Clean Energy
Once upon a time, the Soviet Union was threatening to be the first country to put a man on the moon. The president galvanized the nation to meet the challenge, and Americans got there first. The end.
The story of clean energy could follow a similar script. Global warming is a far larger and realer threat than a Soviet lunar landing ever was, but a similar sense of national mission is missing, even though developing reliable and abundant sources of clean energy is the next lunar landing, the next great leap for both America and humankind.
Unfortunately, clean energy has no space agency to support it. It is still a minuscule corner of business enterprise, without the influence of an industrial-strength lobby. It's interests are fragmented - the sun, the wind, the oceans, the heat in the bowels of the earth. And although the US Department of Energy had sunk billions into clean tech R&D over recent decades, the resulting innovations have only found life in foreign countries. Germany, for example, adopted smart tax and business incentives that encouraged the flowering of clean energy on a mass scale. It now generates a substantial portion of its energy for free. Not so in the US. It's been pretty much government support for coal, oil and gas all the way.
It's too bad. With government support, clean energy could supply 20% of the nation's electricity needs by 2020 and keep $350 in the bank for a typical American family every year, with nary a wisp of smoke. It would also mean new dirty coal plants would no longer be needed, and old ones could be bulldozed, and that the US would have technology to export -- to countries like China and India. Imagine that.
Too good to be true? See what you think after looking at this clean energy blueprint.
Clean Energy Blueprint
It was put together by the Union of Concerned Scientists with the assistance of the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy (ACEEE) and the Tellus Institute. The blueprint provides a portfolio of policies for federal adoption that would provide the incentives needed for this century's moonshot. Here's the plan:
Renewable portfolio standard requiring electricity suppliers to gradually increase renewable energy (except for hydropower)from about 2% today to 20% by 2020
Energy security trust fund (or public benefi trust fund) created by a 2/10ths of a cent/kWh charge on electricity (about $1 per month for a typical household).
Production tax credits of 1.7¢/kWh for renewable energy extended and expanded to cover all clean, non-hydropower renewable resources
Net metering. It allows consumers who generate their own electricity with renewable energy systems to sell their surplus power by spinning their meters backward
Research and development spending on renewable energy and efficiency increased 60% over three years
Combined heat and power plants supported by incentives for efficient plants that produce both electricity and useful heat
National efficiency standards that include minimum standards for a dozen energy-consuming products
State building codes upgraded to model codes established in 1999 and 2000 and to more advanced codes by 2010
Tax incentives to encourage improving the energy efficiency of buildings and equipment beyond minimum standards
Industrial efficiency measures to improve industry’s efficiency by 1% to 2% each year
The projected results?
- Saving consumers money -- by 2020, a typical family would save $350 on energy bills
- Protecting the environment -- by 2020, power plant carbon emissions would be reduced by 67%.
- Diversifying energy supply and creating a more secure energy future.
The end.
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