The word "energy" is a bit of a problem in the whole discussion of energy that is forming up in this country. Scientifically, a Joule is a Joule, and whether it comes from oil, gas, wind, coal, solar, wave, geothermal, hamsters running in hamster wheels, doesn't really matter. But in practice it does, and absent a revolution in politics we need to be having 2 almost completely separate energy debates.
Whenever you hear someone talk about "energy independence" they are actually talking about oil. Oil is an all-by-itself discussion that has almost nothing to do with "energy" as people often think about it otherwise (the wall outlets in your residence). Our oil consumption is almost entirely dedicated to transportation, that is to say, petroleum based fuels (like gasoline and diesel). We certainly use petroleum for other things, but they are beyond secondary.
In this discussion, the single most important thing to know is that it is not possible for us to drill our way out of this. We don't have enough oil reserves to EVER be independent, unless we dramatically reduce the amount of oil we consume. This problem is then all too often tied to renewable/alternative energy, but this is also a huge mistake. A wind turbine cannot refill your gas tank...unless you drive an electric vehicle.
The only way for the US to ever be independent in terms of energy (oil) is to reduce fuel consumption by close to 90%. This is not possible without some pretty serious changes in driving/vehicles/infrastructure. Any time a politician talks about "energy independence" they are using talking points and not being serious (I mean any time, and any politician). Energy independence is a rouse, because the only serious answer is to stop driving petroleum burning vehicles, and no politician would ever dare suggest that.
The second discussion has to do with energy in the form of electricity generation. This is where renewable and clean energy come into play. This discussion has nothing to do with energy independence (we produce lots of coal and natural gas and do our own nuclear and harness our own wind and geothermal and sunshine) but about environmental and economics issues.
Dealing with this side of the energy coin is not as straightforward. When it comes to oil and independence it's pretty easy: we don't have enough so the only way to become independent is to use much less. On this other side of the energy equation, we have a massive economy, and lots of resources, but we also have environmental concerns and a potentially larger economy and the real problem of sustainability going forward. The ideal solution would be to transition "dirty" power generation to "clean" generation in a nice seamless way. Of course that isn't possible, and seamless would mean very slow and that may not be a good idea.
There are arguments about what "clean" energy is and can be with some people claiming coal can be clean (probably not), others who complain that dams destroy ecosystems (they do, but may not need to...and it may not be too bad anyway), and still others who think that wind turbines kill birds (seriously?). Just to be clear, there is no such thing as zero impact energy generation. If we claim energy from some source that is removing some fraction of the energy that would have been dissipated/taken up differently.
Then there are arguments about what it will mean to the economy. Transitioning energy generation and transmission in this country will create new jobs/industries and we will destroy existing jobs/industries. The actual impact is a lot easier to figure in the destroy category, since we know what those industries are, who they employ and how much GDP they generate. Any attempt to figure how big the new industries will be is a guess. It may be a good guess, but it is still a guess. More it isn't concrete. You can't point to a 5 year old and say "That child will have a six figure salary in the new energy economy, but will be lucky to get a $40k/year job otherwise," but you can look at some child's father and say "You will be without a job in x years if we go forward, and you will need to figure out how to do something different."
Those are the two overarching discussions 1) Oil, 2) The Grid. The first is easy enough to deal with in principle, but no one in a position of power is or will do anything about it. The easiest thing to do here would be to have gasoline cost $8/gal...again easy from the "fix" perspective not the people perspective. The second is difficult in all aspects. It is hard to lay out the problems and the solutions. It is hard to determine which way forward is/would be best, and it is very hard to figure out how to deal with the negative consequences either way.
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