Energy Secretary Chu says U.S. lags on developing clean-energy technology

Energy Secretary Chu says U.S. lags on developing clean-energy technology

By John Ingold
The Denver Post
Posted: 02/20/2010 01:00:00 AM MST
Updated: 02/20/2010 01:48:42 AM MST

AURORA — Energy Secretary Steven Chu said Friday that the United States is in danger of falling irreversibly behind other countries in the race to develop clean-energy technologies and must act quickly to avoid that fate.

In a speech at the Colorado Energy Jobs Summit on the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, Chu ticked off a series of areas where he said the country has fallen behind other nations: vehicle fuel efficiency, electricity transmission efficiency, battery technology and nuclear power.

China, he said, is investing more than $100 billion a year in new energy technologies, far outpacing the U.S.

Failure to match other countries' efforts in clean-energy development could mean the U.S. will swap a dependence on foreign oil for a dependence on foreign technology, he said.

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