The Solar Revolution

You know Washington has gotten strange when one of the few voices for sanity is Senator Bernie Sanders from Vermont. With America importing $350 billion in oil from foreign countries,Bernie says it's time we move beyond the wars for oil in the Middle East to create millions of jobs by aggressively moving to energy efficiency and sustainable technologies such as solar, wind, geothermal and biomass. He cites 92% of Americans wanting the country to develop solar energy resources and 77% thinking it should be a national priority.

We know how Bernie tried for single payer on the health care reform bill and had to pull the bill when Oklahoma's Tom Coburn demanded his bill be read out loud. So, here he goes again. This time he has ten co-sponsors for a 9-page bill which calls for 10 million new solar rooftop systems and 200,000 new solar water heating systems over the next ten years. When fully implemented this would triple our U.S. solar energy capacity and increase by 20 times the energy output from photovoltaic panels. The legislation would dramatically increase production of solar panels, driving down costs. It is estimated that this would create 1 million new jobs. Sanders outlines a whole lot of subsidies for taxpayers to install these systems and cites the California Million Solar Roofs initiative under Gov. Schwarzenegger as the model for the bill.

He slams the Senators who are backing a "nuclear renaissance" because it would entail federal loan guarantees for the construction of 100 plants at $10-17 billion a piece. The total loan bill would be about $1 trillion and the CBO estimates that the default risk would be around 50%. Sanders argues that solar energy is produced at 13-19 cents for kilowatt hours, while nuclear is between 25 to 30 cents. He also raises the issue of the higly toxic waste from nuclear plants.

He knows how to win me over by quoting Thomas Alva Edison in 1931, saying "I'd put my money on the sun and solar energy. What a source of power! I hope we don't have to wait until oil and coal run out before we tackle that."

Senator Sanders is right but the nuclear lobby is more powerful. I hope he lucks out on this one.