PASADENA UNITES, DESTROYS OIL & INSPIRED DESIGN STUDENT RUSHES TO D.C. TO CHANGE THE STIM, SAVE THE WORLD AND PROVE ABUNDANCE BY DESIGN IS $$ & FUN

Art Center Summit 2009 keynote speaker R. James Woolsey, former director of the U. S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), was asked at the end of the evening what the headline for the keynote event should be. His answer: “Pasadena unites on destroying oil’s role.“

Andy Karsner, former assistant secretary for Efficiency and Renewable Energy at the U.S. Department of Energy and the other speaker at the keynote event, said his headline was “Inspired design student races to Washington to change the course of the stimulus and change the world.”

Amory Lovins, Chairman and Chief Scientist of Rocky Mountain Institute, who had joined the speakers for an evening-concluding panel, said the headline should be “Abundance by design is profitable and fun.”

Woolsey’s talk, "Urgency: A Vision for Energy Security," centered on America’s oil dependence as the worst of the "malignant" and "malevolent" threats to its national security - but he did not fail to identify others.

Woolsey described global climate change as a malignant threat, by which he meant a threat that comes from the very body of the nation. His position on climate change was straightforward: Human activity may or may not be the sole cause of it but it is clearly happening, human greenhouse gas emissions are aggravating it, and to say humans should not act to stop their spew is like a person with a genetic tendency toward lung cancer saying – Woolsey’s analogy — that it is fine to go on smoking 10 packs of cigarettes a day.

The national electrical transmission grid, Woolsey said, is an example of a malevolent threat. It would be impossible to intentionally design a system so brittle and vulnerable as the one the U.S. has evolved. A wayward tree branch shut it down in August 2003 for several days and, drawing on his vast experience as CIA Director, Woolsey speculated that a terrorist is likely to be smarter than a tree branch.

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Dependence on oil is, in Woolsey’s estimation, the worst of the malevolent threats to U.S. security. He advocates, as solutions, more energy efficiency and more use of combined heat and power (cogeneration) but, most of all, he advocates the complete transition to battery electric vehicles (BEVs), starting with PHEVs with flex-fuel capability and moving, when battery technology permits, to all-electric vehicles (EVs).

Karsner is on a crusade to send the best ideas possible to Washington, D.C. He is deeply concerned about the money about to be spent through the just-signed-into-law stimulus bill. He says the answer is not so much in transparency as in well-designed applications of the money.

He called for "a systems approach to holistic design for urban transportation" so that the classic tragedy of the commons could be reversed and the commons turned sustainable.

He spoke glowingly of the efforts to date of the Obama administration and described what an inspiration this demonstration of America’s capacity to change and renew itself is. He called for citizens to do everything they can to support the new President in winning his agenda.

For solutions, Karsner called for energy efficiency and especially for policies that decouple utility profit and utility development of consumer efficiencies. He also advocated mandates not just to green the federal government’s vehicle fleet but to green the national vehicle fleet. He especially likes the idea of “cash for clunkers” to cut short the normal 17-year lifespan of inefficient, greenhouse gas-spewing, oil-guzzling older cars.

Karsner concluded with a touching and inspiring reminiscence about when his father came home from a year in a foreign war, in the 1970s, only to be faced with a complete change in his former way of life, right down to the exchange of treasured Sunday drives for long hours waiting in gas-station lines. “America can do better,” Karsner remembers his father saying.

“You are my father’s dream and my children’s hope,” Karsner told the audience, urging them to take their talent and their solutions to the nation’s leaders and show them how to spend this fortune in stimulus money to “transform our society…”

This is what it's all about. He already plugs in. When will we? (click to enlarge)

The panel discussion, for which Woolsey and Karsner were joined by Lovins, repeated many of the evening’s themes but elaborated on them and touched on some new material. All 3 agreed on the need for greater efficiencies both in the power generation and transportation sectors but an interesting contention arose between Karsner and Lovins over whether efficiencies without electric power trains could transform the transportation sector enough to meet the requirements of new fuel efficiency standards.

Lovins is the ultimate efficiency maven and believes simple improvements like lightweighting and aerodynamic designs can produce major improvements. Karsner does not believe fleet averages can be brought down without battery-driven vehicles. Woolsey showed little interest in the debate: End reliance on oil and everything else will follow, Woolsey told them.

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Lovins took no issue on Woolsey’s point and said he had written as much in Winning the Oil Endgame, his landmark book on the subject. Karsner said he was a great admirer of the book and its author’s ideas on oil and efficiency.

That’s when the moderator, Professor Clark Kellogg of the University of California, announced time had run out and asked them for their headlines.

Former CIA Director James Woolsey’s 50-second message to the year 2100. From 11thhouraction via YouTube.

Keynote Event of Art Center Summit 2009: Expanding the Vision of Sustainable Mobility
February 18, 2009 (Art Center College of Design)

WHO
R. James Woolsey, former director of the United States Central Intelligence Agency; Andy Karsner, former assistant secretary, Department of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy; Amory Lovins, Chairman and Chief Scientist, Rocky Mountain Institute; Clark Kellog, U.C. Berkeley; Chelsea Sexton, electric vehicle activist

Amory Lovins explains why we’re drilling in all the wrong places. From ed4wb via YouTube.

WHAT
Keynote Event for The Art Center Summit 2009: Expanding the Vision of Sustainable Mobility: Urgency: A Vision for Energy Security (Woolsey), The Future of U.S. Energy and Transporation (Karsner) and a concluding round table (Hidary as host with Karsner, Woolsey and Lovins)

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WHEN
Wednesday, February 18, 2009, 7-9 p.m.

WHERE
Pasadena Convention Center (East Pavilion), 300 East Green Street, Pasadena, CA 911 (626-396-4308)

Woolsey and the other speakers agreed, the time switch from oil to the plug is now. (click to enlarge)

WHY
- Woolsey ended his talk with a reminiscence about an Arab national’s reaction to hearing his diatribe against oil. “You’re going to shut my country down,” the Arab told Woolsey. “No, my friend,” Woolsey replied. “But you oughtta get real work.”
- Karsner reported that one of the best indications of how inefficient the auto transport system came in his trip to Pasadena for the talk. It took him a full third of his travel time from Washington just to get from the airport to the Pasadena Convention Center.
- Lovins pointed out that there are many differences among New Energy and Energy Efficiency advocates but they all agree on the outcomes so it is time to get on with pursuing the outcomes and ignoring the different motivations.

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QUOTES
- Woolsey: “We’ve got to use technology to make these steps of moving to distributed generation, moving to electricity and biofuels, etc., we’ve got to make those more affordable and attractive to regular consumers so that people can see they can make money doing this and they can avoid cost to their family by taking these steps because otherwise we’re going to be locked in to just working with the 5-to-10% who get really really worried about climate change or the 5-to-10% who get really really worried about terrorist attacks…It comes down to making these things more financially attractive…”
- Karsner: “To be an environmentally friendly and economically competitive and agile and secure society, we have got to have far more investments in well thought out design and planning that is executed in a timely manner.”
- Lovins: “I’m getting pretty tired of redesigning stuff that wasn’t designed right…”