Uncertainly seems to surround us today: high
oil prices, recession fears, persistent wars
and extreme weather events. When things seem
to be going wrong, we often revert to previous
behavior that's familiar to us.
All of these challenges are based, in part,
on our energy choices. Our global addiction
to fossil fuels is based on a shaky foundation
of foreign suppliers, resource depletion and
environmental pollution. Business-as-usual will
not get us out of this predicament. This time
we need to accept and embrace change.
We need to flip
the energy paradigm upside down. The
low hanging fruit in energy savings are conservation
and energy efficiency. These can be applied
throughout the economy from large industry and
high-rise offices, to the corner store and every
home. Then the renewables — solar, wind,
biomass, geothermal, hydro and ocean energies
— should get priority for new generation.
Stop building coal-fired power plants until
we can capture and store the carbon.
Corroborating this, the International Energy
Agency hosted 30 global companies and agreed
that renewables
offer the technical solution for climate change
and economic expansion. In pressing for
clear, predictable policy incentives, these
technical officers stated that "urgent
action is needed now. The longer we wait the
more difficult the task of mitigating climate
change becomes."
We are seeing progress. Next month, the US
renewables trade association, ACORE, along with
the U.S. Dept. of State and Commerce are hosting
the Washington International Renewable Energy
Conference (WIREC
2008) March 3-7. GENI will be exhibiting
our latest Visualization demonstration at booth
639, and we invite you to attend if you are
able. This will be the largest Renewable
Energy event ever staged in the United States
— and it's about time.
