Dod: Pursuing Alternative Energy Conservation and Finding

¶ … DOD: Pursuing Alternative Energy

Energy conservation and finding an appropriate energy solution is something that impacts nearly every field and profession, and is an issue which directly impacts the Department of Defense in a constant and lasting manner. The Department of Defense has a responsibility to aggressively pursue alternative energy solutions, namely in the form of biofuels, just as they aggressively pursue the latest updates in technological warfare. In order for the Department of Defense to engage in their basic activities for defense and promoting safety while maintaining security, they need to be able to spend energy. The expenditure of energy is a foundational pillar of what the Department of Defense does. In this day and age, professionals of every field are simply too smart, too educated and too knowledgeable to continue to expend energy in the typical manner -- a manner which is non-renewable and which destroys the planet. There is an aggravated impetus to embrace green energy and rightly so.

The Department of Defense has a staggeringly high acquisition of fuel, so much so, that there's really no excuse or compelling reason to not examine biofuels as aggressively as possible. "DOD is by some accounts the largest organizational user of petroleum in the world. DOD consumed about 117 million barrels of oil in 2011."

DOD has such an extreme dependence on standard fuel strongly connects to the possibility of increasing costs for fuel in the long run and an overall lack of stability because of the volatility in fuel prices. The prediction that fuel costs will increase in the long-term is a real one. The DOD has executed costs for petroleum which have risen significantly and steadily over the last seven years: "Between FY2005 and FY2011, DOD's petroleum use decreased 4%, from 122 million barrels to 117 million barrels (see Figure 2). Over the same period, DOD spending on petroleum rose 381% in real (i.e., inflation-adjusted) terms, from $4.5 billion in FY2005 (in FY2011 dollars) to about $17.3 billion in FY2011.42."

There's no excuse for such a tremendous increase in energy costs; furthermore, there's absolutely no indication that the costs will be reduced in the future in any shape or form. Using history as a guide, costs will continue to increase meaning that the Department of Defense will not be economically feasible anymore. This expenditure is now becoming irresponsible; in trying to finance the defense of the nation, the Department of Defense is in a sense draining the funds of the nation, and putting the entire country into a state of instability, which is the opposite of what it is supposed to be achieving.

Aside from rampant financial irresponsibility, the reliance of DOD on foreign fuels also creates a state where there is a sense of dependence -- which is not good for the state of the nation. Thus, the Pentagon is moving forward with a $420 million effort to make refineries which will help market competitively priced biofuels.

Some politicians disagree with this move, saying that it squanders precious dollars of the budget and reflects completely skewed priorities; however, this couldn't be more wrong. One expert warns, "…that U.S. dependence on foreign oil is a strategic vulnerability that can only be addressed by reducing the military's reliance on petroleum as the sole source of fuel to power its jets, ships and tanks. The Navy initiative announced on Monday to help private firms build biofuel refineries 'will enhance our national security.'"

This is absolutely true: spending all of this money now on biofuels will help the nation and the department of defense spends less money in the years to come. This move needs to be seen as an investment in helping the development of commercial viability for the defense department. The Navy in this respect is very much leading the way as they have consistently been preparing various tests of a range of biofuels and making concerted investments in these sources.

The Navy has indeed been long leading the way in the regard, by engaging in proactive testing of biofuels and demonstrating that there is absolutely no reason that the future of the Department of Defense has to include a dependence on foreign fuels. The Navy was the branch of the DOD which engaged in the testing and certification of 50-50 blends of advanced hydrotreated biofuel and aviation gas as a means of testing, evaluating and demonstrating the wide-range utility and functionality of advanced biofuels in an operational setting. "The military's ability to use fuels other than petroleum reduces vulnerability to rapid and unforeseen changes in the price of oil that can negatively impact readiness, while also increasing energy security….Kaiser delivered 700,000 gallons of hydro-treated renewable diesel fuel, or HRD76, to three ships of the strike group. Kaiser also delivered 200,000 gallons of hydro-treated renewable aviation fuel, or HRJ5, to Nimitz. Both fuels are a 50-50 blend of traditional petroleum-based fuel and biofuel comprised of a mix of waste cooking oil and algae oil."

This is quite so promising because it demonstrates the grand potential of biofuels. Biofuels offer up the possibility to offer affordable, renewable sources of energy for the future, without forcing this on-going situation of dependence on foreign fuel sources -- something which has been repeated far too often in the last few decades. The dependence on foreign fuel is akin to a reliance on a backwards and outdated form of technology -- it's as if the military had become dependent on an old-fashioned technology: using foreign fuels is like still being dependent on typewriters or muskrat rifles. Technology is evolving and the DOD has a strong obligation to apply this evolution to the arena of fuels and alternative energy sources.