Gore Sets 10-Year Clean Energy Goal

Former VP Challenges Next President To Produce All Electricity Through Earth-Friendly Sources

(CBS/ AP)  Just as John F. Kennedy set his sights on the moon, Al Gore is challenging the nation to produce every kilowatt of electricity through wind, sun and other Earth-friendly energy sources within 10 years, an audacious goal he hopes the next president will embrace.

The Nobel Prize-winning former vice president said fellow Democrat Barack Obama and Republican rival John McCain are "way ahead" of most politicians in the fight against global climate change.

Rising fuel costs, climate change and the national security threats posed by U.S. dependence on foreign oil are conspiring to create "a new political environment" that Gore said will sustain bold and expensive steps to wean the nation off fossil fuels.

"We've got to end our dependence on oil and coal," Gore told CBS Evening News Anchor Katie Couric. "They're rising rapidly in price. That's why gasoline prices are going up, and that's why electricity rates are going up. But the new demand for oil and coal from China and these other fast-growing countries means that only way we're going to escape the rising prices, and the dependence on foreign sources is by switching to renewable sources."

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To watch Couric's full interview with Gore, click here

For a complete transcript of Couric's interview with Gore, click here

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In his speech, Gore said some of the nation's biggest success stories have come from making commitments to goals well beyond the next election, citing the Marshall plan for rebuilding Europe, Social Security and the interstate highway system, in addition to putting a man on the moon.

"A political promise to do something 40 years from now is universally ignored because everyone knows that's meaningless," he said. "Ten years is about the maximum time that we as a nation can hold a steady aim and hit the target."

He said it also coincides with experts' predictions that unless dramatic changes to reduce global warming pollution are made within the next decade, "our ability to ever recover from this environmental crisis" may be lost.

This afternoon, both Obama and Mccain accepted Gore's challenge, reports CBS News correspondent Nancy Cordes. As Mccain put it, "If the vice president says it's doable, I believe it's doable."

Gore said the single most important policy change would be placing a carbon tax on burning oil and coal.

The Alliance for Climate Protection, a bipartisan group he leads, estimates the cost of transforming the U.S. to clean electricity sources at $1.5 trillion to $3 trillion over 30 years in public and private money. But he says it would cost about as much to build greenhouse gas-polluting coal plants to satisfy current demand.

"This is an investment that will pay itself back many times over," Gore said. "It's an expensive investment but not compared to the rising cost of continuing to invest in fossil fuels."

Called an alarmist by conservatives, Gore has made global warming his signature issue. He portrayed Thursday's speech as the latest and most important phase in his effort to build public opinion in favor of alternative fuels.

Gore knows politicians fear action unless voters are willing to sacrifice - and demand new fuels.

"I hope to contribute to a new political environment in this country that will allow the next president to do what I think the next president is going to think is the right thing to do," Gore said. "But the people have to play a part." He compared his challenge to Kennedy's pledge in May 1961 to land a man on the moon by the end of the decade.

Gore narrowly lost the presidential race in 2000 to then-Texas Gov. George W. Bush after a campaign in which his prescient views on climate change took a back seat to other issues. In the 2008 presidential race, both the Republican and Democrat candidates support action to curb the gases blamed for global warming.

While dismissing a suggestion that he pulled his punches eight years ago, Gore said his goal now is to "enlarge the political space" within which politicians can "deal with the climate challenge."

To meet his 10-year goal, Gore said nuclear energy output would continue at current levels while the U.S. dramatically increases its use of solar, wind, geothermal and clean coal energy. Huge investments must also be made in technologies that reduce energy waste and link existing power grids, he said.

Gore's proposal would represent a significant shift in where the U.S. gets its power. In 2005, the United States produced nearly 3.7 billion kilowatt hours of electricity, with coal providing slightly more than half of that energy, according to government statistics. Nuclear power accounted for 21 percent, natural gas 15 percent and renewable sources, including wind and solar, about 8.6 percent.

Coal's share of electricity generation is only expected to grow come 2030, according to Energy Department forecasts, while renewable energy would still only provide 11 percent of the nation's power.

Without action, the cost of oil will continue to rise as fast-growing China and India increase demand, Gore said. Sustained addiction to oil also will place the U.S. at the mercy of oil-producing governments, he said, and the globe would suffer irreparable harm.

"One of the reasons why our country's had such a hard time dealing with this, is it does involve national security, energy, the economy and the environment," Gore told Couric. "But there's a common thread that runs through all of them. The key is ending our dependence on carbon-based fuels. And if we grab hold of that thread and pull it, the other problems begin to unravel, and we got the answer right in our hands. It's the the switch over from carbon-based fuel to renewable energy."

Government experts recently predicted that, at the current rate and without an international treaty to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, world energy demand will grow 50 percent over the next two decades. The Energy Information Administration also said in its long-range forecast to 2030 that the world is not close to abandoning fossil fuels despite their role in global warming.

While electricity production is only part of the nation's energy and climate change problem, Gore said, "If we meet this challenge we will solve the rest of it."

[bobmarisol]

''Gore Sets 10-Year Clean Energy Goal: Former VP Challenges Next President To Produce All Electricity Through Earth-Friendly Sources''

-------

Funny how Gore always sounds the alarms and then asks other people to do something about it.

Meanwhile, he is flying around in his personal jet burning over 10,000 gallons of fuel for every flight.

[guad07rg]

Hey Al when you start using as much electricity in your
own home,as the average millionaire and stop using your high carbon footprint
private plane for all your trips, come talk to us
dirtbag

[libo_nazi]

23.5 x ACU (Average Citizen Use) of electricity at his main estate, AND HE''S STILL LECTURING PEOPLE ABOUT ENERGY????

LOL.. Al, you absolutely define your party, and then some!

[oneamerican-]

Al Gore peddaling "carbon credits" as a solution to pollution, is the equivalent of a scammer trying to sell the Brooklyn Bridge.

[badgersouth1]

The USA has had a government of Big Oil, by big Oil, and for Big Oil during the past eight years. Power to the people! Change is on the way!

[bobmarisol]

Does anybody actually like Al Gore? Does anybody actually believe that his rantings on global warming are motivated by anything other than his own need to be in the spotlight?

Seriously, if this guy was so concerned about the environment there is no way he would burn 10,000+ gallons of fuel every other day on his personal jet flights. No way he would live in a mansion that uses 23X the electricity used by the average American household.

[i_am_emac]

typical liberal, he has to tell us how to live but refuses to live under the same standard. Has made millions of his phony animated slide show filled with false information and propaganda (Polar bears dont drown).
Little know fact,in the late 70''s he was preaching about global cooling and the oncoming ice age.

[bobmarisol]

The USA has had a government of Big Oil, by big Oil, and for Big Oil during the past eight years. Power to the people! Change is on the way!

Posted by badgersouth

---------

The only thing Obama needs to change is his diapers. The guy is so inexperienced and unknowledgeable about foreign policy that he thinks he can manage the military without ever visiting the battlefield.

He has never been to Afghanistan. He has only been to Iraq once and that was nearly three years ago. Yet he wants to be Commander in Chief. What a great ''change'' that would be.

His plan to abandon Iraq would only change our emerging success against Al Queda into complete and total defeat.

[galileo1234]

The sun transmits to us 10,000 times the amount of energy being consumed in all forms. If we harness a fraction of the output that''s available in geo orbit, as is the plan in a Satellite Solar Power program (SSP), it will be the largest solution to permanent clean energy. The sunsat was invented by Peter Glaser in the United States in 1968. SSP will use lunar materials for construction, and the program is seen as the industrial reason to settle cis-lunar space. The infrastructure will make use of asteroid materials as well. The sun will last another 4 billion years. The National Security Space Office of the Pentagon now leads R&D, though the program will not be "owned" by DOD. I suggest read up on NSSO''s report: "Space Based Solar Power as an Opportunity for Strategic Security", released 10/10/07. SSP is approaching a business case but still needs cheap launch technologies to get people, tools, and electronics off the ground. Lunar launch is achieved by electromagnetic devices called Mass Drivers. The next President can make the galvanizing call, in Apollo-like fashion, to get the program accomplished. Participation by interested businesses and nations is required. Over the course of a 50-year ramp up, SSP will replace fossil fuels as our primary energy source. Oil can be used for other manufacturing. By using materials already at the top of earth''s gravity well, SSP will come to undersell coal and nuclear fission. The solar system is our home. The battle cry going forward? "DRILL UP!"

[perceptions5]

********* Breaking News **************

Oil prices dropped more than $4, adding to a decline of more than 10% from last week''s record high on worries about declining U.S. demand and easing political tensions between Iran and the West.

Oil''s slide marks the biggest three-day loss in the market in percentage terms since December 2004.

.......................NOW THIS DO NOTHING DEMOCRAT CONGRESS needs to send another message like the one that President Bush sent the other day.

OPEN 100 % of America''s offshore to development and production of oil.

WE THE PEOPLE "HAVE" to vote against ALL DEMOCRATS on November 4th 2008.

THEY are 100% responsible for the suffering of millions of Americans because they took the money from their pals, the Environmentalists...............................For DECADES......

[occams_taser]

I love how the Bushbots are concerned that Gore doesn''t live by his own standards but when it comes to skipping out on Vietnam and other wars they supported, Bushbots love chickenhawks who didn''t live by their own standards...

[bobmarisol]

NOW THIS DO NOTHING DEMOCRAT CONGRESS...

Posted by perceptions5

--------

While most of your comment was right on, I have to disagree with this statement. The Democrat Congress has accomplished one feat - they have set a record for the lowest approval rating ever!

Their approval rating is now in the single digits - less than 10% of Americans believe the Democrat controlled Congress is doing a ''satisfactory'' job.

[libo_nazi]

The USA has had a government of Big Oil, by big Oil, and for Big Oil during the past eight years. Power to the people! Change is on the way!

Posted by badgersouth1 at 02:21 PM : Jul 17, 2008

You''re leaving out the fact that Al Gore isn''t a "people". He''s a Demobot, with major holdings in major corporations, that the people could never even dream of holding in their lifetimes.

Good luck expecting the Dems to change anything except pounding your modest salary into the ground.

[i_am_emac]

get the other side of the story,
read "the politically incorrect guide to global warming" exposes the hype and falsehoods.

[drinuk]

Gore''s Inconvenient Untruth is costing ordinary folks dearly, he has played into the hands of the speculators who in turn are having all their birthdays rolled up into one big pay day. The whole business of Global Warming is a SWINDLE, it is a complete Scam making him and his buddies very, very rich.

The guy should be strung up from the nearest tree.

[cfin5]

This guy needs to go home and live the life he makes good money "TALKING" about for a few years before lecturing to me in the error of my ways...Enviropreacher = Faithhealer

[libo_nazi]

get the other side of the story,
read "the politically incorrect guide to global warming" exposes the hype and falsehoods.

Posted by i_am_emac at 02:44 PM : Jul 17, 2008

More work...less special K.

[jimmyc1955]

occams_taser - Besides the fact that you statement is both incorrect and off topic it was pointless - so thank you for sharing.

None of the posters is starting up a "carbon trading" company that is in line to make huge profits from the "carbon trading" method Al Gore promotes as a way to control global warming. So has he nags, and whines in his usual superior tone instructing the "less gifted then himself" he is planning on making a fortune on the scheme he is promoting.

So for creating a tsunami of fear, ignoring his own rules and living like Royality in private jets and mass consumption of carbon fuels while lecturing everybody else to cut back and conserve he recieves a Noble prize and the adulation of millions of frightened people.

Nice job if you can get it but excuse me if I choose to think this through for myself rather than anoint Al as the next emperor of the world.

[ricfly52]

How can Gore set any public goals. He isn''t anything. He is not a Governor, nor a Senator, nor a Representative. He is a nothing but an unscientific blow hard, ripping people off by the millions every day! LOL

[wardoglrs]

Here is a product that works very well and leaves no emissions. I use this all the time and I''m impressed with it.

www.e3fuels.com

[edward1975-2009]

drinuk: There is no denying that something is happening in the enviorment. All major glacier fields are in retreat, an 1100 sq mile ice field in Antartica has collapsed, and if Greenland continues to lose the ice that they are, they posess 10% of the Earths ice, the sea will rise 20, which in itself will displace over 600 million people.

[libo_nazi]

drinuk: There is no denying that something is happening in the enviorment. All major glacier fields are in retreat, an 1100 sq mile ice field in Antartica has collapsed, and if Greenland continues to lose the ice that they are, they posess 10% of the Earths ice, the sea will rise 20, which in itself will displace over 600 million people.

Posted by Edward1975 at 02:53 PM : Jul 17, 2008

No one here is arguing with the thermometer.

"Global Warming" is not caused by humans, George Bush(also human), cow pies, pig farts, your wife''s huge rear, Al Gore''s wasteful carbon footprint, Nancy Pelosi''s putrid breath, Harry Ried''s scowl, or Ted Kennedy''s tooma. This is what makes AlGore a complete and total fake, and scam artist!

[three-o-six]

Sure Gore can do all of this -- afte all he invented the internet.

[jimmyc1955]

And for those convinced of the Artic thaw I offer this link showing satellite coverage of sea ice from July 2, 1998 and July 2 2008 - notice that there is more ice farther south now than 20 years ago?

Antartic ice is in face increasing. ONly on the small penisula is it melting.

http://climate-skeptic.typepad.com/photos/uncategorized/2008/07/03/deetmp7873arrow.jpg

I just love pictures and fact.

Did you know that the globe cooled by more than 1/2 Degree C last year?

Funny - actual measurements find no evidence of the warming, but computer models keep telling us it is. Seas are not rising, ice is not shrinking but small isolated cases continue to be presented as proof of the whole.

Al Gore is selling you a scam he wants to get rich and famous on.

[edward1975-2009]

The point I was trying to convey is simple. Whether you wish to call it global warming or say it is just a cycle of the Earth, you cannot deny something is happening. And with man dunping pollutants into their enviorment, is speeding that process along. You cannot dump these things into that which you live in and not have ill effects.

[drinuk]

Edward, get real, the planet has been changing for millions of years and nothing we do will change anything. We simply adapt WHEN it happens not spend billions in case it occurs in a particular way, of which we have no idea as yet.

Gore is a Flim Flam man, a Scam Artist.

[txgrouch2006]

Al Gore is a joke. Now he''s making a speech that should have started with "I''m not a President, but I''m pretending to be for this speech..."

[libh8er]

Yawn

[redbds]

I do agree with Gore that we need to develope more and better renewable energy sources. But, he is still trying to sell that global warming arguement. It just isn''t based on fact. Even that shot of the glacier falling onto the ocean in his film was computer generated. An Inconvienient Truth was actually a Computer Generated Lie. He needs to stay in the public eye because he was robbed of his rightful place in the white house. WAAAAAA!

[gwagener]

Certainly, we will have to transition off fossil fuels because at most, we might have 200 years or so and people will be here for billions of years (get your mind around that, not thousands, not millions, BILLIONS). Ten years is probably not practical, but sooner than when we start to run out.

[jimfinster]

The many ignorant comments here help explain why we still do not have a meaningful energy policy.

Whether or not you like Gore, his proposal makes sense.

[redbds]

Certainly, we will have to transition off fossil fuels because at most, we might have 200 years or so and people will be here for billions of years (get your mind around that, not thousands, not millions, BILLIONS). Ten years is probably not practical, but sooner than when we start to run out.

Posted by gwagener at 03:19 PM : Jul 17, 2008

No species can survive for billions of years. I like your optomism, but I am afraid that the earth''s ability to sustain life (or at least human life) will be depleted within a thousand years.

[drinuk]

The most important fact concerning the Al Gore fairy story is that, there is NO computer model on earth capable of predicting so-called global warming or the effects should it be so. That is a simple fact and that any predictions stated are from scientists funded to say so. The theory is absolutely unproven and speculation for financial gain.

I repeat NO Computer Model capable of predicting the theory.

[libo_nazi]

Whether or not you like Gore, his proposal makes sense.

Posted by jimfinster at 03:22 PM : Jul 17, 2008

No problem...let him lead the way! LOLOLOLOL!!!! Not gonna happen.

[medmom04]

I love this man. he looks at the evidence, the empirical evidence, and deduces. and there''s not a scientist in the world who disagrees with him. if you''re smart, you will start giving a rat''s about your world.

[medmom04]

I repeat NO Computer Model capable of predicting the theory.
******
don''t need any computer. all projections were tossed out the window when they realized that they had underprojected, and that the effects of carbon dioxide were much farther along than they had estimated.

[jimfinster]

Whether or not you like Gore, his proposal makes sense.

Posted by jimfinster at 03:22 PM : Jul 17, 2008

No problem...let him lead the way! LOLOLOLOL!!!! Not gonna happen.

Posted by libo_nazi



A prime example of an ignorant comment.

[jimfinster]

I repeat NO Computer Model capable of predicting the theory.

Posted by drinuk



Really? So you are a computer model expert?

[libo_nazi]

Whether or not you like Gore, his proposal makes sense.

Posted by jimfinster at 03:22 PM : Jul 17, 2008

A prime example of an ignorant comment.

Posted by jimfinster at 03:27 PM : Jul 17, 2008

My thoughts exactly!

[redbds]

don''''t need any computer. all projections were tossed out the window when they realized that they had underprojected, and that the effects of carbon dioxide were much farther along than they had estimated.

Posted by medmom04 at 03:26 PM : Jul 17, 2008

It is not the carbon dioxide at all. Global warming will cause mass thawing in Siberia that will release massive amounts of natural methane into the atmosphere making it uninhabital.

[medmom04]

this is no theory. do your research. sheesh even the extreme weather patterns are linked! basic geography 101. the northern ice cap has broken up. what do you think reflects the sun''s rays and keeps us cool here? it isn''t anything manmade!!

[newview08]

How can anybody say there''s a noticable change in the environment? What arrogance to think that with the millions of interconnected natural processes, that we''ve got it all figured out to a point where any person can make that kind of a statement? Glaciers have melted and expanded countless times, we''ve been hit by life ending objects from space, the magnetic poles have shifted, and solar radiation constantly changes in unpredictable ways. In the immense universe, we''re practically undetectable as living organisms, an accident really. It''s taken us over a century of hard work to achieve the standard of living we enjoy now, and this quack thinks he can change the entire foundation of that in ten years? Keep dreaming, it''s utterly absurd. These wingnuts keep using half-truths and a selective sprinkling of scientific fact to keep people fearful and endentured to them, it''s a racket. I for one am tired of hearing this garbage at a time when we should be focused on our economy and the lives of our military people overseas. And no, I''m not a Republican and I will never vote for one. Well, maybe Theodore Roosevelt.

[redbds]

I meant to say uninhabitable. I wish they would put a spell check on this thing.

[medmom04]

regarding carbon dioxide: can''t exclude this my friend. the evidence is in the ice cores, and just about everywhere else....

[libo_nazi]

It is not the carbon dioxide at all. Global warming will cause mass thawing in Siberia that will release massive amounts of natural methane into the atmosphere making it uninhabital.

Posted by redbds at 03:31 PM : Jul 17, 2008

LOL...! Talk about fear mongering.

[drinuk]

jimfinster, I just told you dimwit, no one as yet has developed a model powerful enough to make an accurate prediction. One maybe available during the next two years.

[cathaleen]

Will somebody please get this man a real job. He always seems to pop up with some rediculous unproven theory.

[medmom04]

this is no longer theory. the point of science is to prove or disprove to eliminate ''theory status''. we''re past this, and may all of our gods bless education, eh????????????

[ubrew12]

Carbon trading is a good idea. It needs international support, however, to really take off. That way a reasonable option to burning coal/oil is just to plant more trees.

I don''t understand the ire Gore raises in America. Fortunately, the rest of the world thinks he''s the best.

[libo_nazi]

And no, I''''m not a Republican and I will never vote for one. Well, maybe Theodore Roosevelt.

Posted by newview08 at 03:31 PM : Jul 17, 2008

Wow, so all we have to do is dig him up and put him in the 2012 primary, and you''ll vote republican? LOL!!! So Obama has less power of persuasion than a corpse?