Thirty of the country’s most
prominent leaders in the areas of government, business, and non profits will
meet today to participate in The Center for American Progress Actions Fund’s
“National Clean Energy Project Forum.”
The purpose of forum is to “explore ways of increasing US reliance on
clean energy and reducing the country’s dependence on foreign oil.” With a significant portion of the
American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (aka “the stimulus package”)—signed into
law last week by President Obama—dedicated to “laying the groundwork for a green
energy economy that can create countless green jobs,” the timing of the forum
couldn’t be more timely.
Those slated to participate in the
forum are: former US President Bill Clinton, former US Vice President Al Gore,
US Secretary of Energy Steven Chu, US Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar,
Assistant to the President for Energy and Climate Change Carol Browner, Speaker
of the House Nancy Pelosi, Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee Chair
Jeff Bingaman, oil executive T. Boone Pickens, and environmentalist Robert
Kennedy; Jr. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid will serve as the Honorary Chair
of the event.
The plan is to corral these varied
perspectives into a unified voice to declare a set of “guiding principles”
designed to completely transform the country’s energy usage, so that dependence
on foreign oil can be reduced and efficiency and sustainability can direct
future energy policy. Among the
topics slated for discussion are “modernizing and expanding the electricity
grid,” integrating energy efficiency, and—most significantly for those of us in
the onsite power industry—distributed generation.
So, what do you think? Will forums like this generate any real
solutions? And will distributed
energy continue to be treated as viable avenue for change, or will flashier
concepts (like the smart grid) edge out onsite power in the race towards a more
efficient and sustainable national energy policy?