Wind and solar require new storage and smart grid technolgies to play a larger role in our power system.

"Now is the Time to Be Bold: A Call for New Technology, Policy... and Thinking"

Op-Ed, Washington Post, page H2

April 20, 2011

Author: Henry Lee, Director, Environment and Natural Resources Program

Belfer Center Programs or Projects: Energy Technology Innovation Policy; Environment and Natural Resources; Science, Technology, and Public Policy

"The last few years have not been kind to those who favor energy policy reform. First we had an economic recession that brought many renewable projects to a grinding halt. Simultaneously, oil prices shot up as high as $140 per barrel and dropped as low as $47.

Today, we have a partisan budget fight that threatens to table many of the government’s efforts to bring new and innovative technologies to the marketplace, a deceleration in the pace of offshore oil and gas exploration due to last summer’s oil spill, and a nuclear accident in Japan that has the potential to set that industry back ten years.

Meanwhile, solutions such as carbon capture and sequestration, fuel cells and biofuels—all of which seemed so promising five years ago—are now looking, at best, like solutions that will not start contributing until well after the end of this decade. There are those who seem less worried about this chain of events. If you are a climate skeptic, do not lose sleep about dependence on foreign oil, and reject the concern around the deterioration of the United State’s global competiveness: what is to worry? Let me suggest a few reasons..."

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Document Length: 1 pp.