Energy Independence

I did a blog entry on this subject on September 5th. Obviously, I had been thinking about it for some time. Here's another story on the subject that I wrote on 8/18/04:

Energy Independence

It’s been 228 years since America has issued a good Declaration of Independence and I believe we are about 30 years overdue for another one. I think the only thing stopping us from embarking on a program of Complete Energy Independence is a misguided case of group-think. There are many cliches being repeated out there that stand in the way of our independence and I refuse to believe them. I would like to ask everyone’s help in breaking this dangerous cycle of negative group think.

We will never be independent of oil in our lifetime.
The major energy companies will do anything to hold onto their power.
It’s against the capitalist system to tamper with energy markets.
You will have to sacrifice freedom/fun/power/performance in order to save energy.
The average American will not stand for any change from what we now have.
There just aren’t enough alternative energy sources to replace oil.
You can’t expect a wasteful government to help develop new energy technology.
Big companies are in business for profits, not public welfare and won’t be interested in alternative energy.
Americans are too stupid to understand energy and technology issues.
We can’t do it.
It will take to long.
It’s too hard.

Look at these statements. How many are indesputably, undeniably true? How many of them cannot be challenged or refuted? None of them. Each statement is a self fulfilling prophecy of doom. If you believe them, they are certainly all true. Join me in crushing them and declaring to the rest of the nation, to the rest of the world, and in particular the Middle East that we reject all of these ideas.

Do you know what catapulted a young America past the rest of the world? Technological Innovation. In the early 19th century, we changed the way textiles were made. We put the entire process into one building and powered by our streams, we made new machines that cranked out cloth in quantities never before conceived. None of those ideas were new or originated here. They all came from Europe. These grand ideas were conceived in a Europe whose manufacturing guilds and trades were so entrenched that innovations that threatened those groups were simply not allowed. We were too naïve, crazy, young, idealistic, and enthusiastic to let that stop us. We shot past Europe in a generation and never looked back. We developed steam power and criss-crossed the nation with steamboats and railroads in one generation. We developed electricity and communications and knitted a far flung nation into a single unit in the next generation. We pioneered flight. We perfected the assembly line and mass production and developed the best standard of living in the world. We harnessed nuclear energy first. We saw space being exploited by our cold war adversary and passed them on the way to the moon and never looked back. The rest of the world has followed our lead closely.

We Americans can do anything we set our minds to do, our history proves it. As the saying goes, with great power comes great responsibility. We need to use our undeniable and overwhelming technological dominance responsibly. We need to move the world forward to unlimited energy sources not restricted to decidedly unfriendly parts of the globe. We need to develop renewable energy sources based on fusion, hydrogen, ethanol, wind, solar, geothermal, biological, and fuel cell technology. Maybe we’ll find something new with quantum physics that will astonish us all. We need to do it in such a way that we utilize the framework of the existing energy grid to make the transition to these new forms of energy. We need to find a way to use public money to help do this for the public good while also boosting corporate strength and health. This will provide jobs and help clean up the environment, but most importantly, it will put us strongly in control of our own destiny.

Once we have developed these sources and methods, we need to enrich our nation by exporting the technology to the rest of the world, and then push into space and begin the exploration and colonization of space in earnest.

We Americans can do this, I have no doubt in my mind. All we have to do is state our intentions and declare our independence. Do your part to help make it happen. Simply believe in us.