Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
the experiences of Denis Hayes at the DOE's Solar Energy Research Insti-
tute (SERI). A jack-of-all-trades within the environmental movement,
Hayes had been a key organizer of Senator Gaylord Nelson's 1970 Earth
Day initiative. In 1977, a strange twist of circumstances brought Hayes into
the orbit of the Carter administration. That year, Hayes published a book
on renewable energy called
Rays of Hope: The Transition to a Post-Petroleum
Wo r l d
. It was well received, and while promoting the topic Hayes met
briefly with Saudi Arabia's powerful oil minister, Zaki Yamani, to whom
he gave a signed copy. Hayes did not give the gift a second thought. A short
while later, however, Jimmy Carter's Republican secretary of energy James
Schlesinger found himself in a waiting room outside Yamani's office in a
plush Saudi palace. There on the table was Hayes's
Rays of Hope
, the only
reading material in English. A bored Schlesinger picked it up and read
enough of it for Hayes's name to stick with him.
5
With boosters of nuclear
energy at the head of the DOE nuclear program and men passionate about
coal leading the fossil fuels program, Schlesinger was intent on putting
someone passionate about renewables at the head of the DOE renewables
program. When SERI needed a new director shortly after opening its doors
in 1977, Schlesinger called Hayes.
6
Hayes showed up to SERI ready to put renewables on the national
energy map. As one of the his first tasks, he put together a study to deter-
mine how energy conservation and renewable energy production might
affect the nation's overall energy use. Authored in large part by Hayes's
assistant director, Henry Kelly, the study concluded that by the year
2000, an aggressive renewable energy policy could account for more than
a quarter of the total energy production in the United States, and that the
Carter administration should commit to a goal of producing 20 percent of
all U.S. energy through sources like solar, wind, and geothermal power.
7
In short, SERI showed the DOE that renewables were a feasible option for
the future.
The institute delivered the report— known to its authors as the Solar
Conservation Report or the Sawhill/SERI report (named for Deputy Sec-
retary of Energy John Sawhill)— to the DOE in November of 1980. Novem-
ber, however, was not an ideal time to deliver the report. In the wake of the
1980 election, the DOE tabled the study, and its conclusions were at least
temporarily forgotten.
8
To Hayes, the election at first looked like little more than a bump in
