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When I was a teenager, I was "the kid for President" with my independent campaign of 1984. Running for office, I emphasized that "the budget must be balanced, and taxes must be fair!" My energy policy was not front-and-center, but it was my strong suit. Four years earlier in 1980, a theme about energy first appeared in my political advocacy. (Guess what I have in common with Keith Olbermann? Public attention at the age of 14.)
What was my action in 1980? Well, America had just come through an energy crisis: the second "oil shock" of the 1970s. Meanwhile, I had been studying and researching things about the space program, science, and futuristic thought. I was a follower of [the late] Princeton's Dr. Gerard O'Neill, who had proposed some space colonies and started the Space Studies Institute, which I joined as a financial contributor ("senior associate," as regular contributors were called).
To create space colonies would likely be a financial boondoggle and a giant cost if the federal government was financing it. But, there is a different large space system, Solar Power Satellites, that would collect energy, redirect it to earth, and which could break even and yield a return on investment. It would therefore be economically viable.
1980 is when I began to advocate that the U.S. should go for the Solar Power Satellite system. (As I was then a freshman in high school, all I could swing was a petition from my high school to Ronald Reagan, who had just been elected. However, the newspaper also reported the action and Hartford's CBS affiliate, Channel 3, had me into their studio to cut a TV editorial. The station ran a rotation of citizen editorials, and so I was able--on the air--to call for a strengthened space program with SPS.)
The theme returned in my 1984 platform as the teenager running for U.S. President. In addition to SPS, I also recommended hydrogen and further research into fusion. "SPS / hydrogen" are both emission-free and therefore environmentally friendly sources of energy. Not only could emissions stop, but from a hydrogen engine, the byproduct -- the exhaust -- is H2O; clean, pure water.
Now 24 years later, I continue to stand by my '84 platform. "SPS / hydrogen" continues to be my recommendation for America's energy direction. I am unswayed by ethanol, because it has ramifications that are uglier than what one would think from the first-blush enthusiasm about it. Ethanol is trouble, because arable land is scarce. (Ethanol competes with food, as for what can be grown on any given, limited piece of arable land. Food prices, and world hunger, could rise if we divert mass amounts of cropland to the production of ethanol.)
It is a natural knee jerk response of some to criticize SPS as a "boondoggle." It would certainly be a large investment, but no less so than Reagan's Star Wars project -- something that is less technically feasible, less profitable, and more silly. SPS is a large investment, but the talk in the air is now saying, "Let's have an Apollo-like program to get the U.S. to energy independence." Well folks, SPS / hydrogen remains my recommendation.
Think about a program to make America independent of foreign oil. That is what we would accomplish by heeding my recommendation. This is the way, but time grows short. Politicians have squandered 28 years that could have been progress down this road. What would be the consequences of running out of oil? They would be dire. Food riots are one foreseeable consequence. Politicians are flirting with that outcome. 28 years of progress is what I advocated. What they delivered instead was 28 years of stalling. Time is truly growing short. We need a new energy situation in ten years' time. The stakes are as big as civilization itself. The situation is as dire as starvation -- in ten years' time.
They really do need an Apollo-scale crash program for energy independence in ten years. It seems that one could grow old and grey waiting for Washington to do the right thing. 1980's 14 year old will turn 42 this year. And perhaps, Washington has a plan so that I don't grow old and grey. Rather instead, I can look forward to starving to death, or perishing in a food riot at age 52.
