Mexican Cross-Border Transmission Networks Aff

Case Neg

Renewables AdvLatin America will never adopt renewables – fossil fuels are too economically viable and oil lobby.Meisen and Krumpel 09– President of the Global Energy Network Institute / Research-Associate at GENI (Peter and Sebastian, “Renewable Energy Potential of Latin America”, December 2009; < http://www.geni.org/globalenergy/research/renewable-energy-potential-of-latin-america/Potential%20of%20Renewables%20in%20Latin%20America-edited-12-16%20_Letter_.pdf>) In reality the situation of renewable energies in Latin America is not as positive or optimistic as we might want to think, or as certain statistical data lead us to believe. There are many problems associated with the implementation of renewables as well as their impact on the environment and society. In this context, the main problem for renewable energies in Latin America is in the way energy and development policies have been construct ed. In most cases, energy policies and strategies in Latin America have excluded renewables and other alternatives as being too costly and technologically unfeasible, or by arguing that the country does not have the capabilities to implement them. The easiest explanation for this, and one which is usually mentioned, is the lack of incentive and foresight. Since the region has an abundance of resources such as oil, gas, and hydro, it is in general easier, cheaper and more technically feasible to keep exploiting conventional energy resources than to in vest in renewable energies or create appropriate renewable energy policies. Another common explanation is that the development of renewable energies clash wi th the interest of powerful players, particularly large energy companies, and, therefore, there are few incentives to promote them.

Mexican renewables are inevitablePtashnik 11 – MS in History @ CCNY, Antioch NE, former Vermont Senator(Ben, “Renewable Energy in Mexico,” http://www.solarsanmiguel.com.mx/english/2011/03/10/renewable-energy-in-mexico/)Mexico is on the verge of a solar and wind energy revolution, similar to the growth of these technologies in Europe, China, Japan and North America, where state-sponsored subsidies and favourable regulations have advanced the solar and wind energy industries to significant levels. Renewable energies have become major players in the advanced industrial states, carving a strong niche out of the multi-trillion dollar energy-sector: European countries such as Germany, Denmark and Spain are well on their way to eliminating dependence on gas and other fossil fuels for producing electricity, while creating “green jobs”. Denmark has not only become self-sufficient in electricity, but this small country of six million is now the world’s largest producer of wind turbines thanks to government policies aimed at energy-sustainability, and to carbon reduction policies born from public concerns regarding global climate change caused by the burning of fossil fuels.¶ It is expected that newly emerging industrial nations such as Mexico, Brazil, India and China, will also inevitably shed their dependence on fossil fuels, and will embrace the fountains of free and limitless sun and wind energies. This transition will take time. Many emerging industrial nations feel that they must first grow their economies and catch up with the developed industrial states, and later worry about their “carbon footprint”. In fact China is commissioning a new coal-burning plant every week. In Mexico, the energy ministers were always chosen from PEMEX, the national petroleum monopoly, and so naturally much of the energy policy momentum for decades has focused on petroleum and natural gas plants to produce electricity. President Calderon was the first exception when he was appointed Energy minister during the Fox administration. There are still those within the CFE bureaucracy and governmental agencies who are promoting nuclear and coal to replace oil and gas.¶ Mexico is particularly well endowed with immense sun and wind resources. Mexico is rated the third best country on Earth for potential solar production, and there are great wind resources throughout the Republic. Mexico now has wind farms in Oaxaca and Baja California, and one solar park in Aguascalientes. Thousands of solar photovoltaic systems that produce electricity have been installed all over Mexico in homes and businesses, and many tens of thousands of solar hot water boilers are now in operation here. It should be recognized that a paradigm shift to renewable energy is a slow process, and will require great effort and promotion from the private sector and from the environmentalist community.¶ It is worth noting that in the USA a thirty-year struggle between alternative energy advocates and private oil, gas and coal energy companies has markedly slowed down progress towards energy sustainability. Mexico now has net metering throughout the Republic, while ten States in the USA still do not have

regulations allowing home power producers to connect their solar or wind system to the electric grid. In 2010 lobbyists from the fossil-fuel industries managed to torpedo efforts in Congress at legislation promoting renewable energy and carbon reduction.¶ So Mexico is making relatively great progress in a short time , and has begun the climb out of its dependence on fossil fuels with government energy-sector policies and goals aimed at promoting renewable energy. Mexico’s accelerated commitment to solar and wind made a leap forward with the signing of a new Energy Law in 2008, permitting consumers and businesses to sell power to the grid for credit.¶ This coincided with the announcement that Mexico’s largest oil reserve, the Cantarel oil field in Campeche, had depleted by over 35%. Mexico’s electric power grid is dependent for 74% of its electricity production on gas and oil, and recently Mexico has become a net importer of gas (40%

is now imported from the USA). As fossil-fuel resources diminish it is inevitable that Mexico will be

compelled to move inexorably to renewable energy .

Renewable energy development sufficient in the status quoFahey 13 (Jonathan, Reporter for the Huffington Post, “Renewable Energy Growth Is Rising Around The World, IEA Says” http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/06/26/renewable-energy-growth_n_3504265.html\\CLans)NEW YORK — Renewable energy is growing fast around the world and will edge out natural gas as the second biggest source of electricity, after coal, by 2016, according to a five-year outlook published Wednesday by the

International Energy Agency. Developing countries are building more wind, solar and hydro-electric power plants to meet rising power demand and combat local pollution problems. And the costs of renewables are falling below the cost of

traditional power sources such as coal, natural gas and oil in some markets with high-priced power. Renewable power, including

hydropower, is the fastest-growing power generation sector and it is expected to increase by 40 percent in the next five years. By 2018 it will make up a quarter of the world's energy mix, according to the report, up from 20 percent in 2011. Eighty percent of the renewable power generated in the world, however, is hydropower, a technology frowned upon by environmental groups and sustainability experts because it requires the construction of dams

that can damage river ecosystems. Non-hydroelectric sources such as wind, solar, geothermal and energy derived from plants are also expected to grow quickly, but they contribute a far smaller amount of energy to the global mix. These technologies will supply 8 percent of the world's energy by 2018, up from 4 percent in 2011 and 2 percent in 2006.

Mexican renewables high nowMiller and DeLeon 9 - *Stephanie, consultant on U.S.-Latin America relations and was formerly the Research Associate for the Americas Project on the National Security Team. Born in Venezuela with family from Colombia, Miller earned her degree from Duke University in International Comparative Studies with a focus on Latin America. She currently lives in Bogotá, Colombia, **Rudy, Senior Vice President of National Security and International Policy at American Progress(“Transcending the Rio Grande,” http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2009/04/pdf/mexico.pdf)

Mexico’s energy consumption is growing more rapidly than more developed countries, ¶ and conventional energy sources are unable to meet a considerable portion of this growing demand.48 As a result, renewable energy sources are uniquely suited to meet Mexico’s ¶ growing energy demand as well as fulfill Mexico’s renewed commitment to diversifying its ¶ energy matrix to include more sustainable sources of energy.Along with the highly noted ¶ energy reform legislation passed by the Mexican Congress in October of 2008, two laws ¶ were passed that focus exclusively on developing Mexican alternative energy and on the ¶ creation of a national program to expand Mexico’s renewable energy matrix.49 In addition, ¶ a Fund for the Energy Transition and Sustainable Use of Energy was established with ¶ resources of 3 billion

pesos annually to support projects for energy efficiency, renewable ¶ energy, and diversification of sustainable energy sources.

China and US looking to increase renewable energy nowFahey 13 (Jonathan, Reporter for the Huffington Post, “Renewable Energy Growth Is Rising Around The World, IEA Says” http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/06/26/renewable-energy-growth_n_3504265.html\\CLans)Developing countries, led by China, will account for two-thirds of the global increase in renewable generation. Growth in Europe and the U.S. is expected to slow, though President Barack Obama outlined a sweeping plan Tuesday that would encourage renewed investment in renewable sources. Renewable sources were used to generate 12 percent of the electricity consumed in the U.S. last year, according to the Energy Department. Hydroelectric plants supplied 7 percent of the country's power, and other renewables such as wind and solar supplied 5 percent. Ethanol, mostly made from corn and blended with gasoline, was used to satisfy 10 percent of U.S. gasoline demand last year. IEA Executive Director Maria van der Hoeven said in a statement that the biggest impediment to further renewable growth is changing energy policies that increase risk for investors. "Many renewables no longer require high economic incentives. But they do still need long-term policies that provide a predictable and reliable market and regulatory framework compatible with societal goals," she said.

Trends and Statistics prove- renewable market increasing nowBossong 12 (Kenneth, Executive of the Sun Day Campaign, “Renewable Energy Sees Explosive Growth During Obama Administration” August 29, 2012 http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2012/08/renewable-energy-sees-explosive-growth-during-obama-administration\\CLans)According to the latest issue of EIA's "Electric Power Monthly" with data through to June 30, 2012, non-hydro renewable sources (i.e., biomass, geothermal, solar, wind) provided 5.76% of net electrical generation for the first half of 2012. This represents an increase of 10.97% compared to the same period in 2011. Solar increased by 97.2% while wind grew 16.3% and geothermal by 0.2%. However, biomass dipped by 0.8%. For the first six months of 2012, wind contributed 3.84% of net electrical generation followed by biomass (1.40%), geothermal (0.43%), and solar ** (0.09%). Conventional hydropower accounted for an additional 7.86% of net electrical generation in 2012 - a decline of 14.3% compared to the first half of 2011. During 2008, the last full year of the Bush Administration, non-hydro renewables accounted for 3.06%

of net electrical generation with an average monthly output of 10,508 gigawatthours. By mid-2012, the average monthly electrical generation from non-hydro renewables had grown by 78.70% to 18,777 gigawatthours. Comparing

monthly electrical output in 2008 versus 2012, solar has expanded by 285.19%, wind by 171.72%, and geothermal by 13.53%. However, electrical generation from biomass dropped by 0.56%. According to the latest issue of the monthly "Energy

Infrastructure Update" published by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission's Office of Energy Projects with data for the first half of 2012, 229 renewable energy projects accounted for more than 38% of new electrical generation capacity (not to be confused with actual generation). This includes 50 wind energy projects (2,367 MW), 111 solar energy projects (588 MW), 59 biomass projects (271 MW), 5 geothermal projects (87 MW), and 4 water power projects (11 MW). New renewable energy electrical generating capacity was more than double that of coal (2 new units totaling 1,608 MW). No new nuclear capacity came on line during the first half of 2012. However, 40 new natural gas units came on line with 3,708 MW of capacity (42% of the total). Renewable energy sources now account for 14.76% of total installed operating generating capacity (water-8.66%; wind-4.30%, biomass-1.23%, geothermal-0.31%, solar**-0.26%). This is more than nuclear (9.16%) but less than natural gas

(41.83%) and coal (29.66%). The balance comes from waste heat (0.07%). The numbers speak for themselves —

notwithstanding politically-inspired criticism, the pro-renewable energy policies pioneered by the

Obama Administration have proven their worth through dramatic growth rates during the past three and one-

half years. The investments in sustainable energy made by the federal government as well as individual

states and private funders have paid off handsomely underscoring the short-sightedness of proposals to slash or discontinue such support.

Reliance on renewables now and no stopping the trends- our evidence is predictiveIsola 13 (James, Writer for the Bloomberg New Energy Finance, “STRONG GROWTH FOR RENEWABLES EXPECTED THROUGH TO 2030”, April 22, 2013 http://about.bnef.com/press-releases/strong-growth-for-renewables-expected-through-to-2030/\\CLans)London and New York, 22 April 2013 – New research by analysts at Bloomberg New Energy Finance show that annual

investment in new renewable power capacity is set to rise by anywhere from two and a half times to more than four and a half times between now and 2030. The likeliest scenario implies a jump of 230%, to $630bn per year by 2030, driven by further improvements in the cost-competitiveness of wind and solar technologies relative to fossil fuel alternatives, as well as an increase in the roll-out of non-intermittent clean energy sources like hydro, geothermal and biomass. This is the message of new research published today by Bloomberg New Energy Finance. The findings will be unveiled to delegates this afternoon at the analysis company’s sixth annual Summit, in New York. Further information on the Summit can be found at http://about.bnef.com/summit/. Bloomberg New Energy Finance’s predictions for world energy markets to 2030 come from

its Global Energy and Emissions Model, which integrates all of the main determinants of the energy future, including economic prosperity, global and regional demand growth, the evolution of technology costs, likely developments in policies to combat climate change, and trends in fossil fuel markets. Together these form three scenarios: “New Normal”, “Barrier Busting” and “Traditional Territory”. The New Normal scenario is considered the most likely. It shows the investment requirement for new clean energy assets in the year 2030 at $630bn (in nominal terms),

more than three times the investment in the renewable energy capacity that was built in 2012. This 2030 investment figure is 35% higher than that produced in Bloomberg New Energy Finance’s last global forecast a year ago, and the projection for total installed renewable energy capacity by that date is 25% higher than in that previous forecast, at 3,500GW. In the power sector, the research company’s latest forecasts project that 70% of new power generation capacity added between 2012 and 2030 will be from renewable technologies (including large hydro). Only 25% will be in the form of coal, gas or oil, the remaining being nuclear. The scenarios are based on Bloomberg New Energy Finance’s latest projections for coal and gas prices. For gas, these assume prices stabilise in real terms at $6, $9 and $11/MMBtu in the US, Europe and the Asia respectively.

Non-inherent- US-Mexico talks about smart grids occurring in the status quoPRLog 13 (Press Release Distribution, “Smart Utility Systems at US-Mexico Smart Grid Technology & Business Forum 2013”, March 12, 2013, http://www.prlog.org/12096765-smart-utility-systems-at-us-mexico-smart-grid-technology-business-forum-2013.html\\CLans) Mar. 12, 2013 - LOS ANGELES, Calif. -- Los Angeles, CA - Smart Utility Systems (SUS), a global leader in products, solutions and

services that accelerate return on smart grid investments for the energy and utility sector, is going to participate at the US-Mexico Smart Grid Technology & Business Forum. The second annual US-Mexico Smart Grid

Technology & Business conference is a high-level business development event designed to promote American smart grid technologies in Mexico and connect US firms to business opportunities and key contacts. Lance Brown, Vice President of Customer Service Solutions and Ken Roberts, the Sales & Marketing Director of Smart Utility Systems will deliver a presentation on day one of the Annual Conference. The presentation will shed light on the expertise that Smart Utility Systems brings to the Utility industry by offering a wide range of innovative solutions designed to

meet the industry’s needs now and in the near future. Lance and Ken are looking forward to meeting and discussing

Mexico’s utility industry needs with the Comisión Federal de Electricidad (CFE) executives who will be present

for this exciting event. A reception will follow at Earl Anthony Wayne’s residence, US Ambassador to Mexico to provide a casual and collaborative setting where the US-Mexico Smart Grid Technology & Business Forum participants can engage to discuss how these innovative smart grid technologies can address their immediate needs.

Columbia solves the energy market internal linkElectric Light and Power 13 (PowerGrid International, “U.S. to support Colombia smart grid development”, March 31, 2013 http://www.elp.com/articles/2013/03/u-s--to-support-colombia-smart-grid-development.html\\CLans)The U.S. Trade and Development Agency awarded Colombia's power grid operator XM a grant for the

design of an intelligent supervision and advanced control (iSAAC) system for the nation's grid. USTDA awarded a $463,944 subsidy to help design and implement the smart grid system, which will increase XM's ability to reliably meet electricity

demand and respond in real time to adverse events, XM said in a statement. The technical assistance project will be carried out by the consulting arm of energy and telecom contracting services provider Quanta Services. In 2012 the USTDA awarded a similar size grant to Mexican energy regulator CRE to support development of a regulatory framework for smart grid implementation, to be carried out by U.S. contractor ESTA International.

Security Adv

Obama stimulus funding solvesAndrew Grant- January 26, 2010, (Top 100 Stories of 2009 #38: A Smart Makeover for the Electrical Grid , January-February special issue; Discover, http://discovermagazine.com/2010/jan-feb/38)This may go down as the year when all the talk about creating a next-generation “smart grid” turned into action. The basic technology that transports electricity around the United States is more than a century old. So in October, spurred by

concern over the cost and reliability of the present system, President Obama announced $3.4 billion of economic stimulus funds for smart grid projects and almost $5 billion more in private investment. “We’ve paid attention to individual components of the power system for so long, but now we have to look at the system itself,” says Dan Kammen, director of the Renewable and Appropriate Energy Laboratory at the University of California at Berkeley. These smart grid proposals would create a flexible, interactive relationship between energy producers and consumers. “The grid needs to evolve from one-way wires and cables to something where each power line would send power in either direction—to or from homes, businesses, or industry,” Kammen says. “We need the marriage of energy technology and information technology.” The stimulus package will fund 100 projects nationwide, ranging from the installation of smart meters in homes so that customers can manage their energy use to the improvement of power substations and transformers. Utilities could monitor demand in real time and adjust supply accordingly. Customers could track their consumption and opt to buy more energy during off-peak hours, when it is cheaper and more plentiful. A grid that can store and redirect large quantities of power will also be crucial if the United States generates more than about one-fifth of its power from renewables such as wind or solar, which deliver an intermittent supply of electricity. Ford announced in August that its planned plug-in hybrid vehicles would be able to communicate with a smart grid. The batteries in these vehicles could serve as backup storage, soaking up excess energy at night and giving it back when demand surges. “If we can monitor and understand what’s going on at all times, then we can reap the reward we want,” Kammen says. “And that is reliable, green power.”

No EMP attack---multiple warrantsStewart & Hughes 10 9/9, *Scott Stewart and **Nate Hughes write for STRATFOR Global Intelligence, “Gauging the Threat of an Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) Attack,” http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/20100908_gauging_threat_electromagnetic_pulse_emp_attack, However, there are significant deterrents to the use of nuclear weapons in a HEMP attack against the United States, and nuclear weapons have not been used in an attack anywhere since 1945 . Despite some

theorizing that a HEMP attack might be somehow less destructive and therefore less likely to provoke a devastating retaliatory response, such an attack against the United States would inherently and necessarily represent a nuclear attack on the U.S. homeland and the idea that the United States would not respond in kind is absurd. The United States continues to maintain the most credible and survivable nuclear deterrent in the world, and any actor contemplating a HEMP attack would have to assume not that they might experience some limited reprisal but that the U.S. reprisal would be full, swift and devastating . When we

consider this scenario, we must first acknowledge that it faces the same obstacles as any other nuclear weapon employed in a terrorist attack. It is unlikely that a terrorist group like al Qaeda or Hezbollah can develop its own nuclear weapons program . It is also highly unlikely that a nation that has devoted significant effort and treasure to develop a nuclear weapon would entrust such a weapon to an outside organization. Any use of a nuclear weapon would be vigorously investigated and the nation that produced the weapon would be identified and would pay a heavy price for such an attack (there has been a

large investment in the last decade in nuclear forensics). Lastly, as noted above, a nuclear weapon is seen as a deterrent by countries such as North Korea or Iran, which seek such weapons to protect themselves from invasion, not to use them offensively. While a group like al Qaeda would likely use a nuclear device if it could obtain one, we doubt that other groups such as Hezbollah would. Hezbollah has a known base of operations in Lebanon

that could be hit in a counterstrike and would therefore be less willing to risk an attack that could be traced back to it. Also, such a scenario would require not a crude nuclear device but a sophisticated nuclear warhead capable of being mated with a ballistic missile. There are considerable technical barriers that separate a crude nuclear device from a sophisticated nuclear warhead. The engineering expertise required to construct such a warhead is far greater than that required to construct a crude device. A warhead must be far more compact than a primitive device. It must also have a trigger mechanism and electronics and physics packages capable of withstanding the force of an ICBM launch, the journey into the cold vacuum of space and the heat and force of re-entering the atmosphere -- and still function as designed. Designing a functional warhead takes considerable advances in several fields of science, including physics, electronics, engineering, metallurgy and explosives technology, and overseeing it all must be a high-end quality assurance capability . Because of this,

it is our estimation that it would be far simpler for a terrorist group looking to conduct a nuclear attack to do so using a crude device than it would be using a sophisticated warhead -- although we assess the risk of any non-state actor obtaining a nuclear capability of any kind, crude or sophisticated, as extraordinarily unlikely . But even if a terrorist organization were somehow able to obtain a functional warhead and

compatible fissile core, the challenges of mating the warhead to a missile it was not designed for and then getting it to launch and detonate properly would be far more daunting than it would appear at first glance. Additionally, the process of fueling a liquid-fueled ballistic missile at sea and then launching it from a ship using an improvised launcher would also be very challenging. (North Korea, Iran and Pakistan all rely heavily on

Scud technology, which uses volatile, corrosive and toxic fuels.) Such a scenario is challenging enough, even before the uncertainty of achieving the desired HEMP effect is taken into account. This is just the kind of complexity and uncertainty that well-trained terrorist operatives seek to avoid in an operation . Besides, a ground-level nuclear detonation in a city such as New York or Washington would be more likely to cause the type of terror, death and physical destruction that is sought in a terrorist attack than could be achieved by generally non-lethal EMP. Make no mistake: EMP is real. Modern civilization depends heavily on electronics and the electrical grid for a wide range of vital functions, and this is truer in the United States than in most other countries. Because of this, a HEMP attack or a substantial geomagnetic storm

could have a dramatic impact on modern life in the affected area. However, as we've discussed, the EMP threat has been around for more than half a century and there are a number of technical and practical variables that make a HEMP attack using a nuclear warhead highly unlikely .

More evidence Butt 10 2/1, *Yousaf M. Butt writes for The Space Review, “The EMP threat: fact, fiction, and response (part 2),” http://www.thespacereview.com/article/1553/1, Thus, it is not at all a simple matter, even for countries with considerable resources and focused decades-long effort, to build such weapons, let alone pair them to reliable delivery systems . As carefully argued by John

Mueller in his new book, Atomic Obsession, it is virtually impossible for a terrorist cell to obtain the raw materials needed for a nuclear device and assemble it correctly themselves [Ref 22, p. 172–198]. Even a “crude” U-type device is

not all that “crude” and requires the concerted effort of skilled scientists and engineers. Any weapon produced by a terrorist cell would likely be a one of a kind and would have to remain untested. For a terrorist group to then mate this weapon to a ballistic missile and successfully carry out an EMP strike beggars belief . As John Pike, director

of GlobalSecurity.org has said, “It is just very difficult to imagine how terrorists are going to be able to lay hands on a nuclear-tipped missile, and launch it and reprogram it in such a way that it would be a high-altitude burst like that.” A state would be highly unlikely to launch an EMP strike from their own territory because the rocket could be traced to the country of origin and would probably result in nuclear or massive conventional retaliation by the US. The EMP commission also considers adversarial nations carrying out a shipborne EMP attack that would be less traceable. However, even so, there would some small risk of trace-back that would give the leadership in such nations pause. While nuclear forensics are not well enough developed to assuredly ascribe the origin of a nuclear explosion, even their current state of development would, in some measure, dissuade the leaders of a nation from seriously contemplating such an attack. Furthermore, the US certainly has data, via its DSP satellites, on the infrared

(IR) signatures of the rocket exhausts from the missiles of various countries. Though these signatures are probably virtually identical for the Scud/Shahab/No-dong family of missiles, the nations which may entertain such attacks do not necessarily know whether, e.g., the DSP data can discriminate between a NK Nodong versus an Iranian Shahabs, perhaps due to differences in fuel and/or subtle design idiosyncrasies. This is data only the US has, and it has an inherent deterrent value to nations thinking about launching an EMP strike via a ship-launched ballistic missile. This is almost certainly the case if, say, Iran were to use its solid rocket motor technology to launch such a strike—if and when Iran obtains nuclear weapons, of course. In such a case, the burn time-profile and solid-motor IR signatures could probably be used to tie the missile to a nation. What about an adversarial nation “sub-contracting” its dirty work to a terrorist cell? Again, there would be substantial doubt in the nation’s leadership as to whether or not forensic evidence (whether the device exploded or not) could tie them to the weapon. In any case, as argued by Mueller [Ref 22, p. 163] it is highly unlikely that a nation would give one of its crown jewels to an unpredictable terrorist cell. At least in the case of Iran, this view is supported by in-depth research done by authors at the National Defense University, who conclude, “[W]e judge, and nearly all experts consulted agree, that Iran would not, as a matter of state policy, give up its control of such weapons to terrorist organizations and risk direct U.S. or Israeli retribution.” Though they possess the technological know-how to fabricate a powerful EMP device, the possibility of China or Russia carrying out such an attack is virtually nil . Not only for the regular military deterrent reasons but also , post-Cold War, our economies are intimately linked, which amounts to an inherent economic deterrent. The latter is likely the more relevant deterrent [Ref. 22, p. 65]. We owe China tremendous sums of money, they need us as a market, and both the US and China require Russian oil via intertwined world markets . Although the EMP commissioners have offered a Chinese-language PowerPoint presentation outlining the effects of EMP devices as evidence that China has an interest in such weapons, this presentation is actually of Taiwanese origin [“Electromagnetic Pulse Attack and Defense”, by Dr. Chien Chung], and it is not pertinent to any official Chinese military doctrine. Lastly, General Robert T. Marsh, former Chairman of the President’s Commission on Critical Infrastructure Protection concluded (in 1997) that he did not, “see any evidence that suggests capabilities seriously threatening our critical infrastructure … There are many easier, less costly, and more dramatic ways for terrorists to use nuclear weapons than delivery to a high altitude. Such an event is so unlikely and difficult to achieve that I do not believe it warrants serious concern at this time .”

No risk of an EMP attack and no impact anyways---their authors have an incentive to lie Farley 9 10/16, *Robert Farley is an assistant professor at the University of Kentucky’s Patterson School of Diplomacy and International Commerce and a contributor to PRA’s Right Web, “The EMP Threat: Lots of Hype, Little Traction,” http://www.rightweb.irc-online.org/articles/display/the_emp_threat_lots_of_hype_little_traction, Uncertainty regarding the effect of EMP has fed alarmist predictions about overall impact. For example, although there is agreement that high-altitude nuclear detonations can cause widespread damage to the electric grid and to electronic and digital equipment, there is little agreement on the size of the nuclear weapon necessary to cause significant, long-lasting destruction. The test that damaged electronic equipment in Hawaii measured 1.4 megatons, roughly one hundred times larger than the most powerful nuclear test attributed to North Korea. However, numerous EMP awareness advocates (and some members of the EMP Commission) have argued that a much smaller warhead could destroy electronics from the East Coast to the Midwest. In the absence of conclusive research and testing, the exact size of the explosion necessary to create a devastating EMP remains unknown. Many weapons experts doubt that an EMP attack could cause lasting or irreversible damage . Stephen Younger , former senior fellow at Los Alamos National Lab and director at the Defense Threat Reduction Agency,

argues that while an EMP might create problems in the short term, it is unlikely to cause long-term devastation. Similarly, observers have questioned the capacity of North Korea or Iran, much less a terrorist organization, to develop a warhead sophisticated enough to cause widespread EMP damage . Nick

Schwellenbach, a former researcher at Project on Government Oversight, suggests that the idea of a small, EMP-optimized warhead is absurd: "You have a lot of points of failure in order to get to a warhead that is EMP optimized. … [Y]ou need specialized machine tools, you need capital, but to create a weapon that creates the secondary effect that you're talking about, that's something even we can't do right now.” [9] At this

point, neither Iran nor North Korea possess a missile capable of delivering an EMP attack against the United States. However, Graham, as well as Peter Pry, the president of EMPACT America and former senior staffer with the EMP Commission, have argued in Congressional testimony that Iran could launch a medium-range ballistic missile from an offshore barge or freighter, thus giving the Islamic Republic first-strike capability. Moreover, EMP awareness advocates have argued that if terrorists acquired a ballistic missile and a

nuclear warhead, they could conduct the same kind of offshore attack. The strategic logic of an EMP attack on the United

States remains unclear, and skeptics’ doubts mostly focus on the strategic implausibility of such attacks .

Under the most aggressive assumptions, a first-strike EMP attack might cause widespread economic damage. However, under no scenario would the attack eliminate the ability of the U.S. military to respond . Al Mauroni of the defense

contractor Science Applications International Corporation argues that “the national command authority would be able to identify where a missile came from, determine the effects of such an attack, and respond with nuclear weapons—not necessarily just for an EMP effect—against the adversarial nation.” [10] Former Rep. Curt Weldon, who gave the EMPACT conference’s opening address, argued back in 1997 that it would be politically difficult for the United States to respond to such an attack, as no cities will have been destroyed and no lives lost (at least initially), a claim which other EMP awareness advocates have echoed. However, that the United States would not respond with overwhelming military force to a successful EMP attack strains credulity. EMP awareness advocates have thus far failed to offer a convincing motive for why a rogue state would use its scarce nuclear weapons in a first-strike that might not work, and that would in any case leave the attacker open to a devastating counterattack. EMP as a second-strike deterrent fares no better; the strategic logic of deterrence demands that any retaliatory strike be as lethal and as secure as possible, and it is highly unlikely that any state would rely on unproven weaponry of uncertain lethality to dissuade an attack. While terrorists may have different incentives, the road to a functional EMP capability is much rockier for a terrorist group than a state. At a minimum, the terrorist group would need to acquire and master the operation of a nuclear weapon and a ballistic missile, two steps further than any known group has gone. The central political purpose of the EMP awareness movement appears to be advancement of the cause of missile defense . The most extreme estimates of the effect of EMP restore the Cold War-era existential fears of nuclear war. Schwellenbach argues "what's driving it is the political global context—it gives the right an issue that allows them to justify hawkish behavior. It is almost a perfect solution to any argument against missile defense—North Korea and Iran.” [11] The 90 percent casualty estimate advanced by EMP awareness advocates hypes the notion that the U nited States faces potential annihilation at the hands of its enemies, and goes a step farther: even the smallest nuclear power can destroy the United States with a small number of warheads. This, in turn, reaffirms the need for both a secure missile defense shield (including space-based interceptor weapons) and a grand strategy of preventive war against potential nuclear and ballistic missile proliferators. Almost all EMP awareness advocates—including

Gaffney, Gingrich, and Huckabee—call for increased spending on missile defense. Gaffney and Gingrich have also called for a

“robust” policy of preemptive war, including attacks on Iranian and North Korean missiles on their launching pads. The fact that EMP is poorly researched and not well understood works in its favor as a scare tactic . Since evidence of EMP’s allegedly lasting impact is purely theoretical , EMP awareness advocates can make outlandish claims regarding the threat that even the smallest nuclear arsenal poses. They can also point to allegations made by the official EMP Commission, ignoring the fact that many outside experts dispute its findings .

The Niagara conference’s emphasis on strategic and policy considerations shows that alarmist predictions about EMP attacks serve as fodder for promotion of a larger nuclear weapons stockpile, for missile defense, and for preventive attacks. Despite the effort that conservatives have devoted to this cause, it appears to have gained little traction in the mainstream media. The New York Times, the Washington Post, CNN, Fox News, and other major television news organizations declined to cover the EMPACT conference. Indeed, even the neoconservative Weekly Standard, which seems perpetually on the lookout for ways to plug purported existential threats to the homeland, stayed away from Niagara. One Standard editor said in an

interview with the author, “I don't go for that EMP stuff. Kind of more interested in dangerous scenarios that might actually happen.” [12] Nevertheless, the presence of Huckabee and Gingrich at the conference indicates that some major Republican Party politicians see EMP either as a splendid political opportunity, or as their latest conservative litmus test.

Smart Grid still susceptible to a terrorist attack Kahlon 11 (Parminder, Project (M.S., Computer Science) -- California State University, Sacramento, 2011, Abstract of “Security issues in system development life cycle of Smart Grid”, July 2011 http://csus-dspace.calstate.edu/handle/10211.9/1155\\CLans)Smart Grid includes critical hardware and software applications that can be misused by an unauthorized person or a hacker. Failures can bring critical parts of the system to a halt. The destruction is not only limited to the monetary losses but also human loss due to a disgruntled action. There have been reports

including one from United States Department of Homeland Security that cyber spies have managed to inject malicious software into the electric grid, water, sewage, and other infrastructure control software. This software could enable hackers or unauthorized users to take control of key facilities or networks via the Internet, causing power outages and tremendous damage to all sectors of the economy. As the grid

becomes more central to our energy infrastructure, it will become more important to ensure its security. Smart Grid systems create a link between physical and software systems, both of which can fail.

Previous attempts to implement a smartgrid have led to cyber terrorismAlohali et al 13 (Bashar Alohali, Madjid Merabti, Kashif Kifayat,School of Computing and Mathematical Sciences, Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, UK, “Key Management in Smart Grid: A Survey” http://www.cms.livjm.ac.uk/pgnet2013/Proceedings/papers/1569772387.pdf\\CLans)There are many challenges and issues in the smart grid such as energy metering control and dispatching, connectivity, new trust models and security. However, recently cyber-attacks on critical infrastructure have highlighted security as a major requirement on smart grid [1]. According to a report published by

krebsonsecurity [2], in May 2010, FBI investigated hacking of smart grid meters in Puerto Rico. The bureau distributed an

intelligence alert about its findings to select industry personnel and law enforcement officials. The FBI said it believes that former employees of the meter manufacturer and employees of the utility were altering the meters in exchange for cash

and training others to do so because of “the ease of exploitation and economic advantage to the hacker and the electric customer. Therefore, it is important to ensure that the data carried by smart grid system is kept confidential and that no one but the right receiver can access the data [2].

Terrorists can still hack smart gridsAlohali et al 13 (Bashar Alohali, Madjid Merabti, Kashif Kifayat,School of Computing and Mathematical Sciences, Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, UK, “Key Management in Smart Grid: A Survey” http://www.cms.livjm.ac.uk/pgnet2013/Proceedings/papers/1569772387.pdf\\CLans)Assailants with different motives and skills can take advantage of the weaknesses in security of smart grid system and can cause different levels of damage to the system. Attackers at the top level include online hackers, terrorists, workers, opponents, or client, and so on. Client may change data, information, and can get power without paying. The professionals and experts found only 9 security weaknesses for the period from 2005 to the beginning of 2010. Security experts have indicated a strong interest in the topic. Consequently, 64 vulnerabilities were found by the end of 2011. Furthermore, in the first 8 month of 2012, information about 98 security weaknesses was published. Computer security experts who analysed the vulnerabilities say the weaknesses are not extremely risky on their own because they would mainly allow a malicious user to collapse a system or obtain sensitive data but they warn that the weaknesses could allow an enemy to obtain a hold on a system and find additional security weaknesses that could impact primary procedures [8].

According to Rautmare et al. [9] “the exploitation of the network control system may result in disruption and breaks in operation. That may lead to disruption of service and loss of manufacturing, neither of which is allowable”.

Smartgrids susceptible to cyberterroristsYan et al 13 (Jun, Professor, University of Rhode Island, “MODELLING AND ANALYSIS ON SMART GRID AGAINST SMART ATTACKS”, 2013 http://digitalcommons.uri.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1018&context=theses\\CLansHowever, the Smart Grid yields not only a boost of economic benefits but also a growing number of potential threats from the cyberspace [6]. While the distributed control can reduce the criticality of some control center and thus weaken the impact of

attacks targeted on them, the distributed access from the system-ona-chip (SoC) electrical devices can possibly allow malicious attackers penetrating into the power systems with increased difficulties to detect and track them. Meanwhile, with the huge volume of data

owing along the power transmission network, they are becoming more vulnerable to data or command interception and unauthorized modification, which can be utilized to either cheat the meters for an unfair price or disrupt

power system operations. More seriously, knowledge of the power grid can be learned and the information or intelligence could be used to hack into the distributed control units that may be less protected than the centralized

operation and management hubs, resulting in unpredictable security risks. Hence, it becomes crucial to realize and react to the

vulnerability of Smart Grid in the new forms of potential attacks. These \smart" attacks, if deliberately designed and launched successfully on some critical components, can cast a disastrous impact on the power grid transmission and significantly jeopardize the interest of both the public, the industry as well as the economics. One of the vulnerabilities of Smart Grid that could be taken advantage of by the attackers are the possibility of cascading failure events in power systems, in which a few failed components can trigger the collapse of

normal power transmission and consequently results in blackouts in the distribution networks on the users' side. There are many examples of power grid failures with severe consequences; i.e. the 2003 blackout in northeast U.S., the 2011 blackout in California, Arizona and Mexico, and the most recent 2012 massive blackout in India have all left millions of people in darkness. They have shown that major power blackouts caused by cascading failure, though rare as they are, cast significant impact to both society and industry [7, 8]. Therefore, the government, the engineering community and power industry are paying growing attention to the power grid cascading analysis and many significant results have been published [9{12].

It only takes one attack to cause cascading failureYan et al 13 (Jun, Professor, University of Rhode Island, “MODELLING AND ANALYSIS ON SMART GRID AGAINST SMART ATTACKS”, 2013 http://digitalcommons.uri.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1018&context=theses\\CLans

Several experiments have been performed using this real database. Fig.7 to Fig.8 show some map snapshots of the results. A node or a link in normal condition is shown in black. All the new victims at the current round are highlighted in red, while the previous victims have been marked as blue for clear visualization. In the all these experiments, the network tolerance factor (see [92]) is set to be 1.2,

an empirical value also suggested in [55]. Fig.7 displays the moment when the first victim node is under attack. When it fails, all the branches associated with it also fails. Fig.8 shows the finalized cascading failure where all possible substations and transmission

lines fail according to the cascading failure simulator. These results clearly demonstrate that by carefully selecting the attack victim nodes at the very beginning, it is possible to break down the entire Bay area power grid

RelationsRelations high – cooperation will happen absent renewablesSelee and Diaz-Cayeros 13 (Andrew and Alberto) “The Dynamics of US Mexico Relations” Mexico and the United States: the politics of partnership. 2013. BookYet positive factors fav or prospects for more effective partnership and are likely to drive cooperation over time . First among these is the genuine interdependence of interests that underlies integration between the two countries. Everyday issues that need to be resolved – from the GM bailout to drug traffickinging to natural disasters and water shortages at the border – create a dynamic of constant engagement around highly concrete topics that policymakers on the two sides of the broder need to address. Moreover, the growing complexity of the relationship means that even when disputes arise among the two countries’ political leaders, progress continues along a number of other areas, driven by federal agencies, state, and local covernments, and nongovernmental actors. Increasingly, interactions between the two countries take place simultaneously along a wide number of different points of engagement, which are largely independent of each other and have their own particular dynamics . Progress on one does not necessarily augur progress on another; nor does failure in one area lead to failure in another. Nonetheless, progress in deepending engagement between the two countries will constantly be challenged by the persistent asymmetries that condition the relationship. The different in geopolitical realities of the two countries, the continuing intequality in average income between them and the dissimilar capacities of the two states are likely to continue to limit some efforts at greater cooperation. Recent tendencies have softened the impact of some of these asymmetries. Democraticization in Mexico has made the political systems of the two countries more similar. Increased economic and social exchanges have built ties that mitigate some of the most visible asymmetries and force d the two countries to seek solutions to shared problems . Public opinion studies show how far the two countries have gone in recognizing their mutual interest in working together despite their differences, with ordinary citizens generally far ahead of political elites. Over the long term, interdependence will force the two countries closer and complexity will allow the relationship to lay down even deeper roots along multiple points of engagement. However, asymmetry will continue to create frictions and provide a brake on progress in cooperation. The relationship between the United States and Mexico will continuiously deepen, but wil be a process fraught with tension. The countries have ceased to be distant neighbors but as yet they remain far away from being strategic partners whose relationship is guided by a common vision of mutually beneficial shared outcomes.

New administration promises continued high relations Seelke ‘13[Clare, Specialist in Latin American Affairs, “Mexico’s New Administration: Priorities and Key Issues in US-Mexican Relations,” Congressional Research Service, January 16, 2013]http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/R42917.pdfU.S.-Mexican relations grew closer during the Felipe Calderón Administration (2006-2012) as a ¶ result of the Mérida Initiative, a bilateral security effort for which Congress has provided $1.9 ¶ billion. Some Members of Congress may be concerned about whether bilateral relations, ¶ particularly security cooperation, may suffer now that the party controlling the presidency has ¶ changed. Although the transition from PAN to PRI rule is unlikely to result in seismic shifts in ¶ bilateral relations, a PRI government may emphasize economic issues more than security matters. ¶ President Peña Nieto has vowed to continue U.S.-Mexican security cooperation , albeit with a ¶ stronger emphasis on reducing violent crime in Mexico than on combating drug trafficking; what ¶ that cooperation will look like remains to be seen. He has also expressed support for increased ¶ bilateral and trilateral (with Canada) economic and energy cooperation.

Multiple alt cause – gun control and corruptionBonner and Rozental 9 (Robert C., Former Commissioner – U.S. Customs and Border Protection; Former Administrator – Drug Enforcement Administration, and Andrѐs, Former Deputy Foreign Minister of Mexico; Former President and Founder – Mexican Council on Foreign Relations, “Managing the United States-Mexico Border: Cooperative Solutions to Common Problems,” Pacific Council on International Policy, http://www.pacificcouncil.org/admin/document.doc?id=31)

Current laws and regulations in each country sometimes impede cooperation . U.S. gun laws allow individuals to purchase a range of firearms whose possession would be severely punished in Mexico; some states have much laxer restrictions, and in the case of gun shows, sales are entirely unregulated. The end of the assault weapons ban in the United States has meant that much more dangerous weaponry can now be purchased easily in the United States, and differences in state laws drive controls to the low common denominator for smugglers. That said, U.S. officials currently possess considerable legal authority to

prevent and disrupt arms trafficking, both by preventing straw purchases and interdicting southbound traffic. A far more serious

obstacle to cooperation is institutional weakness on the Mexican side , which shows up in lack of resources, poor professionalism, and corruption. At present, Mexican customs officials inspect only 8% of traffic crossing the frontier; these inspections are conducted at random, and they are often cursory. Mexican Customs also lacks the technology that would allow them to interdict vehicles suspected of carrying contraband (e.g., license plate scanners), much less scan large numbers of vehicles in a short period of time. As a result, it is basically impossible for Mexican officials to deter smuggling of firearms, ammunition,

and bulk cash into the country. Low levels of professional training mean that that law enforcement agencies in Mexico cannot perform several functions essential to closer binational cooperation. Both the police and the military do a poor job of collecting and synthesizing intelligence, conducting undercover operations, and investigating unprofessional conduct by their own personnel. More frequent shifts of personnel also make it more difficult for individual officers on different sides of the border (or even with Mexico itself) to establish long-term working relationships, especially at the Mexican ports of entry. The most striking manifestation of institutional weakness on the Mexican side is corruption . In some cases, U.S. officials with information on major criminal figures have been reluctant to pass it on to their Mexican counterparts; Mexican officials also often mistrust each other. The problem of corruption requires deep structural change within the Mexican justice system and cannot

be resolved simply through the infusion of new equipment or personnel . Recent steps by the Mexican

government to professionalize law enforcement agencies, arrest corrupt officials, reform the judicial system, and convert Mexican Customs into a full-fledged enforcement agency, however, all speak volumes about the government’s commitment to address this problem.

Alt causes – Regulations and trade disputesBonner and Rozental 9 (Robert C., Former Commissioner – U.S. Customs and Border Protection; Former Administrator – Drug Enforcement Administration, and Andrѐs, Former Deputy Foreign Minister of Mexico; Former President and Founder – Mexican Council on Foreign Relations, “Managing the United States-Mexico Border: Cooperative Solutions to Common Problems,” Pacific Council on International Policy, http://www.pacificcouncil.org/admin/document.doc?id=31)

One final impediment to facilitation is the persistence of regulations and trade restrictions that impose unnecessary transactions costs on businesses operating across the border. The most obvious manifestation is the refusal of the United States to honor its obligations under NAFTA regarding cross-border trucking of goods where the Mexican trucks meet U.S. safety standards. This denial of the authorization for the transport of goods by Mexican trucks between the border and another point inside the United States has given rise to a costly process, in which goods must be unloaded and reloaded just to move across the border. It also reduces security whenever cargo is stacked before being reloaded, by introducing yet another point at which contraband can be introduced into containers.

Cooperation high now – it’s structurally resilient, includes investment and is strengthening Mexican renewablesWood 10 – PhD in Political Studies @ Queen’s, Professor @ ITAM in Mexico City(Duncan, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, http://www.statealliancepartnership.org/resources_files/USMexico_Cooperation_Renewable_Energies.pdf)

The history of cooperation between Mexico and the United States in renewable energy is surprisingly longand multi-faceted and it has been a vital, albeit unheralded, dimension to

bilateral relations and a significant boost to rural and later national development for over 18

years . Cooperation in some areas goes back even further than that, with geothermal energy collaboration extending back to the 1970s. Although it is now seen as crucial in the context of efforts to mitigate climate change, renewable energy in Mexico has and always has been seen as a development tool, helping to bring energy and employment to marginalized areas that are not connected to the national electricity grid.¶ Beginning in the 1990s, USAID has invested in long term programs seeking to increase opportunities for renewable energy in Mexico, focusing mainly on small projects in rural areas but also increasingly on projects that a having a far-reaching impact on Mexico's energy profile. The investments made by the US government in mapping Mexico's wind energy resources in Oaxaca and other parts of the country have helped to develop a new source of energy for the national grid and for private consumption, and a new source of employment, investment, technical expertise and economic growth.

Energy coop high nowGNEB 11 – Good Neighbor Environmental Board, The Good Neighbor Environmental Board was created in 1992 by the Enterprise for the Americas ¶ Initiative Act, Public Law 102-532.The purpose of the Board is to “advise the President and the ¶ Congress on the need for implementation of environmental and infrastructure projects (including ¶ projects that affect agriculture, rural development, and human nutrition) within the States of the ¶ United States contiguous to Mexico in order to improve the quality of life of persons residing on ¶ the United States side of the border.” ¶ The Board is charged with submitting an annual report to the President and the Congress. ¶ Management responsibilities for the Board were delegated to the Administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency by Executive Order 12916 on May 13, 1994(“The Potential Environmental and Economic Benefits of Renewable Energy Development in the U.S.-Mexico Border Region,” http://www.epa.gov/ofacmo/gneb/gneb14threport/English-GNEB-14th-Report.pdf)

Despite the challenges, the United States and Mexico are working together on a wide variety of renewable energy and energy efficiency projects. The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) ¶ is working with Mexico to develop a national Low-Emission Development Strategy (LEDS) for Mexico ¶ and also is working with Mexican federal, state, and municipal governments on a range of programs, from ¶ encouraging the use of renewables to energy efficient mortgages and renewable standards. ¶ In 2010, the United States and Mexico expanded their Methane to Markets Partnership with the ¶ launch of the Global Methane Initiative (GMI) to expand and accelerate global methane reductions. ¶ In addition, EPA cooperates with the Mexican Secretariat of Environment and Natural Resources ¶ (SEMARNAT) on reducing heavy vehicle emissions through Mexico’s Transporte Limpio program, ¶ which is based on EPA’s SmartWay program, aimed at reducing

transportation-related emissions by ¶ creating incentives to improve supply chain fuel efficiency. DOE and SENER share information on ¶ smart grid, renewable energy, and energy efficiency technologies, and work with EPA and SEMARNAT ¶ on a partnership to develop a program similar to ENERGY STAR to promote the use of more efficient ¶ building materials and appliances in Mexico. Mexico has taken the lead within the Energy and Climate ¶ Partnership of the Americas on an Energy Efficiency Working Group for the region, and supports ¶ regional interconnections and energy access efforts. Mexico also is part of the Clean Energy Ministerial process, where it leads with other countries on energy efficiency, smart grid, and renewable energy ¶ initiatives. Finally, as part of a 1993 bilateral agreement to the North American Free Trade Agreement ¶ (NAFTA), the United States and Mexico formed the North American Development Bank (NADB) ¶ and Border Environment Cooperation Commission (BECC), which recently have begun assessing and ¶ financing some renewable energy projects in the border area.

Drug trafficking inevitable- US turns a blind eye Messing and Hazelwood 12 (F. Andy Messing is the Executive Director of the National Defense Council Foundation, Bruce Hazelwood wa a member of the Milgroup at the U.S. Embassy, “US Drug Control Policy and International Operations” 2012 http://ndcf.dyndns.org/ndcf/Publications/US_Drug_Control_Policy_and_Int_Ops.htm#_Toc449503510\\CLans)When considering an economic development strategy, we should remember that since drug problem is a world problem, the

development effort is best served when it is brought about with the cooperation of the international community. This way the chances for diverse capital and broad in scope development are increased. Within the drug producing and

trafficking countries the principal reason for the lack of cooperation lies in the U.S. government's willingness to compromise and its refusal to use financial leverage against foreign governments. Take the case of Mexico, through which the majority of the Andean cocaine enters the U.S. The Mexican Government does little to

deter illegal drug transactions within and outside of its country. In spite of this the U.S. certifies the corrupt Mexican Government as fully cooperating in drug enforcement, which gives Mexico preferred trade status and allows it to

bypass certain money borrowing restrictions. For more than 14 years the U.S. financed drug control program in Mexico remains a relative failure. This being the case, and with the President's drug war announcement, why then are Mexico

and other similar countries not isolated and punished? First, U.S. banking institutions are afraid that the application of too much pressure from the U.S. will cause the Mexican Government to default on its huge and increasing

debt. Second, the US. Government is afraid that any decline in the Mexican economy will be an open invitation to a leftist insurrection. Neither reason however is sufficient to continue to undermine the U.S. drug strategy and American society and compromise our own national standards. Narrow business interests and the always convenient threat of communism cause the U.S. to turn a blind eye and weaken the

effectiveness of our foreign policy and drug control efforts. This shortcoming has and continues to prevent any "real" international cooperation in the drug fight.

No Latin American escalation Cárdenas 11 [Mauricio, senior fellow and director of the Latin America Initiative at the Brookings Institution, 3-17, “Think Again Latin America,” Foreign Policy, http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/03/17/think_again_latin_america?page=full]"Latin America is violent and dangerous." Yes, but not unstable. Latin American countries have among the world's highest rates of crime, murder, and kidnapping. Pockets of abnormal levels of violence have emerged in countries such as Colombia -- and more recently, in Mexico, Central America, and some large cities such as Caracas. With 140,000 homicides in 2010, it is understandable how Latin America got this reputation. Each of the countries in Central America's "Northern Triangle" (Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador) had more murders in 2010 than the entire European Union combined. Violence in Latin America is strongly related to poverty and inequality. When combined with the insatiable international appetite for the illegal drugs produced in the region, it's a noxious brew. As strongly argued by a

number of prominent regional leaders -- including Brazil's former president, Fernando H. Cardoso, and Colombia's former president, Cesar

Gaviria -- a strategy based on demand reduction, rather than supply, is the only way to reduce crime in Latin America. Although some fear the Mexican drug violence could spill over into the southern United States, Latin America poses little to no threat to international peace or stability . The major global security concerns today are the proliferation of nuclear weapons and terrorism. No country in the region is in possession of nuclear weapons -- nor has expressed an interest in having them. Latin American countries, on the whole, do not have much history of engaging in cross-border wars. Despite t he recent tensions on the Venezuela - Colombia border , it should be pointed out that Venezuela has never taken part in an international armed conflict. Ethnic and re l igious conflicts are very uncommon in Latin America. Although the region has not been immune to radical jihadist attacks -- the 1994

attack on a Jewish Community Center in Buenos Aires, for instance -- they have been rare. Terrorist attacks on the civilian population have been limited to a large extent to the FARC organization in Colombia, a tactic which contributed in large part to the organization's loss of popular support.

No chance of prolif – treaty norms, and most analysts don’t regard it as a significant threat Sarah Chankin-Gould, a Scoville Peace Fellow with the Arms Sales Monitoring Project at the Federation of American Scientists,

Winter 2004, FAS Public Interest Report, Vol. 57, No. 1, online: http://www.fas.org/faspir/2004/v57n1/tlatelolco.htm, accessed February 20, 2007

In 1967, before the Nuclear Non- Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and at the height of the Cold War, the states of Latin America signed the Treaty of Tlatelolco, creating the world’s first regional Nuclear Weapons Free Zone (NWFZ). Today, Latin America is off the radar screen of much of the arms control community, and nuclear proliferation in the hemisphere is not regarded as a significant threat. Yet rather than

detracting from the importance of the Tlatelolco regime, this should serve as a reminder of what the Treaty has accomplished. The Treaty of Tlatelolco has contributed to the development of non-proliferation norms in the region. It was signed only five years after the Cuban Missile Crisis, at which time Cuba remained committed to maintaining the option of nuclear weapons as long as its conflict with the US persisted. In addition, Argentina and Brazil were engrossed in their own race for nuclear arms during the 1970s and 80s. Today, following Cuba’s 2002 ratification, all 33 states in the region have signed and ratified the Treaty. The Treaty of Tlatelolco The Treaty commits States Parties to use nuclear power for

peaceful means. The parties are required to prohibit and prevent the testing, use, manufacture, production , acquisition, receipt, storage, installation, deployment and possession of nuclear weapons in their territory. To ensure its effectiveness, the Treaty includes two Additional Protocols committing states with responsibility for territories in the region (France, Holland, the UK and US), and the major nuclear powers (China, France, Russia, UK, and US) to maintaining the NWFZ. The Agency for the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons in Latin America and the Caribbean – OPANAL – serves as a secretariat for the Treaty regime. A five-member elected Council meets every two months, with states serving four-year terms. In addition, a General Conference of all Member States is convened every two years. The Agency is responsible for ensuring compliance with the Treaty and fulfilling the mandates of the Council and General Conference, including writing reports and maintaining contact with relevant states and international

organizations. OPANAL and its Member States have shown a commitment to promoting nuclear non-proliferation both in their own NWFZ and around the world.

Solvency

Plan fails – Mexican law and subnational governmentsBonner et al 10 (Robert C. Bonner, Former Commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection; Former Administrator, Drug Enforcement Administration; Andres Rozental, Former Deputy Foreign Minister of Mexico; Former President and Founder Mexican Council on Foreign Relations (COMEXI); http://www.pacificcouncil.org/document.doc?id=31)

At present, however, there is no such a thing as an energy agenda for the border region: no true market for electricity across the border, no binational plan for electricity generation or transmission, and no program to develop new technologies or energy reserves. One significant obstacle to cross-border cooperation on energy is that Mexican law places a state-owned monopoly, the Federal Electricity Commission, in charge of electricity generation and transmission . Several reforms to this state-

owned monopoly are necessary for a cross-border energy market to function , including a standardized investment regime for both countries and direct negotiations between subnational governments across the border.

DA Links

Plan Unpopular

Costs capital – spending and regulatory battlesIbarra-Yunez 12 (Dr. Alejandro, Professor of Economics and Public Policy – Instituto Tecnologico de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey (Mexico), “Chapter 7. Energy Integration in North America: Politics and Policymaking,” Policy Research Project Report 174, May, http://repositories.lib.utexas.edu/bitstream/handle/2152/17560/prp_174-econ_reg_challenges_US_Mex_electricity-2012.pdf?sequence=5)

Greater integration of the electrical grid, both within the US and across its borders, is no simple task :

despite enhanced reliability, economic efficiency, and other potential benefits, regulatory and political challenges remain. Even as

utilities, regulators, and regional networks acknowledge the urgency of expanding the transmission network, they do not agree on who should pay for it or what level of cooperation—much less integration—will be necessary. Discussions over interconnections with Mexico reflect the dimensions of this argument while taking on further

complications due both to shifting political agendas and differences in regulatory frameworks. This chapter

explores these tensions in order to outline the major regulatory and political challenges to greater integration of the North American electricity grid from the United States point of view. The exploration begins with a review of global trade governance, followed by an examination of the current US regulatory and market environment, rooted in the evolution of deregulation since the 1978 passage of Public Utility Regulatory Policies Act. The chapter then examines the relative advantages and disadvantages of greater integration from the varying perspectives of major stakeholders on both sides of the USMexico border, again, with the US point of view, and analyzes ERCOT in depth as a unique participant.

Plan costs capital – intense environment fightsPeach 12 (Dr. Jim, Professor of Economics – New Mexico State University, “Energy Issues of the US-Mexico Border Region,” Border X Roads, October, http://blog.bnsl.org/?p=329)

While cross-border energy projects can increase efficiency, such projects can also create additional difficulties. For example, in the early 2000s various environmental and citizen groups alleged that power plants being built in Mexicali to provide electricity to southern California and Arizona did not meet US environmental standards. The debate over whether or not the plants were being built in Mexico to circumvent US law was bitter and intense (see, for example the report by the US Government Accountability Office on the estimated emissions

from the two plants: http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-05-823).

Plan is expensive- only one transmission in New Mexico would be 2 billionGalbraith 10 (Kate, August 26, 2010, staff writer Texas Tribune“Project to Connect Grids Raises Questions”http://www.texastribune.org/texas-energy/energy/project-to-connect-grids-raises-questions/ )Texas has always operated its own energy grid, separate from the two other grids that span the rest of the nation. But a project quietly emerging in eastern New Mexico would curb that independence — and affect energy prices for Texas consumers in ways that remain much in dispute. The $2 billion

project could connect all three grids (eastern, western, and Texas) as soon as 2013. They would meet near Clovis, N.M., just west of the Texas border. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission has given a preliminary go-ahead to the proposal, known as Tres Amigas, which doubles as the name of the company running it. The federal commission's chairman has praised it as a "prime example of the creativity and pioneering thinking that our country needs."

Neolib K – LinkThe plan is the worst form of neolib – the impact is low wages and decreased international cooperation – vote neg to endorse solidarity against neoliberal impositionBacon 11 (David, Author and Writer, “BUILDING A CULTURE OF CROSS BORDER SOLIDARITY,” 9-27, http://talkingunion.wordpress.com/2011/09/27/cross-border-union-solidarity/)

In the period since the North American Free Trade Agreement has come into effect, the economies of the United States and Mexico have become more integrated than ever. Through Plan Puebla-Panama and partnerships on security, the military and the drug war, the political and

economic policies pursued by the U.S. and Mexican governments are also more coordinated than they’ve ever been. Working people on both sides of the border are not only affected by this integration. Workers and their unions in many ways are its object. These policies seek to maximize profits and push wages and benefits to the bottom ,

manage the flow of people displaced as a result, roll back the rights and social benefits achieved over decades, and weaken working class movements in both countries. All this makes cooperation and solidarity across the U.S./Mexico border more

important than ever. And after a quarter century in which the development of solidarity relationships was interrupted, unions and workers are once again searching out their counterparts and finding effective and appropriate ways to support each other in this new period. The working class movements of the U.S. and Mexico both began in the decades after the seizure of Mexican territory in the

War of 1848, its incorporation into the territory of the U.S., and the unequal relationship cemented by the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. The roots of the cross-border solidarity movement are very deep , and go back more than a century. They are part of the labor culture of workers and

unions on both sides, and have been almost since the beginning of our two labor movements. During the period of the labor upsurge of the 1930s and 40s, most solidarity activity was organized by Mexican workers and unions in support of workers in the U.S. In part, this was due to a point of view among those unions that saw Mexicans and Mexican-Americans, especially along the border, and part of their own constituency. Bert Corona, a leftist born in Juarez, became president of ILWU Local 26 in Los Angeles, and later Humberto Camacho, a Mexican organizer for the United Electrical Workers, helped establish UE Local 1421. Both Corona and Camacho became the two most influential leaders of the immigrant rights movement through the 1970s, and their militant program called for defending the rights of undocumented workers. Corona, Camacho, and their generation of solidarity and labor activists saw that unions in both countries had a common interest. Labor, they believed, should try to raise the standard of living in both countries, and stop the use of immigrants as a vulnerable labor supply for employers. A deportation wave marked the rise of cold war hysteria. In the 1950s, at the height of the cold war, the combination of enforcement and bracero contract labor reached a peak. In 1954 1,075,168 Mexicans were deported from the U.S. And from 1956 to 1959, between 432,491 and 445,197 braceros were brought in each year. As a political

weapon, deportations were part of a general wave of repression that included firings, and even prison for leftwing and labor activists. The movement for solidarity among workers and unions in the U.S. and Mexico didn’t begin just with NAFTA. Solidarity is an integral and indispensable part of the history of the labor movement in both countries, and has always been a two-way street.

Mexican unions especially played a key role in the organization of US unions, some of which would not exist today without that early support. Those early efforts met success through by concentrating on the key role of Mexican workers in the U.S. Today’s circumstances are

different, but the migration of people is just as important to solidarity today as it was eighty years ago. Solidarity has always been a project of the left in each country. A strong left produced a base for developing common action, and popularized political ideas that helped workers understand why internationalism was necessary to confront transnational corporations, and the governments and their policies that supported them.

Conversely, the cold war, nationalism, and anti-immigrant hysteria in the U.S., and repression on both sides of the border, were tools used to break those bonds and proscribe those ideas. Today those threats are growing again. Ties between workers and union in the U.S. and Mexico must grow stronger and become an effective weapon to defeat them. The growth of cross-border solidarity today is taking place at a time when U.S. penetration of Mexico is growing – economically, politically, and even militarily. While the relationship between the U.S. and Mexico has it’s own special characteristics, it is also part of the creation of a global system of production, distribution and consumption. It is not just a bilateral relationship. Jobs go from the U.S. and Canada to Mexico in order to cut labor costs. But from Mexico those same jobs go China or Bangladesh or dozens of other countries, where labor costs are even lower. As important, the threat to move those jobs, experienced by workers in the U.S. from the 1970s onwards, are now common in Mexico as well. Those threats force concessions on wages, and in Sony’s huge Nuevo Laredo factory, for instance, were used to make workers agree to an indefinite temporary employment status, even though Mexican law

prohibited it. Multiple production locations undermine unions’ bargaining leverage, since action by workers in a single workplace can’t shut down production for the entire corporation. The UAW, for instance, was beaten by

Caterpillar in large part because even though the union could stop production in the U.S., production in Mexico continued. Companies like Grupo Mexico can use

profits gained in mining operations in Peru to subsidize the costs of a strike in Cananea. The privatization of electricity in Mexico will not just affect Mexicans. Already plants built by Sempra Energy and Enron in Mexico are like maquiladoras, selling electricity into the grid across the border. If privatization grows, that will have an impact on US unions and jobs, giving even utility unions in the U.S. a reason to help Mexican workers resist it. This requires more than just solidarity between unions facing the same employer. It requires

solidarity in resisting the imposition of neoliberal reforms like privatization and labor law reform as well. At the same time, the

concentration of wealth has created a new political situation in both countries. In Mexico, the old governing party, the PRI, functioned as a mediator between organized workers and business. PRI governments used repression to stop the growth of social movements outside the system it controlled. But the government also used negotiations in interest of long-term stability. The interests of the wealthy were protected, but some sections of the population also received social benefits and unions had recognized rights. In 1994, for instance, the government put leaders of Mexico City’s bus union SUTAUR in prison. But then it proceeded to negotiate with them while they were in jail. The victory of Vicente Fox and the PAN in 2000 created a new situation, in which the corporate class, grown rich and powerful because of earlier reforms, no longer desired the same kind of social pact or its political intermediaries. The old corporatist social construct, in which unions had a role, was no longer necessary. Meanwhile employers and the government have been more willing to use force. Unions like SME and miners face, not just repression, but destruction. In the U.S. a similar process took place during the years after the Vietnam War, when corporations made similar decisions. After the PATCO strike was broken by the Federal government, the use of strikebreakers became widespread. Corporations increasingly saw even business unions as unnecessary for maintaining social peace and continued profits. Union organizing became a kind of labor warfare. A whole industry of union busters appeared, and the process set up by U.S. labor law in the 1930s became virtually unusable by workers seeking to organize. Labor law reform, national healthcare, and other basic pro-worker reforms became politically impossible in the post-Vietnam era, even under Democratic presidents whom unions helped elect. Public workers did succeed in organizing during this period, however, and eventually U.S. union strength became more and more concentrated in that sector. But much as the public sector in Mexico came under attack, the U.S. public sector became the target for the U.S. right, for much the same reasons. This too changed the landscape for solidarity, giving the most politically powerful section of the U.S. labor movement, at least potentially, a greater interest in solidarity with Mexican labor. In both countries, the main union battles are now ones to preserve what workers have previously achieved, rather than to make new gains. Mexican unions are enmeshed in the state labor process, in which the government still certifies unions’ existence, and to a large degree controls their bargaining. In the U.S. labor is endangered by economic crisis, falling density, and an increasingly hostile political system. This leads to a rise in nationalism and protectionism, creating new obstacles for solidarity. But as the attacks against unions are growing stronger, solidarity is becoming even more a question of survival. Unions face a basic question on both sides of the border — can they win the battles they face today, especially political ones, without joining their efforts together? Ddespite the flight of many jobs to China, a U.S. economic recession that has caused massive layoffs in border plants, and extreme levels of violence in many border communities, the maquiladora industry in north Mexico is still enormous, with 3000 plants employing over 1.3 million workers. They’ve been the laboratory for the rightwing shift in labor law and labor relations, now being applied to workers across Mexico. The states are a stronghold still of political conservatism and corporate power, because of the disenfranchisement of the working population. A vibrant and strong labor movement on the border would change Mexico’s politics. The influence of the maquiladoras on U.S. employment and runaway production over the years is undeniable. The growth of labor solidarity in the last two decades between the U.S. and Mexico owes a lot to the border, where U.S. unions first acquired a clear vision of the importance of their relations with Mexican workers. The decline in activity in border factories over the last few years, and in the support from major unions and institutions in both countries for it, is an important weakness in the efforts to build a culture of labor solidarity. In Mexico, the NAFTA debate led to the organization of the Action Network Opposing Free Trade (RMALC), which in turn helped to spark the relationship between the U.E. and the Authentic Labor Front (FAT). That relationship is a model for solidarity between two unions, based on equality and mutual interest, preserving each union’s ability to make its own decisions autonomously. Most importantly, it has been a relationship based on real campaigns on the ground – organizing drives, strikes, and resistance to proposals like the PRI labor law reform. Rank and file workers in both unions have played an important part in those efforts. Frustrated with the slow pace of union organizing in Mexico, the AFL-CIO Solidarity Center assisted the formation of the Workers Support Center (CAT) in Puebla, which led to pitched battles in the state’s maquiladoras, and some important victories. The first came at Mex Mode (Kuk Dong), where the CAT helped set up an independent union, and United Students Against Sweatshops then successfully pressured Nike Corporation into forcing the sweatshop’s management to recognize it and bargain. Recently, the CAT helped workers at a Johnson Controls plant to organize. The UAW in the U.S., which had earlier organized plants of the same company, pressured it into recognizing the union in Puebla. The Mexican miners union, “los mineros”, have begun a process of merging with the United Steel Workers. The mineros are locked in an all-out conflict with the Mexican government and Grupo Mexico in a strike in Cananea, which has gone on for four years. The decision by the mineros and USW to draw together rises from their joint struggles in the mines along the U.S./Mexico border. Workers in U.S. and Mexican mines have a long history of mutual support, even family relationships. While the cold war restrained such support activity for some years, the Cananea strike in 1998 restarted their relationship. After three years the government and Grupo Mexico finally used armed force to reopen the Cananea mine, but they had to do it in the face of numerous decisions declaring such action unconstitutional and illegal. Reopening the mine is one of the clearest examples of the unwillingness of the Mexican government and large corporations to respect the rule of law. “We don’t want to live in a country that’s attracting jobs from other countries like the US and Canada, using the competitive advantage of low wages, the lack of enforcement of labor laws, and even ecological damage,” says telephone union leader Francisco Hernandez Juarez. “These jobs are bound to be temporary anyway, they don’t give us any permanent benefit, and eventually when there’s some unfavorable event, they move to countries where the labor is even cheaper. The majority of Mexicans are being plunged into poverty. It will get worse if we continue depending exclusively on producing for foreign markets, especially the United States, and if we ignore our domestic market. We won’t accept turning into a maquiladora country that’s attractive simply because of its cheap labor. Through our unions, we want to establish more complex and complete labor relations, that permit us to be competitive in making more sophisticated products.” The fight over that political direction is at the heart of the Mexican government’s attack on the Mexican Electrical Workers (SME). Here solidarity efforts from the U.S. are not based on a fight against a common employer, but instead challenge the free trade and free market reforms behind the attack on the Mexican union. President Calderon declared Mexico’s oldest and most progressive major union “non-existent” in October of 2009. He dissolved the state-owned Power and Light Company for central Mexico, and fired all of the SME’s 44,000 members who worked there. Most Mexicans believe this is a prelude to privatizing the electrical industry. Already, despite the Constitutional prohibition, almost half of the electricity generated in the country comes from private producers. Despite the attacks, the union has been able to win back its legal recognition, and is fighting for the rights and jobs of the 16,000 members who have refused to accept their termination. US unions stayed out of previous fights over privatization, especially around electrical generation, in part because the SME is still affiliated to the World Federation of Trade Unions. The WFTU was organized when the UN was founded, originally with CIO participation. But almost all US unions later abandoned it at the beginning of the cold war. The WFTU became the rival of the AFL-dominated International Confederation of Free Trade Unions. In Mexico, however, that cold war barrier began to soften after the leadership of the AFL-CIO changed, and John Sweeney became president. As the Mexico/U.S. labor solidarity movement grew, so did the number of U.S. activists who saw the important role the SME plays in Mexican politics. They respected its democratic structure and strong contract. In earlier confrontations with Mexican administrations, unions like the U.E., whose relationship with the SME goes back decades, mobilized U.S. support Delegations of SME leaders came to the U.S., hosted by the San Francisco chapter of the Labor Council for Latin American Advancement and local labor councils. Their efforts led eventually to press conferences and meetings between SME and AFL-CIO leaders in Washington DC, and complaints at the ILO and under NAFTA’s labor side agreement. In February five international union bodies, the International Metalworkers’ Federation (IMF), International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers’ Unions (ICEM), International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF), UNI Global Union, and the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), cooperated in organizing actions in 40 countries. Over 50,000 workers, students and human rights activists demonstrated at Mexican consulates or otherwise showed their public opposition to the reform. Twenty-seven actions took place in Mexico itself. When many U.S. workers think about Mexico, they envision it as the place their jobs have gone. If they lost those jobs, then Mexican workers must have gotten them. Ross Perot captured their imagination by referring to Mexico as “the giant sucking sound.” The message is that Mexican workers are the enemy, the ones who “stole your job.” In the U.S., most workers don’t understand the enormous impact NAFTA and neoliberal policies have had on Mexicans. When Mexicans, as a result, cross the border looking for work, many U.S. workers often don’t understand who they are or why they’ve come. One indispensable part of their education is greater contact between Mexican union organizers and their U.S. counterparts. The base for that contact already exists, in the massive movement of people between the two countries. Miners fired in Cananea, or electrical workers fired in Mexico City, become workers in Phoenix, Los Angeles and New York. Twelve million Mexican workers in the U.S. are a natural base of support for Mexican unions. They bring with them the experience of the battles waged by those unions. The displacement and potential activity of these displaced union members is just one small part of the link between solidarity and the migration of people. The economic crisis in Mexico is getting much worse, with no upturn in sight. Six million Mexicans left for the U.S. in the NAFTA period, a flow of people that now affects almost every family, even in the most remote parts of country. Migration is becoming a much more important safety valve for the Mexican economy, relieving pressure on its government. It uses the tens of billions of dollars in remittances to take the place of social investment it has cut under pressure from the World Bank and International Monetary Fund. Teachers’

strikes, like the one in Oaxaca in 2006, mushroom into insurrections, when there is no alternative to migration and an economic system increasingly dependent on remittances. Economic reforms and displacement create unemployed workers – for border factories, or for U.S. agriculture and meatpacking plants. Displacement creates a reserve army of workers available to corporations as low wage labor. If demand rises, employers don’t have to raise wages. In a time of economic crisis, unemployed people are used to pressure employed workers, making them less demanding, and more fearful of losing their jobs.