U.S. MILITARY GOES NEW ENERGY, ENERGY EFFICIENT

How the U.S. Military Is Trying to Cut Its Enormous Energy Appetite
Anna Mulrine, March 16, 2009 (U.S. News & World Report)

SUMMARY
Experience in Iraq and Afghanistan has shown military leaders that transporting fuel in war zones exposes convoys to the enemy and costs lives.

A report last year from the Defense Science Board on Department of Defense (DOD) energy use found no strategy in place to cut energy waste and reported DOD guilty of "unnecessarily high, and growing" fuel use.

The report echoed a 2003 call by a Marine General in Iraq to be "unleashed from the tether of fuel."

Moving to New Energy for the military is challenging. The M1 Abrams tank weighs 68 tons and gets 0.6 mpg with petroleum-based liquid fuel. The humvee gets 4 mpg (city) and 8mpg (highway).

Nevertheless, the Air Force and Army have been ordered to move to New Energy and Energy Efficiency. The move is likely to lead a wider U.S. transition by driving the development of new technologies.

Secretary of the Army Pete Geren pushed for a transition to electric transport and the army has now begun using Chrysler's "neighborhood electric vehicles" that go 25 mph and get 30 miles per recharge. The army will take 4,000 of the “futuristic golf carts” over 3 years for base passenger transport, security patrols, and maintenance and delivery services. Future plans call for battlefield plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs).

Neighborhood Electric Vehicle (click to enlarge)

The military is designing buildings to use natural light and smart wiring for more efficient electricity use. It is also experimenting with a concept pioneered in New York City high rise office buildings that uses refrigerator systems to freeze water at night when off-peak electricity rates are low and then uses the ice to cool buildings during the day instead of running air conditioning systems on peak-rate electricity.

Military Electric Vehicles, the next generation. (click to enlarge)

Bases are also beginning to develop local solar, wind and geothermal resources.

The Nellis Air Force Base solar power plant in Nevada saves $83,000/month is electricity costs.

The Nellis Air Force Base solar power plant. (click to enlarge)

COMMENTARY
- The Air Force, the biggest federal government consumer of fuel, buys 10% of all U.S. aviation fuel. (2008: 2.4 billion gallons, $7.7 billion). It has been developing alternative liquid fuels and recently flew a bomber across the country on an experimental biofuel. It hopes half its fuel will be a blended, 50% synthetic fuel by 2016.
- The result of the Air Force's push has been an increase in private sector experiments with jatropha, algae and other biofuel sources.
- While awaiting the development of an aviation biofuel, the Air Force is making its C-17 and C-130 cargo and troop transport workhorses more efficient by eliminating unnecessary onboard weight and carrying only the fuel needed for the mission.
- By using a different coating for the B1 bomber, the Air Force made the plane 2,000 pounds lighter. Every 100-pound reduction in plane weight nets 156,000 gallons of fuel in a year.
- Ground tranport battery electric vehicles (BEVs) will reduce the need to deliver liquid fuel in combat zones, especially in combination with charging stations that can be reuspplied by New Energy sources like solar panels and wind turbines set up in remote, off-grid locations.
- During war, the cost of fuel in combat zones is dramatically increased. The price of a $2 gallon of liquid fuel could be $25 when the cost of lives and ammunition are added. And more fuel is needed during war. Generator use goes up 10 times. One solution is insulating field tents with thick, lightweight foam. The measure has been shown to keep tent interiors in 110 degree desert heat down to 85 degrees while tents without the insulation are 125 degrees.

Foam-insulated tents. (click to enlarge)

- A 1% cut in generator fuel consumption in war zones means 6,444 fewer soldiers in convoys. And convoys are the main targets of insurgents’ roadside bombs.

Unleashed. Invented by James Bond's Q? (click to enlarge)

QUOTES
- Kevin Billings, acting assistant secretary for installations, environment, and logistics, DOD, on driving private sector innovation: "What we're hoping…is that that'll provide enough confidence and predictability in the private economy to fund alternative fuels."
- Billings, installations, environment, and logistics, DOD, on cutting fuel waste: "We used to fill our planes full of fuel…and dump it because you can only land with a certain amount of fuel."
- Paul Bollinger, deputy assistant secretary for energy and partnerships, DOD: "[ Secretary of the Army Pete Geren] wanted to know what the applicability was to the Army and what the Army could be doing…[He] looked at me and said, 'Why don't we just go to electric vehicles?' And just like a TV commercial, we said, 'Brilliant, sir.' Right from there we shifted gears immediately and determined what we could do."
Bollinger, energy and partnerships, DOD, on transitioning to EVs: "We went through a long, laborious process."

Portable solar energy. (click to enlarge)

- Bollinger, DOD, on more efficient lighting in military buildings: "It's an easy one, but we weren't doing it because skylights leaked 30 years ago…"
- Bollinger, DOD, on tent insulation: "…[Less generator fuel is needed] because you don't need as many AC units or heaters to be running to get the tent to a comfortable temperature."
- Bollinger, DOD, on Army Energy Efficiency: "That's all part of the energy equation. You can't be a strong expeditionary force if you're tied to a giant fuel umbilical cord…And that's what we're trying to do—cut the cord."