The Clinton Global Initiative is all about forging partnerships between industry and non-governmental organizations, focused on sustainable economic development. It is not the sort of place you'd expect to find a discussion of the challenges of military deployments. Yet this year's CGI meeting featured a talk by someone who spends his days at the Pentagon, as the US Navy's Deputy Assistant Secretary for Energy Thomas Hicks told the audience how the Navy has taken sustainable technology from testing to deployment in six months, and is gearing up to make the largest purchase of biofuels ever.
Saying "We rely too much on foreign oil," Hicks told two parallel tales of how the Navy was pushing ahead with sustainable technology. The first focused on the support of US Marines (ground troops that are part of the Navy) in forward bases in Afghanistan. The electronics that now support the Marines require significant amounts of electric power which, in the past, has meant diesel generators. That, in turn, has meant a series of tenuous ground convoys that start in Pakistan and face frequent insurgent attacks on the way to their destination. The Navy estimates that it costs one life for every 50 of the convoys they run.
To cut down on fuel use, the Navy created what they termed an experimental forward operating base, or ExFOB, in Virginia. Industry was invited to bring in any technology that could cut fuel use or generate power on site, and try to integrate it into an existing base's architecture. Not everything worked, but those technologies that did were brought to a wargame two months later. Within six months, the first field deployment occurred. That's a pretty rapid pace by most standards.
The technology involved is nothing revolutionary—LED lighting and shades with integrated photovoltaic systems—but the reductions were very substantial: 30 percent to 90 percent reductions in energy use. More significantly, patrols that were in the field used to require fresh batteries roughly every other day. They can now go up to three weeks without a battery refresh. The first deployments were so successfully that the Marines are rolling it out in all their battalions. It will require a substantial initial payment, but the program will pay for itself within six months, and provide $50 million in savings annually from there on out. The ExFOBs are now an annual event for the Marines.
http://arstechnica.com/science/news/2011/09/the-us-navy-goes-green-with-solar-and-biodiesel.ars
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