NYT: Budgets Falling, Not Rising, in Race to Fight Global Warming

[DeepModem Mom]

Budgets Falling in Race to Fight Global Warming
By ANDREW C. REVKIN
Published: October 30, 2006

....research into energy technologies by both government and industry has not been rising, but rather falling.

In the United States, annual federal spending for all energy research and development — not just the research aimed at climate-friendly technologies — is less than half what it was a quarter-century ago. It has sunk to $3 billion a year in the current budget from an inflation-adjusted peak of $7.7 billion in 1979, according to several different studies....

President Bush has sought an increase to $4.2 billion for 2007, but that would still be a small fraction of what most climate and energy experts say would be needed....

Internationally, government energy research trends are little different from those in the United States. Japan is the only economic power that increased research spending in recent decades....In the private sector, studies show that energy companies have a long tradition of eschewing long-term technology quests because of the lack of short-term payoffs.

Still, more than four dozen scientists, economists, engineers and entrepreneurs interviewed by The New York Times said that unless the search for abundant non-polluting energy sources and systems became far more aggressive, the world would probably face dangerous warming and international strife as nations with growing energy demands compete for increasingly inadequate resources....

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/30/business/worldbusines...