President's Blog

We only have to look at the prices at the gas pump to know that we have an energy crisis in this country. It extends not just to the United States, but worldwide. On my recent visit to Canada, their news programs were filled with the rising cost of gasoline. Currently is it about $1.50 per liter Canadian, which equates to more than $5.68 per gallon here. It was not that long ago that gas prices in Canada were on a par with or even lower than the United States.

The National Society of Professional Engineers' annual meeting in late July had energy as its major focus. There were a number of presentations on wave energy, emerging technologies of hybrid vehicles, the critical role of innovation in energy and microbial fuel cells, to name a few. As a backdrop to their conference, a recent edition of their magazine included "The Evolution of Energy," an article by Eva Caplan-Leiserson. A number of officials from the U.S. Department of Energy were quoted in the article, including current department Secretary Samuel Bodman, who made the situation plain: "Securing our energy future is one of the most pressing challenges of our time."

At a recent National Academy Summit on America's Energy Future, Bodman got more specific. "We need transformational discoveries that fundamentally change the rules of the game," he said, since the current solutions of biofuels and expanded "plug-in" hybrid vehicles raise additional concerns about the loss of food supply and increases stress on our electrical system. To promote new innovative solutions, the Energy Department started an Energy Frontier Research Center program that will provide grants to organizations to pursue basic research in solar energy, electrical energy storage, biofuels, hydrogen production and more.

Robert Marley, P.E., deputy director of the U.S. Climate Change Technology Program, believes that we can improve technologies based on past successes. He is confident that we can find better methods of converting cellulose into fuel, more efficient means of making hydrogen using photons from solar energy, better energy storage for hybrid electric cars and improved means of using coal without CO2 emissions.

Stephen Specker, president of the Electric Power Research Institute, believes that our message to the public should be "We can do it, but it won’t be easy." My challenge to civil engineers is for us to get into the game. We need to be working with other engineers and planners in whatever way possible to foster the concept of energy independence.  My challenge to you as ASCE members is this: what should we be doing?