President Bush must have surprised many of his detractors by touching on the topic of oil dependency in his State of the Union address.
“Our goal is to make this new kind of ethanol practical and competitive within six years,” Bush said. “Breakthroughs on this and other new technologies will help us reach another great goal: to replace more than 75 percent of our oil imports from the Middle East by 2025.”
Wishful thinking? Political hokum?
I suppose it’s no more silly than the recent populist hot air about “windfall profits” of oil companies and their imagined gouging. All of it uses simplistic justifications to punish hated energy companies.
What we need is innovation.
When Toyota met public demand for hybrid cars – whatever the real-world benefits – it experienced enormous success. Now other automakers are scrambling to catch up.
That’s the sort of progress Jeff Lyng is all about.
Lyng is a project manager for the University of Colorado’s Solar Decathlon team – twice winners of the national award for most attractive and energy-efficient solar-powered home – and a graduate student in CU-Boulder’s Department of Civil, Environmental and Architectural Engineering.
His team’s goal is to “integrate natural materials and innovative technologies in an environmentally conscious, publicly accessible, energy efficient, modular home design.”
In fact, if you want to see “windfall profits,” watch Lyng’s bank account when he reaches his objective.
Though big profits may be a few years off, recognition is already here.
Last week, at the suggestion of Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman, first lady Laura Bush invited Lyng to attend the State of the Union address.
“Probably the most interesting part of the trip for me was meeting with Secretary Bodman for 15 minutes and talking about renewable energy in general and the decathlon, in particular,” explains Lyng. “That was the highlight of the trip.”
Wherever your lean politically, attending a State of the Union address must be an extraordinary experience.
“It is completely unlike the experience you have on television,” he says. “You can see all the personal reactions of Congress and members of the Cabinet. I think you can hear a lot of that on television, but it was really fascinating watching their reaction to the speech.”
What did Lyng, a committed environmentalist, make of the president’s remarks concerning America’s addiction to oil and to breaking the addiction through technology?
“The addiction comment was particularly apt,” Lyng says. “I have to give the president a lot of credit for admitting that. As a Texas oilman, admitting that America has an addiction to oil is a good first step. I am encouraged by some of the funding for alternative-energy research.”
Lyng had a minute – and by minute, I mean 60 seconds – to meet the president and personally make his case.
“I got the opportunity to meet with him and the first lady,” Lyng recalls. “I tried to advocate as strongly as I could in a minute, that the common ground is energy security and national security in looking at alternative forms of energy.”
A minute’s not much time, I know. But it’s infinitely more face time than you or I will have with the president.
Now, Lyng’s back in Colorado and back at work trying to use cost-effective building practices to make sure his work is accessible.
“We weren’t trying to build a really high-end home,” he explains. “We’d rather build something a first-time home buyer could see themselves in. Something affordable. So making this technology cost- effective is perhaps the biggest goal.”
And a worthy one.
Energy reform isn’t about whining, whether about oil-company profits or the evils of cars. Cars have made us more productive and free. They’re here to stay.
It’s about giving consumers an alternative that makes sense – economically.
(Learn more about the CU National Solar Decathlon Team’s work at solar.colorado.edu)
David Harsanyi’s column appears Monday and Thursday. Reach him at 303-820-1255 or dharsanyi@denverpost.com.
