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Editor, News-Register:
The current spike in gasoline prices should serve as a reminder of the stranglehold oil markets have on our economy. This is not a simple problem that can be solved quickly, it's farcical when people suggest we just "stop using oil." Energy availability is critical to every economic concern from industrial production to air conditioning to travel.
Why then the strange political opposition to developing every reasonable source of alternative energy that we can think of?
Energy sources other than hydrocarbon fuels will be the future, we can be the leading edge of that future. This is about the pursuit of serious engineering solutions to serious problems.
It is not the fantasy that there will be some perfect energy source. For example, wind power obviously won't work everywhere.
But Denmark happens to have good weather for it and generates over a third of its power from wind. Solar power obviously is more worth discussion in Arizona than in Seattle.
It is not the case that we need to pick one thing. Instead we should be pursuing every viable energy source, because we need all the energy we can generate.
Joshua Phillips
McMechen