If the economy is widely known to be the “#1 issue” in this election cycle, then the #2 issue could be energy. $4-a-gallon gasoline is routinely listed by voters as one of their top concerns. Recent polls have “energy” tied with “Iraq” as the second-most important issue, and 22 percent of voters now believe that energy is the nation’s “top concern” — up from just 4 percent who felt that way in 2007.

Most analysts are calling 2008 “a very bad year for Republicans,” and a June poll showed that voters trusted Democrats over Republicans on all top ten campaign issues. A more recent poll showed voters still trust Democrats over Republicans on seven of the top ten issues.

But the GOP believes it has found a winning issue for November — and they are honing in on energy, attempting to portray themselves as the party that will reduce energy costs by expanding energy production, while attacking the Democrats for keeping prices high and opposing increases in domestic production.

Yesterday, minority leader Sen. Mitch McConnell gave an ultimatum to Senate Democrats — either allow a vote on offshore oil drilling or face a filibuster by Republicans on other proposed bills before the August recess.

Senate Republicans have threatened to block nearly all other bills pending before the August recess if Democrats refuse to vote with them on expanding offshore drilling.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said bills that do not pertain to energy can wait until after the August recess, with gas prices now surpassing $4 per gallon. McConnell and top Republicans indicated Wednesday they would oppose any procedural votes to take up other legislation, which require 60 votes to succeed.

“We think there is nothing more important that we can do right now than to deal with the Number One issue of the country,” McConnell said. “This is the biggest issue since terrorism right after 9/11. People are pounding on their desks, saying, Why don’t these people get together and do something about this problem?”

The hardball tactics reflect Republican confidence that they can pull off a major election-year victory with gas prices at record highs, after they have been battered at the polls and have lost on several recent high-profile legislative battles.

[...]Democrats say the GOP is intentionally prolonging the debate in order to score political points by insisting on more than two dozen amendments to the oil-speculation bill. Democrats, who say opening up new lands won’t affect prices for a decade and are concerned about its environmental impacts, have offered the GOP one amendment to the oil-speculation bill.

But the GOP is positioning itself as the party willing to do whatever it takes to lower gas prices. The Republicans say Democrats are scared to cast votes on new drilling in the face of voter anger over high gasoline prices, and they point to the majority’s decision to scrap appropriations bills to avoid a debate over lifting the congressional ban on drilling along the Outer Continental Shelf.

Whether or not Republicans can successfully use this issue to their advantage is open to debate — but all indications are that the Democrats are certainly concerned about that possibility. Which is why, the Wall Street Journal argues, Democrats would rather prevent a vote on offshore drilling than risk appearing responsible for preventing expanded energy production via drilling — (which is a position now favored by 67 percent of Americans. 64 percent of those believe drilling will lower gas prices.)

Majority Leader Reid has decided that deliberation is too taxing for “the world’s greatest deliberative body.” This week he cut off serious energy amendments to his antispeculation bill. Then Senate Appropriations baron Robert Byrd abruptly canceled a bill markup planned for today where Republicans intended to press the issue. Mr. Byrd’s counterpart in the House, David Obey, is enforcing a similar lockdown. Speaker Pelosi says she won’t allow even a debate before Congress’s August recess begins in eight days.

Today, the BBC reported that a new U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) survey estimated that there were 90 billion barrels of recoverable oil in the Arctic — and that, ironically, shrinking polar ice could make that oil easier to extract.

John McCain has also been hitting the pro-drilling theme, criticizing Barack Obama for his opposition to expanded domestic drilling and oil production.

Recent surveys of key battleground states showed that:

…energy could be the pivotal issue in the race for these hotly contested states. Voters in each state consistently ranked gas prices as their number one financial concern. When asked which was more important, a candidate’s position on the war in Iraq or his position on energy policy, voters in each state chose energy.

Gas prices, though, are not the only energy-related issue Republicans are hoping to capitalize on — a crisis in electricity production is also looming in the U.S.:

America uses just 15% more of it today than when the first modern energy crisis hit in October 1973. But electricity use is up 115% since then, thanks to all those plasma screens, iPhones, computers and data centers. And all economic forecasts see substantial growth in demand for electricity–think just of the coming electric cars–yet lots of problems in meeting it.

Right now the nation has 760 gigawatts of power plants to meet current consumption, with another 154 in reserve capacity to maintain grid reliability. But in fact only 10 gigs is truly excess capacity. The other 144 is utterly essential to keep lights on when unexpected demand arises from heat waves, outages or maintenance downtime. That reserve will begin to shrink quickly. NERC estimates that over the next decade 135 gigawatts of new capacity will be needed to meet the growth in consumption. But right now plants producing a total of 57 gigawatts are planned.

Ninety percent of electric power is fueled by nonrenewable coal, natural gas or nuclear power. Renewable sources will not cover the growth in demand. While wind is gaining ground (and now supplies 1% of power), hydro’s share (7%) is shrinking as dams are dismantled. Solar, at 0.01%, is an inconsequential contributor.

Hence the Republican strategy of contrasting what they call their “pro-domestic production” (including coal, natural gas, and nuclear) stance with the Democrats’ anti-nuclear, anti-fossil fuel position. In addition, conservative pundits — and even some anti-carbon environmentalist types — are arguing that only an expanded reliance on nuclear power can truly produce Al Gore’s vision of a carbon-emissions-free energy future.

By generating electricity whose production otherwise would have required the use of fossil fuels, the 104 nuclear plants now operating in the U.S. prevent the release of approximately 700 million additional tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere each year; that is the equivalent of removing 96 percent of all passenger cars from U.S. roads.

Most Democrats and environmentalists have been resolutely against nuclear energy due to environmental concerns from disposing of the spent fuel these plants produce — but lifting a Carter-era ban on reprocessing nuclear waste could greatly minimize this problem.

Meanwhile, the rest of the world is quickly expanding its electricity production capacity. Germany is planning 27 new coal-fired plants by 2030. Italy will increase its reliance on coal from 14 to 33 percent by 2013. 40 new coal plants will be built in Europe by 2013.

As for China and India, the two fastest-growing energy-consuming nations in the world, in 2006 alone China built enough coal plants to equal the entire electricity production of Great Britain. India is planning to quadruple its coal production by 2030.

In the U.S., a network of environmental groups including the Environmental Defense Fund and the Sierra Club have organized campaigns to block the construction of new coal-fired plants in every state. They claim to have blocked 65 new coal plants that have been proposed since 2005.

As for nuclear power, the rest of the world is surging ahead with construction of new plants — France already gets 80 percent of its electricity from nuclear plants, and is also planning to supply neighboring countries. Japan has six new plants under construction and another six planned. India has six under construction and 19 more planned. China has fully committed itself to a nuclear future — it has seven under construction and is planning up to 85 more within the next few decades to meet an explosion of demand.

The U.S. has not built a new nuclear plant in 30 years.

The bottom line: the U.S. is going to need 135 gigagwatts of additional electricity by 2018. That electricity has to come from somewhere. Wind and solar should play a part, yes, but such sources can only account for a fraction of what will be required — even the strongest proponents admit that wind could account for, at most, 20 percent of electricity production. The remaining 80 percent has to come from either a) oil, b) natural gas, c) coal, or d) nuclear power.

Only one of those is a zero-carbon emissions source.