INTRODUCTION: THE COMPLEXITY AND CONFLICTS OF ENERGY IN THE US LANDSCAPE

Why Is Energy Development and Production Important in Regard to Land Use?

Gas and oil wells dot landscapes from Pennsylvania to Texas, bringing both wealth and controversy around air and water quality, wildlife habitat and community change. The advent of nuclear power in the 1950s started a boom of uranium mining, refining and energy production but brought with it the difficult problem of where and how to safely store potently lethal post-energy production nuclear waste for millennia. Appalachia has been shaped for over a century by coal extraction. More recently, the rapid expansion of wind and solar energy has given rise to host of new companies, beneficiaries and conflicts. Wind development, particularly in the more densely populated landscapes of the northeast, has generated conflicts among environmental groups, local citizens at odds with local impact versus global need. Around the country, there is a raised awareness that "clean" energy has its costs too.

Energy extraction and production have powerfully shaped the US landscape over the last hundred years. Blessed with extraordinary natural resources, the United States built the largest economy in the world. While we think of land use primarily as a local function shaped by the creation of housing, office space, tracks and roads, energy production is also a powerful player in land use.

The United States is one of the largest producers of energy in the world. In 2013, it was the world's largest producer of natural gas (30,005,254 million cubic feet) and oil (2,720,782 thousand barrels) and the second largest producer of coal (nearly 1 billion short tons) and renewable energy (at 9.33 quadrillion Btu). Fossil fuels are the main source of energy in the United States. Fossil fuel resources comprised approximately 82 percent of total US energy consumption in 2013 (with nuclear energy comprising 8 percent and renewable energy 10 percent). Beyond generating energy, these natural resources are essential to creating other products, such as oil to make asphalt and coal for steel. Energy production in its many forms cuts across locales and states, and it affects landscapes substantially, if unevenly, across the United States.

The benefits of energy extraction and production are many. They include employment, wealth creation, public revenue, technological innovation, quality of life and national security. Energy extraction, production and distribution create enormous economic benefit. Concentrated and affordable energy is, in some sense, the lifeblood of any modern economy. Yes, primitive economies survive on sunlight, wood and even manure as fuel, but they cannot deliver the variety of goods and benefits (and costs too) that advanced economies with advanced energy systems do deliver. Energy extraction in Wyoming produces over 30 percent of the state's entire gross domestic product (GDP). The gas and oil sector in Texas produces over $212 billion in GDP for the state. In states where gas and oil production is significant, the industry is a prime contributor to state budgets. Wyoming collected some $868 million in state severance taxes in 2013 while Texas collected $4.6 billion that same year. These amounts don't include any other tax benefits stemming from extraction, such as sales and property tax.

In addition to local benefits and costs, there are national and international benefits. The more the United States produces energy of any kind within its boundaries, the less it is dependent on foreign sources and all the potential costs that come with it — exporting dollars to other economies, geopolitical risk and providing revenue to governments that may be corrupt or even funding terrorism. Take, as an example, the boom in natural gas. With a rapidly growing domestic supply, costs have fallen, which has benefitted manufacturing in terms of both overall costs and raw material for certain petrochemical manufacturing. Renewables production creates jobs in construction and installation and, if equipment is made in the United States, manufacturing. The shale oil boom has led to not only growth in US production but also a fall in worldwide oil prices, disrupting the power of autocracies from Saudi Arabia to Russia to exercise geopolitical power. Of course, all of the above named sources reduce electricity production from coal, thus reducing pollutants including greenhouse gas emissions.

Though there is no reliable data to identify the total US acreage dedicated to energy extraction or production, a map of a producing state's various energy facilities shows widespread landscape impact. Take Texas, for instance. The state map is crisscrossed with pipelines, wind energy facilities, oil and gas production wells, refineries and electricity-generating plants of various kinds. For a source like wind, the land impact is both variable and disputed. Is the impact of a wind turbine facility the simple boundary of the project? Wind turbine structures typically take up less than 10 percent of a project site, with roads and other infrastructure taking up the remainder. The US National Renewable Energy Laboratory estimates that the direct site impacts are between less than 1 acre and as much as 6 acres per megawatt (MW) (turbines can range widely in size). But what about the habitat impacts that likely extend both laterally and vertically across a larger acreage? And what about the visual impacts of a wind farm, which can extend tens of miles depending on topography and viewshed?

US energy produces wealth, impact and conflict. Because private property is a fundamental principle and set of legal rights in this country, private owners have a great deal of control over both the production of energy and the landscape it uses. Private property also allows the frequent sale and purchase of assets to the highest bidder. But energy production, especially with the split estate (surface versus subsurface ownership), creates conflict and complexity of access and use for different owners. Because energy extraction and production serve not only the local but also regional, state and national economies, state and federal governments often exercise control (or even veto) over local decisions on energy that in almost all other contexts would not be allowed. And, because the United States embarked on a stronger environmental ethic beginning in the 1970s, state and federal governments also exercise regulatory powers over air and water impacts caused — or presumed to be caused — by energy development.

Why This Book?

Unlike almost any other kind of land use — from dumps to houses to factories — state and sometimes even the federal government actively preempt local decision making...