Appleton Post-Crescent - Editorial: Focus on more incentives for alternative energies


Many critics of U.S. energy policies have called for a "race to the moon" emphasis on developing alternative energies.


They recall America's drive in the 1960s to put a man on lunar soil before the Soviet Union could, when President Kennedy's challenge rallied the nation and its resources to create the technology to do the seemingly impossible.


Today, the challenge is to devote the time, money and attention to winning another race — to find enough alternative energy sources to feed our nation, and the world, before the world's oil runs out.


We're spending $2 billion a week on trying to bring democracy to the Middle East. If we spent that much on making hydrogen fuel cells practical for cars, developing oil shale technology, expanding wind farms or trying to make solar power profitable, the U.S. would be a lot further along two years from now.


Perhaps a contest, like the Department of Defense's DARPA Challenge, which offered a $2 million prize to the first private group that built an unmanned vehicle to traverse the Mojave Desert, would help spur energy alternatives. The DoD race motivated private research and investment in areas that could benefit the military; a similar contest could be used for energy inventions.


Of course, anyone who builds an affordable, practical vehicle that runs on something other than petroleum will reap billions more than any prize the U.S. would probably offer. The challenge is in aiding the front-end investment.


Something Congress has more control over is taxes, which provides an almost-surefire way to influence business. Greater tax breaks could encourage private experimentation in alternative fuel technology; traditional industries such as oil and natural gas get nearly 60 percent of the federal tax breaks offered to energy businesses.


Automakers and gas stations receive tax credits for eco-friendly investment, and citizens can get credits for buying hybrid vehicles. But what if we flip-flopped the tax breaks we gave the oil industry with those we gave to laboratories and engineering firms focusing on renewable-fueled cars and solar-heated homes? Give them the bulk of the benefit.


Focusing on the future, on weaning ourselves off oil, will pay far more dividends than working to lower its current cost. Let's cure the disease, not the symptoms.