electric drive are on the cusp of
commercial availability, and an even larger number are currently in the final stages of development. In general, grid-enabled vehicles
can be either pure electric vehicles (EVs) or plug-in hybrid electric (PHEVs). Both EVs and PHEVs store energy from the grid in onboard
batteries. Energy from the battery powers a highly-efficient electric motor that propels the vehicle. EVs substitute an electric drivetrain
for all conventional drivetrain components. PHEVs retain the use of a down-sized internal combustion engine that supplements battery
power. (These technologies are reviewed in greater detail in Part Two of this Roadmap.) At a basic level, both EVs and PHEVs provide
consumers with clear advantages compared to gasoline powered conventional vehicles of today.
EV Aff: Solvency--A2 "Tech Problems (Batteries)"
ARPA-E is already working on advanced batteries
Arun Majumdar, director, aDvanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E), Testimony before the House
Appropriations Committee, Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development, CQ CONGRESSIONAL TESTIMONY,
3—28—12, lexis.
Batteries for EVs/PHEVs: ARPA-E's advanced battery program is working to develop a variety of rechargeable battery technologies that
would reduce the cost of ownership of an EV or PHEV to that of a conventional automobile without subsidy. One ARPA-E awardee,
Envia, announced at the 2012 ARPA-E Summit that they have doubled the energy density for a rechargeable lithium-ion battery to 400
Whr/kg, an innovation that will cut the cost of the battery pack in half. Other companies are targeting 600 Whr/kg. Our goal is to reduce
the cost of rechargeable batteries to 20-25% of today's cost. n1 Achievements such as this drive key aspects of the EV Grand
Challenge.
Battery costs are set to decrease
Henry Kelly, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary, Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, U.S.
Department of Energy, Testimony before the Senate Appropriations Committee, Subcommittee on Energy and Water
Development, 2—23—10, lexis.
The promise of advanced lithium-ion batteries has had the most dramatic impact. These batteries have the potential to be much lighter,
smaller, safer, and less expensive than their predecessors. Working with industry partners over the past decade, DOE research has
helped make steady gains in all of these characteristics. The most important remaining challenge is to cut costs. One lithium-ion battery
produced today is projected to use eight kilowatt-hours (kWh) of energy (of a total capacity of 16 kWh) and costs roughly $6,500-$8,000
($800-$1,000/kWh of useable energy) when produced in high volume. n10 DOE and its research partners believe that the cost could
likely be reduced to $2,400 ($300/kWh of useable energy) by 2014 with a combination of better materials, optimized battery designs,
and improved manufacturing. At this price, the cost of driving a mile in an electric or plug-in hybrid electric vehicle would be roughly
comparable to that of today's conventional cars. n11 The initial price of new vehicles would be higher, but the energy costs for driving
would be much lower. Additionally, it can be expected that the battery prices will continue to fall while gasoline prices increase in the
coming decades. n12
Expanded GEV scale will drive down battery costs
Electrification Coalition, ELECTRIFICATION ROADMAP: REVOLUTIONIZING TRANSPORTATION AND
ACHIEVING ENERGY SECURITY, 11—09, p. 86.
A main contributor to battery cost is lack of production volume, or scale. A plant that is capacitized to produce 10,000 battery packs per
year as opposed to 100,000 will have battery costs that are approximately 60 percent to 80 percent higher.31 Manufacturing scale offers
one of the largest opportunities for reduction in battery costs. This would be especially true if batteries were standardized. In August
2009, Ford executives called for standardization of battery types for this very reason.32 Achieving large numbers of production of
common battery types has the potential to drive costs down faster than many of the research initiatives currently underway. Previously,
in June 2009, GM global battery systems engineering manager Joe LoGrasso made a similar appeal, suggesting that a convergence of
cell formats may be a prerequisite to commercial success.33 In a May 2009 Department of Energy review, research was presented that
indicated using current materials and current processing technology, scaling up to 500,000 units per year would drive the cost of PHEV
packs down to $363 per kWh, nearly achieving the goals outlined by the USABC.34 Additionally, the research indicated other possible
manufacturing developments that could push that price down to meeting the USABC targets. This research indicates that lack of
domestic scale is one of the largest contributors to the dearth of affordable plug-in vehicle batteries. As of 2009, there is little installed
manufacturing capacity for lithium-ion batteries, and the overwhelming majority of production activity is currently centered in Asia. In the
coming years, however, U.S. production capacity is expected to rapidly increase as government loans spur accelerated investment from
firms such as EnerDel, A123, Compact Power, and Nissan.
EV Aff: Solvency--A2 "Tech Problems (Range)"
PHEV’s solve the range problems posed by pure EV’s
Ron Minsk, Senior Vice President, Securing America’s Energy Future (SAFE), Sam P. Ori, Director of Policy, SAFE
and Sabrina Howell, Senior Policy Analyst, SAFE, “Plugging Cars into the Grid: Why the Government Should Make a
Choice,” ENERGY LAW JOURNAL v. 30, 2009, p. 357.
PHEVs feature a larger battery and a plug-in charger that allows the driver to charge the battery by connecting it directly to the power
grid. When the battery is sufficiently charged, the vehicle may operate in a battery-depleting all-electric or blended mode. Once the
battery is depleted to the point that it can no longer power the vehicle, the vehicle may then operate as a traditional HEV, powered by its
gasoline-fueled engine and its electric motor, a mode of operation during which it would still generally achieve far greater fuel economy
than a gasoline-powered vehicle. Therefore, PHEVs may derive a substantial fraction of their miles from grid-derived electricity, but
without the range restrictions of pure battery EVs.
Most driving occurs over short trips
Ron Minsk, Senior Vice President, Securing America’s Energy Future (SAFE), Sam P. Ori, Director of Policy, SAFE
and Sabrina Howell, Senior Policy Analyst, SAFE, “Plugging Cars into the Grid: Why the Government Should Make a
Choice,” ENERGY LAW JOURNAL v. 30, 2009, p. 357.
The average LDV's trip is less than ten miles, and average households log less than thirty-five miles per day. n207 According to data
assembled by the U.S. Department of Transportation, vehicles driven forty or fewer miles per day log an estimated seventy percent of all
vehicle miles traveled on weekdays and eighty percent of all vehicle miles traveled on weekends. n208 Because the majority of
Americans drive only relatively short distances each day, electric cars should be able to satisfy most driving needs even if they need to
recharge more often than gasoline-powered vehicles need to be refueled.
Many transportation needs can be met by even short-range EV’s
Joshua P. Fershee, Assistant Professor, Law, University of North Dakota, “Struggling Past Oil: The Infrastructure
Impediments to Adopting Next-Generation Transportation Fuel Sources,” CUMBERLAND LAW REVIEW v. 40, 20092010, p. 103-104.
The concern with physical infrastructure also underscores the essence of a psychological infrastructure problem. A common complaint
about electric cars is the limited range. Going back to the EV1, the range was limited as compared to a gasoline-powered car. n119 At
full charge, the EV1 initially had a range of about eighty miles and was later able to get nearly 150 miles in charge, which is significantly
less than gasoline-powered cars. n120 Most gasoline cars have the advantage of providing a cruising range in the area of 350-450
miles. n121 The average commute for most Americans, however, is [*104] currently less than forty miles round trip, meaning that,
even without a charge at work, most users would have far more driving range than they would ever need in a given day. n122 In fact,
many people currently have a car for driving to work (perhaps a normal passenger car) and another "trip" or "family" car, such as a minivan. Thus, because many people may have already made the decision to have cars that serve differing needs, making that "work car"
an electric vehicle should not provide much difficulty in concept or practice.
EV Aff: Economy Adv--1AC (1/3)
Advantage One: Economy
Risk of new recession is high now
WANE, "Ball State Economist: U.S. Is Sliding into Recession," 9--7--12,
http://www.wane.com/dpp/news/business/ball-state-economist-us-is-sliding-into-recession
Ball State economist, Michael Hicks, believes the jobs report indicates that America is sliding into a recession. Hicks
said the number of people added to payrolls could be less than what it actually is, despite the recent
positive economic reports. Hicks said Friday's jobs report from the U.S. Labor Department is "lackluster at best."
ADP, a paycheck processing firm, said Thursday that private companies added 201,000 jobs in August, which is up from the 173,000
jobs added in July. However, many economists surveyed by Briefing.com expect the number was much closer
to 143,000 jobs. The economy generally needs to add around 150,000 jobs per month just to keep up with
the growing population. “Manufacturing job losses, and a string of bad manufacturing and retail sales
figures suggest we continue to slide into recession. The full weight of Europe’s problems are ahead, not
behind us, and so the coming months will see stagnant or declining job creation," Hicks said.
Economic decline leads to nuclear war
Harris and Burrows 9 - Matthew, PhD European History at Cambridge/Counselor in the National Intelligence
Council (NIC), Jennifer, Member of NIC’s Long Range Analysis Unit (“Revisiting the Future: Geopolitical Effects of the
Financial Crisis” http://www.ciaonet.org/journals/twq/v32i2/f_0016178_13952.pdf,
Increased Potential for Global Conflict Of course, the report encompasses more than economics and indeed believes the future is likely
to be the result of a number of intersecting and interlocking forces. With so many possible permutations of outcomes, each with ample
Revisiting the Future opportunity for unintended consequences, there is a growing sense of insecurity. Even so, history may be
more instructive than ever. While we continue to believe that the Great Depression is not likely to be repeated, the
lessons to be drawn from that period include the harmful effects on fledgling democracies and multiethnic
societies (think Central Europe in 1920s and 1930s) and on the sustainability of multilateral institutions (think League of
Nations in the same period). There is no reason to think that this would not be true in the twenty-first as much as
in the twentieth century. For that reason, the ways in which the potential for greater conflict could grow would seem
to be even more apt in a constantly volatile economic environmentas they would be if change would be steadier. In
surveying those risks, the report stressed the likelihood that terrorism and nonproliferation will remain priorities even as resource issues
move up on the international agenda. Terrorism’s appeal will decline if economic growth continues in the Middle
East and youth unemployment is reduced.For those terrorist groups that remain active in 2025, however, the diffusion of
technologies and scientific knowledge will place some of the world’s most dangerous capabilities within their reach. Terrorist groups
in 2025 will likely be a combination of descendants of long established groups_inheriting organizational structures, command and
control processes, and training procedures necessary to conduct sophisticated attacks_and newly emergent collections of the angry and
disenfranchised that become self-radicalized, particularly in the absence of economic outlets that would
become narrower in an economic downturn. The most dangerous casualty of any economically-induced
drawdown of U.S. military presence would almost certainly be the Middle East. Although Iran’s acquisition of nuclear
weapons is not inevitable, worries about a nuclear-armed Iran could lead states in the region to develop new security
arrangements with external powers, acquire additional weapons, and consider pursuing their own nuclear
ambitions.It is not clear that the type of stable deterrent relationship that existed between the great powers for most of the Cold War
would emerge naturally in the Middle East with a nuclear Iran. Episodes of low intensity conflict and terrorism taking place under a
nuclear umbrella could lead to an unintended escalation and broader conflict if clear red lines between those states
involved are not well established. The close proximity of potential nuclear rivals combined with underdeveloped
surveillance capabilities and mobile dual-capable Iranian missile systems also will produce inherent difficulties in achieving
reliable indications and warning of an impending nuclear attack. The lack of strategic depth in neighboring states like
Israel, short warning and missile flight times, and uncertainty of Iranian intentions may place more focus on
preemption rather than defense, potentially leading to escalating crises. 36 Types of conflict that the world continues to
experience, such as over resources, could reemerge, particularly if protectionism grows and there is a resort
to neo-mercantilist practices. Perceptions of renewed energy scarcity will drive countries to take actions to assure their
future access to energy supplies. In the worst case, this could result in interstate conflicts if government leaders deem
assured access to energy resources, for example, to be essential for maintaining domestic stability and the survival of
their regime. Even actions short of war, however, will have important geopolitical implications. Maritime security concerns are
providing a rationale for naval buildups and modernization efforts, such as China’s and India’s development of blue water naval
capabilities.If the fiscal stimulus focus for these countries indeed turns inward, one of the most obvious
funding targets may be military. Buildup of regional naval capabilities could lead to increased tensions,
rivalries, and counterbalancing moves, but it also will create opportunities for multinational cooperation in protecting critical
sea lanes. With water also becoming scarcer in Asia and the Middle East, cooperation to manage changing
water resources is likely to be increasingly difficult both within and between states in a more dog-eat-dog
world.
EV Aff: Economy Adv--1AC (2/3)
Growth removes all incentives for war
Gartzke 11 – Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of California, San Diego PhD from Iowa and B.A. from UCSF (Erik, "SECURITY IN AN INSECURE WORLD,"
www.cato-unbound.org/2011/02/09/erik-gartzke/security-in-an-insecure-world/)
Almost as informative as the decline in warfare has been where this decline is occurring. Traditionally, nations were constrained by
opportunity. Most nations did not fight most others because they could not physically do so. Powerful nations, in contrast, tended to fight
more often, and particularly to fight with other powerful states. Modern “zones of peace” are dominated by powerful,
militarily capable countries. These countries could fight each other, but are not inclined to do so. At the
same time, weaker developing nations that continue to exercise force in traditional ways are incapable of
projecting power against the developed world, with the exception of unconventional methods, such as terrorism. The world is thus
divided between those who could use force but prefer not to (at least not against each other) and those who would be willing to fight but
lack the material means to fight far from home. Warfare in the modern world has thus become an activity involving
weak (usually neighboring) nations, with intervention by powerful (geographically distant) states in a policing
capacity. So, the riddle of peace boils down to why capable nations are not fighting each other. There are several explanations, as
Mack has pointed out. The easiest, and I think the best, explanation has to do with an absence of motive. Modern
states find little incentive to bicker over tangible property, since armies are expensive and the goods that can be looted
are no longer of considerable value. Ironically, this is exactly the explanation that Norman Angell famously supplied before the
World Wars. Yet, today the evidence is abundant that the most prosperous, capable nations prefer to buy
rather than take. Decolonization, for example, divested European powers of territories that were increasingly expensive to
administer and which contained tangible assets of limited value. Of comparable importance is the move to substantial
consensus among powerful nations about how international affairs should be conducted. The great
rivalries of the twentieth century were ideological rather than territorial. These have been substantially
resolved, as Francis Fukuyama has pointed out. The fact that remaining differences are moderate, while
the benefits of acting in concert are large (due to economic interdependence in
particular) means that nations prefer to deliberate rather than fight. Differences remain, but for the most part the
capable countries of the world have been in consensus, while the disgruntled developing world is incapable of acting on respective
nations’ dissatisfaction. While this version of events explains the partial peace bestowed on the developed world, it also poses
challenges in terms of the future. The rising nations of Asia in particular have not been equalbeneficiaries in the world
political system. These nations have benefited from economic integration, and this has proved sufficient
in the past to pacify them. The question for the future is whether the benefits of tangible resources through markets are sufficient
to compensate the rising powers for their lack of influence in the policy sphere. The danger is that established powers may be slow to
accommodate or give way to the demands of rising powers from Asia and elsewhere, leading to divisions over the intangible domain of
policy and politics. Optimists argue that at the same time that these nations are rising in power, their domestic situations are evolving in
a way that makes their interests more similar to the West. Consumerism, democracy, and a market orientation all help to draw the rising
powers in as fellow travelers in an expanding zone of peace among the developed nations. Pessimists argue instead that capabilities
among the rising powers are growing faster than their affinity for western values, or even that fundamental differences exist among the
interests of first- and second-wave powers that cannot be bridged by the presence of market mechanisms or McDonald’s restaurants. If
the peace observed among western, developed nations is to prove durable, it must be because warfare
proves futile as nations transition to prosperity. Whether this will happen depends on the rate of change in interests and
capabilities, a difficult thing to judge. We must hope that the optimistic view is correct, that what ended war in
Europe can be exported globally. Prosperity has made war expensive, while the fruits of conflict, both in terms of
tangible and intangible spoils have declined in value.These forces are not guaranteed to prevail indefinitely. Already, research
on robotic warfare promises to lower the cost of conquest. If in addition, fundamental differences among capable communities arise,
then warfare over ideology or policy can also be resurrected. We must all hope that the consolidating forces of prosperity prevail,
that war becomes a durable anachronism.
EV Aff: Economy Adv--1AC (3/3)
We must invest in a national electrical transportation infrastructure—key to competitiveness
Electrification Coalition, ELECTRIFICATION ROADMAP: REVOLUTIONIZING TRANSPORTATION AND
ACHIEVING ENERGY SECURITY, 11—09, p. 53.
Grid-enabled vehicles will require access to public charging equipment and will frequently interface with the electric power sector. These
requirements present the United States with an opportunity to invest in a 21st century transportation infrastructure. Electrification may
also present the United States with the opportunity to invest in a 21st century transportation infrastructure. Advanced infrastructure
networks are essential to achieving sustainable economic growth and development over the long term. Infrastructure is a national
priority that not only ensures global competitiveness, but also can help countries meet environmental challenges. Ensuring the resilience
of national infrastructure is also vital to long-term national security. Transportation, communication and energy infrastructure have
provided a platform for more than a century of rapid progress in the United States. However, without adequate and appropriate
infrastructure investment, American industries will soon struggle to compete in the global marketplace. The United States has in the past
launched grand infrastructure projects that proved vital to the future health, growth, and stability of the economy. The transcontinental
railroad in the 1800s, the interstate highway network in the 1950s, and the electric power grid throughout the 20th century are a few key
examples. In each of these cases, Americans benefited by enabling and supporting transportation and industrialization across the
country. Today, years of delayed maintenance, chronic underfunding and lack of modernization have left Americans with an outdated
and failing infrastructure that is unable to meet their needs. This endangers the future prosperity of the nation and has a direct effect on
economic competitiveness. Some current estimates suggest that the United States will need to invest $75 billion over the next five years
to update electric generation and transmission infrastructure alone.89 Though power demand is expected to rise more than 23 percent
by 2030, only incremental progress has been made since 2005.90 Efforts at reinforcing the energy grid through further investment in
generation, transmission and distribution have been stymied by local opposition and an onerous permitting process. In this context, the
construction of a national electrified transportation network can be thought of as the cornerstone of an intense effort to modernize both
America’s electrical grid and its transportation sector. Widespread use of electric vehicles will require the substantial deployment of
public charging infrastructure along highways and in cities. It will also require enhancing the intelligence, robustness, and flexibility of the
electric power sector, particularly at the distribution level. This kind of massive infrastructure project has the potential to once again
fundamentally transform our transportation system.
Grid-enabled electric vehicles are key to competitiveness and bolstering consumer spending
Richard Lowenthal, CEO, Coulomb Technologies, Testimony before the Senate Appropriations Committee,
Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development, 2—23—10, lexis.
Both EVs and PHEVs provide consumers and the broader economy with two distinct advantages compared to conventional vehicles.
First, electric miles are cheaper than gasoline miles. Operating a vehicle on electricity in the United States is considerably less
expensive than operating a vehicle on gasoline. In large part, this is due to the high efficiency of electric motors, which can turn 90
percent of the energy content of electricity into mechanical energy. In contrast, today's best internal combustion (IC) engines have
efficiency ratings of just 25 to 27 percent. With gasoline at $3.00 per gallon, the operating cost of a highly efficient IC engine vehicle (30
miles per gallon) is 10 cents per mile. For current pure electric vehicles, assuming an average electricity price of 10 cents per kilowatt
hour, operating costs are only 2.5 cents per mile. Second, electric miles are cleaner than gasoline miles. Vehicle miles fueled by
electricity emit less CO2 than those fueled by gasoline--even with today's mix of generating resources. As renewable power increases
its share of the electricity portfolio, and to the extent that new nuclear power comes on line, the emissions profile of the U.S. power
sector will continue to improve over time; this improvement will directly enhance the emissions benefits of grid-enabled vehicles. By
adopting these technologies at scale, the United States would dramatically reduce its dependence on petroleum, achieve significant
reductions in energy-related greenhouse gas emissions, and catalyze the next generation of industry and manufacturing jobs that could
be the backbone of our country's economic competitiveness in the decades to come. Ultimately, moving to an electric-drive
transportation sector would also substantially increase disposable income for American households, because overall spending on
energy would decrease. This transition is not only technologically possible, it is fundamentally necessary if we are to improve our
economic and national security while preserving our natural environment. However, the wide-scale transformation of our petroleumbased transport system to one powered by electricity is far from certain today. There are a number of challenges facing electrification
that, if not addressed in the near-term, could postpone or prevent progress toward a more secure, efficient transportation sector.
EV Aff: Economy Adv--Auto Industry 2AC
EV technology leadership can drive economic recovery by stimulating growth, manufacturing, and
green jobs
Greenwald and Nigro, 12 – Judi Greenwald is the Project Director at the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions, and Nick Nigro is the Project Manager at the Center for
Climate and Energy Solutions (“An Action Plan To Integrate Plug-in Electric Vehicles With The U.S. Electrical Grid”, Center for Climate Change and Energy Solutions, March,
http://www.c2es.org/docUploads/PEV-action-plan.pdf)//AL
America’s reliance on imported oil leads to a U.S. trade deficit of hundreds of billions of dollars. Electricity
for PEVs provides a suitable alternative that is typically less costly per vehicle mile traveled. Furthermore, as
the world diversifies away from fossil fuels, the economic opportunity to lead in the clean energy industry
is considerable. PEVs’ Effect on Economic Growth: The United States can lead the world in PEV technology
including advanced vehicle batteries and the overall advanced vehicle market, which could stimulate
economic growth. Market growth for alternative and fuel-efficient vehicles can help revitalize U.S.
manufacturing and herald a new era of American leadership in the automobile industry. While the U.S.
economy has struggled to recover fully from the global financial crisis of 2008, clean energy has been one driver of
the recovery. The design and manufacture of new vehicles, including PEVs, has already created thousands of
jobs in the United States.
Auto industry is key to solid growth and produces a huge multiplier effect.
Chandra and Homan 12 – reporters for Bloomberg News (Shobhana and Timothy R., “What’s Good for GM is
Good for the Economy” Bloomberg BusinessWeek, May 17, 2012, http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2012-0517/whats-good-for-gm-is-good-for-the-economy)//ctc
Now for the ripple effect. Government data show that motor-vehicle production contributed half of the first quarter’s
annual pace of 2.2 percent economic growth. When an industry is expanding that fast, it lifts the fortunes
of thousands of other companies. The auto resurgence—from assembly lines and dealerships to steelmakers, freight
lines, and loan providers—signals the U.S. is headed for solid growth, says Joseph Carson, director of global economic
research at AllianceBernstein (AB) in New York. “We’re starting to see the spark in the auto sector that was missing initially” during the
recovery from the recession, says Carson, a former GM economist. “It tells you there’s a certain momentum. A whole host of
areas could see the multiplier effect.We’re at the beginning of a very long and durable cycle.” Contributing to
the auto sales revival are rising employment, an improvement in consumer confidence, and a thaw in lending. Chad Moutray, chief
economist at the National Association of Manufacturers in Washington, D.C., estimates each dollar spent in the industry
triggers an additional $2.02 for the economy. Apex Tool &Manufacturing is benefiting from the trickledown as
the maker of tooling, fixtures, and gauges used to manufacture glass and other products has seen an
increase in auto-related sales since the last quarter of 2011.Glass for vehicles “is the one part of our
business that’s on the rise,” says Apex President Terry Babb. “Everything else is sort of diminishing.” Conglomerate
3M (MMM), which makes fuel-system tuneup kits, beat analysts’ first-quarter profit estimates as U.S. auto and industrial demand
cushioned slowing growth abroad. Rising car sales are helping generate the most business for railroads in four
years: Data from companies including Union Pacific (UNP) and Norfolk Southern (NSC) s how motor-vehicle shipments for
the final week of March hit their highest levelsince June 2008. Foreign companies also are responding to rising U.S.
demand. Faurecia (EO), Europe’s largest maker of car interiors, said on May 3 that it will acquire an interior-components business in
Saline, Mich. VW Credit, the U.S. finance arm of Germany’s Volkswagen (VOW), said in April it’s expanding its Libertyville, Ill., office
and adding about 150 jobs through 2018. Toyota Motor (TM), the biggest seller of hybrid vehicles, said in early May that it wants to
produce more Prius models as demand outpaces its U.S. target of more than 220,000 cars this year. Toyota has also announced it will
spend about $30 million to lift production of four-cylinder engines at its Georgetown, Ky., plant by August 2013, adding about 80 jobs.
All this boosts U.S. manufacturing, which grew in April at the fastest pace in almost a year, according to the
Institute for Supply Management. One reason factories may remain a source of strength for the economy is low
stockpiles, particularly of automobiles, says Conrad DeQuadros, senior economist and founding partner at RDQ Economics
in New York. The inventory-to-sales ratio for motor vehicles—at 1.9 in March—is holding around last year’s
average of 1.87 and is down from 2.39 in 2008, the peak since recordkeeping began in 1967, he says. “Given
the combination of a low-inventory environment and the current selling rates, you could see continued
solid growth in production,” DeQuadros says. There are caveats. The gains in auto sales depend on continued improvement in
overall employment. The jobless rate has been above 8 percent for more than three years, and payrolls rose by 115,000 in April, the
poorest showing in six months, after a 154,000 gain in March, adding to concerns the labor market may be faltering. And even if the
industry’s rebound continues, sales haven’t returned to the pre-recession level of 16.1 million in 2007. The industry’s current share of
gross domestic product, at 2.8 percent, is well below the record 4.8 percent in 1968. While the pickup in sales and its potential to filter
through the economy is clear to investors, auto stocks underperform the market as a whole. Investors are leery of making risky bets on
an industry that was on the brink not long ago. Still, a revival “obviously benefits everybody,” says NAM’s Moutray. “You’re
not only helping outside the auto industry—the glass and steel and seat manufacturers—but you’re also
helping the restaurant that’s on the corner next to all those facilities. It is going to continue to be a bright spot for
manufacturing throughout this year and next.” The bottom line: With production accounting for a big share of GDP
growth, the auto industry is spreading its wealth to suppliers and their employees.
EV Aff: Economy Adv--Competitiveness 2AC (1/3)
U.S. needs to establish a global leadership position in EVs – key to revitalizing the U.S.
manufacturing sector
Lane 11 (Bradley W., Assistant Professor, Institute for Policy and Economic Development, University of Texas at El Paso, “Plug-in Electric Vehicles: A Practical Plan for Progress”, SCHOOL
OF PUBLIC AND ENVIRONMENTAL AFFAIRS, February 2011, http://works.bepress.com/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1010&context=bradleywlane&seiredir=1&referer=http%3A%2F%2Fscholar.google.com%2Fscholar%3Fas_ylo%3D2011%26q%3DElectric%2Bvehicles%2Bare%2Bkey%2Bto%2Benvironmental%2Bleadership%2B%26hl%3Den%2
6as_sdt%3D0%2C23#search=%22Electric%20vehicles%20key%20environmental%20leadership%22, HLR)
The U.S. automotive, battery, and electric power industries, in collaboration with the U.S. government and universities, should
seek to establish a global leadership position in electric mobility, especially in advanced energy storage technologies
and production of batteries and related components. Constructive steps have already been taken toward fostering a
U.S.-based supply chain for PEVs and expanding R&D into advanced batteries and other power train components.
The track record of policies toward PEVs needs to be evaluated and, where necessary, refined as technology and market conditions
change. Thus, the national demonstration and R&D program should be seen not just as a strategy to pursue
worthy energy security and environmental goals, but also as a strategy to help revitalize the U.S.
manufacturing sector.
The global electrification race is on—we risk falling behind without the plan
Electrification Coalition, ELECTRIFICATION ROADMAP: REVOLUTIONIZING TRANSPORTATION AND
ACHIEVING ENERGY SECURITY, 11—09, p. 54.
Stringent CO2 emissions standards and high fuel prices have contributed to rapid developments in the global GEV industry. The United
States faces the very real risk of being left behind in the next global industry. In addition to the direct costs of failing to address U.S. oil
dependence, there are less direct but equally substantial costs associated with failure to move aggressively to support electrification. In
particular, the United States is currently on a path to be at best a second-tier participant in the emerging global market for GEVs and
their component parts. Throughout the electrification value chain, new markets are rapidly developing in Europe and Asia—in battery
technology in particular—and the United States is likely to forfeit the income, manufacturing capacity, jobs, and economic growth
associated with these markets if the status quo approach remains in place. Ingrained structural advantages and favorable public policies
in Asia and much of the industrialized world have laid the groundwork for electrification, and the global marketplace is developing
rapidly. Meanwhile, the lack of a long-term regulatory framework supporting electrification has arguably already been costly for the U.S.
economy. Of the top eight producers of lithium-ion batteries in the world, accounting for 88 percent of the market, none are
headquartered in the United States (all are based in East Asia).91 Currently, no large-format batteries are manufactured and assembled
in the United States at scale. While the global market for advanced batteries was only $900 million in 2008, Deutsche Bank recently
forecast the global market for large format lithium- ion batteries to reach $10 to $15 billion by 2015.92 By comparison, the market for
lithium-ion batteries in consumer products—laptops, cell phones etc.—is currently estimated at roughly $7 billion annually. In fact, the
consumer electronics industry could potentially be a harbinger of the fate of the automotive industry. Unwilling to make the large
investments required to develop manufacturing capacity that offers small returns, U.S. businesses simply allowed almost all consumer
electronics production to migrate to Asia. The electric vehicle, with its high electronics content and expected leaps in connectivity looks
substantially more like a consumer electronics product than cars ever have before. It is not unreasonable to envision a scenario where
Asian firms quickly begin to dominate this industry as well. As the rest of the world pursues electric vehicles, U.S. industry faces the very
real danger of being left behind. Part of U.S. automakers’ hesitancy may simply be the financial requirements of a transition to GEVs. As
the domestic OEMs struggle to gain viability after two bankruptcies, the capital required to re-tool an entire industry is largely
unavailable. Yet, the United States can ill afford to lose another entire industry. A 2002 study estimated the value of the U.S. automotive
value chain at $432 billion.93 This study did not include the compounding value of all the tertiary service industries that rely on the
automotive industry for their health. Although the costs associated with developing a vibrant electric vehicle industry present an
obstacle, the cost of doing nothing, at the risk of giving up the domestic auto industry, is even higher.
We are at risk of losing our global lead in vehicle electrification
Kraig Higginson, Chair, Raser Technologies Inc., Testimony before the Senate Appropriations Committee,
Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development, 2—23—10, lexis.
In fact, the U.S. has led the world in the development of electric motor drive and battery technologies needed for vehicle electrification
including, the invention of the Nickel Metal Hydride and Lithium Ion batteries and advanced AC induction and hybrid motor designs. Yet
at the same time, the U.S. is at high risk of losing its leaderships in both automotive manufacturing and electric vehicle technology to
foreign competitors with government backing. At one time, the U.S. had a 10-20 year lead on electric vehicle development. But sadly we
have a history of being excellent at innovation, but poor at commercialization, failing to capitalize on our own intellectual property in
emerging new industries. As a Case-in-point, although the LCD display technology was invented here in U.S., foreign competitors now
manufacture over 90% of world's LCD screens, which have nearly completely replaced traditional cathode ray tube or CRT displays.
This was due to closer cooperation between private industries and government in countries like Korea.
EV Aff: Economy Adv--Competitiveness 2AC (2/3)
Economic primacy prevents all conflict escalation
Freidberg&Schonfeld, 8 --- *Professor of Politics and IR at Princeton’s Woodrow Wilson School, AND **senior
editor of Commentary and a visiting scholar at the Witherspoon Institute in Princeton (10/21/2008, Aaron and Gabriel,
“The Dangers of a Diminished America”, Wall Street Journal,
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122455074012352571.html?mod=googlenews_wsj)
With the global financial system in serious trouble, is America's geostrategic dominance likely to
diminish? If so, what would that mean? One immediate implication of the crisis that began on Wall Street and spread across the
world is that the primary instruments of U.S. foreign policy will be crimped. The next president will face an entirely new
and adverse fiscal position. Estimates of this year's federal budget deficit already show that it has jumped $237 billion from last year, to
$407 billion. With families and businesses hurting, there will be calls for various and expensive domestic relief programs. In the face of
this onrushing river of red ink, both Barack Obama and John McCain have been reluctant to lay out what portions of their programmatic
wish list they might defer or delete. Only Joe Biden has suggested a possible reduction -- foreign aid. This would be one of the few
popular cuts, but in budgetary terms it is a mere grain of sand. Still, Sen. Biden's comment hints at wherewe may be headed:
toward a major reduction in America's world role, and perhaps even a new era of financially-induced
isolationism. Pressures to cut defense spending, and to dodge the cost of waging two wars, already
intense before this crisis, are likely to mount. Despite the success of the surge, the war in Iraq remains deeply unpopular.
Precipitous withdrawal -- attractive to a sizable swath of the electorate before the financial implosion -- might well become even more
popular with annual war bills running in the hundreds of billions. Protectionist sentiments are sure to grow stronger as
jobs disappear in the coming slowdown. Even before our current woes, calls to save jobs by restricting imports had begun to gather
support among many Democrats and some Republicans. In a prolonged recession, gale-force winds of protectionism
will blow. Then there are the dolorous consequences of a potential collapse of the world's financial
architecture. For decades now, Americans have enjoyed the advantages of being at the center of that
system. The worldwide use of the dollar, and the stability of our economy, among other things, made it easier
for us to run huge budget deficits, as we counted on foreigners to pick up the tab by buying dollardenominated assets as a safe haven. Will this be possible in the future? Meanwhile, traditional foreign-policy
challenges are multiplying. The threat from al Qaeda and Islamic terrorist affiliates has not been
extinguished. Iran and North Korea are continuing on their bellicose paths, while Pakistan and Afghanistan are
progressing smartly down the road to chaos. Russia's new militancy and China's seemingly relentless rise also give
cause for concern.If America now tries to pull back from the world stage, it will leave a dangerous power
vacuum. The stabilizing effects of our presence in Asia, our continuing commitment to Europe, and our
position as defender of last resort for Middle East energy sources and supply lines could all be placed at
risk. In such a scenario there are shades of the 1930s, when global trade and finance ground nearly to a halt, the
peaceful democracies failed to cooperate, and aggressive powers led by the remorseless fanatics who
rose up on the crest of economic disaster exploited their divisions. Today we run the risk that rogue states
may choose to become ever more reckless with their nuclear toys, just at our moment of maximum
vulnerability. The aftershocks of the financial crisis will almost certainly rock our principal strategic
competitors even harder than they will rock us. The dramatic free fall of the Russian stock market has demonstrated the fragility
of a state whose economic performance hinges on high oil prices, now driven down by the global slowdown. China is perhaps even
more fragile, its economic growth depending heavily on foreign investment and access to foreign markets. Both will now be constricted,
inflicting economic pain and perhaps even sparking unrest in a country where political legitimacy rests on progress in the long march to
prosperity. None of this is good news if the authoritarian leaders of these countries seek to divert attention
from internal travails with external adventures. As for our democratic friends, the present crisis comes when many
European nations are struggling to deal with decades of anemic growth, sclerotic governance and an impending demographic crisis.
Despite its past dynamism, Japan faces similar challenges. India is still in the early stages of its emergence as a world economic and
geopolitical power. What does this all mean? There is no substitute for America on the world stage. The choice we have
before us is between the potentially disastrous effects of disengagement and the stiff price tag of continued American leadership.
EV Aff: Economy Adv--Competitiveness 2AC (3/3)
Competitiveness prevents great power nuclear war
Khalilzad, ’11 (Zalmay, United States Ambassador to Afghanistan, Iraq, and the United Nations during the presidency of George W. Bush and the Director of Policy Planning at the
Defense Department from 1990 to 1992, “ The Economy and National Security”, 2-8-11, http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/print/259024)
We face this domestic challenge while other major powers are experiencing rapid economic growth. Even though countries such as
China, India, and Brazil have profound political, social, demographic, and economic problems, their economies are growing
faster than ours, and this could alter the global distribution of power. These trends could in the long term
produce a multi-polar world. If U.S. policymakers fail to act and other powers continue to grow, it is not a question
of whether but when a new international order will emerge. The closing of the gap between the United States and
its rivals could intensify geopolitical competition among major powers, increase incentives for local powers
to play major powers against one another, and undercut our will to preclude or respond to international
crises because of the higher risk of escalation. The stakes are high. In modern history, the longest period of
peace among the great powers has been the era of U.S. leadership. By contrast,multi-polar systems have
been unstable, with their competitive dynamics resulting in frequent crises and major wars among the
great powers. Failures of multi-polar international systems produced both world wars. American
retrenchment could have devastating consequences. Without an American security blanket, regional
powers could rearm in an attempt to balance against emerging threats. Under this scenario, there would be a
heightened possibility of arms races, miscalculation, or other crises spiraling into all-out conflict.
Alternatively, in seeking to accommodate the stronger powers, weaker powers may shift their geopolitical
posture away from the United States. Either way, hostile states would be emboldened to make aggressive
moves in their regions. As rival powers rise, Asia in particular is likely to emerge as a zone of great-power
competition. Beijing’s economic rise has enabled a dramatic military buildup focused on acquisitions of naval,
cruise, and ballistic missiles, long-range stealth aircraft, and anti-satellite capabilities. China’s strategic modernization is aimed,
ultimately, at denying the United States access to the seas around China. Even as cooperative economic ties in the region have grown,
China’s expansive territorial claims — and provocative statements and actions following crises in Korea and incidents at sea — have
roiled its relations with South Korea, Japan, India, and Southeast Asian states. Still, the United States is the most significant
barrier facing Chinese hegemony and aggression. Given the risks, the United States must focus on restoring
its economic and fiscal condition while checking and managing the rise of potential adversarial regional
powers such as China. While we face significant challenges, the U.S. economy still accounts for over 20 percent of the world’s
GDP. American institutions — particularly those providing enforceable rule of law — set it apart from all the rising
powers. Social cohesion underwrites political stability. U.S. demographic trends are healthier than those of any other
developed country. A culture of innovation, excellent institutions of higher education, and a vital sector of small and medium-sized
enterprises propel the U.S. economy in ways difficult to quantify. Historically, Americans have responded pragmatically, and sometimes
through trial and error, to work our way through the kind of crisis that we face today.
The long-term future of our economy is at risk—public investment in things like transportation is
key to our long-term competitiveness and economic health
Adam Hersh and Christian E. Weller, “Making the Right Investments Now Is Key to Future Productivity,” Center for
American Progress, 2—15—12, www.americanprogress.org/issues/2012/02/prod_snapshot.html, accessed 5-4-12.
It has been four years since the start of the Great Recession in December 2007, and the U.S. economy is recovering steadily. Some
indicators show strength such as the labor market, which added more than 600,000 jobs in the past three months. That is great for
people looking for jobs right now, but many of these jobs are low-paying, low-benefit, and unstable. For the longer term people need
well-paying, stable jobs, and those will depend in large measure on productivity growth. As we explain below, however, the U.S.
economy shows some worrisome trends in its productivity growth. Productivity growth—the rate at which we increase production for a
given amount of work and resources—is at the heart of economic growth, competitiveness, and sustained improvements in living
standards for working Americans. In an economy where workers share the fruits of their labors, productivity growth translates into more
and better jobs, and rising incomes for middle-class families. A number of factors affect productivity growth in the future, including the
pace of business investment, the availability of skilled workers, investments in science and research, and adequate financing to bring
new ideas and products to market. The indicators reviewed in this brief raise a number of concerns about the future of U.S. productivity
and, in turn, competitiveness: Productivity growth slowed sharply in the final quarter of 2011 and has increased at only a modest pace
since the start of the current business cycle in December 2007. Further widening of the U.S. high-tech trade deficit signals that the U.S.
economy’s competitive edge needs resharpening. Business investment slowed in the three months through December 2011 and
remains historically low. Corporations are not directing their strong profits to productivity-enhancing activities but rather are holding cash
or buying back their own stock to prop up the share price. Private venture capital investors remain reluctant to fund early-stage
innovative business ideas. How productivity gains are distributed in the economy needs to be addressed, but the gains we’re seeing are
worryingly small. With higher productivity growth we can grow the pie of goods and services available for the same work and be better
positioned to address long-term challenges facing the U.S. economy: increasingly threatened middle-class living standards, the
economic needs of an aging population, long-term federal budget balance, environmental consequences of economic activity, and
increased international competition from rapidly developing countries. Achieving high productivity growth demands sustained policy
attention to create private incentives and supply complementary public investments. The budget President Barack Obama delivered to
Congress this week makes a down payment on these goals for renewing U.S. productivity growth with investments in: Basic education,
affordability of college, and ongoing skills development of the workforce Increased support for research and development, and tax
incentives for manufacturers who create jobs at home Tax incentives for business investment Improved efficiency of our transportation
infrastructure to reduce business costs Congress should move without delay to pass this budget and help build a stronger, more
productive economy to secure long-term U.S. economic competitiveness.
EV Aff: Economy Adv--EVs Solve 2AC
Electrification boosts economy—cuts trade deficit, increases consumer spending
Genevieve Cullen, Vice President, Electric Drive Transportation Association, Testimony before the Senate Energy
and Natural Resources Committee, 5—19—11, lexis.
In addition to the consumer interest in the arrival of grid-fueled (or "plug-in") cars and trucks, the ability of the grid to displace oil
consumption also has significant national security and economic implications. Reliance on oil, and hence the global oil market, is
extremely costly to us as a nation. The acute pain currently being felt at the pump, while not inconsequential, is just a recurring symptom
of the larger problem of our dependence on foreign oil. We import more than half our oil needs and transportation accounts for 72
percent of that consumption. Electricity, on the other hand, is domestically produced from diverse conventional and renewable sources.
The energy security benefits of electric drive are accompanied by the economy-wide benefits of growing U.S. technology and
manufacturing leadership - instead of spending about $380 billion a year to pay our foreign oil bill. At the micro- level, electricity is 1/4
to1/5 the cost of oil - 3 cents versus 12-15 cents per mile. Further, electricity prices are more stable and do not exhibit the volatility of
gas prices. It is estimated that each one dollar increase in the annual average price of a gallon of gasoline reduces average American
household discretionary spending by roughly ten percent.
Electric vehicles boost economy—lower trade deficit, higher domestic employment
Jeff Merkley, U.S. Senator, Testimony before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, FEDERAL
NEWS SERVICE, 5—19—11, lexis.
And fourth, electric vehicles eliminate pollution from the tailpipe. Our fleet today emits pollutants that lead to asthma and contribute to
global warming. Electric vehicles are clean as electricity they use. And, fortunately, that electricity is getting cleaner. Fifth, the fuels that
provides electricity will come right here from America, creating jobs at home; 99.99 percent of the fuels used to create electricity are
here in America. We import 0.01 percent from Canada. By meeting our transportation energy needs from domestic fuels, we reduce
economic and security risks. We reduce our trade deficit. Half of our trade deficit comes from importing oil. When we replace imported
oil with red, white and blue American-made energy, we create jobs here at home.
PHEVs can become a massive export good, driving job creation
Bill Amburg, Senior Vice President, CALSTART, Testimony before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources
Committee, 5—19—11, lexis.
There is a strategic opportunity in this sector, as well, for economic leadership and job growth. The U.S. is currently the world leader in
advanced efficiency technologies for trucks and buses, particularly in hybrid and electric drivelines, presenting a tremendous opportunity
for job growth and even for expanded exports. A recent Duke University - Center on Globalization, Governance and Competitiveness
report identifies these technologies as areas in which the United States has a strategic advantage as an early leader. The particular
areas it researched were electric hybrid and hydraulic hybrid drive systems and the growing high tech component industry supply chain
in the United States to produce them. Indeed, CALSTART sees a tremendous opportunity for export of such components and products,
given U.S. leadership. We are currently working on a program to develop industry partnerships for product export opportunities in these
technologies to China with our U.S. industry partners. We have already seen growth in exports of such products as advanced natural
gas engine systems from North America. Additionally, UCS and CALSTART last year completed a report on the economic and job
growth opportunities from high efficiency trucks. Called "Delivering Jobs." it documented that 124,000 jobs can be created along with
$24 billion in economic savings over the next two decades through expansion of efficiency throughout medium- and heavy-duty
vehicles.
EV Aff: Oil Adv--1AC (1/2)
Advantage Two: Oil
Oil dependence risks destroying the economy
Electrification Coalition, ELECTRIFICATION ROADMAP: REVOLUTIONIZING TRANSPORTATION AND
ACHIEVING ENERGY SECURITY, 11—09, p. 33.
Direct wealth transfer is but one of the many economic costs of American oil dependence. Researchers at the Oak Ridge National
Laboratories (ORNL), for example, have studied at least two others. First, significant economic costs stem from the temporary
misallocation of resources as the result of sudden price changes. In short, when oil prices fluctuate, it becomes difficult for households
and businesses to budget for the long term, and economic activity is significantly curtailed. Second, the existence of an oligopoly inflates
oil prices above their free-market cost. As a result, some economic growth is foregone due to higher costs for fuel and other products.
ORNL studies estimate the combined damage to the U.S. economy from oil dependence between 1970 and 2008 to be $5.5 trillion in
current dollars.39 For 2008 alone, the cost was nearly $600 billion (see Figure 1H).
Oil dependence undermines leadership--military overstrech
Electrification Coalition, ELECTRIFICATION ROADMAP: REVOLUTIONIZING TRANSPORTATION AND
ACHIEVING ENERGY SECURITY, 11—09, p. 30.
The importance of oil in the U.S. economy has given it a place of prominence in foreign and military policy. In particular, two key issues
related to oil affect national security. First, the vulnerability of global oil supply lines and infrastructure has driven the United States to
accept the burden of securing the world’s oil supply. Second, the importance of large individual oil producers constrains U.S. foreign
policy options when dealing with problems in these nations. A crippling disruption to global oil supplies ranks among the most immediate
threats to the United States today. A prolonged interruption due to war in the Middle East or the closure of a key oil transit route would
lead to severe economic dislocation. U.S. leaders have recognized this for decades, and have made it a matter of stated policy that the
United States will protect the free flow of oil with military force. Still, policy alone has consistently fallen short of complete deterrence,
and the risk of oil supply interruptions has persisted for nearly 40 years. To mitigate this risk, U.S. armed forces expend enormous
resources protecting chronically vulnerable infrastructure in hostile corners of the globe and patrolling oil transit routes. This
engagement benefits all nations, but comes primarily at the expense of the American military and ultimately the American taxpayer. A
2009 study by the RAND Corporation placed the ongoing cost of this burden at between $67.5 billion and $83 billion annually, plus an
additional $8 billion in military operations. 33 In proportional terms, these costs suggest that between 12 and 15 percent of the current
defense budget is devoted to guaranteeing the free flow of oil. Foreign policy constraints related to oil dependence are less quantifiable,
but no less damaging. Whether dealing with uranium enrichment in Iran, a hostile regime in Venezuela, or an increasingly assertive
Russia, American diplomacy is distorted by our need to minimize disruptions to the flow of oil. Perhaps more frustrating, the importance
of oil to the broader global economy has made it nearly impossible for the United States to build international consensus on a wide
range of foreign policy and humanitarian issues.
That threatens massive wars
Thomas P.M. Barnett, U.S. Naval War College, "The New Rules: Leadership Fatigue Puts U.S., Globalization, at
Crossroads," WORLD POLITICS REVIEW, 3--7--11, Ebsco.
It is worth first examining the larger picture: We live in a time of arguably the greatest structural change in the global order yet endured,
with this historical moment's most amazing feature being its relative and absolute lack of mass violence. That is something to consider
when Americans contemplate military intervention in Libya, because if we do take the step to prevent larger-scale killing by engaging in
some killing of our own, we will not be adding to some fantastically imagined global death count stemming from the ongoing
"megalomania" and "evil" of American "empire." We'll be engaging in the same sort of system-administering activity that has marked our
stunningly successful stewardship of global order since World War II. Let me be more blunt: As the guardian of globalization, the U.S.
military has been the greatest force for peace the world has ever known. Had America been removed from the global dynamics that
governed the 20th century, the mass murder never would have ended. Indeed, it's entirely conceivable there would now be no
identifiable human civilization left, once nuclear weapons entered the killing equation. But the world did not keep sliding down that path
of perpetual war. Instead, America stepped up and changed everything by ushering in our now-perpetual great-power peace. We
introduced the international liberal trade order known as globalization and played loyal Leviathan over its spread. What resulted was the
collapse of empires, an explosion of democracy, the persistent spread of human rights, the liberation of women, the doubling of life
expectancy, a roughly 10-fold increase in adjusted global GDP and a profound and persistent reduction in battle deaths from statebased conflicts. That is what American "hubris" actually delivered. Please remember that the next time some TV pundit sells you the
image of "unbridled" American military power as the cause of global disorder instead of its cure. With self-deprecation bordering on selfloathing, we now imagine a post-American world that is anything but. Just watch who scatters and who steps up as the Facebook
revolutions erupt across the Arab world. While we might imagine ourselves the status quo power, we remain the world's most vigorously
revisionist force. As for the sheer "evil" that is our military-industrial complex, again, let's examine what the world looked like before that
establishment reared its ugly head. The last great period of global structural change was the first half of the 20th century, a period that
saw a death toll of about 100 million across two world wars. That comes to an average of 2 million deaths a year in a world of
approximately 2 billion souls. Today, with far more comprehensive worldwide reporting, researchers report an average of less than
100,000 battle deaths annually in a world fast approaching 7 billion people. Though admittedly crude, these calculations suggest a 90
percent absolute drop and a 99 percent relative drop in deaths due to war. We are clearly headed for a world order characterized by
multipolarity, something the American-birthed system was designed to both encourage and accommodate. But given how things turned
out the last time we collectively faced such a fluid structure, we would do well to keep U.S. power, in all of its forms, deeply embedded in
the geometry to come. To continue the historical survey, after salvaging Western Europe from its half-century of civil war, the U.S.
emerged as the progenitor of a new, far more just form of globalization -- one based on actual free trade rather than colonialism.
America then successfully replicated globalization further in East Asia over the second half of the 20th century, setting the stage for the
Pacific Century now unfolding.
EV Aff: Oil Adv--1AC (2/2)
Scarcity-induced oil wars risk extinction
Stephen Lendman (Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization) 07 “Resource Wars - Can We Survive Them”
http://www.rense.com/general76/resrouce.htm
With the world's energy supplies finite, the US heavily dependent on imports, and "peak oil" near or approaching,
"security" for America means assuring a sustainable supply of what we can't do without. It includes waging wars to
get it, protect it, and defend the maritime trade routes over which it travels. That means energy's partnered
with predatory New World Order globalization, militarism, wars, ecological recklessness, and now an extremist
US administration willing to risk Armageddon for world dominance. Central to its plan is first controlling
essential resources everywhere, at any cost, starting with oil and where most of it is located in the Middle East and Central
Asia. The New "Great Game" and Perils From It The new "Great Game's" begun, but this time the stakes are greater than ever as
explained above. The old one lasted nearly 100 years pitting the British empire against Tsarist Russia when the issue wasn't oil. This
time, it's the US with help from Israel, Britain, the West, and satellite states like Japan, South Korea and Taiwan challenging Russia and
China with today's weapons and technology on both sides making earlier ones look like toys. At stake is more than oil. It's
planet earth with survival of all life on it issue number one twice over. Resources and wars for them means
militarism is increasing, peace declining, and the planet's ability to sustain life front and center, if anyone's paying attention.
They'd better be because beyond the point of no return, there's no second chance the way Einstein explained after the atom was split.
His famous quote on future wars was : "I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with
sticks and stones." Under a worst case scenario, it's more dire than that. There may be nothing left but resilient beetles
and bacteria in the wake of a nuclear holocaust meaning even a new stone age is way in the future, if at all. The threat
is real and once nearly happened during the Cuban Missile Crisis in October, 1962. We later learned a miracle saved us at the 40th
anniversary October, 2002 summit meeting in Havana attended by the US and Russia along with host country Cuba. For the first time,
we were told how close we came to nuclear Armageddon. Devastation was avoided only because Soviet submarine captain
VasilyArkhipov countermanded his order to fire nuclear-tipped torpedos when Russian submarines were attacked by US destroyers near
Kennedy's "quarantine" line. Had he done it, only our imagination can speculate what might have followed and whether planet earth, or
at least a big part of it, would have survived.
EVs solve--can use the existing grid
Dr. Gal Luft, Executive Director, Institute for the Analysis of Global Security, Testimony before the Senate Homeland
Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, CQ CONGRESSIONAL TESTIMONY, 7—22—08, lexis.
Since we hardly generate any electricity from oil, using electricity as a transportation fuel enables the full spectrum of electricity sources
to compete with petroleum. Plug in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) can reach oil economy levels of 100 miles per gallon of gasoline
without compromising the size, safety, or power of a vehicle. If a PHEV is also a flexiblefuel vehicle powered by 85 percent alcohol and
15 percent gasoline, oil economy could reach over 500 miles per gallon of gasoline. Ideally, plug-in hybrids would be charged at night in
home or apartment garages, when electric utilities have significant reserve capacity. The Department of Energy estimates that over 70
percent of the U.S. vehicle market could shift to plug-in hybrids without needing to install additional baseload electricity- generating
capacity. In addition, the U.S. is the world's biggest potential market for electric cars which can be sold as second or third family car.
Thirty one percent of America's households own two cars and additional 35% own three or more vehicles. There are over 75 million
households in the US that own more than one vehicle and that can potentially replace one or more gasoline only cars with cars powered
with made-in- America electricity.
Electrification is key to energy independence
Electrification Coalition, ELECTRIFICATION ROADMAP: REVOLUTIONIZING TRANSPORTATION AND
ACHIEVING ENERGY SECURITY, 11—09, p. 11.
Despite the magnitude of the challenge and decades of political and policy shortfalls, a solution to America’s oil dependence is
emerging. The United States now has the capacity to permanently enhance our national security and safeguard our economy. To do so,
however, the United States must fundamentally transform our transportation sector, moving from cars and trucks that depend on costly
oil-based fuels to an integrated system that powers our mobility with domestically-generated electricity. Electrified transportation has
clear advantages over the current petroleum-based system. Electricity represents a diverse, domestic, stable, fundamentally scalable
energy supply whose fuel inputs are almost completely free of oil. High penetration rates of gridenabled vehicles—vehicles propelled in
whole or in part by electricity drawn from the grid and stored onboard in a battery—could radically minimize the importance of oil to the
United States, strengthening our economy, improving national security, and providing much-needed flexibility to our foreign policy.
Simultaneously, such a system would clear a path to dramatically reduced economy-wide emissions of greenhouse gases. Therefore,
this report proposes completely transforming the light-duty vehicle fleet into one in which grid-enabled mobility is the new conventional
standard. By 2040, 75 percent of the light-duty vehicle miles traveled (VMT) in the United States should be electric miles. As a result, oil
consumption in the lightduty fleet would be reduced to just 2.0 mbd, compared to today’s level of 8.6 mbd, and it is conceivable that U.S.
oil imports could effectively be reduced to zero.
EV Aff: Oil Adv--Auto Industry Key to Leadership
EVs are key to maintaining global competitiveness in the automobile industry – other countries are
vying to take the lead
Smith ’11 – Writer for Market Urbanism, Forbes, Reason, and the National Review – specializes in the politics, economics, and history of
urbanism (Stephen, “Obama’s Sprawl-Promoting Industrial Policy: Electric Cars,” Market Urbanism, August 27 2011,
http://marketurbanism.com/2011/08/27/obamas-sprawl-promoting-industrial-policy-electriccars/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+MarketUrbanism+%28Market+Urbanism%29) // AMG
During the past few decades, “industrial policy” was an epithet, and you still won’t see Obama going around calling his “green jobs”
projects industrial policy in speeches any time soon. But some think it’s time to shed the stigma, and the flagship Obama industrial
policy seems to be electric vehicles – or more specifically, the batteries that power them: “It was a calculated risk — a lot of
money, to be sure, but given the stakes, I think it was a pretty thoughtful bet,” says Ron Bloom, who
recently served as an assistant to President Obama for manufacturing policy. “If vehicle electrification
really does take off, as many, many people think it will, and we’re not part of it, then we could lose our
leadership of the global automobile industry.” Which would be catastrophic. By some estimates, as much
as 20 percent of all manufacturing jobs are directly or indirectly related to the automobile industry. Bloom
points out that the United States is not the only country betting on batteries; a number of Asian countries
have done so as well.
Maintaining global auto competitiveness is key to our industrial base and technological leadership
Ronis 06 statement of dr. Sheila ronis, director mba/ms programs, walsh college; vice president, national defense
university foundation, troy, michigan china’s impact on the u.s. auto and auto parts industries hearing before the
u.s.-china economic and security review commission one hundred ninth congress second session _________ july 17,
2006 http://www.uscc.gov/hearings/2006hearings/transcripts/july_17/06_07_17_trans.pdf
What isn't understood is the reality that the auto industry affects DMSMS because the industrial infrastructure that
supports the Department of Defense is shared by the auto industry. When a tier supplier to the auto industry
goes under, whether it is a machine tool company or in microelectronics, it reduces DoD's ability to function whether we
say so or not. I think we might as well say so. When government R&D investment in an industry deteriorates, it's
only a matter of time before an industry is in trouble. Manufacturing R&D by the federal government has
almost disappeared. Young people no longer view working in manufacturing as a possible career so we're losing our ability
to train the next generation of scientists and engineers. We're losing critical to defense industries from
shipbuilding to machine tools, high performance explosives and explosive components, cartridge and
propellant actuated devices, welding and even the nuclear industry. All of these industries share the
bottom of the base with the auto industry, and that is what has become a national security issue. We need
to maintain a capability to be globally competitive in both product and process innovation. We must regain our
manufacturing prowess and leadership. We need to reinvigorate the Manufacturing Extension Partnership Program at NIST. We need
to prioritize those technologies that are critical to regaining and then maintaining leadership and
competitive advantage in the overall industrial base so China does not become the world's leader in
technologies we need to be a superpower. China is rapidly becoming the manufacturing capital of the
world. For example, Chinese officials have very publicly stated that they want to become the foundry capital of the world and have a
worldwide monopoly on cast parts. They have a plan to win. And we don't. We need to increase our investment in R&D to produce
the leading edge knowledge, capabilities and patents the country must have to remain an economic, diplomatic and military superpower.
We must increase funding to the national laboratories across the board, especially at the Departments of Energy, Commerce and
Defense. We need to rethink our trade, offset and CFIUS policies to encourage the maintenance of high value-added jobs inside the
country. And we need to reform those national systems that are keeping our industry uncompetitive including
pension and health care particularly in the auto industry. The bankruptcy of Delphi is only the first of many dominoes to
fall if nothing changes. CFIUS must be completely rethought. Having General Motors under the control of foreigners is not the answer.
Many foreign entities buy U.S. assets, not to use them, but to dismantle them. Even Daimler's takeover of Chrysler removed serious
capabilities to Germany, though, of course, no one will go on the record with specifics. Cooperation between government and industry is
essential.Unless we look at the industrial base as a system, we don't even see the problem or the possible
military implications. We're also not even asking whether or not a U.S.-owned industrial base matters, and
we need to explore this issue as a nation.
EV Aff: Oil Adv--EVs Solve (General) 2AC
Eliminating foreign oil is unnecessary for independence - we need only reduce imports to where oil
has little to no effect on economic or military policy
Benjamin K. Sovacool, ’07 -(an Assistant Professor at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National
University of Singapore. He is also a Research Fellow in the Energy Governance Program at the Centre on Asia and
Globalization) 2007 “Oil Independence Possible for U.S. by 2030” http://scitizen.com/authors/Benjamin-K.-Sovacool-a899_s_08b456d033fcee27acbc8caf208135e8.html
Oil independence is possible for the U.S. if comprehensive and aggressive energy policies are implemented aimed at reducing
demand for oil, increasing supply, and promoting alternative fuels. Contrary to what most people might think, oil independence is
possible for the United States by 2030. The news is especially important when one considers that, between 1970 and 2000, economists
estimate that the costs of American dependence on foreign supplies of oil have ranged between $5 and $13 trillion dollars. That’s more
than the cost of all wars fought by the U.S. (adjusted for inflation) going all the way back to the Revolutionary War. The trick is to
start by thinking about oil independence a little differently. Oil independence should not be viewed as
eliminating all imports of oil or reducing imports from hostile or unstable oil producing states. Instead, it should entail
creating a world where the costs of the country’s dependence on oil would be so small that they would
have little to no effect on our economic, military, or foreign policy. It means creating a world where the estimated total
economic costs of oil dependence would be less than one percent of U.S. gross domestic product by 2030. Conceived in this way (and
contrary to much political commentary these days), researchers at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) have calculated that if
the country as a whole reduced their demand for oil by 7.22 million barrels per day (MBD) and increased supply by 3
MBD, oil independence would be achieved by 2030 with a 95 percent chance of success. By reducing
demand for oil, increasing its price elasticity, and increasing the supply of conventional and
unconventional petroleum products, ORNL researchers noted that the country would be virtually immune from
oil price shocks and market uncertainty. If large oil producing states were to respond to the U.S. by cutting back production,
their initial gains from higher prices would also reduce their market share, in turn further limiting their ability to influence
the oil market in the future. So if decreasing American demand for oil by 7.22 MBD and increasing supply by 3 MBD would
enable the U.S. to achieve oil independence in 2030, which combination of policies offers an optimal strategy? Policymakers, for
instance, could lower demand for oil by making automobiles more efficient (by legislating more stringent fuel economy standards for light
and heavy duty vehicles or lowering the interstate speed limit), promoting alternatives in mode choice (such as mass transit, light rail,
and carpooling), or establishing telecommuting centers and incentives for commuters to work from home. They could also promote
rigorous standards for tire inflation and reduce oil consumption in other sectors of the economy.
Electrification of transportation is vital to checking oil dependence
Seifi Ghasemi, Chair CEO, Rockwood Holdings, Testimony before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources
Committee, 5—19—11, lexis.
It would be ideal if there was a free market solution to these threats. But there is no free market for oil. Far from it: today, more than 90
percent of proved conventional global oil reserves are held by national oil companies that are either fully or partially controlled by foreign
governments whose interests are often at odds with our own. As long as we remain dependent on those nations, we remain vulnerable.
At the crux of America's oil dependence is the energy demand of the transportation sector. Transportation accounts for approximately 71
percent of American oil consumption. Cars and trucks are 94 percent reliant on oil-based fuel for their energy, with no substitutes
immediately available in anything approaching sufficient quantities. Any shortage of oil will cause a massive disruption of the
transportation system, creating significant difficulties in day-to-day life which will inevitably lead to chaos. Put another way, when prices
go up, we have only two choices: drive less or pay more. This is unacceptable. A new path forward begins with a statement of
fundamental fact: As long as our cars and trucks are powered by internal combustion engines, we will continue to be dependent on oil.
The solution can be found in something that nearly every single one of you has either on your belt or on the table in front of you. The
lithium ion batteries that power our cell phones and laptop computers can one day form the nucleus of an electrified transportation
sector that is powered by a wide variety of domestic sources: natural gas, nuclear, coal, hydroelectric, wind, solar, and geothermal. No
one fuel source--or producer--would be able to hold our transportation system and our economy hostage the way a single nation can
disrupt the flow of petroleum today.
Transportation electrification is the best way to solve oil dependence
Electrification Coalition, ELECTRIFICATION ROADMAP: REVOLUTIONIZING TRANSPORTATION AND
ACHIEVING ENERGY SECURITY, 11—09, p. 22.
The United States is dangerously exposed to a global oil market whose fundamental characteristics all but guarantee increasing
volatility and instability. Oil dependence weakens our national security, threatens our economy, and degrades the environment. U.S. oil
dependence stems largely from the transportation sector, which relies on petroleum for 94 percent of its delivered energy. Electrification
of transportation—powering our light-duty fleet with electricity—is the best solution available for reducing U.S. oil dependence. Electricity
is produced from a diverse range of fuels that are overwhelmingly domestic, and oil has virtually no role in power generation. Today’s
generation mix already offers environmental advantages versus conventional combustion engines for transportation, and the increased
deployment of renewable generation will only improve this benefit. Finally, the technology to power vehicles with electricity over ranges
that meet most drivers’ needs is essentially available today.
EV Aff: Oil Adv--EVs Solve (Price Volatility) 2AC
Electrification solves the risks of oil—much lower price volatility
Seifi Ghasemi, Chair CEO, Rockwood Holdings, Testimony before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources
Committee, 5—19—11, lexis.
2) Electricity Prices are Stable: Electricity prices are significantly less volatile than oil or gasoline prices. Over the past 25 years,
electricity prices have risen steadily but slowly. Since 1983, the average retail price of electricity delivered in the United States has risen
by an average of less than 2 percent per year in nominal terms, and has actually fallen in real terms. Moreover, prices have risen by
more than 5 percent per year only three times in that time period. This price stability, which is in sharp contrast to the price volatility of oil
or gasoline, exists for at least two reasons. First, the retail price of electricity reflects a wide range of costs, only a small portion of which
arise from the underlying cost of the fuel. The remaining costs are largely fixed. In most instances, the cost of fuel represents a smaller
percentage of the overall cost of delivered electricity than the cost of crude oil represents as a percentage of the cost of retail gasoline.
Second, although real-time electricity prices are volatile (sometimes highly volatile on an hour-to-hour or day-to-day basis), they are
nevertheless relatively stable over the medium and long term. Therefore, in setting retail rates, utilities or power marketers use formulas
that will allow them to recover their costs, including the occasionally high real-time prices for electricity, but which effectively isolate the
retail consumer from the hour-to-hour and day-to-day volatility of the real-time power markets. By isolating the consumer from the price
volatility of the underlying fuel costs, electric utilities would be providing to drivers of grid-enabled vehicles (GEVs) --vehicles propelled in
whole or in part by electricity drawn from the grid and stored onboard in a battery--the very stability that oil companies cannot provide to
consumers of gasoline.
Electrification is superior—price stability
Electrification Coalition, ELECTRIFICATION ROADMAP: REVOLUTIONIZING TRANSPORTATION AND
ACHIEVING ENERGY SECURITY, 11—09, p. 38-39.
Electricity prices are significantly less volatile than oil or gasoline prices. Over the past 25 years, electricity prices have risen steadily but
slowly. Since 1983, the average retail price of electricity delivered in the United States has risen by an average of less than 2 percent
per year in nominal terms and has actually fallen in real terms.63 Moreover, prices have risen by more than 5 percent per year only
three times in that time period.64 This price stability, which is in sharp contrast to the price of oil or gasoline, exists for at least two
reasons. First, the retail price of electricity reflects a wide range of costs, only a small portion of which arise from the underlying cost of
the fuel. The remaining costs are largely fixed.65 In most instances, the cost of fuel represents a smaller percentage of the overall cost
of delivered electricity than the cost of crude oil represents as a percentage of the cost of retail gasoline. 66 For instance, although fossil
fuel prices rose 21 percent between 2004 and 2006 (as measured on a cents-per-Btu basis),67 and the price of uranium delivered in
2006 rose 48 percent over the cost of uranium delivered in 2004,68 the national average retail price of all electricity sales increased only
17 percent (from 7.6 cents per kWh to 8.9 cents per kWh);69 the average price of residential electricity rose only 16 percent (from 8.95
to 10.4 cents per kWh).70 This cost structure promotes price stability with respect to the final retail price of electricity. Second, although
real-time electricity prices are volatile (sometimes highly volatile on an hour-to-hour or day-to-day basis) 71 they are nevertheless
relatively stable over the medium and long term. Therefore, in setting retail rates, utilities or power marketers use formulas that will allow
them to recover their costs, including the occasionally high real-time prices for electricity, but which effectively isolate the retail
consumer from the hour-to-hour and day-to-day volatility of the real-time power markets.72 By isolating the consumer from the price
volatility of the underlying fuel costs, electric utilities would be providing to drivers of GEVs the very stability that oil companies cannot
provide to consumers of gasoline.
EVs improve national security—expand fuel diversity, check against price volatility
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), ELECTRIFICATION OF THE TRANSPORTATION SYSTEM, MIT
Energy Initiative Symposium, 4—8—10, p. 23.
Participants noted that vehicle electrification could promote fuel diversity, given the current mix of fuels for power generation in the US
(although, as noted above, the CO2 impacts of electrification vary fairly dramatically based on the fuel used for power generation). It
was also noted that the security benefits of electrification of transportation follow because electricity is generated almost entirely from
domestic fuels while oil is largely imported. The US is currently a net coal exporter and has substantial renewable and natural gas
resources. Although the US imports uranium (U), the cost of U represents an insignificant portion of the cost of the power generated
from a nuclear plant and there are diverse sources of U in the world.36 In addition, electricity prices are generally less volatile than oil
prices, because the underlying cost of fuel represents a relatively smaller portion of the retail price of electricity. Participants noted the
distinction between retail and wholesale prices. In general, regulators shield consumers from short-term price volatility, the impacts of
which are felt upstream of end users.
EV Aff: Oil Adv--Oil Dependence Bad Ext (1/2)
Oil dependence creates multiple scenarios for war – increases the incentive to go to war while
short-circuiting barriers to conflict
GLASER 2011 (Professor of Political Science and International Relations Elliot School of International Affairs The George Washington University, “
Reframing Energy Security: How Oil Dependence Influences U.S. National Security,” August 2011,
http://depts.washington.edu/polsadvc/Blog%20Links/Glaser_-_EnergySecurity-AUGUST-2011.docx, Sawyer)
Oil dependence could reduce a state’s security if its access to oil is vulnerable to disruption and if oil is necessary for operating the
state’s military forces. Vulnerable energy supplies can leave a state open to coercion —recognizing that it is more
likely to lose a war, the state has a weaker bargaining position and is more likely to make concessions. 1
Closely related, if war occurs the state is more likely to lose. Conflict that is influenced by this mechanism is not
fundamentally over the oil;2 rather, when states already have incentives for conflict, the oil vulnerability influences their assessment of
military capabilities and in turn the path to war. Recognizing this type of danger during the Cold War, U.S. planning to protect its sea
lanes of communication with the Persian Gulf was motivated partly by the importance of insuring the steady flow of oil that was
necessary to enable the United States to fight a long war against the Soviet Union in Europe. During the Second World War, Japan’s
vulnerability to a U.S. oil embargo played an important role in destroying Japan’s ability to fight.3 This type of threat to the U.S. military
capabilities is not a serious danger today because the United States does not face a major power capable of severely interrupting its
access to key supplies of oil. In contrast, China does face this type of danger because its oil imports are vulnerable to disruption by the
U.S. Navy. Protecting access to oil threatens other states—an access-driven security dilemma The vulnerability of a state’s
access to oil supplies could reduce its security via a second, more complicated mechanism—if the state’s efforts to protect its
access to oil threaten another state’s security, then this reduced security could in turn reduce the state’s own security. The danger would
follow standard security-dilemma logic, but with the defense of oil supply lines replacing the standard focus on protection of
territory. In the most extreme case, a state could try to solve its import vulnerability through territorial expansion.
In less extreme cases, the state could deal with its vulnerability by building up military forces required to
protect its access to oil, which has the unintended consequence of decreasing its adversary’s military capability and
signaling that the state’s motives are malign, which decreases the adversary’s security, which leads the adversary to
build up its own military forces. 4 Just as protecting a distant ally can require a state to adopt an offensive capability, protecting
access to oil can require offensive power-projection capabilities. Thus, a state’s need to protect its access to oil could create a security
dilemma that would not otherwise exist. Conflict fueled by this security dilemma need not be over oil or access to oil; by damaging
political relations the security dilemma could prevent the states from resolving political disputes and avoiding the
escalation of crises. Here again, the United States does not currently face this type of danger; this is largely because the military
status quo currently favors the United States, which relieves it from having to take provocative actions. In contrast, China’s efforts to
protect its access to oil could be more provocative and generate military competition with the United States. Oil makes territory
increasingly valuable In this type of case, a state places greater value on owning territory because the territory
contains energy resources that are increasingly valuable. The greater value of territory can increase competition
between states, because the benefits of success grow relative to the costs of competition, for example, the costs of arming.
For similar reasons, the greater value of territory increases the probability that crises over territory will lead to war
instead of negotiated compromises, as states are more willing to run the risks of fighting.5 This type of conflict is the classic resource
war, which is the path by which oil is most commonly envisioned leading to conflict.6 We can also hypothesize that the probability of
conflict is greater when territorial boundaries are contested and the political status quo is ambiguous. Because the norm of state
sovereignty is now widely held, states are less likely to launch expansionist wars to take other states’ territory. However, when
boundaries are not settled, states are more likely to compete to acquire territory they value and will compete harder when they value it
more.7 In addition, unsettled boundaries increase the possibilities for boundedly rational bargaining failures that could lead to war. There
are two basic paths via which a state could become involved in this type of oil conflict. The more obvious is for the state to be a claimant
in the dispute and become directly involved in a territorial conflict. The second is likely more important for the United States—an alliance
commitment could draw the state into a resource conflict that initially began between its ally and another state.8 The state would not
have energy interests of its own at stake, but intervenes to protect its ally. Along this path, energy plays an important but less direct role
in damaging the state’s security, because although energy interests fuel the initial conflict, they do not motivate the state’s intervention. 9
A later section explores the possibility of conflict between China and Japan in the East China Sea, with the United States drawn in to
protect Japan and consequently involved in a war with China. When a state’s economy depends heavily on oil, severe
supply disruptions might do sufficiently large economic damage that the state would use military force to
protect its prosperity. A state this suffers this vulnerability risks not only suffering the damage that could be inflicted by a supply
disruption, which might be the by-product of unrelated domestic or international events, but also risks being coerced by an
adversary. Consequently, states will want to be confident that their ability to import oil will be uninterrupted and will pursue policies to
ensure secure access.
1 For a full analy sis of the when and how o il dependence leaves states vu lnerable to coercion, see Rosemary A. Kelanic, “Black Gold and Blac kmail: The Politics of In ternational Oil Coercion” (PhD dis sertation, U niversity of Ch icago, 2011).
2 For important exceptio ns, see Kelanic, “Blac k Go ld and Blackmail.”
3 Jerome B. Cohen, Japan’s Econ omy in War and Reconstruction (Minneapolis: U niversity of Minnesota, 19 49).
4 On the security dilemma see Robert Jervis, “Cooperation U nder the Security Dilemma,” World Politics, Vol. 30, No. 2 (January 1978), pp. 167-214 ; and Charles L. Glaser, “The Security Dilemma Revisited,” World Politics, Vo l. 50, No . 1 (October 1997), p p. 171-201 .
5 In terms of bargaining theory , see Robert Powell, Barg aining in the Shado w o f Power (Princeton : Princeton University Press, 1999), Chp. 3 .
6 For a generally skeptical analy sis of the standard resource war arguments see David G. Victor, “What Resource Wars,” The National Interest (November/December 2007).
7 For related poin ts, see Shaffer, Energy Politics, p p. 67-70, w ho identifies additional examples that I d o not address , includ ing the Spratly Islands in the South Ch ina Sea and the Arctic Circle.
8 Still another path is for a state to in tervene in an energy -driven conflict to protect its access to oil; this is an example of how variou s mechanisms could overlap with each other.
9 This can be understoo d as a form of alliance entrapment; see Glenn H. Sny der, “The Security Dilemma in Alliance Politics,” Wo rld Po litics, Vol. 36, No. 4 (July 1984), pp. 461-495.
EV Aff: Oil Adv--Oil Dependence Bad Ext (2/2)
Oil dependence makes US China war inevitable
KLARE 2010 (Michael Klare, professor of peace and world security studies at Hampshire College, “Tomgram: Michael Klare, China Shakes the World,”
September 19, 2010, http://www.tomdispatch.com/blog/175297/tomgram%3A_michael_klare%2C_china_shakes_the_world, Sawyer)
Already, China’s
efforts to bolster its ties with its foreign-oil providers have produced geopolitical friction with the
is a risk of far more serious Sino-American conflict as we enter the “tough oil” era and
the world supply of easily accessible petroleum rapidly shrinks. According to the DoE, the global supply of oil and other
United States. There
petroleum liquids in 2035 will be 110.6 million barrels per day – precisely enough to meet anticipated world demand at that time. Many oil geologists
believe, however, that global oil output will reach a peak level of output well below 100 million barrels per day by 2015, and begin declining after that. In
addition, the oil that remains will increasingly be found in difficult places to reach or in highly unstable regions. If these predictions prove accurate, the
United States and China -- the world’s two leading oil importers -- could become trapped in a zero-sum great-power
contest for access to diminishing supplies of exportable petroleum. What will happen under these circumstances is, of
course, impossible to predict, especially since the potential for conflict abounds. If both countries continue on their current path -- arming
favored suppliers in a desperate bid to secure long-term advantage -- the heavily armed petro-states may also become ever
more fearful of, or covetous of, their (equally well-equipped) neighbors. With both the U.S. and China deploying growing numbers of military
advisers and instructors to such countries, the stage could be set for mutual involvement in local wars and border
conflicts. Neither Beijing nor Washington may seek such involvement, but the logic of arms-for-oil diplomacy makes this an
unavoidable risk. Conflict over planetary oil reserves is not, however, the only path that China’s new energy status could open. It is possible to
imagine a future in which China and the United States cooperate in pursuing oil alternatives that would obviate the need to funnel massive sums into naval
and military arms races. President Obama and his Chinese counterpart, Hu Jintao, seemed to glimpse such a possibility when they agreed last November,
during an economic summit in Beijing, to collaborate in the development of alternative fuels and transportation systems. At this point, only one thing is clear:
the greater China’s reliance on imported petroleum , the greater the risk of friction and conflict with the
United States, which relies on the same increasingly problematic suppliers of energy. The greater its reliance on coal, the less
comfortable our planet will become. The greater its emphasis on alternative fuels, the more likely it may make the twenty-first century China’s domain. At
this point, how China will apportion its energy needs among the various candidate fuels remains unknown. Whatever its choices, however, China’s
energy decisions will shake the world.
Dependence hamstrings growth and causes inflation – volatility is the greatest threat to the
economy
LUFT 2007 (Gal Luft, executive director of the Institute for the Analysis of Global Security, “Dependence on Middle East Energy and its Impact on
Global Security,” Institute for the Analysis of Global Security, most recent cited date – 2007,
http://www.iags.org/luft_dependence_on_middle_east_energy.pdf, Sawyer)
For energy importers the rise in oil prices means slower growth rate, inflation, loss of jobs and burgeoning
trade deficits. The biggest casualties are the developing nations some of whom still carry debts which go all the way back to the oil
crises of the 1970s. The recent change of the trade patterns of the Arab oil producers could potentially bring
about the decline of the U.S. dollar as the main reserve currency, a process that may already be on its way. Arab
countries have grown more dependent on imported goods from Europe and Asia rather than the U.S. Since it is now Euros and Yens
that need to pay for the Arabs’ imports, Arab governments think more and more in terms of nondollar currencies. At a time when the
U.S. dollar is weak and U.S. national debt is at a historical high the specter of OPEC countries oil dropping the
dollar in favor of other currencies while being a boon to Europeans, is a great threat to the U.S. economy.
Undermines our ability to effectively utilize hegemony
WEISS et al 2009 (Daniel J. Weiss, Senior Fellow and the Director of Climate Strategy at American Progress, Christopher Beddor, National Security
Intern at Center for American Progress, Winny Chen, fellow, Senior Associate, Crimes Against Humanity program, Rudy deLeon, Senior Vice President of
National Security and International Policy at American Progress, Shiyong Park, intern with the National Security team at the Center for American Progress
Action Fund, “Securing America’s Future: Enhancing Our National Security by Reducing Oil Dependence and Environmental Damage,” Center for American
Progress, August 2009, http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2009/08/pdf/energy_security.pdf, Sawyer)
The United States will remain vulnerable to volatile oil prices and supply shortages as long as it heavily
depends on other nations for fuel and energy. Its need for steady supplies of oil means it must adjust its behavior and strategies in
order to maintain relations with less than-savory regimes including Venezuela, Nigeria, and Russia. These countries, as well as smaller
nations such as Angola, will therefore hold an increasingly disproportional amount of bilateral and regional power, while the
United States has diminished leverage and constrained policy options in strategic regions such as the Middle East and
Central Asia. This trend will be exacerbated as continued depletion of oil production and exports from friendly regimes forces the United States
to import more from antagonistic countries in the future in order to offset the tapering supply. Former military officials are
speaking out on this issue. The CNA Military Advisory Board, a group of distinguished retired military leaders, issued a report in May 2009 arguing that
America’s reliance on foreign oil poses a serious threat to U.S. national security. The report, entitled “Powering America’s Defense: Energy and the Risks to
National Security,” concluded that “U.S. dependence on oil weakens international leverage, undermines foreign
policy objectives, and entangles America with unstable or hostile regimes.”
EV Aff: Warming Adv--1AC
Overwhelming consensus proves that warming is real, human caused, and requires immediate
action—claims to the contrary are just wrong
Kevin Trenbeth, Distinguished Senior Scientist, Climate Analysis Section, National Center for Atmospheric Research
et al., writing with over 30 other distinguished climate researchers, “Check with Climate Scientists for Views on
Climate,” WALL STREET JOURNAL, letter to the editor, 2—1—12,
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204740904577193270727472662.html, accessed 4-6-12.
Do you consult your dentist about your heart condition? In science, as in any area, reputations are based on knowledge and expertise in
a field and on published, peer-reviewed work. If you need surgery, you want a highly experienced expert in the field who has done a
large number of the proposed operations. You published "No Need to Panic About Global Warming" (op-ed, Jan. 27) on climate change
by the climate-science equivalent of dentists practicing cardiology. While accomplished in their own fields, most of these authors have
no expertise in climate science. The few authors who have such expertise are known to have extreme views that are out of step with
nearly every other climate expert. This happens in nearly every field of science. For example, there is a retrovirus expert who does not
accept that HIV causes AIDS. And it is instructive to recall that a few scientists continued to state that smoking did not cause cancer,
long after that was settled science. Climate experts know that the long-term warming trend has not abated in the past decade. In fact, it
was the warmest decade on record. Observations show unequivocally that our planet is getting hotter. And computer models have
recently shown that during periods when there is a smaller increase of surface temperatures, warming is occurring elsewhere in the
climate system, typically in the deep ocean. Such periods are a relatively common climate phenomenon, are consistent with our physical
understanding of how the climate system works, and certainly do not invalidate our understanding of human-induced warming or the
models used to simulate that warming. Thus, climate experts also know what one of us, Kevin Trenberth, actually meant by the out-ofcontext, misrepresented quote used in the op-ed. Mr. Trenberth was lamenting the inadequacy of observing systems to fully monitor
warming trends in the deep ocean and other aspects of the short-term variations that always occur, together with the long-term humaninduced warming trend. The National Academy of Sciences of the U.S. (set up by President Abraham Lincoln to advise on scientific
issues), as well as major national academies of science around the world and every other authoritative body of scientists active in
climate research have stated that the science is clear: The world is heating up and humans are primarily responsible. Impacts are
already apparent and will increase. Reducing future impacts will require significant reductions in emissions of heat-trapping gases.
Research shows that more than 97% of scientists actively publishing in the field agree that climate change is real and human caused. It
would be an act of recklessness for any political leader to disregard the weight of evidence and ignore the enormous risks that climate
change clearly poses. In addition, there is very clear evidence that investing in the transition to a low-carbon economy will not only allow
the world to avoid the worst risks of climate change, but could also drive decades of economic growth. Just what the doctor ordered.
Warming risks the end of humanity—we need to cut emissions now
Ronnie Cummins and Will Allen, Organic Consumers Association, "Climate Catastrophe: Surviving the 21st
Century," 2--14--10, http://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/02/14-6, accessed 6-20-12.
The hour is late. Leading climate scientists such as James Hansen are literally shouting at the top of their lungs that the world needs to
reduce emissions by 20-40% as soon as possible, and 80-90% by the year 2050, if we are to avoid climate chaos, crop failures, endless
wars, melting of the polar icecaps, and a disastrous rise in ocean levels. Either we radically reduce CO2 and carbon dioxide equivalent
(CO2e, which includes all GHGs, not just CO2) pollutants (currently at 390 parts per million and rising 2 ppm per year) to 350 ppm,
including agriculture-derived methane and nitrous oxide pollution, or else survival for the present and future generations is in jeopardy.
As scientists warned at Copenhagen, business as usual and a corresponding 7-8.6 degree Fahrenheit rise in global temperatures
means that the carrying capacity of the Earth in 2100 will be reduced to one billion people. Under this hellish scenario, billions will die of
thirst, cold, heat, disease, war, and starvation.
Transportation sector is best suited, structurally, for large, short-term emissions cuts
Electrification Coalition, ELECTRIFICATION ROADMAP: REVOLUTIONIZING TRANSPORTATION AND
ACHIEVING ENERGY SECURITY, 11—09, p. 35.
The transportation sector will most likely provide the greatest opportunities for early emissions abatement in the United States and
elsewhere. Low rates of capital-stock turnover, particularly in the power sector, mean that emissions from facilities that have already
been built or are under construction are effectively locked in for decades. This limits the scope for the sector to reduce emissions
promptly without largescale retrofitting or very costly early retirement.53 In transportation, however, the capital stock is smaller in size,
much more numerous, and lifetimes are closer to 10 years instead of 50 years, offering a meaningful opportunity to achieve rapid
emissions displacement with better technology.
Changing the transportation sector is the only way to avert catastrophic warming
Ann Bordetsky et al., Natural Resources Defense Council, DRIVING IT HOME: CHOOSING THE RIGHT PATH FOR
FUELING NORTH AMERICA'S TRANSPORTATION FUTURE, 6--07, p. v.
Unless the energy industry changes course, America’s cars and trucks will increasingly run on fuel stripped, mined, or produced in
other environmentally devastating ways from Canada or the United States. These developments are unfolding heedless of another
reason for transitioning away from oil: averting the devastating impacts of global warming. Our changing climate presents an urgent
challenge. To avoid catastrophic global warming, the best expert opinion is that North America needs to reduce global warming
pollution by 80 percent from today’s levels by 2050. Unless we take swift action, U.S. transportation sector emissions, which already
contribute a third of total U.S. global warming pollution, will double by 2050. We can prevent this by doubling fuel efficiency, reducing
miles driven, and rapidly transitioning to low-carbon fuels. These measures will temper the rapid growth in our nation’s oil dependence
and at the same time move us toward achieving the economy-wide goal of an 80 percent emissions reduction by mid-century.
EV Aff: Warming Adv--Warming Now 2AC
C02 Causes Global Warming, Newest Research Methods Account for the Objections of the Skeptics
Oak Ridge Leadership Computing Facility, April 4, 2012
(http://www.olcf.ornl.gov/2012/04/04/carbon-dioxide-caused-global-warming-at-ice-ages-end-pioneering-simulation-shows/)
Climate science has an equivalent to the “what came first—the chicken or the egg?” question: What
came first, greenhouse gases or
global warming? A multi-institutional team led by researchers at Harvard, Oregon State University, and the
University of Wisconsin used a global dataset of paleoclimate records and the Jaguar supercomputer at
Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) to find the answer (spoiler alert: carbon dioxide drives warming). The
results, published in the April 5 issue of Nature, analyze 15,000 years of climate history. Scientists hope amassing knowledge of the
causes of natural global climate change will aid understanding of human-caused climate change. “We constructed the first-ever record of
global temperature spanning the end of the last ice age based on 80 proxy temperature records from
around the world,” said Jeremy Shakun, a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Climate and Global Change
postdoctoral fellow at Harvard and Columbia Universities and first author of the paper. “It’s no small task to get at global mean
temperature. Even for studies of the present day you need lots of locations, quality-controlled data, careful statistics. For the past 21,000 years, it’s even
harder. But because the data set is large enough, these proxy data provide a reasonable estimate of global mean temperature.” Proxy records from around
the world—derived from ice cores and ocean and lake sediments—provide estimates of local surface temperature throughout history, and carbon-14 dating
indicates when those temperatures occurred. For example, water molecules harboring the oxygen-18 isotope rain out faster than those containing oxygen16 as an air mass cools, so the ratio of these isotopes in glacial ice layers tells scientists how cold it was when the snow fell. Likewise, the amount of
magnesium incorporated into the shells of marine plankton depends on the temperature of the water they live in, and these shells get preserved on the
seafloor when they die. The authors combined these local temperature records to produce a reconstruction of global mean temperature. Additionally,
samples of ancient atmosphere are trapped as air bubbles in glaciers, providing a direct measure of carbon dioxide levels through time that could be
compared to the global temperature record. Being the first to reconstruct global mean temperatures throughout this
time interval allowed the researchers to show what many suspected but none could yet prove: “This is the
first paper to definitively show the role carbon dioxide played in helping to end the last ice age,” said Shakun,
who co-wrote the paper with Peter Clark of Oregon State University. “We found that global temperature mirrored and generally
lagged behind rising carbon dioxide during the last deglaciation, which points to carbon dioxide as the
major driver of global warming.” Prior results based on Antarctic ice cores had indicated that local temperatures in Antarctica started warming
before carbon dioxide began rising, which implied that carbon dioxide was a feedback to some other leading driver of warming. The delay of global
temperature behind carbon dioxide found in this study, however, shows that the ice-core perspective does
not apply to the globe as a whole and instead suggests that carbon dioxide was the primary driver of
worldwide warming. While the geologic record showed a remarkable correlation between carbon dioxide
and global temperature, the researchers also turned to state-of-the-art model simulations to further pin
down the direction of causation suggested by the temperature lag. Jaguar recently ran approximately 14
million processor hours to simulate the most recent 21,000 years of Earth’s climate. Feng He of the University of
Wisconsin, Madison, a postdoctoral researcher, plugged the main forcings driving global climate over this time interval into an Intergovernmental Panel on
Climate Change (IPCC)–class model called the Community Climate System Model version 3, a global climate model that couples interactions between
atmosphere, oceans, lands, and sea ice. The climate science community developed the model with support from the National Science Foundation (NSF),
Department of Energy (DOE), and National Aeronautics and Space Administration and used many codes developed by university researchers. “Our model
results are the first IPCC-class Coupled General Circulation Model (CGCM) simulation of such a long duration (15,000 years),” said He, who conducted the
modeling with Zhengyu Liu of the University of Wisconsin–Madison and Bette Otto-Bliesner of the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR).
“This is of particular significance to the climate community because it shows, for the first time, that at least
one of the CGCMs used to predict future climate is capable of reproducing both the timing and amplitude
of climate evolution seen in the past under realistic climate forcing.” The group ran simulations that used 4.7 million
processor hours in 2009, 6.6. million in 2010, and 2.5 million in 2011. The Innovative and Novel Computational Impact on Theory and Experiment program,
jointly managed by leadership computing facilities at Argonne and Oak Ridge National Laboratories, awarded the allocations. Shaun Marcott and Alan Mix
of Oregon State University analyzed data, and Andreas Schmittner, also of Oregon State, interpreted links between ocean currents and carbon dioxide.
Edouard Bard of Centre Européen de Recherche et d’Enseignement des Géosciences de l’Environnement provided data and expertise about radiocarbon
calibration. NSF supported this research through its Paleoclimate Program for the Paleovar Project and NCAR. The researchers used resources of the Oak
Ridge Leadership Computing Facility, located in the National Center for Computational Sciences at ORNL, which is supported by DOE’s Office of Science.
The paleoclimate community generated the proxy data sets and provided unpublished results of the DATED Project on retreat history of the Eurasian ice
sheets. The NOAA NGDC and PANGAEA databases were also essential to this work.
Warming now-Laundry list
Venkataramanan and smitha ‘11(Department of Economics, D.G. Vaishnav College, Chennai, India Indian Journal of Science
“Causes and effects of global warming p.226-229 March 2011 http://www.indjst.org/archive/vol.4.issue.3/mar11-pages159-265.pdf KG)
Increasing global temperatures are causing a broad range of changes. Sea levels are rising due to thermal expansion of
the ocean, in addition to melting of land ice. Amounts and patterns of precipitation are changing. The total
annual power of hurricanes has already increased markedly since 1975 because their average intensity
and average duration have increased (in addition, there has been a high correlation of hurricane power
with tropical sea-surface temperature). Changes in temperature and precipitation patterns increase the
frequency, duration, and intensity of other extreme weather events, such as floods, droughts, heat waves, and
tornadoes. Other effects of global warming include higher or lower agricultural yields, further glacial retreat,
reduced summer stream flows, species extinctions. As a further effect of global warming, diseases like
malaria are returning into areas where they have been extinguished earlier. Although global warming is affecting the
number and magnitude of these events, it is difficult to connect specific events to global warming. Although most studies focus on the
period up to 2100, warming is expected to continue past then because carbon dioxide (chemical symbol CO2)
has an estimated atmospheric lifetime of 50 to 200 years.
EV Aff: Warming Adv--Warming Bad 2AC
Warming Will Cause Extinction
Sify 2010 – Sydney newspaper citing Ove Hoegh-Guldberg, professor at University of Queensland and Director of the Global Change Institute, and John Bruno, associate professor of
Marine Science at UNC (Sify News, “Could unbridled climate changes lead to human extinction?”, http://www.sify.com/news/could-unbridled-climate-changes-lead-to-human-extinction-newsinternational-kgtrOhdaahc.html
The findings of the comprehensive report: 'The impact of climate change on the world's marine ecosystems'
emerged from a synthesis of recent research on the world's oceans, carried out by two of the world's
leading marine scientists. One of the authors of the report is Ove Hoegh-Guldberg, professor at The University of Queensland and the director of its Global
Change Institute (GCI). 'We may see sudden, unexpected changes that have serious ramifications for the overall
well-being of humans, including the capacity of the planet to support people. This is further evidence that
we are well on the way to the next great extinction event,' says Hoegh-Guldberg. 'The findings have
enormous implications for mankind, particularly if the trend continues. The earth's ocean, which produces
half of the oxygen we breathe and absorbs 30 per cent of human-generated carbon dioxide, is equivalent to
its heart and lungs. This study shows worrying signs of ill-health. It's as if the earth has been smoking two packs of cigarettes a day!,' he
added. 'We are entering a period in which the ocean services upon which humanity depends are undergoing massive change and in some cases beginning to fail', he added. The
changes to marine life identified in the report include rapidly warming and acidifying
oceans, changes in water circulation and expansion of dead zones within the ocean depths. These are
driving major changes in marine ecosystems: less abundant coral reefs, sea grasses and mangroves
(important fish nurseries); fewer, smaller fish; a breakdown in food chains; changes in the distribution of
marine life; and more frequent diseases and pests among marine organisms. Study co-author John F Bruno, associate professor in marine science
at The University of North Carolina, says greenhouse gas emissions are modifying many physical and geochemical
aspects of the planet's oceans, in ways 'unprecedented in nearly a million years'. 'This is causing fundamental and comprehensive changes to
'fundamental and comprehensive'
the way marine ecosystems function,' Bruno warned, according to a GCI release. These findings were published in Science
Warming is the only existential risk
Deibel ’07—Prof IR @ National War College (Terry, “Foreign Affairs Strategy: Logic for American Statecraft,” Conclusion: American Foreign Affairs Strategy Today)
Finally, there is one major existential threat to American security (as well as prosperity) of a nonviolent
nature, which, though far in the future, demands urgent action. It is the threat of global warming to the stability of the climate
upon which all earthly life depends. Scientists worldwide have been observing the gathering of this threat for three decades now, and what was once
a mere possibility has passed through probability to near certainty. Indeed not one of more than 900
articles on climate change published in refereed scientific journals from 1993 to 2003 doubted that
anthropogenic warming is occurring. “In legitimate scientific circles,” writes Elizabeth Kolbert, “it is
virtually impossible to find evidence of disagreement over the fundamentals of global warming.” Evidence
from a vast international scientific monitoring effort accumulates almost weekly, as this sample of newspaper reports
shows: an international panel predicts “brutal droughts, floods and violent storms across the planet over the next century”; climate change could “literally alter ocean currents, wipe
away huge portions of Alpine Snowcaps and aid the spread of cholera and malaria”; “glaciers in the Antarctic and in Greenland are melting much faster than expected,
and…worldwide, plants are blooming several days earlier than a decade ago”; “rising sea temperatures have been accompanied by a significant global increase in the most
“Earth’s
warming climate is estimated to contribute to more than 150,000 deaths and 5 million illnesses each year”
as disease spreads; “widespread bleaching from Texas to Trinidad…killed broad swaths of corals” due to a 2-degree rise in sea temperatures. “The world is slowly
destructive hurricanes”; “NASA scientists have concluded from direct temperature measurements that 2005 was the hottest year on record, with 1998 a close second”;
disintegrating,” concluded Inuit hunter Noah Metuq, who lives 30 miles from the Arctic Circle. “They call it climate change…but we just call it breaking up.” From the founding of the
first cities some 6,000 years ago until the beginning of the industrial revolution, carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere remained relatively constant at about 280 parts per million
(ppm). At present they are accelerating toward 400 ppm, and by 2050 they will reach 500 ppm, about double pre-industrial levels. Unfortunately, atmospheric CO2 lasts about a
century, so there is no way immediately to reduce levels, only to slow their increase, we are thus in for significant global warming; the only debate is how much and how serous the
we are already experiencing the effects of 1-2 degree warming in more
violent storms, spread of disease, mass die offs of plants and animals, species extinction, and threatened
inundation of low-lying countries like the Pacific nation of Kiribati and the Netherlands at a warming of 5 degrees or less the Greenland and
West Antarctic ice sheets could disintegrate, leading to a sea level of rise of 20 feet that would cover North
Carolina’s outer banks, swamp the southern third of Florida, and inundate Manhattan up to the middle of
Greenwich Village. Another catastrophic effect would be the collapse of the Atlantic thermohaline circulation that keeps the winter weather in
effects will be. As the newspaper stories quoted above show,
Europe far warmer than its latitude would otherwise allow. Economist William Cline once estimated the damage to the United States alone from moderate
levels of warming at 1-6 percent of GDP annually; severe warming could cost 13-26 percent of GDP. But the most frightening scenario is runaway
greenhouse warming, based on positive feedback from the buildup of water vapor in the atmosphere that is both caused by and causes hotter surface
temperatures. Past ice age transitions, associated with only 5-10 degree changes in average global temperatures, took place in just decades, even though
no one was then pouring ever-increasing amounts of carbon into the atmosphere. Faced with this specter, the best one can
conclude is that “humankind’s continuing enhancement of the natural greenhouse effect is akin to playing
Russian roulette with the earth’s climate and humanity’s life support system. At worst, says physics
professor Marty Hoffert of New York University, “we’re just going to burn everything up; we’re going to
heat the atmosphere to the temperature it was in the Cretaceous when there were crocodiles at the poles,
and then everything will collapse.” During the Cold War, astronomer Carl Sagan popularized a theory of nuclear winter to describe how a thermonuclear war
between the Untied States and the Soviet Union would not only destroy both countries but possibly end life on this pla net. Global warming is the post-Cold
War era’s equivalent of nuclear winter at least as serious and considerably better supported scientifically.
Over the long run it puts dangers from terrorism and traditional military challenges to shame. It is a threat
not only to the security and prosperity to the United States, but potentially to the continued existence of
life on this planet.
EV Aff: Warming Adv--EVs Solve 2AC
Rapid electrification is necessary to meet greenhouse gas targets
Frederick Smith, Chair, President and CEO, FedEx, Testimony before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, 6—22—10, lexis.
Finally, petroleum consumption poses a long-term threat to global environmental sustainability. Curbing emissions is a global issue, and
there is not yet an international consensus on a long-term stabilization objective or on the changes in emissions trajectory needed to
meet such a goal. International discussions are increasingly centered on a stabilization level that ranges between 450 and 550 parts per
million (ppm) CO2 equivalent (CO2-eq). In a recently released report, the International Energy Agency assessed the make-up of U.S.
new passenger vehicle sales that would be required to meet a 440 ppm target. The analysis found that by 2030, more than 60 percent
of new vehicle sales would need to be based on some form of electrification, ranging from traditional hybrids to pure electric vehicles.
GEV’s will substantially lower CO2 emissions—cuts emissions from the transportation sector as we
green our electricity generation infrastructure
Ron Minsk, Senior Vice President, Securing America’s Energy Future (SAFE), Sam P. Ori, Director of Policy, SAFE and Sabrina Howell, Senior Policy Analyst, SAFE, “Plugging Cars into the
Grid: Why the Government Should Make a Choice,” ENERGY LAW JOURNAL v. 30, 20 09, p. 364.
But perhaps of greater importance is that once GEVs are in place, their emissions profile will continue to improve without any additional
changes to the vehicle, as the emissions profile of our power generating plants improve. At the moment, there are over 250 million LDVs
on the road, each burning fuel and [*364] emitting carbon dioxide. n249 To achieve improvements in their cumulative emissions profile,
improvements must be made in the emissions profile of each vehicle, one at a time. An electric-powered vehicle fleet, however, would
circumscribe the challenge of reducing those carbon emissions to roughly 6,900 coal and natural gas generation plants that comprise
over eighty percent of the nation's power generating capacity. n250 It is far simpler to sequester carbon or employ renewable energy at
the power plant than the tailpipe. Indeed, analyses of the cost of greenhouse gas emission reductions routinely find that it is more
expensive to reduce emissions from vehicles than from power plants. Therefore, proportionately more emission reductions will come
from power plants that from vehicles. n251 By shifting the emissions stream created by vehicles from their tailpipes to central power
stations, we will both facilitate and lower the costs of combating climate change.
Widespread PHEV adoption will substantially cut oil use and CO2 emissions
Alan Crane, Senior Program Officer, National Research Council, Testimony before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, 6—22—10, lexis.
In addition to costs, the necessity of charging the batteries essentially every day to deliver their promised fuel savings may be a
constraint on PHEV growth. It is not clear how many people have a safe source of power, preferably in a garage, and the willingness to
plug it in regularly. If PHEVs meet the maximum practical penetration rate, the savings in oil and carbon emissions will be significant.
PHEV-40s could cut gasoline use by 55 percent by 2050, and PHEV-10s by 40 percent, relative to a reference case with no PHEVs or
increased efforts on other technologies. However, much of this improvement could also be gained from improved efficiency of
conventional vehicles and hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs). The high efficiency scenario analyzed by the committee, with a high fraction
of HEVs, also showed a reduction of 40 percent in gasoline use. A PHEV-10 is expected to save 19 percent of the gasoline that an
equivalent HEV would use, while a PHEV-40 would save 55 percent. In comparison, HFCVs directly reduce gasoline use because the
hydrogen will be produced from natural gas or other non-oil sources.
EVs result in significant emission reduction even on the current power grid – multiple studies prove
Kaplan et al., 10 – *affiliated with Frontier Group, a think tank that issues issue experts, writers and analysts to produce ideas and research to promote a cleaner environment and a
fairer and more democratic society, **Brad Heavner, B.A. from the University of Michigan, Senior Policy Advisor for Environment America and State Director of Environment Maryland, AND ***Rob
Sargent, graduate of the University of Vermont, Energy Program Director for Environment America and oversees policy and strategy development for energy and global warming campaigns
throughout the U.S., more than two decades of experience leading a wide range of environmental and public interest campaigns (Siena, Charging Ahead: Curbing Oil Consumption with Plug-in
Cars”, Environment Maryland Research & Policy Center, June 2010,
http://www.environmentmaryland.org/sites/environment/files/reports/Charging-Ahead.pdf)//BI
Plug-in cars emit less global warming pollution than cars powered by gasoline when fueled from today’s electricity
sources. This is largely because electric motors are vastly more efficient than the internal combustion engine,
driving a car much farther on the same amount of energy.12 Many studies have compared global warming pollution from
plug-ins versus that from conventional cars. There is a wide range of results, since there are a number of factors that differ from study to
study—for example, the gas mileage of the conventional cars plug-ins are being compared against, and the amount of electricity the
plug-in cars are assumed to use. However, over 40 recent studies have shown that plug-in cars produce less
carbon dioxide than traditional gasoline-powered cars.13 An electric car powered by electricity from
today’s electric grid will have lower global warming emissions than a conventional car. One study by the
Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) found that a car fueled by electricity from unused capacity in our
current electric system would emit 27 percent lessglobal warming pollution than a car fueled by gasoline.14
EV Aff: Warming Adv--A2 "Dirty Energy"
Will still cut emissions by 60% using existing electricity-generation tech
Kraig Higginson, Chair, Raser Technologies Inc., Testimony before the Senate Appropriations Committee,
Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development, 2—23—10, lexis.
Driving on grid electricity will provide over a 60% reduction in total well-to-wheels emissions in California according to an EPRI study.
More importantly, as state's grid improves to meet new RPS (renewable portfolio standard) in the next few years, the total well-to-wheels
emissions will continue to decrease as the percentage of renewable energy increases. PGandE in California offers one of the greenest
energy mixes in the country with over 50% of its power coming from low emission sources such as hydroelectric, nuclear, geothermal,
wind and solar. As the U.S. moves to meet a national RPS, the well-to-wheels emissions will continue to go down. This is part of the
long-term advantage of the plug-in electric vehicle that aligns well with the nations overall energy plan.
EV shift would cut emissions in half EVEN IF we use existing ‘dirty’ electricity generation
Kraig Higginson, Chair, Raser Technologies Inc., Testimony before the Senate Appropriations Committee,
Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development, 2—23—10, lexis.
Why Extended Range Electric? This is due to the many advantages of electric transportation. We have a well-established electric
infrastructure in place, capable today of accommodating millions of additional electric vehicles. Electric motors much more efficient,
about 90% efficient compared to about 15% for gas engines. According to a study by the Electric Power Research Institute, charging
electric vehicles from today's grid would cut GHG emissions in half, even with today's coal fired power plants. As states meet their
renewable portfolio standards, the grid continues to become cleaner. The two key steps to meeting the nation's energy goals are 1)
plugging in electric vehicles to the grid, and then improving the grid with renewable energy. The U.S. has the advantage of massive
reserves of alternative fuels and renewable energy including the world's largest reserves of geothermal energy.
EVs cut CO2 emissions even if powered by coal plants
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), ELECTRIFICATION OF THE TRANSPORTATION SYSTEM, MIT
Energy Initiative Symposium, 4—8—10, p. 22.
Coal currently fuels around 45% of electricity generation in the US. In view of this high level of coal generation, several participants
questioned the value of EVs in reducing CO2 emissions. Well-to-wheels analyses conclude, however, that even with the current US
generation fuel mix, EVs would produce less CO2 than conventional vehicles fueled with petroleum.
EV Aff: Add-On--Air Pollution 2AC
Plug-in hybrids decrease emissions—improved by vehicle-to-grid tech
Ramteen Sioshansi, Ohio State University and Paul Denholm, National Renewable Energy Laboratory, “Emissions
Impacts and Benefits of Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicles and Vehicle to Grid Services,” ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE
AND TECHNOLOGY v. 43 n. 4, 2—09, pp. 1199-1208.
Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicles (PHEVs) have been promoted as a potential technology to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases and
other pollutants by using electricity instead of petroleum, and by improving electric system efficiency by providing vehicle to grid (V2G)
services. We use an electric power system model to explicitly evaluate the change in generator dispatches resulting from PHEV
deployment in the Texas grid, and apply fixed and non-parametric estimates of generator emissions rates, to estimate the resulting
changes in generation emissions. We find that by using the flexibility of when vehicles may be charged, generator efficiency can be
increased substantially. By changing generator dispatch, a PHEV fleet of up to 15% of light-duty vehicles can actually decrease net
generator NOx emissions during the ozone season, despite the additional charging load. By adding V2G services, such as spinning
reserves and energy storage, CO2, SO2, and NOx emissions can be reduced even further.
Extinction
Driesen, 03
- Associate Professor of Law, Syracuse University (David, Buffalo Environmental Law Journal, “"LEARING SUSTAINABILITY":
SYMPOSIUM ARTICLES: SYMPOSIUM HELD AT THE UNIVERSITY AT BUFFALO LAW SCHOOL, OCTOBER 13, 2001: Sustainable
Development and Air Quality: The Need to Replace Basic Technologies with Cleaner Alternatives”, Fall 02-Spring 03, 10 Buff. Envt'l. L.J. 25, L/)
Air pollution can make life unsustainable by harming the ecosystem upon which all life depends and
harming the health of both future and present generations. The Rio Declaration articulates six key principles that are
relevant to air pollution. These principles can also be understood as goals, because they describe a state of affairs [*27] that is worth
achieving. Agenda 21, in turn, states a program of action for realizing those goals. Between them, they aid understanding of sustainable
development's meaning for air quality. The first principle is that "human beings. . . are entitled to a healthy and productive life in harmony
with nature", because they are "at the center of concerns for sustainable development." n3 While the Rio Declaration refers to
human health, its reference to life "in harmony with nature" also reflects a concern about the natural
environment. n4 Since air pollution damages both human health and the environment, air quality
implicates both of these concerns. n5
EV Aff: Add-On--Grid Reliability 2AC
Electrification will promote renewables development, stabilize the electrical grid—function as
batteries while using offpeak energy
Electrification Coalition, ELECTRIFICATION ROADMAP: REVOLUTIONIZING TRANSPORTATION AND
ACHIEVING ENERGY SECURITY, 11—09, p. 41.
Ultimately, the benefits of a widely deployed electric vehicle network will also feed back to the grid. Approximately 160 million vehicles,
or around 65 percent of the present U.S. light-duty vehicle stock, could be powered solely by existing off-peak generating capacity.79
Grid-enabled vehicles will be plugged into the electric grid for much of the time that they are not on the road. Utilities can optimize the
use of these batteries, meeting the needs of all consumers, including motorists, at the lowest possible cost. In short, motorists and the
utilities can be thought of as having complementary interests. Renewable energy will play an increasing role in U.S. power generation.
The principal difficulty with wind and solar power is their intermittent nature. GEVs will not only improve national and economic security,
they will also act as distributed storage devices for electricity, enabling utilities to even out fluctuating energy production. Vehicle
batteries can become storage devices capable of supporting the grid during periods of peak demand. Recent advances in smart
metering, online billing, and vehicle-to-grid (V2G) technology enable a revolution in communication between homes, vehicles, utilities,
and renewable energy sources. Our electric and vehicle infrastructures will converge, creating synergies and vastly increasing the
overall efficiency of our entire energy system.
Extinction
Rifkin, 2 (Alan, The founder and president of the Foundation on Economic Trends, Fellow at the Wharton School’s
Executive Education Program (Jeremy, The Hydrogen Economy: The Creation of the World-Wide Energy Web and the
Redistribution of Power on Earth, p.163-164)
It is understandable that we would be unmindful of the critical role that oil plays in feeding our families, because the process of growing
food is so removed in time and place from our urban lives. The same holds true for the electricity that we have come to rely on to
maintain our daily routines. The electrical grid is the central nervous system that coordinates a densely
populated urban existence. Without electrical power, urban life would cease to exist, the information age
would become a faded memory, and industrial production would grind to a halt. The fastest way to ensure
the collapse of the modern era would be to pull the plug and turn off the flow of electricity. Light, heat,
and power would all stop. Civilization as we know it would come to an end. It is hard to imagine what life
would be like without electricity, although it has only been utilized as a source of energy for less than a century. Most of our
great-grandparents were born into a world with electricity. Today, we take electricity for granted. That is because, food,
it is abundantly available. We rarely think about where it comes from or how it gets to us. It is a kind of stealth force, tucked away
inside wires overhead, buried in the ground, or hidden inside our walls. Colorless and odorless, it is an invisible but
indispensable' presence in our lives.
EV Aff: CP Ans--States
Federal R&D is key to transportation innovation- state and private research doesn’t include highrisk and long-term projects.
Giuliano, ’12 - Professor at University of South Carolina, Senior Associate Dean for Research and Technology, Director of METRANS transportation center, Ph.D. in Social Sciences,
expertise in transportation policy, metropolitan special structure, travel demand, and urban transportation (Genevieve, “Why We Need University Transportation Research,” Eno: Center for
Transportation, May 2012, http://www.enotrans.org/eno-brief/why-we-need-university-transportation-research) // AMG
Universities are where basic science ideas find real-world applications I will begin with the type of research that
happens almost exclusively in universities and government research laboratories: long-term, high-risk basic research.
Because payoffs are uncertain, basic research is not conducted within the R&D departments of private firms, or by
states, or by most federal mission agencies (e.g. U.S. Department of Transportation and U.S. Department of Agriculture). The major source of
funding for basic research is the federal government (most notably via the National Science Foundation and the National Institutes of Health ); this
federal role is justified by the benefits to the economy and society that a robust basic research program generates.
Without the support of federal funding, little basic research would take place, eventually affecting U.S. global
competitiveness. Transportation is generally perceived as an applied field. Is there an argument for long term, high-risk
research in transportation? Transportation is often the beneficiary of basic research in science fields. Some of the
best-known examples come from civil engineering, the traditional home of transportation research. Civil engineers developed bridge technology,
tunneling technology and other advancesthat contributed to the transportation revolution of the nineteenth century. Indeed, David Billington (1985, Princeton
University) argues that bridge technology was a critical element in the settlement patterns of the U.S. One example of using basic research is provided by pavement research. Using
wave theory first developed by Joseph Boussinesq (French Academy of Sciences) in 1872, and the theory of elasticity and plasticity developed by H. M. Westergaard (University of
Illinois) in 1926, Yoder (1959, Purdue University) and others began development of pavement design principles. These principles were first tested in the late 1950s, and eventually
led to pavement design standards that have evolved ever since (Sinha et al, 2002).
Battery R&D is key to EV commercialization and economic competitiveness – National laboratories
network is critical to development
Wright, ’10 - VP Business Accelerator Project, Leading Supplier of Battery Systems for EVs and Hybrids (Mary Ann, February 23, Hearing Before a Subcommittee on the Committee on
Appropriations, United States Senate, “Opportunities and Challenges Presented in Increasing the Number of Electric Vehicles in the Light Duty Automotive Sector,”
http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CHRG-111shrg56643/pdf/CHRG-111shrg56643.pdf
, p. 64-5)
As we execute our plan to create an advanced battery manufacturing industry wecannot ignore the future. The nature of technology is that there is always somethingbetter on the
horizon. For the United States to achieve global product and manufac-turing leadership in this technology is just the first step; we must sustain it withcontinuing and robust Federal
R&D funding. In the same manner that lithium-ionis now supplanting nickel metal-hydride as the technology of choice for electric drivevehicles, the next game-changing chemistry is
Japan has set a national tech-nology goal for a seven times
improvement in specific energy coupled with a 94 per-cent cost reduction for electric drive vehicle batteries by 2030.
Commercialization ofthese technologies will depend on not only fundamental chemistry and materialsbreakthroughs,
but also substantial innovations in manufacturing processes andequipment.Technology R&D on this scale is risky and
costly, requiring more resources, bothcapital and intellectual, than what is available in the private sector alone. Continuing Federal support through the DOE and its national laboratory network iscritical to ensuring that the technology
of the future is made here at home. The nearcollapse of U.S. financial markets over the last 2 years has made it
painfully clearthat our eroded manufacturing base must be rebuilt and returned to its time-testedposition as the
cornerstone of a healthy economy.We need to develop next generation lithium-ion batteries by improving electrochemistries, as well as the battery systems which support and extend cell life. Wemust discover and develop the
successor electrochemistry to lithium-ion. There areseveral technologies under consideration as the next
transformation in battery tech-nology. Equally important is the rest of the battery system, which includes sensorsand
thermal management components. Federal R&D support must be maintainedin these areas in order for our domestic
industry to remain competitive. We needto foster a collaborative relationship with the national labs and private industry
toenable technology ideas to go from the labs to commercial success in the marketplace.
already being pursued by our globalcompetitors in partnership with their governments.
Federal action is key to streamlining the permitting process for EVSE
Lowenthal, ’10 - CEO Coulumb Technologies (Richard, February 23, Hearing Before a Subcommittee on the Committee on Appropriations, United States Senate, “Opportunities and
Challenges Presented in Increasing the Number of Electric Vehicles in the Light Duty Automotive Sector,” http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CHRG-111shrg56643/pdf/CHRG-111shrg56643.pdf
, p.
32-33)
So, I have some policy recommendations.
Permitting electricalwork is a local issue, typically the responsibility of a city or a coun-ty
government, and rules vary widely between jurisdictions. Theprocess of requiring an electrician to obtain a permit and
schedulean inspection can stretch an otherwise short and simple electricalupgrade into a burdensome, severalweeklong process, a concernthat was confirmed by several participants in the recent projectconducted by BMW in Los
Angeles, New York, and New Jersey.So, first, policy, we need streamlined permitting processes na-tionwide for the
installation of EVSE in order to get those timesto reasonable levels.Second, today there are roughly 54 million private garages forthe 247 million
light-duty vehicles that we have in the UnitedStates. For consumers who park in parking lots or curbside atnight, overnight charging requires shared stations. By
treatingelectricity as a transportation fuel, regulators can foster competi-tion in the nascent EV infrastructure
marketplace and help to fa-cilitate a rapid deployment of public charging infrastructure.The California Public Utilities
Commission recently indicatedthat it is not inclined to regulate electricity for sale for EVs . None-theless, the decision is not yet
finalized and represents the opinionof only a single PUC.In many cases, current regulations require a seller of electricityto be treated as a
regulated utility. In other words, if an apartmentbuilding, shopping center, or fast food restaurant has been—
hascharging stations, it could be subject to the full range of regulatorycompliance mechanisms that affect utilities.
This level of regulationwould likely present—prevent even minimal deployment of charg-ing infrastructure in the
public, in private garages, in condomin-iums, apartments, and the workplace.Rather than depending on the Nation’s
public utilities commis-sions to rule on this, we would ask that the Federal Energy Regu-latory Commission ensure
that electric vehicle charging is a com-petitive marketplace with market-based pricing.
EV Aff: DA Ans--Budget
Infrastructure investment generates more jobs than other types of federal spending
Donna Cooper, senior fellow, Center for American Progress, MEETING THE INFRASTRUCTURE IMPERATIVE, 2-12, p. 2.
Among the tools at the government’s disposal to boost jobs, rebuilding our infrastructure is one of the options with the greatest impact.
After President Barack Obama proposed the American Jobs Act, Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics, found in 2011 that
new federal spending for infrastructure improvements to highways and public schools would generate $1.44 of economic activity for
each $1 spent. In reviewing the economic impact of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, the Congressional Budget
Office found that infrastructure investments and purchases by the federal government for goods and services had the largest jobs
multiplier impact of all the stimulus elements.
Infrastructure spending is tiny compared to the rest of the budget
Donna Cooper, senior fellow, Center for American Progress, MEETING THE INFRASTRUCTURE IMPERATIVE, 2-12, p. 14.
The federal government budget authority for 2010 was $3.48 trillion. In that year, we devoted a relatively small amount of federal
appropriations toward maintaining and improving our critical public infrastructure assets. In fact, total federal infrastructure
appropriations for direct grants, loans, and tax incentives were $92 billion in 2010, a mere 2.6 percent of all federal expenditures.
Infrastructure stimulus can save the economy—we can afford the additional debt
BUSINESS INSIDER, “Yes, It’s Tie for a Massive Infrastructure Spending Program,” 6—19—12, lexis.
I recently laid out the fundamental problem with the US economy: Massive consumer debts and high unemployment are crippling
consumer spending, which accounts for about 70% of our economy. I noted that, to get the economy healthy again, consumers have to
get back to work and reduce their debts. This latter process has begun, but it will take significantly more time, probably another decade.
No one can wave a magic wand and make consumer debt go away. (If they could have, they would have). What someone can do is
wave a magic wand and create jobs--jobs that benefit the whole country and put spending money back in consumer's pockets. Who can
wave that magic wand? The government. Instead of cutting spending and firing people, the way it has been for the last few years, the
government can do the opposite: Commit to spending, say, an extra $2-$3 trillion over the next decade to rebuild our country's
infrastructure--and create work and awesome infrastructure for millions of Americans in the process. Yes, the government could also
commit to hiring more teachers, firefighters, policemen, and other folks who generally improve life for all Americans. But hiring those
folks is much more controversial. So the government should start with a massive infrastructure spending program. But wait. Can we
afford to spend $2-$3 trillion on infrastructure? We already have $15 trillion of debt, and we're accumulating more debt at a rate of more
than $1 trillion per year! The answer is.... yes, we can afford it. As long as we commit to fixing our social-insurance programs (Social
Security, Medicare, Medicaid) over the next decade. Those programs are what are slowly bankrupting this country, not infrastructure
spending. And in the meantime, our infrastructure is collapsing.
EV Aff: DA Ans--Federalism
States lack jurisdiction – FERC oversees the grid and determines whether to upgrade it
Tracy, 5/14/12 - Staff Writer (Ryan, Wall Street Journal, Here Comes the Sunstorm,
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303505504577404360076098508.html)
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, which oversees the grid, has begun to look into possible
new rules. Chairman Jon Wellinghoff said the four-member commission might require upgrades if it found
"the threat was high and the cost was low." Regulators could require the industry to install blocking devices on transformers,
for example, or raise the construction standards for high-voltage gear. Or they might take less intrusive action, like ordering more
monitoring devices and additional threat assessment. An April 30 conference organized by the commission saw vigorous debate on how
quickly the grid needs upgrading.
No jurisdiction – FERC is responsible for grid deployment and integration of EVs
GlobalAutomakers ‘11 (http://www.globalautomakers.org/resources)
U.S. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC)
FERC oversees the advancement of the nation’s electric or
“smart” grid. FERC is responsible for ensuring the functionality and interoperability of the smart grid,
including deployment and integration of plug-in electric and hybrid electrical vehicles.
Federalism is dead--immigration, Obamacare rulings
Richard J. Peltz-Steele, Professor, Law, UMass law School, "Dismantling Federalism Is a Shortcut with a Very Steep
Price," FORBES, 7--8--12, http://www.forbes.com/sites/realspin/2012/07/08/dismantling-federalism-is-a-shortcut-witha-very-steep-price/
Recent decisions from the Supreme Court delivered a one-two punch to American federalism. While media focus
on the political impact of the immigration and healthcare decisions on the elections, our constitutional system is reeling from a
blow of greater proportion. In the first high-profile decision, Arizona substantially lost its battle to maintain a state
immigration enforcement system. The dispute arose from the gap between what the feds say and what they do, specifically
the failure to police immigration to the satisfaction of Arizona taxpayers. The decision in Arizona v. United States was mostly about
federal preemption of state law. And preemption law is notoriously fuzzy: “eye of the beholder” unfortunately characterizes the Court’s
approach. The majority saw the Arizona case as an instance of Congress so thoroughly “occupying the field” that no room remained for
state law. Justice Thomas, in a concise dissent, reasoned that Congress had not precluded state law such as Arizona’s, which merely
echoes federal law. Whatever one thinks of Justice Scalia’s dissent, he got the facts right. The difference between majority and
dissenter perceptions turns in part on whether the President’s inaction in enforcing federal immigration law has preemptive significance.
And certainly, as Scalia wrote, the Framers would have abhorred this result; the states always have cherished their borders. One
columnist wryly noted that the Framers would not have signed a constitution abolishing slavery. True, but that deficiency of our
Constitution was addressed through amendment. No amendment yet has erased state borders. Preemption always poses a fuzzy
question, but the Court’s ruling against Arizona takes a bite out of state power. Expansive federal
inaction was read to displace a traditionally sound exercise of state police power that only sought to complement federal law—as
written. The states now seem more than ever at the mercy of the federal government and its deep pockets to
decide what is and is not the province of the state electorate. So what local policy decisions will next take up residence between Capitol
Hill and K Street? Healthcare, it seems. In NFIB v. Sebelius, the Court substantially upheld the national healthcare initiative advanced
by the President, including the controversial individual mandate. The Court majority rejected the mandate as an exercise of Commerce
Clause power. But leaving academic jaws agape, the majority capitalized on a marginal, throw-it-at-the-wall-and-see-if-it-sticks
Government argument that the penalty for failure to comply with the mandate was not a penalty at all—rather, a tax within the power of
the Taxing Clause (as well as the Sixteenth Amendment, a further flimsy stretch). The majority’s use of the Taxing Clause dealt
another blow to federalism. Again pundits derided the dissent, this time for getting hung up on the infamous hypothetical of
government-compelled broccoli consumption and stubbornly failing to acknowledge that the individual decision not to buy health
insurance (inaction again) is itself a regulable commercial act. The problem of federalism can get lost in the shuffle. But in using the
Taxing Clause, the Court offered precious little in the way of limiting principles. Indeed, the Taxing Clause now seems poised
to become Congress’s favorite new toy to run circles around the Commerce Clause and its carefully
erected barriers to federal omnipotence. Whatever mandates formerly defied the reach of Congress may now be offered to
individuals as a “choice,” and persons lacking the wisdom to choose correctly may be “taxed” accordingly. Congress need not even use
the word “tax”; the Justices will strain their eyes to find a tax wherever a penalty lies. Citizens refusing to buy their shares of broccoli
admittedly seems far-fetched. Imagine instead a domestic airline industry on the brink of collapse. A federal bailout compels all
persons to buy airline tickets—or to invest in troubled banks, or to subscribe to failing newspapers—it’s the patriotic choice, after all.
Agoraphobic? Prefer to keep money under the mattress and get your news from TV? No problem; the “tax” on non-compliance comes
due April 15. Federalism is not an anachronism. The “United States” has—have—survived because of a well drawn balance between
sovereign states and the federal government. This system of “vertical separation of powers” is one of our essential checks and
balances, right along with the three branches of government (“horizontal separation of powers”) that kids learn about in grade school.
Imbalance in this formula can spell catastrophe; think Civil War or European financial collapse. Immigration and healthcare are critical
public policy problems, but they are not intractable. Congress and the President have ample constitutional power at their disposal to
achieve meaningful reforms without running roughshod over the States. Dismantling federalism is a shortcut with a steep price.
EV Aff: DA Ans--Oil
Oil does not help producer economies—Dutch disease
CNA Military Advisory Board, General Charles F. Ward, General, USAF (ret.), chair, POWERING AMERICA’S
DEFENSE: ENERGY AND THE RISKS TO NATIONAL SECURITY, 5—09, p. 5.
For many countries, however, the presence of oil can be as much a curse as a gift. While oil can enable some nations to flex their
muscles, it can also have a destabilizing effect on their economic, social, and political infrastructure. In many cases, the discovery of oil
deposits can bring about “Dutch disease,” an economic condition that can occur when a nation’s large endowment of a natural resource
attracts all capital away from other sectors while simultaneously increasing the currency valuation to the point where trade in other
economic sectors collapses. When the natural resource that caused the Dutch disease goes from boom to bust (as has been the case
with oil), the economy and social fabric of the afflicted nation can be left in tatters [25].
Oil dependence makes oil shocks inevitable – extinction
HENDERSON 2007—frequent contributor to Countercurrents, an organization devoted to resolving climate change (Bill, 24 February 2007, “Climate
Change, Peak Oil And Nuclear War,” http://www.countercurrents.org/cc-henderson240207.htm, DA: 7/19/2012//JLENART)
The awakening
public now know that climate change is real and human caused but still grossly underestimate
the seriousness of the danger, the increasing probability of extinction , and how close and insidious this
danger is - runaway climate change, the threshold of which, with carbon cycle time lags, we are close to if not upon.
A steep spike in the price of oil, precipitated perhaps by an attack on Iran or Middle East instability spreading the insurgency to Saudi Arabia,
could lead to an economic dislocation paralyzing the global economy . Such a shock coming at the end of
cheap oil but before major development of alternative energy economies could mean the end of civilization
as we know it. And there is a building new cold war with still potent nuclear power Russia and China reacting to
a belligerent, unilateralist America on record that it will use military power to secure vital resources and to
not allow any other country to threaten it's world dominance. The world is closer to a final, nuclear, world
war than at any time since the Cuban missile crisis in 1962 with a beginning arms race and tactical
confrontation over weapons in space and even serious talk of pre-emptive nuclear attack.
Middle East instability and global consumption are alt causes to high prices
Ydstie 3/23 – writer for National Public Radio News [John, 3/23/2012, NPR, “Why Gas Prices Are Rising Even as Demand Is Down,”
http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2012/03/23/149220383/why-gas-prices-are-rising-even-as-demand-is-down]
"If our demand for gasoline is falling, why are prices in the U.S. rising?"
are lots of reasons why the price you pay at the pump might rise; from additional taxes levied by
the government to threats of supply disruption in the Middle East. The latter, of course, is a big reason
gasoline prices are higher now even though demand throughout the world is quite soft and falling in the
U.S.
Fadel Gheit, managing director of Oil and Gas Research at Oppenheimer and Company, says the price of
oil depends on several factors — "number one: crude oil prices." Of course, crude oil prices are set in a global
market. That means even if U.S. demand for oil is forecast to fall significantly over the next 25 years, Americans will pay more for each
galloon of gasoline if the global price of oil rises, which is quite likely. While Americans are using fewer gallons of oil per person, consumers
in India, China and other emerging markets are using more. In 2010, China added 10 million more cars.
With a population of more than 1 billion people, that nation is going to use more oil in the future and that
demand will likely drive prices up.
Now let's examine another important question:
Well, there
EV Aff: DA Ans--Politics Link Turns
Policies to fast track EVs are empirically bipartisan
Berman, 11 – leading writer and researcher about electric cars and green transportation, regularly contributes driving reviews and technology articles to The New York Times, KQED
Public Media, Reuters, Mother Earth News and other publications (Brad, “Bi-Partisan Representatives Introduce New Act to Promote Electric Cars”, PluginCars.com, 3 May 2011,
http://www.plugincars.com/bi-partisan-representatives-introduce-new-act-promote-electric-cars-107125.html)//BI
There aren’t many initiatives that Republicans and Democrats can quickly agree upon, but deployment of
electric cars is one of them. Both sides of the aisle support a strong EV future in the United States, as a strategy
for job creation and reducing dependence on oil. Today, U.S. Representative Judy Biggert (R-IL) joined Reps. Edward J.
Markey (D-MA), Jerry McNerney(D-CA), and Anna Eshoo (D-CA) to introduce the Electric Drive Vehicle
Deployment Act—legislation designed to fast track the deployment of energy-saving electric vehicle and
plug-in hybrid technologies. “In my home district, researchers at Argonne National Laboratory are leading the charge on
advanced vehicle battery technology, and their work is already paying dividends in terms of energy savings,
American jobs, and U.S. competitiveness,” said Biggert, referring to a recent manufacturing agreement between Argonne,
LG, and General Motors for the Chevy Volt. “I’m glad to work with my colleague on a bipartisan effort to help
advance the widespread use of electric vehicles,” said McNerney, who serves alongside Biggert on the Science, Space,
and Technology Committee. “At a time of high unemployment, there’s great potential for job creation in this field and it’s critical that we
lay the groundwork now for these new opportunities.” The bill authorizes the U.S. Secretary of Energy to award up to $300 million to
each of 10 different deployment communities around the country. These communities will then serve as domestic hubs for EV
manufacturing and deployment, as well as proving grounds for best practices. The Electric Drive Vehicle Deployment Act guarantees
these consumer benefits: At least $2,000 (beyond existing tax credits or other federal and local incentives) for the first 50,000 EV
consumers within each deployment community An extension of 2014 federal tax credits for the purchase and installation of electric
vehicle charging equipment for individuals (up to $2,000) or businesses (up to $50,000 for multiple equipment purchases). The bill also
authorizes additional development, deployment and manufacturing incentives for EV technologies, including bond authority and a
limited number of smaller grants for municipalities not selected as deployment communities. “As America experiences the rise and fall
of gas prices alongside the rise and fall of al Qaeda leadership and other Middle Eastern despots, it is time to tell the oil sheiks funding
terror networks that America needs their oil as much as we need their sand,” said Markey, Ranking Member on the House Natural
Resources Committee and senior member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee. “It’s time for America to start
driving toward a clean, safe energy future, and electric vehicles can help power the way.”
Republicans empirically support government incentives for EVs – seen as a way to move away form
gasoline
Lehmann 11(Evan, Climate Writer, “Republican Sees Electric Car Bill as a Climate ‘Step’”, Ney York Times, http://www.nytimes.com/cwire/2011/05/26/26climatewire-republican-seeselectric-car-bill-as-a-clima-79979.html?pagewanted=all)//LCS
Sen. Lamar Alexander, a Tennessee Republican, expressed confidence yesterday that the promise of
increasing America's energy independence at a time of high gas prices could drive the bickering Congress
to cooperate on an electric car bill he introduced with Sen. Jeff Merkley, an Oregon Democrat. But Alexander also embraced
climate change as a man-made problem that the government has a responsibility to correct. That counters a host of statements by
Republicans who expressed skepticism, or denial, about the impacts of society's emissions while campaigning last year. "My view on
climate change is of course it's occurring. Anyone can see that," Alexander said at an event hosted by National Journal yesterday. "The
big argument is what you do about it. ... I think what you do about it is take steps." The question now is whether that go-slow approach
will be adopted by Congress, which has been feuding over partisan symbols like expanded oil drilling and repealing oil company tax
deductions. Yet behind the campaign-style maneuvering are a handful of energy bills that are grasping for traction before presidential
electioneering and political theater overtake serious legislating. They seek to steer the country's transportation system
away from gasoline, which accounted for 33 percent of carbon dioxide emissions in 2009, by promoting the
use of natural gas in trucks, advancing electric cars and renewable energy, and saving power. That could have
an impact on transportation emissions, 65 percent of which come from personal car use. Now is the time,
in some people's view, to provide government incentives for the purchase of alternatively fueled cars . That would
dovetail with high pump prices and spark consumers to buy more efficient and cleaner cars, supporters say.
Political support for EVs – warming, energy security, gas prices
Broder ’12 – reporter with the New York Times (John, “The Electric Car, Unplugged”, 3/25/2012. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/25/sunday-review/the-electric-carunplugged.html?pagewanted=all)//DHirsch
“There is much more political support for it today, for a variety of reasons,” he said. “Global warming, energy
security, petroleum prices, all these vectors are aligned to support the electrification of the automobile,
whether it’s hybrid, plug-in, extended-range hybrid or full battery-electric.”
But he added that the Volt was an incredibly complicated device in the early stages of development. “When you push the start button,
you’ve got 10 million lines of software running. On an F-15, it’s about eight million lines of code. You’re really driving a modern data
center, and a lot can go wrong.”
He noted that the current Volt was the first generation and predicted that its third version, which will come between 2020 and 2025,
will gain wide acceptance, as long as G.M. does not end the project and the government backs a
nationwide infrastructure of charging stations.