Big Steps for Energy Independence

There’s no question that Ventura County government needs to take steps to improve its readiness for rolling blackouts as well as other emergencies such as earthquakes.

What the Board of Supervisors needs to decide this week is whether those steps should be baby steps--merely replacing old, worn-out generators with new and bigger ones--or giant steps toward eventual energy independence.

We are glad to see this discussion taking place, with Supervisors Steve Bennett and Frank Schillo in particular pressing county staff to take a significantly bigger-picture view than usual. It’s a discussion that should also be taking place in all 10 of the county’s city halls, and in many other institutions and businesses.

The opportunity presented by the current energy crisis recalls a vision expressed during a speech in Ventura a few years back by Amory Lovins, a Harvard- and Oxford-trained physicist, MacArthur Fellow, author of two dozen books, co-director of Colorado’s prestigious Rocky Mountain Institute research center and energy policy advisor to several heads of state.

Lovins described the rapid improvement in small-scale electricity-generating technology and predicted a future in which more and more homes and businesses would produce most or all of their own power, sharing their excess with the grid. In his scenario, the proliferation of these small systems would not only keep up with growing demand for electricity, but eventually allow large, polluting power plants to be retired one by one.

Clearly, that day has not yet arrived--and nothing that the Ventura County Board of Supervisors decides this week is going to change that. But the current crisis has installers of solar panels working overtime and some ideas that once seemed farfetched suddenly merit a closer look.

We like the proposal put forth by Schillo that gas already being produced (and wastefully burned off) at the Toland Road landfill be used to generate power for the Government Center. Many details would need to be studied before such a plan could work, but this is the kind of forward-looking creativity that the county should be encouraging.

Likewise, the turbine-generator concept previously introduced by Bennett might well not provide the sort of instant backup the county feels it needs, but it could be a significant piece in a larger strategy to ultimately wean county government operations from reliance on the grid.

Leadership is displayed in many ways. Taking immediate steps to keep the lights on in the County Government Center this summer is important. So is demonstrating that consumers are not captive to whatever deal is worked out between Sacramento and electricity producers.

We encourage the board to stretch its stride in this case. It will take years to achieve energy independence, to feed into rather than draw from the grid, to collect rather than pay the electricity bill. But it is a goal worth pursuing--and it is a goal that will never be reached with nothing but baby steps.