Nov 4 - McClatchy-Tribune Regional News - Bruce Henderson The Charlotte Observer, N.C.


Like a chipper emergency-room doctor, New York Times foreign affairs columnist Thomas Friedman delivers the grimmest news with a dose of can-do spirit.

Climate change will increasingly fever the planet, the three-time Pulitzer Prize winner says. Freedom in petroleum-producing nations will suffer as oil prices rise. Species worldwide will continue to die off at alarming rates as human populations -- and middle-class expectations -- soar.

But the author of "Hot, Flat and Crowded" filled Davidson College's 600-seat Duke Family Performance Hall on Tuesday in part because he remains an optimistic opinion-maker.

A Green Revolution that produces clean, cheap, reliable energy, Friedman says, could solve most of the globe's biggest challenges. By leading that charge, he says, the United States could reclaim its dominance in innovation, education and other measures.

Energy technology, he predicted, will transform the planet as the explosion of information technology did over the past 20 years.

"I think we can get our groove back by taking on the planet's problems," he said. "I believe that country has to be the United States of America. If it's not, the United States' chances of passing on our standard of living is zero."

U.S. energy innovation is far from dead, Friedman said. But government policies have failed to harness it, and other countries are taking the lead. The globe's problems, he said, will be solved by innovators, not politicians.

His Davidson appearance resulted from book-research "tutoring" by one of those entrepreneurs, Larry Kellerman, president of Charlotte-based Cogentrix Energy, an independent power producer.

The buzz now over hybrid vehicles and solar panels pales compared to the energy "revolution" Friedman envisions. Fundamental change will have occurred, he said, when "green" no longer refers to sustainable energy because it's so embedded in the nation's culture.

That change will occur, he said, when government policies and incentives stimulate clean-energy investment and prices fall as technology is widely adopted.

"Change your leaders," he said, "not your light bulbs."

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