Under President Biden the U.S. Military Must Lead the Way on Climate Change

by Ray Mabus (Time Magazine) ... When I left office in January 2017, at sea about 40% of energy came from non-fossil fuel sources. Nuclear is 17% and the rest was from a variety of biofuels. In 2011, President Obama directed the Departments of the Navy, Energy and Agriculture to come up with a national biofuel industry. Using the Defense Production Act, which has been in the news a lot around COVID-19, the Navy invested in biofuel refineries (while requiring at least a 2-1 private match). Because of this investment, now biofuels are increasing available and, importantly, are becoming cost competitive with conventional fuels. The Trump Administration stopped the program of buying biofuels by the Pentagon in spite of the harm it did to the military and the climate but they could not reverse the refinery investment or the effects it is having. And the Pentagon could very rapidly change back to renewables.

An order from the incoming Biden Administration telling the Pentagon to move very quickly to renewables would send a powerful message on climate change. Like so many things in the past—think the internet, GPS and flat screen TV’s—what the military does often quickly transitions into the civilian sector. Corporate America is already embracing renewables not just for climate change but for bottom line reasons since renewables are today cheaper than fossil fuels. The military’s aggressive switch could dramatically speed up what is already happening in the private sector and would help the transition away from fossil fuels that President-elect Biden has spoken about making a priority. Such an order would help save the planet, make the American military a better fighting force and move the United States into the new clean energy economy with its millions of new jobs. Not a bad day’s work.

As former Saudi Oil Minister Zaki Yamani famously said, “The Stone Age didn’t end because we ran out of stones. It ended because we invented something better.” This is exactly where we are today with the Oil Age. READ MORE