Vincent Sheheen, speaking to the Clean Energy Summit this morning.
Does that headline sound a bit odd? Well… I was trying to capture what I tend to think, or perhaps feel, whenever I hear Vincent Sheheen speak publicly.
He says a bunch of perfectly fine things that I personally agree with, but he doesn’t make you go away all charged up and ready to do something — such as vote for him. Which could be key.
The speech was just fine. He was the keynote speaker at the Clean Energy Summit over at the convention center, and I thought all the points he made were good ones. I have every reason to believe the audience thought so, too.
The essence of what he said is captured in this excerpt from the op-ed he wrote to publicize the event ahead of time:
Now is the time for South Carolina to step forward as a leader in clean energy, which will benefit our state in many ways and move us toward a more prosperous future.
First, clean energy will help our state’s bottom line and create reliable and affordable energy sources for our citizens. When we create more energy from our own resources, we can stop sending South Carolina dollars out of state and keep them here to build our economy from within.
Currently South Carolina is a net energy importer. About $8 billion a year, a huge outflow, goes out of state to buy energy either as liquid fuel or fuel to power our electric-generating plants. By strengthening our own clean-energy sector, we can keep more of that money here to build our own economy.
In the next decade alone, we could create more than 30,000 jobs directly by attracting clean-energy companies or supporting homegrown ones. Add to that the tens of thousands of additional jobs that will be created in industries that support clean energy, and there’s a tremendous ripple effect.
Plus, with our great capacity to grow, South Carolina could expand further in the recycling, wind and solar industries to employ more than 60,000 within a decade, and our total clean-energy work force could jump as many as 74,000. That means more jobs, better jobs and good pay for the long-term for middle-class families. All we need is the right leadership to look ahead and build a more prosperous future.
Our state is blessed with natural assets that give us great potential to lead the nation. For solar projects, we have an abundance of sunny days. For wind, we have an expansive coastline. For biomass, we have 500,000 acres of available land that could provide great opportunities to sow and harvest energy crops. And of course, we have great people…
And so forth.
He tried creating a little suspense by saying he was going to, here and now, make an announcement about an industry that would bring lots of jobs to South Carolina… but I’m sure before he actually said “the Clean Energy Industry,” everyone figured out that was what he was going to say, so I don’t think the effect worked too well. Maybe if he’d done it a little more quickly… I don’t know.
Vincent always comes across as a really nice guy, so that’s good. He smiles a lot. He likes to salt his speeches with the little self-deprecating politician jokes that tend to go over well with Rotaries and similar audiences. For instance, he suggests that if wind turbines were placed outside the Senate and the governor’s office, “we can power the whole state.” People respond politely. And that’s about it.
I write this way because, as you no doubt have gathered in the past, I think Vincent Sheheen would make a good governor. He’s someone I would trust to make sound policy decisions on a wide array of issues. He would run an administration that would be open and honest, and he would strive for needed reforms to make government be more responsive and do its job better. He’d be a good-government governor, instead of an anti-government governor, which is what we’ve been accustomed to for more than a decade.
But can he get elected? I tend, when I hear him speak, to worry about his intensity, or seeming lack thereof. I don’t doubt that he will work hard as a campaigner, but I worry about his ability to connect sometimes, to motivate people to get on his bandwagon.
Maybe I worry too much. He came so close to winning last time, and now Nikki Haley has a record to run against, so maybe Vincent can win just by being Vincent. I don’t know.
I said something about all this to a friend who was there for the speech. I said Vincent comes across as a good, smart guy whose attitude is, “Sure, I’ll step forward and be governor, if no one better does.” My friend said, “Well, isn’t that what we want?” Meaning a citizen-leader who’s not power-starved or driven by some destructive ideology?
Well, yes. As long as such a person manages to get elected. We’ve seen enough of where good speakers get us. Nikki Haley is a good speaker, partly because she taps into the well of chip-on-the-shoulder demagoguery that has been popular in recent years. Actually, it’s been popular a lot longer than that in SC. Ben Tillman rose to power starting with a rip-roaring populist speech in my hometown of Bennettsville in 1885.
We definitely don’t need more of that.
But can an unassuming good guy get elected? We’ll see…
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When I was writing that headline, I was thinking of the line from “Five Easy Pieces,” said of a piano: “It has absolutely no objectionable idiosyncrasies.”
But I thought that, as movie lines go, that one was a tad obscure to quote directly in a headline…
I think the energy that goes into generating renewable energy (solar, ethanol, wind) is greater than the lifetime output of the generator.
Wouldn’t that be true of any type of energy source? Isn’t that the gist of the 2nd law of thermodynamics? No transfer of energy is 100% efficient. The output is always some less……according to the 2nd law….. I think.
“Wouldn’t that be true of any type of energy source?” – Scout
Correct, the problem has been in the degree of efficiency for energy conversion. For renewable sources, so far, the efficiency has not been much better than for radioisotope thermoelectric generators (RTGs), which are usually reserved for long duration satellites because nothing else will even work. Someday, solar efficiency may overtake conventional forms of energy generation, but progress in improved solar cells —materials able to both withstand solar radiation and produce electric power efficiently has been rather slow since Becquerel (1839). Today, the best efficiency under ideal conditions is still under 50%.
But wait, the truth about “clean energy” is even uglier: Electric cars [are] no greener than gasoline vehicles… Writing in the journal IEEE Spectrum, researcher Ozzie Zehner says electric cars lead to hidden environmental and health damages and are likely more harmful than gasoline cars and other transportation options. http://www.upi.com/Science_News/Technology/2013/07/01/Study-Electric-cars-no-greener-than-gasoline-vehicles/UPI-40741372711871/#ixzz2Xw6UXWZH
“Vincent always comes across as a really nice guy, so that’s good.” For a decent candidate that is necessary, but not sufficient. Facts must be part of a governor’s platform. Either a personal track record, obviously missing in Sheheen’s case, or government’s best efforts to date.
Consider Vincent’s sound-good, hypothetical solar employment figures, for instance. Vincent has less credibility in that industry than Obama:
“There is a crisis in the solar manufacturing world there’s no question about it. With three companies declaring bankruptcy in three weeks, there’s no question that they’re all under pressure.” – Ken Zweibel, director of the Solar Institute at George Washington University.
Since Solyndra, which squandered $527 million of federal funds, there have been more clean energy failures of taxpayer funded Democrat contributors, and California’s state Legislature passed legislation requiring the state’s three investor-owned utilities to collect another $200 million from ratepayers to fund itsprogram. there have been more bankruptcies including Colorado-based Abound Solar ($400 Million guaranteed by U.S. taxpayers), and these:
• Ener 1
• Beacon Power
• Abound Solar
• Amonix Solar
• Spectra Watt
• Eastern Energy
Good luck, Vincent, get your feet on the ground.
If he loses again to Haley, his statewide political career is over, right? He can spend the next three decades
as a generic Democrat state senator.
That plus his law practice wouldn’t make such a bad living.
Definitely. Vincent would take a big pay cut to be governor.. He doesn’t NEED the job.
2014 is essentially an “all-in” year for the Democratic Party in South Carolina. If Sheheen can’t beat Haley after her disastrous first term, they are about as relevant as the Green Party. (and not Alvin)
Just like 2010, Sheheen wil run a negative campaign against Haley without defining himself. He will hope Haley’s negatives will translate into more votes for him. It’s the strategy of a loser, not a leader.
We all know what Haley is now. Tell us what Vincent Sheheen will do without referencing Haley.
1) Doug, as i have asked here long ago without ANY response, kindly tell me what it is that you know now; what, exactly, is Haley?
2) After the unmentionable (at least by Brad) news of the SC Supreme Courts ridiculous challenge to the “castle doctrine” what comment does Vincent have now? None, exactly!
Another smiley lawyer-politician trying to win votes by hiding his agenda (Obama’s).
Haley is our version of Sarah Palin. Lightweight in brain power, ethically challenged, and a hypocrite on numerous topics.
But she is also Governor of South Carolina which in and of itself is not much of a big deal. It’s a figurehead position that really carries little weight in changing the direction of South Carolina’s future. Vincent Sheheen may win but he will do little to make any real difference in the way this state is run.
What I don’t like about Sheheen is that he has used Haley and Sanford as his targets rather than present a clear vision of what he would do as governor. Last time around, it was boilerplate “economy, schools, blah blah blah” drivel. The day he places the blame for South Carolina’s problems where it truly lies (Leatherman, Harrell, and a few others) is the day I will consider voting for him. As long as he continues to pretend the problem isn’t the guys surrounding him in the State House, he’s just another empty suit to me,
I hope Alvin runs for guv. Anyone want to help me pay his filing fee?
Or clean underwear.
We collectively want incompatible things: energy independence (even if it costs us more $$ than imported energy) and cheap energy. Right now the citizens of Lac Megantic, Quebec don’t think domestically produced oil is such a good deal, but there are some folks (none on this blog that I know of) who would say losing one small town every few years is an acceptable price to pay for cheap oil.
As an anecdotal point of evidence: Halifax, Nova Scotia, is located in an area with rich coal deposits. I noticed that the cruise terminal there is all-in on green energy: they have small wind turbines AND solar panels in addition to the usual sources of energy.
Wind and solar don’t actually PRODUCE energy. They just move it around. It takes more energy to get the raw materials out of the ground and made into a turbine or solar cell then they will generate in their lifespan. So basically you burn coal and oil from North Dakota and West Virginia to manufacture a device that will make clean power in Halifax or California.
Well, I am not a scientist, but didn’t I learn something about conservation of energy….only nuclear actually creates energy?
I mean that if you expend energy to extract and burn coal or oil, you eventually release more energy from the fossil fuel than you spent to retrieve and process it. I don’t believe this is currently the case for solar or wind.
I see. How about geothermal?
Also, over time, as these emerging technologies develop, they will become more efficient on a steep curve. Carbon fuels do not share this probability.
I’d be interesting to see your spreadsheets laying out the higher life-cycle costs. Plus, the coal that Halifax would burn would come from the mines on Cape Breton Island.
Fossil Fuels don’t produce energy either – the energy is simply released that has been bound up in the carbon bonds. It’s a transfer too. That is another scientific law, right? – energy is never created or destroyed – it just changes form. (My husband has just informed me that this is only true in normal chemical reactions and that nuclear does actually create energy, but still in the case of Fossil Fuel sources…..it’s a transfer/change of form too).
But I get what you are saying now. Are you sure, though? What are you basing those figures on?
I mean the wind and the sun don’t cost anything once you get the things built. So the limiting factor is the life of the equipment. How do you know how long the turbines will last and at what rate they are converting energy during that time – wouldn’t you have to know that to say they don’t generate as much energy in their lifetime as it took to create them. Even if this were true now, I doubt it would always be true, if we pursue developing these technologies. I also find it hard to believe that the same would not be true for fossil fuels. They are not free – we have to pay lots of people to get them out of the ground and expend a lot of energy doing it. Not to mention the loss of energy when things die like animals affected by oil spills and the chemicals they use in fracking. I think that counts too. Personally.
I’m not necessarily doubting you but I’m skeptical and curious what you are basing that on.
I’ve heard it both ways.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesconca/2012/07/01/is-the-answer-my-friend-blowing-in-the-wind/
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/08/070813153419.htm