Dear Editor,

Thank you for publishing the Op-Ed articles by Martin Witchger and earlier by Greg Schweizer in Student Life. It is good to see that the field of energy and the environment, and the research done by faculty, is creating a debate/discussion on campus amongst the students. It helps all of us get better educated on the challenging issues we face. Hopefully this debate, followed by a sound education, will help us tackle and solve some of these issues.

I will not get into a debate on “clean coal technology R&D” in this short note. This brief note is to point out some inaccurate facts about the Symposium on Global Energy Future that are being circulated­—that it was primarily only representing  clean coal technologies (quote: …clean energy alternatives were grossly underrepresented.) Not true at all!  I respectfully refer all interested to the Symposium website, http://mageep.wustl.edu/Symposium2010 and the program therein—http://mageep.wustl.edu/program2010. Please note that copies of the presentation are also posted on the site for all to review. 

As pointed out by Martin in his Op-Ed piece, there were 4 sessions on coal and a keynote discussion on the future of fossil fuels. For every session on coal on Monday there were 2 others, in parallel, not related to coal—e.g. on solar energy, bioenergy, venture capital for renewable energy, green buildings, etc. On Friday, Saturday and Sunday, there were keynote presentations which were broad and covered solar energy, nuclear energy and climate change issues.   In addition to Greg Boyce and Joe Strakey, who spoke at the Symposium on Global Energy Future, I wish students availed themselves of the opportunity to listen to Kristina Johnson, Richard Meserve, Gary Calabrese (yes, VP of a company that touted a solar energy product), John Holdren and several presidents from our partner universities who attended and spoke about the challenges faced by their regions, and how their respective universities were stepping up to the challenge. We were glad to have a networked group of 800 or so students interact with each other, remotely with a low carbon footprint, (MAGEEP network: http://mageepdocnetwork.ning.com/), and the innovative solutions for “campus clean energy” that were presented at this Symposium. Many of these students were from WUSTL, and we thank them for participating. The Symposium on Global Energy Future was indeed broad and had excellent coverage of all possible energy issues. I would also encourage the students to read the Preliminary Report on the Global Energy Future that was released during the meeting (a final report will be posted later).

The Symposium on Global Energy Future was indeed balanced! I encourage students who are interested in the subject matter to participate actively and attend these meetings. Working collaboratively with students, staff and faculty­—both here at Washington University and from our partner Universities—we will make a difference! 

Pratim Biswas
The Stifel and Quinette Jens Professor
Chair, Department of Energy, Environmental and Chemical Engineering
Director, MAGEEP