Jon Huntsman shares energy plan in Manchester, NH

Republican presidential candidate Jon Huntsman shared his plan for energy independence at a town hall meeting with employees of Public Service of New Hampshire held in Manchester on January 4, 2012. The one time Utah Governor and U.S. Ambassador to China was also endorsed by former Secretary of Homeland Security Tom Ridge at the event.

Transcript of Huntsman’s remarks on energy:

Voter: Governor, we’re importing a lot of foreign oil and exporting those dollars overseas.

Talk a little about your energy policy to reverse that trend and how we can be more self sustaining with our energies in the country to support our economy. 

Jon Huntsman: Well, I want to start by leading a conversation in this nation that points out how ridiculous it is to maintain this heroin like addiction to imported oil, and the transfer of wealth to the tune of $300 billion a year that lands in countries that having nothing more than a transactional relationship with the United States.

I would say, “We’re losing a huge opportunity here, when we can be doing it based upon what we have in great abundance here.”

So we wake up to the reality in this country that – we were talking about this earlier – we have more gas than Saudi Arabia has crude oil.

I say, “How stupid are we?”

I mean, when are we going to wake up and get with the picture here, and start converting more to transportation, converting more to power and electricity generation, and converting more to basic manufacturing, where we’re at maybe 19 percent. 

They want to go higher, but they need that clarion call from the bully pulpit that says, “Folks, it’s not a mandate, but here’s where our country is going in terms of energy independence. Jump on the bus. We’re not looking back, we’re moving forward.”

I’ll tell you how many companies would start moving in that direction.

There’s just been no clarity in terms of where we go.

So as the first Governor to sign onto the Pickens Plan, I like the natural gas part of the Pickens Plan, and I’ve talked to T. Boone Pickens several times about energy and our energy needs.

And I say, you can talk about the multiplicity of products that we can begin drawing from.

That’s all a reality. I think it’s very real.

I think the sun and the wind will play a role in the future.

I think inevitably that’s where science and technology takes us. 

The question becomes, if we’re going to do it in a non-subsidized fashion -- we’re all learning that you can’t do it in a subsidized fashion. It crashes and burns.

We’ve got to build a bridge from our today to that inevitable tomorrow, whenever that is.

And I say, lets begin building that bridge with the products we have in abundance.

And here’s the one thing I want to do. 

When elected president, because you can’t, again, I’m not one to promise the moon.

I say, here’s the one step I’m going to take, because I lived this reality when I drove a natural gas car as Governor.

I never thought I’d drive a natural gas car.

I ran into an entrepreneur in the northern part of our state. 

He said, “I’d love to take that black Suburban of yours and convert it to natural gas.”

I said, “I had no idea that you could even do that.”

So you know, thinking in terms of wanting to move towards greater energy independence, I said, “Go for it.”

Tooled around the state.

We started a wide ranging conversation around the state about alternative fuels only to find that the rate limiting feature was there was no distribution.

There were no fill up stations.

And the last thing the Governor wanted was to get caught 300 miles from nowhere.

So I went to our public utilities and said, “Folks, you can either be ahead of this debate or you can be behind. I think you’re going to want to be ahead. I need some help in building some infrastructure so we can designate a natural gas corridor and get the marketplace moving so people begin buying up.”

Which they did.

People responded to that and they were right on it.

We ended up designating a natural gas corridor, which I thought was pretty cool.

But the one thing I want to do as President, I want to break up this one product distribution monopoly, because it’s not serving our needs.

And it favors oil, and only oil. 

And I say, that’s not right.

That’s not fair to all the other products that we want to begin drawing from.

And I think it could be the most powerful contribution towards energy independence of anything.

Because, let’s face it, if we’re going to make energy independence or steps towards that goal a reality, we’ve got to have the infrastructure with which to do it.

You know, words are just words unless you can actually talk about the infrastructure.

So I want to do to that distribution system what we did to broadcast communication back in the early 1970’s when we went from three stations to a multiplicity of stations.

And I say, it’s going to take the Federal Trade Commission.

Of course, it’s going to take the Senate Judiciary Committee.

They all have to be part of it.

But let’s start the journey, and let’s get a President who can actually advocate in favor of making that very important step, without which it’s a whole bunch of talk and we don’t have the infrastructure in place with which to get something done.

So I think that would be the most important contribution we could make, and I want to get behind it.

Video of Jon Huntsman’s energy comments courtesy of C-Span:

Jon Huntsman fields questions on global warming, cap and trade in New Hampshire

Jon Huntsman faced tough questions about global warming and energy policy during his November 1, 2011 meeting with the Monadnock Ledger-Transcript editorial board in Peterborough, New Hampshire. 

A complete video of the meeting has been posted to YouTube, with the energy portion starting at 21:10: 

Transcript of Jon Huntsman's comments on energy:

Monadnock Ledger-Transcript: I was hoping you’d give us a preview of your energy plan. I know that you’re gonna unveil it today, but we don’t go to press until Thursday anyways, so we’re not going to scoop anybody.

Obviously, it’s a wildly controversial issues, especially now, but I think there are a lot of disagreements about what the government’s role is in terms of incentivizing a renewable economy, if that’s even a priority.

So I know that you’ve said that you do believe that global warming is occurring and that you have variously supported and not supported cap and trade programs. So I was wondering what your platform is on cap and trade and if you could articulate for us exactly what you the role of government is in spurring a shift to a green energy economy. 

Jon Huntsman: The role of government should, number one, be bring up through reviewing regulations that make it very difficult, as I found as Governor, with respect to natural gas out West. Bring up opportunities to get more of what we have in great abundance in this country.

Number two, I believe it ought to be the role of government to break up the oil monopoly as it relates to transportation. So whether it’s light vehicles or heavy vehicles on diesel, you don’t have much of an option. I think that’s a legitimate… 

Monadnock Ledger-Transcript: Can you expand on that just a little bit?

Jon Huntsman: Yeah, I think that, you know, as we had with federal communications – with communication networks in the ‘70’s we had a monopoly. And there was an FTC review and there was a review by the judiciary committee within the Senate to break that up. And today, we all benefit on that communications side by having a whole lot more. 

I think the same thing needs to happen on oil.

I think the FTC and the Judiciary Committee in the Senate need to look at the distribution network for oil and say, “Somebody has a huge advantage here and until such time as we look at breaking it up, we’re not going to be able to allow alternative fuels and other options to become viable.”

Monadnock Ledger-Transcript: So by distribution networks, do you mean gas stations, the companies that transport oil from the production station to those has stations? At which point in the distribution network do you that there’s…

Jon Huntsman: Well, that is one part of the distribution network. For example, if you want to fire your car on natural gas, there is little in the way of distribution capabilities.

We don’t have a smart grid, for example, for electric cars. So if you want to look to the future and say, “If you want anything but the hydrocarbon called gasoline and diesel,” you’re pretty much screwed, because there is nothing available.

I found this as Governor. As Governor, I ran my car on natural gas. I didn’t think you could do that until I met some entrepreneur in the northern part of the state who said, “I want to convert your state Suburban to natural gas. I paid him out of pocket to do it.

I drove around the state with two big tanks in the back of my car for years. And, you know, with the idea that if you didn’t fill up at two or three stations where you had access, you’d find yourself in the middle of the desert stranded.

So I went to the public utilities and said, “We’re going to create a super natural gas highway in this state that’ll link one end to the other. We’re really going to give people an option. You either want to be ahead of this debate, or you’re gone be behind, but I’m asking you to help.”

So they stepped up and they decided they’d make an investment in traditional service stations along the way. This is like Colorado to Nevada, that stretch of land. And they decided to step and actually make investments so you could actually fill up from natural gas along that corridor.

I think were one of the first states to actually do anything like that.

So it’s achievable, but you’re going to have to take on the oil monopoly and you can only do that through an FTC review, with the Senate Judiciary Committee taking a look at it.

But I want to open up options for natural gas, for alternative fuels, for electric cars, in which case if you want to recharge in your garage, we need a smart grid. You can’t do it today.

So all of this supposes that over the next ten years or so we’re gonna get really smart about alternatives beyond just oil, but I think that’s a legitimate role for the government to be playing.

And then on the whole basic research side, I think between health sciences and the National Institutes of Health and what they do around cancer, for example, that’s an important investment. And I think our energy future under ARPA-E, which is the, you know, the analogous organization to DARPA at the Defense Department is also important, because therein we’re going to figure out how we can begin drawing from the sun and how we can begin drawing more from the wind. 

I mean, ultimately we’ll be there, but we’re not there today. And you can’t force technologies into the marketplace before they’re ready. We’re learning that with each passing day. The subsidies, you know, before they’re ready to be deployed into the market place, you know, they just don’t work.

But through basic research sponsored by the government, I think you begin to develop the technology sooner than you otherwise might, which then would create more of a level playing field for individual companies that will then adopt…

On solar approaches, on wind energy, we’re just not there today. We’ll be there at some point. 

Monadnock Ledger-Transcript: So you think that the role of government is in sponsoring research, not necessarily for incentivizing individual projects.

Jon Huntsman: You know it isn’t picking winners. It isn’t an industrial policy like we saw in Japan in the ‘70’s and ‘80’s. That doesn’t work.

And we’re finding that with Solyndra for example. I think there are going to be a lot more Solyndra’s, on both the Republican side and the Democrat side. People just finding money and throwing it at technologies - nascent technologies that aren’t ready for primetime. And we’ll find that they’re not ready for primetime, they can’t compete with things like natural gas. But, you know, given 20 or 30 years they’d probably be viable.

So where we are today is we’ve gotta build a bridge to tomorrow. You know, 30 years or whatever that point is we’ll be drawing from the sun and the wind. I have no doubt about that. Technologies will catch up to where we need to be. 

We’ll innovate our way forward, but how do you build a bridge from today to tomorrow. I think that will in large part be driven by freeing up materials that we need to use for transportation, like natural gas, creating a smart grid, converting our fleets more and more to where they can be flexible fuel fleets.

That’s the only way you can get from today to tomorrow in an affordable, competitive fashion.

Monadnock Ledger-Transcript: I understand that you have a three-part plan. That it’s reviewing regulations that you find to be too restrictive on the natural gas industry, and reviewing the distribution network for energy, and sponsoring research on renewable energy technology.

I’m wondering specifically with the restrictive regulations, there is a lot of controversy about this because, you know, people put that forward often as, you know, regulations are too restrictive. And the easy counter is, “Well those regulations are needed to protect the environment, to protect the health of the populations around where development and resource exploitation is taking place.”

Could you be more specific about the regulations that you find to be too restrictive and how you would unencumber industry without risking the health and safety of the environment and citizens?

Jon Huntsman: Yeah. Again, I’m all for protecting health. I’m all for a sound environment. I mean, that’s what we’re passing on to the next generation.

But when you have things like NEPA, that has been around since the 1960’s, started by Republicans by the way.

Monadnock Ledger-Transcript: What is it?

Jon Huntsman: The National Energy Policy Act, which governs how you use land and the steps and the requirements and the red tape needed to actually access things like natural gas. It’s terribly prohibitive to the point where you might as well throw up your hands in frustration before you even begin. It’s hardly competitive given what other countries in the world are doing in terms of preparing to fuel their future economy.

That’s gotta be dealt with, I mean, the prerequisites for NEPA for example.

On the EPA side, just things like the restriction that was just imposed on the large vehicle fleet, which is, you know, the 20 percent consumer of the hydrocarbon called oil. The thought you could transition that fleet towards natural gas, President Obama basically through the EPA made that impossible by putting mileage restrictions or mileage criteria on the big rig fleet, the 18 wheeler fleet, making it impossible for them to convert to natural gas. Yet, that would be the first transportation opportunity that you would logically have.

Monadnock Ledger-Transcript: Mileage restrictions meant you have to build engines that get at least this much per mile, right? To maximize our fuel use as a country, you can’t have engines that suck up gasoline. So how does that prevent development of natural gas? I don’t understand.

Jon Huntsman: Well, if you look at the restrictions that were just put on the 18 wheeler fleet, it makes it impossible for them to convert to natural gas.

Monadnock Ledger-Transcript: Why?

Jon Huntsman: You’ll have to ask the White House.

Monadnock Ledger-Transcript: No, why does it make it impossible for them to…

Jon Huntsman: It sets new criteria that are impossible to meet unless you use gasoline, unless you use diesel.

Monadnock Ledger-Transcript: …is natural gas less mileage efficient? 

Jon Huntsman: There may be a problem with that in the beginning, but uh…

Monadnock Ledger-Transcript: Okay, I was having a hard time understanding that. Everyone just assumes that natural gas must be more efficient, therefore you burn less of it per gallon…

Jon Huntsman: It’s because engines are built, as I found in my Suburban, for gas. So, you know, you make the tweaks and whatever catalytic converter or whatever, you can basically achieve the same efficiencies.

Monadnock Ledger-Transcript:  … with a lot of unintended consequences from the sound of it. That’s interesting, I wouldn’t have thought that.

Jon Huntsman talks energy in Plymouth, NH

The “fully loaded” cost of a gallon of gasoline is around $13, Jon Huntsman told voters gathered for the Grafton County Republican Committee’s Columbus Day Dinner, held on October 11, 2011 at the Common Man Inn in Plymouth, NH.

Huntsman’s comments came as he was responding to a voter’s question about the hidden cost of oil:

Voter: Governor, I’d like to thank you for your bravery in pointing out that we need a new national security strategy. One that’s not bankrupting America. One that’s indicating that the global policing, nation building approach is not defending national security.

I want to turn to energy. We spend… In New Hampshire we spend about $3 billion a year importing fossil fuels that we can’t produce here. We don’t have it and we won’t have it. My question is, I know you back a level playing field energy, would you back bringing all the hidden costs, the hidden subsidies for fossil fuels that we can’t produce here into the cost of fossil fuels, such as lung disease, premature mortality, storm disasters, subsidies, tax subsidies such that our energy sources that we have here, such as wind and biomass, we can produce those and compete on a level playing field.

Would you bring those hidden subsidies into the cost so that all energy sources can compete on a level playing field?

Jon Huntsman: Thank you for your question. My energy policy calls us drawing upon all the energy options we have available to us and we have them in great abundance in this country. 

First of all, we need to level the playing field by phasing out subsidies and the corporate welfare. I mean, you kind of got to look at our tax code and look at how bunched up its become over many, many years and what its costs people to comply with our tax code these days.

And I say, “Clear it out. Lower the rate. Create a level playing for one and all.”

And I think for the energy sector that would be very, very important.

We all know that at some point we are going to be drawing a whole lot more from the sun and from the wind. That’s inevitable. Everybody wants to do that at some point. But we have made a mistake by trying to subsidize things too quickly when they’re not ready for the marketplace. So you force technologies into the marketplace when they’re not ready and they fail.

And I’m saying that the business community, science and technology will continue working on technologies that will draw from the sun and draw from… That’s inevitable.

What I wan’t to make I do as president is that we’re able to draw from some products that I would call transition products. Bridge products like natural gas that allow us to move from the here and now into the future. That might be 20 years, it might be 25 years before we have viable technology that allows us to do what all of us we can do from a science and technology standpoint.

I think we ought to be drawing from that which we have in such abundance.

Voter: But I’m wondering taking the hidden subsidies: the premature mortality, the lung disease – putting those into the price.

Jon Huntsman: If you take out subsidies and as businesses have to deal with the reality of – whether a hypercarbon based economy or what – all those costs are going to have to be factored in at some point. So I say start by taking out the subsidies and let the costs stand on their own. I think that would be a very good place to start.

But the energy policies, we all need to get our heads around. Because for 8 presidents, starting with Nixon, who said, “You know, 38 percent imported oil. This is a carrying shame. We’re not let this get any higher.”

Carter takes over – 40 percent imported oil. “You know, I’m going to create the Department of Energy to make sure that this doesn’t get any higher.” 

And here we sit at 60 percent imported oil.

But let’s talk about some of the fully loaded costs. We go to the gas pump and we pay four bucks or four bucks and fifty cents or whatever it is for a gallon of gas. Take a look at the fully loaded costs.

So the Milken Institute of Los Angeles, they a great quantitative shop. They do terrific quantitative analysis. They will say when you factor in the deployment costs, when you factor in keeping the sea lanes open for the importation of oil. By the way, the Europeans derive a benefit from that as well. When you factor in the terminaling and handling and storage costs, it’s not $3 or $4 or $5 a gallon. It’s $13 a gallon.

If Americans were to stop and just do the math and figure out what it costs this country on a fully loaded basis, they’d be running for cover. They’d say that $300 billion transfer of wealth from the United States to countries that are dangerous and unpredictable. Those days are over. I mean, those days have got to be over.

We’ve got to move toward energy independence. It can be done. And I believe it is the will of the people in this country to move us in that direction as quickly as possible.

Granite Grok captured Huntsman's comments on video. The energy portion of the Q&A starts at 5:50: 

Jon Huntsman on natural gas subsidies at the Google Fox News Debate (Video)

Former Utah Governor and 2012 Republican presidential candidate Jon Huntsman fielded a question about subsidies for natural gas during the September 23, 2011 Google Fox News Debate in Orlando, Florida.

Here's what he had to say:

Chris Wallace, Fox News: Governor Huntsman, in Utah, you offered millions of dollars in tax credits to promote clean energy. In June you said that as president you would subsidize natural gas companies. How is that different from the Obama administration, which gave the solar panel company Solyndra a half-a-billion dollars in federal loan guarantees, and as we all know, that company ended up bankrupt, and we taxpayers ended up on the hook?

Jon Huntsman: Chris, first of all, it's an honor to be here in Orlando, home of my wife, the greatest human being I've known in 28 years. 

We've learned some important lessons as this economy has spun out of control. We have some hard decisions to make. And we're not going to fix the problem. We're not going to be able to bring our people together in America until we fix the economy.

I'm convinced that part of the divide that we're experiencing in the United States, which is unprecedented, it's unnatural, and it's un-American, is because we're divided economically, too few jobs, too few opportunities.

We have learned that subsidies don't work and that we can no longer afford them. I believe that we can move toward renewable energy, but we're going to have to have a bridge product. Everybody wants to draw from the sun and draw from the wind, and I'm here to tell you that eventually that will make sense, but today the economics don't work.

We need something like natural gas. I've put forward an energy independence program, along with tax reform and regulatory reform. Just by drawing from natural gas, for example, you're looking at 500,000 to 1 million jobs over the next five years. It is ours, it's affordable, it has important national security implications, and we should begin the conversion process.

Wallace: But just a 30-second follow-up, sir. In June, you told the New Hampshire Union Leader as president you would subsidies the natural gas industry.

Huntsman: I would be willing to begin an effort, so long as there was a rapid phase-out. I do not like subsidies. I do not like long-term subsidies. But if there was some sort of way to get the ball rolling with a - with a - with a quick phase-out, I would be in favor of that.

Jon Huntsman talks wind, solar in New Hampshire

Jon Huntsman shared his thoughts on wind and solar power yesterday, while appearing as a guest on WGIR New Hampshire News Radio. Huntsman's comments apparently came in response to question posed by host Paul Wescott and were focused on Solyndra, the now bankrupt solar company that received federal stimulus funds back in 2009.

Here's what Huntsman had to say:

It’s another example of where subsidies just don’t work. 

Technology is going to take us forward at the pace of the free market. I have every confidence that 20-25 years from now we’re going to be drawing a whole lot more from the wind and from the sun. I think that’s inevitable.

The technology has to take us there. You can’t force that with subsidies.

And all the while, we’ve got to rely increasingly on fuels we have in great abundance in this country. We need a bridge from where we find ourselves to the future 25 years from now.

I think one the fundamental problems we’ve made in recent years is we’re trying to force technologies before their ready. We’re trying to force them into the marketplace before the economics actually work.

Everyone’s excited about moving into a new clean, environmentally friendly phase when it comes to energy and power generation. We have to realize the technology has to be there and the cost conversion has to be there from an economic standpoint and we’re not there yet.

So a sad chapter where subsidies have been thrown after technologies not yet ready for the marketplace and we see the result. 

Jon Huntsman talks energy independence at Dartmouth College

2012 Republican presidential candidate Jon Huntsman embraced natural gas as a cheap, clean transitional fuel during his appearance at Darmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire yesterday:

The lowest of low hanging fruit, that I think would be an immediate engine of growth in this country - energy independence.

We’ve talked about it for eight presidents. And yet today here we sit on an abundance of resources.

If somebody told you today that the United States had as much natural gas as Saudi Arabia has crude oil, that would be the story of the century. And that’s reality. And yet we don’t be any attention to it. It’s almost like it doesn’t exist.

Everyone wants to draw from the sun and everyone wants to draw from the wind. And I do to. We tried to make that happen in the State of Utah, but we need more time.

We need a transitional product for transportation, for power, for manufacturing that will get us from where we are today to where we want to be in the future.

Natural gas. It’s cheap. It’s clean. It’s ours. And it carries profound national security implications in a part of the world that is dangerous and unpredictable.

 Watch the full video of Jon Huntsman's speech at Dartmouth College. His energy comments start at 14:03