By Cheryl Pellerin, American Forces Press Service
From www.defense.gov
WASHINGTON, D.C. – A hard push by the Defense Department and the military services to reduce dependence on fossil fuels will shrink risks on the battlefield along with the Pentagon’s carbon footprint, a DOD official said.
Oliver Fritz is deputy director for policy in the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics, and assistant secretary of defense for operational energy plans and programs.
He joined energy experts from each service in a panel discussion during the 12th National Conference on Science, Policy and the Environment about how DOD can drive clean energy innovation.
“Historically, energy has been a decisive factor in warfighting, … most recently in Afghanistan and Iraq, where you see fuel not only being needed in increasing quantities, but being moved over a battlefield without front lines,” Fritz said. Many American lives have been lost on such convoys, he added, moving fuel or protecting it.
Substituting solar energy, biofuel and other technologies can pay off in warfighting capability, Fritz said.
“Those technologies are cleaner and do have a lower carbon footprint,” he said, “and in a way, that carbon footprint is a metaphor for some of the logistics risks that we’re trying to reduce.”
The Defense Department released its first operational energy strategy in June to improve energy efficiency and costs, and to support strategic goals and lower risks to warfighters.
Broad strategic changes that include the decline of front lines and the emergence of anti-access technologies like missiles and roadside bombs “designed to disrupt our ability to freely maneuver, whether that’s around Afghanistan or around the globe, are forcing us to rethink how we are going to project and sustain power if our logistics are under attack,” Fritz said.
The strategy urged more fight with less fuel, more options with less risk and more capability with less cost, he added, and clean technologies can help to make those things happen.
“The strategy was issued last year, and we’re in the process of implementing that. … But in addition to having meetings at the Pentagon, we’re actually trying to make a difference on the battlefield,” Fritz said.
In Afghanistan, this means a new suite of more efficient generators and centralized power.







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