President Obama’s Green Dream

During his State of the Union speech, given on January 25, 2011, President Obama set forth some big challenges to the energy industry. The President would like to see 80% of the United States’ electricity coming from clean sources. Included in those sources are solar, wind and nuclear power, but also, somewhat oddly, "clean" coal.



Whether or not coal can be scrubbed enough to be considered clean is yet to be determined, but these lofty goals are encouraging, if they can be maintained beyond this administration. Further improvements in infrastructure, including high speed rail which would be made available to 80% of Americans, are also in the plan.



"Our Sputnik Moment"



President Obama describes this juncture in energy history as "our Sputnik moment." Just as the scientists involved in the space race of the 1960s lacked both the technology and support structure to achieve their desired goal of getting to the moon, current innovations are not yet up to effectively providing that magical 80%. However, the President believes that it is time for the United States to move aggressively towards developing the knowledge and technology needed.



Today it isn’t the Soviet Union we need to surpass; rather it is China, a country which not long ago was considered quite backwards. Remarkably, to those who haven’t been paying attention, China is now far outspending the US in developing clean energy technologies.



Jobs, Too



With a desperate need to boost job growth, the clean energy sector is poised to play the role of a double hero. Not only will a serious investment in clean energy technology encourage high school and college students to pursue careers in science and math (something the US desperately needs), it will also create a variety of jobs suitable for all sorts of people. Additionally, if things go well, it will decrease our dependence upon foreign oil.



Is President Obama’s dream realistic? It really depends upon how much money the government and private business sector is willing to invest in developing appropriate technologies that will help the country achieve that 80% mark. Can it be done? Probably. Will it be done? Only the future will tell.



Michael Rupkalvis works with the LedBulbsandLights website. The site features a variety of different types of environmentally-friendly LED products, including the 1x1-watt LED spotlight and other LED lights and bulbs.