Given supply and demand projections, fossil fuel prices have nowhere to go but up.  The current economic recession will end, U.S. energy demands will increase, and without action to increase clean efficient energy, our economy will be wrenched by ever-higher more volatile fossil fuel prices.

  • The financial crisis we are experiencing now is in part due to our energy posture, according to high-ranking retired military leaders.[1]
  • Over the last few decades we have seen fossil fuel prices fluctuate wildly in large part because of increasing demand and decreasing supply.
  • Oil has jumped as high as $140 a barrel – sending prices at the pump upwards of $4 a gallon for gasoline.[2]  Coal prices also spiked, with the benchmark Central Appalachian coal hitting $175 per short ton.[3]
  • The economic downturn has caused those prices to come down temporarily, but still they remain high – gas prices are 40% higher now than in January – and will continue rising once the economy recovers.
  • Oil prices are projected to climb to more than $100 a barrel by 2015 and $190 a barrel by 2030 according to the International Energy Agency (IEA).[4]
  • There are expensive national security implications of relying so heavily on fossil fuels: we pay for our oil by sending billions of dollars to countries openly hostile to the US.  And because we consume far more than all our reserves, on or offshore, we can never stop that flow of money as long as we are using oil.

1 Powering America’s Defense: Energy and the Risks to National Security, CNA May 2009 www.cna.org

2 BBC News, Oil at Record Near $140 a Barrel, June 2008, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/7457157.stm

3 http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/coal/page/coalnews/coalmar.html – spot; http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/7457157.stm

4 http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125784836637040853.html#mod=todays_us_page_one. www.iea.org

Pennsylvania businesses have led the way throughout our nation's history. Pennsylvanians launched the railroads that first connected our country for commerce, powered the industrial revolution, and forged the steel that built our cities. It's time for Pennsylvania businesses to again lead the way to new jobs through a clean energy future.