Donald Trump’s unjustified war on Iran and the resulting global fuel crisis is a continuing reminder that true energy security and independence will continue to elude us so long as we remain dependent on fossil fuels.
Whether it’s wars over oil and gas resource access or attacks on fossil fuel power plants and energy grids, this reliance on finite resources only worsens a country’s threat profile. News this month of Russia’s deadly attacks on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure, Russian drones swarming Ukrainian power stations, and Kyiv running out of time to prepare for another winter of attacks on its energy grid illustrates this urgency.
No country will be energy-secure or independent as long as its fuel supply remains finite and fossilized and its power plants and energy grids centralized and fossil fuel-dependent. Those are sitting ducks, targets very vulnerable to attack by adversaries.
There is another way to bolster energy security and independence: decarbonized and decentralized energy. Using local, renewable resources to power, heat and cool a community, with battery storage for backup, provides immediate relief from being precariously power plant-dependent or grid-dependent.
That’s what Ukrainian communities are increasingly doing in response to Russian attacks on their fossil-fueled power plants and energy grids. In direct response to Russia’s war, municipalities all across Ukraine are making the switch fast.
With the Iran war accelerating the transition to renewable energy, the gains from energy transition are obvious: countries like Spain are rapidly transitioning to renewables – better insulating themselves from gas price shocks and better protecting themselves from future grid-wide blackouts.
In this global rush to get off fossil fuels, however, we can’t leave those on the frontlines behind. With no end in sight for Russian aggression, more Ukrainian power plants and energy grids will be bombed, leaving more without power, heat and water. Many Ukrainians who were fortunate enough to have heat this past winter had already made the switch to solar power, heat pumps and battery storage backup, thanks to the help of local non-profit organizations like EcoAction and Ecoclub, and donors abroad.
Efforts like the Hromada Project, which is named after the Ukrainian term for “community”, will be essential in helping Ukrainians weather the war by connecting local nongovernmental organizations in Ukraine to public- and private-sector support from around the world.
That’s exactly what our government should be doing: helping communities around the world be more energy secure and independent, sourcing their power locally with renewables, storing energy in batteries for backup, and electrifying everything to make the transition seamless. That’s certainly what is happening in China, which has dominated the global wind, solar, battery and electric vehicle markets as a result.
Instead, Trump and his Republican followers seek to keep the US addicted to fossilized thinking. Weaponizing the Department of Defense to stall onshore wind development, repealing tax incentives for renewable energy development and using taxpayer dollars to bribe clean energy developers to abandon projects endangers our ability to adopt secure, affordable and clean energy technologies now. Forcing Americans to remain dependent on ageing fossil fuel infrastructure exposes us to increasing residential electricity rates and riskier grid conditions.
Before another war is waged, and American defense budgets doubled, now is the time to double down on what will make us truly secure and independent. Transitioning off the fuels that start wars, and transitioning on to the energies that are decentralized, infinite and available in every community and country on this planet: that’s what real freedom looks like – and it’s all within our grasp.
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The US representative Lloyd Doggett serves Texas’s 37th district in the House of Representatives and is a member of the Ukraine caucus and the House sustainable energy and environment coalition. Michael Shank PhD is adjunct faculty at New York University’s Center for Global Affairs, and at George Mason University’s Carter School for Peace and Conflict Resolution
