Direct Testimony of Thomas M. Hildebrand - Consumer Advocate ...

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News from Inside the Pentagon
provided by the InsideDefense NewsStand
DSB task force report wrapping up
VULNERABLE ELECTRIC GRID PROMPTS CALL FOR ENERGY-
INDEPENDENT BASES
Dat?: Siaq’ 31.2007
An influential advisory panel to Defense Secretary Robert Gates will soon recommend the Pentagon
protect critical domestic military installations by making them energy independent, a move intended to
wean the U.S. military from America’s electrical grid which the panel believes is vulnerable to tenorist
attack and natural disaster.
James Schlesinger, a former defense and energy secretary, is concluding a yearlong Defense Science
Board task force he is leading that proposes the Pentagon prepare for failures of the electrical grid -- on
which U. S. facilities heavily rely -- by “islanding,” a concept that envisions installations generatins their
own power, according to sources familiar with the report.
“The grid is fragile,” said one source familiar with the panel’s deliberations. “So there was some
concern in the task force about DOD’s ability to operate in the event of a grid failure for an extended
period of time.”
In iZugust 2003, a massive blackout hit huge swaths of the Northeast, Midwest and Ontario, Canada.
affecting tens of millions of people. This power outage was traced, in part, to overgown trees in Ohio
that touched high-voltage electrical lines, setting in motion sequential blackouts that eventually knocked
more than 100 power plants offline
Susceptibility to deliberate attack is also a concern.
”They had a variety of scenarios that they were very concerned about,” said the source, who declined to
discuss any of the particular scenarios.
The panel -- which Pentagon acquisition executive Kenneth Krieg commissioned to examine a wide
range of issues, including “opportunities for DOD to produce energy for its own use” -- will recommend
that domestic bases shift from the electric grid to renewable energy sources such as wind and solar
energy and possibly by small-scale nuclear power plants, the sources said.
The “Task Force on DOD Energy Strategy” is also set to recommend the Defense Department establish
a senior executive responsible for energy leadership, although it is expected to stop short of calling for
an “energy czar.” as some members of the task force had proposed.
On the issue of carbon-based fuels, the DSB is not expected to advance any far-reaching
recommendations. The panel is expected to endorse many steps the Defense Department has taken over
the last year to bring greater attention to energy efficiency both at facilities and across its fleet of
weapon systems.
Last month, Krieg established a pilot program that requires three next-generation weapon system
programs to consider energy efficiency as a key part of their designs, a significant step that could pave
the way for economic fuel consumption to play a prominent role in planning for future U.S. combat
capabilities.