ENERGY QUEST
Americans used to rely on animal power for transportation and to carry goods from place to place. And oil from whales to light our evenings. Today`s energy quest it’s gasoline, motor vehicles, and vast amounts of electricity to light our cities and power our economy. But one study claims that Americans spend just six minutes a year focusing on energy. The American public does not like to think about its energy use.
The one place Americans do think about energy use is when they’re standing at the pump. Global demand makes oil prices rise and fall in response to events beyond our borders and out of our control about energy quest
We worry about how our economy gets buffeted. And the only way we do something about that is to take into our own hands our destiny.
In this program, we look at how America uses energy. And we’ll meet people like you who are helping their communities find new sustainable resources and save energy.
Conservation, and energy efficiency, has already been something that the U.S. has had tremendous achievement. And it is something, as the fifth fuel, that can be very, very important for our future.
Tapping that fifth fuel can be as challenging as drilling for oil or gas. But powering communities in these new ways also empowers people. We can control the things that go on in our homes. We can control the things that go on in our communities.
What is more conservative than harnessing what is available and around us in a long-term sustainable way? The host of this program, earth scientist Richard Alley, knows the dangers of climate change. But he also teaches about energy at Penn State. And he’s optimistic that Americans can build a sustainable future. Some states and cities are rolling up their sleeves and moving ahead. These citizens are heroes of America’s new energy story and show the way to a sustainable energy future. The good news is we don’t have to wait for the national policies. Helping ourselves with clean energy is also helping the earth’s climate.
The atmosphere doesn’t care one whit what people think. The atmosphere cares about what people do. We visit five very different communities, from Alaska to Texas, Portland to Baltimore plus Kansas, in America’s heartland, to find out how they’re developing new sources of energy, or cutting waste, and why strategies like those make sense for all of us.
Sometimes when Americans hear energy, the next word that comes to mind is a crisis. It really doesn’t have to be that way. Shirley Jackson, former head of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and now president of one of America’s leading technical universities, thinks the United States is actually well-placed. Well, the U.S. is lucky because we have such a diversity of climates and diversity of geologies and in the end, diversity of actual energy sources. And that, in fact, makes us very fortunate compared to other parts of the world. They may have a given source of energy, but they don’t have multiple sources. Alaska, like the rest of America, has been addicted to oil. Now, can abundant sustainable options make America’s renewable state? Kodiak Island, Alaska at 3,600 square miles is about half the size of New Jersey.
Getting around almost always involves a boat, or a plane, or a float-plane that’s a bit of both. Kodiak’s population is less than 14,000, leaving most of the island undeveloped and natural. That beauty is one of Kodiak’s economic assets, bringing tourists to watch bears raising cubs and catching fish. Kodiak’s human population also catches salmon, with fish exports providing another key source of jobs and income.
The island wants to limit imports of dirty and expensive fossil fuels, and tap natural resources to supply as much clean and locally generated energy as possible.
Fuel prices, because we live on an island, are very expensive. You know, you learn pretty quickly that you need an alternative.
Kodiak was the first place in Alaska to make wind power a substantial part of the energy mix, with its three 1.5 megawatt turbines on Pillar Mountain. So getting good quality, low-cost sustainable power is really necessary for the long-term viability of the economy of Alaska and achive the energy quest of U.S.
