Lack of vision on policy clouds energy future - Kammen, SF Chronicle

[Coastie for Truth]

Daniel M. Kammen, "Lack of vision on policy clouds energy future", San Francisco Chronicle, Friday, May 13, 2005.

A very long op-ed. The excerpt that caught my attention---

A true energy policy, one worthy of presidential endorsement, would have several key components:

-- First, the United States needs to recapture the mantle of leadership in innovative renewable-energy technology and policy. Today, orders for wind turbines are flooding Danish and German factories. Germany, in fact, also has almost three times the total installed wind capacity as the United States, with a resource less than that of North Dakota alone, according to an analysis of data from the American Wind Energy Association and other sources. The global market for photovoltaics -- solar cells -- has, like the wind industry, grown by more than 20 percent a year for the past decade, according to the San Francisco solar-energy research firm Solarbuzz, Inc., and yet the United States lags behind Japan and Germany in producing and installing this local and secure source of power.

-- Hybrid vehicles, the hottest-selling cars on the market today, are almost entirely imported from Japan. This industry produces high-quality jobs that could be based in the United States but increasingly go overseas.

-- The president should make raising the average fuel efficiency of our vehicle fleet a national priority. More oil can be saved, and far more cheaply, through this mechanism than any other action.

<snip>

-- Finally, instead of denying and impeding international treaties such as the Kyoto Protocol to limit the emissions of greenhouse gases, the federal government needs recognize the business potential in leading the fight to safeguard the planet. Business opportunities abound in developing and selling solar panels, wind turbines and gasifiers that turn agricultural waste and crops into a truly natural gas, as well as developing a new generation of energy-efficient appliances.

-- Taken together, these advances could evolve our economy from one of energy "hunter-gatherers" to one of "energy farmers" -- from a reliance on a precarious and tremendously expensive traditional supply to meet a steadily growing demand, to one that emphasizes a full range of energy supply, efficiency and demand-management technologies. That's a policy worthy of presidential support"

Chew over that last paragraph ---

I excerpted a bare minimum of the op-ed. Definitely worth a read.

Professor Daniel M. Kammen holds the Class of 1935 Distinguished Chair in Energy at UC Berkeley. He is also a professor in the Energy and Resources Group and in the Goldman School of Public Policy (Senator Feinstein's family) at Berkeley. He also co-directs the Berkeley Institute of the Environment.

[lapfog_1]

1. The Bush administration answers (satire)

1. Oil, nukes, and coal will meet the future of energy needs of all
patriotic Americans, otherwise the over 1600 American deaths
to secure these resources, plus the thousands more in the future,
will be in vain.

2. Global Climate change is a myth propagated by tree hugging
ultra left liberals so we don't need to worry about that... not
to mention that 1 or 2 degree change is just something that no
one should worry about (no one can even tell the difference!).

3. Since the Rapture is now imminent, resource depletion is
not only not something to worry about... it's our God Given
Right to use these resources as much as we want.

[jpak]

2. Thanks for posting this Coastie

Great article!