Energy and security

Monday, May 25, 2009 | 2:07 a.m.

For about 18 months Nellis Air Force Base has operated a 140-acre solar facility that generates more than 30 percent of the base’s power needs. This is the direction in which the entire country should be going, according to a dozen retired generals and admirals.

The officers collaborated on a report that states that national security will be threatened in the coming years if we do not get serious about kicking our oil addiction and developing much more renewable energy, setting an example for the world.

Included in the report released last week is this quote from Vice Admiral Dennis McGinn, a former deputy chief of naval operations. “Increasing demand for, and dwindling supplies of, fossil fuels will lead to conflict. The U.S. cannot assume that we will be untouched by these conflicts.”

The generals and admirals make up the Military Advisory Board of the Virginia-based Center for Naval Analysis, which produced the report. The center, known as CNA, is a nonprofit research organization.

This CNA report, titled “Powering America’s Defense,” is a follow-up to its 1997 report about ways the United States should prepare for the high probability that climate change will bring instability to many parts of the world.

Renewable energy is now the focus because converting to it is one of the essential preparations. Projections show that the finite nature of fossil fuels will result in a dwindling supply of oil in the coming decades. They also show that unchecked climate change will bring ever more droughts, storms and wildfires, causing dwindling supplies of food and fresh water.

The report correctly points out that our own national security would be gravely threatened if global conflicts arise — and they almost certainly will — over the vanishing resources. Rapid conversion to renewable energy, however, could both reduce stress on oil supplies and reduce greenhouse gas emissions, a primary cause of climate change.

As military officers might say, we should get going on this conversion — double time.