New alternative energy initiatives will help the U.S. break its reliance on hydrocarbons
By Samuel W. Bodman
United States faces big
challenges in the energy
and transportation arena. President
George W. Bush put it plainly in the
State of the Union message earlier
this year: America, he said, is addicted to oil.
With the U.S. now importing 60
percent of the oil we use and a national bill for this habit that came to
$250 billion last year, there is simply
no time to waste. With worldwide
demand growing rapidly, and with
concern about the environmental
impact of greenhouse gases rising,
the deployment of clean, reliable
sources of energy is clearly in our
national interest. But it will not be an
easy task.
In his address, President Bush unveiled two new programs that will
help the U.S. maintain its economic
and scientific edge, notably in the
energy area.
First, the American Competitiveness Initiative proposes a major increase in federal funding for basic
science research, particularly for the
physical sciences.
Our Office of Science is now the
largest source of federal funds for
basic research in the physical sciences in the United States. But in order
to ensure that we remain the world
leader in this area, the President has
committed to doubling the budget
of this Office over the next ten years.
This administration believes that
advances in science and technology
will, among other things, help the U.S.
break its reliance on imported energy
sources and hydrocarbons. And so,
in conjunction with the Competitiveness Initiative, the new Advanced Energy Initiative proposes to significantly increase our national investment
in alternative fuel and clean energy
technologies in order to reduce our
dependence on foreign sources of
energy.
The focus here is on technologies
that are close to making a splash but
need a final push. Over the past decade or so, a tremendous mount of
work has been done on possible new
energy sources. The Advanced Energy Initiative essentially proposes to
pick some inners. This may not be
the usual role for government, but
we must do it if we are to meet the
energy demands of the future.
Our goal is to identify the most
promising technologies—the ones
that could have the greatest impact
on the marketplace in the relatively
near future—and then really go after
them.
The way I think about it, we are
looking for technologies that will
break through in my lifetime—say
in the next 20 years or so.
That may
seem like a long time. But considering how complicated the science is,
how long it can take to bring a technology to market, and how large and
complex the problem is, this is really a
reasonable—even aggressive—time
frame.
Among other things, the Advanced Energy Initiative will: accelerate the development of solar
photovoltaics, a technology that
converts energy from the sun into
electricity in a highly efficient manner;
improve the efficiency and lower the
costs of new wind-power technologies; produce better batteries for use
in hybrid automobiles; and develop
cheap, practical ethanol made from
plant fiber, which some scientists suggest could make ethanol cost-competitive by 2012 and displace up to
30 percent of current fuel use.
These programs deal with generating power from clean coal, from
wind and solar energy, and—in the
automotive sector—alternative fuels
such as ethanol in the near term, and
ultimately electricity and hydrogen.
What they have in common is a
focus on accelerating the development of the most promising technologies in all of these areas, so we
can bring them online at the earliest
possible date.
In the automotive sector, the
technologies now being developed
for flex-fuel and hybrid vehicles and
hydrogen fuel cells will open the
door to exciting new vehicle designs
and configurations that I believe will
hold great appeal to consumers,
while also addressing our concerns
about fuel sources and emissions.
Regardless of the specific alternative energy effort—whether it’s
solar power, wind power or encouraging the use and availability of
ethanol—the Department of Energy
will continue to encourage all stake
holders to move forward, and seeks
to be an active and effective partner with industry in developing these
and other truly transformational
technologies.
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