Informing the U.S. Energy Policy Debate

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Related Programs:
American Strategy Program

America’s continuing growing demand for energy is facing an upward climb of oil and gas prices, competition for energy from countries like China and India, and concerns about CO2 emissions, global warming and its impacts. We are now engaged in heightened discussions about energy use and alternative and renewable sources of energy in the U.S. political landscape. Unfortunately, the space for broad and honest debate is often clouded by political ideologies, difficulty in understanding the data that is available, and biased presentations by special interests that focus narrowly on aspects of the nature and severity of the challenges and how best to address them.

At this seminar, the Millennium Institute will unveil the new Threshold 21-USA (T21-USA) model that provides a transparent and comprehensive means to assess the broader benefits and impacts of the various options in a non-partisan manner. It is a dynamic framework that helps guide energy policy formulation by showing results through long term and across-the-board scenarios. T21-USA informs the policymaking process by revealing the results of alternative energy policies and options in the future, and demonstrating their implications for the economy, the environment, and society under different assumptions. The meeting will show how several current energy policies will work out over time and discuss how others can be developed and tested. It will include a discussion of the model’s structure and relationships by experts in the public and private sectors. Realistic applications of the model will also be presented.

Participants

• The Hon. Mike Honda (D-CA)*
  U.S. House of Representatives
• The Hon. Roscoe Bartlett (R-MD)*
  U.S. House of Representatives
• John Harris
  Changing Horizons Fund
• Andrea Bassi
  Senior Modeler
  Millennium Institute
• Hans Herren
  President
  Millennium Institute
• John Shilling
  Chair
  Millennium Institute Board of Trustees
• Joseph Fiskel
  Co-Director, Center for Resilience
  Ohio State University
• Steve Wehrenberg*
  Chief of Human Resource Strategy and Capability
  U.S. Coast Guard
• Allan Baer
  President and Executive Director
  SolarQuest
• Richard Lawrence
  Association for the Study of Peak Oil-USA
• Mitzi Wertheim
  CNA Corporation
  
• Steven Clemons
  Director, American Strategy Program
  New America Foundation
  
  *invited