Energy Crisis: Is America In Trouble

Global energy crisis threatens, scientist says
CHICAGO (April 17, 1997) -- An impending global energy crisis with potentially massive impact on American industry and jobs can be avoided if America strives for a portfolio of energy systems, a distinguished scientist said here today.
In advocating an end to name-calling between energy advocates and environmentalists, Alan Schriesheim said, "We cannot set effective energy policy in an environmental vacuum, nor can we set effective environmental policy in an energy vacuum."
Schriesheim, director emeritus at Argonne National Laboratory, spoke at a gathering sponsored by the Chicago Academy of Sciences at the University Club of Chicago.
Energy demand will soar worldwide over the next 20 years, he said.
"What do you think might happen," he asked the audience, "to the world's energy needs and environmental concerns if we added a new United States to the planet every three years for the next 20 years? This is not an academic question. The world population today is growing at exactly that rate, and it is projected to continue growing at that rate through 2020."
The bulk of that population growth will come in the poorer countries, Schriesheim said, "places where talk of energy policy comes second to talk of food and shelter and survival; places where, if the only affordable fuel is growing in the rain forest, you will take that fuel today without a moment's thought of the consequences tomorrow."
The Argonne scientist's talk was titled "What Every High School Graduate Should Know About Energy," and was part of the Chicago Academy of Sciences lecture series "Science Literacy for the 21st Century: What Should Every High School Graduate Know?"
Schriesheim told the audience that world population growth of more than 86 million people per year is "the equivalent of adding two cities the size of Chicago to the planet each month."
"So not only will all the Earth's current population demand more energy in the years ahead," he said, "those billions of new people are going to want their share too."
Schriesheim chided energy executives who dismiss environmental concerns, and environmentalists who dismiss the energy production potential of fossil fuels, flowing water, and uranium in favor of so-called "renewable" energy sources such as solar energy. He said that for the next several generations renewables -- such as solar, wind, and farm-grown energy crops -- are expected to provide only 2 to 4 percent of global energy supplies.