1.  Lack of a cohesive, unified U.S. energy policy greatly compromises national security and stymies investment. Without concrete decisions on key issues like carbon cap & trade and emission reduction targets, as well as clear guidance on energy mix prioritization, businesses are reluctant to make large investment decisions in multi-year commercialization efforts.

2.  Growing concern that the U.S. is rapidly going from a leadership position to a laggard in the adoption of renewable energy; particularly vis-à-vis China. And, this trend is particularly vexing since most new technological innovation is still occurring in America but is being adopted and commercialized overseas.

3.  Little consensus exists on which energy source or combination will best reduce U.S. dependence on foreign oil or provide a suitable low-carbon replacement for traditional fuels.

The two articles below give a good overview of the aforementioned items 1 and 2.

Will the U.S. Be Shut Out of Clean-Tech Markets by China and Other Competitors?

Over There: The Yanks are Coming (同胞, can you spare a dime?)

Regarding item 3, the animated discussions yielded a veritable treasure trove of facts on various fuel types that I’ve summarized (not exhaustively) below.

Nuclear: Yes, nuclear. More than 50% of the attendees believe nuclear is the best path forward for reducing domestic reliance on foreign fuels. If you believe in an electric car future and improved smart grids, nuclear looks very appealing. Florida Power and Light already produces 19% of its electricity from nuclear and claims to have rates 12% lower than the national average. So, why don’t we have more? In the U.S., it takes billions of dollars and 10 to 20 years to get a new reactor approved and built due to the stringent federal and state licensing and permitting process. In fact, no new reactor has come online in the U.S. in 30 years. In comparison, the French power company EDF uses nuclear to generate nearly 78% of France’s electricity production, and French companies are now the new leaders in nuclear electricity.

Solar: Not so much. While consumers love the concept, the cost and technological limitations have kept its adoption in the U.S. very low. In fact, less than one gigawatt of solar power came online in the U.S. last year. The CEO of BrightSource Energy stated that if every southern-facing house in the U.S. had solar panels, the electricity they would contribute would still account for less than 15% of the U.S. energy demand. In addition, Shell CEO Peter Voser stated at the conference that they have ceased funding of solar projects in their renewable energy portfolio…yikes.

Natural gas: If T. Boone Pickens has his way, every truck in the U.S. will be converted to it sometime soon. He is working with the Senate and House members to introduce legislation that would mandate that a certain percentage of U.S.-based truck fleets are converted to natural gas within the next few years. The logic? It is estimated that American natural gas reserves are four times the oil reserves of the Saudi’s, and, therefore, we can significantly reduce our dependency of foreign oil by using our own plentiful resource. And, T. Boone isn’t the only advocate for American natural gas. According to Voser, Shell has major investments underway here, and they expect their natural gas production to exceed oil production by 2012.

Wind: Hardly blowing. The U.S. has more estimated wind capacity than any other country, so why isn’t it going gangbusters? The fundamental problem is that the areas that are best for wind production lay too far from the electric grids in the U.S. So, why not just add transmission lines to the areas? The construction costs are high, and the legal costs to acquire land rights may be even higher. It’s estimated that it may take as many as ten years to actualize a major transmission project even if we started today. By comparison, the Chinese now lead the world in wind energy produced and will exceed their 2020 targets this year, according to Amory Lovins of the Rocky Mountain Institute.

Biofuels: So, before we all jump off the ledge or start practicing Chinese, is there any silver-lining in these ominous clouds? How about artificially generated life, specifically made to produce biofuel? Leveraging research funded by Exxon Mobil, Synthetic Genomics (www.syntheticgenomics.com) is designing cells to create synthetic algae that produce bio-crude as a waste product. This bio-crude could then be collected and go straight to a refinery. They literally designed the DNA of the algae strain from scratch to accomplish the task using software. The company is headed by Dr. J. Craig Venter whose team was the first to decode the human genome, so it’s a safe bet they know what they’re doing. Scary sci-fi or the next big thing? Soylent Green: It’s Fuel!!!

So, if you are concerned about our energy future, what can you do? You can throw your support behind industry groups and their efforts to push for a coherent U.S. energy policy. You can write your elected officials and let them know your displeasure at the lack of governmental leadership and our diminishing competitiveness. Or you can just simply *Buy American* and thereby support the businesses inventing, commercializing and employing Americans. Vote with your dollars while they are still worth something and not printed in Mandarin.

Cheers, Matt